Super Simple Chocolate Mousse

A dessert with only 4 ingredients (one being a pinch of salt!) is DEFINITELY a winner in my book. It takes about 30 minutes to make; 5 of which is actually making, the rest is time in the fridge so requires no effort. A 5 minute job with hardly any dishes sounds like the perfect dessert for me!! It's really good just to make in ramekins for the family or you could serve it in Martini glasses with a curl of orange zest if you wanted to give it a bit more refinement.

 

You'll need:

6 egg whites

2 tbsp. caster sugar

150g dark chocolate

1 pinch salt

 

Method:

1. Melt the chocolate in a bain marie or in the microwave. Allow to cool while you start with the egg whites.

 

2. Whisk the egg whites until they start to form soft peaks and slowly add the sugar. Whisk until they're firm but not stiff peaks.

 

3. Add 1/3rd of the whites into the chocolate to loosen it and fold through.

 

4. Add the chocolate to the remaining whites and fold the mixtures together.

 

 

5. Pour the mousse into your serving dishes and chill for 30 minutes (or longer, they won't 'over-chill' so can be done well in advance).

When they're set (or before if you're really impatient like me), tuck in!!

 

They're super simple to make and can be 'jazzed up' with some orange zest or fresh berries. It's a really good and simple recipe to work from.

 

As long as you don't knock the air out of the egg whites, you can't go wrong! Be gentle with it and you'll have a lovely light, fluffy and delicate mousse :)

 

With the leftover egg yolks, try making custard!

Custard.... the old-fashioned way.

I'd just made chocolate mousse so had lots of egg yolks left. Considering I hate waste, I decided to make a proper egg custard with the yolks rather than using custard powder. I'd also decided to make a salted caramel and apple tart so the custard went perfectly with that.

I used Mary Berry's recipe from the BBC Food website but took pictures as I went to give a step-by-step guide (and also to remind myself of what each step should look like next time I make it!).

The recipe is in the link there so I'll just post the pictures (because I'm lazy and sick of typing for today!).

Milk, cream and vanilla heating up.

Egg yolks, sugar and corn flour mixed.

A little hot milk into the eggs so the eggs don't split when you add them to the rest of the milk.

Egg mixture back into the rest of the milk.

Pan back on the heat and stirred until custard is thick.

All ready to be slathered over some cinnamon and apple tart ;)

(Or poured gently on the side if you want to take a photo of it without it being obvious that the tart was swimming in it before you started munching on it....)

 

The recipe is simple enough as it is but if you haven't made custard the 'proper' way before this might help :)

 

 



Salted Caramel, Cinnamon and Apple Tart

I went away to West Wales for the weekend with my mum and came back to the house to find cream, apples and a block of puff pastry that needed to be used up. Instantly I thought of caramel and cinnamon and came up with this super simple tart. It's soooooo yummy. It was just a kind of 'bung it all together and hope for the best' kind of experiment but I really like it.

 

First of all I made a salted caramel sauce. I've used this recipe numerous times and it's always come out perfectly. I'd definitely do this bit first or a while in advance. It keeps really well in sterilised jars but really isn't that time consuming to make when you need it. For a tart this size I used a whole batch.

 

The other ingredients you need are:

2 eating apples, cored and sliced thinly

1 block of ready-made puff pastry (unless you have ages to spare to make your own, shop bought is perfect)

1 tsp ground cinnamon

2 tbsp. caster sugar.

 

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 220 degrees Celsius.

2. Roll out your puff pastry to about 1/2 a centimetre thick (or however big your tray is, mine was about 30cm x 20cm in a rectangle).

3. Stab the pastry with a fork, leaving about an inch around the edge as a border. This should stop the middle puffing up too much but give you a nice light edge to the pastry. Bake for about 10-12 minutes until golden and puffed up. When you take it out turn the oven down to 160 degrees.

4. When the pastry is golden, take it out of the oven and spread over your salted caramel, leaving about an inch around the edge.

If your pastry has puffed up in the middle too much, feel free to keep stabbing it (I did as I liked jabbing it with the fork) but don't worry too much as the caramel will flatten it down.

5. Once you've got your pastry all covered in caramel, lay your apple down in rows.

6. Mix your caster sugar and cinnamon together and sprinkle over the apple.

7. Put the tart back into the oven (remember its at 160 degrees now) for about 10-15 minutes until the apple is slightly brown and the cinnamon sugar is melted and caramelised.

When it comes out it should look like this:

 

Sprinkle with some icing sugar and allow to cool slightly (the caramel will firm up if you leave it to stand for about 5 minutes) and serve it up. It's also really good cold!

 

Tips

*Serve with ice cream or custard (I made custard the old fashioned way to go with this as I had egg yolks left after making a mousse)

*Don't worry if your caramel looks runny when going on. If you make it in advance and allow it to cool it should be a spreadable consistency for topping the pastry and it'll firm up as it cools after baking.

*If you reeeeeally love cinnamon then when the pastry comes out of the oven after being in the first time, sprinkle on some cinnamon sugar then too before adding the caramel. I did and it was yummy!!

*For a more refined and less rustic tart, try serving the caramel in little jugs, baking apple wedges in cinnamon sugar by themselves (just on a baking tray and sprinkled with sugar until softened) and making your pastry really thin and cutting into small rectangles. Sandwich baked apple between the cooled pastry rectangles and build it up kind of mille-feulle styley. You can drizzle over the caramel just before serving to stop the pastry from going soggy. I've not tried this but it should definitely work. I'll give it a go sometime but if anyone tries it this way, fire a picture over!! :)

 

I served it with the homemade custard (it's quite pale so blends in with the plate) but vanilla ice cream or some yoghurt would work really well too. Obviously there's absolutely nothing wrong eating it by itself! Also, if you want a bigger chunk there's nothing wrong at all with that. I went for a modest serving as I'd just eaten a chocolate mousse I'd made beforehand and been dunking biscuits in caramel as I was getting on with the tart and had caramel cooling... Oops!!

 

It's super simple and has hardly any work or ingredients involved and looks like it's a real labour of love. Give it a go! :)

 

 



Salted Caramel Sauce

Okay, I know this recipe isn't technically baking, but I think the fact that it goes with baked goods (such as the tastiest sauce ever to drizzle over warm chocolate brownies with a big blob of vanilla ice cream) totally justifies it being in here!

It's a really simple recipe with only 4 ingredients and although it requires a bit of concentration to make it, you'll be really proud of yourself once you've done it!!

Ingredients

175g caster sugar

3 tablespoons water

125 ml double cream

1/2 - 1 tsp salt flakes (depending on how salty you want it)

Method

1. Gently heat the sugar and water in a heavy-based saucepan over a low heat until the sugar dissolves. Once the sugar has dissolved, stop stirring!

2. Turn the heat up and boil the mixture - don't stir it or the sugar will crystallize!!

3. When the colour changes to a rich gold, remove the pan from the heat. If you're getting parts of the pan cooking the sugar faster than others then swirl the pan to get an even distribution of sugar and heat but don't be tempted to stir it!

 

4. Once you have your golden caramel, remove from the heat immediately (it'll carry on cooking and go from golden to burned in no time unless you're really careful - this is the hardest bit!), and add in the cream and salt. It'll bubble up but this is totally normal because your caramel is so hot. Stir the pan until the caramel is smooth and thick. When you've got your caramel texture, set the pan aside to cool.

I couldn't get a picture of mixing the cream and salt in as the steam blocked up the camera on my phone but persevere, don't be scared and just keep stirring!!

This stores really well in a sterilised jar and is a really versatile sauce. It's really handy to have a jar in the fridge to dunk biscuits into if you've had a day that's really sucked... it's a guaranteed pick-me-up! I think sugar fixes everything and this recipe is definitely one that can make most things better!

Tips

- Try serving with ice cream to create a super simple dessert.

- Don't be scared to try it - if you cook the sugar too much you've only lost sugar and a bit of water. If you think you may have burnt it don't just add the cream and hope for the best or you'll get a bitter tasting caramel that really doesn't taste too good. You're better off starting again, learning from the mistake and being even more careful to make sure you get your salted caramel perfect. 

- Try adding it to the top of a Nutella pizza (I'll post a recipe to that when I get round to making it) to give it a bit more 'oomph' (not that it needs it). Definitely not something for the faint-hearted! Probably enough calories in that to last you a week but once you try it you really won't care!!

This recipe makes about half of a jar full so if you wanted to double up the quantities to make a full jar to give it as a cute homemade gift that'd be perfectly fine :) It also stores well in the fridge, just let it come to room temperature before serving.

(As you can see by the time I'd got round to photograph it, half the jar had 'mysteriously' disappeared..)

Better than brownies... Cheesecake brownies!!

Okay, so I looooove cheesecake. The one thing I possibly love more is cheesecake baked into cake. For some reason it's just heaven for me.  Cheesecake frosting is also a front-runner in the list of my favourite things to eat. Anyway, the brownie recipe that I posted is awesome in itself, but I've found that a way to make it even better (in my opinion) is to turn it into a cheesecake brownie.

The brownie recipe is exactly the same as the one I posted before (http://bronnibakes.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/bronni-bakes-brownies.html) but I just mix a baked cheesecake filling through the brownie batter.

The cheesecake mixture is basically the same as the first recipe in the cheesecake frosting page which is just a 200g tub of full-fat cream cheese with icing sugar mixed through to taste (do it a tablespoon at a time as it really doesn't need too much. Don't make it too sweet as the brownie itself is rather sugary so you want to keep that cream cheesey tang. Once combined mix a large egg through the mixture with a fork. 

If you want to add some chocolate chips or chunks of chopped up belgian chocolate that works reeeeeally well too (this most certainly isn't a healthy recipe!!). I sometimes add white chocolate to the cream cheese and sugar mix (melted sometimes then folded through or in chunks, whatever you prefer) and mix through some fresh raspberries for a white chocolate and raspberry cheesecake brownie. I must admit it's pretty damn special. Cherries also work well in it. 

It's really versatile and you can play around with it as you want. I'm sure some grated orange zest through the cheesecake mixture would work a treat in the brownie too. Maybe chop up some chocolate orange segments and mix them through it too to reinforce the orangeyness? That would be a pretty good Christmas brownie I reckon!!

Tips

- Don't over-mix the cream cheese - it'll go runny and won't give the thick and creamy texture of a good cheesecake when it's baked through

- Try adding the cream cheese filling to cupcakes too. Just a teaspoon full in each cupcake before putting them in the oven works a treat and gives each cake a nice cheesecakey filling. If you wanted to do chocolate cheesecake cupcakes, use the vanilla batter in the link but substitute 20g of the flour for cocoa powder. 

- When adding the cheesecake to the brownie, don't mix it through thoroughly. Swirl it through leaving good 'blobs' of it still there otherwise it'll all blend into one batter and won't give the contrast you want between gooey brownie and soft, fluffy cheesecake.

-If you wanted a simple but impressive dessert at a dinner party that everyone thinks has taken considerable effort and time, make this and serve warm with some ice cream!

It really is a super simple recipe that gives gorgeous results. Give it a go and you won't regret it. It'll soon become one of your favourite things too!

Bronni Bakes Brownies!!

Okay, so I know there's a LOT of brownie recipes out there and everyone thinks they have the perfect one. If you're a fan of a dense brownie that's got the right balance of gooeyness and cakeyness, then I'm sure these would be a really good hit! It's not my FAVOURITE brownie recipe ever, as that's the one we have in work. Seriously, those brownies are TO DIE FOR, literally. That recipe is top secret and belongs to the cupcake shop I work in as it was devised by one of the bakers there. If you want to compare the brownies in this recipe to those then if you're in Scotland you're in luck as that's where Bibi's is based. If you're not lucky enough to come and taste it for yourself, I think this recipe makes a pretty good alternative. It's based on one from 'You' magazine that my mum found in March 2013. It's certainly the closest one I've found to the awesomeness that is the legendary Bibi's brownie!!

Since tasting Bibi's brownies, my mum's been in search for the next best thing so was constantly getting as many recipes as she could find until she found the best possible alternative. It's super simple and requires minimal effort but gives perfect results every time (unless you're my mother in which case they somehow seem to resemble bricks...). Hopefully I make the recipe clear enough to make it idiot-proof (it's really not a complex one at all!!).

 Ingredients
125g dark chocolate (the better the chocolate the better the brownie)
175g unsalted butter
3 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
275g muscavado sugar (light or dark, the  dark one will give a 'fudgier' texture but both work well)
75g self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Method
1. Melt the chocolate and butter together in a bowl over a pan of simmering water or in the microwave (be careful with it and stir it often if microwaving to prevent burning).

2. Whisk the eggs with the sugar and vanilla until frothy. 

3. Add  the chocolate mixture to the egg mixture and mix until well-combined.

4. Sift in the remaining dry ingredients and fold through.

5. Pour into a rectangular tin (about 30 cm x 20 cm although a square would work well but give deeper brownies). I usually do them flatter and in a longer tin just so the mixture goes further. They rise up so don't be alarmed if it only covers about 1cm in the bottom of your tin!! It's meant to be a very liquid batter too so don't panic that you've gone wrong!

6. Bake at 160 degrees Celsius for about 30 minutes until firm to the touch. It can still be gooey in the middle (as I like it) as it will set when it cools and give a fudgier texture to your brownie.  
7. Cool completely before slicing up then store in an airtight container for about a week (not that they'll be around for long!!)

It's really versatile too! I've added brazil or macadamia nuts, peanut butter (crunchy gives a much better result but if you're lacking some teeth for chomping power by all means go with smooth), marshmallows (although I find it best to put them on top of a warm brownie when it comes out of the oven rather than bake them into it), cherries, raspberries, white chocolate chunks... basically anything. Cheesecake brownies are also really good too!!

I hope you find these really simple to make and they go down a treat like they do when I make them. Get creative and experiment by adding things to them too like fresh fruit or nuts!



Pumpkin Gingerbread Cake

I found a recipe online for pumpkin gingerbread and was really intrigued. We had some canned pumpkin at home so I decided to give it a go. My mum's really keen on pumpkin and anything with spices in it so while I was visiting my parents I thought it would be a good time to try it out to make sure it'd get eaten! I must admit, it didn't really appeal to me at first but once I'd tried it I was convinced. I added more spice to the recipe than it initially said and drizzled the finished cake with some icing just to give it a sweet edge rather than being somewhere in between sweet and savoury (not that it needed it as it's definitely more cake-y than bread-y but I liked it with the extra sweetness). Anyway, even if you're not a massive pumpkin fan I'd still give this cake a go. It doesn't overpower the cake at all, just gives it a really nice moistness and subtle earthy flavour. I'm sure you'll be convinced as I was!!

 

 

These quantities make a regular loaf tin sized cake. I'm sure if you wanted to do it in smaller tins to make individual cakes that would work really well or in a big square to slice it up into little cubes. I like the convenience and less 'pretentious' loaf tin for this simple cake though.

 

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups caster sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

1/3 cup cold water

1/2 can pumpkin puree

1tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp ground mixed spice

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1 3/4 cups plain flour

1 1/4 tsp baking powder

3/4 tsp salt

 

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 170 degrees Celsius. Grease your loaf tin with butter or line it with a paper insert (I use some paper liners which are super convenient and really inexpensive from Lakeland http://www.lakeland.co.uk/5553/2lb-Loaf-Tin-Liners )

 

2. Mix your sugar, oil and eggs together until smooth then beat in the water. When it's smooth and frothy, add in the pumpkin and spices and mix well.

 

3. Sift the remaining dry ingredients into a bowl then add the dry ingredients to the wet ones and fold through until incorporated. Don't over-mix it.

4. Pour your batter into your lined tin.

 

5. Once your tin is full, place it in the oven for about an hour. Mine took about an hour and 20 minutes but check it after an hour to see if a skewer comes out clean.

 

When it's done, the cake will be risen and golden. I thought it looked a bit bland and wanted to jazz it up a bit....

 

 

So I made a really simple icing just by adding water to icing sugar a little at a time to make a thick paste. I then piped it over the cake in a giant zig-zag and let it set before slicing it up and serving.

 

 

Like I said, even if you wouldn't consider yourself a pumpkin fan or don't like the idea of pumpkin in cake, try it! It may sound a bit strange but it's popular for a reason. I think this would go down a treat in the cold winter months with a nice big mug of tea or hot chocolate but even in summer it's a really nice tea bread or alternative to other cakes. It's dense yet moist and has a unique earthy and subtley spicy flavour. I actually quite like it (and that surprised me!).

 

If anyone does give it a go I'd love to think what you thought of it! There don't seem to be many recipes around so I'm not sure if that's because it's just not popular or because the cake goes by a different name. I'm sure any pumpkin cake has spice in it but I really like the balance in this one without it being too overpowering. I'm not sure what else I can say to convince you other than you'll be pleasantly surprised.

 

Also, I know in the UK canned pumpkin can be hard to come by but while shopping in Waitrose last week I saw they'd started to stock it. I'm sure ASDA would sell it too as they're quite good on stocking American products over here (for obvious reasons). I really think canned pumpkin is underrated in the UK... I'm definitely a convert and intend using it much more now!! 

 



Pumpkin Spice Pancakes

I made a pumpkin gingerbread cake based on a recipe I'd seen online. When wondering what to do with my leftover 1/2 can of pumpkin puree, I decided to experiment with some pumpkin spice pancakes. I'd never had them before so didn't really have a guide to go on - it was just a case of making it up as I went along. Considering that, I'm pretty pleased with the result: not bad for a first attempt! The recipe could use a bit of tweaking but they're still a pretty big success already I'd say! For someone who's not a fan of pumpkin in sweet things, they were pretty unusual and went down a treat with a big bowl of fruit and some maple syrup on a cold and rainy morning!!

You'll need:

2 eggs

1/4 cup caster sugar

1 pinch salt

1/2 can pumpkin puree

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp ground all spice

1/4 tsp ground cloves

1 tsp cinnamon (half if you want a more subtle taste but we're biiiiiig cinnamon fans!)

1 1/2 cups of self-raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder 

1/2 cup melted butter

1/2 - 3/4 cup milk (depending on how thick your batter is due to the size of your eggs).

What to do:

1. Firstly I mixed the eggs and caster sugar together with a pinch of salt.

2. I then added the pumpkin, flour, baking powder and spices and enough milk to turn it into a thick paste to get the lumps out of it (I was too lazy to sift it).

3. I then added the remaining milk and melted butter and mixed it again. 

This is what my batter looked like. Still quite thick so it held it's shape on the griddle but not too thick so that it was paste-like.

I heated up the crepe maker and cooked the pancakes on that (each one was about a tablespoon of batter). As I'm pretty sure not everyone has one in their kitchen (I certainly don't I was just making the most of the novelty of having it at my parents' house), a regular bakestone or frying pan would do just as well. When the mixture started to bubble on top (after about a minute), I flipped them over to let the other side cook (about 30 seconds). Obviously the cooking time might be different depending on how hot your pan is; I'm not sure the temperature of my crepe maker.

When they're cooked, pile them up on a big plate and enjoy the smell!!

Mine look really rustic and homemade but if you wanted to take a bit more care over spreading the batter out you could get a much more professional finish! I made a few into heart shapes which I much prefer to the classic round ones. I'll definitely be taking a few extra seconds in the future to 'prettify' them into heart shapes.

We made these after lunch one day so my mum opted to eat hers hot off the griddle with maple syrup, ice cream and a few token berries.

I put the cooled pancakes in the freezer and just took some out for breakfast the next morning (had I known the temptation to tuck in would've been so great I wouldn't have bothered freezing them at all). Microwaved for a few seconds they were as good as fresh and went down a treat with a big fruit salad and some maple syrup.

They're super simple to make and can make a handy quick breakfast (if frozen and microwaved or toasted), great lazy brunch or a super simple dessert. They make the house smell amazing too!!

The Best Lemon Drizzle Cake EVER!

Okay, so I'm not the biggest fan of lemon cakes. I can take or leave them unlike most other cakes. This one however, is a hit with everyone. It reminds me of my childhood and standing on a stool in the kitchen with a wooden spoon with my mother and making it the old fashioned way. I still make this on a regular basis and its definitely a hit with the whole family.

The recipe came originally from a lady called Margaret who my parents met in the SCBU facility in the hospital I was born in. I was in the neonatal unit for a short while and it was there that my mum befriended Margaret, grandmother to another baby there (who I think was called Joshua). She made this cake one day and then gave my mum the recipe after it was such a hit. Every time I make it I think of the emotional turmoil it must've helped my parents through, and have therefore dubbed it the all-healing, miracle lemon cake. If you make it you'll realise that it's not an exaggeration; it really is pretty special!!

 

I usually make this in a 2lb loaf tin but have also tried making cupcakes with it which also went down a treat!

 

 

 

It's a really simple method too:

1. In a bowl cream 110g butter (or Stork) and 110g sugar together until light and fluffy.
2. Beat 2 eggs in a bowl and weigh out 175g of self-raising flour.
3. Add the flour and beaten eggs alternately until you've incorporated both.
4. Add in the zest of a lemon and mix through.
5. Pour the mixture (it's quite thick so don't be alarmed) into a 2lb loaf tin and bake  at 180 degrees Celsius for 30-40 minutes until a skewer comes out clean. If you're making cupcakes they obviously won't take that long, I'd try them for about 18 minutes then keep checking. I'd also recommend turning the oven temperature down to around 160.

 

While the cake is in the oven, combine the juice of the lemon with 4 tbsp. of  icing sugar and mix until smooth. It's a VERY runny icing so don't be tempted to add more icing sugar!

When the cake comes out of the oven, allow to cool for a few minutes then while it is still hot pierce several holes in the top of it using a skewer. Pour the icing over and allow it to soak into the cake.

Allow the cake to cool in the tin.

When cool, slice it up into generous slices and enjoy a moist lemon cake with a perfect balance of sharp and sweet.

 

I've also made this cake and added fresh lemon curd into the middle of the batter before baking which works a treat. If not everyone's a fan of lemon curd, you could always spread some on after it's been baked and sliced (any maybe add some clotted cream if you're feeling really naughty!).

 

It's definitely a favourite in our family so I hope you enjoy it just as much!

 

 

Cute Sheep Cupcakes

I first saw the idea for sheep cupcakes on a Facebook post from a bakery that I follow. I then decided to give it a go for myself. They're so SO simple but look really cute and seem to be really popular!

You don't need many ingredients at all. I just used the recipes that I've previously posted for vanilla cupcake batter and buttercream and used that as my starting point.

I piped a big swirl with an open nozzle (the one with the big hole in it) and kept it quite flat rather than building it up to a peak. I then just covered it in mini white marshmallows and that's your sheep mostly done! The face was made from black and white fondant icings and just secured in place with a blob of buttercream. It's really that simple!

This one is relaxing on a little patch of grass which is a big crunchy cookie covered in green buttercream. I used a 'grass' nozzle to get the grass effect but I'm sure it'd look great even if it was just spread on flat!

 

 

I hope you give these a go to see how easy they can be! They don't need to be vanilla flavoured either! Try making a chocolate base (substituting 20g of flour for 20g cocoa powder in the original recipe) or with white chocolate buttercream. The list of potential variations is endless so get creative! I want to make the base 'welsh cake' flavour as the sheep are associated with Wales. That's an experiment for another day.

 

I hope these bring a smile to your face!

 

 



Pina Colada Cupcakes

Okay, so on some summery days all you want is to sit in the sun with a yummy cocktail. One of my favourite cocktails has got to be the classic pina colada. For the days when relaxing with the genuine thing isn't possible, these cupcakes make a pretty good alternative!

I started this by using the usual vanilla cupcake recipe that I usually use. Before baking I mixed through some crushed pineapple (about 2-3 tablespoons) to make sure the sponge had a good pineappley flavour. If you don't like fruit in cupcakes then you could leave it out and rely on the icing for the pina colada flavour but I really like fresh fruit in cake and think that it helps to make it a pina colada cupcake, rather than a plain vanilla cake with interesting frosting (not that there's anything wrong with that!). If you want to add some coconut into the cake then that's fine too, although I relied on the covering of coconut on the top of it for my coconut fix. I did however add a few tablespoons of coconut rum into the sponge but again, if you wanted to leave this out there's enough desiccated coconut on the icing to give it the 'colada' feel.

While the pineapple cupcakes were in the oven baking, I set about making the icing. I made the regular vanilla buttercream that I usually do (on a previous post) and added a few tablespoons of Pineapple Sourz liqueur. You can add it to taste but I added a fair amount (probably due to being a student!) to make sure the icing was undoubtedly pineapple. I didn't colour it initially, so left it white so that I could flat ice the cupcakes when cool.

When the cakes were completely cool, I covered them in the pineapple flavoured icing so that they were flat. I usually do this by putting a large 'blob' of icing in the middle of the cake and then use a small spatula to spread it out flat from the centre out by using gentle strokes from the middle of the cake direct to the edge of the cake case. Be sure to get the icing into all the ridges of your cupcake case!

Once the icing was flat on the cakes (don't be too fussy about it, it doesn't need to be perfect because you'll be covering it up anyway), put some desiccated coconut into a shallow dish. Put each cake into the coconut 'head first' so that the coconut sticks to the buttercream. Gently swirl the cakes into it if necessary to make sure that they get a good coconutty covering.

Once the cakes have all been flat iced and coconut-covered, add a few drops of yellow food dye into the remaining buttercream. This isn't necessary but I love the contrast with the white coconut rather than the whole cupcake being white. Fill up a piping bag fitted with a star shaped nozzle and pipe a small swirl onto the top of each cake. I start with the piping bag on the far edge of the cupcake and pipe in an anti-clockwise swirl, narrowing with each time round to make the tip.

I had some jelly beans which came in random flavours (I think they were JellyBelly beans) and picked out the pineapple, coconut and pina colada flavoured ones to use as decorations on the top. They're not essential but I really think they finish the cupcakes off well and look really cute.

I'm sure there are plenty of variations out there of the good old pina colada cupcake but this was my experimental and 'make it up as you go along' version. I just used things that I had to hand to improvise with the recipe but I think it worked out quite well. You'll notice that there's only 9 in the photo from a batch of 12. The three that 'went missing' between finishing off with the jelly beans and taking the picture would suggest that other people thought they were a success too!!

I really hope you try this and it puts a big smile on your face as it did mine :)

 



Beach Baby and Frog Cupcakes

I made these a few years ago for a party in the summertime. I made the beach baby just because they were seasonal and the frog ones were made because they were just so cute! I got the idea from a book from the Australian Women's Weekly that I picked up there on holiday once. They're so simple but look soooo cute!! One batch of icing (listed on a previous post) is plenty to cover two batches of cupcakes as each one doesn't require anywhere near as much frosting as they would if you were piping it!

 

The beach baby ones were so simple. I just made a vanilla cupcake batter and a batch of vanilla buttercream and sprinkled over some light muscavado sugar to resemble sand. I topped them with a Liquorice Allsort beach mat and a jelly baby to be my little sunbather. I didn't have any cocktail umbrellas (or I'd have used them) to be parasols so had to improvise with some petit four cases and cocktail sticks, secured together with a small blob of fondant.

 

The frog cupcakes are even simpler! I baked a batch of vanilla cupcakes and used the vanilla buttercream with a few drops of green food dye. I just spread the icing on top, sliced up a few marshmallows and stuck some blue Smarties to them when they were still sticky. You may need to snip a flat bit off the bottom of the marshmallow slices if you don't have a thick layer of icing or the 'eyes' don't stand up properly.

 

 

 

They're really simple cupcakes to both make and decorate and are sure to go down a hit with children and anyone who appreciates all things quirky and cute. They're also great to make with children!

 

I hope you give them a go!

 

 

 



Birthday Cakes

I thought I'd share some 'big' cakes that I'd made so that this cake blog has a bit of variety in it. These are all celebration cakes that I've made for people's birthdays; some from books as inspiration and some which I've thought of based on a specific theme. I really enjoy making novelty cakes like this as well as cupcakes, they just take sooo much longer to make than a batch of cupcakes. I'm such a perfectionist that I probably spend far more time making them than I should but I like to have things just so. I've not done any in a while now, the latest one of these is from before I left home to go to university so all of these were done from when I was 15 up to 18. I look at some now and think 'I could do that so much better if I re-did it' but still, I'm really happy with them. I can't wait to get back into making more novelty celebration cakes when time permits.

 

 

This cake I made for my niece. I totally forgot to take a photo of it before I gave it to her so this is one that she took just before slicing into it. I had no idea what to do as she has some crazy, wonderful and random tastes. Summing her up in a few words would be difficult so I went with variety as the theme. I wasn't sure exactly what to go for decoration-wise so thought I'd mix it up a bit to reflect her personality. I love the combination of stripes, colour blocking, polka dots, flowers and a big bow. It's the kind of cake that puts a smile on your face (I hope!). It was one of the first (if not the first) birthday cakes I made so it's simple enough to be replicated by even the most novice bakers (I managed it!).

 

This cake was one that I did for my nephew's 18th birthday. I asked my sister what he liked in order to think of some kind of theme for the cake.. she replied 'boobs'. It seemed to go down really well at the party and everyone commented on it. It was a bit of a challenge and I just made it up as I went along. Having no templates or anything for the bra proved slightly difficult as I obviously didn't anticipate quite how much fondant I'd need to cover the cake sufficiently, hence the addition of nipples to it. I never intended it to be quite so risqué but people seemed to like the cheeky aspect of it. This is still one of my favourite cakes to date. 

 

Similarly to the boob cake above, I made this cake using a pyrex bowl. As long as it's greased enough there really is no trouble turning the cake out. I used a madeira batter just because it's a bit more robust than some others and tended to support the fondant better. The little boy who I made this for loved aliens and I loved trying to create this super cute UFO cake. I found an image in a children's cake book that my mum had bought from her school fete, but don't have the book any more. It's pretty much modelled on that but with a few extra bits that I just added when I was playing around with decorations. This one never fails to make me smile :)

 

This SpongeBob cake is again, a really simple one. I know ASDA sell some similar but you can't beat homemade! It really is so simple to do! All it requires is a bit of fondant colouring and cutting out shapes. I did most of the cutting out with various sized circular objects that I had to hand (of course use cutters if you have them!) and did the mouth freehand. It probably works out cheaper to buy one but the satisfaction that you get when you look at a mass-produced cake that sells in huge quantities then look at your own and it's almost identical (if not better than the commercial one!) is immense. It's a really simple cake that goes down really well!! Who could fail to know who the star of this cake was?!

 

This cake was for a family member's 65th birthday. She loves golf so I was asked to make a golf-themed cake. I didn't set off with any plan at all, it just kind of happened - I had too much batter for my square pan so put it into a bowl and just thought 'ahh sod it, I'll bake that too'. The little figure I got from a confectionary supplies shop in Cardiff and it was just the right size for the cake. I know the scale on it is awful as there'd be no way in hell that poor woman could hit a ball that size but I just think it's a really cute cake with a very obvious theme! For the grass on the board I just covered the fondant in some dyed desiccated coconut and the bunker is just muscavado sugar. If I was making it again I'd probably hollow out the bunker just to make it a bit more realistic and less gravity-defying.

 

This cake was a gift from my next-door neighbour to her friend. We, as a family, have always been really close to this particular neighbour and she's more like family to us now. When she asked me to make a cake for someone I didn't know I was a bit worried at first in case the woman didn't like it but decided to just give it a go. Sonia, the lady whose birthday it was loved reading. I was going to try and replicate a complex book- themed cake by doing a library or something but then decided to keep it simple. I just covered a Victoria sponge in fondant, used a big kitchen knife to make indentations to resemble pages and embossed some lettering in the top which I then piped over with royal icing (as my freehand piping skills were a bit pants then!). It's a really simple idea but went down well and was a good cake to cut up easily and serve to lots of party-goers.

 

This cake was inspired by one that I'd seen in the foodhall of a big department store in London (I think it was Selfridge's). I saw this chocolate cake with marshmallows on and thought 'I can do that bigger!'... so I did. Underneath is a chocolate fudge cake with a white chocolate ganache centre. It's then covered in marshmallows using white chocolate as 'edible glue'. I poured the excess chocolate down the outside of the cake and stuck some Dr Oetker wafer flowers to it to give it a more 'celebration cake' kind of feel. I also added some edible glitter for a touch of sparkle. I had to go to the local florist and ask really nicely for some cellophane in order to transport the cake as it got a lot bigger than anticipated and I didn't have a box big enough. This is probably the simplest cake on here but one of the most visually impressive. I loved making it and the reception it got was amazing! It's also quite a cheap one to make as it's mostly shop-bought marshmallows!

 

Okay, when I said I'd made these all before I left for uni, I lied. This cake is quite a recent one from a few months back. It was for a mothers' day display in work but I just loved the spring feel it gives. I'm getting quite a lot of practice in with giant cupcakes now and am totally convinced by them. I love experimenting with different flavours and styles of piping. They're so versatile!

 

This cake was one that I made for an 18th birthday. I decided to go big with it but still keep it simple. It's a really easy cake but it's still quite 'in your face' due to the hot pink and animal print. I found the ribbon a while back in Costco and just bought it because it was so unusual. I tend to buy lots of random stuff when I find it and tell myself it'll come in handy at some point (although a lot of it ends up in the bin as it was a crazy impulse buy for something I have no use for). I used a posy pick (kind of like the top of a biro) to put into the top tier to hold the feathers as sticking wires into a cake is something I really didn't want to do for hygiene reasons. This again is a madeira cake but with chocolate, lemon and vanilla layers just to add a bit of variety. There are sparklers on the bottom tier but it's really hard to see them and we didn't manage to get a photo when they were lit as they failed and only lasted a few seconds.

 

Finally, this cake was one that I made for my 16th birthday. Since I was little I've insisted on making my own birthday cakes as then the blame lies solely on me if I don't like it. I'm incredibly fussy, hard to please and a total perfectionist so really don't envy anyone who is tasked with the job of making my birthday cake, as my mother was for the first few years of my life. As soon as I was able to help in the kitchen, it was impossible to get me out of there. When I was about 5 I discovered that sticking chocolate finger biscuits in a cake made a hedgehog and was determined to have hedgehog cakes until the novelty wore off as I got older. For my 15th birthday I made a cow print cake (white fondant covered with some black royal icing piped into 'splodges' with some fondant modelled cows sat on top munching grass) but I can't find a photo. This is the first birthday cake that I actually have a picture of. I got the inspiration from a picture I saw online and just simplified it so that I could make it relatively easily. It's a really simple idea but I love the way the cake looks in its entirety. It's super cute and I love the pastel yellow against the bright vibrant decorations. It's like summer in edible form (ironically my birthday was in January so the summer theme didn't really work...).

 

 

Hope this inspires!