Dang, am I exhausted! It’s been months in the planning, packing, executing, commuting, microwaving of sad lonely dinners for one and absolutely sod all baking. BUT! Finally! Me and Hungry Hubby are back together again, living in the same (beautiful) house and all is well with Our World again.

All in all, I’ve a very good feeling we’ll be very, very happy here for the next three years of my contract. Such is a doctors life – laying down roots until you’re a consultant is a risky business.

Anyway, after two short weeks*, we have completely moved in and apart from a second delivery of Ikea bookcases and kitchen cabinets etc etc, our move is complete. We have recycled our last flat pack cardboard removals box – it felt like a sacred moment down in the recycling room of our new development that did!

Everything has found a home (more or less) and whilst working like a demon at my day job and then coming home to break my back further on the “sorting out” and lots of late nights, it’s time to do some baking again.

Chocolate Gooey Raspberry Cakes

{*= short in the numerical sense you understand – anyone who has ever moved a home knows exactly why it is up there with marriage, divorce and bereavements as one of the number one sources of stress. My poor skin is suffering from an eczema flare and I’m not looking quite as, erm, “polished” shall we say as I would like for my day job.}

Actually, it’s a bit of a fib to say I’ve done sod all baking as really what I mean, is sod all for me. There have been a batch of cupcakes, a big fat carrot cake and some ooey gooey caramel apple sticky buns on my Facebook page but this is the first time I’ve felt I’ve really had the time (and energy) to potter about my spacious new kitchen and whip up a treat or two. So whilst the baking fairy had sprinkled me with the energising spirit of domestic goddessery I thought I’d do two bakes. A noobie and an oldie. So here they are.

Miranda Gore Browne’s book “Biscuit” is just lovely. It’s quintessentially English and rings of nothing but proper, made with love home bakes. It’s an Ode to the Biscuit and I’ve loved everything I’ve made from it. If you want American cookies, look elsewhere – instead, revel in some Ye Olde British biccies and put the kettle on. This time, I chose some divine little bics Miranda calls “lemon drizzlers”. I had an inclining just looking at the picture that I would really love them. They were a triumph.

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Little free form moulds of ground almond, rich sweet dough, doused immediately upon exiting the oven with a lemon glacé icing, I’m not ashamed to say that we ate half before I even got my camera out of its bag! For all the simplicity of the ingredients, method and look of these biccies you are rewarded with a rather magical texture I can akin to my friend Thanh’s toothsome, citrusy sweet Friands, but in biccie form.

They have a chew to them as you bite into one of these drizzlers but it quickly gives way to a melting texture and that sharp tang of lemon. I planned on taking these into work as I thought they’d be handy for in between clinics but alas, there weren’t enough to bring in for my colleagues, they somehow disappeared. And the teapot got well used. Neither events are anything to do with sticky pawed me and Hungry Hubby. Honest.

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So then I had to come up with another treat to take to work and ironically as I hadn’t tried a drizzler before I decided on these but I turned to Thanh for another cracking recipe. These little cakes are just to die for. I’ve made them in all sorts of shapes and sizes, even once turning them into a pan of brownies and another time mixing it up a little with some peanut butter and salted peanuts rather than Nutella and fresh raspberries. This way though, in my mini muffin pan with just a single raspberry to adorn them, is my favourite.

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I only ever make half a batch of Thanh’s recipe as I find it makes 10 muffin sized cakes or here, 20 mini muffin sized ones. Now if I were having a big party I would make more but as I find them hard to part with at the bay of times, making fewer is the answer for me! Now, should you be on the 5:2 diet, you’ll be delighted to know two facts.

One, these cakes last at least three days in a tin at room temp.

Two, each morsel made as I have in miniature is only 52 calories per cake! Yup, me and one of my nurses did the math on Tuesday lol.

What you get is a rich chocolate cake with a close but moist crumb with a molten middle filled with Nutella and topped with a raspberry that upon baking, oozes into the Nutella and forms a concentrated fresh raspberry jam taste and texture. Oh, they are just wonderful! Everyone I’ve made them for loves them and I even came into work this morning (long after the last cake had been eaten) to find my colleagues discussing how I should be on the next Bake Off as they were so good! Lol, now I can’t take credit for this wonderful recipe but I’ll give you my scaled down version.  It is originally a recipe by Katie Quinn Davies of the beautiful blog What Katie Ate.

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As for Miranda’s drizzlers – get the recipe here. Just do yourself a favour and make a double batch. They don’t last long enough if you don’t 😉

Print
Gooey Cakes with Nutella and Raspberries
Servings: 20
: 79 kcal
Author: Just Jo
Ingredients
  • 100 g caster sugarDSC_0156
  • 2 large eggs
  • 50 g plain flour
  • 40 g cocoa
  • 90 g melted butter
  • 20 large raspberries frozen work very well
  • Half a small jar of Nutella
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 200°C.
  2. Spray a mini muffin pan with oil. If using mini baking cups, you don’t need to spray them.
  3. Whisk the eggs and sugar until fluffy.
  4. Sift over the flour and cocoa and whisk this in, followed by the melted butter.
  5. Spoon out about 2 tbsp worth of batter into each cup.
  6. Dot ½ tsp Nutella onto each then push a whole raspberry on top of the Nutella, nestling it into the cake batter by half – the cake will rise around it and hold the raspberry and Nutella in place.
  7. Bake for 10-12 minutes by which time the chocolate cake will spring back and the fruit will be jammy and encase all that molten Nutella. Happy days!
  8. Cool in the tin for 10 minutes before unmoulding.
Recipe Notes

Adapted from What Katie Ate (the blog)

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