eggscellent cupcakes...(groan, I know, but come on, it's Easter!)

Two years ago for Easter I made some cupcakes. They were good cupcakes, with some very good icing. I kept thinking that next time around I would make them again, kind of like an Easter tradition. Except I didn't. Instead I spent last Easter making hot cross buns (see that tradition did stick!) and learning about patchwork. The whole time-consuming posh icing, nice presentation, thing went out of the window. 

Then this Easter I very nearly didn't make them. I was thinking we should be good, that we should be thinking ahead and trying to shed pounds for Summer and eating better. Then I let on to people at work that I had this recipe up my sleeve, and the inevitable happened, I spent last Tuesday night elbows deep in ganache trying desperately to evenly and beautifully ice a set of cupcakes for my co-workers. 

I also upped the game this time around. Last time I had vanilla cupcakes with chocolate icing, however, I know the ladies in my office, and given the choice of vanilla or chocolate, chocolate wins. And so on Wednesday morning last week I braved my bus journey to work, with my elbows out and scowl on, cradling a cake tin filled with carefully iced and topped chocolate Easter cupcakes. It was worth it. The office loved them, and it was nice to take a little something special in as everyone has been working incredibly hard in the run up to the break.

I think these would be the perfect little treat for anyone over Easter, especially if you've got a bunch of dark chocolate and mini-eggs kicking around. I made both large and mini-cupcakes as they are seriously rich, and sometimes all you need is a little bite of sweetness with a mid-afternoon coffee. (and yes, you can totally justify eating three small ones in one mouthful go)

I won't post the cupcake recipe, as I got it from the lovely Rosy, over here. She is right, they are amazing, dense, moist and with a lovely depth of flavour. I made two batches, the first to get exactly 8 large cupcakes, and the second to split between a few more large and a whole host of mini ones. I had 11 large and 11 small in the end, and the batch of ganache I made was enough to generously ice them all. 

I will share my whipped ganache again, in case you missed it last time around. It's my go-to chocolate icing recipe for both cupcakes and layer cakes, as it is beautifully soft to pipe or spread, and firms up well to hold it's shape. Careful though, this stuff is incredibly rich!

Whipped Ganache 

You can easily halve this recipe and it'll be enough for eight cupcakes, or there abouts.

8 ounces dark chocolate
3/4 cup double cream
1/4 cup soft butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
 

Chop chocolate and transfer into a heat proof bowl. Heat cream until bubbles form around the edge of the pan, pour cream over the chocolate. Let sit for 1 minute then stir until combined.(if, like me, no matter how small you chopped your chocolate the whole lot won't melt, then you can place the bowl over barely simmering water and stir like crazy to get it to melt. You have to be really careful though as if you get it too hot you will split the ganache and it will be gone forever, I speak from bitter experience, one that left me in tears at 11pm on evening a few months ago...so beware!) Add butter to the chocolate (make sure its soft and at room temp) and stir until combined (you can also do this in the double boiler situation if you're still having trouble getting everything to melt together - do remember as soon as the ganache is smooth to remove it from the heat and continue stirring to avoid over-heating).  Whisk together sugar, salt, milk, and vanilla in another bowl until combined.Pour the sugar mixture onto the chocolate mixture, then stir until combined and smooth.  Let sit at room temperature until thickened.  Beat with an electric mixer until fluffy. Pipe onto cupcakes when they're completely cooled. Lick bowl. 

Bring out the rum!

There is something very satisfying about successfully decorating a cupcake with a beautiful swirl of icing, and something especially satisfying about it when it contains as much rum as these guys! I really love cupcakes, I'm completely on the bandwagon of their resurgence. However I wasn't sure how they would go down with a bunch of people who are probably more grown-up in their cake preferences than I am. N has never complained when I've put a cupcake in front of him, but they're not exactly the most macho of treats. In fact they're probably the least macho treat ever, so I wanted to make a more adult version. How do you do that, make them as dark chocolate as possible and add lashings of alcohol. Oh yeah!

Since we weren't sure if our egg-allergic friend would be coming I decided to make most things without eggs anyway. No-one else would notice, and if she was coming she'd be able to eat almost everything. I chose a vegan chocolate cupcake recipe from my new book "Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World" and then topped them with buttercream (made with normal butter as I didn't have any vegan marg) made with rum. I added rather more rum than they suggested (about twice as much as they recommended in fact!) and it was wonderful.

All my fears about non-macho cakes when out the window as they were quickly devoured by ladies and gents alike.


Rum Buttercream: Makes enough to ice 12 cupcakes with large swirls. You can halve the recipe if you don't want small rum mountains on top of your cupcakes. But honestly, what self-respecting person doesn't want a mountain of rum?

Adapted from "Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World"

1/4 cup softened butter (or vegan marg)
1 - 1 1/2 cups of icing sugar (I think I only used one in the end)
2 tbsp light rum (I used an organic spiced rum. mmm...)

Beat the butter and sugar together until fluffy but still holding it's shape. Add the rum and beat until combined. If it's too wet to pipe add small increments of icing sugar until it's solid enough. Chill until ready to use.


P.S. I want to thank my Mum for the new piping kit. It's excellent, and having a second piping bag on hand (especially a posh one) was so useful.

Baking Day! (June): brownies, cupcakes and biscuits

Although there have been bits and pieces of baking going on, it feels like a very long time indeed since the last baking day. In the end it turned into rather a mammoth day, with me making not one, but three things! Clearly I had been feeling deprived.



I've been craving brownies all week for some reason. I'm not sure why because they are rarely something I think about eating of baking. Perhaps I just felt the need for a pure chocolate hit. So whatever was going to happen brownies would be made. However, I also wanted to make some biscuits. Ages ago I bought a moose-shaped cookie cutter and still hadn't gotten around to using it. N kept reminding me of it, and this week my new hoodie arrived in the post, complete with moose design and "mooses like peanut butter too..." slogan. So I knew I had to get the cutter out and give it ago, moose shaped peanut butter biscuits it had to be!

But, then I was faced with a real dilemma. I already had to things I wanted to make, but three new cookbooks on my reading pile. It felt rude not to try something from them, particularly as the Ottolenghi has such an impressive and extensive baking section. Also, N had commented in a cafe recently that their chocolate cake looked really good, and that he reckoned the only reason he thought so was because it was decorated with bits of Cadbury's Flake! I of course, replied with a sarcastic comment about now having to top anything I baked for him with Flake to make it appetising. Another challenge for my baking day, I had to make something I could stick a bit of flake on to continue the joke.

It occurred to me that I also hadn't indulged my cupcake love for a while too, and what would be more perfect than cute little cakes topped with flake. Fortunately Ottolenghi not only includes two cupcake recipes in his book, but I had all the ingredients for one of them.

Thus began the baking day adventures. My mission, to make low-fat brownies, peanut butter cut-out biscuits and hazelnut cupcakes topped with flake!

The brownie recipe came from Baking Bites, a blog I not only read twice a day (because she manages to update so often) but rate really highly. It not only talks about recipes, but reviews products and give tips and advice. It really is everything you'd want from a food blog. There had been a post on their previously about double chocolate brownies, that looked great, but then a few days later she posted about low-fat brownies. Now what with needing as low fat a diet as possible because of my back this immediately caught my eye, especially as her comments said that it didn't lack anything taste and texture wise die to being low fat. I eagerly copied down the recipe and decided to give it a go. The batter was really thick, and hard to spread in a parchment lined baking tray (I had to get N to hold the paper in place while I struggled with the spatula) but it did settle out whilst baking. I wasn't sure what the result would be like, especially as I managed to overcook it slightly and so it didn't come out as gooey as I had hoped. However, the taste was great. Rich and cakey (due to overbaking, next time I'd baked for less time to get it fudgey) and with a nice chocolate flavour that wasn't too sweet. Plus you definitely wouldn't know it was low fat.




Low-fat chocolate brownies (makes 8)

preheat the oven to 180C and grease/line a 10" by 6" baking tin

3/4 cup plain flour
1/3 cup cocoa
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2oz dark chocolate
2 tbsp butter
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp fromage frais of low-fat yoghurt
1 egg
1 egg white
1tsp vanilla essence

Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt. In a large bowl melt together the butter and chocolate. Whisk this mixture with the sugars and yoghurt and when combined whisk in the eggs and vanilla. Gently mix in the flour. The batter will be really thick. Bake for about 20mins until a toothpick comes out with moist crumbs. Allow to cool then cut into eight.

The peanut butter biscuits posed slightly more of a problem. I couldn't find a recipe anywhere for a peanut butter cookie recipe that you could roll out and cut shapes with. In the end I decided to just experiment. It could go horridly wrong, but that was a risk that would be worth taking! I used a basic recipe for cut-out biscuits and used peanut butter rather than butter. I also only used an egg yolk, since I had one left from the brownies. This meant the dough didn't really come together, so I had to add a bit of water, but in the end it rolled out fine and made some nice biscuits, not too sweet with a subtle peanut flavour. I glazed them with some of the icing I was going to use on the cupcakes.


Moosey peanut butter biscuits. (Makes 8-10 large biscuits)

Preheat oven to 190C and line/grease a baking sheet

125g plain flour
63g peanut butter
63g brown sugar
1 egg yolk (or 1/2 beaten egg)
water to make up to a dough

Beat the butter and the sugar and add the egg. Sieve the flour into the mixture and mix into a dough, gradually adding enough water to make it roll-able. Roll out and cut into shapes. Bake on a high shelf for aprox. 15 mins.

Finally I made the hazelnut cupcakes. I halved the recipe to make only six since there was already a rather large amount of baked goods in the house. Instead of using the cream cheese icing suggested in the book I used a whipped chocolate ganache, and plonked a hunk of flake on top.

Now you have all these delicious goodies, settle down in front of the cricket with a cup of tea and enjoy!

Belated birthday cupcakes.

It was K's birthday in February and I had promised to make her birthday cupcakes. Problem is, she lives in Oxford and we've both been pretty busy this year already, so I didn't have a chance to see her until this week. We were off to see Blood Red Shoes at the Oxford Zodiac (part of her present!). Even though I was on the bus and wasn't sure if we'd have time to go back to her house before the gig I knew I couldn't let her down and still wanted to surprise her with some birthday cupcakey goodness.

So in the morning I dutifully wrapped her other presents and then set to work on the baking. I wanted to make something ultra indulgent. I decided on Uber double chocolate cupcakes with a dark chocolate ganache icing. I also decorated them with bright star sprinkles to give them an extra ounce of celebration and fun. I thought it would be just the thing to celebrate her birthday in style and keep us going after the gig!

I managed to find a wine box that fit them in perfectly and that I could both wrap and keep upright in my bag. It all worked out perfectly and she loved them.

Happy (belated) Birthday K!

Since I am currently curled up on the sofa watching a film there is no excuse not to post the recipe, which I adapted from the 500 cupcakes and Muffins book by Fergal Connolly.

Uber double chocolate muffins (makes six to eight muffin sized cupcakes)

Preheat the oven to 175C and line a muffin tray with papers.

4oz Softened butter
4oz caster sugar
4oz Self raising flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
3tbsp cocoa powder
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla
50g dark chocolate chunks
50g white chocolate chunks

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix until the chocolate chunks are evenly distributed in the batter. Spoon it into the cases and place in the middle of the oven. Bake for 25 mins. They should rise until just level with the top of the cases. Allow to cool fully before decorating.

Call me the allergy-friendly baking queen

It feels slightly wrong to post the above picture and following recipe as technically it is not my handy work. I shall explain. I have a friend who has recently been told she shouldn't be eating gluten. I was horrified at the news as there are so many foods I love, and would love to share with her, that are just full of the stuff. So many things have gluten in them, basically anything that uses flour, as well as lots of other random things that you wouldn't even think of.

As you'll have realised from the previous post about egg-free desserts I am always up for a challange, especially a baking one. I love it when my vegan friend visits, not only because she is one of my favourite people in the whole world, but because it gives me a chance to experiment with all sorts of fun things.

Saying "I'm giving up gluten" just sounds like a challenge to me. So in return for her showing me the amazing delights of Columbia Road flower market, and not only humouring my decision to buy a lemon tree, but helping me back with it, I promised her a gluten free baking session. We relocated to my North London Kitchen (which is considerably larger than hers) thanks to a lift from the musician boyfriends (who couldn't help mocking the lemon tree, swearing the fruit on it was glued on and the lemon scent just kitchen cleaner that had been sprayed over it), and donning our wonderful girly aprons we set to work.

She wanted something chocolate and cute so I suggested cupcakes and she jumped at the idea. An hour and a half later, and one curry and pizza delivery later (the poor musicians hadn't had lunch and were starving and we'd monopolised the kitchen with mixing bowls and chocolate wrappers) we had gluten free cupcakes. All the mixing and decorating are down to her, I just helped cream the butterceam icing and fill some of the cake cases.

We used roughly this recipe adapted from 500 Cupcakes and Muffins by Fergal Connolly. It made 12 regular cupcakes and 4 muffin sized ones.

300g gluten-free plain flour
175g caster sugar
1 1/2 tbsp baking powder
2 beaten eggs
4 tbsp melted butter
300ml milk (I used soya milk)
1 tsp vanilla
210 g chopped chocolate (we mixed white and dark)
3tbsp cocoa

Preheat oven to 200C

In a medium bowl, mix the flour, sugar and baking powder. In a large bowl beat the eggs, then add the butter milk and vanilla and mix until combined. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and stir until combined, then add the chocolate. Spoon the mixture into the cases until they're about 2/3 full. Bake cupcake sized ones for 20 minutes, muffin sized for 25 mins. leave to cool before decorating.

We used a white chocolate buttercream for the filling and decorating.

I think you could adapt this recipe and swap in dried fruit or nuts etc for the chocolate, leaving out the cocoa.

Cute fairy cakes were definitely the perfect way to end a fantastic day and a busy weekend.

Easter treats part two: egg nest vanilla cupcakes

As the photo shows the kitchen was rather busy on Thursday afternoon. Having finished my work for the day I started making all the Easter treats at around 3pm. I had ciabatta proving, roast tomatoes cooling, hot cross bun dough resting and the came the cupcakes. Oh yes, there had to be cupcakes!

Having just posted about how rarely I use the Kenwood I have to admit that it got a good outing on Thursday. All stages of the cupcakes called for it. I think it must have felt rather smug to have usurped the bowls (which to be honest were full of hot cross bun-y goodness!). I wanted to make a plain cupcake that I could decorate with a predictable Easter theme, egg nests.

I chose the Magnolia Bakery vanilla cupcake recipe that everyone raves about as the base and decided that I would finally attempt a ganache icing. N's birthday is coming up and when asked about what sort of cake he might want he said there was a certain type of icing he would really like. I have spent the last few weeks pointing to pictures on the front of food magazines, cakes in the windows of shops and photos on the web and finally figured out that it is probably a chocolate buttercream ganache. In order to be sure about this I thought that I could use it on my Easter cupcakes, as the colour and swirled piping would make it perfect for imitating a birds nest, and it would allow N to try it and confirm I was right.

So I made a batch of vanilla cupcakes and then mixed a ganache, piped it on and added mini-eggs. The result, a lovely textured but plain cupcake with a nicely rich cute topping. The plain cupcakes meaning that the overall combination wasn't too over the top. I was really pleased.


N was also delighted, not only because he got cupcakes, but because the icing was indeed what he hoped for. We took them away with us on our country break to sustain ourselves. A good job too because it snowed and there is nothing like curling up in front of Match of the Day with a cup of tea and indulgent cupcake, with the snow swirling outside the window.

I also made six mini-cupcakes and iced them, this time adding a variety of sprinkles rather than eggs. I hide them in an egg box and presented them to N this afternoon as a treat for in front of the football. It was so quaint I couldn't resist!

And now for the recipes:

Vanilla Cupcakes: Adapted from Magnolia Bakery recipe (I don't actually have their book yet, but I am hoping to pick it up asap)

Makes 12. (I cut it down to this as the original made 24 and that was way too many for me)

1/2 + 1/4 cups self-rising flour
1/2 + 1/8 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cups sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 cup milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 180 degrees.

Line a 12-cup muffin tins with cupcake papers.

In a small bowl, combine the flours. Set aside.

In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugar gradually and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the dry ingredients in three parts, alternating with the milk and vanilla. With each addition, beat until the ingredients are incorporated but do not overbeat. Using a rubber spatula, scrape down the batter in the bowl to make sure the ingredients are well blended. Carefully spoon the batter into the cupcake liners, filling them about three-quarters full. Bake for 20–25 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of the cupcake comes out clean.

Chocolate Buttercream Ganache:

(I actually halved the following and it made enough to ice 6 large and 6 mini cupcakes)

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate
3/4 cup whipping cream
1/4 cup butter , room temperature
2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

1. Chop chocolates and transfer into a heat proof bowl.
2. Heat cream until bubbles form around the edge of the pan, pour cream over the chocolate.
3. Let sit for 1 minute then stir until combined.
4. Add butter to the chocolate (make sure its soft and at room temp) and stir until combined.
5. Whisk together sugar, salt, milk, and vanilla in another bowl until combined.
6. Pour the sugar mixture onto the chocolate mixture, then stir until combined and smooth.
7. Let sit at room temperature until thickened.
8. Beat with an electric mixer until fluffy.
9. Pipe onto cupcakes when they're completely cooled.

Happy St Patrick's Day...fancy a pint?

Guinness and chocolate cupcakes. Need I say more?!

Baking Day! (March) Part Two: More cupcake madness!

My recent obsession with cupcakes is somewhat taking over my life. I have been ordering all sorts of cute and exciting sprinkles to decorate them with and thinking up all sorts of batter/icing flavour combinations. I have even been dreaming about making them! Sad, but true.

So, although N had asked for something else to be the centre of Baking Day (post on it's way...) I just knew I had to indulge the cupcake fixation.

I didn't want anything too rich, and after a week of glorious late-February sunshine I wanted something to reflect the refreshing taste of Spring we've been having. So I decided to make citrus cupcakes; one set of orange, one set of lemon. I used a recipe for lemon cupcakes, and before adding the lemon juice and zest split the batter so I was able to mix one half with lemon juice and zest and the other with orange. The only problem being that I needed to remember which was which!



Once the cakes had cooled I decided to try out different icing combinations too. So, I iced six lemon with lemon cream cheese icing, and six lemon with orange buttercream, and then had six orange with lemon cream cheese icing and six with orange buttercream meaning I had one of each type of cake with each type of icing.



Ah, cupcake obsession sated for one weekend at least!


Now for the recipe: It was taken from the Cupcake Bakeshop blog, which I can't recommend too highly. I then adapted it for the orange ones. I have no idea how they've turned out as we haven't actually gotten around to eating any, but the batters smelt lovely whilst cooking and rose really well.

Lemon Cupcakes
12 regular cupcakes / 180 degree oven

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
3 large eggs
11⁄2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1⁄2 cup milk
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
zest of one lemon

1. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes.
2. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until incorporated.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
4. Measure out milk and vanilla.
5. Add flour mixture and milk alternatively, beginning and ending with flour mixture.

NB: At this point I split the batter and added half the amount of lemon needed to one and the equivalent of orange to the other.

6. Mix in lemon juice.
7. Fill the cups about 2/3 full and bake at 180 for 20 minutes until a cake tester comes out clean.

My new cupcake obsession

We woke up this morning to bright February sunshine and finally the need to turn the heating down slightly. I was even able to open the blinds and let the kitchen flood with natural light. Ah, what a perfect beginning to a Sunday.

Since the temperature is rising slightly and another month draws to a close we knew it was time to get properly started on the garden. However, before we got going with all that I had even more important things in mind: cupcakes!

I have become slightly obsessed with the idea of cupcakes recently. I just love the pretty decorations and outrageous icing colours you can lavish on them. They are also so versatile, there are so many different flavours or combinations of flavours to choose from I don't think you'd ever get bored. So last week I splashed out and ordered some posh paper cupcake cups and a range of exciting sprinkles (I also bought cookie cutters which will no doubt make an appearance sooner or later!). The package of baking goodness arrived yesterday. I tried to hold out until Baking Day - which is next week, so not exactly ages away - but I just couldn't resist.

So this morning whilst listening to Desert Island Disks on Radio Four I began my cupcake experiment:



I had a vanilla cupcake recipe and decided to adapt it to make it chocolate in order to top them with coffee icing and little bear sprinkles. I also thought that to indulge my decorating needs even further I would make some bright red vanilla icing and add some chocolate star sprinkles, thus continuing the red theme I have adopted.

I think the results came out rather well, and they were just the thing with a cup of tea after a hard afternoon's work clearing the garden.






Mocha Cupcakes: (this mix makes 12, but I halved it - there's only so many two people can eat and we're trying to be good!)

For the chocolate cupcake batter:

125g self-raising flour
125g caster sugar
125g soft unsalted butter
2 eggs
1⁄2 teaspoon real vanilla extract
six squares of very dark chocolate (melted)
2 teaspoons cocoa powder
2 tablespoons milk, approximately

Preheat the oven to 200ºC/ and line a 12-muffin pan with paper cases. In a medium bowl, cream the butter and sugar, beat in the eggs one at a time with a little of the flour. Then add the melted chocolate, vanilla extract, cocoa powder and fold in the rest of the flour, adding the milk to get a dropping consistency. It will look as if the mixture is not enough to make 12 cupcakes, but it is as they will rise well so you only need to fill each cup by two-thirds full. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until the cupcakes are cooked and golden on top (it took me 20 mins for six as the chocolate make the mixture stickier). As soon as bearable, take the cupcakes in their cases out of the tin and let cool, right way up, on a wire rack. Decorate the cupcakes after they’re completely cool.

Mocha Icing:

50g butter (softened)
100g Icing sugar
1 Tsp Vanilla extract
1 Tbsp Camp coffee (or to taste)

Cream together the butter and sugar until stiff and smooth, add the vanilla and mix, then add as much of the coffee as you require for taste.

I also made the plain vanilla icing. This time replacing the coffee with 1/2 tsp of red food colouring.

Ah cupcakes, so many possibilities, so little time!

Cupcake prettiness

We had a flurry of activity in January and as a result there was an inevitable flurry in the kitchen. Towards the end of the month N's parents came to visit, and although I never need an excuse to make cakes the occasion did seem to provide the perfect reason. The only problem was that his parents now live in France, home of the pâtisserie, of not only delicious cakes and pastries, but also ones that are divinely presented. So the pressure was on.

This was the result:


A set of cute lemon cupcakes iced with gloriously coloured butter icing and topped with sugar flowers. Although the cupcake mix itself wasn't very good (too buttery I think: half of those I made fell apart and so my yield in the end was only six - better for the waistline, not great for domestic goddess esteem) I thought that the results with the icing were so pretty (the picture really doesn't do them justice) and I just can't wait to have an excuse to make them again.