Friday 20 April 2012

Cupcakes, cupcakes and more cupcakes!!!






Oh la la cupcakes!!!!!

Call it how you want, cupcakes, fairy cakes or patty cakes. Basically they are a small cake designed to serve one person, frequently baked in a small, thin paper or aluminium cup.

Why did I choose cupcakes???
  • Coz cupcakes are stylish
  • Coz cupcakes are friendly
  • Coz cupcakes are fun to decorate
  • Coz cupcakes are versatile
  • And most important cupcakes are portable
The sky is the limit when decorating cupcakes. With just some imagination, you can create a whole world of cupcakes wonders.

On the photo above, I have create a bouquet of cupcakes !!!!!

Oreo Cream Cheese Blondies

9x



Oreo biscuits.....they are my favourite cookies. No matter how we indulge with it, I like mine best with TLD ( Twist, Lick, Dunk)

Ingredients:
  • 225g butter
  • 2 eggs
  • 3/4 cup light brown sugar
  • 1 cup of sugar
  • 3 1/2 cups plain flour
  • 1 tbsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 11/2 cup chocolate chips
  • 225g cream cheese
  • 2 tbsp sugar
  • 2 tsbp milk
  • 24 Oreo cookies
Method:

Pre heat oven to 200c/180c for fan oven.

Cream butter and sugar until well combined. Add the eggs and vanilla extract and continue to beat until all are well combined.

Add flour, salt, baking soda and chocolate chips, mix until just combined.

Press half the dough into a bottom of a greased 9x13 pan. Bake for about 8 minutes, until slightly browned.

While bars are baking, beat cream cheese with sugar. Add the milk to make a spreadable consistency.

Remove bars from oven, top with the 24 Oreo cookies. Spread the cream cheese mixtures over the Oreos. Top with the remaining half of the dough.

Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until the bars are set.

Cool before cutting into 24 bars.

Saturday 14 April 2012

Moist Ginger Cake




Just one word to describe this cake ....."divine"

If you are looking for a slice of spice, try this deliciously moist ginger cake!!!
It has a gingery glaze that part sank into the cake and the top part will set as a thin crust.

Ingredients:

for the cake
  • 115g unsalted butter, softened
  • 250g self raising flour
  • 3 tsp ground ginger
  • 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 100g golden syrup
  • 100g black treacle
  • 100g brown sugar
  • 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 2 large eggs
  • 200ml milk
  • 50g stem ginger, finely chopped
for the glaze:
  • 4 tbsp boiling water
  • 4 tbsp ginger syrup from the jar of stem ginger
  • 200g icing sugar
Method:

Preheat oven to 180C/160C for fan oven.

Line a 20cm square/9" round cake tin with baking paper.

Blitz together in the food processor the flour, ground ginger, bicarbonate of soda, butter and ground cinnamon until it looks like bread crumbs. Put it aside.

In a large sauce pan, put in together the black tracle, golden syrup, finelly chopped stem ginger and brown sugar. Heat gently until the sugar has dissolved. Raise the heat and cook for a further couple of minutes, then remove from heat.

Beat the eggs and milk into the hot syrup mixture.

Add in the flour and butter crumbs. Stir throughly until the mixture are well combined.

Pour into the prepared cake tin. The mixture at this stage is a bit runny.

Bake for about 40 minutes or until skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

When the cake nearly finish the baking time, make the glaze by mixing all the ingredients together until its smoothand well combined.

When the cake is cooked, let it stand in the tin for about 10 minutes.

Pierce the cake all over with the skewerand then pour over the glaze. Some will soak into the cake while the rest will harden and create a fine glaze on top of the cake.

Leave to cool and set completely before removing from the tin.

Raspberry Bakewell Cake

















LOVED IT !!! TOTALLY SCRUMPTIOUS
...... AND SURPRISING LIGHT.

This is a simple and no fuss cake to make and really quick to prepare. Or should I call it idiot proof cake...lol.

I am using raspberries for this recipe but can be replace with any type of berries. If you like almondy tasten just replace the vanilla extract with almond extract.

Ingredients:
  • 145g butter, softened
  • 145g sugar
  • 145g self raising flour
  • 145g ground almonds
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract/almond extract
  • 2 large eggs
  • 250g raspberries
  • 2 tbsp flaked almond
  • icing sugar, to serve
Method:

Preheat oven to 180c/160c for fan oven. Grease and line a 20cm loose bottom cake tin.

Blitz all the ingredients into a food processor until well combined.

Spread half the mixture over the cake tin and smooth the top. Scatter the raspberries over and then spread the remaining mixture on top and spread evenly. You might want to use your fingers to do this as it is easier to spread.

Scatter the flaked almonds over the top and bake for 50 minutes until golden.

Cool, remove from the cake tin and dust with icing sugar before serving. It is also lovely to warmed up and served with ice cream.....yum



Sunday 8 April 2012

Easter Cupcakes

                   
            HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE !!!

Ingredients:
  • 2 eggs
  • 100g self raising flour
  • 100g golden castor sugar
  • 100g softened butter
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
Method:
Preheat oven at 180c or 160c for fan assist oven.
Place softened butter, eggs, sugar, flour, baking powder and vanilla essence into a mixing bowl. Beat for a few minutes with eletric mixer until the mixture is light in colour and fluffy.
Line the muffin tin with 12 cases and divide the mixture between them. filling up the cases to about two-thirds of the way up.
Bake for about 20m minutes until the cakes have risen and are lightly golden. Lift the cakes (still in the paper case) out of the tin and leave them to cool on a wire rack.
For the buttercream:
  • 55g unsalted butter, softened
  • 250g icing sugar
  • 30ml milk, room temperature
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • green and black food colouring
Method:
Beat the butter, icing sugar, milk and vanilla xtract together in a bowl until light and fluffy. Put half of the buttercream in another bowl and add green food colouring to it. Reserve this for the grass. Add black colouring to the other half and mix well. This will be use for the nest.

Put the green buttercream into a icing bag using the grass/hair nozzle. Pipe it on the side of the cupcakes. Once completed, wash the nozzle and use it to make the nest. Place the black buttercream into a clean piping bag and press out the buttercream in a long pipping to make the nest along the grass.
Decorate the cupcakes with mini easter eggs and also little chick.