Gem and Jo Bake Again

So if you saw our last post you'll know that we had a BBQ to celebrate the end of summer. For dessert we decided to keep things simple and we baked brownies and chocolate chip cookies. When we say keep things simple, we really kept things simple and we decided to use easy to bake items. These really cut down on the time need to make them and they turned out really delicious. Also Gem cannot cook without burning the whole house down so easy bake is the way to go!

We decided to begin with making the Home Cook Chocolate Fudge Brownies as these required a bit more time in the oven than the cookies. These were super easy to make. We just added all the ingredients into a mixing bowl and blended them together. What was great about the Home Cook brand was that it came with it's own baking tray that could be thrown away when the brownies were baked. This meant that we didn't have to do much washing up, and if there's one thing that we despise with the intensity of a thousand suns, it's washing up.

After taking the brownies out of the oven and perhaps eating one or two while they were still hot, we started to make the cookies! We picked up Odlum's Quick Chocolate Chip Cookie mix.These too were super simple to make (well in reality all you really do is mix!). Like the brownies, you only need a few ingredients such as some water, butter or margarine and mix it all together! Simples! 

The next part is the best! You get a hand full of dough and roll it into a ball in your hand, then stick it down on a lightly greased tray and press a little with your finger tips! 

Then stick the tray in the oven and bake them puppies until golden brown!

Both of these easy bake products were simple and easy to bake and tasted amazing when they were done! We will definitely be getting the Odlums Cookies again, they were absolutely delicious and had just the right amount of vanilla! 

Check out Odlums Here

Check out Home Cook Here

Both of these websites have tons of recipes and baking tips that will have you baking like a master in no time! 

Thanks for reading guys, let us know if you've tried either of these recipes or if you have a favourite recipe by Odlums or Home Cook! 

Until Next Time, 

Gem and Jo's End of Summer BBQ

We are starting back at college very soon and we have to face the fact that our summer is pretty much up! So in order to come to terms with this quite depressing notion, we decided to have a bit of a bbq with our friends, to say farewell, adios, au revoir, aloha, slán and auf wiedersehen to summer (That's goodbye in five languages for those of you who didn't get that!).
So in order to have a properly good shindig we felt the need to firstly make bunting. what kind of a party would it be without bunting, not a very good one in our opinion! We made it using A4 paper, string, and paint and strung it up in the trees to make the place look all sorts of pretty!

Next we prepared all the food because whats a bbq without food, its just a bunch of people hanging around! We decided to have a pretty laid back menu with burgers, sausages, salads and whatnot. We got pretty much all of this from Aldi, which meant everything was super cheap and really delicious! Seriously, their meat rivals some of the best butchers in Dublin (which Jo wouldn't know  since she's an ole veggie head). 

For dessert we baked!!!! And boy did it taste good! But you'll have to wait and see what we made in our next post, which will be up soon! 

We also made smores, cause what would a barbeque be without smores? They're kinda mandatory at a bbq! To make them we put rich tea biscuits on some tin foil wrapped trays and topped each with a marshmallow and a piece of chocolate (however we may or may not have eaten half the bar before it reached the tray!). You just have to stick the tray under the grill for a few minutes and voila! Top with one more biscuit and shove it in your mouth! (A glass of milk is advised).

As we are all of drinking age (yes we are adults even though we don't act it all the time!), we decided to make a bit of a cocktail to serve up with dinner. Now Jo is a bit of a peach fiend, anything peach flavoured or scented she must own, so peach schnapps was a must. We added that to equal parts orange juice and pineapple and passion fruit juice, gave it a swirl and poured it over ice for  super summery liquid-y deliciousness. 

Just before everyone arrived we set out some really cute little candles in jars, for the ambiance you know? It made the place look really cute and cosy!! Plus the candles were citronella, which kept the flies away, who likes flies all over their burgers? Not us! 

We had a really good night and it was a nice end to a great summer! The food was delicious (thank you Jo's mammy, we weren't really allowed near fire. That would have put everyone at risk!) and it was great getting to chill and goss with our friends before the hectic-ness of our final year of college takes over. 

As always, thanks you guys for reading! We really do appreciate it when we look at our stats at the end of the day and realise so many people have read our stuff!

Let us know in the comments if you liked this post! 

Until Next Time,