Cookies are awesome. They’re simple to make, tasty, you can freeze the dough and you can eat it raw if you want to. I love them all. If I had to choose to only make one type of cookie for the rest of my life though, I would choose these.

But why?

Well, I’ve got to admit that the main reason isn’t even in their name – it’s the cinnamon in them that I would gladly give up the chance to eat any other type of cookie for. It might not be the first flavour you’ll taste in them, but it’s there, and it gives the cookies a wonderful warmth that just wouldn’t find otherwise.

Don’t get me wrong, the oatmeal gives the cookies a wonderful chewy texture, and the raisins give a brilliant juiciness, but it’s the cinnamon that does the job for me every time.

So, chances are, if I say I’m going to be making you some cookies I’ll probably be making you The Oatmeal and Raisin cookies. Om nom nom.

Makes 25 small cookies, and takes about 20 minutes all told.

Ingredients

• 150g butter
• 85g soft brown sugar
• 50 granulated sugar
• 1 small egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 100g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 125g porridge oats
• 100g raisins

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 180ºc

2. Cream the butter and sugars together.

3. In a separate bowl, combine the egg and vanilla extract, before adding these to the creamed ingredients and mixing lightly.

4. In yet another bowl combine the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Then, you guessed it – mix this slowly into the creamy eggy mixture.

   I tend to do this a third at a time to make sure everything combines together.

5. Finally, mix your oatmeal and raisins and add them to the mix.

6. Make sure everything comes together, cover and place in the fridge.

   Ideally, leave your mixture in the fridge overnight, but if you can’t wait then make sure you leave it in there for at least half an hour. The reason we do this is to let everything firm up again, which in turn means that the cookies won’t spread to cover your entire baking tray when you cook them.

7. Once your cookie dough is fully chilled, use a tablespoon to remove small chunks, which you should form into balls. Place them on a baking tray – I tend to fit nine cookies on a tray.

   Try to handle your balls as little as possible – you want them chilled, remember?

8. Bake for 11 minutes. Allow to cool sightly before removing from baking tray and then leave to cool on a cooling rack.

   Alternatively, put a couple of cookies in a shallow bowl with some good quality vanilla ice-cream and nom.

Another post, another chance to point to Lay the Table and show off a different recipe than the one Becs used. This time it’s for big fat nommery Chocolate Orange Cupcakes.

The cake mix is a fairly standard mix, with a bit of good quality cocoa powder thrown in. On top of that you have a nice fruity orange sugar syrup, all topped off with some zesty orange frosting.

Takes a couple of hours all told, ideally with a day in the middle. 20 minutes cooking time for the cakes.

These ingredients make 12 normal sized cupcakes or 24 little ones.

Ingredients

Zesty Orange Frosting

• 150g icing sugar
• 100g cream cheese (full fat!)
• 50g unsalted butter
• The grated zest of two oranges.

Orange Sugar Syrup

• The juice of one orange (about 5 tbsp)
• 75g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp Cointreau

Chocolate Cupcake base

• 100g unsalted butter
• 100g caster sugar
• 2 medium eggs
• 85g self raising flour
• 15g cocoa powder

Instructions

Zesty Orange Frosting

1. Cream the butter and sugar.

2. Add the cream cheese, and mix this in too.

3. Grate the zest of two oranges and, you guessed it, add this into the mix as well!

   Don’t chuck the oranges though – you’ll need one of them for the syrup.

Orange Sugar Syrup

1. Juice one of the oranges you had left over from the frosting.

2. Bring the orange juice and sugar to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar.

3. Let the syrup cool, and then stir in the Cointreau (or other orange liqueur if you prefer).

   Yes, this means there will be a tiny bit of alcohol in your cakes. If you’d prefer there not to be, just add another tablespoon of orange juice instead at this point.

4. Leave to infuse overnight if at all possible to let all the lovely flavours intermingle. If you can’t wait, then start making the cupcakes now instead.

Chocolate Cupcake

1. Preheat the oven to 160ºC.

2. Cream the butter and sugar.

3. Lightly beat the eggs, and slowly add them to the mix – combine on a medium speed.

4. Once the sugar, butter and eggs are combined, mix in the flour and cocoa powder at a low speed.

   That’s your cake mix – nice and simple.

5. Put your mix into your cupcake cases, and from there into the oven for 18-20 minutes.

   I use a children’s plastic icing plunger to place my cake mix into cases. I find this is much easier than using spoons, and quicker than using a proper icing bag (which is use for the proper icing).

6. Once the cakes have cooked, leave them to cool for ten minutes if you’re making normal cupcakes, or five minutes if you’re making mini ones.

7. Prick the top of the cupcakes a few times with something pointy like a cocktail stick, and using a pastry brush coat the tops with the sugar syrup.

   Be careful not to splash syrup everywhere, but also remember that the syrup is fantastic and will keep the cakes lovely and moist and add flavour so don’t be stingy. Don’t be worried if you have a load of syrup left though – that’s normal.

8. Once completely cooled, you can ice the cakes using your preferred method.

9. Finally, eat the damn cakes!

Last weekend was Becca’s birthday, and since I’d been promising her I’d make her a birthday cake I ended up scouring the internet for a nommy sounding recipe. Somehow I managed to miss the fabulous sounding recipe that Becs recently posted on Lay the Table, and instead settled on one from the BBC Good Food website, even though if I’m honest it didn’t visually appeal to me too much. As Becca said about the Good Food cake: “It looks like a f*cking breezeblock!”.

I’m ridiculously happy that I looked past that initial photo. What I ended up with after I tweaked things a bit was frankly fantastic. It’s ridiculously rich though, and definitely not something I could see myself making every week – it’s most certainly a treat cake.

Takes one hour and fifty minutes – twenty minutes preparation of the cake, one hour cooking, half an hour icing.

Ingredients

For the cake:

• 250g self raising flour
• 250g soft brown sugar
• 50g cocoa
• 250g plain chocolate
• 250g butter
• 4 eggs
• 200ml water

For the sauce and icing:

• 150g plain chocolate
• 250g milk chocolate
• 300ml single cream
• 25g butter
• 700g icing sugar

Instructions

The Cake

1. Preheat the oven to 160ºC.

2. Mix the flour, sugar and cocoa in a bowl.

3. Melt the chocolate, butter and water together in a pan.

4. Allow to cool slightly, and beat the wet into the dry mixture along with the eggs.

5. Dollop your mixture into a cake tin and bake for one hour.

The Icing

1. Whilst the cake cools, it’s time to make the icing.

   Melt the chocolate, butter and single cream in a pan, and mix until it becomes smooth and comes together.

2. Allow the sauce to cool for about 20 minutes.

3. Beat in about 250g of icing sugar.

   At this point the sauce should be rich, thick and dark.

4. Slice the cake in half, and spread as much of the sauce as you want between the slices. Put the top of the cake back onto the bottom.

5. Beat in the remaining icing sugar.

   The sauce will now have become icing, will be a lot lighter in colour and will form peaks in your bowl.

6. Apply the icing to the cake. Make it as messy as you want – there’s something magical about a fully iced cake covered in dozens of little peaks and troughs.

7. Allow the cake to set.

   Over the next couple of hours the icing will harden, allowing it to crunch when you bite into it. The inside of the cake and the rest of the icing will remain wonderfully moist and rich.

8. Host a party, or take the cake into work. This is one cake you certainly don’t want to keep to yourself.

I’m a big fan of flapjacks – they’re sweet and oaty and fruity and yummy. Even better, they’re gluten-free, so my coeliac friends can eat them too.

Most of the time I make mine with cherries and sultanas, but it’s just as easy to substitute in other ingredients.

Takes 10 minutes to prepare, 20 minutes to cook.

Ingredients

• 150g unsalted butter
• 200g light brown sugar
• 4 tbsp golden syrup
• 350g porridge oats
• 150g sultanas
• 100g glacé cherries

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 180ºc

2. Melt butter, sugar and golden syrup in a pan.

3. Whilst the meltening is happening, chop up your cherries. I tend to take them down to quarters.

4. Once everything’s melted remove from the heat, and mix in the oats, cherries and sultanas.

5. Press into a tin, and cook for 20 minutes in the oven.

6. Once it’s out of the oven, let the flapjack cool for a few minutes before scoring it deeply into portion sized pieces.

7. Once cold, turn out the flapjack and break into pieces.

Takes 30 minutes – 10 minutes preparation, 20 minutes cooking.

Ingredients

• 170g unsalted butter
• 50g granulated sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 210g plain flour
• a pinch of salt

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 180ºc.

2. Cream the butter and sugar, then beat in the vanilla extract.

3. Add flour and salt, and mix until everything’s come together.

4. Press hard into a tin and bake for 20 minutes, or until slightly golden.

   If I’m making this Shortbread to turn into Millionaire’s Shortbread I like to line the tin with foil to make turning it out later easier.

5. Once the Shortbread comes out of the oven, if you’re just going to keep it as Shortbread then you might like to score it with a knife to make it easier to break into nommy pieces once it’s cool.