Lavender and Orange Cupcakes...

...a recipe for grown up cupcakes. 

Hi folks, I'm really excited to share this recipe with you today. I haven't made cupcakes in such a long time, so I've dusted off the Kitchenaid and made these ones, which I think are just perfect for the summer months. 

These cakes are so simple, I know I say that all the time but these really are. I am not a professional baker in the slightest so if it's on this blog it's easy... trust me! 

On with the recipe.

You will need:

6 lavender flowers (plus extra for decoration)
125g lightly salted butter
125g caster sugar
finely grated rind of 1/2 an orange
2 eggs
150g self raising flour
1/2 teaspoon of baking powder

And for the icing...

150g icing sugar
6-7 teaspoons of orange juice
Purple food colouring (I used gel colouring)


How to make them:

First, line your cake tray with 12 cup cake cases and pre heat your oven to 180 degrees c. Next, cream the butter and the sugar together, until you make a smooth and creamy mixture which is very light in colour. 

Now you need to add all of the ingredients but leave the eggs to one side, just for the moment.

Just to let you know, if your lavender is still in flower when you add them, pull the flowers out of the bud first (not sure that is exactly what I mean!?) and then pull the bud away from the steam and put both the flowers and the buds in the bowl. The picture above should show you what I mean. Before you add the buds to the mixture, give them a little squeeze to release more lavender loveliness and combine all of the mixture.

Next, beat the two eggs in a small bowl and then add the egg slowly whilst mixing the cake mixture. 




Once all of the ingredients are well mixed together you will have a classic looking cake mix. Evenly distribute the cake mix between the cake cases and bake for 20 minutes or until risen and just firm to touch. 




Transfer the cooked cupcakes on to a wire rack and leave them to cool completely before decorating. 

Decoration:

I can not, never been able to, never will be able to, decorate cakes beautifully with all the swirly whirly icing. It's just too hard! But runny icing I can do, so these cakes were perfect.

Make the icing the same way you would with water but use orange juice instead. Add the orange juice, a teaspoon at a time, until the icing is the consistency of thin glacé icing. You want the icing to trickle over the edges of the cakes. Add the purple food colouring a tiny bit at a time so that you make a soft lilac colour. 

Before the icing sets completely you need to decorate them with beautiful, edible, flowers. I decided to use lavender and viola, both picked from my own garden. 

Look how beautiful they are! So simple, yet so pretty. The colours just say summer to me and the taste... mmmmmhmmmm! 

I'd like to make these again and host a little garden tea party. I wonder what other cakes I could make with more flowers from my garden... rose water cupcakes decorated with roses? Ideas!!!

Enjoy x

An Easy Peasy Carrot Cake Recipe...

...because I heard it's the Easter Bunny's favourite. 

Happy Easter! I love love LOVE this weekend, normally because we're either on our way to Cornwall (or on our way back, not so good) but also because it really feels like the worlds waking up. I'm not a religious person but I definitely like to enjoy a weekend which is all about celebrating all things new... and chocolate eggs, can't forget the chocolate eggs. 

* Oh, also I'm aware this blog has been "all about the bake(ing)" recently, not sure why, I've just been enjoy cake, and why not?! I'm sure they'll be more variety soon. * 

On with the cake...

I am going to give you a step by step guide this time, as I've put a few recipes together so you don't need to go anywhere else...

Ingredients

For the cake...

175g unsalted butter

175g soft light brown sugar

250g self-raising flour

1 tsp ground cinnamon

3 medium eggs (beaten)

100g chopped walnuts

350g peeled and grated carrots

26 x 16cm tray-bake tin lined with greaseproof paper

For the topping...

300g cream cheese

2tbsp icing sugar

zest of 1 lemon

1 packet of orange ready to roll icing

1 packet of green ready to roll icing 

(you could make your own icing but this stuff is cheap and easy)

What to do

1. Cream the butter and the sugar together until smooth and slowly add the 3 beaten eggs to the mixture. 

2. Next, fold in the flour until well combined and then add the cinnamon, walnuts and carrots. Before you add the carrots, your mixture may seem a little drier then normal cake mix but the carrots add a lot of moisture so don't worry about that. 

3. Once everything has been mixed together and the walnuts and carrots have been evenly distributed, pour your mix into your tray. 

N.B I have no idea why I didn't cut the paper out and line the tray (greasing the sides) but you should. 

4. Bake the carrot cake at 160 degrees c for around 45 mins - 1hr. Check your cake is ready by popping a knife or chopstick into the centre of the cake, if it comes out clean your cake is baked.

5. Allow you're cake to cool for 10 mins and then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely. This cake will be very crumbly so please do allow it to cool before you handle it too much.

6. Whilst the cake is cooling you can start to make the carrots. You could make your own fondant icing at this point but I cheated with this stuff...

... it was only £1.50 and just too easy to resist.

Start by rolling a small piece of the orange icing into a ball and then shape it into a cone. Score lines across the carrot with a knife or tooth pick. Next make a hole at the top of the carrot with a chopstick. 

7. Next you will use the green icing to make the leaves. You have to make a really small tear-drop shape. Pop the pointy bit into the hole you put at the top of the carrot and then make two snips, in the green icing, to form 3 leaves. 

      

   

8. Once you have prepared 15 mini fondant carrots, it's time to make the frosting. This part is really simple, you just need to put the cream cheese, lemon zest and icing sugar into a bowl and mix. 

9. When the cake is completely cool you can spread the cream cheese frosting all over the top of the cake. 

 

10. To finish, place your fondant carrots on top of the cake, imagining where the slices will be and then slice your cake into 15 pieces.

And you're done! 15 lovely little slices of Carrot Cake, perfect for an Easter treat. If there was a tradition of leaving something out for the Easter Bunny this is what I would leave him. 

I hope you all have a restful Easter weekend. Here's to Spring and here's to too many chocolate eggs!

Amy x

Lemon Drizzle Cake (with a twist...)

I've never made a Lemon Drizzle Cake before...

... and when toying with a Victoria Sponge recipe for a Sunday afternoon treat, I came across a Jamie Oliver Lemon Drizzle Cake recipe which also used up a few ingredients that I had in the cupboard. Decision made...

I've cooked a few Jamie Oliver dishes but I'm not sure I have ever baked any of his cakes before. Just like his savoury dishes, this cake was simple and really taste (really really tasty). The good thing about Lemon Drizzle Cake is that you don't have to worry about a dry sponge, the syrup does the work for you. I urge you to give this recipe a go.

Ingredients

For the cake:
115 g unsalted butter, softened
115 g caster sugar
4 large free-range eggs
180 g ground almonds
30 g poppy seeds
zest and juice of 2 lemons
125 g self-raising flour, sifted

For the lemon syrup:

100g caster sugar
90g lemon juice
(The twist) Splash of gin number 1

For the lemon icing:

225g icing sugar
zest and juice of 1 lemon
(Another twist) Splash of gin number 2



As usual, I'm not going to give you a step by step guide, Jamie does that better then me in the link above. I'm just going to show you a few pictures and tell you about "the twist!"

This recipe really isn't complicated at all. Once you have creamed the sugar and butter together and slowly added the four eggs, it's just a case of adding all of the dry (cake) indigents and folding them together. Add cake mix to your lined cake tin and bake. Mine baked at 180 degrees for around 40 minutes. Leave your cake to cool slightly and then make the syrup.  

 For the syrup you just have to melt the sugar over a low heat with the lemon juice... and now time for "The Twist!"

Goes together like a horse and carriage...

Now it's not rocket science but what do you (I) think of when you think of lemon? Gin and tonic surely?? No, just me! Well, I thought it would be a good idea to add a splash of gin to the lemon juice just before you melt the lemon juice and the sugar together. You know what, it worked!!!

Once your cake has cooled slightly (but still warm) you have to prick small holes in the cake and then pour your syrup (with "The Twist") all over your cake.

Next up your icing... again, add a little splash of gin to your lemon juice and once your cake is cool, pour the runny lemon and gin icing all over your cake. Use a knife to help spread the icing and let it "drizzle" over the sides of the cake.

So there you have it, a alternative, more grown up, version of Jamie Oliver's Nan's Lemon Drizzle Cake. Maybe she'd prefer this version! 

This cake is great with a cuppa but even better with a G & T, but then, aren't most things?

Enjoy,

Amy x

The Most Chocolatey Birthday Cake... EVER! Happy Birth

I can't promise this is healthy...

Howdy! I didn't blog last week, I wanted to but I attempted to bake gluten free biscuits for my gluten free friend and it went sooooo wrong. You would've laughed! Anyone else have trouble with gluten free baking? I've attempted a few things for my friend but it never goes to plan, maybe it's just me... Oh well, back to what I'm (fairly)good at.

Happy Birthday!

Every year, we have a week in February, where three of our friends have birthdays on three consecutive days. (What are the chances?!) We're all heading out for Sunday grub today and although the desserts, at the place we are heading to, have come highly recommended, you can't have a birthday gathering without a birthday cake... enter 'The Chocolate Beast!"

I discovered this recipe through the blog What Jessica Baked Next and have had my eye on it for a while, I just needed to find an excuse to make such a chocolate dream! I found Jessica through Instagram. Her recipes are so straight forward, go and check her out. I highly recommend the Ferrero Rocher cheesecake, deeeeelicious. 

On with the bake...

You will need

For the cake...
(I used a 9 inch cake tin)

220g Plain Flour
450g Caster Sugar
2 tsp Bicarb of Soda
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Salt
85g (good quality) Cocoa Powder
2 medium eggs
250ml Buttermilk
125ml Vegetable Oil
250ml Fresh Strong Coffee

To decorate...

450g Chocolate Fudge Icing
Pack of 16 (2 finger) Kit Kat Bar's
Large sharing bag of chocolate M&M's

What to do...

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C and line your cake tins with greaseproof paper and grease the sides with butter. Sift all of your dry ingredients(flour, sugar, bicarb, baking powder, salt, cocoa powder) into a large bowl. 

Mix with a wooden spoon until well combined.

2. Next, add the wet ingredients (eggs, buttermilk, oil and coffee) and mix in an electric mixer until well combined and it is a smooth mixture (no lumps)!

Mmmm, chocolate...

3. You are now going to split your mixture between the two cake tins. I ended up with around 1500ml of cake mix so I poured approximately 750ml of cake mix into each tin. Bake your cakes for around 35-40 minutes, until your cakes have risen and a knife comes out clear when gently pushed into the middle of the cake. 

Don't forget to lick the bowl ;-)

4. Allow your cakes to be completely cool before you begin to decorate. You need to spread a thin layer of the fudge icing on to the top of one of your cakes and then place the other cake on top like a sandwich. Next spread the rest of the fudge icing all around the top and sides of the cake.

5. Next, you are going to place (single) Kit Kat Bar's all around the outside edge of your cake. Then, sprinkle M&M's on top of your cake. Tie a colourful ribbon around the outside of the cake and you are done. 

I'm so excited to present this to my friends later, I think they're going to love it. It really is so simple but I think it looks super effective. A real fun cake for the kids or the grown ups in your life! I'll let you know how it goes down over on Instagram later.

Oh, and a big Happy Birthday to my wonderful friends! I hope you have a great day, love you all lots!

Amy x

Blueberry Bakewell Tarts Recipe

Has spring sprung?

What a wonderful day! Well here in Birmingham town it feels as if it was the first day of spring. Hope it isn't just teasing us, because I've really enjoyed feeling the sun on my old bones. I even popped to the shops without "the big coat" on today, although I think I got a little carried away because I came home a little chilly. 

Anyway... The blue skies made me feel motivated to take part in my summer sport today, baking. I've never really thought about it until today but baking cakes and desserts is definitely something I do more of when the sun is shining, I wonder why that is? The bake of choice today were some Blueberry Bakewell Tarts, a recipe I found in one of the first Bake Off books. 

And I bought my first bunch of fresh flowers for the year...

I am going to try and give you a step by step guide in how to bake these sweet treats as I adapted it a little as I baked.

You will need:

To make the jam...
200g blueberries
2 tbsp caster sugar
A squeeze of lemon juice

To make the pastry...
200g of plain flour (and extra for dusting or if your dough is a bit wet to begin with)
100g unsalted butter
40g icing sugar
1 large egg (super market large is fine - xl will make your dough too wet.)

For the frangipane...
55g unsalted butter
55g caster sugar
1 large egg
40g ground almonds
15g plain flour

For decoration...
Runny icing, made from icing sugar
Fresh blueberries

1. You need to start by making some jam. This may come as a surprise to some but I have NEVER MADE JAM! (Shock horror!)But the recipe called for something very basic indeed so I thought "what could go wrong?!" 

You just pop all of the ingredients for the jam into a saucepan and let it bubble away, stirring every so often until it is thick and looses its wateriness. Push it through a sieve to loose the skin and leave the jam to set. 
  

             

Set your jam to one side to let it cool.. your boyfriend will then come in to tidy up around you, and pour the jam you just made down the sink!!!! So do that first step all over again... or is that just my bad luck?!

2. Next up is the pastry... this was less eventful. You need to put the flour and butter into a bowl and rub it, with your fingertips, until it forms breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar, then stir the beaten egg into the mixture. You then need to stir and mould the mixture, again using your hands, until it forms a dough. At this point you may need to add (a lot) more flour. My mixture was very wet at this point and I think it was due to the size of the eggs. Just keep adding flour until it holds together and doesn't stick to your hands. 

             



 

Let the dough chill for at least 30 minutes. 

3. Role the pastry out, until it is 3mm thick and cut out circles with a 5cm cutter. Line the base of a muffin tray with the circles. Then cut strips of dough that are 1cm x 15cm long and line the edges of the muffin tray with the strips. 

You could cut the circles a little larger and a push them up against the edges of the muffin tray... Chill again for 15 minutes.

 4. At this point pre heat your oven to 170c. Next up you're going to make the frangipane. Just put all of the ingredients into an electric mix and give it a good whirl until it is all combined. 

5. Take the pastry cases out of the fridge and prick the bases. Put a small amount of jam into the bottom of the cases and then top with  the frangipane mixture. 

                   

   

        

6. Place the muffin tray in the preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes or until the golden in colour. 

7. Allow the tarts to cool on a wire rack before decorating with runny icing a fresh blueberries. 

8. Make a cuppa and you're done...

A super simple recipe to help mark the start of Spring (I hope!) 

Enjoy x