Birthday presents

My final update for today is something that I completed AGES ago. It was for my girlfriend's birthday, and she asked specifically for cake. In fact she asked for 2 cakes. And no small cakes either...

What was requested was: a GIANT Fondant Fancy, and a caterpillar cake. Both of which are apparently available in some supermarkets. But hey, I was never going to just go and buy the cakes.

Unfortunately as it was a long time ago, and I didn't write it down at the time, I've forgotten the details of what I used/recipes.

The fondant fancy was based on 2 victoria sponges (8" square) layered on top of each other, with about 225g (9 oz) of buttercream on top (75g butter, 150g icing sugar). This was all wrapped in a vast amount (1.2 kg) of ready roll icing.

The caterpillar cake was based on a chocolate roulade (http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8568/chocolate-roulade) with truffles for legs (recipe at bottom), a rolled icing face and coated in melted chocolate. Very yummy!

Suffice it to say, they went down VERY well... though they did take a long time to eat (and the fondant fancy was VERY sweet!).

Recipe for truffles:

Ingredients - makes lots, depending on how big you make them!

100g (4 oz) plain chocolate

3 tbsp condensed milk

75g (3 oz) cake crumbs (I use a bought madeira cake, and freeze any left over for another day)

Cocoa powder/icing sugar to dust. about 25g (1 oz) each.

1. Melt the chocolate and condensed milk in a double boiler (bowl over a saucepan of hot water). Make sure the bowl doesn't touch the water!
2. Mix until combined, and leave to cool until sticky.
3. Stir in the cake crumbs, and leave to cool a bit more. Once mostly cool, roll into balls and dust with the icing sugar/cocoa powder. Pop them in the fridge to set them if necessary. They can be shaped into anything you want too!

These truffles really are superb. Super easy, and if you use good chocolate, it pays dividends. Good for a little gift for someone, or a special treat.

MMFC

Ambulance Cake

So apparently my last post was in November of 2011. That is a whole 5 months ago.


A lot has happened in 5 months, and not enough of it has involved cake. However when I have had a chance to make cake, I've done it in style.


Looking back through the photos I've taken, my main chocolate cake has featured a number of times, in slightly different forms. There are the more standard forms such as these two:

However, as most of my time for the last term (or at least 4 weekends of it) was spent doing an ambulance based training course. As a bit of a reward (to myself and the other members of the course), the night before the assessments I set to creating a (rather epic) ambulance cake. I used the same chocolate cake recipe, but baked it in a square tin that I then cut into suitable slabs, and built the cake up from that. A minor amount of reshaping later, and the ambulance shape was born.


With a bit of ingenuity (due to a lack of suitable icing) we made a very muddy ambulance, complete with windscreen, windscreen wipers and blue lights!

Agreed it requires a bit of imagination to see it properly, but with only an evening to create it (and assessments to revise for) I was limited in my creativeness. Look out for the mk. 2!


MMFC

Valentines Hearts

It may have escaped your notice, but somehow I doubt it, that 2 months ago, it was St Valentine's day. In light of this, I decided to make some Valentine's themed cupcakes.


These were very simple to make, based on a normal vanilla fairy cake, and then just decorated especially.


Ingredients - makes about 18


100g (4 oz) margarine
125g (5 oz) caster sugar
150g (6 oz) self raising flour
2 eggs
2 tbsp milk
0.5 tsp vanilla essensce


Icing


100g (4 oz) royal icing sugar
cold water
2 tbsp sieved strawberry jam
200g (8 oz) pink ready-roll icing

1. Preheat the oven to 190*C.
2. Either process all the cake ingredients together, or follow this step wise route: Cream the margarine and sugar together. Beat in the eggs one at a time. Then add the milk and vanilla essence. Finally fold in the flour.
3. Spoon the mixture into baking cases (1/2-2/3 full) and bake for 15 minutes.
4. Remove from oven a cool completely on a wire rack.
5. Icing - mix the water and royal icing sugar to make a thick paste that is still spreadable. The jam should be sieved through either muslin or a fine sieve will do.
6. While the cakes are cooling roll out the pink icing and cut the correct number of heart shapes out of the icing. The icing should be 0.5-1 cm thick. Spoon the white icing onto the cakes in a thin layer.
7. Place one heart in the centre of each cake. Spoon the jam into a piping bag, and pipe a line onto each heart, a few mm away from the edge.

These really do look like a special kind of cake, and are a nice little touch for valentines. Obivously you might not manage 18 between two people, so you could half the mixture. If you are feeling fancy, you can add a touch of rose water to the mix. Replace 1 tbsp of milk in the cake with it, and replace the water for the white icing to taste. It makes a good addition to the cake, and adds a bit more depth to it.


Hope you enjoy!


MMFC

Pina Colada Cupcakes

Ingredients - makes 12


25g (1 oz) grated creamed coconut (I used liquid creamed coconut, which worked ok)
125g (4 oz) butter
125g (4 oz) caster sugar
2 eggs
150g (5 oz) SR flour
0.5 tsp baking powder
75g (3 oz) dried pineapple


Icing


150ml (0.25 pt) double cream
3 tbsp white rum
Fresh pineapple wedges

1. Preheat the oven to 180*C, and line a 12 section bun tray with cases. Chop the dried pineapple. Cream the butter and sugar, and add the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
2. Fold in the sifted flour and baking powder, creamed coconut and dried pineapple. Beat until light and creamy.
3. Divide the mixture amongst the cases and bake for 20 minutes or until risen and just firm to the touch. Cool on a wire rack.
4. Lightly whip the double cream with the rum and spoon over the cooled cakes. Decorate with a wedge of pineapple.

These cakes are a very special treat to anyone who enjoys pina colada (or coconut in general). It could probably be altered into quite a nice 8" birthday cake if desired. The creamed cocount (liquid) worked nicely, though I used a bit less than 1 oz. It kept the cakes nice and moist too, without an overpowering coconut taste. I added a bit of the creamed coconut to the icing too to add to the coconut flavour.

MMFC

Jaffa Cupcakes

As the name suggests, these are cakes very much like jaffa cakes (But better!)


Ingredients - makes 12


165g (5.75 oz) SR flour
30g (1 oz) cocoa powder
220g (7.75 oz) caster sugar
2 eggs
170 ml (0.25 pt) milk
1 tbsp finely grated orange zest


Icing


250g (9 oz) icing sugar
60g (2.25 oz) unsalted butter
2 tsps finely grated orange zest
2 tbsps orange juice
Orange cachous to decorate

1. Preheat the oven to 180*C and put out 12 cases out. Melt the butter.
2. Sift the flour and cocoa into a large bowl and stir in the sugar. Add the eggs (beaten), milk, melted butter and orange zest and beat with electric beaters until well combined.
3. Divide evenly among the cases and bake for 18-20 minutes until a skewer comes out clean. Transfer onto a wire rack to cool.
4. Cream the butter, orange zest and icing sugar until smooth in a large bowl. Decorate each cake with buttercream, and cachous if wished.

One large orange makes enough zest for the whole set of cakes (just!), so if you are keen on oranges, get two. Very tasty cakes.


MMFC

Chocolate Cake

This is my favourite chocolate cake recipe. I've used it millions of times, and it makes a beautiful cake. Very chocolatey, very nice!


Chocolate Cake - one 8" cake roughly 2" deep

125g (4oz) semisweet or milk choc

3 tbsp milk

80g (3oz) marg

200g (7oz) sugar

3 eggs

200g (7oz) SR

1 tbsp cocoa

Icing - buttercream

3oz marg

6oz icing

1 tbsp cocoa

Icing - ganache

1 ½oz butter (must be butter)

1oz cocoa

4oz icing sugar

2 tbsp milk

  

1. Melt choc and milk in heatproof bowl.
2. Add to everything else in processor.
3. Process.
4. Bake at 180 °C for 35-40 mins or until a skewer comes out clean. Best to rotate it in the oven halfway through.
5. Cool on a wire rack in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn out of the tin.
6. Cut cake in half when cold. 

If not using a processor, blend butter and sugar, then blend in eggs one by one. Fold in the flour and cocoa powder, and then add the melted chocolate. For best results, use processor.

Icing methods:

Buttercream – just blend everything together in a bowl until smooth

Ganache icing - melt butter in a pan, add milk and heat gently until smooth mixture formed, then sift in icing sugar and cocoa powder. Stir until smooth and glossy. Should be liquid enough to pour and spread on cake.

You should ice the middle of the cake with buttercream, saving about 1/3 or 1/2 to coat the outsides with. Put the top on the cake, and then coat the top and sides with buttercream. Leave to set. 

Now is a good time to make the ganache icing. Let it cool a little before actually pouring it onto the cake, as otherwise it will melt the buttercream and make a horrible mess. Spread the ganache icing all over the cake, being careful to not spread too deep and hit the buttercream. Once it completely covers the cake, get a wet pallette knife and smooth the ganache out to make a nice sheen.

The cake can then be decorated in a variety of ways - chocolate buttercream piped onto it, chocolate leaves put on top, leave it blank, or anything else you like!

Hope you enjoy this cake as much as I do. I've used it to make a Harp shaped cake, a radio shaped cake, and a number of other birthday cakes.

MMFC

Anniversaries galore...

So as previously mentioned, it was my Aunt and Uncle's 20th Wedding anniversary this summer, for which I made a quite epic cake. Here are some photos of the cake:

This had a fruit cake base (using this recipe: http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2988/hot-toddy-fruitcake but used sweet sherry instead of whiskey - Thanks for the recipe Hannah!) covered in marzipan, and then ready-roll-icing, stuck together with home-made jam. Then I put a chocolate cake on top (my favourite choc cake recipe - to follow), iced with chocolate buttercream and then coated in ready-roll-icing. It was all stitched together with some piped royal icing.


THEN the big one - the cake pops. These use a basic 2 egg chocolate cake recipe (4oz SR flour/4oz Marg/4oz Sugar + 2 eggs + cocoa powder) mixed with 2.5oz Cream Cheese and 5oz of icing sugar. The cake is crumbed in a food processor, and then has the cream cheese/icing sugar mixed into it to make a moist "dough". This is then put onto a lollipop stick, coated in chocolate/cake covering and decorated. The result:

Combined with the cake....

Next up, it was my parent's anniversary today - and this week I've been preparing a cake for them. The same chocolate cake as my favourite one above, coated with chocolate buttercream, and then a chocolate ganache. I then covered the whole cake in chocolate leaves :D

Finally, for LINKS' teambuilding at the start of the summer, I made a cake for my friend Lorna for her 21st birthday. She is fascinated/obsessed by elephants, so that was an obvious choice of cake design. I gave her the tin afterwards, cos we bought a special shaped Elephant tin. I used the basic chocolate cake recipe from above (using cocoa powder), but just increased the size a bit to fit the tin.

That is all my photos for the summer - I shall follow up with the chocolate cake recipe.


MMFC

Watch this space.

Hey everyone/anyone,


I know I haven't written on here a lot this year (fail). Hopefully I'll remember to write on it more next term. I'm just writing to say there will be quite an epic update soon, with pictures of the cake I made for my Aunt and Uncle's wedding anniversary (along with a vast collection of Cake Pops - if you don't know what these are, GOOGLE THEM).


Other than that, hope you've all had a good summer!


MMFC

So it has been a while...

...That's not to say I haven't been baking lots. Plenty of flapjacks to keep me going during exams, a few birthday cakes and a few sets of cupcakes. Heres a selection of photos from my baking escapades since March...

Frosted Banana Cupcakes (very weird Yoghurt icing - tasty though)

This cake I made for a friend's birthday who unfortunately couldn't be there to have any (she was in Northern Ireland), so I had to eat it all myself... shame! A chocolate Giant Cupcake (tin courtesy of my brother) :D

Chocolate cake with leaf decoration and cream filling :D, made this one for another friend's birthday.

Chocolate orange cake (mk 1) with chocolate leaves decoration and white chocolate coating.

Chocolate orange cake (mk 2) with chocolate ribbon decoration and a white chocolate coating. Very chocolatey, went down a treat as a gift :).

I'll be sure to post some recipes sometime soon.. promise.

MMFC

Chocolate Toffee Cupcakes

As the name may suggest, these are very sweet and sickly. My favourite kind of cake!
They use a plain cake (though you could just as easily use chocolate flavour, or banana if you are feeling really adventurous) with a toffee sauce and them covered in melted chocolate. Mmmmmmm!!


Ingredients - makes 18 nicely

100g (4oz) butter or margarine

125g (5oz) sugar

150g (6oz) self raising flour

2 eggs

2 tbsp milk

½ tsp vanilla essence

Icing

1/2 can (200g) of sweetened condensed milk

50g (2oz) caster sugar

65g (2.5oz) butter

2 tbsp golden syrup

100g (4oz) plain chocolate

100g (4oz) milk chocolate

1. Preheat the oven to 190*C. Line 2 bun trays with paper cases. Cream the butter and sugar in a bowl, and add in the eggs. Beat until mixed.
2. Fold in the flour, milk and then vanilla essence. Divide into cases. Bake for 15 mins or until golden brown on top (and a skewer inserted comes out clean).
3. Cool on a wire rack. While cooking, start on the icing.
4. Put the condensed milk, sugar, butter and golden syrup in a medium heavy based pan and heat gently stirring until all the sugar is dissolved. Cook over a gentle heat for 5 mins or until a pale fudge colour.
5. Leave to cool until thick and spreadable. Then spread onto the tops of each cake.
6. Melt the chocolates (separately) in double boilers or in the microwave. Spoon the melted chocolate onto the tops of the cakes and make pretty patterns - i.e. swirl the two with a cocktail stick, or pipe one onto the other etc.
7. If you are like, decorate the tops with slivers (or curls if you can make them) of chocolate.

For chocolate cakes, add a bit of cocoa to the cake mix for chocolate (15 g (0.5 oz)), or for banana, remove 15 g (0.5 oz) of sugar and butter/margarine and replace with a mashed banana. Cook for roughly the same amount of time. Enjoy!


MMFC

Fruity Lunchbox Muffins

Number 2:


These are a bit like the raspberry muffins I wrote about a few posts ago, but are a bit less sweet. They keep for only a few days though, so don't make too many at once! I used frozen raspberries in mine, and Muller light yoghurt borrowed from my housemate - about 1 of the big pots is 150g. I also used 200g plain flour instead of wholemeal, as I have nothing else to use wholemeal flour on.

Ingredients - makes 12 normal size cakes or 6 muffins


100g (3.5 oz) plain flour
100g (3.5 oz) wholemeal flour
2 tsp baking powder
75g (3 oz) caster sugar
2 eggs
2 tbsp mild olive oil or veg oil
40g (1.5 oz) butter, melted
2 tsp vanilla extract
150g (5 oz) red fruit yoghurt
100g (3.5 oz) fresh raspberries or strawberries, cut into small pieces

1. Line a tray with cases. Preheat the oven to 200*C. Put the flour, baking powder and sugar in a bowl.
2. Whisk together the eggs, oil, melted butter, vanilla extract and yoghurt with a fork and add to the bowl.
3. Mix gently with a metal spoon until the ingredients have started to blend together. Scatter with half the berryy pieces and mix a little more until the ingredients are only just combined. Divide amongst the cases and scatter with the remaining berry pieces.
4. Bake for 15 mins or until well risen and just firm. Allow to cool. (A warm one is quite nice to eat though!)

Mine turned out a little paler, due to the lack of wholemeal flour, but tasted great. The sponge turns blue around the berries as the colour of the berries seeps out into the sponge. Overall a very nice not-so-sweet cake for a lunchbox.

MMFC

Mile High Marshmallow Cupcakes

Its been a long time since my last post - apologies! I've been rather busy in labs and such (though as anyone will tell you, I still haven't done any work). So to make up for it, I'll (barring any disasters) put up 3 posts this weekend :D.


Firstly, these are some Marshmallow cakes. They have lots of marshmallows in (duh) that caramelise in the oven. mmmmm. Plus a huge amount of icing - make these a nice little treat.

Ingredients - makes 12 normal size cakes or 6 muffins


50g (2 oz) Marshmallows
125g (4 oz) butter
100g (3.5 oz) caster sugar
2 eggs
150g (5 oz) self-raising flour
0.5 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract


Icing


75g (3 oz) Marshmallows, plus extra chopped for decoration
300ml (0.5 pt) double cream

1. Line a 12 hole tin, preheat the oven to 180*C and cut the marshmallows into small pieces. Either: Put all the other cake ingredients in a mixer and mix until light and creamy, then skip to part 4 or
2. Cream the butter and sugar. Blend the eggs and vanilla essence in.
3. Slowly add the flour and baking powder, mixing constantly until thoroughly mixed.
4. Stir in the marshmallow pieces and divide the mixture amongst the cases.
5. Bake for 20 minutes or until risen and just firm.
6. Icing - Cut the marshmallows into small pieces and put about a third in a small saucepan with half the cream. Heat very gently until melted. Tip into a bowl and leave to cool.
7. Whip the remaining cream until it forms soft peaks. Stir in the marshmallow cream and remaining marshmallows pieces, then pile onto the cakes. Scatter with extra chopped marshmallow pieces.

(This one looks strangely yellow - I think it was the lighting of the room)

The icing may be better if you use more (0.5 or 2/3) of the marshmallows in the melting stage, and then use the rest to scatter, omitting stirring any pieces in. This should make the icing very easy to pipe and so make more fancy looking cakes :D

MMFC

Rippled Raspberry Cupcakes

I made these cakes the other day, using defrosted frozen raspberries. They tasted really really good. Very light and fluffy. The raspberry mix would probably have worked better if i'd swirled it round in the cakes, but as it was they were really really good.

Ingredients - makes 6 or 7 muffins, 12 cupcakes

125g (4 oz) butter
125g (4 oz) caster sugar plus 2 tsps
2 eggs
150g (5 oz) self raising flour
0.5 tsp baking powder
75g (3 oz) fresh raspberries (or defrosted frozen raspberries)
Icing sugar to dust

1. Line a 12 hole cupcake tin (or 6 hole muffin tin). Preheat the oven to 180*C.
2. Crush the raspberries with the 2 tsps of sugar so they are broken, but not a juicy mush.
3. Put the butter and sugar (minus the 2 tsps) in a bowl and beat until light and creamy.
4. Fold in the eggs, then the flour and baking powder. Half fill each case with the mixture. Spoon a small amount of the raspberry mush ontop of this. Then cover with the leftover mixture. Swirl the cakes gently with a spoon.
5. Bake for 20 minutes or until risen and just firm. Cool on a wire rack. Dust with icing sugar.

 

I think these work better as muffins than as cupcakes. The size is essential. Also, the raspberries are likely to go off very quickly, so don't make lots of these in one big go.

MMFC

White Chocolate Chip cupcakes

I made these muffins a long while ago, and used some white fudge icing on top. They were pretty good. Unfortunately as it was such a long time ago I can't remember much else, anyway here is the recipe.

Ingredients - makes 12 muffins

125g (4.5 oz) butter
170g (6 oz) caster sugar
Eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
250g (9 oz) self-raising flour
125ml (4 fl oz) buttermilk
200g (7 oz) white chocolate chips


Icing

200g (7 oz) white chocolate
5 tbsp milk
175g (6 oz) icing sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 170*C, line a 12 hole muffin tin with paper cases
2. Beat the sugar and butter together until pale and creamy. Gradually add the eggs, beating well after each addition. Then add the vanilla extract.
3. Fold in the flour alternately with the buttermilk and fold in the chocolate chips.
4. Divide the mixture among the cases until 3/4 full. Bake for 20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
5. Leave the cakes in the tin for 5 minutes then transfer onto a wire rack to cool.
6. Icing - Put the chocolate and milk in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water.
7. Leave until melted, then sift in the icing sugar until smooth. Leave to cool for a little bit before spreading on the top of the cool cakes.

 MMFC 

Gingerbread House

Another of my favourite things to make at Christmas time: Gingerbread.
Specifically, gingerbread houses.

This year, as last year, I made 2. One at university, one at home. They are so very very tasty, and good fun to make too!

Both were made from the same recipe, but with variations on decoration. The recipe for the gingerbread is from BBC Goodfood (http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/4900/simple-gingerbread-house), but after that I just make it up with whatever I fancy at the time.

Ingredients

250g (9 oz) butter

200g (7 oz) dark muscovado (or brown) sugar

7 tbsp golden syrup

600g (1lb 5 oz) plain flour

2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

4 tsp ground ginger

Few extra spices – cinnamon/nutmeg/mixed spice

Icing

1 kg ready roll icing

Small amount royal icing

Smarties

Choc drops

12 boiled sweets

Strawberry laces

Food colouring (red, green, black)

Chocolates for the centre of the house (2 standard boxes of Celebrations or similar)

Anything else you wish to decorate with e.g. chocolate buttons, silver balls etc

1. Cut out templates (cardboard is best) for front (and back) panel, roof and sides of the gingerbread house.
2. Melt the butter and golden syrup and sugar together.
3. Mix the flour with the bicarbonate of soda and spices. Then mix the melted butter etc into the flour until it forms a stiff dough. Leave to sit for about half an hour.
4. Roll the dough out on a floured surface to roughly 0.5 cm thickness. Cut out 2 front panels, 2 roof panels, 2 side panels and 4 windows out of the side panels. From one front panel cut out a door from the centre. Leave the other front panel whole.
5. Crush the 12 boiled sweets in plastic bags. If you have different flavours its best to keep them separate and do 3 of each - 4 different coloured windows. Pour roughly 3 sweets worth into each window hole.
6. Place each cut out template on a lined baking tray. Any excess dough can be rolled out to make trees or a chimney or other shapes. Keep the templates for later.
   
7. Bake in a preheated oven at 180*C for 12 minutes or until golden brown at the edges/firm to the touch.
   
8. Recut each panel to shape as you take it out of the oven and leave to cool on the baking parchment.
9. While cooling roll out about 3/4 of the ready roll icing large enough to fit the house on. Place it on foil on a tray (one with handles is best).
10. Once cool, softly mark the icing sugar with the sides, front/back panel and door. Put the side panels on the external side of the front/back panels.
11. (if wanted) Surround each window with a square of ready roll icing and stick smarties or similar into it.
    
12. Pipe or drizzle a line of royal icing on the marked lines. Softly put each of the panels into place, and support. Pipe icing on the inside of each corner. Leave until set.
13. Pour the chocolates into the centre of the house. Pipe royal icing onto the edges of the front/back panel and top of the side panels and attach the roof.
14. The house is now (virtually) complete. Decorate how you like, I've included pictures of my latest creations for inspiration. Use royal icing to attach any more gingerbread. Once finished decorating, gently shake icing sugar over the whole tray.

I hope you all enjoy making them as much as I do - They don't take hugely long, and the effect is amazing. If you are feeling adventurous try making it bigger or more intricate. Here are the pictures of my past successes. I'll put up a template too once I've scanned mine in.
 

 Templates: (one has measurements to draw your own, other is a print and copy version)

Reindeer Cupcakes

Merry Christmas everyone! To get in the festive spirit, I decided to make some festive cupcakes.

Hence these Reindeer Cupcakes:

As you can see I made a few of them (16 in the end for an apparently 12 cake recipe, though I did cook them in a slightly smaller shaped tin than normal) with lots of different styles/facial expressions :D. They were very fun to make, especially making the antlers and the eyes. The cakes aren't a particularly chocolately recipe, so maybe adding more cocoa powder would help, or using a richer chocolate cake recipe instead.

Ingredients - makes 12 ish, depending on size

150g (5 oz) butter
150g (5 oz)  caster sugar
160g (5.5 oz) self raising flour
3 eggs
15g (0.5 oz) cocoa powder

Icing

100g (4 oz)  Icing sugar
50g (2 oz) unsalted butter or margarine
1 tbsp cocoa powder
if using butter, 1 tbsp boiling water

half a glacé cherry for each cake
pack of M & Ms (or similar)
150g (5 oz) plain chocolate

1. Preheat oven to 180*C. Line a 12 hole cupcake tin with paper cases.
2. Either process all ingredients together with electric beaters, or mix butter and sugar until light and creamy. Then fold in eggs. Then fold in flour and cocoa powder.
3. Divide among the cases, and bake for roughly 20 minutes, or until risen and firm.
4. Allow the cakes to cool completely. In the mean time, melt the plain chocolate in a double boiler. Pipe the melted chocolate onto baking paper or greasproof paper, ontop of a baking tray, in the shapes of antlers - make 2 per cake, and a few for breakages. Use the remaining chocolate to make pupils on the M & Ms for eyes. Put in the fridge to set.
5. Cream the butter and icing sugar and cocoa powder to make a buttercream.
6. Once the cakes are cool, for any that are too pointy, chop the tops off (and eat :D) to flatten them. Spread a very thin layer of buttercream over the top. Place half a cherry close to the edge of each cake. Place two eyes in the centre of each cake, above the cherry.
7. Once cool, the baking paper can be peeled from the antlers, and the antlers inserted into the top of the cakes just above the eyes.

I've also been making lots of sweetmeats (e.g. fudge, truffles, fondant etc) for people for christmas presents which have worked to varying degrees of success - the vanilla fudge doesn't seem to have a set, probably because it was boiling far too long to get to temperature. Still tastes great though. I won't say much more about the rest - they all worked fine (though I did end up making 90 odd truffles! :O)

Hope you all have a wonderful, and gluttonous christmas! I shall hopefully be producing some cakes for new year's too.



MMFC

Coconut, Ginger and Lime cupcakes

I made these a few weeks ago, so have kinda forgotten what they were like. Unfortunately between then and now I've had too much to do to write about them. They were tasty, though I think a bit less ginger in the cake would have been better. The coconut taste is very subtle. 

Ingredients - makes 36 mini muffins (18 or so normal sized ones)

150g (5.5 oz) unsalted butter 
170g (6 oz) caster sugar
2 tsp lime zest - about 1 lime's worth
2 eggs
55g (2oz) finely chopped glacé ginger (maybe use 1/2)
215g (7.5 oz) self raising flour
45g (1.5 oz) desiccated coconut
185ml milk

Icing

425g (4.5 oz) icing sugar
10g (0.25 oz) butter
1 tsp finely grated lime zest
2 tbsp lime juice

1. Preheat the oven to 180*C. Line a tin with appropriate baking cases
2. Beat the sugar, butter and lime zest until light and creamy. Add the eggs seperately, beating well after each addition. Add the chopped ginger.
3. Sift in the flour and coconut inalternately with the milk
4. Bake for 15 minutes (for mini muffins, slightly more for normal sized ones)
5. Icing - Combine all the ingredients, adding enough lime juice to make a runny-ish icing. Drizzle over the cakes when cool.

Fluffy Coconut cupcakes

I decided on (/was told to make) these cakes as one of my housemates was going away for the weekend, and she can't stand coconut. Personally, I thought they were very nice, and have a new love for coconut. The icing was particularly good. I left out the coconut essence (because I couldn't be bothered to buy it) and so they had a much mroe subtle coconut taste, which I think is better. Also, They work quite well in normal size cases, even though the recipe suggests using mini-muffin cases.

Fluffy Coconut Cupcakes - makes 36 mini (18 normal size)

250g (9 oz) self-raising flour
45g (1.5 oz) dessicated coconut
230g (8.5 oz) caster sugar
250ml (9 fl oz) buttermilk [If you can't find buttermilk in the shops,take some normal milk (250ml) and add 1 tsp lemon juice to it, then let it sit for half an hour]
2 eggs
1 tsp coconut extract (can be omitted)
125g (4.5 oz) unsalted butter, melted


Icing

280g (10 oz) icing sugar
135g (4.75 oz) desiccated coconut
75g (2.5 oz) unsalted butter
0.5 tsp coconut extract (can be omitted)
2 tbsp hot water
lightly toasted desiccated coconut to decorate.

1. Combine the flour, coconut and sugar in a bowl and make a well in the centre. Combine the buttermilk, eggs, coconut extract and butter. Then pour into the well and mix until well combined.
2. Divide evenly amongst the cases and bake for 12 minutes at 180*C (15 minutes for normal sized ones) or until a skewer comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack.
3. Icing - Combine the icing sugar and coconut in a bowl, add the butter (softened), coconut extract and enough water to make a spreadable icing. Spread each cake with a thick layer, and then sprinkle toasted coconut on top (or dip the cakes into the coconut)

These cakes were really tasty! The coconut on top gave a good simple decoration too. Not too difficult to make either. I think they will be much better without the coconut extract, so they have a more subtle coconut taste. You can toast the desiccated coconut very easily on a baking sheet and under the grill for a few minutes. Just don't forget to shake it up a bit so they don't burn.


MMFC

Mocha Cupcakes

More chocolately goodness! These cakes are sooooo good, though the recipe is a bit odd. I'm going to try them again, but with a bit more coffee granules in as really it just tasted of chocolate (not that that is a bad thing!). The icing was sooo good too, very gooey and chocolate-y :D.

Mocha Cupcakes - makes 12 muffins

250ml (8fl oz) water
250g (8 oz) caster sugar
125g (4 oz) butter
2 tbsp cocoa powder
0.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 tbsp coffee granules
225g (7.5 oz) self raising flour
2 eggs, beaten.


Icing

150g (5 oz) plain chocolate
150g (5 oz) butter (unsalted)
2 tbsp golden syrup
12 chocolate covered coffee beans to decorate

1. Line a muffin tin with 12 cases. Put the water and sugar in a saucepan and gently heat, while stirring, until the sugar is dissolved. Stir in the butter, cocoa powder, bicarb and coffee granules and bring to the boil. Simmer for 5 minutes.
2. Beat flour and eggs into the cooked chocolate mixture until smooth (use a whisk or sift the flour in). Divide into the cases. Bake for  20 minutes at 180*C until risen and firm.
3. Icing - Melt the chocolate, golden syrup and butter in a double boiler. Leave to cool and then chill. Once chilled and firm enough, spread on the top of the cool cakes. It softens quickly,so spread fast. Decorate with the coffee beans if wanted.

I'm definitely going to make these again, as they were soooo tasty. Though I think I'll make them normal sized cupcakes (so roughly double the number of cakes) so I can share out the goodness :). Also, I must remember to turn the oven on when I bake.... ;) error.



MMFC