BBC Good Food Show

Today was the first day of The London BBC Good Food Show. We had an exceptional start. Arriving late yesterday afternoon after baking our hearts out for 2 days straight to get all of our yummy brownies up to the show we got set up and ready to go.

We introduced a new product to our family of brownies. We are now doing a Do-It- Yourself brownie. Which is essentially the same mix we use for our brownies, but you can take it home, mix it yourself, and enjoy fresh baked brownies...I dare them to make it too far out of the pan! They proved so popular this morning we sold out all of our kits by this afternoon!! We will shortly be adding them to the website and they will be available for Christmas orders.

Thank you to everyone who dropped by today! Thank you for having a taste and all of your wonderful comments!

More excitement to come for tomorrow! Hope you come by and visit!

Big Chocolate Kisses!

Deirdre

5 Star Brownies

Well, today we had our first visit from the local food safety officer. We spent some time discussing the logistics of running the kitchen. Then came the nerve racking part, I was making up the orders for the day with an audience (the food safety officer and a student)!

Great news is that the inspection went well. We received 5 stars, the highest rating. The food inspector was very impressed with our general awareness and the steps that are taken in our kitchen to ensure great food safety.

Unfortunately for her, she was unable to taste test any of the brownies, something she looked very sad not to be able to do!

For more information: http://www.iwight.com/scoresonthedoors/

Isle of Wight County Press

For those of you who don't live on the Island, we have just received our first local press. The Isle of Wight County Press published a story about the business.

Check it out:

http://www.iwcp.co.uk/News/Business/LIFE_IS_SWEET_FOR_DEIRDRE.aspx

Garlic Farm

So some of you might have been wondering why I was tinkering with the idea of putting Garlic in to brownies...I'm not just a crazy experimentalist! We have now started distributing our brownies at the Islands very popular Garlic Farm Shop. Set in a beautiful location this sweet farm shop offers all sorts of food goodies, mainly involving their star product, you guessed it, garlic! They also carry many Island based companies, now including ours!

If you're ever in the area, I recommend you come check them out.

www.thegarlicfarm.co.uk

Food Lovers Approved!

We just got word that we have been approved by the team at Food Lovers Britain (www.foodloversbritain.com). They are a discerning group who look for local and regional businesses using the freshest local produce to deliver quality produce and products. Led by Writer, broadcaster and food advocate, Henrietta Green.

Last week we sent them a sample pack of our triple chocolate brownies and apparently they were well enjoyed as we have officially received the thumbs up!

Brownies by any other name?

Well, in the test kitchen we've been going through many of the suggestions that were given to us at the Real Food Festival (and let's just say there were lots, blue cheese flavoured brownies anyone?).

An interesting one that we decided to give a go, as it sounded challenging was the reverse brownie. A white chocolate brownie with dark chocolate chunks.

After thinking out how to do this and what quantities to use, etc, we made our first reverse brownie. It is definitely in need of some tweaking, but generally, the first attempt was a success.

Tasted like white chocolate, had the same texture of a brownie, but was white, not chocolate. The official tester (aka my fiancee) has declared the reverse brownie a success that he will eat again, can we please add more white chocolate?

I've not taken any pictures yet, as I'm still worried that it looks a bit like an alien brownie, it is white! But as soon as we've perfected it we will be taking some glamour shots and getting it online.

Next test idea: Garlic brownies, can it be done and still taste good? Stay tuned!

Weddings & Brownie Cupcakes

Well, after many requests at the Real Food Festival- Do you do wedding cakes, favours, etc, I decided it was time to put the thinking cap on and come up with a neat idea for the wedding brownie! We've done them before (small picture), but I got to thinking they could be even better.

After thinking it out for a while I decided to go the cup cake route, as they are pretty and well we can keep the recipe as a brownie on the inside, but dress it up as a cupcake on the outside. We whipped up a nice buttercream icing and I'm pretty pleased with the effect. I think they would make a lovely addition to any wedding. Not to mention we taste tested some (as you must when you bake brownies for a living!) and they are pretty darn good! Let us know what you think.