Sweet 2 Eat Baking

Strawberry, Chocolate, & Vanilla Buttercream Frosting Cupcakes - School Bake Sale

2012-03-02T23:38:00.001Z

Strawberry, Chocolate & Vanilla Buttercream Frosting Cupcakes

Aren't children wonderful? I love the way they spring things on you. For example, Wednesday evening the children returned home from school and casually stated that there was going to be a school bake sale. Great, I'll help and whip up some cupcakes. It was the perfect chance for me to use my new purchased pink cupcake courier, weyhey! I thought my cupcake courier might've sadly ended up being used as more of a storage device for my cupcakes than actually transportation. I was therefore excited that it would actually be used for it's intended use as a transportation device rather than a sorry "Hurry up and eat me" device!

"Soooo, kids, when is this bake sale?" I ask. "It's tomorrow and Friday, Mum." Ummm, what?! Wonderful! (detecting sarcasm yet?) So I was up at the arse crack of dawn on Thursday morning writing a letter to my eldest daughters teacher asking if they would like any help with the bake sale. I stated that I would be happy to whip up some cupcakes for them. I even included a photo of one of my past cupcakes. The school called back and were very grateful for my offer and accepted.

That's when the mad rush started. I originally planning on baking 12 chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting, 12 strawberry filled cupcakes with strawberry buttercream frosting and a strawberry on the top as garnish, and 12 vanilla cupcakes with 6 as baby pink buttercream frosting and pink sprinkles and the other 6 the same but in blue and blue sprinkles (you know the good ol' boy/girl colours! Kids are fickle, huh?)

But I didn't have time, or the correct ingredients or time or cash to go to the shops so I evened up baking 12 chocolate cupcakes, 24 vanilla (with the intention on coring 12 and filling with strawberry jam (jelly)). Unfortunately, I didn't even have time to core the 12 and fill with jam/jelly neither. In fact, disaster struck when decorating. I ran out of icing (powdered/confectioners) sugar when making the buttercream frosting. Noooo! Again, no time to pop out to the shop. What a mess! Le sigh! I managed to get all my strawberry buttercream frosting on all 12 cupcakes and had a little left over and because I had no more icing sugar, I made do with icing alternate the chocolate cupcakes. Thankfully, I managed to frost the 6 pink cupcakes, but with the blue I only managed 5 and on the last I had to spread the icing (hence why one looks messy!)

By the time I was finished, it was time to physically pick the kiddos up at the end of the school day. What a rush! I got the cupcakes safely to their destination of digestion doom the school seemed over the moon to receive the 36 cupcakes. They were charging 25p (40¢) per cupcake but raised the price of my cupcakes to 50p (80¢). My kids came home from school today and I'm happy to report that all my cupcakes sold on the very first day of the bake sale. Therefore I'm happy to report that I raised £18 (approx. $28.51) for the school. Not at all a disaster then but wow, stressful. I've volunteered again in the future as long as the school give me a couple of days notice, lol.

Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe

Makes 24 cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Total time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:
300g Butter
300g Self-raising flour (see US version)
300g Caster/Superfine sugar
6 medium Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla extract

Method/Directions:

Preheat your oven to 160°C, 325°F, Gas Mark 3.

Grease or line a muffin pan with paper cases.

Beat the butter in your mixture until light then add the caster sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy.

Meanwhile, sift the self-raising flour into another bowl and set aside.

Add the eggs one at a time adding a spoonful of flour to the mixture after each egg to prevent curdling.

Add the vanilla extract and the remaining flour and mix until incorporated.

Spoon or pipe the mixture evenly into the paper cases and bake for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Chocolate Cupcakes Recipe

Makes 12 cupcakes
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 20-25 minutes
Total time: 30-35 minutes

Ingredients:
100g (3½ oz) slightly salted butter, softened,
220g (7¾ oz) light brown sugar,
1 tsp vanilla extract,
2 medium eggs,
160g (5¾ oz) self-raising flour (see US version)
40g (1½ oz) cocoa powder,
125ml (4fl oz) milk.

Method/Directions:

Preheat your oven to 160°C, 325°F, Gas Mark 3.

Line the cupcake tin with cupcake cases.

Combine the butter and sugar together with the vanilla extract and the eggs and beat until light and fluffy.

Add the flour and the cocoa powder and mix together while gradually adding the milk. Make sure that all the ingredients are mixed well.

Evenly spoon or pipe the mixture into the cases.

Bake for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre of one of the cupcakes comes out clean.

Another good dead for the day - check!
-Lisa

Technorati Tags: baking, butter cream, buttercream, buttercream swirls, cup cakes, cupcakes, fairy cakes, frosting, recipe, school, bake sale

Easter Egg Royal Icing Sugar Cookies - A Dedicated Post!

2012-03-01T20:00:00.000Z

Royal Iced Easter Egg Cookies

Is that you I hear sniggering at my Easter egg cookies?! Hehe! This is my very first attempt at decorating cookies so please bear with my unprofessional-ness results. More on the cookies later.

But first, this post is dedicated to two wonderful ladies who live across the pond in the US. Namely, the wonderful Pam from Cookie Crazie and Karen who owns a cookie decorating shop called Karen's Cookies but also has a blog, Karen's Cookies Blog. This is quite a random story so make yourself a cuppa', get comfy, and put your feet up!

I absolutely love visiting dessert blogs. Whether they're concentrated on just cakes, cupcakes, cookies, or general desserts, you'll find me there. I love to participate and comment too. I love receiving comments on my own blog so I always make an effort to comment on others' blogs too. I like to make you feel loved (even if you do have 1,583,736,585+ comments! LOL). I have quite a strange way of finding new blogs too. Sometimes I google something specific by blogspot.com sites, sometimes I click blogroll links, and most of the time I see your comments on someone else's blog and click through to your blog and subscribe.

On the day that I found Pam's Cookie Crazie blog, I don't even remember how I found her as I was sucked into my cookie concentration mode. I loved what I saw so I immediately subscribed. I saw that Pam mainly used Americolor food colouring to colour her icing for her cookies. I have heard many great things about Americolor but as I'm based in the UK, the prices they charge this side of the pond isn't great and I don't think they stock and sell the full range here.

Lookit Pam's vast Americolor range! Yowza!

I commented on Pam's blog asking about Americolor. Pam responded to my comment quickly and so kindly offered to ship specific colours to me as she has friends with cookie decorating stores, how wonderful! We got chatting in email and Pam had an idea. She decided on a whim to let me choose $30 worth of Americolor food colouring from Karen's Cookies store. I was sooooo speechless! Seriously, I didn't know what to say to Pam to show my gratitude. There were no words that could describe how I felt! When I could string some readable words together, all I could muster was a thousand "thank you's". I feel so blessed to have found a new friend who, like me, loves to help.

I was really surprised that my parcel from Pam and Karen arrived just shy of one week from emailing my colour list to Pam. I am in love, the colours are as fab as raved by many people and Karen has gained a new customer for life. I can't wait to place an order with Karen. Her web store is fantastic, so much variety and the prices are great too. I was very surprised to receive 21 Americolor gel food colours in total.

Please do check out Karen's Cookies store for a full range of everything needed to create beautiful cookies and more. Also, check out Karen's Cookies blog, and of course, Pam's Cookie Crazie blog too. Both of these ladies are insanely talented cookie decorators. I want to be like them when I grow up, hehe!

Pam and Karen: If you happened to be reading this, I'd like to take a moment to thank you yet again for everything you have done for me. You both are two wonderful ladies. I really cannot thank you enough from the bottom of my heart. I really am ecstatic! Bless you both.

Back to the cookies. I made these cookies with my wonderful new Americolors that were gifted to me. I'm very impressed with the colours and the quality. I've already noted that I only needed a tiny amount of colour to get a deep shape. In fact, I was going for a pastel colour and only put 1 tiny drop in my royal icing and got a colour which was too deep. Amazing! My other paste colours are concentrated but not in the way Americolor is. Very impressed indeedy!

I have been busy researching wildly on how to decorate cookies. Some state a thicker royal icing for outlining and a 10 second icing for flooding. Others recommend a 10 second icing for both. I tried to outline the other day, as a practice, and found a royal icing recipe in one of my books which stated 2 medium egg whites to 500g of icing/powdered/confectioners sugar. This was really too thick but as I didn't know any better at the time, I attempted to use it. Obviously, it didn't work and I was disappointed (mainly in myself and my abilities) but I don't give up easily!

The next day, I heavily researched (when ironically, my colours arrived). I felt more confident in myself. I made a 10 second icing and divided up to colour. I put my royal icing in my piping bags and away I went. I did made a couple of mistakes outlining at first but the fantastic thing is it can be scraped off. Wohoo!

I really enjoyed decorating these cookies. I have the bug for cookie decorating now, and colours. It's addictive! Recipe below:

Vanilla Sugar Cookie Recipe

Makes 25 large or 40 small cookies
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 12-15 minutes
Total time: 27-30 minutes

Ingredients:
FOR THE COOKIE DOUGH:
185g (6½ oz) Butter, unsalted.
240g (8½ oz) Caster (superfine) sugar,
390g (14 oz) Plain (all-purpose) flour,
1½ tsp Vanilla extract,
½ tsp Salt, 1 med Egg.
FOR THE ROYAL ICING:
500g (1lb 2oz) Icing/Confectioners/Powdered Sugar,
2 Egg Whites,
Water (to thin down to a 10-second royal icing),
Food Colouring in desired colours.

Method/Directions:

Preheat the oven to 160°C, 325°F, Gas Mark 3. Grease and line two baking trays (alternatively, use baking/parchment paper, silicone liners or Silpat or similar).

Beat together the butter and sugar. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until creamy.

Sift the flour and salt into a bowl and add one half of it to the butter mixture and beat until combined. Add the rest of the flour and mix to a dough.

Roll the dough into a ball, wrap in cling film (plastic wrap) and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Lightly flour your work surface and roll out the dough to 3-4mm thick. Using your desired cutter(s), cut out shapes and place on your prepared baking trays. Bake for 12-15 minutes until golden brown. Cool for 5 minutes on the trays before moving to a cooling rack.

While the cookies are cooling, use this time to whip up a batch of royal icing. First, sift the icing sugar (confectioners/powdered sugar) into a large bowl then slowly add the egg whites and thoroughly mix the two together.

Keep mixing until the icing is glossy and is the correct consistency. To test: run a knife through the middle of the icing approx. 1" deep. If the icing forms a flat surface between 5-10 seconds, it is the correct consistency. Some people prefer a thicker consistency for outlining and allow for a flat surface between 15-20 seconds.

Transfer the icing into separate bowls - as many as you have colours. Apply a few drops of gel or paste food colouring until you reach your desired shade.

If you prefer two different consistencies, divide icing into two - one for outlining (15-20 second icing), and one for flooding (10 second icing) to ensure both are the same shade.

Decorate as desired. Leave to set overnight. I tend to find that my icing takes longer to dry as I work in humid conditions. My royal icing takes 24-48 hours to set completely.

Don't forget to visit Pam and Karen. Click the images below:

If you managed to read this entire blog post, well done to you!!
Having an eggcellent time!
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: biscuits, cookies, royal icing, easter

Cookies on the way and some exciting news!

2012-02-26T23:25:00.001Z

Sorry I haven't blogged lately. As you may know, I have severe arthritis and have been having a hard time with it lately. Yesterday was particularly bad. I wasn't even able to get out of my pit! Today has been half and half. My eldest daughter has been my saviour. She made me a sandwich at lunch and 2 cups of tea! Bless her little 11 year old self. I doped myself up on painkillers today which has helped, shame they didn't work at all yesterday!

But that being said, I'm hoping that my bad day is over and done with and some good days follow. I do my baking at night when the kidlets are safely and snugly wrapped up in their piggy blankets and snoozing. Those of you that are parents know the feeling when you creep into their bedrooms at night and watch them sleeping soundly. Cuteorrific or what?

I've done some baking tonight. Namely cookies. So stay tuned for some decorated cookies within the next day or so (as long as I can stand and hold a pastry bag and squeeze, which may sound like a 'normal' thing to you healthy peeps, but for me, it's something I have to work through). I'm not going to indulge you what shapes I've baked, you'll have to check back in, hehe. I'm a tease, huh?

I'm going to tease you further too. I have exciting news. This exciting news will not be happening until probably Fri next week but when it happens, you will know. As long as you view my site in a browser, you will see. I'm excited... but are you?!

The cookie monster will be visiting you shortly. Let's chant together... Coookkiieesss!!

Girly Pastel Tri-Coloured Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes

2012-02-19T23:08:00.001Z

Girly Pastel Tri-Coloured Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes

When I was younger, I'm talking between 5-15 years old, I was a tom boy. I don't have any sisters but one brother that's 2.5 years older than myself. I played with boy toys. I had a boat load of cars, boy helicopters n' all! Not one Barbie in sight (nor action man! Yes, I was that tom boyish that even an action man was considered a "doll" is our household). I watched F1 racing, rally racing, motorbike racing and even went to a few football games with my dad.

So… what happened?! Since when did I get so damn girlie?! It must've been when the 3 spawns of Satan came along. I'm joking, I love my 3 wonderful mini me's. And somehow, somewhere, my three wonderful girls are ALL proper girly. We're not talking a little pink here, more like anything that's pink, fluffy, unicorns, and over the rainbow-ish, girly. I think somewhere along the line their girlieness spread to me. Now I like anything pink and girly but to even the balance, I still love my motorsport and cars (real ones, yay! not that I have anything flash or fast *reality hits!*)

My girly side must have come out a lot when I decided to make these cupcakes. I was wanting to do a triple coloured cupcake swirl for a few days and I knew straight away it had to be pink, lilac and white. Those colours just compliment each other. I think they do. I even decided to bake them in funky Polka Dot cupcake cases in red and green. I also coloured the cake batter pink, which I suppose you can't really tell by looking at the photo alone but if you compare the colours with a regular, I guess it can be seen.

I really enjoyed piping these try-coloured cupcakes with the pastel colours. It sent me on a high afterward (but that could just be the sugar rush!) I topped them with a little pearl white lustre dust too which looks invisible in the photos (the sheen on the 2nd photo) but looked beautiful in real life.

The recipe I used was the same as my previous Sugarpaste Hearts Valentine's Cupcakes as I had some batter remaining that I coloured pink.

Rock on girls!

Girly Pastel Tri-Coloured Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe

Serves 12
Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Total time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:
150g (5½ oz) Butter
150g (5½ oz) Caster sugar
150g (5½ oz) Self raising flour
3 med Eggs
½ tsp Vanilla extract

Method/Directions:

Preheat your oven to 140°C, 275°F, gas mark 1. Line a tin with 12 cupcake cases.

Beat the butter and sugar together with the vanilla extract until the mixture becomes light and fluffy.

Add the eggs gradually, beating well between each.

Sift the flour, add to the mixture and mix carefully until just combined.

Remove the bowl from the mixer and fold gently through with a spatula. Evenly spoon or pipe the mixture into the bases.

Bake for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre of one of the cupcakes comes out clean.

Allow cupcakes to cool thoroughly before decorating. Decorate as desired.

For the triple coloured buttercream swirl I made some buttercream, divided into 3, coloured 2 with a teeny bit of red to create the pink, and the same for the lilac with a teeny bit of violet. I then put the frosting on some plastic wrap and rolled it, sealed one end with a knot (repeat for all colours) then put the 3 different coloured wrapped frosting inside a icing/pastry bag and fitted my nozzle and piped away. Voila! Triple colours in one piping bag.

Trying to ram a tall buttercream'd cupcake in my gob and failing, epically! Clean-up on aisle 5 please.
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: baking, butter cream, buttercream, buttercream swirls, cake, confectioners sugar, cup cakes, cupcakes, fairy cakes, frosting, icing, vanilla, vanilla cupcakes, piped, piping, piping bag, icing bag, pastry bag

Valentine's Sugarpaste/Fondant Hearts Vanilla Cupcakes

2012-02-12T20:06:00.000Z

Valentine's Sugarpaste/Fondant Hearts Vanilla Cupcakes

It's all pink, fluffy, and lovey dovey on my blog right now. Which I guess is very apt with tomorrow being the day of [barry white voice] Luuurrvvee!

Ima behind on blogging lately. Bad me! I actually baked these cupcakes about 3 days ago and decorated 2 days ago. I better get my arse moving since I've got more cakey goodness to share too, Oooo!

I decided to go with something different this time and bust out the freebie matching heart cutters I received from a great baking mag. I still have a lot of tools I've bought which I haven't used. I'm blaming it on being tool overwhelmed!

I decided I'd go for vanilla cupcakes then in my head there was the idea of having a white sugarpaste fondant disc on top of the cupcakes which I put a square stitch effect (which you sadly can't see in the photos, unless you stare). Then I was going to go for red gum paste hearts with a white heart cut out inside the larger heart, still following?

After I did this, I dug out the black paste food colouring and made myself some black gumpaste and thought that the little red hearts that were left over from cutting out of the larger hearts would go to waste so I thought black and red would make some nice contrasting colours too. And now looking, I do think I like the contrasting black, white and red cupcakes better myself!

For the final touch, I piped some white royal icing around the edge of the larger heart. I think the white piping looks great on the black heart. I only wish that I used a smaller tip to get a smaller dot. Finished off with a silver dragee.

Recipe below photo. I made 36 cupcakes in total and they're all gone but 4! Obviously my family needs to join CA (Cake Anonymous)!

Valentine's Day Hearts Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe

Serves 12
Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Total time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:
150g (5½ oz) Butter
150g (5½ oz) Caster sugar
150g (5½ oz) Self raising flour
3 med Eggs
½ tsp Vanilla extract

Method/Directions:

Preheat your oven to 140°C, 275°F, gas mark 1. Line a tin with 12 cupcake cases.

Beat the butter and sugar together with the vanilla extract until the mixture becomes light and fluffy.

Add the eggs gradually, beating well between each.

Sift the flour, add to the mixture and mix carefully until just combined.

Remove the bowl from the mixer and fold gently through with a spatula. Evenly spoon or pipe the mixture into the bases.

Bake for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre of one of the cupcakes comes out clean.

Allow cupcakes to cool thoroughly before decorating. Decorate as desired.

Cake cupid strikes!
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: baking, cake, cake batter, cake tin, caster sugar, cup cakes, cupcakes, cutters, dessert, eggs, fairy cakes, icing, ingredients, muffin tin, occasions, powdered sugar, recipe, rolling fondant, Saint Valentine's day, self raising flour, St Valentine's Day, Valentine's, Valentine's Day, Valentines day, vanilla, vanilla cupcakes, vanilla extract, sugarpaste, sugar paste, gum paste, gumpaste, fondant, hearts

Valentine's Pink Rose Buttercream Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes - Made with Love

2012-02-06T00:23:00.000Z

Valentine's Pink Rose Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes w/ Pink Sugar Sprinkles & Lustre Dust

Flowers… for me? Oh I do declare! - Ace Ventura!

Valentine's day is fast approaching. Who's in the mood for some luuurrrvvveeee? No? OK, must just be me, *sulks off into the gutter where I belong!*

I love receiving flowers. What girl doesn't? As long as they're not from some garage (yes, we do know, guys!) and as long as they're not granny flowers too. If any men happened to somehow set eyes on this, do your loved one a favour and for Valentine's Day get that special lady in your life half a dozen roses. More if you're not on a budget. Nothing quite says "Love" on Valentine's day than a massive bunch of beautiful red roses (hint hint, address details below, hehe). Although, unfortunately, many men just don't have a clue when it comes to flowers. Many have never even bought any. Insert me with my fella. I'm the first person he has bought flowers for, hilarious but cute since he made the effort for me.

I thought I'd get in the V-Day mood by baking some rose, or rosette (if you like) buttercream swirl frosted cupcakes. This is my first time piping buttercream roses and I must admit that overall, I'm super happy. Obviously, some were better than others but most were great. I made these as a trial run for Valentine's day as I want to do lots more but in contrasting colours of baby pink, lilac and bright red and make into a beautiful cupcake bouquet.

For these cupcakes, I also added some beautiful pink sugar crystal sprinkles with some pearl white lustre dust. You cannot see the lustre dust well on the photos but it shows lovely in life form with your eyeballs.

Valentine's Pink Rose Buttercream Swirl Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe

Makes 24 large cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Total time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:
300g Butter
300g Self-raising flour
300g Caster sugar
4 medium Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla extract

Method/Directions:

Preheat your oven to 160°C, 325°F, Gas mark 3.

Grease or line a muffin pan with paper cases.

Beat the butter in your mixture until light then add the caster sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy.

Meanwhile, sift the self-raising flour into another bowl and set aside.

Add the eggs one at a time adding a spoonful of flour to the mixture after each egg to prevent curdling.

Add the vanilla extract and the remaining flour and mix until incorporated.

Spoon or pipe the mixture evenly into the paper cases and bake for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Here's hoping I get masses of red roses for Valentine's.

Ever hopeful,
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: butter cream, buttercream, buttercream swirls, cake, cake batter, cake flour, caster sugar, confectioners sugar, cup cakes, cupcakes, eggs, fairy cakes, flour, frosting, icing, ingredients, powdered sugar, recipe, self raising flour, St Valentine's Day, treat, Valentine's Day, vanilla, vanilla extract, Valentine's, valentines, Valentines day, pink rose, rose swirl, rose swirl buttercream, rose swirl icing, vanilla cupcakes, muffins, Saint Valentine's day, rose swirl frosting

Black Forest Gâteau Cupcakes!

2012-02-04T19:41:00.001Z

Black Forest Gâteau Cupcakes

Do you like Black Forest Gateau cake? Do you sometimes find a slice of Black Forest Gateau a bit too much (if you slice it like a huge door wedge, like moi!)? Then do like I did and do a cupcake version.

I lay in bed the other night thinking of Black Forest Gateau and thinking "Mmm, I could so do with some Black Foresty Gateau goodness right now" but then was thinking was it worth making an entire cake just for a few slices? Probably not. And I only wanted a wee little slice. How hard is it to slice a cake thinly. I mean, C'mon. You're reading from a woman that slices cakes that would feed 3!!! Oh, and let's face it, who feels as guilty eating a cupcake or two in comparison to a slice of cake? Brucey bonus!

What to do. [tumbleweed blows past] I know… CUPCAKES. Specifically deliciously moist and chocolatey cupcakes with gorgeous black cherry jam piped into the cupcakes (or core and fill) with sweetened whipped double (full fat) cream on top. Not forgetting those delicious melt-in-the-mouth flaked shaved chocolate pieces. Finished with a black cherry. Nom nom.

These have probably been done before but I haven't seen them personally so I'm reserving the right to say I had this idea, lol!

Recipe and directions below:

Black Forest Gâteau Cupcakes

Makes 16-20 cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 16-18 minutes
Total time: 31-35 minutes

Ingredients:

CUPCAKES
½ cup (50g) Cocoa powder
1 cup (240 ml) Boiling water
1 ⅓ cups (175g) Plain flour
2 tsp Baking powder
¼ tsp Salt
½ cup (113g) Unsalted Butter
1 cup (200g) Granulated white sugar
2 large Eggs
2 tsp Vanilla extract
DECORATIONS:
1-3 tbsp Black cherry jam
300ml Double (full fat) whipping cream
4 tbsp Icing sugar
1x Can of Black cherries (or Glacé cherries if you do not have)
A few chunks of Plain chocolate

Method:

Preheat oven to 375°F (190°C). Lightly butter, or line 16 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a small bowl stir until smooth the boiling hot water and the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Then in the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat only until incorporated. Then add the cooled cocoa mixture and stir until smooth.

Fill each muffin cup about two-thirds full with batter and bake for about 16 - 20 minutes or until risen, springy to the touch, and a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean. (Do not over bake or the cupcakes will be dry.) Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool.

When cupcakes have cooled. Pass the black cherries through a sieve. Reserve the cherries in the sieve and cut/mash enough to pass through a piping tip or alternatively, core the cupcake with a knife or a cupcake corer.

Pipe or spoon the black cherry jam into the cupcakes. Use according to how you want to taste. i.e. more for a stronger taste. Replace cupcake cores if you cored.

Whip up the 300ml of double cream adding 4 tbsp of icing sugar to sweeten and pipe onto the cupcakes.

Take a few chunks of chocolate and either shave off or grate onto the cupcakes.
TIP: Place some baking paper over the zesting part of your grater and grate the chocolate. This way, the chocolate does not get stuck on the grater therefore wasting chocolate {insert shocked face}!).

Place a black cherry on top of each cupcake to decorate. If you do not have any black cherries in, substitute for a glacé cherry but bear in mind this will completely change the overall flavour. This step is completely optional.

Chocolate cake, chocolate pieces, sweet jam and whipped cream… could it get any better?! Apparently not.

Chocolate and whipped cream crumb covered kisses,
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: baking, baking powder, black cherries, black forest gateau, Black Forest Gâteau, butter, cake, cake batter, chocolate, chocolate cake, cocoa, cocoa powder, confectioners sugar, cup cakes, cupcakes, eggs, fairy cakes, flour, glace cherries, glacé cherries, icing, jam, muffin tin, powdered sugar, whipped cream, white sugar, dessert, black cherry, chocolate cupcakes, black forest cake, black forest jam, black forrest, black forrest cake

Rich and Chocolatey, Chocolate Butter Cake w/Buttercream Icing

2012-01-31T23:40:00.000Z

Moist Chocolate Butter Cake with Chocolate Buttercream

Yum yum in the tum tum! This chocolate cake is definitely chocolatey (is that even a word?!) This definitely went down a storm in my house. Kids and adults alike! This cake is lovely and moist too. The buttercream was like velvet on my tongue.

You cannot see in the photo (above) but I iced the entire cake (top and sides) with the chocolate buttercream. It definitely added to the taste and texture. If you want even more texture, just grate or shave some dark chocolate on the top and sides of the cake. Perhaps white chocolate if you like the contrast.

Moist Chocolate Cake w/ Buttercream Frosting

Serves 8-10
Prep time: 15-20 minutes
Cook time: 35-40 minutes
Total time: 55-60 minutes)

Ingredients:
120g Plain chocolate, chopped
30g Cocoa powder
240ml Boiling water
295g Plain flour
2 tsp Baking powder
1 tsp Baking Soda/Bicarb of soda
226g Butter
400g Granulated white sugar
3 Large eggs
2 tsp Vanilla extract
240ml Milk
FROSTING:
120g Chocolate, chopped
150g Unsalted butter
160g Icing sugar, sifted
1 ½ tsp Vanilla extract

Method:

Preheat oven to 350F/180C and place rack in the centre of the oven. Butter or spray with nonstick vegetable spray, two - 9x 2 inch (23x5cm) round baking pans. Line the bottoms with parchment or wax paper. I personally used a deep 8" cake pan myself.

In a heatproof bowl, place the chopped plain chocolate and cocoa powder. Pour the boiling water over the chocolate and cocoa powder and stir until they have melted. Set aside to cool.

In a separate bowl, whisk or sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Beat the butter until smooth and creamy. Gradually add the sugar and continue beating until the mixture is fluffy (this will take about 3 minutes). Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Add the vanilla extract and melted chocolate mixture and beat to combine.

Add the flour (in three additions) and milk (in two additions), beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Beat only until the ingredients are mixed together. Divide the batter evenly between the two earlier prepared pans and smooth the tops. Bake for about 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean and the tops spring back when lightly pressed.

For the frosting: Melt the chocolate for the frosting in a heatproof bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature. Beat the butter until smooth and creamy (about 1 minute). Add the icing sugar and beat until it is light and fluffy (about 2 minutes). Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the chocolate and beat on low speed until incorporated. Raise the speed to medium-high and beat until the frosting is smooth and glossy (about 2-3 minutes).

Spread the frosting in the centre of your cake with a little strawberry jam (optional). Spread the remaining frosting on the top and sides of your cake. Smooth if required and set in the refrigerator.

Chocolate cake crumb covered kisses,
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: baking, butter, butter cream, buttercream, cake, cake batter, chocolate, cocoa, confectioners sugar, frosting, icing, jam, recipe, vanilla, white sugar, chocolate cake, chocolate buttercream

Chocolate Fudge Cupcakes

2012-01-17T17:48:00.001Z

Chocolate Fudge Swirl Cupcakes

Who can resist the wonderful melt in the mouth chocolate fudge swirl cupcakes?! Surely kids can't. Namely twin boys which recently turned 5! Double the trouble! I thought that they'd love the chocolatey goodness. This turned into somewhat of a craft project with the cupcake wrappers that I also made. I did buy some pretty papers to match but they ended up being too small for a cupcake wrapper. But not to fear, once I get my scalloped punches, they will come in super handy making cupcake toppers!

I'm quite happy with the way these turned out. The chocolate fudge frosting was so delicious, especially the texture. It was a lovely harder than buttercream consistency which melted in your mouth yet with a delicious crunch from the optional sprinkles I added.

I'll definitely make these again soon. I really enjoyed baking and decorating these and the crafting involved with the cupcake wrappers. Love, love, loved it!

Recipe below image.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Fudge Swirl Frosting

Makes 16-20 cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 16-18 minutes
Total time: 31-35 minutes

Ingredients:

Chocolate Cupcakes
½ cup (50g) Cocoa powder
1 cup (240 ml) Boiling water
1 ⅓ cups (175g) Plain flour
2 tsp Baking powder
¼ tsp Salt
½ cup (113g) Unsalted Butter
1 cup (200g) Granulated white sugar
2 large Eggs
2 tsp Vanilla extract

Chocolate Fudge Icing/Frosting
4 oz (120g) Plain chocolate, coarsely chopped
⅔ cup (150g) Unsalted butter
1 ⅓ cups (160g) Icing sugar, sifted
1 ½ tsp pure vanilla extract

Method:

Preheat oven to 375°F (190°C). Lightly butter, or line 16 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a small bowl stir until smooth the boiling hot water and the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Then in the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat only until incorporated. Then add the cooled cocoa mixture and stir until smooth.

Fill each muffin cup about two-thirds full with batter and bake for about 16 - 20 minutes or until risen, springy to the touch, and a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean. (Do not over bake or the cupcakes will be dry.) Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool.

Once the cupcakes have completely cooled, it's time to make the chocolate fudge frosting.

Melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.

In the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter until smooth and creamy (about 1 minute). Add the sugar and beat until it is light and fluffy (about 2 minutes). Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the chocolate and beat on low speed until incorporated. Increase the speed to medium-high and beat until frosting is smooth and glossy (about 2 -3 minutes).

Deocrate cupcakes as desired.

Melt in your mouth chocolately goodness,
-Lisa.

Technorati Tags: baking powder, butter, butter cream, buttercream, cake batter, cake flour, chocolate, cocoa, cup cakes, cupcakes, eggs, fairy cakes, fudge, icing, muffin tin, powdered sugar, recipe, vanilla, vanilla extract, cocoa powder, plain flour, salt, white sugar, frosting

Bloglovin' Post

2012-01-16T17:30:00.001Z

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Chocolate Orange Cupcakes with Orange Buttercream Icing

2012-01-11T17:12:00.001Z

Chocolate Orange Cupcakes with Orange Buttercream Icing

Forgive me father, for I have sinned. My confession today is that although I like chocolate, I'm not fussed on chocolate cupcakes or cake [everyone recoils in horror!] I'm not entirely sure why, no clue. Just the way I'm wired I guess *shrug*

If you're a chocolate lover you seriously have to try this recipe. Goodness me, they are gooooood! *I* love them myself even after my above confession. I think I'll definitely be keeping this recipe for anything chocolatey needed. I adapted the recipe from Joy of Baking to include the zest of 1 orange. I only thought they'd have a 'hint' of orange but the flavour is just a perfect combination in relation to the chocolate and I do love a Terry's Chocolate Orange!

I thought I'd made some orange icing to compliment the chocolate in the cupcakes also. I added 1 orange zest to the buttercream icing as well as some freshly hand squeezed orange juice, only about 2 tablespoons but my icing came out rather runny again and adding more icing sugar didn't seem to fix the issue so instead of putty swirls, they're more like sponges but never mind, I'm still learning and gaining a lot of experience along the way.

Chocolate Orange Cupcakes with Orange Buttercream Icing

Makes 16-20 cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 16-18 minutes
Total time: 31-35 minutes

Ingredients:

Chocolate Orange Cupcakes
½ cup (50g) Cocoa powder
1 cup (240 ml) Boiling water
1 ⅓ cups (175g) Plain flour
2 tsp Baking powder
¼ tsp Salt
½ cup (113g) Unsalted Butter
1 cup (200g) Granulated white sugar
2 large Eggs
2 tsp Vanilla extract 1 Zest of an orange

Orange Buttercream Icing/Frosting
¾ cup Butter, softened
1 Zest of an orange
16oz Icing sugar
2-3 tbsp Orange juice

Method:

Preheat oven to 375F (190C). Lightly butter, or line 16 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a small bowl stir until smooth the boiling hot water and the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Then in the bowl of your electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat only until incorporated. Then add the cooled cocoa mixture and stir until smooth.

Fill each muffin cup about two-thirds full with batter and bake for about 16 - 20 minutes or until risen, springy to the touch, and a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean. (Do not over bake or the cupcakes will be dry.) Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool.

Once the cupcakes have completely cooled, it's time to make the orange buttercream frosting.

Beat the butter and the orange zest on medium speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add the icing sugar, beating until well blended.

Stir in 2-3 tbsp orange juice, adding additional orange juice if necessary, to reach desired consistency.

If you do make these, please stop by and let me know how you got on with them and/or any photos/links to your creations. I'd love to see.

Chocolate orange hugs
-Lisa

Technorati Tags: baking powder, butter, butter cream, buttercream, cake batter, cake flour, chocolate, cocoa, cup cakes, cupcakes, eggs, fairy cakes, icing, muffin tin, powdered sugar, recipe, vanilla, vanilla extract, cocoa powder, plain flour, salt, white sugar, orange zest, orange peel, frosting

Blueberry Muffins

2012-01-09T20:13:00.001Z

Delicious Fruity Blueberry Muffins

Holy crapola are these delicious! To be honest, I didn't think much of them to minute they came out the oven and I tucked in, as I always do *blush!* But it seems as though, the longer you can manage to stay away from these, the more delicious they get.

I certainly wouldn't eat them on the day they are made. The day after, or the day after that they're the best. Or, if you can handle to make the batter and cover it and leave it in the fridge overnight to marinate. That way, they'd be best. I doubled the recipe so with double, the recipe called for 300g blueberries and I used 350g. Half normal, and half I smashed up…. nom!

Take your stress out on the blueberries! You will squish down mutha-forker! Then I'll eat you and your brains. Mmmm, brains, sweet juicy brains!

Blueberry Muffin Recipe

Makes approx. 16
Prep time: approx. 15 minutes
Cook time: 16-20 minutes
Total time: 31-35 minutes

Ingredients:
150g (5oz) fresh or dried blueberries
100g (4oz) caster sugar
100g (4oz) butter
300g (11oz) self-raising flour
1tsp baking powder
2 large eggs, beaten
1tsp vanilla extract
140ml (¼ pint) milk

Method:

Line a muffin tray with paper muffin cases.

Cream the butter and sugar until fluffy then add in the eggs, one at a time.

Add the milk and vanilla extract then fold in the flour and baking powder to make a thick batter.

Divide the blueberries into 2 and with a fork squish half then fold in the blueberries and spoon the mixture into the muffin cases. Bake for 16-30 mins at 160°C (325°F or gas mark 3). - My blueberry muffins were cooked after just 16 minutes by testing with a cocktail stick

Leave the blueberry muffins to cool in the tray for 10 mins before turning out.

Happy blueberry smashing! Enjoy!

Technorati Tags: baking, baking powder, butter, caster sugar, ingredients, milk, recipe, self raising flour, vanilla, blueberry muffins, blueberries, blueberry muffin recipe, blueberry muffins recipe, fresh, dried, cake flour, eggs, vanilla extract, cake batter, muffin tin

Yearly Occasions A4 Dividers - Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Halloween & Christmas

2012-01-07T02:14:00.001Z

A4 Paper Occasion Dividers for Recipe Binders - Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Halloween & Xmas

I've been busy either looking through online recipes, printing them and editing and more printing and then after all that, I realised I now have a nice collection of recipes I've tried and want to keep and ones I'd like to try. After realising this, I quickly realised they were a mess! Starters with desserts, and mains next to things like Christmas cake! I already have dividers in my A4 recipe binder such as "Starters, Mains, Desserts, Cake and Occasions." But then all my occasions recipes were now messed up… For example: Valentine's recipes mixed in with Halloween recipes. The last thing anyone wants on Valentine's day is to get confused and bake their other half a severed leg cake with gushing blood. Hmm, niceeee, romantic indeed!

With this in mind, I decided it would be nice to make some pretty A4 paper dividers. So I made some, and if anyone likes these, feel free to download them and print the dividers off for yourself.

For now, the dividers only consist of..

Valentine's Day recipes,
St. Patrick's Day Recipes,
Halloween Recipes
Christmas Recipes

But I will be considering making more. If you want a certain one, you can just request one in the comments. I imagine I will be adding more in the future. Perhaps, Easter, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Birthdays, St. Georges Day, Bonfire Night (or Guy Fawkes Day), Independence Day, etc.

You can download these by clicking here. :D

Technorati Tags: recipe, recipe dividers, A4, paper, occasions, A4 recipe dividers, St Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day, St Patrick's Day, Paddys day, Halloween, Christmas, Xmas, Holidays, Easter, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Birthdays, St Georges Day, Bonfire Night, Guy Fawkes

Lemon Drizzle Cupcakes with Lemon Icing

2011-12-28T23:52:00.000Z

Lemon Drizzle Cupcakes with Lemon Icing

My partner has been asking to make lemon drizzle cake for days. I fancied turning the whole lemon drizzle cake from a loaf or cake pan size to cupcakes instead. Baby lemon drizzles! The recipe for the lemon cake itself has only 1 lemon zest, bugger that! If I want lemon, I want it to taste nice and lemony and one zest in that size of ingredients didn't seem enough so I added 2 and it was perfect!

Lemon Drizzle Cupcakes

Makes 24 cupcakes
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 18 minutes
Total time: 33 minutes

Ingredients:
225g unsalted butter , softened
225g caster sugar
4 eggs
finely grated zest 1 lemon (I used 2)
225g self-raising flour

Method:

Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Beat together 225g softened unsalted butter and 225g caster sugar until pale and creamy, then add 4 eggs, one at a time, slowly mixing through. Sift in 225g flour, then add the finely grated zest of 1 lemon and mix until well combined. Spoon in the mixture into cupcake cases.

Bake for 16-18 mins until a thin skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Lemon Icing

Ingredients:
150g / 5 oz icing sugar
20ml / 4 tsp lemon juice
Zest of 1 lemon

Method:

Sift icing sugar into a bowl.

Add lemon juice bit by bit until mixture has a smooth consistency, but not too runny. Use more or less as required.

Add in the lemon zest.

Drizzle onto fully cooled cupcakes and decorate as desired.

Happy baking, enjoy! :D

Technorati Tags: cake, cupcakes, icing, lemon drizzle, lemon cake, lemon

Cookie / Biscuit Press (Thank you Santa!)

2011-12-25T23:41:00.000Z

Santa came down my chimney and gave me a…..

Cookie / Biscuit Press!

Looky what I got for Christmas from my parents. I did know it was coming but I asked for it at least 2 months ago and it's exciting to get new gadgets.

I have used it. However, I need to change the recipe and use cookie press recipes. I used a sugar cookie recipe which needs to be refrigerated first, which didn't go too well with the press but it was only a trial run and I had sugar cookie dough left over from the last batch I made so thought I'd just have a trial run with this.

It's also an icing set but I don't think I'll be using it for that. I'll stick with my good grip disposable piping bags, etc. for now. But might give it a whirl in the future. I can still use the nozzles though if I want, they're more for detailed work and I'm all into doing cupcake swirls at the moment. I should change that for now and get practicing though. :)

Merry Christmas from our household to yours!

Technorati Tags: cookies, icing, santa, biscuit press, cookie press, icing gun, icing set, cookie icing

Coooookkkiieeessss!

2011-12-24T22:29:00.000Z

Sugar Cookies

Theres just something about the word 'cookies' that makes me want to shout it out loud and drawn out. So 'Cooookkkiiiieeeeessss' seemed the appropriate title to this blog post.

I felt in the mood for baking cookies although I've not made a single cookie since I was in primary school. Yes, really! For some reason, I thought I had Christmas cookie cutters. I was wrong! :( All I had was a snowflake cutter that I bought from a local cake wholesalers (man, I love that shop), and a star that was in a set. I seriously thought I had a Christmas set. Well, that was a minor let down. I thought I'd just carry on with the stars and the snowflakes.

I used a sugar cookie recipe from Cake Central. I liked the fact that the recipe is in american cups as it was easy for me to measure the cups rather than weigh and when I was finished, the dough was lovely. I followed the recommendations on rolling out the dough on baking paper but the cookies were incredibly hard to cut and lost their shape if I tried to move to the baking tray so I chilled the pre-rolled dough in the fridge for a few hours and tried again. They came out alright but I did find it difficult to move the shapes from the baking paper onto the baking tray (with a layer of baking paper too). A few did crack and broke off.

All in all, they baked beautifully and are delicious. When I try this recipe again (which I definitely will) I will roll on baking paper again and when chilled I will transfer onto a dusted surface for ease of transferring.

I even put about 20 of these cookies into a zip-seal bag and put them into the children's stockings. Hehe.

NFSC - No Fail Sugar Cookies Recipe

This recipe is GREAT when using complex cookie cutters. The dough holds its’ shape and won’t spread during baking. Make sure you let your oven preheat for at least 1/2 hour before baking these or any other cookies.

Ingredients:
6 cups flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 cups unsalted butter
2 cups sugar (white granulated)
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract or desired flavouring (I like almond myself)
1 tsp. salt

Method:

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Mix dry ingredients and add a little at a time to butter mixture. Mix until flour is completely incorporated and the dough comes together.

Chill for 1 to 2 hours (or see Hint below)

Roll to desired thickness and cut into desired shapes. Bake on ungreased baking sheet at 350 degrees F (176 C) for 8 to 10 minutes or until just beginning to turn brown around the edges. This recipe can make up to 5-dozen 3″ cookies.

Hint Rolling out dough without the mess:
Rather than wait for your cookie dough to chill, take the freshly made dough and place a glob between two sheets of parchment paper.

Roll it out to the desired thickness then place the dough and paper on a cookie sheet and pop it into the refrigerator.

Continue rolling out your dough between sheets of paper until you have used it all. By the time you are finished, the first batch will be completely chilled and ready to cut.

Reroll leftover dough and repeat the process! An added bonus is that you are not adding any additional flour to your cookies.

I didn't ice my cookies but then they were delicious without. The next time I will be making these, I think I will be replacing 50g of flour with 50g of cocoa to make chocolate cookies. Happy baking, enjoy! :D

Technorati Tags: baking, butter, cookies, biscuits, cutters, sugar cookies

Vanilla Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Swirls

2011-12-23T21:24:00.000Z

Vanilla Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Swirls

OH.MY.GOD!! These were so good, even if it was just a standard sponge recipe (see below) with standard basic buttercream swirls. Needless to say, I made these about 3 days ago. I made 24 of these vanilla cupcakes with the buttercream swirls and they're now ALL gone! =)) My children made their own basic sponge cupcakes, so really, these were eaten by just myself and my partner (although the kidlets did have a few).

I made just standard sized cupcakes and filled them approx. ¾ full with the batter. Popped them in the oven and kept an eye on them since my oven is quite new and seems to cook things rather faster than expected (I only realised this when I started baking! Haha, you learn things about your appliances spending more time loving them, huh!?) They were cooked at approx. 15 mins and were utter perfect in flavour and texture. We ate a few before I even iced them *blush*

I left to cool overnight as my illness means that I often feel bad in the daytime (I guess morning arthritic stiffness, I need oiling!) so therefore I usually bake in the early evening but most of the time in the late evening! :O Iced them with the basic buttercream recipe (see below). To be honest, I haven't dealt with buttercream much and this was my first time swirling icing on cupcakes. Basically, the basic buttercream recipe I used isn't really good for swirling with cupcakes. Think it's more of a cake filling recipe but as I've said many times before, you live and learn. The buttercream was OK to swirl but was rather slightly liquid. I thought it might've been because I coloured it with gel/paste food colouring (a time before, I used liquid and it ruined it). I therefore posted this question on the Cake Central forum and the lovely ladies helped me by stating I needed more icing to make the cupcake swirls more firm. So I'm glad it wasn't the colouring (wayheyy!) I also wished I had flavoured the buttercream. Should of added a tsp or 2 of vanilla extract. I'll definitely be doing these again, in a range of funky colours, and flavouring. Must get in more flavours too.

OK, now I'm hungry and want to go bake more. These were supposed to be for Christmas. Oops! :)

Vanilla Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Swirls Recipe:

Makes 24 regular sized cupcakes
Cook time: 15-18 minutes.

Ingredients:
200g/7 oz Butter
200g/7 oz Caster sugar
200g/7 oz Plain flour
1 tsp Baking powder
2 tsp Vanilla extract
2 Eggs

Method:
Preheat the oven to 180°C / 350°F / gas mark 4 and place cupcake cases into a cupcake pan
Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl until soft and pale

Beat the eggs in one at a time

Add the vanilla extract

Sift in the flour and baking powder and mix together

Spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases between ½-¾ full

Bake in the oven from 15-18 minutes.

Allow to cool completely before decorating

Basic Buttercream Icing Recipe:

Recipe from the BBC Food website

Note: As I said before, I wouldn't recommend this recipe for piping swirls. For piping swirls, adjust the icing sugar quantity from 10 oz to 16 oz as recommended on Cake Central.

Swirls approx. 12-14 cupcakes

Ingredients:
140g/5oz butter, softened
280g/10oz icing sugar
1-2 tbsp milk
few drops food colouring

Method:

Beat the butter in a large bowl until soft. Add half of the icing sugar and beat until smooth.

Add the remaining icing sugar and one tablespoon of the milk and beat the mixture until creamy and smooth.

Beat in the milk, if necessary, to loosen the mixture.

Stir in the food colouring until well combined.

I would not recommend using liquid food colouring as it makes the icing more liquid (which is fine for runny icing). I used a gel/paste food colouring but powder will work just as good too.

Happy baking. Enjoy! :)

Technorati Tags: cake, caster sugar, desert, ingredients, recipe, vanilla, cupcakes, fairy cakes, buttercream, butter cream, cup cakes, icing, buttercream swirls, flour, butter, powdered sugar, confectioners sugar, self raising flour, baking powder

Traditional Christmas Cake Part II

2011-12-22T21:33:00.000Z

See Traditional Christmas Cake Part I, for the recipe, details, before decorating photo and other blurbs.

Traditional Christmas Cake Part II

I'm late on this, late to post it. I've been uber busy, let's just say. I've been baking a few times. I made standard cupcakes, blueberry muffins, and some other cupcakes that I have yet to post, possibly tomorrow. Things just haven't gone our way lately. My car (which is less than 2 yrs old) broke down and it didn't just break down, it broke down in diva style! Insert key > turn > car throws huge hissy fit and shook so much the entire vehicle just vibrated [err, no!]

Anyway, back to cake. So I finished the Christmas fruit cake. I fed it with Brandy again. Let's just say I'm never buying ready rolled marzipan or icing again. What a nightmare! I covered my cake with ready rolled Marzipan and that wasn't too bad, but not good either (specially since I bought a great well-known brand). But when I got to the ready rolled icing, I left it to sit at room temperature since it was stored in a cupboard which is quite cold inside. Tried to unroll it and it either just stuck to the supposed non-stick paper or cracked. So I ended up just throwing it in a pile and kneading with icing sugar and rolling again myself. It wasn't too bad but it really is quite poor. It cracked when I was smoothing too and I had to fix best I could but all in all, I wasn't impressed with the icing's end result. I did colour some icing in Christmas red and green and cut out some snowflakes. You cannot see the green snowflakes in the picture, but it's there (green hue blur on back).

Decorated with a Santa popping out of a chimney, a snowman and a penguin. I popped the penguin on a red snowflake but after I had finished decorating and stepped back to look, he looks more like he's sat on an iceberg! :) Popped a "Merry Christmas" sign on and applied some ribbon as a finishing touch.

I'm sorta happy overall. My mum commented on how nice it is today and said she was impressed to say it's my first Christmas cake. I just wished the icing was more smooth. When I covered my last test-run (umm, I ate it all) Christmas cake, I made my own sugar paste icing and that came out fine so it must've been the ready-roll. *shrug*

Ah well, another point to add to experience. I do think it looks quite pretty and it'll taste fantastic. Just can't wait to get my munchers around it now.

Must.not.eat.it. Must.wait.till.christmas. Chant with me! :D

Technorati Tags: baking, brandy, cake, christmas cake, currents, glace cherries, glacé cherries, ground almonds, mixed peel, mixed spice, raisins, rolling fondant, traditional, marzipan, apricot jam, santa

Conversion guide

2011-12-18T21:41:00.001Z

Contents:

Oven temperature guide
Cake tin sizes
Solid, liquid, gram to oz conversions
Rolling and covering fondant / sugarpaste icing size guide
Cake baking size, temperature and baking time chart (not sure how to adjust baking times with an upscaled recipe? See this guide)
Upscaling or downscaling cake recipe quantities (multiplying recipe)

N.B. This guide and the information provided has been researched by Lisa at http://sweet2eatbaking.blogspot.com and is free to download and share. If sharing, please credit my blog by linking to the above URL as I have taken a lot of time to source all the above information, type it all up, and/or provided custom calculations myself. If you have any further questions, please feel free to drop me an email. Thank you.

Oven temperature guide

Cake tin sizes

As a rule of thumb, a square tin holds about 25% more than a round tin of the same size. If you're using a square tin for a round tin recipe, keep the temperature the same, and turn the cake during baking, as the corners tend to cook faster than the middle.

Solid/liquid and gram to oz conversion

Calculating icing/sugarpaste/fondant rolled size guide

When rolling out fondant/sugarpaste, etc. icing, more is better. This guide assumes that the cake pan size/recipe has the most common size of a 3" depth.

Cake baking times

The chart below is a guide only to assist with approximate temperatures and baking times when upscaling cake batter. Adjust times for fan assisted ovens (remove 20°C from amounts below or look at the temperature conversion guide on page 1).

Upscaling cake recipe quantities

This chart helps down and upscale cake recipe quantities and assumes that the recipe you are using is the most common size/shape which is an 8 inch (20cm) round cake, 3 inch (7.5cm) deep. For square cakes, use the round quantities below and deduct 1 inch from the round cake chart, or alternatively, see the cake tin sizes chart on page 1.

Technorati Tags: oven temperature guide, cake tin size, round to square cake tin, rolling fondant, icing rolling size, upscale cake recipe, downscale cake recipe, ingredients, recipe quantities, convertor, C to F, F to C, oven temperature, gram, mililitre, ml, g, oz, ounze, fluid, cake pan, cake tin, cake baking times, icing size

Fantastico Aprons

2011-12-12T22:40:00.001Z

This fantastic houndstooth kitsch apron made by CreativeChics

Amazing Aprons!

When you're in the kitchen being creative with your food, or whether you're being creative with crafts, why settle for those standard shop-bought 'ugly' aprons. I had been on the hunt for some nice aprons and to endless shops but they're all standard looking aprons. I wanted to express myself myself in a way in which shop-bought standard aprons didn't do. OK, fair do, they make them in patterns now but seriously, that's it. They're just a standard shape and unflattering. I hit the internet, namely the home of everything home-made and fabulous. I'm talking of Etsy.

I seriously want to buy e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g on Etsy! Everything is just so fantastic on there. I started my search for aprons and man alive did I find some. When I say some, I mean a lot. After weeding through a lot of aprons, I saw the 'one'.

Namely, this one on the left. However, it was from a previous customer and no more left. I had already decided by then that I now wanted 2 aprons. I contacted the seller and received a response super fast. They were happy to re-make the apron for me sourcing more of the same fabric… wonderful!

I received the pricing and quickly looked through their shop for my second apron choice and again, my decision was another apron that wasn't currently listed in their shop but on their logo. This apron I chose for my second apron is the one shown above, fabulous eh?! Again, I was met with a super quick response stating that they were again happy to make this custom apron and promptly listed my custom listing on Etsy.

After I had paid for my aprons the ladies at CreativeChics were amazingly fast at sewing and creating my aprons. Seriously, how do they keep up with creating all those fantastic aprons on their listings as well as difficult pests (like myself) asking for custom orders? These ladies must have lightning fast fingers, I swear! I was even surprised at how fast I received the aprons in the post, considering that I'm in a completely different country. I'm in the UK and the fab CreativeChics are in the US.

I definitely will be placing another order with them. I'm so very impressed with my aprons. They even added a lovely personal touch with a different recipe card in both aprons, I loved that! Oh, and they're super flattering and beautifully crafted. I will certainly be buying future 'mother-in-law' one as she has fantastic taste and I just know she'd love, love, LOVE one of these.

If you fancy taking a look, check out the following links but beware, once you look I guarantee you'll order!

http://www.CreativeChics.etsy.com

P.S. You can click the above images and they will open full-size to reveal the beauty in the details.

Technorati Tags: aprons

Traditional Christmas Cake Part I

2011-12-11T22:47:00.001Z

(Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake with Brandy)

Traditional Christmas Fruitcake

I'm gonna break this puppy into two posts. First, and in this post is the recipe, the cooking of the Christmas traditional Fruit cake. The second post will of course be the decorating of the cake.This recipe is compliments of Be-Ro. I decided to make this cake as it brings back sentimental memories for me *drifts off in happy daydream with head in hands looking at the sky* "ahhhhhhhhh" :)

Basically, from ever since I can remember in the last 11,158 days I've been alive (but who's counting, right?!) My mums mum, also known as my Nana, has baked this Be-Ro Christmas cake using this recipe. So, to me, this brings back good childhood Christmas memories. Unfortunately, my Nana now is too ill to bake said cake every year which makes me sad. But she happily told me her secret recipe (not that it is a secret). So I made it, late November. I then decorated it using ready-rolled Marzipan. And made my own Fondant (sugar paste) icing and covered it in that. Unfortunately, the cake did not make it until Christmas. We, umm *shuffles foot* ate it. When I say 'we', I actually mean 'mainly me' *shuffles foot again and looks guilty*. The fella had a couple of slices and so did the kids, but I, umm, ate the rest! But all was not lost. The cake was uber delicious and tasted just amazing, just like Nanas! And I soon realised that this so-called Christmas cake was really an unexpected, unrealised practice run! I'll be happy if my next one turns out as good or even better.

Back then, when I made my own fondant (sugar paste) icing which I covered the cake in. I realised I wanted to try my hand at gum paste figures. I did have some rubber figures to fall back on in case all went horribly wrong and this time when I planned to re-bake my Christmas cake, I'm using ready-roll regal ice. But I wasn't planning that back then as I wasn't planning on being the weak-willed sugar monster I am.

But hey-ho, I made my own gum paste snow man. He's actually too big to go on the cake, standing at approx. 2.5-3" tall. But I made him and he's my first attempt. Please don't laugh (although, inside I'm secretly cackling!) I didn't have any gum paste tools back then so I improvised just using my hands, back of paintbrush to sink in the eyes and the buttons and of course, that beautiful, yet tacky, tooth pick… hurrah! I won't be using Mr Ghetto Snowman from down in the Bronx this year. I'm sure the kids will devour him in a single bite, but I definitely will be trying my hand at gum paste models in the future. I think I'll try to have the arms come together at the front, which will obviously look better than ghetto toothpicks!

Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake Recipe:

Ingredients:
350g (12 oz) Plain flour (or self-raising if you prefer a more open texture)
1 tsp Mixed spice
100g (4 oz) Ground almonds
4 medium eggs
150 ml (¼ pint) Milk (or ½ milk, ½ brandy) - I have used ½ milk and ½ brandy
225g (8 oz) Butter (plus extra for greasing)
225g (8 oz) Caster sugar
225g (8 oz) Currents
225g (8 oz) Sultanas
225g (8 oz) Raisins 100g (4 oz) Glacé cherries (halfed)
100g (4 oz) Mixed peel

Method:

Heat oven to 150ºC, 300ºF, Gas Mark 2. Grease and line a 23 cm (9 inch) round or 20.5 cm (8 inch) square tin. (I used a 20cm/8" round tin on both occasions.

Sieve together flour, spice and ground almonds. Beat eggs with milk.

Cream butter and sugar, stir in flour mixture and egg mixture alternately, a little at a time.

Lastly add fruit. Mix thoroughly. Place mixture in prepared tin and protect with brown paper.

Bake for about 3½-4 hours.

Allow to cool then cover with almond paste (Marzipan) and leave for 1 week. (see my alterations below*).

Royal icing:

If possible, stand the cake on a revolving cake stand or upturned cake tin.

Spread the icing on with a palette knife dipped in hot water to ease smoothness of the finish - but avoid making the icing too wet.

Cover the cake completely with icing, using sweeping strokes of the knife. Then spread the top smooth. To make the sides straight, bring the palette knife around the cake continuously, holding the knife upright.
N.B. If the cake is to be iced further e.g. piping, leave to stand for 24 hours.

*Alterations (on my 1st created cake):
I altered the way I created my cake. On the method, step 6, I did not cover the cake immediately after cooled. I fed my cake with brandy the day after cooking. I then spread the cake with warmed spreadable apricot jam (so the Marzipan stuck to the cake) when the cake had fully absorbed the brandy. I covered the cake in marzipan and then immediately after with my home-made fondant (sugar paste) icing.

On the 2nd cake I baked last night, I waiting until it had cooled fully before removing the dome from the top of the cake and feeding my cake with brandy. I will store my cake in cling film in an air-tight container. I intend to feed my cake again in 1 week time and will then decorate it ready for Christmas. Look out for Part II in one week! :)

Technorati Tags: traditional, christmas cake, brandy, mixed spice, ground almonds, milk, caster sugar, currents, sultanas, raisins, glacé cherries, glace cherries, mixed peel, fruit cake, baking

Black Forest Gâteau

2011-12-10T22:36:00.002Z

Black Forest Gâteau

OK, so this turned out to be a disaster! Oh well, you live and learn. As you can see from the photo, it just looks like a complete pile of sh*te! But it still tasted good. I followed the recipe but I think I lost a lot of air in the mixture after folding in the fluffy egg whites. I've not seen a recipe for chocolate cake which doesn't include any butter in the mixture. The next time I make it, I might try it a different way to the recipe I used. I may just use my usual denser sponge mix adding the chocolate into it so that it rises since that was the issue really. Oh and my crappy decorating skills, of course! Not to mention, I drained the canned black cherries and wiped them with kitchen towel but after cutting in half, the cherries were still rather juicy and therefore a lot of the whipped cream mixed with the cherries slid all over the place. Pah.
I will try this recipe again in the future as I do love me a wee slice (wee slice meaning giant sized shovel) of Black forest gâteau. Nom nom.

Black Forest Gâteau Recipe:

Serves 10
Prep time: 45 minutes
Cook time: 18 minutes
Total time: 63 minutes (1 hour, 3 minutes)
Suitable for vegetarians
Ingredients:
Butter for greasing,
6 large eggs (separated)
150g golden caster sugar
50g cocoa powder (sifted)
50g dark/plain chocolate
425g tin pitted black cherries in fruit juice
2 tbsp kirsch or cassis (optional, I didn't use as I don't have any in)
2 tbsp black cherry jam
200ml whipping cream
handful fresh cherries (again, optional).

Method:
Preheat the oven to 180ºC, fan 160ºC, gas 4. Lightly butter 2 x 20cm loose-bottomed cake tins and line the base with baking parchment.
Place the egg yolks and the sugar in a large bowl. Using an electric hand mixer, whisk for 3-4 minutes, until pale and slightly thickened. Using a large metal spoon, fold in the cocoa powder and 25g chocolate, roughly chopped.
In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until stiff. Add 1 spoonful to the chocolate mixture to loosen slightly, then carefully fold in the rest using a large metal spoon. Divide the chocolate mix between the cake tins and bake in the middle of the oven for 18 minutes, until the sponges are no longer wobbly in the middle when you shake the tins gently. They will be puffed up when you take them out of the oven and will sink a little during cooling. (not for me! Mine were like dense sponges but I think I folded it in all wrong, Gah!)
Leave the cakes to cool in their tins, then slide a palette knife around the outside of each to ease from the tins. Discard the baking parchment and place 1 cake on a serving plate.
Drain the cherries, reserving the juice. Mix 2 tablespoons cherry juice with the kirsch or cassis (I skipped the liquor and just and used just the cherry juice) and drizzle over the cake on the plate. Evenly spread the jam on top. Softly whip the cream and spread half of it over the jam. Cut two-thirds of the cherries in half and place on the cream. Finely grate the remaining 25g chocolate and sprinkle half over the cherries.
Top with the second cake and spread the rest of the cream on top. Place the reserved whole cherries around the top edge. Scatter the remaining chocolate in the middle and arrange the fresh cherries in the centre.

Nutritional info:
Per serving: 287 calls, 14.6g fat, 7.5g sat fat, 29.4 total sugars, 0.3g salt.

What a disaster. I do wanted this one to come out well, look great decorated and all but what will be, will be. Live and learn, or in my case, live and next time pray I do better! hehe. Either way, here's one recipe for you to try. Enjoy.

Technorati Tags:
baking, black cherries, black forest gateau, cake, chocolate, clack cherry, cocoa, desert, jam, recipe, treat, whipped cream, Black Forest Gâteau

Profiteroles w/Chocolate Sauce

2011-12-06T21:52:00.003Z

(pic courtesy Sainsbury's book)

Profiteroles with chocolate sauce

This is the first time I've ever made this and for a first timer, I have to say that these were surprisingly easy to make despite choux pastry apparently being hard to make? *shrug* Maybe this recipe is just a good recipe? Maybe my food mixer is just good? lol. Maybe I was just lucky?

Although, the only problem I did have was the piping of the whipped cream inside the choux buns. Such a novice, I had to try and play around with the nozzles I had to get best results but all in all, these were definitely fun, easy to make and certainly rewarding to eat after! Nom nom nom!

These didn't last long at all. The fella ate quite a few and commented that they were nice and tasted as good (if not better) than shop ones. I have to agree that I thought they were better. I certainly wash;t expecting them to taste nice at all but way hey! Always a Brucey bonus I say! Although I didn't manage to get a photo of my actual profiteroles (they didn't last that long!) they didn't look too far off the stock image above albeit a load more chocolate on the top. I made the recommended amount too.

Profiteroles with Chocolate Sauce Recipe:

Makes 18 profiteroles
Prep time: 30 minutes
Cook time: 40 minutes
Total time: 70 minutes (1 hour, 10 minutes)

Suitable for vegetarians

Ingredients:
50g unsalted butter (small cubed) plus extra for greasing,
60g plain flower
1 teaspoon caster sugar,
2 medium eggs (beaten),
300ml whipping cream,
1 tbsp icing sugar

For the chocolate sauce
200g plain chocolate,
5 tbsp double cream,
2 tbsp golden syrup

Method:

Preheat the oven to 200ºC, fan 180ºC, gas 6. Place the butter in a medium sized saucepan. Add 150ml cold water and simmer over a low heat until the butter has melted. Bring to the boil, then quickly add the flour and sugar (I sifted both the flour and sugar into a different bowl then bunged them both in together straight off the heat). Remove from the heat (or do it my way) and beat briskly with a wooden spoon until the mixture forms a smooth ball that leaves the sides of the saucepan clean.

Tip into a bowl and leave to cool for 5 minutes, then gradually add the egg, beating until you have a smooth, shiny paste (I put my mixture into my mixer, attached a K-beater and added all of the eggs at once then turned on high until sufficient smooth, shiny paste as mentioned above). Lightly grease a sheet of baking paper and place on a baking tray (I greased the tray and placed a clean sheet of baking paper on top of greased tray). Spoon the paste into a piping bag with a plain nozzle and pipe into 18 walnut-sized balls, leaving space between them for spreading.

Bake for 10 minutes, then increase the oven tempreature to 220ºC, fan 200ºC, gas 7 and bake for a further 15 minutes, until the choux buns are light golden brown and firm to the touch (here, I adjusted cooking times as mine were cooked with 5 minutes remaining on the clock, so best to keep an eye on them during the last 15 minutes of cooking). Quickly pierce each one underneath with a skewer to let steam escape, then leave to cool on a wire rack (I left mine on the baking tray on the baking paper covered after and they were absolutely fine and not at all greasy underneath).

To make the sauce, place a heatproof bowl over a pan of gently simmering water and melt the chocolate with the double cream and golden syrup until smooth (I melted the chocolate completely first before adding the double cream and golden syrup).

To make the filling, whip the cream with the icing sugar. When the profiteroles are cold, pipe the cream into the middle of each and spread (or in my case drizzle (yum)) the tops with chocolate sauce.

Nutritional info:
Per serving, 195 calls, 14.6g fat, 8.9g sat fat, 10g total sugars, trace salt.

Enjoy! :)

The must have 'About Me' post

2011-12-05T21:19:00.001Z

The must have first post where I have to make myself sound as exciting as possible to attract would-be readers! So, here goes... *gulp*

I'm Lisa, I'm 30 (at the time of posting this). I am a disabled mum of three little girls, Katrina (11), Collette (8) and Abbi (7). Not forgetting my partners son, Josh (7). I live in Nottingham, in beautiful sunny *cough* England! I have Psoriatic arthritis (PSA) and have had it since I was approx. 13 years old. Daily life is a struggle with the constant pain, fatigue and of course, stiff and fused unusable joints all over my body.

Due to this, I do not work and often find myself bored. I needed a hobby and fast! I do love photography as a hobby that I have done for years but my disability now somewhat restricts that. But I do enjoy cooking main meals (when the children don't cock their noses up at my wonderful 'creations') but wanted to broaden my horizons by baking up some yummy mummy desert treats. I'm an amateur at this still. Oh so amateur-ish! So, I'm not just cooking up a treat, I'll often be found 'cocking' up a treat too! :) But ah well, practise makes perfect huh?

So, here you will see the good, the bad, and the downright ugly, heh! Follow along if you will, the more the merrier and join in with the fun and the mess found in my kitchen after. Oh, and while you're here, grab that dish cloth and help me tidy up will you? Ta muchly!

I'm using a Kenwood Chef Titanium food processor/mixer which I recently purchased and have used a lot! It is fantastic. I love that it is a mixer with the usual whisk, dough hook, K-beater and a flexible beater (which scrapes the sides of the bowl as it beats) as well as a food processor which fits on top, and also has a liquidiser which also fits on top. I'm lusting after the ice cream and mincer attachments too.

Favourite recipes:
-I'll be adding to this as I go along-

Profiteroles w/chocolate sauce