cake me home - adventures in my kitchen

Happy Valentines Day

2012-02-14T09:25:00.000Z

Wishing you all a happy Valentines day
xx

Brownie Cake

2012-02-05T22:12:00.002Z

Brownies are becoming a regular 'thing' around here right now. Lots of little tweaks to the recipe means lots of re-baking, just to compare. Such is the hardship of creating a recipe...

Chocolate and Raspberry Brownie

2012-02-01T15:20:00.000Z

Act of Kindess

2012-01-30T18:23:00.000Z

Well I tried... I work with a lovely lady, who sadly is suffering from Carpel Tunnel Syndrome. Today I arrived early for work, so popped off and picked up a little bunch of daffodils, nothing much, but I bought them for her, thinking they might just lift her spirits a little - she's waiting for a date for an operation to release nerve and alieviate the pain she's in.

So off I toddled to work, clutching my little bunch to give to Diana - but upon arrival I'm greeted by my boss, who is lovely too (I'm very fortunate!), but clearly not Diana. I did say he could have them, so I suppose it still counts, just not quite as I intended!

Image taken at The Eden Project in April 2009, when I took my mum away for a weekend to Cornwall. This was the very best weather we had that weekend!

Ruffles

2012-01-28T17:08:00.000Z

I made my first Ruffle Cake this week - and I loved it. So much so, that 4 days later I made one for us to have at home too.

What's not to love about pastel buttercream and flower blossoms?

Act of Kindness

2012-01-27T14:48:00.000Z

It wasn't much, but this week I've made a real effort to chat to the people serving me in shops. Not when there's a huge queue of people behind me - the idea is not to annoy them! However, eye contact, a genuine smile, and the time for a few words where possible has led to some lovely conversation and a slight spring in my footsteps. I'm making time to chat, and it feels good. (Cue slightly denomic grin here)

Inspiration from Aesop

2012-01-20T07:26:00.000Z

I had a book of Aesop's Fables as a child. It was a book I loved. It was this large (particularly oversized when you are small) duck egg cloth bound book that belonged to my father, with quite large font and these delicate full colour plate illustrations at intervals. I used to love gazing at the illustrations as much as I enjoyed reading the stories. I think my particular favourite was the fable with the Crow & the Pitcher - where a thirsty crow, spying a pitcher of water that is too low to drink from, drops pebbles into the pitcher until the water reaches a level that he can drink from. Thoughtfulness can be better than brute strength.

So where is all this going? Well a couple of years ago I read a blog about a woman who'd celebrated her 38th birthday by doing 38 acts of kindness, and it touched a cord with me, but was soon forgotten about. My husband turned 38 last week and that made me remember about those little acts of kindness - and in searching for the original blog post I found this quote:

"no act of kindness, however small, is ever wasted" Aesop

I don't want to wait until I turn 38 in September to do my version, or indeed restrict it to just once a year. After all it's not the size that matters, but the simple act, so I'm just going to try to do a little something every week that is a little Act of Kindness and see where we go.

Lemon Curd

2012-01-13T09:32:00.000Z

There is something I find very soothing about making a jar or two of lemon curd. It really is very simple to do, though you do need to devote 20 minutes or so to it. So, gather some lemons and pop the kettle on to make a cup of tea and why not have a go?

Lemon Curd - makes about a jar

You will need:

1 large lemon
75g caster sugar
2 large eggs
50g unsalted butter (cut into small pieces)

How to:

Whisk the lemon juice with the eggs in a heatproof bowl, add the sugar and then the butter.
Place the bowl over a saucepan of barely simmering water.
Stir frequently until thickened - about 15-20 minutes
Pour into a sterilised jar, with a lid and store in the fridge.

It's tempting to turn the heat up 'just a bit' to make it thicken quicker, but don't! I learnt from experience that if is heated too quickly it can go a bit grainy rather than the smooth texture it should be. It'll keep for a couple of weeks in the fridge - just remember to get it out about 10-20 minutes before you want it to allow the flavour to develop from the cold.

Cake!

2012-01-06T18:02:00.001Z

I had a huge desire to bake today. I had no reason to bake, I just wanted to. So I did...

Christmas Cakes

2011-12-29T13:05:00.000Z

I actually got round to finishing our cake on Boxing Day. Not at all imaginative about it's design, it was more a case of, if I don't do it - it won't happen at all. So a very simple, white on white with a marzipan orange for my husband and marzipan holly leaves.

Happy Christmas

Joe made a much more imaginative effort on his first ever Christmas cake...

Molly Cake

2011-12-07T16:04:00.000Z

Whilst it's true that I love my cake, it's also true that I could do with losing a few pounds. A little bit of 'research' - which widely translates as being sat at the computer with a mug of tea (and perhaps the smallest slice of cake) and searching Google, revealed a recipe for 'Molly Cake' which is a cake made without fat, sugar, eggs and dairy! So, in the interests of my waistline and because I'm very curious I decided to give it a go.

Ingredients

250g stoned dates, roughly chopped - I cut mine with kitchen scissors (much quicker)
300ml water
85g plain flour
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground mixed spice
85g wholemeal flour
500g bag dried, mixed fruit
50g ground almonds
80ml orange juice

Preheat the oven to 170°C, gas mark 3 and line a 1lb loaf tin with baking parchment. I used my half pound tins to make two.
Place the chopped dates and water in a pan and bring to the boil. Remove the pan from the heat and set aside to cool a little.
Sieve the plain flour, baking powder and mixed spice into a bowl. Add the wholemeal flour, mixed fruit and ground almonds and stir to combine. Stir in the wet date mixture and the orange juice. Mix well.
Spoon into the loaf tin.
Bake for 45-50 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
Turn out onto a wire rack and cool.

The recipe really is very simple and the cake smells delicious as it's cooking. In fact so lovely, that I couldn't actually wait for it to cool before cutting the first slice.

And the verdict? Actually really nice, so nice in fact we're wondering if it might work as a Christmas cake as long as we feed it. It's incredibly moist - although maybe some of that will go as it cools. It tastes sweet, and I think it's nigh on impossible to realise that there is no butter, sugar or eggs in it.

So huge thanks to Waitrose for the recipe.

Naan with Chickpea Curry

2011-11-29T08:55:00.002Z

I don't know about you, but I've been very much inspired by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall in his recent series on veg. At a point in my life when I was finding it hard to be inspired in the kitchen he has re-lit that fire. So today, I bring you his Chickpea Ketchup Curry and my very first attempt at a naan, which is a bread I totally love, and yet so fearful of attempting. However, images of freshly baked naan keep creeping in my mind, and I thought it high time I just went for it...

So I did. Lots of googling the recipe, reading up info on wikipedia and just general oohing at the lovely images of naan, mixed in with a touch of salivating.

The Chickpea curry recipe is from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall on the Channel4 website, and the naan recipe is loosely based on another of Hugh's recipes and lots others that I found.

Naan - Ingredients

500g plain white flour
7g yeast
300ml warm water
7g salt
1 heaped tablespoon natural yoghurt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Place the yeast into a bowl/jug with about 100mls of the water. Stir and leave for 10 minutes.
Add the flour and salt to a bowl, stir to combine and make a well in the centre. Add the yeast and water mix, yoghurt, vegetable oil and the remaining water. Mix this to a sticky-ish dough, then turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 5-10 minutes until you have a smooth dough. I used my dough hook to mix the flour and wet ingredients and it looked very very sticky - so I added a couple of handfuls of additional flour, before turning out and kneading by hand - adding a touch more flour still.
Place into a lightly oiled bowl (I just added oil into the bowl I'd already used), cover and allow to prove for about an hour.
Knock back the dough and knead again. Cut into 4 (next time I'm cutting into 6 to make them slightly easier to fit in my pan!) and roll out to about half a centimetre thickness.
Heat a frying pan (the heavier based the better) over a medium heat. Once the pan is hot pop one piece of the dough in at a time and cook until it has formed a crust and bubbles are forming on the top side (about 4 minutes). Flip over and cook the other side. Once it was done, I added a small knob of butter to the pan and swirled the naan around in it, before flipping to coat the other side and then turned onto a board, whilst I repeated with the remaining dough.

Christmas 2012 - Part One

2011-11-27T13:24:00.000Z

White Chocolate and Macadamia Nut Cookies

2011-11-25T16:37:00.001Z

As it turns colder, my heart begins to yearn for more than just an afternoon cuppa.

Yesterday was one of those days!

White Chocolate and Macadamia Nut cookies were the object of my affection, and a walk in to town to get the ingredients would surely allow me to eat one (or two) without guilt!!

The recipe is a nice easy one too as you first mix the wet ingredients and add the dry to it and bar the macadamia nuts and the white chocolate everything else was to hand.

White chocolate & Macadamia Cookies (Makes approximately 24)

INGREDIENTS:

1 egg
150g soft brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
125ml vegetable oil
60g plain flour
30g self raising flour
1 tsp cinnamon
100g macadamia nuts, coarsely chopped
150g white chocolate, chunked

1. Beat the egg with the sugar until combined, then add the vanilla essence and the oil.

2. Add the dry ingredients; flours, cinnamon, nuts and chocolate. Mix well.

3. Place the mixture into the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

4. Preheat the oven to 180^oC (Gas 4). Grease and line two baking trays.

5. Drop rounded dessert spoons size of mixture on to your trays - remembering to leave room for them to spread.

6. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Allow to cool slightly on the tray before removing them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Pizza Napoletana

2011-11-17T20:29:00.000Z

The recipe is taken from The Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart. The recipe uses unbleached bread flour. I didn't have enough, so I opted to use the wholewheat flour that I've had in the pantry for what seems an age now (curiously enough though, the flour was even in date!). The recipe is one that requires a little forward thinking, again, not my strong point, in that the dough is made ahead and left in the fridge overnight. This went against all my knowledge of placing dough in a warm place to prove...

I made the dough on Wednesday night, it was very simple to do - in part because I threw it in the mixer. Then I divided the dough up and stuck them in oiled bags and stuck them in the fridge...

Yesterday, I forewarned the family we might be having a takeaway as I got the dough out of the bags. I squished them into half inch thick rounds, covered with the bag and left them to it for a couple of hours. What I wasn't expecting to find when I returned was a nice soft dough.

Using wholewheat flour does give it less elasticity, so I rolled the dough out as thin as I could before sticking it on the pizza stone and rolling it thinner still. By pre-heating the stone it starts to cook the dough straight away - which helps form a crisper base (a trick I learnt from Jamie Oliver).

Ever so organised, I hadn't thought about the tomato sauce... and we were due out to Sea Cadets within the hour. Out came the tomato puree and a thin layer was added to the dough, which was now starting to crisp up nicely. One pizza was topped with mozzarella, streaky bacon and basil leaves.

The other - my favourite combination of mozzarella, raisins and red onion.

I don't have two stones so the second pizza (my favourite) was relegated to a baking tray. Both were then placed into the oven, 8 minutes in and the pizza on the stone was ready, and the other one was moved up a shelf and left for a further two minutes.

A dash of olive oil and voilá, thin, light, crispy, delicious pizza.

I will be making this again, very simple and I loved the wholewheat base.

Pizza Napoletana from Peter Reinhart (Makes two 9" pizzas)

170g unbleached bread flour (I used wholewheat)
3.5g salt
1/3 tsp instant yeast
16g olive oil
116g water

Method

Stir the flour, salt and yeast in a large bowl. Stir in the oil and water until the flour is combined.
Stir for about 5 to 7 minutes to get the gluten going. You should end up with a smooth dough that is a little sticky. It should clear the sides of the bowl, but not the bottom. If it is too dry add a couple of drops of water, and if a little too wet add some more flour and mix again.
Prepare two food grade bag which you have oiled lightly. Divide the dough into two balls, flour your hands and shape the dough into a ball. Place the dough into the bag and pop it in the fridge overnight.
A couple of hours before you want to cook them remove the remove the dough from the fridge. Dust your worktop with flour (and your hands). Place each ball on the counter and then gently press each into a flat disc about 1/2 inch thick. Top each with a little flour and oil (I forgot to do this bit...) and cover with another bag. Let rest for 2 hours.
At least 45 minutes before cooking put on your oven on at it’s maximum temperature. If you are using a baking stone, pop this in too.
About half an hour after you started pre-heating your oven you now need to start to stretch your dough. Coat your hands in flour including the backs and your knuckles. Gently lay the dough on to the top of your fists and carefully stretch it by bouncing the dough in a circular motion. As it starts to spread out you can move to the full toss method, if you wish (I didn't). If it sticks to your hands at any point lay it out flat and redust your hands, continue stretching until it is the desired width. I started bouncing my dough, then finished it off by rolling it out with a rolling pin.
Top your pizza as you wish. Transfer the pizza to your oven. It should only take between 8 and 10 minutes to cook. You might want to turn it 180 degrees after 2 minutes, if you think it might over cook on one side.

We will remember them

2011-11-11T07:38:00.002Z

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, not the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Monster in the kitchen

2011-11-10T15:32:00.000Z

So, it's not the prettiest cake in the world - but a stacked two tiers of Victoria Sandwich, sandwiched with jam and vanilla buttercream and topped with a cherry and almond buttercream layered cake and covered with oodles of pic'n'mix made my 12 year old jump up and down with joy. Then rush to get his camera.... (he's a blogger in the making!)

Happy Birthday Joe
Mum
xxxxxxx

Cherry loaves

2011-11-08T23:43:00.001Z

Today's baking efforts, in between 8 hours of work and a committee meeting for a local charity.

Marzipan Fruits

2011-11-06T19:11:00.000Z

Some Sunday afternoon fun for the Boy and I.

Ghost Time

2011-10-26T15:17:00.000+01:00

I'm not sure if you've noticed, but it would appear that Halloween is coming up later this week.

What could be better than a spot of ghost cake making using American hard gums, ready to roll icing and a nozzle to cut eyes. Perfect for an 11 year old...

Add a touch of glace icing, and you're away

A perfect 'trick' to play on an unsuspecting Gramp, who pops the whole thing in his mouth and then can't talk for ages..... and the black icing on the spider webs makes his teeth turn a very nasty grey too.

So much fun :)

Poor Gramp, best make him something more natural next time...

Victoria Sponge

2011-10-24T19:33:00.000+01:00

Stencil + Icing Sugar = Quick decoration

Website

2011-10-18T09:13:00.003+01:00

I'm so excited to finally announce that I'm now on the web! My website is finally up - and I think spelling error free... (though anyone who spots an error, will be paid in cake!). So all that remains to say is:

Soak with me

2011-10-10T12:54:00.001+01:00

Well since my last post, I've spied a fellow blogger, and published author, Vanessa Kimbell who is also into gifting at Christmas. She's come up with a lovely idea to encourage us all to make a gift - so I'll be joining in. Will you?

Okay, so since my last post I have indeed managed to collect the grand sum of three tin cans. There is still time to collect them though as this week I'm concentrating on the important role of soaking the dried fruit.

You can use any recipe you like. Mine is a variation on Nigella's Rich Fruit Cake, which I've tweaked over the years. We have a thing for cherries in our house and are not at all fussed over mixed peel. My quantities are based on a 225g (1/2lb) cake which should give me a nice number of little cakes (about 6) and enough to make a small round cake. Feel free to use which ever recipe you like.

FRUIT SOAKING:

450g sultanas
450g raisins
150g currants
200g whole glacé cherries

Place all of the dried fruits into a large bowl and add 120ml of brandy. Cover and leave to soak overnight at a minimum. I leave mine to soak for about a week, turning the fruit over in the morning - and inhaling the fumes.

Right, now I just need to aquire more cans. I foresee a weekend of 'things' on toast and soup coming up!

Join with me in a week (or two) for the last bit...

Bake with me?

2011-10-01T12:46:00.000+01:00

There is nothing nicer than giving a gift at Christmas, and as with every year, I try to make something home-made to give. Most people do not really 'need' a bought gift, and something that you've put some effort into is often (although sadly not always) received with real joy.

Do you fancy baking some mini Christmas cakes with me?

They're perfect for giving as gifts and very very simple.

If you'd like to bake along with me all you need to do this week is collect some tin cans, doesn't matter if they are baked beans, tinned tomatoes or even tinned fruit. Just wash them out, keep them safe and pop by soon for your next task!

Damson Cordial

2011-09-27T09:21:00.000+01:00

Many of my early memories involve me with a member of my family stomping out in the countryside, plastic bag in pocket (sorry - no glamourous wicker basket for me), plundering natures harvest. There was a most spectacular time when I returned with, I think, just a couple of blackberries after an afternoon harvesting with my granddad. The rest I'd eaten. Needless to say I did see them again later that evening...

Now, shush - please don't tell my mum, but I'm not a huge fan of Damson Jam... So I thought I'd give Damson Cordial a go.

The resulting cordial is perfect, sweet and syrupy and even better for being made from free fruit! You don't need any particular 'equipment' for making the cordial apart from some muslin (or a very fine tea towel - though not your favourite one, as it'll stain it heavily) and some way of straining the fruity mush overnight.

DAMSON CORDIAL - taken from RiverCottage Handbook No.2

You'll need to pick about 2kg of Damsons to make about a litre and half of Cordial, plus sugar and a couple of bottles and that piece of muslin or a tea towel.

Place the damsons into a large pan and add 300ml of water for every kilo of fruit. Bring this slowly to the boil and cook gently until the fruit is soft, crushing with a wooden spoon as you go.

Once the fruit is nicely soft (this took about 30 minutes), remove the pan from the heat.

Scald your muslin/jelly bag/teatowel with boiling water and suspend over large bowl. I didn't have any muslin to hand (it's in a box still to be unpacked!), so I just laid a tea towel over my bowl, tipped the fruit mush into it and tied it up. I then hung it from the handle of a wall cupboard suspended over the bowl and let it drip overnight. Using a tea towel is fine - it just soaks up more of the resulting liquid than the muslin would.

The next day measure your strained liquid and pour into a clean pan, adding 700g sugar for every litre of liquid. Heat this gently until the sugar has disolved and then pour into warm, sterilised bottles.

The Cordial should keep for a couple of months provided the liquid is sealed when hot and stored in a cool dark place. I think we'll run out of cordial long before it gets a chance to go off...

Perfect Sunday

2011-09-25T17:06:00.000+01:00

Today has been a busy day in the kitchen. My husband complained (via Facebook, I may add) last night that there was nothing yummy to eat in the house. So today I have baked coffee and walnut cakes, a fruit cake, some vanilla fudge and some double chocolate chip cookies. That should see him through the evening I hope.

I also made the Boy's favourite breakfast (currently) of eggy crumpets, and then some spicy parsnip soup for lunch.

Now I'm just waiting for my husband to come home from work so we can eat our Roasted veg and chicken for tea. Not that I'm very hungry. Too much bowl licking I fear...

Best Ever Blini's

2011-09-10T12:37:00.000+01:00

I've made Blini's before, but they've never quite managed to live up to my expectations. Until this week, and would you believe it - it came from Nigella. A book I've had for ages...

As you can see - I don't use a blini pan for cooking these. I don't have one, and I rather like the random dollops of yeasty pancake, besides this way I can make smaller or larger ones depending on the topping!

So if you fancy treating yourself to some blini's I can highly recommend this recipe, firstly for the ease of making the batter and secondly for the light texture of the finished blini.

You will need:

75g buckwheat flour
75g strong white flour
1 sachet easyblend yeast
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
100ml milk
2 tbs creme fraiche (I used soured cream)
1tbsp butter
1 egg, separated

Method:

Mix the flours with the yeast, salt and sugar. Nigella recommends using a warmed bowl for this.
Pour 100ml milk into a measuring jug. Add the creme fraiche or soured cream and mix well. Then add enough water so that the liquid comes up to the 250ml mark.
Add this mix to a milk pan and add the butter. Warm gently until the butter melts.
Allow this mix to cool to blood temperature before beating in the egg yolk.
Pour this mix onto the flours, and combine. Cover with a damp tea towel and leave in a warm place for 2 hours - or the fridge overnight (so you could make this in the evening, ready for a special breakfast...)
Just before using the mix, whisk up the egg white and fold in. I would say gently - but by this time my batter was very thick and gluey... so I just went for it, and the resulting mix seemed fine!

Preheat the oven (to keep the blini's warm), heat up a frying pan. Melt some butter and drop spoonfuls of the mix in. I needed to use another spoon to scrape the very sticky mix off... Turn the blini over when the batter starts bubbling on top. It's worth noting that the first two or three didn't really bubble much, so I ate these 'duds' as cooks perk!

Nigella says not to press down on these whilst cooking, and I'd go along with that - otherwise you just 'squish' all the fab puffiness out of them!

The mix made about 24 smallish (but more than a bite size) blini's and we kept some back in the fridge for another day, just re-heating them naughtily in the toaster.... :)

Sugar Flowers

2011-09-06T09:19:00.000+01:00

Preparation

2011-08-16T11:31:00.001+01:00

One of the golden rules for cake decoration is about proper preparation. For me this means filling in any slight imperfections in the fruit cake before applying the layer of marzipan. Still got a few holes to finish before this one is ready.

Also remembering to apply a marzipan filler to the bottom edge to ensure no air can get in and spoil the cake.

Lamb & Chips

2011-08-12T09:04:00.000+01:00

Minted lamb pitta's with 'Villandry' style wedges

Mini Fruit Cakes

2011-07-16T12:35:00.001+01:00

Well I am pleased to report that the little fruit cakes I baked for our anniversary worked. They are muffin sized, so reasonably substantial.

I topped them all with homemade marzipan before adding icing to some of them. I'd forgotten to get apricot jam, but discovered that warmed marmalade made a good substitute.

You will need: (Makes 12 decent sized little cakes)

500g mixed fruit
75g glace cherries (I like the natural colour ones best)
60ml Cointreau
125g butter
100g light brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons of marmalade (I think I might even try 3 next time)
250g plain flour

Method:

Place all of the dried fruit, including the cherries into a bowl. Add the Cointreau and leave to soak overnight. I only left mine a few hours, they really need overnight soaking.
Preheat the oven to Gas 2
Cream the butter with the sugar.
Add the eggs and marmalade and beat well.
Sift the flour into the batter mix and then add the dried fruit, mix well.
Drop spoonfuls into muffin cases and bake for 1hr 30min - 2hrs (depending on your oven). Mine needed almost 2 hours. They are done when the cake tester (skewer) comes out clean.
Allow to cool in the muffin tin.

These are lovely on their own, or you can add little discs of marzipan and fondant icing to replicate little 'Celebration Cakes'. One is quite large - we'd happily share and you can always freeze them without the marzipan and icing. The addition of the cointreau and marmalade give them a good orange taste - without mixed peel and the light brown sugar make them lighter than a traditional rich fruit cake.

Butterfly Cakes

2011-07-16T11:40:00.001+01:00

Simple white butterfly with an iced body

Mini Cakes

2011-07-14T12:34:00.000+01:00

Today is our wedding anniversary, and hubby has a thing for fruit cake - he ate our top layer... (enough said!).

So, I've baked some mini fruit cakes to celebrate with later.

The fruit was soaked in Cointreau, because I love it - and these are as much for me as they are my beloved.

Now I just need to taste them - as I tweaked the recipe somewhat and decide how to decorate them.

If the recipe works I shall post it on here, along with a 'finished' picture.

Neapolitan Cake

2011-07-11T21:33:00.000+01:00

6 layers of yummy sponge in pink, vanilla and chocolate topped with lashings of scrummy buttercream and topped with sweets.

Thanks for Debs (the twins aunt) for the last two images x

Salad Days

2011-07-07T19:02:00.000+01:00

Crispy Bacon and Crouton Salad

Cloud Cake

2011-06-16T12:25:00.000+01:00

Originally called a Lemon & Coconut Cake, this is now renamed - in honour of the time that my husband walked in the door from work and commented on the lovely smell of baking and I told him I was making a "Lemon Cloud Cake".

"What !?!" said my husband. Clearly I'd been in the deep depths of baking mode and was obviously distracted by the stunning blue sky and puffy white clouds, though it really is fabulously light and fluffy...

You will need:

125g self raising flour
125g butter
125g caster sugar
2 eggs
some milk
1 lemon, both juice and zest
1 tsp vanilla extract
lemon curd
buttercream icing
dessicated coconut

How to:

Grease and flour a 9" deep cake tin, preferably loose bottomed.
In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar together
Add the eggs and mix well
Sift the flour and add one tablespoon at a time and mix well, adding some milk to make a light batter. I normally add about a tablespoon, but it'll depend on your flour
Add the lemon zest, lemon juice and vanilla extract
Pour into a prepared cake tine and bake for 20-30 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean
Allow to cool in tin for 5 minutes before turning out to cool properly
When cool, cut the cake horizontally into 4 layers*
Sandwich the cake with layers of buttercream and lemon curd
Top cake and sides with more buttercream and cover with dessicated coconut.

* The first time I made this I managed to cut 3 layers, the last time only two - just cut what you can, the best bit really is the eating.

Marmalade

2011-06-15T10:28:00.000+01:00

Yes, I know marmalade season was ages ago, but as I use my mum's secret trick of freezing the oranges to use later in the year - anytime can by marmalade time for us.

You will need:

1.5kg Seville oranges
2 medium lemons
2.25kg granulated sugar

Plus: Muslin, string, sterilised jars and covers

How to:

Take a jug and place a large square of muslin on top.
Cut the fruit (including the lemons) in half and squeeze juice, putting the juice into the preserving pan* and the pips into the muslin square. Cut the fruit in half again and remove as much pith and flesh as possible. Put the pith and flesh into the muslin and tie up with string. Pour any liquid from the jug into your preserving pan.
Cut the skin into fine shreds and place in the preserving pan with 4 pints of cold water. Add the muslin bag and bring to the boil. Simmer uncovered for about 2 hours or until the fruit is soft and the liquid has reduced by at least a quarter.
Remove the muslin bag and drain over the pan. Measure the liquid and peel into a measuring jug and return to the pan adding 450g of sugar per pint of liquid. Heat gently and stir until the sugar has dissolved - it takes about 15 minutes.
Now boil rapidly for about an hour - the longer it's boiled the darker the colour will be. Test the marmalade to see if it's setting by putting a spoonful on a cold saucer and pushing with your finger to see if it wrinkles - if so, it's set. Leave to cool slightly for 15 minutes.
Spoon the marmalade into warmed jars and leave to stand until cold, then cover and enjoy!

Will make about 5lb (roughly 5 x 450g) jars of marmalade

* If you don't have a preserving pan, use the largest saucepan you have and reduce the quantities accordingly.

Toasting Marshmallows

2011-06-03T12:49:00.000+01:00

Following our recent camping trip, where I rather foolishly raised the stakes in catering, I thought I ought to elevate the humble toasted marshmallow too.

All I'll say is that the addition of Jaffa Cakes works very well - and two cakes either side of a freshly toasted marshmallow is a rather indulgent, and rather sweet end to a camp dinner, oh and they don't stay around long enough to grab a photo of them...

Glamping up the trangia

2011-05-28T08:44:00.001+01:00

We couldn't resist the lovely weather, and our hearts were yearning for some country air. So we dusted off our camping gear and made the long journey to a campsite not 10 miles from home. I can't quite believe we stayed so close either, but it made the journey very short and sweet!

The Boy brewed up a fabulous cup of tea, and with some provisions

and a little help from some neighbours

our camping tea had reached Glamping status:

Yum x

Peanut Butter Ice Cream

2011-05-26T10:57:00.000+01:00

My brother in law and I share a love of peanut butter - though he favours 'Skippy' whilst I'm a 'Whole Earth' girl, however, differences aside he wondered if I could make a peanut butter ice cream... ooh yum was my first thought, along with 'why didn't I think of that!' So I decided to have a go.

I decided to use my non 'custard' base - the peanut butter is fairly rich anyway but with the addition of a couple of egg yolks to see if I could replicate the 'clag' you get when eating a peanut butter sandwich.

You will need:

150ml double cream
150ml single cream
40g sugar (preferably caster, but I used granulated)
2 dessert spoons of smooth peanut butter (Whole Earth won!)
2 egg yolks

Pop all of the ingredients into a saucepan, mix well and heat slowly, stirring frequently until the sugar has dissolved.

Once the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is nicely combined allow to cool. I poured my mix into a jug so it would be easier to pour later.

Once the mixture is cold - pour it into your machine* (or tub).

Let the machine work it's magic.

Add some chopped up chocolate if you want to recreate a 'Reeces Pieces' type flavour.

Pop into a freezer tub to enjoy a little later, or eat a scoop straight away...

*I have an ice cream machine with a freezing unit, but you can make ice cream without a machine. You just need to pour the cooled mixture into a freezer tub and pop it in the freezer. To ensure you get a nice smooth, creamy consistency you need to remember to check your ice-cream every 30 - 45 minutes and break up the formed ice crystals with a spoon/spatula. Give the mix a good beating and replace back in the freezer, you'll need to do this for about 2-4 hours depending on your mix, but then you should have nice creamy ice cream.

We previously had one of the 'freeze the bowl' type makers and they work well, but I would often forget to freeze the bowl, or realise I had no space left in the freezer for it, so a few years ago we bought a re-conditioned unit direct from the manufacturer. It still wasn't that cheap, it's heavy and quite large - but I love it and if you've the money, the space and the love of ice-cream its an investment I'd recommend.

Hollandaise

2011-05-16T11:04:00.000+01:00

We had some wonderful Asparagus arrive in this weeks veg box - so it seemed an appropriate time to attempt making some Hollandaise sauce for the very first time.

Its a very simple dish of just egg yolks, butter and lemon juice. It is notorious for being a rather difficult sauce to create - it's prone to curdling very very easily. Thankfully I had read Nigella's recipe and had a sink of cold water on hand to plunge the bowl into if it looked like it might curdle and a husband to yell at to quickly fetch an ice cube too.

Obviously I needed both. One moment I had beautiful silken Hollandaise and a head that was a little inflated with thought of 'pah, who said Hollandaise was difficult', the next a bowl of something that was begining to curdle. A plunge into the sink and an ice cube later (thanks to hubby and Nigella) and I had once again a Hollandaise that looked okay.

It tasted lovely enough to make me want to give it another try next weekend.

Flower Combinations

2011-05-12T09:17:00.000+01:00

Been trialling some floral arrangements for a cake at the weekend. We're all liking this one the best, so now I'll just need to re-create it.

Work in progress

2011-05-10T11:48:00.000+01:00

A couple of celebration cakes are due out later this week, so this week has all been about black hands

and pretty colours.

Fougasse

2011-05-07T11:58:00.000+01:00

I woke this morning with a real desire to make bread. It's rather lovely to knead dough - although of course I cheated with the dough hook....

I've always wanted to try to make fougasse, it's a very pretty looking 'loaf' and seems perfect for sharing. The slits seem to really lend themselves to being torn apart. My recipe today came with the Summer Harvest supplement from Waitrose's current magazine. Of course my storecupboard was bare of the sun-dried tomatoes it called for, so I substitued sun-dried chilli instead. Only one chilli though...

So into the mixer went the flour, sugar, salt and yeast, the lukewarm water was added and I switched on and let it do it's thing whilst I tore into the basil plant and crumbled a chilli. Both were then thrown into the mixer bowl and allowed to knead some more, then turned out onto my floured work top, shaped and rolled to an oval before the slits added. Then plonked on a tray and covered with some oiled clingfilm to prove for an hour, before being popped into a hot oven for half an hour to bake, whilst I made the salad to go with it. Verdict - very yum, very easy and I will be baking it again. Soon.

Home Made Jazzies

2011-05-06T18:56:00.000+01:00

Simple, but effective project, perfect for after-school on a hot day.

We popped some trays in the fridge to cool and set about melting some white chocolate in a bowl over simmering water, whilst the dark chocolate we put straight into the pan over a low heat, but were careful not to scorch the chocolate.

Once melted we dolloped teaspoons of the melted chocolate directly onto the baking trays before adding the sprinkles on top.

Then back into the fridge to allow the chocolate to cool and set.

Fruit Basket Cake

2011-05-05T11:23:00.000+01:00

This weeks cake is a rich fruit cake, covered in a thick layer of marzipan and then royal iced using a basket weave nozzle and topped with marzipan fruits. We're almost there, just the basket handles to ice and some more fruit to make, so it should be ready for Saturday.

Great British Cupcakes

2011-05-03T09:11:00.000+01:00

Still feeling patriotic? I am, so I'm unashameably reposting images from our Afternoon Tea last Friday.

Red, White & Blue Sprinkled Butterfly Cakes

Simple Sprinkles in red, white and blue

Union Jack Baking Cases - from Lakeland

Royal Wedding

2011-05-02T09:12:00.000+01:00

Wow. Did you watch it? I did. It has to be said that I do love a good wedding, and as weddings go, I did think that this was particularly lovely. Having got up for work at 3am (the nation still needs cake!) I'm not sure if the tears were due to my tiredness or the emotions of the day. We'd asked our neighbours round for a spot of afternoon tea, so watching the wedding was shared between some cake and scone baking and sandwich making. However time was found to sit upon the sofa, cup of tea (Earl Grey for me) in hand watching it on the television. All the time with one eye on those grey looking clouds!

I thought Kate's dress was wonderful, I loved the lace. I thought her sister had a stunning gown. William looked every inch the proud groom - and even the Queen looked thrilled (mostly!)

So what about the cake!

Wow! 8 tiers and 17 cakes do make for a fairly impressive display. I loved the intricate piping - I think Royal Icing will be making a well deserved comeback too.

And, if the word is correct, I loved the fact that the sugar flowers were chosen for their meaning. Not sure I'd have wanted to create 900 of them though.

Well done to the team at Fiona Cairns. I think it was definately worth the reputed 5 weeks it took to create.

Royal Wedding Tea Party

2011-04-29T12:10:00.000+01:00

Royal Wedding Fever hits today! Can't post much - as I'm glued to the box!

Looking forward to tucking into this though...

Easter Nests

2011-04-21T16:32:00.000+01:00

It's hard to believe that the Easter holidays are almost at an end. Particularly so, as it's only Good Friday tomorrow. Thankfully too, bearing in mind I had a jolly late night last night (seeing Nerina Pallot in concert) and an early start (4am), the Boy wanted to do nothing more than a spot of baking today. I've no idea how your weather is/was, but it was fairly warm here - so what could be better (and simpler) than Chocolate Easter nests.

Now I'm sure you've all got a recipe stashed away safely, but I'm popping mine here - mainly so I needn't spend an hour looking for it next time he (and I) wants to make them!

Chocolate Nests

100g dark chocolate, broken into chunks
75g butter
1 heaped tbsp Golden Syrup
75g (ish) Cornflakes/3 shredded wheat
Chocolate Mini Eggs

Makes about 12 'fairy cake' sized chocolate nests.

Pop a large pan on the hob and melt the chocolate slowly in it. Add the butter and the golden syrup. Turn the heat off and allow the residual heat of the melted chocolate to melt the butter and syrup.

At this point we both stuck our noses into the pan (not literally) and took a big inhale of the yummy melty chocolate smell.

Add the cornflakes (or shredded wheat, if you're being authentic) to the pan and mix until the cornflakes are well coated. A top tip here is (if you can bear it) to put the cornflakes onto a baking sheet and stick them in a warm oven so they heat up. Then add the warmed flakes to the chocolate, this stops the flakes from cooling the chocolate mix too quickly and makes them easier to coat.

Then spoon into cake cases, top with a couple of mini chocolate eggs and pop into the fridge to cool.

Eat and enjoy!

Apricot Danish

2011-04-16T12:18:00.000+01:00

So so simple and I really can't understand why I don't bake make these more often. The hardest part is catching them before they start to burn. I seemingly haven't cracked that yet, or perhaps I just need to try more often.

Take a tin of apricot halves (drained), a jar of apricot conserve, some cold custard (be it bought or made), a pack of puff pastry and some icing sugar. Makes 12 Apricot Danish.

Roll out your puff pastry into a rectangle roughly 30cmx40cm and cut in half. Pop one half to one side to give you a little more room. Then trim the edge of your pastry, I use the rolling pin to help with this.

Then cut this rectangle into 6 smaller rectangles.

Make 4 short slits into each rectangle. Add a dollop of cold custard, top with an apricot half and add ¹/₂ tsp of jam to the top of the apricot

Then take one corner of the pasty and fold it towards the centre, repeat this for the other 3 corners. Brush with a little milk and add a sprinkling of sugar. Place on a baking sheet and bake in a hot oven (Gas 7) for about 10 minutes until the pastry is crisp and cooked, I get on with making the second batch whilst the first is baking in the oven.

Add a liberal sprinkling of icing sugar whilst they cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes then place on a cooling rack to cool completely. Do not be tempted to eat fresh from the oven. Molten jam is very painful on the tongue.

Oranges & Lemons

2011-04-08T12:14:00.000+01:00

First off was an orange and poppyseed cake. Now, I've never tried an orange and poppyseed version before, it's always been a lemon version, but I thought I'd give it a whirl.Didn't quite come out of the tin intact and maybe a tad too many poppyseed, but it smells wonderful. Very very orangy. Tried drizzling chocolate on top - didn't like the look of it, so smothered it instead.

So, now it has a glossy chocolate topping - so I think it's okay. Haven't actually taste tested it yet...

Then it was on to an old faithful - Lemon Drizzle Cake.

The tops might have been overdone just a little. Remind me not to answer the phone whilst baking, but it is so light, moist and lemony that I don't think you'd even notice the addition of the burnt bits.

Battenberg

2011-04-06T12:20:00.000+01:00

Battenberg is something I've wanted to try. The cake above was my second attempt. The cake below was my first attempt...

Okay, so it didn't help that I very carefully lined the tin length ways rather than width ways.

Resulting in two long and thin sections of cake. I may also have overdone the food colouring too.

...and the marzipan was too sticky also. You'd think that would be a good thing - helping it to stick to the sides of the cake, liberally coated in apricot jam, but no. I ended up with marzipan stuck to almost everything bar the cake.

Good thing I'd popped two loaf cakes in the oven whilst attempting to make this one. Out came a small chocolate and a small vanilla loaf cake. Once cooled they were trimmed and cut in half and sandwiched back together with the help of a trusty jar of Nutella. The marzipan was rolled on baking parchment and stuck to the sides of the cake with more Nutella and finally a Battenberg good enough to eat.