A Cakey Update

Since finishing my mammoth baking year I have been doing less baking and more of other things. But I haven’t given up completely. Here is a roundup of what I’ve made in the oven since March:

Luilakbollen (Lazybones Buns)

These came from a recipe from the Netherlands in the Hairy Bikers’ Big Book of Baking. I made these with my friend Josie whose Grandfather is Dutch (although she had never heard of them before). These spicy, fruity bread buns smelt amazing and were lovely warm with melted butter. When they cooled down they were less yummy so I repurposed them into a bread and butter pudding!

Chocolate Lollies

A trip to the flagship Lakeland shop in Windemere ended with my buying lots of baking goodies including a kit to make some chocolate lollies. These turned out ok but I used quite cheap chocolate and so the consistency after melting and resetting was a bit odd.

Giant Cup Cake

It was a colleague’s birthday in April and so I decided to flex my baking skills. This time I made and iced a giant sponge cupcake (made using a special shaped tin). Although this went off to her party, it certainly looked impressive.

Edible Campfires

Not technically baking as such but I wanted to share the awesome creations that my Brownies made at their recent sleepover. These were incredibly lifelike but totally edible with matchmaker logs, digestive biscuit bases, and sweetie and icing fire and stones.

As well as continuing to bake and make some "baubles" I also hope that I can use this blog to put up some updates on my other exciting adventure. More to follow...

(Hint: Look in the top navigation bar!)

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

January’s theme for Clandestine Cake Club matched perfectly with the venue. We ate our selection of Vintage and Retro cakes from assorted floral tea plates, drank real hot chocolate from retro glass cups and lusted after the beautiful dresses and accessories at The Vintage Boudoir Tearoom in Lancaster. 

For my cake I delved into the Clandestine Cake Club Cookbook and this recipe stood out.  I remember my mum making this for us at home, and it turns out it was one of my Nannie’s signature cakes too. Also, I love pineapple and cherries so it seemed like a perfect choice.

Method

First I made a butter (I used real butter to add to the retro feel), golden caster sugar and honey paste that was spread into the bottom of the tin. It was pretty thick and sticky and difficult to move about, but I got there in the end. Then I pressed in the pineapple rings and glace cherries in a pretty pattern, taking care to leave a space at the edge. The sponge was your standard flour, butter, eggs, caster sugar, baking powder, vanilla essence mixture which was made the old fashioned way (i.e. not all in one). This was poured over the pineapple etc. in the tin. Again it was difficult to spread about and I was worried that I was going to dislodge the fruit if I went to hard.

Then the tin went into the oven for about 25 minutes.

Results

I decided that as the book said this was best served warm I would make the cake straight after work, just before going to Cake Club. This meant that it was a bit of a panic when my oven did the usual and decided that it wasn’t going to play ball and cook things in the time that they should. But eventually the skewer came out clean and we (my guest and new college Sarah and I) set off with the cake in my cake carrier (thanks Mum!).  And we weren’t even late.

It was definitely the right decision to bring the cake warm. When I turned out the cake (a nerve wracking experience with everyone watching) the steam and the smell that came off it was amazing. The butter/sugar/honey on the top had formed a sticky glaze and the sponge was moist. There were patches where the glaze had collected in the corners and gone a bit solid but they still tasted ok, if a bit sweet. The family tradition will continue and I will be making this again when I have enough people to enjoy it warm.

Score: 9.5/10

Soundtrack: Chatting to Sarah about all things cake.

Finished!

This week was my 26th Birthday. As well as being another year older it meant that I am no longer a member of “The Senior Section” and am now just a plain old adult leader in the land of Girlguiding.

However, more excitingly it meant that I had reached my deadline for completing the Queen’s Guide Award and guess what? - I’ve only gone and managed it!

This means that since October 2013 I have:

Baked 56 bakes and spent more than 69 hours baking, researching and blogging…

...Spoken to over 180 people about organ donation, given out nearly 200 leaflets and 40 posters, and written 10 facts sheets about the cause…

...Kept 4 strangers entertained for 3 days while getting my Senior Section Permit despite of the snow...

...Sourced 4 Brownie fancy dress outfits and reviewed 90 bands, artists, shops and foods at Solfest 2013...

...Gained my Leadership Qualification, became a Brown Owl and attended 34 Brownie sessions and 5 Senior Section meetings...

...Spent 5 nights in Berlin in charge of 17 Rangers (giving out countless numbers of plasters and bottles of water)...

...Organised seaside crafts for hundreds of soggy Brownies...

...Dreamt up loads of ideas and suggestions to shape the future of guiding at Innovate...

And done so many other things that aren’t directly related to the award that I wouldn’t have done if I hadn’t taken on the challenge.

But most of all I have met some amazing, welcoming people that have helped me in so many ways I can’t even count.

So I want to say a big THANK YOU to all of these people and hope that my Guiding adventure continues to be as rewarding and as fun!

Snowy Winter Fudge

It’s December and that means only one thing – it’s time for Christmas baking. Christmas is the best time of year for cake and this year I am going to have a go at making lots and lots different kinds of them. My first bake (is it a bake if it doesn’t involve an oven?) is this fudge that I think looks super wintery. 

Method 

I got the recipe from a booklet that Tesco sent me and you can find it here. 

This recipe was really easy to make (although all the very unhealthy ingredients were a bit scary). I put the butter, sugar, condensed milk and syrup into a pan then melted everything and brought it to the boil. As the mixture boiled (for about 8 mins) it thickened and turned a darker colour. I had to keep stirring though so that it didn’t stick to the bottom and burn. 

I then mixed in the broken biscuits (just like a cheesecake base) and put the mixture into a greased tin. Mini marshmallows were put on top and pressed into the mix and then everything was covered in a dribble of while chocolate. The fudge then went into the fridge to set. 

Results 

I really liked this fudge, although it was so very sweet that you couldn’t have lots in one go. I thought it tasted yummy and also looked great. I am thinking of adding cranberries or maybe even glitter for a more grown up feel and using it as a Christmas gift.

Score: 9/10

Tropical Fruit Cake

After a break last month (Brownies got in the way) it was time this week to make another cake for Clandestine Cake Club.  The theme this month was “Happy Cakes”. I went for a Tropical Fruit Cake because being in the tropics makes me happy (and so does cake). Fruit cake is also on my list of “basics” to attempt to master, and as I near the end of my QGA, it was time to get back to trying to get these right.

Method

I found the recipe in a Stork advert in a magazine. It’s also available, with a video, here. They call it a Winter Wonderland Cake on the website but since I didn’t decorate it, my cake deserves a simpler name.

The eggs, flour, ground almonds, baking powder and of course Stork were beaten together to make a pretty basic heavy sponge. I did worry a little when the mix wasn’t turning out completely smooth, but then remembered that the ground almonds would make it look a little gritty. I then folded in the fruits which had been soaking in orange juice for 30 mins plus. I couldn’t find the sour cherries required in my local Tesco so I substituted these for yet more cranberries. The tropical fruits took some finding too and I ended up with a mix of mango, pineapple, papaya and apricots; all chopped into cranberry sized pieces.

This mixture then went into a large greased and lined tin and into the oven for the long baking process (1 hour plus). As usual, even with a thermometer, my oven didn’t really play ball. The inside of the cake didn’t cook in the time allowed so the outside was a little darker than I would have wanted.

Results

It’s always nerve wracking when you have no idea what your cake is like until a room full of pretty much strangers cut into it and start eating. Apart from the slightly brown outside the cake itself was pretty yummy. However, I had forgotten about one of the perils of fruit cake baking – sinkage! All the fruit had sunk to the bottom and in this laden down cake this meant that the bottom inch was like a dried fruit salad. The top part was like a lovely madeira cake though. I might have to search the internet for a cure for this, although I fear this is an ongoing issue for many.

Score: 7/10

Chocolate Chip Shortbread

Another bake on my list of basics is shortbread. I decided to make them a little more interesting by adding some chocolate chips.

Method

I used this recipe by Dr Oetker that used just butter, sugar, flour and chocolate chips.

Results

This bake was a bit of a disaster from the very start. I didn’t have enough plain flour so had to use half self-raising. Then my mixture was VERY short. It was so crumbly that I gave up on ever being able to roll it out and instead squished it into a square tin. I left it to firm up a bit in the fridge before putting it in to bake. Because I had free styled it a bit with the form (tin vs rounds) I had no idea how long it needed. I think I left it in too long as the shortbread was looking on the brown side of golden when I took it out. The shortbread tasted ok, if a little over done but was very dry and crumbly still. I didn’t really enjoy eating my biscuits.

Next time I’ll make sure I have all the ingredients before setting off and I will make more effort to get a nice dough at the start.

Score: 3/10

Soundtrack: The 20/20 Experience, Justin Timberlake