Flour Free Gooey Goodness

Spying a metro over someones shoulder one december evening on my way home from work i saw Nigella was doing a signing of her new book at Selfridges the next evening. I thought: 

Ah an excellent christmas present for my mum, she'll love this!

The next evening i had about 5 minutes between finishing work in covent garden and getting there to get a good spot in the queue so legging it down a packed oxford street at the peak of christmas time i thought: 

She better actually be there. I better get a good spot in the queue. Man i wish i worked at Selfridges, this would be so much easier (guess where i ironically work now. Dreaming for another book signing of interest that i can be at the front of the queue for. ho ho ho)

Standing in an extremely packed lower ground floor in the middle of a very long queue, clutching my newly purchased Nigellissima book, the front pages bare and ready for a sharpie pen blessing i thought: 

This better be worth it, if all the recipe's are for salad i will be most annoyed.....

Et voila it was all worth it as the chocolate olive oil cake that i successfully baked last weekend was divine and there was a very happy momma Sax on christmas day when she opened her present and saw the message in the front pages. 

I am an awesome christmas present buyer and world renowned attempted cake baker daughter extraordinaire. Aren't my family lucky to have me living with them still.

Baking with olive oil may seem daunting or slightly weird- you may think the cake will be greasy or have a strange taste or that nutty smell that comes with (good quality) olive oil but this wasn't the case at all. It meant the cake retained just the right amount of soft gooeyness you need whilst its in a hot oven without been raw or undercooked in the middle.

You can substitute the ground almonds with flour. However even with no allergy sufferers in the house i still went with the almonds- and the complete lack of butter, milk and flour in this cake makes it seem just a teeny bit healthier doesn't it? (I asked my parents if almonds had dairy in them before writing this. I've said before Rachel is the brains behind this operation.) meaning its also the perfect tea time treat if you have guests who suffer from those allergies. 

Finally standing in front of the beautiful and talented Nigella herself i thought:
Er, nothing. I thought nothing. My mind went completely blank in a way i thought i was far too cool for it to go when around people from the tele. When she said hello and i er'd and ummm'd like a complete and utter loon until she finished signing the book in silence and handed it back to me where i then proceeded to walk away impersonating the blue one from finding nemo. A kind looking Selfridges employee then looked at me and asked if i needed any assistance. Great.

Holly x

Recipe link below to reduce blog post waffling length-

Rhubarb Spiced Cake

Oh What To Do With Rhubarb....

As you may or may not know, my family keeps a gorgeous vegetable patch, providing us with super fresh ingredients to cook with and share with our friends. Around this time of year, we usually have a glut of rhubarb- and unable to face a month of rhubarb crumble (very nice, but wears thin after a while) I went on the hunt for something different. 

I came across this recipe on the Internet, as my cook books were not providing something of interest for once, and I am glad I did. This cake is super moist, reminiscent of the sticky ginger cake I used to love as a kid, and everyone who tried it loved it. Easy peasy recipe by the amazing Mary Cadogan (although I will make some notes at the end) so crack on and enjoy! Very good for those who might never buy rhubarb in their weekly shop.

Rhubarb Spiced Cake

Count Your Cupcakes

Everyone has seen the film Bridesmaids right? You know the hilarious female led film with enough gross bits to compete with any lad film, puppies as party favours and chris o'dowd trynna make it as a big time movie star... WELL there's a scene halfway through the film where kristen wiig has some sort of ex bakery owner equivalent of crying over your ex boyfriend at midnight and decides to bake a cupcake, except she just bakes ONE cupcake, and ever since seeing that film i have been been desperate to know how she just makes enough mixture for one perfect little cupcake. Obviously she has no effing clue. She is an actress. Not a real life baking lady. The cupcake probably tasted like ass.

ANYWAY, pointless examples aside. I finally found a recipe one day when browsing pintrest- i tracked down the source of the picture and found it on a very lovely and exciting baking blog called Bakergirl- A truly scrumptious baking blog from across the pond with tons of delicious recipes and great photography to go alongside- no iphone snaps and instagram filtering in sight which i am incredibly guilty of in regards to this blog.....

Its perfect because sometimes the thought of making 24 cupcakes in an afternoon and then having to ice them all with nowhere to then take them to afterwards can seem a bit of a pointless waste and probably one of the reasons i avoid making cupcakes unless its someone's birthday, because no one NEEDS 24 cupcakes in the house (yes, i did just say that) and theres always too many and not enough icing etc etc.

So here is the recipe for vanilla cupcakes just for 2, they will make 2 if you're using large muffin cases- or 4 with the standard small cases.
The recipe was a quick and easy success- i was a tad worried as baking is like science and when you start messing with quantities and measurements all sorts can go wrong but after about 15-20 minutes in a pre heated non fan oven at 180c they were soft vanilla perfection!
I baked 4 and bought cute cupcake carry boxes from Hertford cake shop and  took them to the boyfriends. They survived a whole train journey to London til they met some womans wildly swinging backpack on the packed W3 bus. She's lucky i didn't see the damage til i got off otherwise it would have been a heavy mock rocco bag TO THE FACE!

Holly x

1 egg white

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/4 cup flour- 32 grams in UK

1/4 heaping teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt 
1 1/2 tablespoons milk

Preheat oven to 350°F. (180C and no fan) Line a muffin pan with 2 liners.

In a bowl, add egg white and sugar and whisk until combined. Add in vanilla and melted butter and stir until mixed. Add flour, baking powder, and salt and stir until smooth. Stir in milk. Divide batter equally between the 2 cupcake liners.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until cake is set and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcake comes out clean. Let cool completely & then frost as desired

I was was in the mood for experimenting as i only had 4 to decorate so i made a bright pink creme cheese frosting with smashed up pieces of green and blacks honeycomb choclate and gold edible glitter. Because it was new and i couldn't help myself.

Visit bakergirl's beautiful blog at the budding baketress for this recipe and hundreds of other delicious sweet treats:

Bakergirl

Madness Free Macaroons

Here is the very simple and easy to follow recipe for the very successful macaroons me and rachel made a few weeks back. In the next post below is a bit more detail and tips about colors and flavors and lots more pictures!

Makes 16

75g ground almonds

115g icing sugar

2 large egg whites- left to sit for a few hours at room temp. V important.

50g caster sugar

1.2tsp vanilla extract

food colouring

Filling:

115g soft cheese

1tbsp icing sugar

flavours/colours of your choice

• Place the ground almonds and icing sugar in a food processor and process for 15 seconds.
• Sift mixture into a bowl.
• Line two baking sheets with baking paper.
• Place egg whites in a bowl and whisk until soft peaks are formed.
• Gradually whisk in the caster sugar to make a firm and glossy meringue.
• Whisk in vanilla extract and your chosen food colouring.

If the food colour makes the mixture slightly runny continue to whisk until you have a very thick and stiff meringue mixture- this is so important to make the macaroons thick and fluffy and not leak all over the baking sheet!!

• Using a spatula carefully fold in the blitzed almond mixture one third at a time.

Fold the mixture until its a shiny and thick ribbon like batter then pour mixture into a piping bag. Use a sandwich bag and cut off the corner if you don't have a piping bag. Insert a small nozzle. Our mixture was luckily so thick we didn't need a nozzle fitted and the bag just helped control the amount we put onto the baking paper.

• Pipe the small rounds onto the baking sheets spacing well. You want them to be thick with little peaks.
• Tap the baking sheets firmly onto the counter to get rid of any bubbles and the peaks.

This action helps create the 'frilly foot'- which is the airy chewy level beneath the hard shell of the top!

• NOW LEAVE AT ROOM TEMP FOR 30 MINUTES. This is so important as this is when the macaroons form the hard shell/skin on the top! Check this after 30 minutes very carefully by pressing the top. If its slightly firm and shiny and doesn't stick then they are ready to go in the oven.
• Place in pre heated oven at 160c with NO FAN.
• Bake for about 10-15 minutes.

If after this time the bottoms are still soft and sticking leave for a few more mins with the oven door open!
Cool for 10 minutes or until they are cool and formed enough to peel of the baking paper.
If they are sticking place in the freezer for 5 minutes and they should come away easily.
Leave to cool on a wire rack completely.
Fill with your desired filling and enjoy!

Taken from the easy to follow recipe book Macaroons
Macaroons: 30 perfect bite sized treats

Macaroon Madness Continued

I am going to admit, hands down, i have no idea how to correctly spell Macaroon/Macaron?! My spell check just tried to make it macaroni. No almonds in that pasta based dish.

Anyway if you want to confuse yourself and question the spelling even more then try making the damn things. After successfully creating these pesky little treats you can call them maccas for all i bloody care. Im just so happy it worked!

Here are the pics from our successful baking session- as you can see you don't have to follow the colors exactly as the recipes suggest- its a great opportunity to experiment- for the below we used violet grape, tangerine and mulberry food colouring paste, which is stronger and less runny than cheap liquid ones so much safer for mixing into delicate mixtures such as this!

You can also experiment with fillings as much as you like also, for example the chocolate rum ganache for the pink ones didn't set right in the fridge so we used a chocolate cream cheese filling instead! Or you could always use whipped cream or a plain buttercream/frosting and add flavours such as peppermint or lavender and dye your macaroons accordingly!
You can also see from the pics the importance of how thick the mixture is (the purple is thicker therefore made much smaller, puffier macaroons) and the spacing you should allow for them to cook!

We made ginger, blueberry cheescake and chocolate rum flavours-

Pesky Purple Piping Bags

Many, many of you will be sitting here laughing at this when i say that at 23 years old, with many many years of baking and cake eating experience under my belt, i have only just learnt how to use a piping bag.
You, laughing person over there, are either:
a) an incredibly experienced baker who has taken baking up as either a full time career or hobby therefore could pipe a cake with your eyes shut because you have the time, patience and practice!
or
b) have never, ever attempted it in your life and think the people on the telly on great british bake off make it look soooo bloody easy surely YOU can do it too! Its just squeezing icing out a bag in a circle right?
RIGHT?!

So my mothers day baking treats this year came in the form of vanilla cupcakes from the magnolia bakery book- another chance to practice this pretty much flawless recipe, adding dry ingredients in 3rds i think has such clear advantages when making cupcake batter, much better than, and it pains me to say this, nigellas 'blitz it all in the processor' approach which i find can end up very runny. This mixture was so thick i almost panicked, but it was easy to put in the cases and baked in about 15 minutes!
I used mini cases and therefore opted for a small nozzle to pipe the icing which when comparing with the mini cupcakes in Lolas bakery a few days later i realised it wasn't essential, a normal/medium sized one works just as well and leaves less lines on the icing, however i twisted and held the bag properly this time, took my time and the icing was a good consistency (cream cheese icing- it holds so well) I also used raspberry flavoring and my absolute first choice for food coloring a lovely violet/lilac one i use on everything!
Not bad for my second attempt. My first attempt we forgot to put the nozzle into the bag before adding the icing. So ya know, baby steps and all that.

Holly x

Welsh Cakes From Yorkshire (and gin)

Last weekend me and Rach had plans to bake some cupcakes and drink some cocktails at my house for a chilled friday night in (chocolate cupcakes with choc orange icing and gin, cucumber and elderflower cocktails, if you were wondering).

I used the Hummingbird book recipe for chocolate cupcakes and for the buttercream- i swear i had used this before- but they were very dry and just. blah. I always find this with chocolate cupcakes, is it from the extra dryness from the cocoa powder? Its def a weak point of mine! The "buttercream" icing was even worse! milk in icing?! are you crazy!! The only good bit was the orange flavoring which of course was from a supermarket and nothing to do with the hummingbird book. What a shame!
I should have stuck with good old nigella or the flawless magnolia bakery cupcake recipe. Shame on me! I will not even put you off your dinner with pictures because they looked very rude. Have you ever tried to use piping bags and chocolate icing for the first time after a few gin cocktails and a long day?

It was as very immature (hilarious).

It was also St.Davids day and rachel suggested we make welsh cakes, these were easy peasy and very tasty and very gin cocktail and gossip proof! We also cooked them in lard. This is very appealing after a  few drinks. I wanted to add bacon. I also insisted we use my teapot cookie cutter. This was an excellent decision.

We used James Martin's recipe from his book My Kitchen. Im not 100% i even like welsh cakes. Im not even 100% sure they were cooked all the way through. Im 100% it was way past bedtime at this point. But he is northern and strangely handsome. If he says make the welsh cakes. We make the welsh cakes.

225g plain flour

85g caster sugar

1/2tsp mixed spice

1/2tsp baking powder

50g butter cut into small pieces

50g lard small pieces and some for frying

50g currents

1 egg beaten

By hand mix the butter and dry ingredients til combined and crumbly. 

Add the currents. Mix in the egg and by hand mix until you have a dough. Add a bit of milk if needed.

Roll out on floured surface and cut with cutters. Making sure they're not too thin!

Heat a griddle and use some of the lard to grease. 

Cook the cakes a few minutes each side until golden brown.

Sprinkle with icing sugar and serve with jam and butter or enjoy on their own! (or with bacon and maple syrup... or ketchup... mmm)

Holly x