Dark Chocolate and Amaretto Cake

So, I have an ever growing list of cakes I've baked recently, not for orders but just for fun that I plan to post on the blog along with the recipe and what I thought of the bake. Some of these cakes I made quite a while ago, some recently however sometimes these get pushed to the back of the list for even more recent cakes I've made, this is the case today.

The reason for this is I got a new cake book and after a brief browse and 1 bake I can already tell that it's going to be a firm favorite. The book people came to my work last week and even though I had made a promise to myself not to purchase any more cookery books I couldn't help myself and came away with a copy of The Clandestine Cake Club Cookbook. The recipes in the book are from different members in all the different factions of the club all over the UK  and some abroad. and after reading about the club it sounds so much fun and a really great concept. I mean any club based on cake is a great concept right?

 I'm so glad I broke my own promise to myself though as it is a beautiful book filled with inspiring recipes and I think I want to bake them all. Boyfriend and one of my best friends have already had a look through and picked about 7 or 8 cakes between them for me to bake next haha.

There were so many cakes in the book I wanted to bake first however my choice was based on the fact I had a big bag of Amaretti biscuits that needed using as well as most of the other ingredients required so I decided on the Dark chocolate and Amaretto cake which was a recipe from Carmella Hayes, part of the Northampton and district CCC. The recipe itself was really well written and the cake came out perfect and full of flavour. Here it is :

I apologise for the terrible photo, I was a tad rushed as boyfriend really wanted a piece before it had even finished cooling.

Dark Chocolate and Amaretto Cake:

This cake is best mixed by hand to retain the best texture.

4 large eggs
50 g Caster Sugar
200g Self raising flour
100g Ground Almonds
1 Sachet of pane degli angeli ( An Italian vanilla flavored raising agent) or 1tsp baking powder with 2tsp Vanilla extract.
200g Butter, Melted
200g Good quality dark chocolate, chopped
200g Amaretti Biscuits  crushed
2 tbsp Amaretto liqueur

Pre heat the oven to 180 deg C and grease and line a 23cm round cake tin.

In a large bowl beat the eggs and sugar using a wooden spoon. Add the flour, almonds, baking powder and vanilla (or Pane degli angeli) and melted butter and mix well. Stir in the chocolate, Ammaretti biscuits and Amaretto liqueur, mixing well.

Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for 45 - 50 minutes until the top is firm to touch and a skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.

Leave to cool in the tin for about 10 minutes, the transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Any way that's all for now, I'm off to plan my next bake

Kris xx

Mothers day cupcakes, a Very Leopard Print Birthday and Easter Basket Cupcakes

I have been very busy with cupcake orders recently. We've had valentines day which I thought was busy but then Mothers day came and I found myself having to make 92 cupcakes and a two tier Birthday cake over a weekend.

Here are just a couple of the Mothers day cakes I made

Both of these where Lemon flavour cupcakes with the bottom set decorated with hand made Lillies. These were my first attempt at flowers like this and I definitely want to get better and develop a wider range.

As i said earlier I also made a two tier Birthday cake over Mothers day weekend too. This was for my friend Alex. Last year I made her the pink princess birthday cake topped with feathers that can be seen in this post
and this year I wanted to make something even bigger and better. My friend is renowned for loving anything leopard print as well as anything with a bit of sparkle so I came up with this :

To get the leopard effect I used icing sheets round the side and a disc cut for the top and then I covered the joins on the top with piped icing. The sheets gave a really great effect and were easy enough to work with.
The lettering around the cake reads "Happy Birthday Lady Alex" as me and a friend also bought her a Lady ship title as a gift (hehe)  Any way she loved it and didn't even want to cut the leopard print tier at first.

Lastly today I have been getting ready this week for another busy cupcake making weekend with lots of Easter orders to be made. This week I have been practicing some designs ready and I think these ones are really cute:

The cupcakes are vanilla and I used vanilla frosting dyed green and piped using a multi holed nozzle to create a grass effect (this was harder on my hands than expected) I then used a strawberry licorice straw for a handle and decorated with tiny chocolate eggs. I'm now gearing up to decorate many more of these and a few other designs this weekend for Easter orders.

Any way that's all for today, no recipe this time but lots of pictures that I hope will inspire you.

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris xxx

Red Velvet Cake and another Wedding.

One of my best friends recently tied the knot and as well as being a bridesmaid I was also tasked with making her cake, this consisted of 130 vanilla cupcakes with both pink and white icing and butterfly decorations and then a top cake of Red Velvet cake filled with Cream Cheese frosting and covered in a white roll out fondant.
Jen and her Husband Chris both love superheroes so they also wanted to incorporate this into the topper on the cake as well as with other elements of the wedding such as the table names and the sweet cart. Any way Jen loves Harley Quinn from Batman and she saw a perfect topper idea on the Internet then found a lady who would replicate it in clay resin (I think that's what they're made of right?)

Any way here's the cake.

As you can see some small crafty fingers had already taken a couple of cakes.
And here's the topper:

As there were more cakes than the stand would hold the rest could be stored under the table to top up as guests helped themselves.

Any way as it's almost Valentines and I have have a few orders for red velvet cupcakes as well as a few people asking me about red velvet I thought I'd post the recipe I used for the top cake. As well as for this adorable cup cake (decorated with Red Velvet cake crumbs)

And here's how they're made: (Recipe via Hummingbird cake days)

Makes about 18 large cupcakes (can be easily halved)

Red Velvet Cupcakes

120g Unsalted Butter
300g Caster Sugar
2 large eggs
20g Cocoa Powder
40ml Red food colouring  Note: avoid natural red colourings as this will produce a duller and browner red. I use Silverspoon artificial Red food colour sold in sainsburys or Dr Oetker Red (not natural)
1 tsp Vanilla Essence
300g Plain Flour
1tsp salt
240ml Buttermilk
1tbsp White Wine Vinegar
1tsp Bicarbonate of Soda


Pre heat the oven to 190 degC.
Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy and then add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition until thoroughly mixed.

In a separate bowl, stir together the cocoa powder, food colouring and vanilla to form a paste. Add the paste to the batter and mix until fully incorporated.

Sift together the flour and salt and then add this to the batter in  two batches, alternating with the buttermilk and mixing after each addition.

Finally in another bowl, mix together the vinegar and bicarbonate of soda and mix this into the cake batter.

Line a muffin tin with paper cases and fill. Bake in the oven for 18-20 minutes or until the sponge bounces back when lightly pressed. allow to cool before frosting.

For the icing


100g Unsalted Butter, softened
600g Icing Sugar (I actually used a bit less for a softer icing, more like 400g)
250g Cream cheese (Again I used more like 200g)


Beat the butter and icing sugar with an electric whisk or mixer until you have a sandy consistency. Add the cream cheese and mix until everything is incorporated and the frosting is smooth and fluffy.

Decorate as desired.

For the big top tier of the wedding cake I used this recipe for each layer of the cake (The cake was 2 8" layers and quite deep, so for a smaller cake you may need to use less or divide between shallower tins) with a layer of cream cheese frosting in the centre. As this cake was in the oven for longer I double lined my cake tin both sides and bottom to ensure the sides didn't brown to much and stayed a nice red.

Any way that's all for now, I have quite a few of these cupcake for valentines day orders so I best start my shopping list for ingredients. Let me know if you make these for a loved one!

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris
xx

Lots of Birthdays and a Wedding

WOW it has been over a month since I updated, I knew that would be the case in October / November as it is a very busy time for me with birthdays. A few of my good friends and also my boyfriend have had a Birthday n the last month and I've made cakes for them all as well as having another couple of cake orders on top of that including my first wedding cake.

I also had a little break away to Dublin for one of my good friends hen weekends and of course there were (very) early morning cupcakes for the flight over there. Dublin was a great city, I'd never been before but I was very impressed, it was also full of great little independent cafes with fresh food friendly staff and great coffee. I was particularly impressed by one we visited on day one called Brother Hubbard. full of brilliant fresh homemade cakes and tasty coffee. I had the flourless orange blossom and almond muffin with chocolate ganache and it was amazing. One of my friends has demanded I try to re create it myself.

Any way so I'll start with the Birthdays. The first Birthday I baked for recently was my friend Jen's who had Birthday / Halloween party. Jen is obsessed with zombies and particularly loves the walking dead so I thought I'd make her a cake in homage to that. I saw a few ideas online and ended up with this:

She was overjoyed with it and dubbed it the "best birthday cake ever" however I do think she is biased haha. I had a helper making this cake and it was brilliant, my friend Alex came round and was a brilliant helper helping make buttercream, roll out icing etc, I could get used to that!

The next cake was for an order for the next day and it was a copy of a cake I have made before just with different writing and it was chocolate inside I didn't get a picture of this but it was the same as this one


Then the other 2 birthday cakes were for the same day, these were for my boyfriend and one of my best friends Mandie, who have birthdays just a day apart and had a joint celebration meal.

For boyfriends cake I went for a Lego themed cake as he is a big kid at heart who loves Lego, here it is:

Finding something to cut the circles for the top was the hardest part but the bottom of a large piping nozzle worked.

And for Mandies cake she had requested that she didn't want " A boring normal shaped cake" so after toying with a few Ideas themed around her hobbies (one of which is indoor rock climbing) I made this cake:

She loved it and was especially grateful as she knows how much I hate making sugarpaste figures.


Ok so that was all the Birthdays, now onto the wedding. A friend asked me a while back if I would make her wedding cake for her, she only wanted a simple cake, nothing to over the top but still it was the most nerve wracking experience ever. It's such an important thing and I was a nervous wreck by the end of it! I even dreamt that a creature got in my house and ate the bottom tier (I know I'm crazy.) but both her and her husband were very happy with the finished cake and it was cut up in the evening for all the guests who seemed to enjoy it. Here it is:

 

You cant tell too much as the pictures are bright but the bottom and top layer had little pearlised dots. 

And I just can't help tweaking.


The cake was fruit layer on the bottom, carrot for the second tier and vanilla for the top tier.

and that's it for now! back to all the Christmas baking. 

Double Chocolate and Raspberry cake

I'm being very bad and abandoning my blog again but time seems to get away from me so fast, I can't believe its soon time to start thinking about Christmas baking, ok I might have already started thinking about it haha.

Any way the list of cakes I've made and not had a chance to post about yet is growing so I thought that it's long overdue for an update.

Over the whole of this summer I have had an abundance of raspberry's from the garden (and they're still growing) so quite a lot of the recipes I have tested have has a few raspberry's thrown in at some point.

Any way what seems like a long time ago now Asda posted a recipe to their facebook page for a Double Chocolate Raspberry cake and who couldn't pass up an opportunity for a chocolate and raspberry combination!

The same recipe is also posted on goodtoknow.co.uk so I'm not sure where it originally came from. It's not the best written recipe, for instance it doesn't say the quantities of which to divide the white chocolate but I made enough chocolate curls to cover the top then put about a good tablespoon of white chocolate into my filling (any more seemed to make it too runny) and then used the rest as drizzle.

Any way here's my cake:

And here's the recipe:

200g self-raising flour
25g cocoa
1 teaspoon baking powder
225g butter, at room temperature, plus a little extra for greasing
225g caster sugar
4 eggs

For the filling: 

200g white chocolate
300ml double cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
300g fresh raspberries

Preheat the oven to 160°C.
Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder into a bowl. Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl  until pale and fluffy.

Beat in 1 egg then a spoonful of the flour mix. Continue adding eggs and flour alternately until it has all been added and the mixture is smooth.
Spoon into your desired greased tins (i used 2 shallow 8 inch tins as it saved cutting the cake in half)

Smooth the top of the cake so it's level then bake for 35-40 minutes (as I used 2 shallow tins this was more like 30 mins) or until the top feels firm and a skewer comes out cleanly when inserted into the centre of the cake.

Leave to cool in the tin for a few minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Meanwhile unwrap and soften the block of white chocolate in the microwave on full power for 10 seconds.  With the flat side of the block of white chocolate facing upwards, shave off chocolate curls by running a swivel-bladed vegetable peeler over the top. If the curls are very tiny, microwave the chocolate once more then try again. Chill the curls.

When the cake is cold, break the remaining chocolate into pieces and melt in a bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water.

Whip the cream in a second bowl then fold in two thirds (i used a couple of table spoons but not to much or the cream may go to runny) of the melted chocolate and the vanilla.

Cut the cake into two layers if needed, put one of the layers on a serving plate, spoon over half the cream then sprinkle with half the raspberries. Add the other cake half and repeat the layers.

Drizzle the remaining melted chocolate from a spoon in zigzag lines over the top of the cake and finish with the chilled chocolate curls.

and that's it chocolate and raspberry, perfect! And it didn't last long (cakes with white chocolate don't tend to around me). It's also a great looking cake that wows guests, if not a little tricky to cut with all that cream.

any way that's all for today, next time I will update you on my very first wedding cake I recently and nerve wreckingly made

cupcake Kris 

Lots of cakes to keep me busy

Just a quick post today as I have been really busy recently, lots of baking amongst other things and gearing up to make my first weeding cake (eeek)

But I thought I'd update with a few pictures of some cakes I've been baking recently and then I promise I'll try to update with a recipe by the end of this week

any way first was a friends the Flash themed birthday cake:

Then I had an order for two extra chocolaty cakes covered in chocolate fondant and decorated simply but however I liked. here they are:

First one decorated with giant white chocolate buttons.

Next one was a bit of a rush job with the decorating and I wasn't sure what to do but went with fondant roses and chocolate vines.

Then I had an order for some lemon cupcakes for a baby shower.:

I wish I would have been able to make more of these cute little feet but I was short on fondant.

And lastly was an order for some cupcakes for a saints and sinners theme hen night!

Chocolate and Vanilla

Are you a saint?

Or a sinner?

So that's it , no recipe for today but a lot of pictures. I have another bust few weeks coming up with weddings birthdays and lots of plans but as ever it will involve a lot of baking. then hopefully I'll get time to bake some new things for me just in time for Christmas (blimey where has the year gone! )

Until next time

Cupcake Kris

Pecan Toffee tray bake and Shrek Birthday Cake

So a while back you may remember that I had a German friendship cake that just kept on going. I tried a few variations on the recipe and one of the favourites was Pecan fudge. After all the sourdough mix had finally gone from cluttering up my small work top and been given out I decided to adapt the pecan fudge cake to a normal tray bake square cake so that I could use up the leftover pecans and fudge, ok ok, I admit, I had to go and buy more fudge in the end because I ate the rest.

This was really just a basic cake but the flavours marry really well together and it came out soft and light. I even had to make another one a few days later as boyfriends brother liked it so much he wanted one to himself.

Any way, not the best pictures but here are some slices, right before they were scoffed.

And here's how it's made 

80g Caster Sugar

100g Light brown soft sugar

170g Butter

3 eggs

170g Plain Flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1  - 2 handfulls of pecans (broken up into chunks and left a few whole)

1 large handfull of all butter fudge cut into smaller chunks

Pre heat the oven to 180 deg C and grease and flour a square cake tin or deep tray.

Cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy, then add the eggs one at a time whisking as you go.

Then sift the flour and baking powder into the mixture and fold in until all the ingredients are combined. 

Toss the pecans and fudge in a little flour and then stir into the mixture until evenly dispersed.

Bake in the pre heated oven for approx 20 minutes or until cooked through and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Slice into squares, decorating with more fudge or pecans if desired.

I found the flour did stop the pecans from sinking to the bottom of the cake but most of the fudge still sank and melted a little as it was heavier but it still tasted great.

I've also had a couple of big birthday cakes to make recently which I'll be posting here and here's the first, done a few weeks back. A Shrek themed cake for a 3rd Birthday: 

Inside was a vanilla sponge with ogre green icing. I'm cant really make models so I improvised with the 3 with Shrek ears and because I couldn't find any Shrek figure toys I attempted his face.

Any way that's all for today

Keep Baking

Cupcake Kris xxx