Kim and Tim make brownies

Best birthday cake ever

A little while ago, me and my housemates made chocolate orange ginger hazelnut brownies. Well, I say "we" made them, but I seem to remember that Tim and Kim, two friends of ours, made them whilst I gave them instructions. Not that I'm bossy at all, or taking advantage of the little competition between the two of them to get them to make my cake... Anyway, we had a couchsurfer called Renato staying with us that night and as it happened to be his birthday, we presented this to him as a birthday cake. We all really enjoyed it, so here's the recipe...

• Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 5/180°C.
• Cream together 250ml sugar, 240g soya/sunflower spread and 1tsp salt (if you have a blender you could use it now, but we didn't).
• Add 3 tbsp cocoa powder and 125g self raising flour (if you don't have self raising flour, just add baking powder to plain flour, about 3tsp for every 225g).
• Stir in 100g melted chocolate (be careful not to burn it), 120ml orange juice and a handful of chocolate chips/nuts/crystalised ginger/anything else you want to add. Be careful not to over-mix it!
• Line a square tin with greaseproof paper and pour in the mix.
• Bake for 25 minutes. It should still look a bit squishy, but cools harder.
• Enjoy! It's possibly one of the best brownies I've ever tasted...

Recipe source: Return of the Cake Scoffer

Abi and Emma make cheesecake, and Emma has a terrible confession

First off, the good news. Me and my friend Abi tried out a new cheesecake recipe, which was absolutely delicious; much better than my previous attempts (which were, nevertheless, still perfectly edible). Some of the ingredients seem a little odd, but for the taste, it's definitely worth it. I'll write up the recipe in just a moment...

A more successful attempt at cheesecake

Now for the not so great news... Well, in short, I'm not vegan anymore. I alternate between thinking "Oh, I'll still be mostly vegan, just less strict..." (I managed to put myself off the taste of milk, cheese and egg so it's just things that contain them which I actually still like); "Yuck, why am I eating this? I want to be completely vegan!" (when confronted with a cheese sandwich, or thinking about the dairy industry); "Mmmm, I'll go back to veganism someday, just not yet..." (when eating Galaxy chocolate); "Yeah, being vegan's great, why did I ever stop?" (when eating vegan chocolate); but mostly it's, "Ah, I can't be bothered. I agree in theory, but I don't feel so passionate anymore and it's just so annoying all the things which could so easily be vegan, but aren't..." which is why I'm not vegan anymore. Basically, I'm just a failed human being.

I still bake vegan cake, though, so that's all okay... So, looking on the bright side, back to the cheesecake.

• Preheat the oven to 175°C/Gas Mark 4.
• Mash 15 digestive biscuits (about 200g).
• Mix with 100g melted margarine, 50g sugar and 1/2 tsp cinnamon.
• Spread out in a pie tin and leave to cool.
• Blend 250g silken tofu with 250g vegan cream cheese (we used Scheese).
• Add 75g sugar, 1 tsp vanilla extract and 2 tbsp lemon juice.
• Grate 1/2tsp skin of lemon and 1 tbsp skin of orange then add to the mix.
• Fill the tin with tofu mix and bake for 30-40 minutes.
• Leave to cool.
• Boil 100ml juice (we used elderflower) and whisk in 1tsp agar flakes (alternatively, just use veggie jelly).
• Add some sliced fruit to the top of the cake, then pour jelly on top.
• Leave to cool, again... Then enjoy!

Recipe source: Rebecka. Thanks! :)