Dairy free ganache with my new kMix

Last week when we were at the Glasgow bake off we all, yes all, got to bring home a Kenwood KMik so I had to try mine out.  

This hand mixer belongs to the Kenwood kMix range. Compact, clean and designed for everyday use, the Hand Mixer can be relied upon to help with a variety of food preparation tasks.

The Hand Mixer has a powerful 350W motor, and five speeds plus pulse and high quality stainless steel beaters and kneaders for effortless mixing.

The die cast aluminium, ergonomic body has a soft grip handle. The tactile design of this hand mixer makes it both comfortable to use and beautiful to look at. 

One of the other things that we had made at the afternoon we were there was a ganache. This had been made with full fat cream, which I just cannot get away with eating at all, but I liked the idea of something other than "butter" icing to put on a cake, so I looked up a recipe on line and found a dairy free version and had to try it out. 

I made a basic Victoria sponge and added some drinking chocolate to flavour it, dairy free of course, 

200g sugar

200g margarine 

4 eggs

200g self raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tablespoon drinking choc. 

beat all ingredients together, split between two greased sandwich tins and bake at 170 oC for approx 20 mins.

So I set about making the ganache and hoped for the best. First off all I put a packet of uht coconut cream into a pan to warm up. Once the cream had warmed it became liquid.

add the uht coconut cream to a pan and heat gently

While the cream was warming, I weighed out the same weight in dairy free chocolate, I had some "chocolate" drops in the cupboard, not the cheapest but a very good quality. If you are on a budget some of the supermarkets do an own make basic plain chocolate that would work nearly as well.  

weigh out the same weight in chocolate

and melt together gently.

This made a smooth runny mixture that once it was cool can be used as it is to pour over a cake or a pudding. It can if you prefer be whisked to thicken it up to use for a filling or a topping on a cake. It can be whisked to different thickness's depending on how long you whisk it for. 

slightly too thick, a few seconds less would have been better

Have to say I thickened mine slightly too much and so had to microwave it for ten seconds to warm it up slightly to make it more manageable and spreadable.

in, on and decorated

I also made some small cakes with the same mixture  and decorated these with an icing bag. The finished ganache was amazing, very pleasant to eat and even OH has gone back for more, and you would not know it was dairy free. I will make this again. Chocolate fudge cake may well be on the cards next. 

So what did I think of my kmix? 

The mixer is well made and a good weight. It stands well on its base and can be placed on the work top between stages. I like the pulse switch on the mixer that allows for short bursts if needed. The switch is well placed and easy to switch up and down  with a thumb during use. It runs smoothly and quietly.  The handle is easy grip and very comfortable to hold. 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

I like the simple stand that comes with the product, it holds the beaters as well as dough hooks. The cord wraps round the bottom of the mixer to keep it neat and tidy.

on its stand

Curry's are asking us to share a baking tip in a blog post, my tip would be to use the best quality of ingredients that you can afford.