Easter Nests

Yes, these are cute; yes, they are kitsch, but I love them all the same - Nigella Lawson

The verdict: How could you not love easter nests? Cute, so easy to make, and hello? chocolatey!

Unusual or substituted ingredients: I wasn't sure if I'd be able to buy shredded wheat here (it's such an English sounding ingredient!), but yes, in the cereal aisle, there it was. It comes in pillow like biscuits (about the size of weetbix) so it needs to be broken up, and that's about the hardest job of all in this recipe. That, and not eating the chocolate before you melt and mix it with the shredded wheat.

Oh, and stopping your husband from eating the bird's eggs (sugar coated solid chocolate eggs, not actual bird eggs!!) straight out of the bag.

Special utensils or cookware: None. This is a no-bake recipe - the most "baking" you have to do is melting the chocolate with a bit of butter in the microwave!

Repeatability: This is a very quick and easy thing to whip up at easter - if you are having people over for coffee or having a lot of kids (grandchildren, nephews and nieces, whatever) it is easy to make these. Nigella must make them big, as she got 5 nests out of the mix. I got 12. I don't think you want them too big, to be honest.

Sauciness: Well, you know how I feel about chocolate - it's always saucy! This is a simple recipe though that Nigella includes in her "children" chapter - it is definitely something that the kids could make with some help, and I'm pretty sure they'd make a big mess, but have fun doing it!

Overall pleasure level: I didn't mind these at all! 7 out of 10 for me! Happy Easter everyone!

Torta alla Gianduia

Welcome to our newest Mouthfuls of Heaven team member, Georgie! We're thrilled to have her helping us out, sharing the Nigella love!
Bells and RoseRed.


"Anything that has a whole jar of Nutella in it is already a winner in my book" - Rose Red




Or, if you're from the more working-class neck of the woods, Nutella Cake.


The verdict: A winner indeed. Despite some mistreatment in the form of my temperamental oven, this cake was moist but firm, rich and importantly, chocolatey. Definitely on my make-again list.



Unusual or substituted ingredients: I made the recipe to spec, including a 400g jar of chocolate-hazelnut spread, ground hazelnuts and quite a bit of dark chocolate. Double cream for the ganache topping. All readily available, but not often in my pantry.



Oh, and Frangelico liquer, both in the cake and the ganche topping. Nigella suggests substituing with rum or similar; easily done, depending on preference and availability, I think.


Special utensils or cookware: None. Baked in a springform tin.


Repeatability: Certainly. Go the whole hog with the toasted hazelnuts on top for a special occasion, or just the ganache, or even your regular choccy butter icing with a dash of liquer for everyday. It's a lovely dense, moist cake (being all nuts and no flour), so would keep rather well for several days.


I did break the cardinal rule here though: I didnt read the recipe all the way through. Cooking instructions are for 40 minutes at 180oC, "until the sides come away from the pan"; after that time, it was still very moist in the centre. Yes, the sides had come away, but it was pretty wet in there still. So I gave it another 15 minutes (with 5 minute-ly checks).



If I had kept reading, to the part where Nigella says " unmould the cooled carefully, leaving it on the base as it will be too difficult to get such a damp cake off in one piece." I may have twigged that the cake is supposed to be fairly moist.

Sauciness: Oh yes, very high. Not only are there good bowls to lick, plus an empty Nutella jar, this combine two of my favourites, chocolate and hazelnuts.

Overall pleasure level: Very good indeed. This was given an very solid 9 by those who partook. Bumped up to a 9.5 with double cream on the side. Yeah, baby!

Roxanne's Millionaire's Shortbread

Amazingly, Nigella doesn't give any kind of Nigella-esque quote for this recipe. Don't know why, because it is a very Nigella-esque recipe! - Rose Red

The verdict: You know, when I first saw this recipe I thought "oh, shortbread dipped in chocolate. Whoopee". Clearly I didn't read past the first sentence, because this recipe is actually what we in Australia usually call Chocolate Caramel Slice - much more descriptive of what it actually is. Although the idea of calling it Millionaire's shortbread is very apt - it is as rich as all get out! Unusual or substituted ingredients: Nothing unusual. Just sweet sweet sweet - condensed milk, golden syrup, chocolate. Plus flour, butter and sugar for the shortbread. And because milk chocolate could not be decadent enough, I used dark chocolate. But of course!
Special utensils or cookware: Nigella says this recipe introduced her to the concept of both melting chocolate in the microwave, and also making caramel in the microwave. Having never made caramel at all before, I can't comment on the relative benefits, but it was very quick and easy to use the microwave. Nigella cautions to regularly check and stir the caramel to avoid burning it, and I followed this advice to the letter. In fact, I quite possibly didn't cook the caramel enough (about 5 or 6 minutes I think), but it still worked out absolutely fine! Amazing actually, watching the condensed milk caramelise.

Repeatability: Oh, I would definitely make this again. For sure! It is darn hard to cut though. The chocolate on the top cracked and so it ended up being a bit messy. Perhaps if the chocolate was a bit thinner it would be easier. Also, I recommend cutting into small pieces - it really is very rich.

Sauciness: Oh yeah baby! Plenty of bowls to lick with this recipe! As well as the tin of condensed milk (am I the only one who can confess to eating condensed milk straight from the tin? Sometimes my mum would have a tin in the fridge with leftovers, and my brother and I would compete to eat it in secret, a teaspoonful at a time...heaven!)

And you really get your hands dirty making the shortbread - I thought I would never get all that butter rubbed into that flour. But I got there in the end.

Overall pleasure level: I know some people find this too rich (husby wouldn't even try a tiny piece) but for me, it was divine! 10 out of 10. Make it - you won't regret it! (and lest you think I ate it all by myself, I took most of it into work!)

Cream Cheese Brownies - challenge accepted!

umm, they worked for me... - Rose Red


I just had to cook them for twice the recommended time (40 minutes all up). I hope this doesn't mean I am an evil person...

Cream Cheese Brownies

What's not to like? - Nigella Lawson

The verdict:
There's nothing to like about this recipe, except for one thing. The way the recipe is written is intriguing.

Nigella writes, in the instructions on how to melt the chocolate and butter, that you can leave it on the stove without heat for a while before it's finished melting because it will continue to 'deliquesce' if left. Gee, thanks Nigella. You help me enhance my vocabulary, even when your recipes suck.

There will be no photos for this post. What you'll get is essentially a rant. If anyone else has made these with success, speak up! So far, my test audience of one (George) agrees with me. Nigella let us down on this one.

Unusual or substituted ingredients: Cream cheese. I thought it sounded weird to put cream cheese cubes in the mixture, but I must have liked the idea at least a little or I wouldn't have ventured down this track. Basically you cut up fridge cold cream cheese and plonk the cubes into the part-poured mixture, before covering it over with the remaining mixture. It's supposed to be like a chocolate cheesecake.

Special utensils or cookware: None.

Repeatability: Never. I was making these for an afternoon tea at George's house and I had to turn up empty handed because they failed abysmally. Why did they fail? First of all, she says to cook them for 20 minutes. The mixture has hardly warmed up in that time. Forty minutes later I really had to get them out of the oven so I could let them cool before I went out and they still weren't set.

I let them cool totally and inside, they were still runny. The cream cheese was the problem, I think. Nigella says to use 200g of cheese but once I'd put about 50g worth of cubes in the mixture, there was no room left so I think it was overcrowded and seriously impeded the cooking process.

Sauciness: Zero. I was just angry. We threw the lot out.

Overall pleasure level: I got no pleasure from this recipe at all! I felt like less of a failure though when George declared it hadn't worked for her either.

If anyone else wants to have a go to give this recipe a chance in perhaps more competent hands, go right ahead. If you don't have the book, I'll send you the recipe. Let's get a challenge happening!

Oh and the reason there are no photos is that I was in rather a rush and forgot to take any during the making of them. By the time they were supposedly done, I was so disgusted I wanted to remove all evidence of them.

These get a big fat zero out of ten from me. Nice idea, pity about the result.

Coca-Cola Cake

It's really just a divinely tender-crumbed chocolate cake - and there's nothing wrong with that. And however odd you might think it, everyone loves it when I make it - Nigella Lawson

And she's right! It really is just a very moist, delicious chocolate cake - if you didn't know it had coke in it, you would never pick it!

I've been wanting to make this cake ever since I got the book. This weekend gave me the perfect opportunity - dessert for dinner with my brother and his family (all great lovers of coke!). And even a glass of the black gold leftover to enjoy while the cake is baking!The verdict:
Unusual or substituted ingredients:
Well, for a start, a can of coke. Not an unusual item to have in your house, but (in Australia at least) unusual to put in a cake. American readers, is this a US tradition or just what we non-Americans might think is popular fare?? I did use Coke Zero though, only because I happened to have a can of that.Also, buttermilk. Nigella says if you don't have buttermilk, which I didn't, you can use low-fat milk and some yoghurt. Since I hate yoghurt, I don't usually have any of that in my fridge either. My mum is visiting for a few weeks and likes it, so she has some. But it's passionfruit yoghurt. I didn't think it would work too well with a chocolate cake that also has coke in it. So I used low-fat milk and a squeeze of lemon juice, which is another alternative to buttermilk.

Finally, golden caster sugar. I knew I should have bought some last week at the deli. Not to worry, just used normal caster sugar.

Special utensils or cookware:

None, except that as this is a very runny cake mixture, Nigella recommends lining the springform tin with foil. Which I did. Even though I was not entirely confident I would be able to get the foil off, or that the foil would even do the intended job.

But it did - hurrah! I would recommend gettting extra wide foil, so you only need one piece for the whole cake tin. Otherwise, the mix slips under the join in the foil. Not to worry, cook's treat!
Repeatability:
I would definitely make this cake again - very moist and chocolately. As usual though, Nigella's icing mix could be halved and you would probably still have leftover icing. She must spread it on soooo thick! Too sweet for me!

Sauciness:
Mmmm, this is one good cake. But not much left to lick out of the bowl, since it is so runny! But not to worry, lots of leftover icing!!

Overall pleasure level:
Oh very good - not really a novelty cake at all! I'll give this a 9 out of 10!

Chocolate Cheesecake

In theory, the cheesecake purist within me shudders at the idea of something so unorthodox - Nigella Lawson

The verdict
I don't consider myself a cheesecake purist so am unsure what is so wrong with the idea of a chocolate cheesecake. Feel free to enlighten me.

I made this to take to lunch with friends and their children and it went down a treat, unorthodoxy and all.


Unusual or Substituted Ingredients
Nigella says to make just a plain biscuit base for this cheesecake but I couldn't resist adding some baking cocoa to the biscuit mix before smooshing them down with the base of a glass. That's a trick I learned a while back. It's a good one.


Special Utensils or Cookware
You'll need a springform tin and a baking tray large enough to hold it. Once the cake is made, you put it in a bath, about 2-3cm up the side of the tin before cooking it for an hour.


It's worth noting that you're supposed to melt the chocolate and add it to the cheesecake mixture, stirring it through gently so you get a marbled effect.

Nope. Not in my house. I tried that. The chocolate, once it hit the cold mixture, sort of turned into flakes so no marbling occurred. I think next time I'd let the chocolate cool a lot more before I tried that.

Repeatability
Oh yes. This is a good one. Even though I would personally like a chooclate cheesecake that was richer (read: more chocolatey) the rich creaminess of this marvel is pretty bloody good. It's quite a wet cheesecake so it's kind of mousse-like in texture. I'l ddrag this one out for entertaining again and again, I imagine.

This is all that was left after four adults and two children (see below) polished it off.

Sauciness
I imagine if served with a greater concentration of chocolate, some chocolate dipped strawberries, appropriately placed whipped cream and you'd have one very saucy dessert on your hands.

Or, if you're a child, on your face. Meet Miranda and Sebastian. I think their faces say it all.





Bells

Pain-au-chocolat Pudding

It looks beautiful and tastes divine - Nigella Lawson

Just for Bells' birthday - a lovely wintery choccy custardy pud. Mmmm mmmmmmmm.
The verdict:

Unusual or substituted ingredients: This is really a bread and butter pudding. However, unlike your standard B&B pudding, this uses pain-au-chocolates (chocolate croissants) rather than bread and sultanas. As I was buying the ingredients late on a Saturday afternoon in a rush (as I was making it for dinner at friend's that evening) I couldn't actually find 4 pain-au-chocolat, so I bought 3 (from 2 different places) and a plain croissant as well.

Other than that, nothing particularly unusual. Unless, that is, you count half a litre of milk and half a litre of double cream as unusual. That's a litre of pretty creamy dairy in there!! Oh and 4 egg yolks and 1 whole egg. Oh my. I think it's going to be creamy custard! And since I have 4 egg whites left over, my next Nigella recipe will give you a very easy way to use them up.

Special utensils or cookware: None - just a big bowl to hold the creamy custard as you are making it, before you pour over the previously sliced p-au-c that you've put in a casserole dish. Repeatability: This is a very easy dessert - I would definitely make it again. Sauciness: Well, you know with a litre of creamy stuff, this is quite saucy. And once you cook it all together, the chocolate from the p-au-c oozes out into the custard and gives it a delicate, not overwhelming, chocolate taste. Overall pleasure level: As Nigella says: "I can't tell you how comforting this is". It is truly a comfort food. A point or two off for looks (because, really, Nigella - it might look "beautiful" straight out of the oven, but there is no way to serve this to make it look even remotely attractive!

So for me, an 8.

Chocolate-Cherry Cupcakes

I love their dark, glossy elegance - Nigella Lawson

I needed chocolate on the weekend. I wasn't making anything from this book that didn't have chocolate in it somewhere, so obviously I turned to the chocolate chapter and i was not disappointed. These are delicious!



The Verdict

Unusual or substituted ingredients - Nigella recommends morello cherry jam. We looked, admittedly not extensively, but we couldn't find any. Sean, having grown up in the cherry capital of Australia, knew that morello cherry jam would be more tart than sweet, so we tried to find something like it. We didn't really succeed (well, you can't if you don't get to taste it first) so when I found the jam I bought (it was French) was quite sweet, I just used less sugar).


Special Utensils or Cookware - none. This is getting repetitive. I'm going to do a fancy recipe soon just so I can say yes! I needed to scour Canberra for this or that. These are made in muffin sized pans and I have those. So nothing special.

Repeatability - Try and stop me. I'll make these again for sure. They are rich, dense, quite heavy (see photo below for how they sank - is this an indication of heaviness? Anyone know how to remedy this?)


Sauciness - Oh these are very saucy. Especially once you dress them with icing which is boiled cream and melted dark chocolate. It goes on quite thin, then starts to thicken. I reckon next time I'd wait for it to cool a little to allow for easier moulding. Adding the glace cherry on top was just the perfect finishing touch. I'm not even a huge fan of them, but you couldn't not include them and they really added something.

Overall pleasure level - I thought these not-so-little cakes were divine. After my previous failure with cakes including jam in the recipe list, I was skeptical, but never let it be said I don't go back for attempts at learning from past mistakes! These are just wonderful. I had to try and offload them at work though because 12 of these naughty delights was just going to do us in entirely. At work, they were both loved and reviled as being too, too naughty.

That icing really is the best. Make them today! When the cream and chocolate on top goes all chewy and dense, it really is the best. I'm giving them 9, but am not expecting RoseRed to make them any time soon since she professed her loathing of all things cherry.




Bells

Chocolate Macaroons

the utter gorgeousness of just one mouthful of these...reveals the rank inadequacy of language - Nigella Lawson


And that's probably true, because out of this recipe, which should have made at least 18-20 macaroons, I managed to get 10. Just one bite is all you'll get!


When Bells and I were discussing what we planned to make on the weekend, she mentioned she was going to try the pistachio macaroons, which sound fabulous. But to sound a note of warning, I had to mention the disaster that was my experience with Chocolate Macaroons - pretty much same recipe but different nuts.


The verdict:
Unusual or substituted ingredients: Not really. The recipe calls for ground almonds. I've no idea if you can buy ground almonds (I expect you can, I just couldn't see them in the supermarket) and assuming they are different to almond meal (which I think they must be, as Nigella uses almond meal elsewhere in HTBADG), I just bought whole almonds, and ground them in the food processor - that sounds right doesn't it?!
Special utensils or cookware: The macaroon mix is supposed to be piped onto the baking tray. So I got out my fab-o tupperware icing ball and used that. I needn't have bothered. The painstakingly piped macaroon mix just blurbed into a dollop sized blob on the tray. So don't worry about the piping, just use a spoon.

Sauciness: Nigella suggests using baking paper lined trays. As I always do with biscuits, I use my tupperware silicone sheets (have I mentioned how much I love Tupperware??!!). Well, that was a mistake. These little suckers were so saucy they stuck to the sheet. So for round two, I thought, well, maybe Nigella's right, maybe I should use baking paper. Heh. Big mistake. Stuck even worse.

Of the 20 macaroon rounds on the sheet, I could use none of them. None. See the white rounds on the bottom of each one. That's the baking paper. Completely stuck. Thanks a bunch, Nigella!
Repeatability: I am not going to bother. I do accept that maybe I did something wrong with this recipe - maybe I should have just used almond meal. Maybe I used the wrong baking paper. I did think I might give the pistachio version a try, but I'll leave that to Bells.
Overall pleasure level: This was a rare Nigella failure. I did get 10 usuable macaroons, and they did taste pretty good sandwiched with the chocolate patissiere stuff (which is basically cream, chocolate and a little bit of butter), but a failure all the same. So it's a 4.

Stayed tuned for the next exciting episode of Macaroon. Will Bells shell eleventybillion pistachios by hand? Or will she buy them pre-shelled? Will she pipe or just dollop? And how many pistachios will she eat before putting them into the mix? And the real cliff-hanger - will they end up in the bin?

Night and Day Cupcakes

This, like the cream cheese brownies, uses my favourite combination of densely sweet and smoothly sharp - Nigella Lawson

What a change from oat cakes hey! Back to the tried and true chocolate cupcakes (well, clearly not these particular ones, I've never tried them before, but you know what I mean). I do like a cupcake - a single serve size of moderate amount, portable, and very easy to eat. The problem is, how do you stop at one!

The verdict

Unusual or substituted ingredients - nothing particularly unusual, except perhaps for the cream cheese icing, which you wouldn't ordinarily expect on a chocolate cupcake. But as Nigella says, it adds a nice dimension to the sweetness of the chocolate (particularly given the loads of icing sugar added to the cream cheese, which sweetens it quite a bit).

I'm not sure if it is proper cooking etiquette to do this, but I pretty much always cube my butter and soften it in the microwave - otherwise it is never soft enough to blend properly (I always forget to take it out of the fridge hours before I'm going to be cooking!) - am I the only one who does this?

Special cookware or utensils - none, except a food processor - this is a very easy recipe, pretty much bung it all in the magimix and whiz until blended. Ok, it's a little more complicated than that, but not much! As always, Nigella suggests using a muffin tin. She must have very small muffin tins. I used a patty cake tin and got the recommended 12 cupcakes, plus two muffin sized ones. If I'd used a muffin tin, I think I would only have got 8 altogether - not enough for a work morning tea, which is what these were for!

Repeatability - I would definitely make these again - nice light cupcakes, not too rich or heavily chocolate but luscious enough with the cream cheese icing to feel special.

Sauciness - mmmm, I enjoyed scraping the food processor bowl clean on these babies! (who doesn't, when they cook cakes?!). With the icing, I made only half the recommended amount, which was plenty for all of these cupcakes, unless you like your icing an inch thick!

Nigella recommended decorating with a chocolate coated coffee bean, or shaved dark chocolate. Not having any coffee beans on hand, and not feeling like I could be bothered with shaving dark chocolate, I was pretty happy to leave these as is. And I think they worked perfectly just so!

Overall pleasure level - both the cooking and the eating was good on these. I'm giving them an 8.5!