This is possibly one of my favourite desserts ever, and it’s surprisingly easy to make! If you don’t like chilli chocolate then you could just use good quality dark chocolate, but the chilli gives it a nice warming aftertaste. I used Lindt chocolate for this recipe, which comes from The Hairy Bikers’ Great Curries. It goes really well after a curry – make sure you check out my posts about the Chicken tikka masala and Saag aloo which are also from this great book!

Serves 4-6, depending on ramekin size

Ingredients

200g plain dark chilli chocolate
200ml double cream
50ml semi-skimmed milk
extra-thick double cream or creme fraiche for serving

Method

1. Put the chocolate on a sturdy board and chop it finely with a good strong knife.

2. Pour the cream and milk into a saucepan and bring slowly to the boil, while stirring. Remove from the heat.

3. Tip the chocolate into the pan with the cream and stir vigorously until the chocolate melts. Pour the mixture into 4 or 6 small ramekins or espresso coffee cups (anything small and heatproof will work!) and leave to cool.

4. Cover with cling film and chill for at least 2 hours before serving. If leaving to chill for more than 2 hours, remove from the fridge 30 minutes before serving. Enjoy!

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If you’re looking for a bit of sweet comfort food, then look no further! This recipe is from the BBC Food website and serves 6, but we just halved the amounts here (and left out the raisins because Tom doesn’t like them!). We had a huge batch of cooking apples from our neighbour, so I made a big pan of stewed apple and froze the rest of it, so there will be plenty of Eve’s pudding (and crumble) for us – yay!

Ingredients

6 large Bramley apples, peeled, cored and sliced
200g/7oz unsalted butter, softened
110g/4oz brown sugar
2 tbsp golden syrup
large pinch ground cinnamon
140g/5oz raisins
200g/7oz self raising flour.
4 free-range eggs
vanilla ice cream, to serve

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4.

2. Grease a large serving dish with 25g/1oz of the butter then scatter in the apple slices. Sprinkle over one or two tablespoons of the brown sugar, the golden syrup, cinnamon and finally the raisins.

3. In a mixing bowl, beat together the remaining butter and sugar with a wooden spoon until pale and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then use a large metal spoon to gently fold in the flour.

4. Spoon the batter over the apples and gently even out with the back of the spoon.

5. Bake for 45-50 minutes, or until golden-brown and cooked through. Serve warm with ice cream.

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Ingredients

4 Bramley Apples (with caster sugar to sweeten and a squeeze of lemon juice)

Cold water (enough to just cover one layer of apples in a pan)

200g plain flour

100g butter

100g dark muscovado sugar (or soft brown sugar)

100g oats (optional)

1-2 tsp cinnamon (optional)

Method

1. Peel the apples and chop into fairly small pieces. Place in a medium/large sized pan and add a squeeze of lemon juice – this stops the apple from going brown. There have been many occasions when I haven’t had a lemon, so I discovered that using golden caster sugar hides the slight browning.

2. Then add just enough cold water to cover the apple. Always be sparing with water – it is much better to add more later if needed, as you can’t take it out once it is in!

3. Cover the apples with caster sugar. I don’t usually measure this out, I just do it by eye. As with the water, you can always add more later if you prefer your apple sweeter.

4. Leave to simmer on a low heat. Whilst the apples are cooking you can start to make the crumble mix – and also pre-heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas 4.

5. Rub the butter and flour together until the mix resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add in the sugar (if you’re using the dark muscovado you might need to bash any bigger sugar lumps with a wooden spoon) and any optional ingredients such as oats and cinnamon.

6. The apple is cooked when you can squash it with the back of a wooden spoon. I like my apple quite chunky, but if you prefer it a little smoother then you can just give it a good stir. Put the apple into an oven-proof dish and pour over the crumble mixture (remember to box up some apple and crumble mix in separate boxes if you’re freezing some).

7. Bake in the oven for around 40 minutes, or until golden brown. Enjoy with custard and a cuppa (or ice-cream and a coffee if you prefer!).

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