Birthday Brownies

My boyfriend has invented the ultimate gift for all female colleagues who celebrate their birthday at the office: birthday brownies. As a bonus he decorates them in a way that suits the birthday girl, in this case with drunken cats barfing magic rainbow puke. (I came up with that theme and I'm proud of it :) Because I haven't eaten a crumb of these brownies I decided to bake a little something for myself, this chocolate orange cream cheese pound cake. It's not as wildly decorated, but it does taste GOOD. I'm going to make love to it for the rest of the week.

Now We Wait

Seems like spring has finally come our way. I love to watch how nature revives as the days grow longer. Sowed some seeds today, cress as you can see in the picture, and a few flower bulbs, can't wait for them to sprout!

Sweet Agaric

The past couple of days I spent on this project. It began with something I saw on Pinterest. There was a picture of kids painting with M&M's. They put them in a bowl with water and the water got the color of the M&M's and the candies themselves turned white. As you can see in the picture. I found this really interesting and wanted to know more about the dyes. This is what I found on Wikipedia:

Red M&M's currently contain Allura Red AC (FD&C Red #40, E129). In Europe, Allura Red AC is not recommended for consumption by children. It is banned in Denmark, Belgium, France, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Austria, and Norway.[10] Instead, Cochineal (E120) is used in the red shells.
Allura Red AC is a red azo dye that goes by several names including: Allura Red, Food Red 17, C.I. 16035, FD&C Red 40.
In Europe, Allura Red AC is not recommended for consumption by children. It is banned in Denmark, Belgium, France and Switzerland, and was also banned in Swedenuntil the country joined the European Union in 1994.[11] The European Union approves Allura Red AC as a food colorant, but EU countries' local laws banning food colorants are preserved.[12] In Norway, it was banned between 1978 and 2001, a period in which azo dyes were only legally used in alcoholic beverages and some fish products.[13]
In the United States, Allura Red AC is approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in cosmetics, drugs, and food. It is used in some tattoo inks and is used in many products, such as soft drinks, children's medications, and cotton candy. On June 30, 2010, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) called for the FDA to ban Red 40. Executive Director Michael Jacobson said, "These synthetic chemicals do absolutely nothing to improve the nutritional quality or safety of foods, but trigger behavior problems in children and, possibly, cancer in anybody."[14]

The red dye apparently isn't that good for you, to illustrate that I arranged the props as a fly agaric, which also is not recommended for consumption.

Sarah Illenberger

»KINDER! WAS DAS ALLES KOSTET!«
NIDO MAGAZIN
Fotografie: Ragnar Schmuck

I just discovered the work of Sarah Illenberger and fell head over heels with her aesthetics, humorous touch and great love for detail. Seriously the color schemes, great ideas, materials she uses like paper, flowers, food. Mind is blown. She filled me with tons of ideas and I haven't even met the woman. I should. But first I have to grow me some balls.

Rootlets

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Last autumn, when these hydrangea flowers were cut off by the gardener, I rescued them from the garbage and put them in a vase. Out of habit I put them in water, it wasn't necessary, since the flowers were all dried, but I hadn't really thought about it. I just kept them this way and they still look beautiful. But a few weeks ago I noticed they were growing little rootlets. I accidentally rooted the hydrangeas! I probably should plant them, now what should perk up my table? Tulips? 

Close-up

Black Bean Brownies

Today I thought it was about time I tried black bean brownies, the most weird, healthy and humble brownies recipe there is. But along the way I threw in so much stuff, basically everything I had lying around, it turned out to be yep still weird, but in a crazy decadent way. The brownies contain more black beans than butter or sugar, but that is totally negated by adding a layer of deep, dark butter caramel. With 'normal' black bean brownies you will leave people guessing the secret ingredient, today's brownies however have so many secret ingredients they will leave a distorting trail of crumbs, full bellies and confusion. They are a bit strange (but not just because of the beans, you can't really taste them) and nonetheless utterly delicious and lusciously rich.

The basic black beans brownies recipe was adapted from Joy the Baker (she is great, I'm a huge fan of hers. I might dedicate these brownies to her cat, which is good-looking, funny and a bit scary, just like the brownies) and I also had a little look at the version of Green Kitchen Stories (the king and queen of the green cuisine, I'm afraid they would be terribly shocked if they knew what I did with the bean brownies) 

The deep, dark butter caramel sauce recipe was adapted from Smitten Kitchen (also a tremendous source of inspiration) but because I was going to sprinkle salted nuts on top I used unsalted butter.

Brownies:

50 gram butter

150 gram chopped chocolate

1 1/4 cup black beans, rinsed and drained

1 1/3 cup sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 cup salted nuts, I used a mix of pistachios, pecans and almonds

Place a rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Line an approximately 23x25 cm baking pan with parchment paper, leaving about 4 cm of overhang on all sides.

Fill a medium sauce pan with 4 cm of water.  Bring the water to a simmer. Place butter and chocolate in the bowl.  Place the bowl over simmering water and stir until chocolate and butter are melted and combined.  Remove the bowl from the simmering saucepan (the bowl might be hot!).

Puree the beans in blender with the flour, 1/2 cup of the nuts, cocoa powder and baking powder.

Allow the melted chocolate mixture to cool for a few moments.   Whisk in the bean puree and vanilla extract.

In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs for about 3 minutes, whisk in the sugar. Add to the chocolate mixture. Use a spatula and fold to incorporate.  

Add whatever you have lying around in your pantry, in my case banana chunks and chocolate covered raisins.

Once thoroughly combined, pour the batter into the prepared pan.  

Bake brownies for 30 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the center comes out with just a few chocolate crumbs on it.  The center may seem undercooked, but it will cook further as it cools.  Brownies are better slightly underdone than overdone. 

Let cool on a wire rack for 20 minutes.  

Deep, dark butter caramel sauce:

1 cup sugar

85 gram butter, the better you can get, the better it will taste (true!)

1/2 cup cream, at room temperature

Melt the sugar over medium high heat in a larger pot than you might think you'll need. (I'm sorry the melting takes a while, but in the end it's all worth it!) Cook the liquefied sugar to a nice, dark copper color. Add the butter all at once and stir it in, before turning of the stove and pour in the cream (the sauce will foam up quite a bit when you add it; this is why you want the larger pot.), whisking until you get a smooth sauce. Keep whisking till it has thickened a bit, pour over the brownies and sprinkle with remaining nuts.

Use the overhanging parchment paper to remove the brownies from the pan, slice and indulge.

The mysterious landscape of brownies

Tulips

My mother put the tulips inside when it started to freeze again. Although, now it is above zero, the flowers remain inside. I'm thinking of doing this at my place, I love the idea of an early spring in my living room.