A little while ago I was approached by a representative of
Bakingmad to see if I would like to make one of their recipes and review it on my blog. Given how much I love to bake, I didn't have to give it much thought and I chose one of their Valentine's Day recipes... A Brownie Rolo Heart. You can find more Valentine's Day recipes here:
I made sure I followed the instructions to the letter, assembling all my ingredients before I started, lining my tin properly etc.
But despite taking all this care I stumbled at the first hurdle. The recipe calls for the butter to be rubbed into the dry ingredients (something I've not come across before in a brownie recipe) but the proportion of fat to dry ingredients was too large and instead of the expected breadcrumb like texture the result was a very sticky creamed mixture, the majority of which was stuck to my hands. At this stage I got out my electric mixture and proceeded to mix everything together with the whisk. Back on track, the cake went into the oven... for 30 minutes according to the recipe.
But it was 50 minutes before the centre of the cake stopped looking liquid and I was prepared to risk taking it out of the oven. I've made a lot of Brownies over the years and I know that they should be squidgy in the centre and not at all dry... but I didn't think they should be poured out of the tin!
I was concerned that the outside edges would be hard and dry and a little burned, which is always a problem with chocolate... but it looked okay so I went ahead and decorated the cake.
And the verdict.... well the proof of the pudding as they say...
...is in the eating!
And this went from Heart to nothing in 24 hours...
With comments like "Oh Boy" and "Good Cake". It was moist, very chocolately and with a toffee like layer along the bottom... the Rolos had obviously all sunk to the bottom of the cake! I think it was more of a chocolate fudge cake than a Brownie and I wouldn't make it if it was Brownies that I wanted. But with a bit of tweaking to the recipe, I would definitely make it again! The evidence speaks for itself!
And for having the pleasure of testing... and eating this excellent chocolate cake, the Bakingmad people have given me a cookbook to giveaway to my readers.
Called the Big Book of Bread, it is not only filled with all manner of bread recipes for yeasted breads, fruit breads, flatbreads etc...
But it also has sections on using bread in other recipes such as desserts...
and main courses.
If you would like to leave me a comment telling me your favourite chocolate recipe then I will pop your name into a draw to win this fine cook book. The winner will be picked on Thursday which is Valentine's Day. I'm sorry that I will have to limit this giveaway to UK readers this time as it is quite a heavy book and I'm not sure I can afford to send it overseas without taking out a mortgage!
