Lava cakes for two

Weekends are baking time for me and this time I decided to experiment with a new recipe for some delicious chocolate lava cakes and served it for breakfast - everyone was so enthusiast and being that this could actually be one of my favorite desserts to bake (& eat of course) I thought I could share my recipe with you. This can be a lovely dessert idea to serve to your better half after a special meal or for a romantic breakfast in bed and it's not a case this recipe makes the perfect amount of mixture to serve two super yummy chocolate lava cakes...

For two chocolate lava cakes you'll need:

• 125g dark chocolate
• 30g unsalted butter
• 1 egg and 1 egg yolk
• 15g white flour
• 1 tablespoon of white sugar
• a pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon of coffee powder
• icing sugar & strawberries for serving

Once preheated the oven to 220°C I melted the chocolate and the butter using a bain marie as it's my favorite way to do it but you can definitely go for microwaves if you prefer, but always remember to whisk often both cases. I then added the egg and egg yolk, mixed, added flour, white sugar, salt and coffee and mixed well again and again until I had a very smooth mixture. I then buttered two of my super cute (and cheap) Emile Henry Ceramic Ramekins and threw in my chocolate mixture in equal parts. Placed them on a baking sheet, they were ready to be baked in the oven for around 10/12 minutes (and not more). It's important to not overcook them as our lava cakes are meant to have a soft and liquid-y heart.

Once baked you can remove them from the oven and leave them cool for a few minutes or until the ramekins can be handled and then reverse it on a cute little plate. Using the icing sugar and the strawberries try to embellish your dessert - I cut a strawberry in half and placed it around my little lava cake and sprinkled a bit of icing sugar on top. When you'll cut it with a spoon, it will reveal a soft and delicious chocolate heart which will supply the perfect amount of sweetness in your weekend. This dessert is super delicious and can be served in special occasions to friends, family or lover to leave them all super impressed even if it's just the easiest and quickest dessert to prepare and bake!

Will you try my lava cake's recipe?

Black Cherry & Chocolate (Ben's) Cookies

Last month I was in London and of course I needed to give some Ben's Cookies a whirl for the first time. Fair enough I felt in love with them, and once I came home I knew I had to try baking them myself. A month later I came up with a pretty custom recipe very Ben's Cookies inspired and totally Luke Evans based (oh dear, check his channel out because he makes the most beautiful videos) and thought I could share it with you as I'm pretty satisfied with the result. I assure you, these cookies are delicious, my entire family loves them, and if you're looking for something easy to make but very impressive to offer to your family or guests, you should give them a whirl!

For 9 big cookies you're going to need:

• 300g brown sugar
• 200g unsalted butter
• 1 medium egg
• 325g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• A lot of dark chocolate and some sour black cherries

As you can see the ingredients are pretty basic and the majority of them I'm sure you all already have in your fridge, the only thing you may need to buy are black cherries, but these cookies are very customizable and you can add whatever you want and make them as you prefer like nuts, almonds, white chocolate, everything really! They're also pretty easy to prepare, you just need to remember to preheat the oven at 220°C and having your butter at room temperature before proceding.

I simply beated all the ingredients together with a whisk as it's the easiest way: starting from butter and sugar, I wanted it to be very soft and fluffly so I beated those two ingredient together for a few minutes, then I added the egg and beated again. Once mixed flour and baking powder together, I added them to the butter, sugar and egg mixture little by little until the dough was formed and it was quite solid and firm and not too sticky. If you feel your doug is too sticky add a bit of flour and beat again. Then I chopped the chocolate and added it to the mixture with some black cherry as well and blended all very evenly so that all the cookies had the right amount of chocolate and cherry once formed. I created nine big balls with my dough, arranged them on a baking tin lined with parchment paper and flattened them a tiny bit with my hands. Keeping in mind these cookies will spread out, I placed them reasonably apart from each others. Then I baked them for 12/13 minutes in the oven at 220°C, and they came out very chewy and gooey, but you can definitely let them bake a few minutes more if you desire. Consider your cookies will continue cooking on the hot baking tin when you pull them out of the oven, so don't overcook. I left them rest and cool for 20/30 minutes before trying them.

I think the dark chocolate really compliments and balances the sweetness of the sour black cherries, but I can't lie, they are very sweet, and if you don't love super sweet things you may have to consider using a lot less cherries than I did. But these to me were perfection, and I'm really satisfied on how they came out, so I hope you can enjoy this recipe too and try them in the upcoming future! 

What is your favorite cookies flavor?