RECIPE | PEANUT BUTTER BLONDIES

Blondies AKA the sexier sibling of the classic brownie are a fudgy love affair waiting to happen

Blondies are ridiculously moreish without the hit of being too rich. It's almost impossible to make them without eating half the batter before you've put them in the tray... let alone devouring them molten hot out the oven.

Peanut Butter Blondies

As with any baking... to take it to a whole new level just add peanut butter!

Ingredients:

220g Plain Flour

1 1/2tsp Baking Powder

180g Butter

300g Peanut Butter

250g Light Brown Sugar

2 Eggs

1 1/2tsp Vanilla Essence

75g Chopped Nuts

200g White Chocolate

Instructions:

1.  Preheat your oven to 180°C and grease and line a baking tin with baking paper.

2. Cream the butter and the sugar for 2-3 minutes with an electric whisk until fluffy and light in colour.

3. Add the peanut butter, eggs and the vanilla essence to the mixture and mix.

4. Fold in the flour and baking powder and combine until the mixture forms a batter.

5. Chop the white chocolate into small chunks and fold into the batter along with the chopped nuts.

6. Pour the batter into the baking tin and spread evenly.

7.  Place in the centre shelf of your oven and bake for 35 minutes or until firm in the middle.

RECIPE | PEANUT BUTTER AND BANANA MUFFINS

This is the recipe we used at Inkwell on Friday. This makes around 12 medium-large muffins.

My recipe is adapted from Rachel Allen's recipe which can be found HERE.

Ingredients:

250g Plain Flour

75g Rolled Oats

1tbsp Baking Powder

30g of Mixed Seeds

2 Eggs

1tsp Vanilla Essence

75g Light Brown Sugar

2 Bananas (Ripe)

100g Crunchy Peanut Butter

50g Butter (Melted)

250ml Milk

Instructions:

1.  Preheat your oven to 190ºC and fill a muffin tray with 12 muffin cases (or alternatively you could use fairy cake cases and make 24 little muffins).

2.  Sieve the flour into a large mixing bowl and add the baking powder, rolled oats and mixed seeds.

3.  In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and sugar together until fluffy and mousse-like. Add the vanilla essence, 2 bananas (make sure they are mashed well), peanut butter, melted butter. Add the milk last.

4.  Fold the wet mixture into the dry mixture - be careful not to over-mix.

5.  Spoon the mixture into the muffin cases. You can sprinkle over some extra oats and seeds at this point (I forgot to do this!).

6. Place the muffins in middle shelf of the oven for 20-25 minutes (or until the top of the muffins spring back when you touch them).

7.  Leave to cool for 20 minutes and dust with icing sugar for a pretty finish!

We also made some smaller muffins in cupcake cases and topped with Cinnamon Buttercream Frosting and Grated Chocolate.

LIFESTYLE | MORE BAKING AT INKWELL...

I had another afternoon of fun and baking at Inkwell last Friday, this time with my baking buddy David! We bake on the Friday afternoon so that there are cakes to sell in the Cafe the next day. Last week's cakes were a MAJOR success so I was asked back to bake this week!

To learn more about Inkwell visit my previous post HERE.

We made some nut and seed flapjacks...

Some peanut butter and banana muffins...

...and some smaller versions with cinnamon buttercream frosting.

(This was our first attempt at using a piping bag - please forgive us!).

Also in the kitchen was some delicious home made roasted red pepper soup...

...and some carrot and chickpea veggie burgers!

I love being able to experiment and get creative in the kitchen and it's great to know that we can do it for a good cause too. I'll be back again next week with some vegan cakes and a few more wonders.

Do you like my hat (and my flapjacks)?

RECIPE | "SPECIAL" ICE CREAM

Okay... so technically this isn't a recipe post. But I just had to share this.

For a good few years now "Special" Ice Cream has been in existence.

Thanks to the help of a special friend and an array of miraculous toppings it never fails to be a wonderfully different creation every single time.

Last night we created perhaps the best yet.

My two litre tub of Asda Smartprice Vanilla Ice Cream (a bargain 89p) was JAZZED up and dressed to the nines with a concoction of peanut butter, marshmallow fluff, cinnamon, banana, apple crumble granola, pecans, meringues, cookies and some puffed wheat.