This year we’ll be in Spain for Easter and I was a bit sad that we’d miss out on some of our favourite Easter traditions. Sure there’s the egg hunt but it’s the treats and the celebration of new life as our extended family gathers together, that I’ll miss most. In typical fashion, I decided to move up the holiday and so we gathered the family for a quick mini celebration. If you’re in need of a new iPad, read on because we have a giveaway!
Disclosure : I am part of the PTPA Brand Ambassador Program with Gay Lea and I received compensation as part of my affiliation with this group. The opinions on this blog, as always, are TOTALLY ours!
This month Gay Lea encouraged us to get creative in the kitchen with the theme ” Not your Grandmother’s recipe” and sure enough, there’s NO WAY I’d be messing with any of my grandmother’s recipes (she’d be SO unimpressed!). For Sri Lankans Easter falls around the same time as our New Year and so only a few Christian families celebrate Easter. Growing up my dad insisted that we go to Church in the morning and then the extended family came over for dinner. Each year the menu changed drastically but we loved seeing the chocolate biscuit pudding make an appearance at dinner.
My mom’s cousin makes THE BEST biscuit pudding and during our visit to Sri Lanka this December, she ensured that I had my fair share. It had been years since I had her biscuit pudding and so I thought I’d merge her version and my mom’s recipe to come up with a slightly boozier version that’s more to my current liking. This no bake biscuit pudding is easy to make and fun for kids to help out in the kitchen!
Gay Lea focuses their products around only the good stuff and their slogan “Born on the Farm” means the ingredients list includes only the things that NEED to be in there. No extra processing, no extra chemicals, and no extra preservatives. Take Gay Lea’s Salted Butter for example – two ingredients: Milk/Cream and butter. Nothing else. You can taste the goodness in my Chocolate Biscuit Pudding which has plenty of butter!
No Bake Boozy Sri Lankan Chocolate Biscuit Pudding Recipe
- 1/2 cup of salted Gay Lea butter at room temperature
- 1 cup icing sugar
- 1/2 cup cocoa
- 3/4 cup cream
- 1 packet Marie biscuits
- 1/2 cup warm milk (or milk coffee if you’re a coffee lover!)
- 2 tbsp Cognac
- Handful of chopped pecans or cashew nuts (for garnish)
- 1 tbsp chocolate sauce for garnish (if desired)
Using a handheld mixer whip the butter until fluffy, add the icing sugar and cocoa powder and mix until everything has blended. Add cognac and cream, mixing until the chocolate icing is nice and fluffy.
Choose a deep dish (Little Monkey’s lunch box worked perfectly for us!) and place a layer of cling film ensuring that all the sides are covered. This will help you lift the pudding out easily when cooled.
Pour the warm milk into a bowl (big enough to dip the biscuits in). Ensure that the cookies are not overly soaked, so they don’t crumble (pop it in your mouth if it does!). The chocolate buttercream is soft, creamy and decadent, which contrasts nicely with the milky cookie layers.
Slather a later of the buttery chocolate mixture into the base of the dish. Then, dip the biscuits a few at a time into the milk (or coffee) and layer them into your serving dish. Next layer with chocolate mixture (about 1/2 inch high). Follow with another layer of soaked biscuits and then the chocolate mixture. Continue layering until you only have a 1/4 cup of chocolate mixture and ensure that your last layer is a biscuit one.
Chill for at least 2 hours.
When you’re ready to serve, take it out of the fridge, and gently lift the pudding out of the container with the aid of the cling film. Flip the cake onto your serving tray and ensure that the biscuit layer is at the bottom. Now use the remaining chocolate mixture to even out the top nicely and garnish with nuts and chocolate sauce as desired.
Enjoy a slice with a cup of tea or with a glass of red wine!
Gay Lea has some great recipes to inspire you to get in the kitchen, so enter below for a chance to win an iPad Mini so you can check out the awesome video recipes!
Melissa Black
April 4, 2017 at 1:26 amWe use food processors for lots of things like shredding and grinding. So handy and much faster and more consistent than by hand.
Yashy
April 4, 2017 at 10:39 amTrue! I need to get one soon!
Andrea Amy
April 4, 2017 at 1:57 amI get recipes online from websites, blogs, etc, and I definitely use my kitchenaid hand mixer and stand mixer to make things easier.
Yashy
April 4, 2017 at 10:39 amThose mixers are the best!!
Amy Heffernan
April 4, 2017 at 6:02 amThanks to the internet I am always able to search new ideas and recipes for cooking! New tools in the kitchen are also a huge help when you have them! Like those big mixers. Thanks!
Yashy
April 4, 2017 at 10:39 amYes. I love getting inspiration from new recipes.
ivy pluchinsky
April 4, 2017 at 10:51 amI use a food processor a lot! And I really need a mixer, have always wanted one!
s powell
April 4, 2017 at 10:51 amHi I like using the internet to search new recipes. Its a lot easier than going through books although there is a couple go to recipies in the books but I tweak them up by checking on the internet.
Beth Dimauro
April 4, 2017 at 10:53 amI love collecting new recipes to cook for my family.
Jane Reid
April 4, 2017 at 11:24 amI think technology is really helping with Healthy Eating . I love my High Tech blender for Smoothies and making Nut Milks etc plus Air Popper for Popcorn and Air fryer .
Natalie V
April 4, 2017 at 11:40 amI bought a food scale to weigh my baking ingredients rather than measuring – it’s made such a difference!
Natalie V
April 4, 2017 at 11:45 amIt wouldn’t let me upload my story – so I’ll post it here! These are my Gramma’s almond cookies. Every year, it became more and more challenging for our family to get to Saskatoon and for her to visit us, so she would send them to us in the mail. Back in that day, margarine was the thing to bake with. It came in a large rectangular plastic tub. Gramma would go through an entire tub making these cookies for the various family members and then because we lived in Calgary, she’d fill the tub and mail them to us. I made them for my mom after finding the recipe last year – but we cannot for the life of us use margarine in baking – so I used Gay Lea butter – salted (it adds a little something) and they turned out fantastic! They’re best when they’re extra crispy and drenched in milk. We had forgotten we had the recipe after my Gramma had passed. Actually, I made them for my mom probably every weekend for a month, they were so tasty and brought back a lot of good memories! And real ingredients, not chemicals!!!
Yashy
April 7, 2017 at 1:04 pmThank you for sharing the story with us! Sorry you had to post it twice. I now want to sample them and totally agree about the salted butter adding a certain something something!
Bailey
April 4, 2017 at 11:59 amI love being able to google a specific ingredient and get all sorts of recipes.
joanne darrell
April 4, 2017 at 3:28 pmTechnology helps me in the kitchen when I use online recipes.
Stephanie
April 4, 2017 at 3:59 pmI don’t really use technology in the kitchen other than websites for recipes! That’s where I get most of my inspiration.
LILLIAN BROWN
April 4, 2017 at 4:16 pmTechnology helps me in the kitchen, love using my pressure cooker and looking up new recipes on my computer
nicky
April 4, 2017 at 4:26 pmWe find recipes online, and we use the computer to look them up while we are cooking in the kitchen. This iPad would really come in handy for that!
Calvin F.
April 4, 2017 at 4:28 pmYes I look for recipes online, I never owned a tabliet or ipad before. I usually use my phone or pc before hand.
I use the toaster oven a lot, microwave, and blender some of the times.
Kim Tanti
April 4, 2017 at 5:32 pmI love my ninja. I use it daily for my shakes.
Angela Mitchell
April 4, 2017 at 8:50 pmI’m still missing a few electric pieces for my kitchen that I would like like a stand mixer etc. I do use a lot of online recipes now though and it’s so convenient!
Andrea
April 4, 2017 at 9:02 pmI get recipes from blogs, pinterest, etc. thanks to the internet.
Joanne
April 4, 2017 at 10:51 pmI could totally use a new iPad; mine fell off the counter while “cooking with baby”. It went well. LOL This recipe looks CRAZY delish and I can’t believe my Sri Lankan neighbours never shared this with me. Boo on them. And now, Yay on me because I have the recipe. #YAS
Yashy
April 7, 2017 at 1:01 pmoh no! I’ve lost quite a few things trying to do things with a kid attached to me. I know how it is! Fingers crossed for you and maybe you can make it and take it over to them!! hahaha
Christine Murray
April 5, 2017 at 5:25 amI spend hours searching the internet on recipes and ways to reinvent old recipes. Thanks for the chance to win.
Ira
April 5, 2017 at 10:21 amI don’t use much of the new gadgets. Stand mixer is my best help.
Diana Powell
April 5, 2017 at 12:50 pmI use pinterest and blogs to find recipes . I use a hand mixer and food processor a lot . My dream is to have a stand mixer .
Martha Martin
April 5, 2017 at 1:10 pmNice contest.
Lauren Martin
April 5, 2017 at 1:12 pmI like your website and you have a great contest going.
Mark Martin
April 5, 2017 at 1:13 pmI just entered your contest and really enjoyed the recipes on the Gay Lea sites as well.
kristen visser
April 5, 2017 at 3:21 pmTruthfully the best tool I have right now is the internet! thanks to the net I am able to search new recipes and make my own twist to them as I don’t always have everything that they ask for
Bernice
April 5, 2017 at 8:09 pmfind a lot of recipes on the internet and save them to pinterest
Jackie M
April 5, 2017 at 8:54 pmI love using my tablet to find and collect recipes! I also love using modern kitchen gadgets!
HEIDI C.
April 6, 2017 at 1:28 amI use the net regularly to look for, pin and read about recipes, cooking techniques, kitchen tools. Certainly different from my Granny’s cut-out recipe albums.
Elizabeth Matthiesen
April 6, 2017 at 2:50 pmCertainly, finding recipes/videos on line, my Kitchen Aid mixer, my pressure cooker, blender, microwave all help lessen and make the work load lighter and quicker.
Wanda Tracey
April 6, 2017 at 8:40 pmI use my Pc to look up some really good recipes for my family.I use my blender,mixer and pressure cooker to help with the recipes and to speed things up.Since I love cooking and baking the i_Pad would be an awesome asset to have to help me find recipes we enjoy. 🙂
Amie
April 8, 2017 at 3:09 amLove watching videos on youtube , I’ve found a few really good ones , I also have a few site that a full of great recipes i have on my fave list , so much easier these days with every cook book you need at your finger tips with the internet !
Yashy
April 10, 2017 at 7:56 amSo true! Videos help a lot!
Lindsay T
April 8, 2017 at 4:01 pmTechnology is a huge help in my kitchen! Most of my recipes now come from pinterest or google searches!
Yashy
April 10, 2017 at 7:56 amI’m with you!! LOVE technology!
kathy downey
April 8, 2017 at 4:30 pmI have have been modernizing my cooking and yes technology does help in the kitchen naming just a few food processors,coffee makers,dishwashers,slow cookers,kitchen aids have make life in the kitchen so much easier.
Jenny
April 8, 2017 at 7:56 pmFrom being able to program when I want my coffee maker to turn on, to throwing ingredients into a slow cooker and pressing one button, technology definitely helps me in the kitchen.
Treen Goodwin
April 10, 2017 at 8:04 amTechnology is a huge hing in my Kitchen as I love to look for new recipes online , and also save recipes i see on Facebook to my phone or pinterest 🙂
Debbie White Beattie
April 11, 2017 at 5:07 amI’ve been trying new recipes but mostly I love using all of the old and new kitchen gadgets. Plus all of the websites with recipes and videos; it’s much easier to cook now.
nicolthepickle
April 11, 2017 at 6:54 amI use a tablet a lot for recipes. That’s about the extent of my modernness in the kitchen.
Brook
April 11, 2017 at 1:29 pmI do everything gluten free and corn free and I only use a scale to do my measuring.
Matthew
April 11, 2017 at 5:47 pmI use an iPad now instead of a cook book
Terri Baker
April 12, 2017 at 10:28 amI no longer need to pull out the big cookbooks when I am in the kitchen. I now use my tablet and this hels save a ton of space and it is easier to find the recipes I am looking for.
Kimberly
April 12, 2017 at 10:49 pmTechnology definitely makes it a lot faster took look up a term or ingredient when cooking. And for substitutions it’s the best.
ginette4
April 13, 2017 at 6:36 pmI love using my mixer, it makes baking so much easier..I cannot live without it
Stephen
April 15, 2017 at 8:52 amIt’s easy to go and find a recipe for anything you want to make online now, makes cooking so easy.
Janice Stoiko
April 15, 2017 at 9:20 amI like that I can quickly reference a baking term online if I am not familiar with it or even pull up a video.
Florence Cochrane
April 17, 2017 at 9:04 amI love looking how to do a recipe on my tablet. I love gadget that help to make preparing food easy and fun.
Rebecca Roberts
April 23, 2017 at 10:23 pmI just bought a new toaster! Ha! I don’t have very much tech in my kitchen!
Jeannie Lam
April 30, 2017 at 12:03 amThe computer is definitely helping me with cooking with new recipes and techniques I’m learning.
Carol M
April 30, 2017 at 8:57 amI use my phone sometimes to access a recipe because it’s small and doesn’t get in the way.
Jenn
April 30, 2017 at 4:45 pmWe don’t have any smart kitchen appliances yet but technology still plays a big part in the kitchen for us. I don’t buy as many cookbooks anymore because I get most of my recipes from pinterest or youtube. More often then not, I have my phone propped up somewhere so I can follow along a recipe or how-to video.
Lisa
April 30, 2017 at 9:56 pmTechnology is big help in my kitchen – my phone being the most helpful one. I like using Siri to help me convert measurements, and I like to meal plan and make groceries on my phone. My sister has a hands-free faucet in her kitchen and it is so handy. I’d love to get one soon.
Calvin F.
May 20, 2017 at 3:53 pmGreat chocolate biscuit pudding!