I must admit I’d never heard of Fitwaffle before I picked up a copy of this book the other day. I’d gone to Northallerton to buy baking supplies and saw Fitwaffle’s Baking It Easy on the shelf in WHSmith! I am always looking out for new baking books. Those of you who know me well, know I love my recipe books, especially the baking ones. I had to have a massive recipe book cull a while back and went through all the books I’d not really bothered with. I think my local Oxfam were wondering where on earth they would store all these books as there were too many to put on the shelf. I don’t buy as many new books as I used to. This is a mixture of trying to save my important cash for other things or really that I can find most things I want on the Internet!
So, having never heard of Fitwaffle before and seeing a rather scrumptious looking S’more Cookie Dough bar adorning the cover, I just had to peek inside. Here were loads of mouthwatering recipes with many using small amounts of ingredients. (I like that idea!)
Eloise Head is the name behind Fitwaffle, which is an Instagram page and a blog which started off as a way of showing her fitness and food experiences. But then once the pandemic started, Eloise started up Fitwaffle Kitchen on TikTok and Instagram where she posted her foodie creations from her home during lockdown. She wanted these recipes to be accessible, as at the time as we all know, sometimes certain ingredients were difficult to come by. This is why some of Fitwaffle’s recipes are 3,4 or 5 ingredient bakes. I was totally up for that but surprised that I hadn’t seen all these recipes before on Instagram. I do have TikTok but need to learn how to use it properly!
The Book Layout is very user friendly with a useful section on equipment and some key ingredients you may come across in the books. You’ll be pleased to know you don’t need any fancy tins or utensils to bake these recipes as they are all things you can buy in a supermarket or that you probably have in your kitchen anyway. There’s also a double page spread listing some ingredients you will find in a Fitwaffle recipe. Again, these are all things you will find in a supermarket.
There are 8 chapters of recipes. The first seven chapters starts with a 3 ingredient bake, then progresses through from 4 ingredients to 5. The final chapter is entitled All Star Bakes which contain more ingredients but were too delicious to leave out.
The eight chapters are:
- Fudge, Cups, Truffles and Bites
- Cakes, Cupcakes and Muffins
- Mug Cakes
- Traybakes
- Cookies, Biscuits and Other Flat Bakes
- Ice Cream, Shakes and Chilled Desserts
- Sweet Breakfasts
- All Star Bakes
As with any baking recipe book, I always look to the cookie section first! Always my favourite thing to make, again why my blog is called SmartCookieSam! I wasn’t disappointed with the selection in this book, I can tell you. The other section I always head to after the cookies, is the traybake one because at the moment I make lots of brownies, blondies and Rocky Road. The latter is so easy to do and to knock together if you don’t have much spare time. Hence why I chose a Rocky Road recipe to test out first!
My Top Ten Recipes to choose out of Baking It Easy (in no particular order!)
- Easter Fudge
- Chocolate Bark
- Chocolate Biscuit Cake
- Cookies and Cream Marshmallow Bars
- Peanut Butter Cornflake Bars
- Chocolate Malt Ball Rocky Road
- Speculoos Rocky Road
- Nutty Caramel Slice
- Soft Speculoos Cookies
- S’Mores Tart
To be honest, I am not overly enthusiastic about making Mug Cakes and although I love ice cream and shakes, I’d rather look towards the baking element of the book. But having said that, the recipes do look delicious.
I chose to make a Speculoos Rocky Road as my first recipe to test out of the book. Speculoos, for those of you who don’t know, is the type of Belgian biscuit which we know as the brand Biscoff or those lovely crisp, spicy cookies you get in a coffee shop. Biscoff, to me is a dream ingredient in baking. Not just the biscuits but the oh so delicious spread you can buy in jars. Speculoos is also known as Speculaas in the Netherlands and you can buy wonderful speculaas spice blends to make these gorgeous cookies. Fitwaffle’s Speculoos Rocky Road uses the Biscoff biscuits (the traditional ones, not the circular sandwich ones), Biscoff Spread, white chocolate and mini marshmallows.
You can see how to make Speculoos Rocky Road in Fitwaffle’s video here:
I have a tin of condensed milk in the cupboard so it might be Easter Fudge next on the list! Watch this space!
Happy Baking!
Love Sam xx
SmartCookieSam 