Easy desserts.

Have just been invited to a pot-luck dinner party this weekend and the host asked me to bring dessert. I chirpily responded with an "OF COURSE!" while crying on the inside. I am terrible at desserts, I made a really good tiramisu once, but I think that's too risky for a dinner party of 10ppl as lots of people hate it. Does anyone have any good suggestions, nothing too heavy? And I do not bake, I repeat, I [b:3i0z0voc]do not[/b:3i0z0voc] bake. So something that involves no baking. I really want to wow them, since I blog about food and am always posting about food and cooking on Facebook peoples expectations will be high. Why oh why couldn't I have gotten the starter!??

Make an Eton mess, its so easy to make and tastes great! All you need is merginue, fruit (strawberries) and cream. You can add other stuff too like honey, icing sugar, mint leaves etc. Serve in fancy glasses and volia!

The easiest and most delicious dessert I have ever made is Donal Skehan's bursting berries. I can't find the recipe now on his blog, and I can't remember which of his books its in so I don't have exact quantities but for two of us (big portions) I would take two punnets of berries (not strawberries though) and put them in a pyrex dish. Then grate half a big bar of white chocolate over them and bake (sorry!) in the oven (maybe fan 180 degrees?) for about 10 minutes. Keep an eye on them - he recommends 7 minutes but I find they need longer. You can serve with ice cream. The flavours are delicious - you'll be licking the bowls! I guess you can multiply my quantities by 5 to serve 10 people...

Thanks for the lovely suggestion Twingie and ott, but the host asked that it be made and prepped in advance (as his kitchen is too small to accommodate everyone), which wouldn't really work for an Eton Mess or the bursting berries (yum sounding and doesn't count as[i:3kcffptp] real[/i:3kcffptp] baking I reckon!!). I wonder should I just make the tiramisu and not worry that people mightn't like it.

cheesecake is simply to prepare n can be made in advance.

You could definitely make Eton Mess in advance - bring it to the host's house in a big dish. But I don't think it's a suitable dessert if you don't want to bake - making meringue is baking! What about chocolate mousse? You will need a mixer to whisk the egg whites well. Do you have one? I love creme patissiere - I use Delia's recipe (which might be on deliaonline). My mum made it once and topped it with stewed berries and a thick chocolate sauce. It was amazing. That's something you could bring in a big dish. I can't remember anyone ever saying they don't like tiramisu though!

I'm shiiiiiite at baking too, but there are two things that I know are failsafe! 1. Choc-vanilla marble cake. This is utterly foolproof, I promise. Crazy easy but looks like you went to loads of effort 2. Crumble - seriously, EVERYBODY loves crumble and it is easy-peasy. I use granny smith apples and raspberries (frozen raspberries, just chuck them in as is!), and then I serve it with decent vanilla ice-cream. Easy-ass crumble recipe (you can make 2 or 3 of these): 200g flour 150g butter 100g sugar (I use brown sugar cos OH really likes it, but doesn't matter a bit what sugar you use) Apples - I use about 4 big granny smiths Raspberries - no idea of quantity, I just chuck in whatever looks right Pinch of cinnamon / a few cloves if you like Method: Preheat oven to 180 Prepare your fruit - peel, core and chop the apples, mix the raspberries in with them. Flavour with cinnamon or a couple of cloves if you like. Put into your baking dish. Make crumble: Make sure your butter is really cold, and cut it into cubes. Lash the flour and sugar into a mixing bowl, mix them together, then rub the butter cubes into the mix. Just use the tips of your fingers and rub them together, until the mix resembles breadcrumbs. Top your fruit with this crumble, pop in oven and wait til the crumble is nicely golden. In our oven this takes about 40-45 minutes.

Strawberry Cheesecake - oh so simple and ooooooohhhh so yummmmmmy! Ingrediants Half a packet of digestive biscuits 50g of butter 1 packet of strawberry jelly 200mls of boiling water 300g of regular Philadelphia (at room temperature) 150ml of whipped cream Method Crush the digestive biscuits Melt the butter and stir in the biscuits and press into a spring form tin (I use a 20cm tin) Dissolve the jelly in the boiling water and cool in the fridge until its at the point of setting Gradually whisk cooled jelly into the Philadelphia Whip the cream until it holds its shape and gently fold into the Philadelphia & Jelly mixture and pour over the biscuit base. Chill for 2-3 hours in the fridge until its set You could get very fancy and then top with fresh strawberrys if you want. I never do! 1 packet of

Crumble or cheesecake would be perfect, both are dead easy, chilled cheesecake take minutes to prepare.

Ok - what you want here is something simple simple simple but that looks impressive. Key Lime Pie. Its so easy. You can either make it as a big tart-style dessert in the one dish (best if there are a lot of people) or if it's for a party of 4-6 it looks super impressive if you put the mixture into individual glasses. The base is just digestive biscuits crumbled up and melted butter (same as you would do for a cheesecake) Then the top is the juice and zest of 9 limes mixed with condensed milk and whipped cream. Just pour over the top and refrigerate. Decorate with a lime wedge - voila!