Triple Chocolate Truffle Pie

Hello everyone,
Today I am here with a new recipe. Those of you that follow me on Instagram (@curlsncakes) might know that I recently came back from a (more than) week-long holiday in London. It was fantastic and I managed to see plenty of shows, ballets and musicals, one of which were the Broadway hit: Waitress. The musical is based on a movie from 2007 with Keri Russell and Nathan Fillion, with music written by Sara Bareilles. I saw the movie some time ago and loved it, because it was tragic and beautiful, and had so many pies in it.

Waitress is about an unhappy woman, Jenna. She's in a messed up relationship, but works as a waitress in a diner. Jenna's only happy when baking her pies. All along watching the movie and then the musical (which is beautiful with lovely music, by the way) I kept wishing there would be a recipe book for all these incredible pies that Jenna bakes.

Coming out of the play I noticed a book in the little shop stand in the theatre. And lo and behold, it was what I had wished for: Sugar, Butter, Flour - The Waitress Pie Book.
I was so excited and instantly bought it (and some other things).

This first pie that I baked from the book is called the In the Dark Dark pie, and it makes 24 cm pie. I made some modifications to the recipe to suit me and my ingredients more, and I will present that modified recipe. For the original recipe, see the book. Without further ado...

Triple Chocolate Truffle Pie

INGREDIENTS

For the pie shell:

• 1 packet of Oreos (original)
• 75 grams melted butter

For the pie filling:

• 230 grams dark chocolate, chopped
• 2 dl skimmed milk (1.5% fat)
• 2 dl heavy cream (35% fat)
• 2 eggs

For the pie topping:

• 2 dl heavy cream, chilled
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 dl powdered sugar
• 3 tablespoons cocoa powder
• Decorations in the form of chocolate curls

DIRECTIONS

Preheat your oven to 175°C.
Crush the oreos in a blender and add the butter to it. Press the moistened oreo crumbs into your pie tin. Refrigerate for at least 15 minutes and then bake in the middle rack of your oven for 10 minutes.

Bring the milk and heavy cream to just before a boil in a saucepan and pour it over the copped chocolate. Mix until smooth. In another bowl, whisk the eggs and then pour the chocolate mix into the eggs. Pour the egg mixture into the cooled pie crust. Bake for about 45 minutes. The centre of the pie should still be rather loose and wobbly when given a shake.

For the topping mix vanilla, sugar and cocoa together in a bowl. In another bowl whip the heavy cream until slightly thickened, then add the dry ingredients and whip until stiff peaks form. Pipe the topping using a piping bag and a tip unto the cooled (to room temperature) pie. Add the chocolate curls on top, and voilà!

I personally preferred this pie chilled, rather than cooled to just room temperature. So if you're anything like me, bake this pie the day before serving and refrigerate until you are going to eat it.

Until next time!

Much love,
Mona

Etsy Love: Summer Linen

 Hello all,
Some weeks ago, at the first sign of some warmer weather my sister and I went out to photograph this wonderful dress that I purchased from the Little Women Atelier shop on Etsy. This dress is so wonderful and breezy. It's made of 100% linen and it helps me keep cool in the summer.

Little Women Atelier is a shop inspired by the book Little Women by Louisa May Alcott from 1868, and something about this dress, the Meg dress has the elegance of the 19th century. Whether it's the puffy sleeves or the full skirt, I'll leave to you to decide. Little Women Atelier is a family business, and together the incredible women of their family create magnificent dresses, fit for any lady.

When I saw the Meg dress, I knew I had to save up to get one. It is one of the prettiest and most feminine dresses I own, without it being too girly. I purchased it in pale pink, which is a wonderfully serene and delicate colour, but they have this dress in many other colours too. The dress is well-made and the wonderful linen fabric feels so soft. It's a dress that inspires slow-living, sitting in your armchair with a good, classic book, having long walks in the warm summer breeze, or baking your favourite cake or biscuits to enjoy with family and friends. Simply said, it's a dress to live in and enjoy life in.

Dress: Little Women Atelier (here)
Flats: Asos (old)

I hope you all have a terrific start to your summer. I will be enjoying it in my breezy dress.
Much love,
Mona

Chocolate Macarons

Hello all,
Some weeks ago I made chocolate macarons, after not having baked macarons for over two years. I was worried that I had lost my touch, but alas it was fine!

That proves that this recipe is an easy one, and that really, you have to be really unlucky to fail with it. The macarons may not have been perfect (I think I would've needed another minute of beating the batter), but they were very tasty. That's really all anyone can ask for!

Chocolate macarons

INGREDIENTS

• 100 g almond powder
• 3 egg whites (about 100-110 g)
• 4 tablespoons sugar
• 185 g powdered sugar
• 15 g cocoa powder
  

DIRECTIONS

I like to prepare my egg whites by leaving them in room temperature for a day before I start baking. It yields better macarons in my opinion.
 
Preheat the oven to 150°C.
Sift the almond powder and throw away the large pieces.
Mix the almond powder with the powdered sugar and the cocoa and sift again.

In another bowl whisk the room tempered egg whites until it starts to foam. Then gradually add the tablespoons of sugar. Whisk the egg whites until thick and shiny. You should be able to hold the bowl upside down without anything pouring out.

Add the almond-powdered sugar-cocoa mix to the eggs and mix. This is where it can get a bit tricky. Obviously the almond-mix should get completely incorporated within the egg whites, however you usually need to mix it a bit more. I usually pick up a bit of the batter with a spatula and if it falls down in a ribbon like shape it is ready and should not be mixed anymore. Mix it too much and you get flat macarons.

Pour the batter into a piping bag with a round tip and pipe the batter onto baking trays prepared with baking sheets. Now it is important to let the piped to-be macarons rest on the baking trays in room temperature for about an hour. I know you're eager to see how they turn out, but the resting of the macarons is super important, because the surface dries a bit and that makes them not loose their shape when they are baked, and it enables the feet to come out when baked (if the anatomy of a macaron is a mystery to you, I highly recommend googling it, but below a photo follows to explain some things).

After the macarons have rested for about an hour in room temperature, bake them at 150°C for about 14 minutes.

Let the macaron shells cool completely before you fill them with ganache. For my ganache recipe click here.

I also painted my macaron shells with a bit of edible gold, just so that they would look a wee bit more luxurious.

And that, my friends, is really all there is to it!
I hope you enjoy this recipe.

Much love,
Mona

Woodland elf

Hello lovely people,
Hope you are all well. I am doing so well lately *knock on wood*. My medicines have stabilised my mood, and my depression has kept away. At the same time I've been in 12 weeks of cognitive behavioural therapy for my OCD, so I'm doing quite well.

As I've been doing well, I've had the time and interest in doing things, and I've been dabbling in creating larp characters. This character that I'm introducing today is a woodland elf. I imagine her name is Belilmadia and she enjoys walking in woods and singing with the birds.

It was fun to create this character and all her little details. The dress is the Acacia maxi petite dress from Holy Clothing, which I fell in love with from the moment I saw it. I decided on accessories around the dress.

The most enjoyable part of becoming this elf was adding the elf ears. I have dreamed of being an elf since I read The Hobbit when I was 8 years old. Finally I looked like one, and I feel like the ears were the most essential part. The ears are from the Etsy shop Mad House FX studio.

 

Dress: Acacia dress by Holy Clothing

Wig: LF667R by Wig is Fashion

Elf Tiara: This from Ayalga

Ear Cuff: This from Ayalga
Boots: Bought in London

I hope you liked this character, and these photos. The photos are taken in the woods about 5 minutes from where I live. I realise I'm very lucky having woods so close to where I live. The photos are by my incredible sister.

Much love,
Belilmadia

3.14 Day

Hello everyone and Happy Pi Day!
I come to you on this special day with another recipe, this time (of course) for pie!

This apple pie is adapted from a recipe by the Hummingbird bakery. I personally love my apples to be a bit on the sour side, so I chose Granny Smith apples, but you could use any juicy apples.

The wonderful apron and dress that I am wearing are both from Olga Valeska's Etsy shop. And my ring is from Femme De Bloom.

Without further ado...

Apple Pie

INGREDIENTS

• 520 g flour
• 220 g butter
• 4-5 tablespoons cold water

• 150 g butter
• 5 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 1/2 kg apples
• 100 g sugar
• 1 egg + a tablespoon milk

DIRECTIONS

Preheat the oven to 175°C.
Whisk the 220g butter with the flour, until you get a grainy consistency. Add cold water, tablespoon by tablespoon until the dough comes together. Leave to rest in clingfilm for an hour.

Divide the dough into two equal parts (one part for base, and one for the pie lid). Roll out one part of the dough until half a centimeter thick and line the pie tin with it.

Peel and slice the apples in fairly thick slices.
Put the 150g butter and cinnamon in a saucepan and melt the butter, then add the sugar followed by the apples slices. Make sure all the apple slices are covered with the butter-cinnamon-sugar mixture and let cook for a couple of minutes until the apple slices soften a bit, but are not completely cooked. Spread the apple slices on a plate and leave to cool.

Fill the dough covered pie tin with the cool apple slices. Roll out the other part of the dough, and place it on top of the apple slices like a lid. Cut a couple of slits in the pie lid (so that the steam can leave) and add any decorations.

Beat the egg and add a tablespoon of milk to it, then brush this mixture over the pie lid. Sprinkle on some sugar and bake for 30-40 minutes.

So there you have it, my apple pie. I hope you like the recipe and I hope you spend this Pi Day eating lots and lots of pie. I like to eat my pie with ice cream or custard, but I prefer Pie à la mode. How do you like to eat your pie? Please tell me in the comments.

Much love,
Mona

Blueberry bundt cake with lemon icing

Hello all,
Today I have a recipe of a delicious, citrusy blueberry cake for you! But before that I need to tell you about my inspiration behind this bake.

Two weeks ago was my birthday. I turned 28 years old, which I'm very happy about, because finally I left 27 behind me. The number 27 is really difficult to pronounce in Swedish - tjugosju. I'm so relieved I don't have to say I'm tjugosju years old anymore!

For my birthday, my dear friend Christiane (IG: @aliceinthewoodssomewhere) sent me a package filled with wonderful things, among them a beautiful Ravenclaw-styled apron that she had made herself!! I fell in love with everything in my birthday package, but I'm a real sucker for handmade things. I imagine that I can feel the love it was made with. This apron, in true Ravenclaw colours brightened my life with it's bold blue colour. And with that I figured I need to bake something with blueberry in it. So after a little bit of experimenting, I present to you a blueberry bundt cake.

Blueberry bundt cake with lemon icing

INGREDIENTS

• 200 g butter, room temperature
• 2 dl sugar
• 4 eggs
• 4 dl flour
• 2 tablespoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons lemon zest (I used all the zest I got from 1 lemon)
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 dl milk, room temperature
• 250 g blueberries

• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 3 dl powdered sugar

DIRECTIONS
Preheat your oven to 175°C. Prepare the bundt tin by buttering it, and then add flour to it so that the cake won't stick to the tin.

Beat the butter and sugar until slightly fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time.
Mix the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, lemon zest) together in a separate bowl.
Mix the milk and lemon juice in another bowl.
Alternate between adding the dry ingredients, then the wet, to the butter-and-sugar-mix. Start and end with the dry ingredients. Mix in the blueberries lastly. If you use frozen blueberries, like I did, they might become a bit wet, and might sink to the bottom of the batter (this happened to me). To avoid that, roll the blueberries in a bit of flour, and then add them to the batter.
Bake for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out dry.

For the icing, mix the lemon juice with the powdered sugar until it becomes thick, but pipeable. Drizzle or pipe the icing onto the cake after it's cooled.

I hope you enjoy this recipe. It was a lot of fun to make it and then bake it, and finally eat it!

Much love,
Mona

Etsy Love: Folksy and whimsical

Hello everyone,
It's been a while since I blogged and more than a year since my last Etsy Love post. I'll remind you of what it is - my Etsy Love posts are posts where I introduce you to some of my favourite shops and creators that can be found on Etsy.

I want to introduce to you the incredibly creative illustrator, photographer, artist, seamstress, crafter and shop owner Olga Valeska. Her style is influenced by traditional folk art and it has an air of whimsy to it - I absolutely adore everything about her and her shop. You can find Olga's stunning instagram account @olga_valeska, and her beautiful website here. Her Etsy shop has fantastic items, such as fine art prints, post cards, notebooks, home decor and hand made items of clothing, like the dress that I am wearing.

I saw this dress on instagram, and immediately thought I had to have it. I was lucky enough to find out it hadn't sold yet. The size of it was just right, on the milimetre, for me. So I instantly bought it.
When the package arrived it was like Christmas! Olga had packed it beautifully with love and an incredible eye for details. She had added a number of gifts for me in the package, such as a beautiful wooden hanging decoration and a mini wreath, as well as some postcards that are so beautiful that I want to frame them. Finally getting to the dress - I squealed with joy upon seeing it. It is just as folksy and whimsical as I wanted it to be. The dress is beautifully made with wonderful wooden buttons down the back, and the hand-embroidery is delicate, precise and oh-so-lovely! It is a comfortable and stunning dress that made me feel like a snow fairy in it. I adore it!

Olga is currently working on more items of clothing and I for one am excited about that!
She also has a sale in her shop right now! So please check it out - HERE.

Dress: Olga Valeska's shop (one of a kind)

Hood: Magic Doll (shop is now closed)
Knee socks: Primark
Boots: Ecco

Much love,
Mona

#IAMxTHELIGHT

The gorgeous inspiration and youtuber Nia the Light (IG: @niathelight) created this beautiful challenge where you're supposed to list the things you are and own it!

For a sufferer of depression like myself it's not always easy to express self-appreciation or self-love. This past week has been a really difficult one for me. I've had a really rough time with my OCD and I have been very low. Things have been dark and dreary, hazy and grey. So this challenge was just what I needed. I very rarely compliment myself, and I very rarely have positive thoughts about myself. However, because of this challenge I wrote a list of all the things I think I am. Then I crossed over the negative words. In the video below I decided to omit the negatives and only say the positives and neutrals. It felt surprisingly good to make a video only saying nice things about myself.

So I want to pass on this challenge... If you do it, please let me know.

And thank you Nia for this incredibly difficult and eye-opening challenge.

Much love,
Mona