Tag: breakfast

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Chocolate Cooking General Recipes

Buttermilk Waffles for Brunch!

My favourite type of waffles are Belgian Liège style waffles (names after Liège, a city in Belgium). There is a little shop in Kenginston Market in Toronto that serves up some pretty delicious ones! It’s called “Wafles & More“. They also serve a a pretty good hot chocolate, should you feel like a rich, warm drink to accompany your already decadent breakfast 🙂

Wafles & More
Belgian Waffles

I woke up this morning craving some waffles and since it is New Year’s Day (and most places are closed), I knew I would have to cook some up myself. Given that Liège style waffles are made with a yeast-based dough and therefore, cannot be made on a whim, within the hour, I decided upon buttermilk waffles instead. They turned out pretty great!

Should you want waffles that are not too sweet, with just a hint of warm molasses and sourness, slightly crisp on the top, fluffy in the middle, and glowing with a caramel-coloured hue, then try this recipe!

Ingredients:

2 cups of flour

1/4 cup turbinado, light brown, or dark brown sugar (packed)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1.5 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

0.5 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)

114 g (8 tablespoons) cultured, unsalted butter (if you can’t find cultured butter, any unsalted butter will do)

2 cups whole buttermilk

3 eggs (separated)

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Toppings (you could use any or all of these, or throw on any toppings that appeal to you):

Whipped Cream (Ideally, flavour it with some liqueur)

Berries

Bananas

Melted Chocolate

Maple Syrup

Chocolate Hazelnut butter (go here for a recipe)

Nutella

Peanut Butter

Jam

Method:

1. Place all the dry ingredients in a bowl. Mix and then sift them all into a large bowl.

2. Warm the butter and buttermilk to just slightly warmer than room temperature.

3. Mix the butter, buttermilk, egg yolks, and vanilla essence together in a bowl. Then add this mixture to the dry ingredients and gently mix them all together with a whisk.

4. Whip the egg whites until they form stiff peaks.

5. Turn on your waffle maker.

6. Gently fold the egg whites into the mixture from step 3.

7. The batter is now ready! Spoon some into the waffle maker and let it cook for about 3 minutes. You will have to figure out how much batter to add into the waffle maker, as well as precisely how much time to let the waffles cook, after a few tries (both these variables will be influenced by the type of waffle maker you have).

8. Your waffles are good to go! Throw on some toppings and enjoy!

9. Just a note, I think whipped cream is an absolutely essential topping for waffles. I recommend whipping some up right before you start making the waffles. I also suggest adding some liqueur to the cream before you start whipping it up. I used cherry liqueur!

10. Also, if you’d like, you can make a few extra and store them in the fridge. I have found that when you’re ready to eat them, it’s best to heat them up in the oven at 350 degrees Celsius, for 2 mins on either side, after basting them with some butter.

Neatly plated waffles 😊
Simple buttermilk waffles
Messy waffles 😝
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Food General Recipes

Creamy and Refreshing Yoghurt Parfait: A Summer Delight!

I wasn’t always a huge parfait fan. If you follow this blog, you know that I mostly only eat chocolatey sweet things. But then, we went away for a weekend this June, and had this delicious parfait every morning at our Bed and Breakfast:

On a side note, we stayed in a boat house on the water in Catalina Bay, in the Kawartha Lakes region and it was absolutely lovely! Here are some photos of the place:

Our hostess was very gracious and kind, and the real bonus was that there was a resident kitty at the B&B!

But I was telling you about the parfait: it’s been a hot summer, and I’ve really been craving some creamy, berry filled parfait ever since our trip. So I went ahead and made some this morning:

If you’d like to give it a shot, here’s how:

Equipment:

A small thick bottomed saucepan

A grater or zester

Two bowls

Spoons, a spatula, and a whisk

Ingredients:

1 cup yoghurt

1/4 tsp vanilla essence

1 cup blueberries (frozen or fresh)

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup water

1 tsp finely grated lemon zest

1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice

1-3 tsp granola (you can go here, if you want to make your own (you can skip the coconut if you don’t like the idea of blueberries with coconut))

Method:

1. First, we’ve got to make our compote: Bring the sugar and water to boil in the saucepan at medium-high heat. Let it cook for 6-8 mins until the mixture thickens a bit. Add in the blueberries, lower the head to medium, and stir gently. Cook the berries for about 5 minutes. If you’re using frozen berries, cook the berries for a little longer. Take the pan off the heat. Add in the lemon zest and juice and mix well. Let the compote sit for about 15-20 minutes, until it cools.

2. Whisk the yoghurt and vanilla together in a bowl.

5. Serve the compote and yoghurt together in a new bowl. You can do it in whatever way looks nice to you. I did this:

6. Top off with granola and enjoy!

Categories
Cooking Food General Recipes

Scrumpalumpous Sunday Morning: Pumpkin-Apple Pancakes topped with my ‘Sugar and Spice Butter’

I woke up this morning with a hankering for delicious pancakes 🙂 but I didn’t want just plain old pancakes, I wanted to make something interesting. Of course, I could have made nutella pancakes, or ice-cream pancakes, but I wanted to try to make something a little, well healthier.

You see, over the past few days, I’ve been trying to eat more fruit and vegetables. It is however, not an easy thing to do, given that I dislike most veggies and nearly all fruit. Yesterday, I even tried making myself a carrot smoothie, because I hate eating carrots. I chopped up a few skinned carrots and threw them in the food processor with some water. This experiment did not go too well, and I do not recommend trying it at home. I ended up with what can be best described as orange glop, of which I unfortunately took a large gulp. This was, in equal measure, both brave and stupid.

So this morning, I woke up with renewed determination; I was going to eat fruit, and I was going to enjoy it! I decided on pumpkin and apple pancakes topped with maple syrup and a flavoured butter that I call ‘Sugar and Spice Butter’. This I washed down with hazelnut and chocolate tea.Delicious and Simple Sunday Brunch

This was a delicious and fairly easy to set-up, sunday brunch. And yes, while it wasn’t really that healthy, it was most definitely a change from my usual chocolate-themed food 🙂

And this did go into the making of this breakfast 🙂

Apple Pancakes

I admit that I did take a shortcut, just this once. I started off with pancake mix. Calm down dear readers, there is a reason, a justification for this otherwise unpardonable sin! First and foremost, I am NOT a morning person! Second, this Trader’s Joe’s mix is absolutely delicious. You really should go and stock up on a whole lot of boxes of this in the fall- it’s a seasonal product you see.

So I followed the instructions on the box, except that I added chopped up apple bits to the batter. For the flavoured butter all you need is:

1/4 cup good quality unsalted butter

2 teaspoons brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg

A few drops vanilla essence

Whip all this up in a bowl and then heat the mixture for about 45 seconds on low heat in the microwave, just enough to melt the sugar. Then whip it all up again and place it in the fridge to cool and harden. And there you have it: flavoured butter for pancakes, crepes or bread!

Recipe for 'Sugar and Spice Butter'

Oh and I have to fess up, I did finish up my brunch with a little dessert. I moved over to the coffee table, with this:

Tea and a side of a Nutella

Another cup of tea and a little cup of home-made hazelnut chocolate butter 😉

Mmmm…I can’t help it, I am a chocolate nut-butter fiend.