Dark chocolate and strawberry brownies

21 July: Fresh strawberry and almond brownie
I made these brownies for church on Sunday 21 July and I shall not be giving the recipe as I got a bit carried away with too many strawberries which led to sweet soggy collapsing mess. (There is a hint of this in the photograph.) We ended up having to eat from the communal plate with spoons – not the most elegant of  a sweet and sustaining something with coffee after church. It was however a delicious mess which the empty plate I took home bore witness too. (Thank goodness for a plentiful supply of coffee spoons.) Made with wholemeal flour, ground almonds and dark chocolate with 70 %  cocoa, I added an overabundance of strawberries (200g) which not only contain a lot of water in themselves but were washed too enthusiastically and  insufficiently patted dry. The stalwart connoisseur tasters declared it would be an excellent pudding. So back to the drawing board to prefect a strawberry brownie. (I notice from my post of 11 July when I made Strawberry and almond blondies that I had used just 100 grams of strawberries!)

Apple and almond blondie

28 July: Apple and almond blondies

Ingredients

115g/ 4 oz butter + a little more for greasing

225g/8 oz soft light brown sugar

2 eggs lightly beaten

140 g/ 5 oz wholemeal self raising flour

85g/3oz ground almonds

2 dessert apples chopped into small chunks

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C/ 160 degrees C for a fan oven/ 350 degrees F/Gas Mark 4

Grease and line a shallow tin (mine is  7.5inches by 9.5 inches-/c.20 by 25 cm  but a 7 inch/18 cm or 8 inch/20 cm square tins would do as well) with baking parchment. If you cut the paper so that two sides stand higher than the tin, this makes removal of the cooked cake from the tin very easy.

Put butter and sugar in a saucepan over a gentle heat and stir until sugar has dissolved but don’t let the mixture boil (a bit of bubbling is ok). Let this cool for about 10 minutes.

Now add the lightly beaten eggs to the mixture and follow this with the sifted flour and ground almonds. Lightly toss in the chopped apple. 

Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, making sure that  the apple pieces are well distributed and the mixture is of an even depth.

Bake in the prepared oven for 20-25 minutes until a skewer in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Leave it in the tin for a few minutes and then, holding the baking parchment, remove the cake from the tin. (I often leave the cake in the tin until I get it to church.) Cut up and serve.

A light, moist cake, this went down well with coffee on a warm summer morning. I made it again in the week and have to say that it’s just as good with afternoon tea or for pudding.