Birthday treat! - Chocolate buttercream frosting

Although his birthday was on the fourth, I couldn't celebrate my brothers birthday until the start of the weekend when he comes back from the capital city. Usually when its an unplanned celebration we simply order a fancy delicious cake. However, for a change I wanted to make the effort in baking something for him. Which he better appreciate! 

I remember viewing an awesome recipe months and months ago that looked absolutely delicious and was quite simple. The worst thing was that I couldn't find it. I almost spent straight three hours just looking for it on the web trying to remember what it was called. Im sure you know the sickening feeling of not finding something you really wanna find. And just when I was about to give up, I found it. Hooray!

Moist chocolate cake from Foodess, why were you so hard to find? 

Anyways now that I found it I hurried to the kitchen to bake this good looking before my brother arrives. I have to say its one of those recipes that are simple yet super tasty. 

Keeping it nice and simple meant that I just needed a good frosting to go with the cake and I'm ready. Nice and simple also means I'm still in my lazy phase hehe. 

My favorite two frostings to go with a chocolate cake are chocolate ganache and chocolate buttercream. Although the ganache is more rich, I preferred a more sugary and fun chocolate buttercream to go with this cake. And I used the frosting to sandwich to of the cake layers together and cover it up.

As you can see from the above photo, I'm not the best decorator when it comes to celebration cakes. Definitely not in my lazy phase. So after running out of icing sugar I used a ready canned vanilla frosting to make the side swirls, and the same frosting to write on the cake. Although I prefer writing with melted chocolate. 

For the awesome Moist chocolate cake recipe from www.foodess.com click Here.

Chocolate frosting

Makes one batch (I made 2 batches to go with this cake)

2 cups icing sugar 

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

45g butter, softened

8 tbsp milk (more or less depending on preferred thickness)

splash of vanilla extract 

1. Mix icing sugar, cocoa powder, 30g of butter and 4tbsp of milk using an electric mixer/stand mixer starting with low speed for 30s and then increasing to a medium speed until the mixture comes together.

2. Add remaining butter (15g) and 2tbsp of milk and continue mixing on high speed.

3. Add the vanilla extract and continue mixing.

4. If your happy with the thickness your done, if not add the 2 more tbsp of milk for a more spreadable and glossy frosting texture.

*Add more milk if you feel your frosting is still thick. However, don't over-do the milk!

*Cover and refrigerate frosting if not used at once.

Creamy Cheese Dessert With Raspberry Cream

Everytime my sister gives me the 'puppy eyes' I know she wants me to make her something sweet. I think I've made it clear to my family I'm the one to go to when your craving DESSERT!

Since I'm going through a lazy phase I knew I didn't wanna do something that requires baking or even heating! The first thing I saw when I opened the fridge were those beautiful fresh raspberries waiting to be sweetened.

At first I thought of making something chocolatey but decided to go for cream cheese. I've mentioned earlier how much I like having desserts out of a dessert glass. You guessed it! Thats what I'm doing.

Graham crackers and some butter were the first thing I grabbed to make the bottom crust of the dessert until my eyes caught a pack of swiss roll staring at me. 

For a little twist instead of the usual graham crackers, I thought I'd cut out some of this vanilla flavored swiss roll and add it to the bottom of my dessert instead of the crackers. I used a ready swiss roll I had bought earlier but its always better to use a freshly baked one or even leftover pound cake.

Either cutting the cake in small pieces or cutting it in a few round pieces is fine. It depends mainly on the size of your cups. (here's what i did)

Anyways, my main idea was a layered cream cheese dessert. Now, for the raspberries I made a raspberry cream to go with it. The twist is that instead of the raspberries being completely juiced, I made sure little seedy-berry bits remained. (I didn't completely blend them).

I basically tossed a few raspberries in the blender and blended them half way through (Anyways with a few raspberries and a big blending machine the raspberries wont be able to turn into juice completely).

Then I simply added a little cream and sugar to sweeten them up. Don't worry about the little bits of raspberries that don't mix completely. The purpose is to keep those little bits!

What I really love about this dessert is that its TOO LIGHT. By light I mean not until you have your 

third serving would you feel you've just had your first one (if that makes any sense) TRUST ME!

Prep time: 10-15 minutes. Makes 6-8 servings.

Creamy cheese mousse:

200g cream cheese, softened
1 cup whipping cream, beaten
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp. lemon juice

1. Beat the cream cheese using an electric hand mixer or stand mixer, add the sugar and continue beating.
2. Fold in the beaten whipped cream to the cream cheese mixture. Spoon in the vanilla extract.
3. Spoon in the lemon juice and set in the fridge.

Raspberry cream

12 fresh raspberries
1/3 cup + 2 tbsp whipping cream, beaten
2 tsp. sugar

1. Blend the raspberries in a blender, stop before the raspberries turn fully into juice (see picture above)
2. Transfer the blended raspberries to a bowl and add the beaten whipping cream, mixing them only with a spoon/spatula.
3. Add the sugar and continue mixing with a spoon/spatula until well combined. 

Assembly

Raspberries for topping

Pack of swiss roll (vanilla or strawberry flavored) or pound cake

- Once you have both cream fillings ready. begin adding small pieces of swiss roll/pound cake to your dessert glasses, pressing gently at the bottom.

- Add a layer of the cream cheese filling and then top it with small pieces of swiss roll/pound cake.

-Re-add another layer of the cream cheese filling. 

- End by adding a couple of teaspoons of the raspberry cream and top with a few raspberries.

Delicious Oreo Cheesecake Dessert

 Its almost like every time you add oreo to your desserts it tends to make them 10x better.
And what have we been seeing lately? ... Oreo cheesecake!
Oreo dessert recipes on the web or even Oreo desserts sold at our favorite coffee shops.

I thought of making an Oreo cheesecake but this time eaten straight from a dessert glass.
I actually prefer having desserts in a glass. I just think its easier to eat from and most importantly they usually look pretty!

uhmm I guess grey-colored dessert isn't that pretty, but trust me its TOO DELICIOUS.
And the best thing is that it's super easy to make. Anyone can make this dessert!

Prep time: 10 minutes. Makes 8 servings (varies according to dessert glasses)

Ingredients

2 long packs of oreo biscuits. (I used around 16-20 pieces)
Sweetend Condensed milk. (make sure you have at least one can. You might need more depending on the size)
300g cream cheese.
1/2 cup sugar.
1 cup cream. (Now I usually use a pretty heavy looking cream sold under the Nestle brand - I attached a photo I found on the web- however if you don't find that you can go for heavy cream but taste the mixture after that and see if you'll need more sugar)

1. Crush oreo's in a food processor (without the white part) and transfer to a bowl.
2. Start by adding 2 tablespoons of condensed milk to your crushed oreo's and mix. Add more condensed milk if needed. The Oreo's should be sticky by now.

These crushed Oreo's should make the bottom part of the dessert. Begin by spooning them in your glasses.

3. In a blender, mix cream cheese, sugar, heavy cream and 2 tablespoons of condensed milk.
4. Transfer the cheese mixture to another bowl and add hand-crushed oreos to the mixture. Size of the crushed oreos shouldn't be too small or too big. Just crush them in small sizes with your hand as you add them to the mixture.
5. Mix the cheese mixture with a spatula/spoon so that the hand-crushed oreo's blend in perfectly.

Spoon the mixture over the bottom layer of oreo's. Top with an Oreo and set in the fridge for at least an hour.

Note: They would also look awesome if you make one more layer of crushed oreo and then the mixture again, in thin parfait glasses.

Meet Maryam

Halla!

It was the successful food bloggers that inspired me to make my own blog and share with the world my 'down-to-earth' dessert recipes.
Although most of them have had quite a long journey in the culinary world, this has not stopped me from allowing my self to share the beginning of my journey and growth in recipes.

Coming from the middle east, I'm hoping I would be able to add a unique twist to modern and traditional recipes. As well as introduce my own culture's delicious desserts.