Churrrrrrrrrrros

So I haven't posted for a while because I have been in Tel Aviv this week.
Definitely can't be fucked to actually bake out here because realistically its a treck and other people's kitchens make me uncomfortable.
Like my boyfriend Tyson's house, his mum is a serious pro and makes loads of bread and stuff and all her ingredients are intimidating. Not that it really stops me.
My favourite place to bake is Tally's house.
This is Tally:

The general routine at Tally's is that she phones me up telling me she wants to bake, and then we either both fuck it up or she watches and laughs and gets distracted. She also likes to do things 'the scouse way' where you put a cake in a saucepan. Special one she is.

Anyway, Tel Aviv is standardly gorgeous and this is the longest I've ever gone out here without losing my bikini top on the beach. It's probably because Rob Lawee hasn't arrived yet.
The first time I got assaulted in this way it resulted in me freaking out and getting salt water in my eyes. At which point of course I got a leg cramp and started sinking titanic style as an elderly Israeli man touched himself nearby.

I've been with Shier in her amazing place out here and we've spent the majority of the time trying to retaliate all the 30 year old suitors pursuing her. The problem is that she is too nice. Today as a creepy guy texted her she was nice enough to give a simple response. When I got texted by a creep, I immediately told him to suck my dick. We balance eachother out well.

I just got back from La Mer, and for those who don't know Tel Aviv it's a place where 14 year olds go to get drunk. It is pretty nice there though, minus the minors.
I just came back feeling all sandy and it hit me how much i crave my Soap & Glory. Anyone who doesn't know what that is is mad. It's brilliant, not just because of the puns.
Here's what every girl should own and use on the daily:

1.  Clean on Me

God send if you fancy the softest skin in the entire world. Smells so good, so creamy.

2. The Breakfast Scrub

They say on the side of the tin 'do not eat'. You would think they're joking but it takes a serious amount of restraint not to eat this. It smells like granola and honey and happiness. My sister tried to eat it because she was that kid at nursery who ate the play dough and hasn't grown out of it yet.

3. No Clogs Allowed

Anyone that knows me knows I don't really have spot prone skin BECAUSE I'M A FUCKING GODDESS. Jokes. But spotty or not this stuff feels so good. It's self heating and exfoliating and you don't have the worry of drowning while washing your face because it has a cute little sponge thing to sort your life out.

It's probably about time I stop bullshitting and actually talk about food because realistically that's what you're here for. To stare at food. And not read what I'm saying.
So let's talk CHURROS.

Churros are fantastic, and this kind are little bite sized ones. They're surprisingly really easy to make and a massive crowd pleaser. Whenever my boyfriend and his friends come over for a bun up it's the ideal snack, mostly because they get so excited by the dipping.
See here they are:

N'aww.

So here's how you make churros:

Vegetable oil for frying

1 cup water

1 stick (4 ounces) butter

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted

3 eggs & 2 egg whites

For dusting:

3 tablespoons of cinnamon and sugar, mixed

Prepare to fry the churros by heating about 1 1/2 inches of oil in a deep pan.  The oil should be about 360 degrees F.

To make the dough, bring the water, butter, cinnamon and salt to a rolling boil in a 3-quart saucepan.  Stir in the flour all at once.  Reduce the heat to low and stir vigorously until the mixture forms a ball, about 1 minute.  Remove the pan from the heat.

Let the batter sit for 5 minutes to cool.

When it’s warm (not hot) to the touch, add one egg at a time. Keep stirring until the mixture comes together and is smooth.  (You can do this in a mixer with a paddle attachment if you’ve already had your daily workout.) Note: Since it was way too dry for me, I added 2 egg whites. It was then perfect.

Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a large star tip.  Have sterilized scissors on hand.  Hold the bag over the hot oil, squeeze a strip of dough about 1 inches long, snip it with the scissors and let it drop into the oil.  Fry 10 to 12 balls at a time, turning once, until golden brown, about 2 minutes on a side.  Drain on paper towels.  Roll the churro tots in the sugar/cinnamon and serve immediately.  These are really best minutes after they’ve been fried.

Serve with whipped cream and/or melted chocolate.

Red Velvet & Cream Cheese Brownies

This week has been very hectic, and so I actually haven't been able to bake at all.
When I say at all, I mean I only managed to make brownies.

Monday was my standard routine of going to Tiger Tiger, quite possibly the perviest club in London. Except this time we celebrated Ariella's belated birthday/leaving to Israel, which was important because it meant free shots from her hot parents.

It was as pervy as ever, so when Nicole Scherzinger's foul song 'Right There' came on and the slag sung 'come on baby put your hands on my body' this creep that looked like one of the Desperate Housewives murderers started feeling me up. I explained to him that the song wasn't to be taken literally. He moved on to the girl next to me. Classy lad.

The rest of the week was filled up by seeing my boyfriend, Tyson Beckford, before he goes off to Thailand or wherever he said he was going. I assume Thailand because that's where all my sister's boyfriends go when they inevitably leave/turn gay.

This seems to be a pattern in our family as I spent the other night listening to my ex talk about his break up with Jesse. (Don't be optimistic and think 'Jessie the Cowgirl'...not quite...more Jesse the guy dressed up like a red indian for the Village People party they attended recently)

You thought I was joking. Either way we hate Jesse. He's a liar.

So since then we've had results day, which has been stressful as shit. I magically got all A's in English and Classics which I keep having to double check, while art literally fucked me.
To be fair I have my teacher Valerie to thank, even though she laughs at me every single lesson when I say something retarded she is a pretty great teacher.
Unlike our other teacher who doesn't need to be named who spent an entire lesson with us gossiping about plastic surgery while eating a sandwich...
The day was emotional but made me really proud of lots of my friends, especially Essie Buckman, Shier Ziser, Ariella Wagerman, , Matt Kuber, Nechama Harris, Toni Enright, and Natalie Barber - all fucking geniuses.
Probably a lot more too, my favourite is because they're way too down to earth for anyone to know they're so clever. Matt not so much.

It was a very nice day, and my parents got out the gin and tonic to celebrate. Although I'm pretty sure it wasn't in honour of me...because it was 6pm and therefore officially happy hour anyway.

SO BACK TO TODAY.
I'm going to Tel Aviv tomorrow FINALLY.
I've been in London so long that they tried to set it on fire to make me leave.
Its all very exciting because I'm going to stay with Shier and her two brothers Lamar and Simba.
I've also been super duper cool enough to download the BA app to track my boarding pass. Ultimate neb.

I need to pack and I totally can't be fucked. If it wasn't for going away tomorrow I would probably be high and baking a cake while listening to Otis Redding. Basically an ideal morning.
Instead, I'm sitting around waiting for my ridiculously excessive Boots order to arrive with all my holiday non-essentials.
In the mean time, I'll share with you the brownies I made mid-week. They're amazing.



Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 2-oz dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 tsp red food coloring
• 2/3 cup all purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 8-oz cream cheese, room temperature
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Butter the bottom and sides of a 8 inch metal baking pan. Put a long piece of parchment paper in the bottom of the pan, letting the parchment extend up two sides of the pan and overhang slightly on both ends. (This will make it easy to remove the bars from the pan after they have baked.) Butter the parchment.

In a small, heatproof bowl, melt butter and chocolate together. Stir until combined and very smooth. Set aside to cool for a few minutes.

In a large bowl, whisk together sugar, eggs, vanilla extract and red food coloring. Add chocolate mixture and stir until smooth. Add flour and salt and stir until just combined and no streaks of dry ingredients remain. 

 

Pour into prepared pan and spread into an even layer. To prepare cheesecake mixture, beat cream cheese, sugar, egg and vanilla extract in a medium bowl until smooth. Distribute the cheesecake mixture in 8 dollops over batter in the pan.

Swirl in with a knife or spatula.Bake for 35-40 minutes, until brownies and cheesecake are set. A knife inserted into the cheesecake mixture should come out clean and the edges will be lightly browned.

Let cool completely in pan on a cooling rack before lifting out the parchment paper to remove the brownies.

The Ugly-Sexy Cheesecake

My sister AND THEO'S 'ugly-sexy' principle is vital to life.
 You probably haven't realised it yet, but there will always be a handful of people out there who fulfil all your ugly-sexy needs.

I'll explain myself.

Say you're out at a club, and you see this guy from across the room.
First of all you think 'shit, he is ugly' but then it becomes blindingly apparent that he is so sexy that you want to live inside his skin like an ugly-sexy onesie.

The point is, these are the guys (and girls) that have a certain sex appeal about them totally untarnished by their looks.
 You're totally drawn to their personality, or voice, or just want to make a bagjob out of them.

For those of you who are still lost (or have closed the page because you wanted cake and you're getting the rantings of an insane person), here are some examples of ugly-sexy people:

1. Professor Snape

...Yeah you would.

2. Lady Gaga

Let's be honest, her face is a bit weird. But you would probably let her take a ride on your disco stick or what have you..

3. Scar

Enough said.

So I think you get my point.

Now this cheesecake is the epitome of ugly-sexy.

It looks like shit. Like genuinely it's so ugly. But...it's sexy.

You know you want to taste it, and when you do it's AMAZING.

It has fucking oreos in it man. OREOS. Oreo's only make life better. Fact.

There is only one thing better in life than oreos. And that is oreos and milk.

This cheesecake however is even better.

Here's how it's done:

1. Put a packet of oreos in a ziplock and mash the shit out of it

2. Stir them into 2 spoonfuls of melted butter in a bowl and then press into a springform pan.

3. Pick your favourite cheesecake recipe (you're not allowed mine, remember)

4. Roughly chop half of another packet of oreos and stir them into the cheesecake mix. Bake as usual.

5. Await ugly-sexy godliness.

P.S. Don't literally go all American Pie and have sex with the cheesecake. It's disrespectful. You should honour and accept a cake's boundaries and religious beliefs. Except for bundt cake...that just seems called for.  

White Chocolate Carrot Cake

For those of you that follow me on facebook, you'll know how I feel about this whole 'riot' situation.
I think it's very important to articulate both sides of an argument in a calm and detailed, nonbiased fashion when dealing with these sorts of affairs.
I feel that I conveyed this powerfully over the weekend:

Honestly though, the fact that people can have such little respect for the place they live in and the people they live amongst really says a lot about how far society has regressed.
The whole thing was just a little too Lord of the Flies for me, except with a little less of a homosexual undertone...

I feel like it's safe to say it's over so I can FINALLY go out tonight again, even if it is with Toni Enright.
We've been so bored staying in all this time, we ended up sending eachothers pictures to a TV dating line. 
And unfortunately have been recieving things to this effect all day...

Awkward..
CARROT CAKE
I have once again decided to dedicate a cake to one of my hair faux pas. 
You can only imagine the damage I'm about to show you from the title. 

Shit got crazy. It was the first time I understood what it was to be told you have no soul. (actually that's not true, but we're talking hair wise here)

Anyhow, carrot cake seems fitting for this one. Because I looked like a big fat carrot cake.

RECIPE

Ingredients:

300 soft light brown sugar

3 eggs

300ml sunflower oil

300g plain flour

2tsp baking powder

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp vanilla extract

300g carrots, grated

Cream cheese frosting

100g white chocolate, melted

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Mix the sugar eggs and oil, then slowly add the flour baking powder and spices.

2. Stir in the grated carrots, pour into prepared caked tins.  Cook for 20/25mins.

3. Mix up icing sugar, butter, cream cheese and milk, varying quantities until smooth and thick. Add the melted chocolate as well as some cinnamon and nutmeg.
4. Using a palette knife, sandwich the two cooled cake layers together and frost with the cream cheese frosting.

 Decorate as desired!

Wagermuffins.

Today is Ariella Wagerman's birthday, and so I am bestowing on her the huge honour of naming the best muffins anyone has ever made after her.

I think I'm morealess over my fear of muffins (although not the blueberry kind...they just seem like they have an agenda)

Ariella is one of my oldest friends and I see her for about 40 seconds every few months, but that's ok because we have a deep bond. The sort of bond that you get with a girl who gropes you in their sleep and then tries to avoid talking about it after.
Also, the girls face doesn't change. Ever. Here's our oldest and newest photos:

 Here are some embarrassing facts about Wagerman.
1. She is a raging Harry Potter fan.

2. She is an AWFUL drunk.
3. She can never watch the X factor the same way again...
4. She nearly died. And I nearly died listening to the 3 hour long story.
5. Due to a camera swap faux pas, many more people have seen her topless than she would've liked.

Time to talk about MUFFINS.

These muffins are oh so amazing. I don't know if Ariella likes muffins, I don't care either.
 Everyone likes these muffins.
They are maple and pecan, and they taste like a delicious Canadian man covered in syrup.

Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:
350g flour
160g sugar
2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
300ml milk
1 egg
70g melted butter
200g maple syrup
100g shelled pecans

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a bowl.
2. In a jug, whisk up the egg and milk, then stir into the batter.
3. Follow this with the melted butter and 100g of the maple syrup, stir in. (try not to eat batter)

4. Stir in the pecans, then spoon into muffin cases and drizzle with remaining maple syrup. 

5. Cook for 20 mins, they should be bouncy to the touch and moist.

SO DAMN YUMMY.

*In other news, some has excitingly followed my peanut butter muffin recipe. Yay! These are Daniel Levin's:

Anyone else who trusts me enough to try out one of these recipes - send it to mee!

*Banana S'more Cupcakes*

*before I start talking about myself, this needs to be said. These cupcakes are UNBELIEVABLE. You can't even understand. Just give them a chance.*

Today has been a very hungover day indeed.
I'm starting to worry that this blog in itself will provoke AA meeting invitations, but in truth I'm not a big fat alcoholic I just love to blog on lazy mornings after going out. And I'm a total lightweight.
I blame my parents for this entirely.
Ever since I can remember, my parents have told me alcohol is the cure for everything.
If I had a stomach ache, my dad gave my brandy.
The other day I insisted I didn't want to go out for dinner with a sore throat and temperature, and my mum assured me that a Mojito would be a good idea.
Even recently I tried to take some paracetamol, only to realise that there was no water to take it with. My dad replied 'what are you talking about, there's scotch right here.'

My parents really aren't crackheads, but they just love the juice. Who knows.

I woke up today with glitter all over my face and assumed that I had finally turned into a fairy and that Peter Pan and I could run away together but then that it might not work out because he always gives all his attention to that ungrateful Wendy cow who literally arrives on his turf, and then takes ALL his friends back to freaking London, so he's alone in Neverland with some cunt who wants to hook his guts out but secretly has a big fat gay crush on him. Sorry...I take issue with parts of Peter Pan.

So it turned out I wasn't a fairy, which is fine in the long run considering complications shown above.

I had a lovely cup of tea and a french macaroon and then Jessy asked if I wanted to get high, make cakes and watch pretty little liars. I thought, well that's what I was planning anyways, so definitely.

This is Jessy:

She technically belongs to my sister, but I like her too so I'm allowed to play with her.
Jessy and I collaborated different cupcakes to make a whole new special cupcake, and Stephanie pouted because she didn't get to hold a cookery book.
(if you don't remember who Stephanie is, she's the posessive person from the best cupcake in the entire world)

Here's what stingo jessy and I came up with:

FOR THE SPONGE
80g butter
280g caster sugar
200g plain flour
40g cocoa powder
1tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
240ml milk
2 bananas
Chocolate sprinkles
5 digestive biscuits

FOR THE TOPPING
200g caster sugar
4 egg whites
100g chocolate

1. Mix together the dry ingredients and butter

2. Mix the eggs and milk in a jug and mix into batter

3. Mush up the bananas and then mix them into the batter

4. Pour into cupcake cases 3/4 the way up
5. Sprinkle the chocolate on top of the cupcakes, then put the digestives in a ziplock bag and mash them with a rolling pin, sprinkling half of them on top of the cupcakes
6. Cook for 20mins at 170C

7. While the cupcakes are cooling, whisk together the egg whites and in a saucepan heat up the sugar with 150ml of water and let boil for 5 mins, then carefully pour into the fluffy egg whites and keep mixing until shiny and firm
8. Using a knife, spread the meringue onto the cupcakes creating spikes and waves.

9. Put under a grill for a few seconds to create golden peaks.
10. Sprinkle with remaining digestive crumbs, then stick a piece of chocolate on top for decoration.