Spooky blackberry and white chocolate cupcakes

There was some left over white chocolate icing from my birthday cake in the freezer so I thought I'd use it for a Hallowe'en bake: white chocolate buttercream ghosties on a sponge with a gory blackberry centre.

 

I love the little ghostie faces, they were fun to paint on. I'm always slightly apprehensive about using the circular nozzle for piping icing on cupcakes because, well, they can look a bit like *whisper* poo, but I hope the ghost faces stop anyone else from thinking that.

 

 

Although not bad, I wasn't 100% happy with my sponge. I think they could have been fluffier. I used my usual recipe but decided to add 4 mashed blackberries to the batter (as well as a whole blackberry inside each cupcake) but the batter looked too wet so I added a little extra flour. Perhaps I ended up over mixing, or maybe it was the addition of the pureed blackberries, but they didn't turn out the way they usually do. Strangely they tasted much better the second day.

 

This is my favourite photograph. "Oh no don't eat me!"
 

I've also decided to enter my cupcakes into this month's Hallowe'en themed Calendar Cakes hosted by Dollybakes. Calendar Cakes is a baking challenge alternately hosted by Rachel from Dollybakes and Laura from Lauralovescake with a different theme set at the start of each month. I've never taken part in any of the baking challenges, I'm not really sure why, but I'm doing it this month! The closing date is on Wednesday so there's still time to enter if you fancy joining in with the fun.

 

Blackberry and white chocolate cupcakes

I used the equal weight method. My three eggs weighed 6oz (about 170g, sorry but my brain is naturally programmed to Imperial measurements) so this is what I used:
 

6oz caster sugar

6oz Stork margarine

6oz eggs, lightly beaten

6oz self-raising flour

a packet of blackberries
 

Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4 and line a muffin tin with cases. Cream the fat and sugar for about five minutes until light and fluffy. Add the eggs along with a little of the flour to prevent curdling then add the rest of the flour in one go along with 4 mashed blackberries and mix until just incorporated. (At this point I added a little extra flour as the mixture looked a bit too wet.) Put a good teaspoon full of the batter into each case and plop a blackberry on top. Fill the cases until 3/4 full with the remaining batter, covering the blackberry. Pop the tray in the centre of the oven for 20-25 minutes until lightly golden and firm to touch. Cool in the tin for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. I found my mixture made 13 large cupcakes (yes, annoyingly I needed an extra tin for one cupcake) but it depends what size you want them.

 

 

Unfortunately I don't have a recipe for the icing as it was my mum that originally made it and she just mixed to taste. It's basically a bog standard butter icing mixed with a block of melted white chocolate. If you make too much (like she did) you can always freeze left overs. It defrosted and whisked up beautifully.

Hummingbird birthday cake

It was my Dad's birthday last Wednesday so I thought I'd try the Hummingbird Bakery's Hummingbird cake from their first book. I think this wins the award for fastest disappearing cake as there was none left to snack on the following day!

I loved the flavour of this cake: warm and fruity. Banana, cinnamon, pecan and pineapple make brilliant cake making buddies. It's similar to a carrot cake in terms of texture and spice, but the bananas and pineapple make it extra juicy.

 

And everybody loves a bit of cream cheese icing, you just can't go wrong with it. I must say that Bee whipped up a very smooth batch. She did an excellent job with her first triple layer cake.

 

We decided to really go for it and put 54 candles on the cake (no need to guess Dad's age!) It was an impressive blaze. Thankfully we didn't need to call the fire brigade.

 

This was a really nice sized triple layer cake and easy to cut. Triple layered without being ginormous! With previous layered cakes I've found that they can be unstable to cut and difficult to eat if they're really deep and high. I worried that these sponges hadn't risen enough but on cutting and tasting they were absolutely fine. It's definitely a recipe I'd be happy to use again. I wonder if it would work as a bundt...

 

I'm feeling too lazy to type out the recipe, but you can find it here through Ros, The More Than Occasional Baker. She also has a nut chopper!

Sticky gingerbread

Last week I had an urge to make gingerbread. I don't know why, as ginger isn't my spice of choice, but I couldn't shake off the thought of a wintery spiced gingerbread.

 

The batter for this loaf tasted so good, it's a wonder any of it reached the tin. It seems I like ginger more than I thought.

The recipe did state to leave the cake a day before eating but I have no willpower. The smell from the oven was too much for me and I had to have a piece there and then. The cake texture was very smooth and it tasted more of treacle than ginger which worried me. However all was ok the next day. The flavours were much more balanced, the cake developed more of a crumb texture and the crust started to feel sticky. It didn't have much of a chance to get stickier as we ate all the cake. Moral of the story: leave your gingerbread till the next day to eat.

 

Sticky gingerbread

Recipe from The Great British Book of Baking, p.238

 

225g self-raising flour

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tbsp ground ginger

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground mixed spice

115g unsalted butter, chilled and diced

115g black treacle

115g golden syrup

115g dark brown muscovado sugar

275ml milk (it says not to use skimmed, but I only had semi-skimmed milk)

1 medium free range egg, beaten

 

Heat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Grease and line a 900g loaf tin, about 26 x 13 x 7cm. Sift together the flour, bicarb. soda, ginger, cinnamon and mixed spice into a large bowl. Add the diced butter and rub into the flour mix using your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Gently warm the treacle and syrup in a pan until melted and runny but not hot. Set aside until lukewarm. Put the sugar and milk into another pan and heat gently, stirring well to dissolve the sugar. Leave to cool until lukewarm, then whisk the milk into the flour mixture, quickly followed by the treacle mixture and the egg, to make a smooth thick batter, the consistency of double cream.

 

Put the mixture into the prepared tin and bake in the centre of the oven for about 45 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the loaf comes out clean. Leave the loaf to cool completely on a wire rack before turning out. Wrap the loaf in foil and leave for at least a day before cutting; it will get stickier the longer it is kept. Store in an air-tight container.

Bundt-alicious!

My baking is too bundt-alicious for ya babe! I'm sure that's what Beyonce wanted to sing about, rather than her curvacious behind.

 

As well as Mary Bee, I received a bundt tin for my birthday. I was very excited about using it and decided to try this apple bundt cake recipe from Dollybakes, who is unquestionably Queen of the bundts.

 

If you own a bundt tin I urge you to try this recipe. It is like a hug in cake form, packed full of warming winter spices and a deliciously sweet, sticky, maple glaze. It reminds me of a sticky gingerbread but with a lovely addition of apples. I'm tempted to use this cake for a sticky toffee pudding at Christmas this year instead of my usual date traybake. I think it would make a heavenly dessert served with a thick toffee sauce.

 

It's safe to say I'm a full blown bundt convert, I can easily see myself making more. There is something very appealing about its shape and size. It makes a statement without having to faff about with icing and decoration.  This bundt also cut beautifully which made it great for sharing.

I also baked two apple and blackberry mini loaves using my new loaf cases. They completely spilled over during baking as I don't own smaller loaf tins and put them on a flat tray unsupported. Bad idea.

Please don't be put off by their unappealing appearance as they tasted lovely, especially fresh from the oven as the crumble topping was extra crunchy, although it went a bit soggy after a day. I really liked the addition of orange zest too. The recipe can be found on BBC Good Food.

Meet my kitchenaid

Gone are the days of stroking Kitchenaids in John Lewis/kitchenware shops.... this one is mine!

 

I got a beautiful, yellow kitchenaid for my birthday last week. It has been a particularly busy, stressful year so my mum thought I deserved an extra special birthday present. My friend and I decided to name her (definitely a her) Mary Bee. We thought it was only right to honour Ms Berry during the Great British Bake Off season and the name Bee suits a happy, yellow mixer.

A week later I still have an uncontrollable urge to stroke her every time I enter the kitchen. I've also discovered that I can take self portraits in the shiny mixing bowl. Endless hours of fun. They're not just for baking folks.

When I young I liked to play "kitchen" and one of my favourite toys was a tiny cream and brown plastic stand mixer with an orange beater which would whisk when you flicked a switch on the side. I spent a lot of time whisking cake batter water. Now I have a grown up version!

 

Apologies for the lighting in the last two photos. Bee's yellow doesn't agree with night time photography.

White chocolate jazzie birthday cake

It was my birthday last Wednesday and being the white chocolate fiend that I am, requested a white chocolate themed cake. Mum certainly didn't skimp on the white chocolate!

The cake consisted of two plain victoria sponges cut in half and layered with strawberry jam and white chocolate butter icing. Once assembled, it was covered in even more white chocolate butter icing and decorated with super sized Jazzies (Jazzles/Snowies). White chocolate buttons were scattered round the plate, just in case there wasn't enough white chocolate :)

Jazzies are my favourite pick n mix sweet, so to know that I can buy pimped up versions from the baking aisle of Tesco is pretty exciting.

You know you're old when you can't blow out all your candles in one go. Either there were too many candles or I have appalling lung power!

The white chocolate butter icing was insanely sweet but incredibly tasty. If you've just eaten dinner, I would advise cutting thinner slices as even I couldn't finish a whole slice in one sitting! 

 
I'd also like to say a massive thank you to all my readers as I reached 100 followers this week! I was amazed when I reached 10 followers so to reach 100 is really exciting. Thank you for taking the time to read, follow and/or comment on my blog and I hope you keep visiting. :)

ABC...

....it's as easy as 1 2 3*. Apparently not as this post has been lurking around the drafts folder since June.

 

 

Back in June, Gem of Cupcake Crazy Gem nominated me for an ABC (Awesome Blog Content) award and in August Susie of Fold in the Flour nominated me for one as well. Thank you ladies! It's fantastic to know that others enjoy my little blog filled with baking and pretty things, especially coming from blogs I enjoy following. It's a nice feeling :)

I found filling in 26 alphabet related facts surprisingly difficult but here we go!

A is for Acne. I was finally put Accutane for my skin last August for 6 months. It caused all sorts of nasty side effects, but I do have completely clear skin now for the first time since I was 11. The novelty of waking up in the morning with clear skin still hasn't worn off.

B is for Bill Bailey. When I met him earlier this year I asked if he could write "from Manny" (his Black Books character) on the autograph to which he replied "you do know that's not my real name?"

C is for cake stands. I would be very sad without them.

 

D is for dinosaurs. In my final year at uni I dressed up as a stegosaurus for Hallowe'en and my friend, Alice, was a pterodactyl. On our way home a couple gave us £1 as they said we had the best costumes they'd seen that night! My friend Kirsty captured us on polariod.

E is for Edinburgh, where I went to university and lived above a bakery.

F is for flossing. I don't mind flossing my own teeth but the "clicking" sound of someone else flossing their teeth is like fingernails on a chalk board to me. It's horrible.

G is for grumpy. I am not a morning person.

H is for hot chocolate. I may have spent a lot of money in Whittards recently....

I is for impatient. I wish I had more patience (and the camera lenses actually) to take really beautiful cake photographs, but I always want to eat the cake immediately and I can't be bothered to iron the tablecloth.

J is for Jive Talkin'. I won't have any of you bad mouthing this Bee Gees track. It's a fantastic dance number.

K is for kitchen. I cannot wait to have my own! I spend a lot of time dreaming about my future kitchen.

L is for licking the baking bowl clean. I've been doing it since I was a toddler and I'm unlikely to change.

M is for Milkolait. Does anybody remember it? It was basically a white chocolate version of Nutella and tasted absolutely AMAZING. I haven't seen it stocked anywhere since about 1997. Gutted.

N is for nerd. I was one of those sad people at school who loved learning grammar in language classes. I also enjoyed doing music theory which most people seem to hate.

O is for Orchestra. I play the violin in my local (amateur) orchestra. We only play during the winter months and we're certainly not anything to rave about, but it's good fun.

P is for Princess Bride, my favourite film.

Q is for Quavers, the name of my Primary 6 netball team. Yes, we named ourselves after a packet of crisps, I don't know why. I was Goal Attack.

R is for Royal Winton Grimwades. My favourite brand of fine bone china.

 

S is for socks. Spots, stripes, hippos, ducks, dinosaurs, hedgehogs, elephants, firemen, policemen, piano keys, hearts, teacups, party rings, flowers, campervans. You name it, I have it.

 

T is for toe! I broke my little toe on my right foot during an unfortunate trampolining incident in P.E. at secondary school. It somehow got stuck in the criss-cross weave of the trampoline when I was sitting down and when my friend jumped my body bounced but my toe stayed caught. I hobbled around the rest of the school day in agony and by the time I got home my foot was black down one side. It took about a year to fully heal and to wear footwear other than trainers.

U is for.....you guessed it, Utility China! I can't get enough of those pastel, mix and match colours.When I was little I had a plastic teaset in green, pink and yellow which I loved to mix and match. I'm assuming this is where the obsession began.

V is for Volkswagen Beetle. I love Betty my Nissan Micra, but I've always loved old beetles. My Dad had an orange one in his late teens!

W is for white chocolate. There used to be a place in Edinburgh called Chocolate Soup where you could drink espresso sized shots of molten chocolate. I miss their white chocolate shots :(

X is for X-Men. God I love those films, even X-Men 3 which wasn't great.

Y is for yes please! Always the answer I give if someone offers me a cup of tea. It became a running joke at work last year.

Z is for zip. Is it just me or does anyone else dislike obvious zips on dresses? I hate it when I think I've found a pretty (usually floral) dress but then look at the back and there is a massive, exposed zip. Uggghh.

Phew! Congratulations if you managed to read all of that! I'm passing the ABC award on to the following people:

Emine of MBakes
Gem of Little Gem's Diary
Kim of Cakes From Kim
Louise of Tea at Weasels
Paula of Sweetharts Cakes and Bakes

I thought it would be nice to pass it along to a mix of bakers/china lovers/crafters. Remember to check out Gem and Susie's blogs as well as my nominees as they're lovely bakers (unless you're on a diet, then enter with caution!)

*gotta love a Jackson 5 reference :)