Rocky Road

So recently I visited the famous London Borough Market with my lovely friend Olivia! Being a London newbie I need a little help finding the good places! If you are visiting London or just haven't been yet its a great place to go and shop for speciality food and for a GIANT lunch! The market has everything from home-made cakes and pastries to organic vegetables, wild game and artisan foods from all over the world. We decided to grab a enormousness, spicy, meat-filled sandwich followed by an equally massive brownie. The market is reasonably priced and a great visit for inspiration as well as buying beautiful gifts. The surrounding coffee bars and cafe's are also wonderful, supplying great food and original brands. For example, Monmouth Coffee Company or, the one we chose that day, Elliot's Cafe, which was friendly and warm with a great range of unusual and fragrant coffee, which, for me was wasted as I am a baby and don't like coffee!

Recently I have been having a bit of a no-baking phase as my scales have been broken, tragically! However, this made me think what I could make without scales and I decided to make Rocky Road or Fridge Cake. I thought this would be easy enough without scales as the chocolate bars have the grams on the packet and then you put in whatever you fancy! This is my recipe and it was very indulgent and chocolatey, a great recipe to make if you fancy something very sweet and gooey! and something that would be fun for children to make as they can add anything they like and be creative!

Ingredients:

200g Milk Chocolate
150g Dark Chocolate
50g Butter
2 Tblespns Maple Syrup
Marshmallows
Raisins
Mars Bar pieces
Crushed Digestive Biscuits

Method:
Melt chocolate and butter in a bowl over bowling water.
Mix together melted chocolate mixture and maple syrup in a large bowl and add all other ingredients until combined. (other ideas might include pecans, walnuts or malteasers)
Pour into tray prepared with parchment paper and leave in fridge until set (about 2 hours)
Then finally cut into squares and enjoy!

 I have been tuning into Paul Hollywood's Bread, which I am really enjoying. I have always been afraid of making bread, but it seems a little less daunting now and I think it may be something I will try very soon. Although the slow motion kneading and sexy music did make me laugh...a lot! So far he has covered great British breads and this week was surrounding flat breads, one of which I have (sort of) made before. On a trip to India a few years ago, Tom and I took a cooking class in Kerala. We went to a very welcoming family who opened their home to tourists and taught us all how to cook our own traditional Indian meal, complete with South Indian barbecued fish and Pathara flat bread to go with it! It was VERY difficult! but really fun to try! If you ever visit Kerala look for Bar-B-Que cooking classes in Kumily.

One last thing for today, this week a friend at work, Peter, is holding a larger-than-life Bake Sale for all the employees to buy cake and raise money for a great cause that see's him scaling Ben Nevis in Scotland in the summer. I am taking part, with many other bake-happy colleagues, by donating a cake. I will be doing a blog all about the bake sale with details of Peters charity and some great recipe ideas as well as tips on how to hold your own bake sale from peter himself! So stay tuned for that!