buy coffee ingredients online Archives - Buy Coffee Beans & Ingredients Online UK Wholesale

Ultimate chocolate cake recipe

Posted on June 10, 2014 by Sara Walker

Drinking chocolate powder isn’t just for making hot chocolate with – it’s also a great baking ingredient. Don’t just use it to replace cocoa powder in recipes, though, as it’s sweeter and bulkier so you’ll also need to the flour and sugar proportions. Here’s our recipe for a delicious, moist chocolate cake made using drinking chocolate.

You’ll need:

For the cake –

200g butter or margarine, softened
180g caster sugar
150g self raising flour
75g hot chocolate (drinking chocolate) powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 large freerange eggs
3 tablespoons milk

For the icing –

225g good quality dark chocolate, broken into pieces
125ml double cream
150g butter, cut into pieces
225g icing sugar
1 heaped teaspoon instant coffee powder

What to do:

Grease and baseline a 20cm deep round cake tin. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
Beat the butter and sugar together, then whisk in the eggs and milk. Add the dry ingredients (flour, chocolate, baking powder) a little at a time, and beat until fully combined.
Spoon the mixture into the prepared cake tin, smooth off the top with a spoon, and bake for around 45 minutes until well-risen. The surface should feel spongy when you touch it with a finger – to check if it’s done, insert a clean skewer into the thickest part of the cake. If it comes out with no uncooked cake mixture sticking to it, the cake’s ready. Allow to cool in the tin for five minutes before turning out onto a wire rack.
Meanwhile, make the icing. Put the chocolate and cream in a heavy bottomed saucepan, and heat over a low heat, stirring continuously, until the chocolate is fully melted. Add in the butter, and stir until combined. Stir in the icing sugar until smooth, then remove from the heat and allow to coo and thicken.
When the cake is completely cool, cut it in half horizontally with a large breadknife, and spread half the icing over the middle of the cake. Sandwich together and top with the remaining icing.
Serve with a large mug of your favourite coffee.

Here at the Wholesale Coffee Company, we’re coffee experts – but we also sell all manner of related items such as powdered milk, sugar, and hot chocolate powder. To view our range, please visit our website at www.wholesalecoffeecompany.com.

Easy chocolate fudge

Posted on May 21, 2014 by Sara Walker

If you like to drink your coffee on the move, you’ve probably come to appreciate the ease and convenience of powdered milk. As well as a useful coffee ingredient, though, powdered milk is also a great cooking ingredient. This chocolate fudge is incredibly easy to make and involves no temperature measuring, and as there’s very little cooking involved it’s also ideal for children to help with. The secret ingredient? Powdered milk.

You’ll need:

8 tablespoons hot water
60g butter
130g skimmed powdered milk
100g sugar
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
450g good quality plain chocolate

In a large, heavy bottomed saucepan, put the butter, water, powdered milk, sugar and vanilla and heat gently until the butter melts. Stir continuously until all the ingredients combine to make a smooth paste.
Break the chocolate into as small pieces as possible, and add to the mixture. Keep stirring until the chocolate melts. Don’t be tempted to turn the heat up, as if the chocolate burns the mixture will be ruined. Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool slightly.
Line a 20cm square baking tin or shallow dish with clingfilm, pressing it well into the corners of the tin.
Spoon in the chocolate mixture, and spread it out evenly, pressing it into the edges and corners.
Put the tin in the fridge and allow to chill for three to four hours or overnight. Turn out onto a chopping board, remove the clingfilm and cut into small pieces.

The perfect accompaniment to this rich, sweet treat? A large cup of your favourite coffee. As well as all manner of coffee ingredients such as powdered milk, we also stock a wide range of coffee beans in single bags or wholesale quantities. For more information, please visit our coffee beans page.

Iced coffee recipes

Posted on April 11, 2014 by Sara Walker

Now the weather is finally getting a little warmer and British Summertime has kicked in, we’re starting to think about picnics and eating alfresco. Here’s a selection of our favourite iced coffee recipes, perfect for summer evenings with friends.

Coffee shake

Start by making a quantity of freshly brewed coffee, made from freshly roasted beans. To serve four, make a litre of coffee, then allow it to cool and chill in the fridge, preferably overnight. Add four scoops of vanilla ice cream and four tablespoonfuls of chocolate syrup, then whizz in a food processor until smooth. Pour into tall glasses, then top with a spoonful of whipped cream and a handful of fresh berries.

Ultimate iced coffee

To serve four, start by making half a litre of strong black coffee as before. Allow it to cool then put in the fridge until completely chilled. Add a standard tin (400g) of sweetened condensed milk, four tablespoons of chocolate syrup and, if liked, four tablespoons of rum. Stir everything into the coffee until fully combined, then pour into tall glasses over crushed ice and garnish with fresh mint leaves.

Iced mocha coffee

This recipe is not so much for an iced coffee as for a hot coffee with an icy topping, a great combination of flavours and textures.

To serve four, brew a litre of fresh coffee and add four tablespoons of chocolate or caramel syrup. Mix until fully combined. Pour into cups and add a scoop of vanilla ice cream and one of chocolate ice cream. Sprinkle with chocolate shavings, add a couple of chocolate-covered coffee beans on the side and serve.

At the Wholesale Coffee Company, we stock a wide range of coffee beans and coffee ingredients, including flavoured syrups suitable for a variety of uses. For more information, please visit www.wholesalecoffeecompany.co.uk.

Homemade strawberry syrup recipe

Posted on December 30, 2013 by Sara Walker

Flavoured syrups are one of the most useful standbys in your kitchen or restaurant. They’re great for adding to sauces, making into milk shakes or flavoured sodas, drizzling over ice cream or pancakes or, of course, adding to hot chocolate or coffee. Here’s our recipe for a simple strawberry syrup – you can replace the strawberries with other fresh berries in season, such as raspberries or blueberries, as well as ripe stone fruit like peaches.

You’ll need:

500g of fresh strawberries or other berries, washed, hulled and chopped
150g caster sugar, plus a little extra
2 tablespoons liquid glucose (available from larger supermarkets)
1-1/2 teaspoons lemon juice

Put the berries in a food processor, and pulse in short bursts until pureed. If they stick a little, add a drop of hot water. Next, scrape the puree into a pan and add the sugar, glucose syrup and lemon juice. Stir everything round, and taste it, adding a little more sugar if necessary, as a lot depends on the ripeness of the strawberries. Once you’ve happy, bring the mixture to a boil, then turn down the heat and let it cook for a about a minute until it thickens. Skim off any foam that’s come to the surface, then strain it through a sieve to remove the strawberry seeds. The syrup should keep in the refrigerator for at least three days, as the lemon juice acts as a preservative.

This fresh syrup is delicious, but it’s expensive to make when strawberries aren’t in season, and it has a relatively short shelf life so can’t be made in large quantities. For an easier option, we stock a litre bottle of strawberry-flavoured syrup for only £7.29 which will be a fantastic addition to your kitchen store cupboard. For more details, and to browse the other syrups in our range, please visit our coffee ingredients page.

The history of cinnamon

Posted on December 24, 2013 by Sara Walker

Cinnamon is a perfect partner for coffee, and it’s often to be found sitting on the counter of coffee shops, ready to be sprinkled onto cappuccinos. Although it’s now commonly available, at one time it was prized for its rarity, as it was produced from the bark of only one tree, the cinnamonum zeylanicum which only grew in Sri Lanka. Modern cinnamon mostly comes from the cinnamonum cassia tree, which is far more widespread and is cultivated in a range of countries including Vietnam, Brazil and the West Indes.

The use of the spice as a medicine and a cooking ingredient dates back thousands of years. It was used medicinally as an aid to digestion and a remedy for colds and flu, and modern research has shown that it has anti-clotting and anti-microbial properties. These latter properties are what made it so efficient as a preserving agent, and for hundreds of years it was used to pickle, spice and flavour food.

Because of its value and rarity, it was an immensely important commodity, and the Portuguese, Dutch and English all tried to gain a monopoly in the 18th century.

Although it’s now commonly available, cinnamon remains relatively difficult to grow as it matures slowly. The tree is encouraged to shoot by careful pruning, and the shoots are trimmed and dried to harvest the bark, which is dried as cinnamon.

Today, the spice is still popular as a flavour, and along with nutmeg and cloves it’s a traditional ingredient of mulled wine, Christmas pudding and a range of other sweet and savoury ingredients. It also complements the taste of coffee made from freshly-ground coffee beans, and it’s often sprinkled over or added to coffee drinks.

At the Wholesale Coffee Company, we stock a delicious cinnamon-flavoured syrup for adding a quick, sweet spice hit to your coffee drinks. For more information and to see our whole range, please visit our coffee ingredients page.

Winter Blues and Nights as Dark as Coffee

Posted on December 16, 2013 by Sara Walker

If you live in the northern hemisphere the days are a lot shorter now, the nights longer, the air colder and Christmas cheer the thing to keep you awake and happy, apart from, of course, coffee. In the blistering cold and pitch black darkness you really do need a thing or two to keep you going. We have come up with various ideas for how to keep ourselves awake and happy during the day.

One of our fabulous ideas (if we may say so ourselves) is to combine the smell of gingerbread with coffee. Scent is a feel good factor and most people tend to wake up at the smell of fresh roasted coffee beans. Of course you need some light as well, so our recommendation is to get yourself a mighty nice gingerbread house, which you can put tea candles in. Next to it you keep a candle holder with coffee beans in it and a candle (be sure to watch this if you use a regular candle rather than a tea light, as the beans can catch fire when the candle get to the level of the beans!).

The other feel-good factor you need is of course fresh roasted coffee beans in your cup – in other words: a fresh cup of java. If you want to make it to taste like Christmas you can add some cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg (potentially a dash of cardamom too), as well as a little bit of honey or maple syrup.

To really perk you up in the darkness serve your coffee with some chocolate. You can either turn it into a Mocha, have a square of really good quality dark chocolate with it, or a slice of some dark chocolate cake. The darker the better for added antioxidants (fight the cold system!) and if you can find some cake that’s sweetened by honey, or maple syrup, rather than sugar. In the two coming posts we will teach share a raw chocolate recipe, and a chocolate cake that is sweetened in this way.

Apart from fresh roasted coffee beans and divine chocolate, what will keep you going through winter is plenty of rest, exercise, fruits, vegetables, walks in the outdoors, and some vitamins, like added vitamin D in lieu of sunshine.

If you want to buy coffee for your winter blues, you can buy coffee online through our shop. We offer great prices and great coffee (that in and of itself should cheer you up instantly!).

Naturally flavoured coffee

Posted on December 8, 2013 by Sara Walker

In most high street coffee shops, you’ll have noticed the rise of flavoured coffees. Most establishments now offer a sophisticated ‘coffee menu’, which features not only old favourites like cappuccino and latte but also house creations such as caramel or chocolate-flavoured coffee.

If you’d like to try these relative newcomers to the world of coffee, a simple way is to invest in some flavoured syrups, which will give you an intense, sweetened hit of flavour at the tip of a bottle. It’s also possible buy coffee beans that are themselves flavoured, normally by being sprayed with flavouring oils after roasting.

For a slightly more time-consuming but more natural approach, you can flavour the coffee yourself with spices and other natural ingredients.

Method

There are two easy ways of adding flavour to your coffee at home – either adding ingredients to the coffee grounds before brewing, or adding them to the brewed coffee itself. The method you choose depends on your own personal taste, and also on the ingredients you use, as coarser ingredients will need to go through a filter process.

Here are a few ideas to try.

Take a handful of whole almonds, and roast them in a hot oven, turning occasionally to prevent them burning. Crush them roughly in a food processor, and add them to coffee grounds in a cafetiere or the filter basket of a drip coffee machine. Serve the coffee sweetened with a little brown sugar, and topped with whipped cream and a drizzle of chocolate syrup.

For a refreshing summer drink, try adding fresh orange, lemon and lime zest to the coffee grounds before brewing. Let the coffee cool completely, and serve black and sweetened over crushed ice.

For a winter treat, make a cup of your favourite black coffee, and sweeten it with a little sugar. Stir in 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon, top with whipped cream and add a dusting of chocolate powder and a tiny pinch of nutmeg.

If you’d prefer to buy your coffee ingredients online for added convenience, we stock a wide range of coffee beans and flavoured coffee syrups, ideal for making quick flavoured drinks. Please visit our coffee beans page for more information.

Dinner party desserts made with coffee – coffee ice cream

Posted on November 20, 2013 by Sara Walker

You’ll need an ice cream maker for this simple recipe, but the results are really worth the investment. Using espresso beans such as our great value Suprema coffee beans will give a rich depth of flavour. This ice cream is great served on its own, accompanying another dessert or made into a sundae with whipped cream, chocolate-covered coffee beans and a drizzle of caramel syrup.

Ingredients

600 ml whole milk
4 tablespoons coarsely-ground coffee, made with fresh coffee beans
135g caster sugar
8 egg yolks
2 tablespoons cornflour
250ml double cream

Put the coffee and milk together in a saucepan, and bring to the boil. Remove from the heat, and leave to stand for 10 to 15 minutes. Strain through a fine sieve to remove the coffee grounds, and put about three quarters of the mixture back into the pan, retaining a quarter. Stir the sugar into the pan, and heat gently until dissolved.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks and cornflour then gradually pour on the hot milk. Tip the mixture back into the pan, and heat until it comes to the boil, whisking constantly. It should thicken just enough to coat the back of a spoon – at this stage, take it off the heat quickly before it curdles.
Stir in the reserved milk, and leave the mixture to cool.
Once cold, remove any skin that’s formed and churn it in an ice cream maker until slushy.
Whip the double cream until it stands up in soft peaks, and fold into the ice cream. Finish the freezing process.
To serve, remove from the freezer 10 to 15 minutes before required, to allow the ice cream to soften.

For a wide range of top quality coffee beans, suitable for all uses, please visit our coffee beans page at the Wholesale Coffee Company website. We also stock a range of flavoured syrups and other coffee ingredients, perfect for making coffee drinks or for using in recipes.

Dinner party desserts made with coffee – hot coffee soufflé

Posted on November 18, 2013 by Sara Walker

If you’re a little more confident in the kitchen, try impressing your guests with this coffee soufflé, served with a spiced cream flavoured with cardamom pods. As with any soufflé, the trick is not to overcook it – it should be soft in the middle and crisp on the outside. Make sure the oven is really hot before you put the dish in, resist the temptation to check on it partway through the cooking, and you should get a perfect result.

Ingredients

4 eggs, separated
160g caster sugar
45g plain flour
75ml Tia Maria or Kahlua coffee liqueur
375ml milk
2 tablespoons coarsely ground coffee, made from fresh coffee beans
350ml single cream
2 cardamom pads

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees centigrade, and butter a 1.5 litre soufflé dish.
While the oven’s heating, start by preparing the spiced cream. Lightly crush the cardamom pods, and put them in a saucepan with the cream. Bring to a boil, then remove from heat and allow to stand for 15 minutes. Strain, then put in the refrigerator until needed.
Put the milk in a saucepan, add the coffee and bring to a boil. Remove from the heat, and leave to stand for about 15 minutes.
Whisk the egg yolks with 120g of the caster sugar until really light and fluffy. Trapping air in at this stage is what will cause the soufflé to rise, so spend some time on this stage.
Whisk in the flour, then strain in the milk, whisking constantly until combined.
Pour the batter back into the saucepan, then bring to a boil, whisking constantly until it thickens. Remove from the heat, and add the coffee liqueur.
Whisk the egg whites until they stand up in stiff peaks. Fold in the remaining caster sugar, and carry on whisking until you have a glossy meringue.
Fold the meringue into the coffee mixture, and pour the finished batter into the dish.
Bake for 20 – 25 minutes until well risen and firm on top. Serve immediately with the spiced cream.

For a wide range of top quality coffee beans, suitable for all uses, please visit our coffee beans page at the Wholesale Coffee Company website. We also stock a range of flavoured syrups in our coffee ingredients section, perfect for making coffee drinks or for using in recipes.

Easy dinner party desserts made with coffee – chocolate mocha sorbet

Posted on November 16, 2013 by Sara Walker

Tasting like a cross between a sorbet and an ice cream, this sophisticated dessert will draw gasps of appreciation from your guests, but it’s surprisingly easy to make. It uses strong espresso coffee to give a slight sharpness to the rich, chocolaty base, and as it can be made several days in advance it’s a stress-free option on the night. Use the best quality chocolate you can find, at least 70% cocoa solids.

Ingredients

675ml water
90g plain dark chocolate
5 tablespoons strong espresso coffee, made from freshly-ground coffee beans
300g caster sugar

Start by breaking the chocolate into little pieces, then blitzing it with short bursts in a food processor until it looks like very coarse, lumpy powder. Tip it into a saucepan, add 300ml of the water and the coffee and warm over a very low heat, stirring until all the ingredients are fully melted together and combined.

Add the caster sugar and remaining water and bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce the heat and allow to simmer for around ten minutes until it thickens slightly. Remove from the heat and allow to cool completely before transferring to an ice cream maker. Churn until slushy, then transfer to a chilled bowl and freeze for several hours. If making this dessert beforehand, it will need to soften slightly before serving. Don’t be tempted to make it more than a week in advance, though, as it may granulate and lose its smooth, creamy texture.

Serve in glass dishes, decorated with chocolate-covered coffee beans.