Cake for the Youtube!

Check this week's post from Youtube!

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Tsekkaa tämän viikon päivitys Youtubesta! 

Chocolate chip VS raisin [Nyt myös suomeksi!]

Can you tell the difference? // Huomaatko eron?

 It is time to solve the forever going battle between chocolate chip and raisin cookies! Originally I got this recipe from my granny and it included just raisins. I realized that why not to try with some chocolate chips.. It can't be bad, right?

Honestly, I've never understood the hate against raisin cookies. I absolutely love these ones but the result with chocolate knocked me out. I don't know if it's the fact that it's CHOCOLATE or just new flavor but they probably even topped the raisin version. Even though I had this amazing experience, I'm not going to abandon the original version because the flavors fit together like a glove. Therefore the judging is up to you, my readers. Bake some cookies and tell me your opinion on my Facebook page!

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Vihdoin on tullut aika kirjoittaa ensimmäinen suomenkielinen päivitys! Rehellisesti sanottuna kyllä vähän jännittää, kun on tottunut kirjoittamaan englanniksi jo pitkän aikaa. :D Tänään siis selvitetään taistelu suklaa- ja rusinakeksien välillä. Kysymys on jakanut mielipiteitä netissä jo pitempään, joten päätin selvittää todellisen mielipiteeni asiasta.

Sain alkuperäisen, rusinoita sisältävän reseptin mummiltani ja päätin kokeilla pientä muunnosta. Minulla ei ole oikeastaan koskaan ollut mitään rusinakeksejä vastaan, koska nämä kyseiset keksit ovat olleet yksi lemppareistani. Siispä tein puolet erästä rusinoilla ja puolet suklaahipuillla, jotta voisin vertailla. En tiedä oliko ero siinä, että ne tarjosivat uuden makuelämyksen vaiko siinä, että luonnollisesti rakastan suklaata, mutta suklaakeksit olivat mahtavia! Aion silti pitää perinteisen reseptin mielessä, koska mitäpäs sitä toimivaa enää muuttamaan. :) Teidän käsiinne jää siis pulman ratkaiseminen. Leipokaa ja kertokaa teidän suosikkinne Facebook-sivuillani!

125g (4,5 oz) Butter// voita

1,5dl (5 fl oz) Sugar// sokeria

4,5dl (15 fl oz) Oatmeal// kaurahiutaleita

1dl (3,5 fl oz) Flours// vehnäjauhoja

1dl (3,5 fl oz) Raisins// rusinoita (2dl if you're making raisin cookies only// 2dl jos teet vain rusinakeksejä)

1dl (3,5 fl oz) Chocolate// suklaata

1 tsp/tl Baking soda// soodaa

0,5dl (1,75 fl oz) Cream // kermaa

Preheat the oven to 200°C (400F)

We're going to start by mixing the dry ingredients, in the order of given up there, into the melted butter. So one more time: start with sugar, then oatmeal and flours.

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Lämmitä uuni 200°C (400F)

Aloitetaan sekoittamalla kuivat aineet annetussa järjestyksessä sulatettuun voihin. Eli ensin sokeri, sitten kaurahiutaleet ja jauhot.

Mix the baking soda into the cream and add it to the dough.

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Sekoita sooda kerman sekaan ja kaada se sitten taikinan joukkoon.

These were too big piles, make them even smaller cause they'll spread a lot!// Tee kasoista vielä pienempiä, koska ne leviävät aika lailla!

 Divide the cookie dough into two and mix the raisins with other and chopped chocolate with another one. Use spoons to create little piles onto the baking sheet (notice that they'll spread a lot!) Bake them for 5-10 mins depending on your oven. Mine took about 7 mins.

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Jaa keksitakina kahteen osaan ja sekoita toiseen rusinat ja suklaa toiseen. Kasaa lusiokoiden avulla keksit pellille, mutta jätä hyvin leviämisvaraa äläkä tee kekseistä liian isoja! Paista keksejä 5-10 minuuttia uunista riippuen. Meidän uuni teki tehtävänsä noin 7 minuutissa.

Whoopsie!

Here, on the right, you can see the result when making too big cookies and bake them for too long. Left one is the perfect individual. :) They should turn golden brown when baked enough time.

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Oikealla näette liian isoksi kasatun keksin, jota erehdyksessäni paistoin liian pitkään. Vasemmalla taas loistoyksilö. :) Tarpeeksi kun paistat, kekseistä pitäisi tulla kullanruskeita.

After all this fuzz I wouldn't take this problem too seriously. I'd say that unless I was expecting to eat for ex. choclate chip cookie and I got raisin one, I would be mad. Otherwise I'm happy with both of these and so were everybody else. Therefore let's solve this problem once in for all on my Facebook page in the following week!

Ps. Shoutout for my awesome boyfriend who has his birthday today! I love you so much boo! xoxo

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Kaiken tämän jälkeen sanoisin, että kärpäsestä on tehty härkänen. Pettyisin siinä tapauksessa, jos odottaisin saavani suklaakeksin, mutta saisinkin rusinakeksin. Muuten jatkan elämääni hyvillä mielin, tietäen että reseptivalikoimassani on taas yksi hyvä uusi tulokas. :) Selvitetään siis lopullisesti tämä Facebook-sivuillani tulevan viikon aikana!

Ps. Synttärionnittelut parhaalle poikaystävälle ikinä! Rakastan sua niin paljon boo! xoxo 

Happy Saint Patrick's Day folks!

Finally I got to stick my fingers into a new dough. After a long break it was great to be back in the old familiar kitchen. :) This recipe is actually from one of those new cookbooks I got from there. I needed to do some converting before I got in to the business but I think I got everything right. At least the result was delicious! I remember tasting warm banana bread for the first time at my est friend's. I fell straight in love with that but forgot to ask the recipe for it. This all happened before my trip so of course I forgot all of this until I found this book which included the recipe.

I don't know if you guys noticed but I put a little poll on my Facebook page, whether I should write this in Finnish also or not. I'd really appreciate if you would give your opinion there so I'd know how to improve this blog. :) Therefore this is the last "normal" post here and depending on the poll answers, who knows, maybe the next post will be written also in Finnish! So remember to give your vote on http://www.facebook.com/ChictasticBaking

After all this rant, shall we get started?

You'll need 2 loaf pans (size 8,5 x 4,5 x 2,5 inch; 21,5 x 11 x 6cm)

Butter for greasing

6,5 dl (2 3/4 cups) Flour + extra for the dusting

2 tsp Baking powder

2 tsp Cinnamon

1 tsp Salt

2,4 dl (1 cup) Chopped walnuts

3 Eggs

3 Bananans (prefere ripe ones)

1 Lemon zest and juice

1,2 dl (1/2 cup) Vegetable oil

2,4 dl (1 cup) Sugar

1,2 dl (1/2 cup) Brown sugar

2 tsp Vanilla extract

Start by greasing and dusting the loaf pan and preheat the oven to 180°C (350F). Mix the following ingredients in a bowl: flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Chop the walnuts roughly and mix them into the flours. Create a little well in the middle of the flours for the wet ingredients to be mixed in.

Mash the bananas until they're smooth paste. In a separate bowl, lightly beat the eggs just enough for them to be mixed. Apply the bananas into the eggs and stir well.

Mix the lemon zest into the eggs as well. Then it's time to add both of the sugars, oil, vanilla extract and lemon juice into the mixture and we're almost there!

Pour 3/4 of the mixture into the well and stir it well. When you're done with that, you can pour in the rest of the mixture and kind of fold it in. Try to avoid extra stirring since the bread will loose its fluffiness if done so. 

Move the batter into the loaf pan with spoon. As seen from the picture, the pan should be about half full.. or half empty if you're pessimist :D

Bake the bread on the middle level for 35-40 mins (mine actually took 50 mins for some reason). Just check it with a tooth pick or what not so it will be fully baked.

The one we have here turned out to be extremely delicious but I feel like it was missing some fluffiness. Just need to remember next time not to stir it too much. :) I'll probably make some more on next week since my brother also fell in love with this. I got a kind request from him yesterday that if I'd have any time to make some more of it soon. :D

10/10 and two thumbs up from P-chic. This is definitely going to my "best recipes" archive!  

Why do all good things come to an end?

Greetings!

Right in the beginning I want to apologize for the long delay in my posts. I got some sort of tourists stomach flu and I've been sick for whole February. Despite the sickness, the trip was a blast! We didn't do as much stuff as we did the last time I was there and that bothered me at first. Seeing all these other friends experiencing awesome stuff on the other side of the world made me think.. It actually took me a couple of days to realize that I had never been so happy in my life. Just feeling that other person's warmth on you while watching tv for example. That's the real thing I miss. Sharing those simple everyday moments with each other in real time. Not days after on Skype. 

Moving on to some happier thoughts; where did we visit the last time? Well, we headed our way to the Countryside Mall. We wanted to see this awesome zombie movie "Warm bodies" (coming out on April 5th in Finland!!) and while we had some extra time afterwards, I wanted to find something delicious. First I spotted the place called Great American Cookies. They basically make cookie cakes with fancy decoration on them. We got some different brownies and a cookie sandwich from there.

Up there in that picture we have chocolate fudge brownies (dark ones), peanut butter brownies and that sandwich. I was pretty surprised since I've always considered brownies as fluffy, cake kind of treat. These ones, on the other hand, were more cookie like. They were harder to bite in and crumbled easily. Therefore I still stand for fluffy "normal" brownies! :D The cookie sandwich was pretty good. At first I thought the filling was going to be ice cream so I was kind of disappointed when it turned out to be some sort of cream-icing filling.

After shopping for some scented candles, sweater and food we ended up to  Morrow's Fine Candy & Nuts.

Yup, I found some Finnish candy from there!

Once again, I couldn't do anything else but drool over the chocolates they had there. As the name of the store says, they also had a huge variety of different kind of nuts. You guys probably know me so well that you know I only picked the chocolates ;) On the pictures above, we have colorful little marzipan treats, chocolate covered orange peels, red velvet dome, chocolate covered marshmallow stick, chocolate/m&m covered pretzel aaand chocolate covered pretzel sticks. My favorite one was absolutely the M&M pretzel but basically anything covered in chocolate goes.

I had some better day in between being sick so we tried to take advantage of them and do as much stuff as we could. Unfortunately The last few days we saved for the most awesome amusement park, Busch Gardens, I had to feel bad again. -.- Then a little bit more that few tears were shed at the airport. For few things I'm extremely happy to be home, like the ease to go to the doctor's here compared to USA. So here comes to an end the 8 absolutely A-M-A-Z-I-N-G weeks in Florida and my booboo. Eagerly waiting for the adventures in the future. Yea, what's going to happen next?

Well, I have few important things to tell you. First of all, I have applied to the vocational school for the baker's education. I know! I've never been this excited about anything school related hahah. I also applied to the same art school as last year. Which brings me to the next topic. This March is going to be tough for me since I need to work on those entry exam artworks. It's going to take a lot of time along the work. So don't get scared if I'm not posting as much as I do usually. :) I'll get into this more after this month.

Thirdly, I have some big plans concerning the blog. As you can see, I have put up a little poll on my Facebook page whether I'd start to write also in Finnish or not. I really would like to get your opinion on this so I could improve as a blogger and please my readers. :) Feel free to give me other feedback too! I've also considered starting to make short videos of different baking tips and tricks.  I got some great new cookbooks from Florida so there's going to be amazing new recipes as soon as I get to bake.

With these word I wish you all chictastic spring and I'll see you guys soon! ;)