While busy exploring Twitter this week, I developed an instant obsession with photos of Quay’s 8 texture chocolate cake that adorned Reemski’s profile page (and check out her blog at http://www.tummyrumble.net/). The gooey, soft chocolate layers quickly prompted me to dig out my own chocolate brownie recipe that I had adapted from Nigel Slater’s “Very Good Chocolate Brownies” recipe. Here’s a teaser of the end result.
The very best gooey, fudge, mud chocolate brownies and recipe!
What makes a good muffin? To me it needs to be warm, moist and wholesome. If you have tried a fresh baked muffin from Steel Espresso in the mornings you will know exactly what I mean! Not only do the staff get creative with the daily flavours but their muffins are consistently moist with a crisp “muffin-top” that makes a die-hard foodie like myself extremely jealous!
Well, that jealousy and my obsessive curiosity got the better of me and I attempted to re-create the perfect muffin at home (although it wasn’t perfect – more on this later).

Catalonia satisfies but lacks that something special
Tapas seems to be the new Thai in Sydney and we are not complaining! I can think of nothing more enjoyable than trying a variety of small plate “tempters” with a few friends and ploughing through a few bottles of Spanish wine (yes the Ramon Bilbao Crianza Tempranillo is fantastic!)
This is exactly what we did on Saturday night at Catalonia in Kirribilli (http://www.catalonia.com.au/). We were seated downstairs and it was oddly quiet for a Saturday night (a slight cause for concern but it was a very wet, stormy evening). We were far too adventurous to be limited by the set menu so we ordered the following from the selection of ~20 dishes on offer with my thoughts on each…


