Raspberry and Chocolate Blondies

All this playing in the snow has worked up big appetites. The cinnamon roll cake I baked disappeared in less than 24 hours so I searched for something new to back to fill up the cake tin and found this recipe over on BBC Food. It calls for 150g of white chocolate and I only had 100g (less the bits filched while I was chopping it) so I adapted the recipe to suit what was in my cupboard. They don't look anywhere near as perfect as the BBC's, but they taste gorgeous and I can't imagine they'll last long

• 200g Stork
• 75g white chocolate , roughly chopped 
• 100g milk or plain chocolate, chopped
• 300g light muscovado sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 200g self raising flour
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 125g frozen raspberries 
• 1/3 bag of mini-marshmallows (optional)

Method

1. Grease and line brownie tin (mine is 9x13in) and preheat oven to 180C (160C fan forced) or Gas mark
2. Melt margarine. Take off the head and add chopped white chocolate. stir gently so it melts and mixes in nicely
3. beat sugar with eggs until light and frothy
4. fold in flour, sugar, vanilla and salt. 
5. pour in margarine mix and stir in gently with spoon or spatula
6. pour batter into tin and sprinkle over chocolate, raspberries and marshmallows evenly
7. bake 50 minutes and leave to cool in the tin

Gives around 15 squares.

These are wonderfully squidgy with the chocolate and raspberries sinking to the bottom and the marshmallows all gooey on the crispy top.

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Caramel Marshmallow Popcorn

I pin so many American recipes without the intention of making them. I just love the photos and the sound of them - kind of like window shopping, I guess. I have 5 kids over this afternoon and the weather is pretty rubbish so I thought I'd try this recipe for Caramel Marshmallow Popcorn I found at Chef-in-Training. I was going to do a s'mores version but stuck to this recipe because at least I know this one works.

These are the instructions but make sure you check out the website as Nikki has some awesome recipes.

Ingredients

• 1 package microwave popcorn popped (I did it the old fashioned way)
  
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 2 Tbsp. light corn syrup or honey (I used honey)
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 12 large marshmallows (I used half a packet of mini marshmallows because this is what I had)

Instructions

1. Pop popcorn until done, remove any unpopped kernels.
2. Melt butter in a medium saucepan over low heat.
3. Add brown sugar, corn syrup, vanilla and marshmallows.
4. Turn heat to medium and stir until marshmallows are melted and mixture is smooth.
5. Pour over popcorn and stir in until popcorn is evenly coated.
6. Store in an airtight container.

It  goes all sticky when it cools, and it's worth stirring it again before it cools completely as the sauce sinks to the bottom of the pan. It is gorgeous but very sticky