Tuck Shop Cupcakes.

Howdy!

I havn't been able to blog in a while as the naughty USB ports on the laptop broke and it's been driving me mad, but off to the shop it went and now it's back and all fixed and shiny.  I've missed blogging but I have been busy baking, alot for orders though including 28 cake pops and 20 ice cream cone cakes, which unfortunatley because I was so rushed in making and delivering that I forgot to take any pictures.

A few weeks ago I also made some suprise cupcakes for a friend of mine. It was a friends birthday and they were having a bbq. A friend of mine asked if I'd bring cucpakes (it wasn't even the friend who was having the bbq who asked, it was my cheeky cupcake feind friend Alex) So needless to say my friends (apart from Alex) were pleasantly suprised when I turned up with 24 cupcakes! I made 12 Mojito Cupcakes as these are just perfect for a sunny BBQ and then I made 12 surprise Tuck shop cupcakes. 

My friend Alex was in fact the inspiration for these cupcakes as the week before at the pub she had ordered a dessert favorite of hers called Tuck shop ice cream cake. It was pretty much a basic ice cream cake but on top was a variety of different chopped up sweets, chocolate bars and biscuits. With the fun being in the fact it's different every time. (Alex was very disappointed that time as she didn't get a piece of mini roll and another friend did) So I decided to surprise her and incorporate this idea of a Tuck shop and variety into some extra special cupcakes with enough that she could look at them all and decide which cake had her favorite treats on.

And here they are:

 The cakes themselves are this recipe for Chocolate Cupcakes and Vanilla frosting, however I didn't just wan't treats topping the cakes so I also baked some into them. So you never knew which treats you would get inside your cake!

I started with this lot: 

A big selection of the kind of treats you could buy at a school Tuck shop. I then resisted temptation to scoff the lot and once I had filled 12 cupcake cases with the chocolate batter I dropped a peice of a few treats into each cupcake. I left the jelly sweets and jelly beans out of the batter as I felt the other treats would work better.

Once they were baked with the treats inside they looked like this:

 Then I simply piped them with Vanilla frosting and topped each with different peices of treats!

These cupcakes are definitley for the sweet tooth! My choice would be one topped with things like Fudge and caramel like this one in the front:

Apparently these cakes were very tasty, fun and definitely for someone with a sweet tooth! I would like to say I know this from personal experience but I didn't get one myself! They were all snatched up and eaten, I managed to save one and take one home but then boyfriend ate that one too! I managed to eat some of the Mojito cakes though and also a rather large slice of my friends scrummy Malteaser cheesecake! (I'll have to steal and post the recipe for that one!)

Any way that's all for today I cant look at the picture of the bowls of sweets any longer as I'm having serious cravings hehehe!

Bye for now!

Cupcake Kris

Cornbread muffins

Last week I had watched way to much Diners, Drive ins and Dives on the Food Network and one thing that programme always makes me crave is BBQ sauce smothered, red meat loaded American BBQ food. In this case I was craving ribs in particular. So off I went to the butchers and bought a sheet of ribs.

With them I was planning to have home made paprika potato wedges and BBQ beans but I also wanted something else, something which gave me the excuse to bake ...  Cornbread! I first had Cornbread in Bodeans in London which is just the best BBQ restaurant where you can really pig out, and now I'm not in London I miss it often. since then I have tried making a variety of different cornbread recipes, and whilst I thought they were good nothing has yet matched the sweet, soft muffins from Bodeans. Although I think these are pretty good served warm with butter or my favorite, with a big bowl of BBQ beans.

here they are:

I also made some with grated Cheddar on top of the batter although I only made a couple for me as boyfriend has a rather odd dislike for recipes with cheese (how can you not like cheese?)

Really disappointed I didn't think to take a picture of the whole package, BBQ sauce smothered ribs, beans, wedges and muffins.

Here's how they're made:

200g Fine yellow cornmeal (Polenta)
170g Plain flour
1tsp Baking powder
1/2 tsp Bicarbonate of soda
Pinch of salt
1/4 tsp Cumin
dash of Paprika
2 large eggs
300ml  Milk
45g Butter, melted
3 heaped tbsp soft brown sugar (I add a little caster sugar also but I like mine sweet)
300g Grated cheddar (Optional) 

Preheat the oven to 190degC and line a tin with muffin cases.
In a large bowl mix together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, Bicarbonate of soda, salt, cumin and paprika.. Melt the butter and stir in the brown sugar. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and add slowly to the dry mixture whilst stirring. Mix the eggs and milk in a jug and slowly add this to the mixture beating until the batter is smooth. If the batter looks a little thick ad a couple more tablespoons on milk.

If desired stir in 2/3 of the grated cheese and then spoon the mixture into cases. top with the remainder of the cheese (if using cheese) and bake for approx 25mins. Leave to cool.

Just before serving they can easily be re-warmed in the oven for a minute or two.

and that's it, there you go a savoury treat for a change. Back to cake next week!

Cupcake Kris xxx 

Double Chocolate Raspberry cupcakes with Chocolate Ganche

I have to apologise it feels like I've neglected my Blog of late! I've still been baking away though, as well as meeting up with friends, going climbing, visiting family, going on a road trip to see the Foo Fighters (who rocked), burning myself through falling asleep in the sun, getting ill, getting better, lots of shopping and attending and BBQ filled weekends with 2 BBQ's in the space of 24 hours. 

But now I'm back with a recipe I tried out a couple of weekends ago when meeting up with a few friends down the pub.

It's not very often that I want to make a particular kind of cake just so as I can use a certain cake case however a while back my lovely friend Jenny bought me a present (I love how my friends buy me cupcake related gifts) of the prettiest cake cases they were dark red with purple patterns and I thought Id have to make a cupcake that fitted perfectly with the case. And when I first saw the cake raspberry's came to mind.

I looked around for a few ideas before deciding that the cakes should be really chocolatey with a gooey raspberry centre. I filled the cakes with a good raspberry conserve and I made a chocolate ganche topping instead of my usual butter frosting and then finished them off with a fresh raspberry.

here they are:

The cakes turned out really nice, they kind of had a brownie texture to them with a slightly crispy top but soft almost gooey inside with a raspberry centre. And the chocolate ganache worked perfectly not as sweet as allot of frosting but gave the cakes a really chocolatey kick.

Here's how they're made:

Chocolate Raspberry cupcakes

110g Plain Flour
20g Cocoa Powder
150g Caster Sugar
1 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
Pinch of Salt 
40g Unsalted butter at room temp
120ml Whole milk
1 egg
1/4 tsp Vanilla extract
50g Plain Chocolate, Melted
Raspberry conserve (About 6 tbsps)

Preheat the oven to 170deg C
Put the flour, cocoa, sugar, baking powder, salt and butter into a bowl and beat together with an electric whisk or rub between your fingertips until you have a sandy consistency.

Whisk the milk, egg and vanilla in a jug and slowly pour about half into the dry mixture, beat to combine then beat in the remaining liquid until the batter is smooth. Add the melted chocolate and stir in gently.

Spoon the mixture into paper cases until 2/3 full and bake in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes until risen and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Leave to cool on a wire rack. 

Once cool poke a small hole in the centre of each cake (I used the tip of a piping nozzle) and pipe in some raspberry conserve until it fills the hole.

Leave to rest while you make the Ganache.

Chocolate Ganache

100g Plain Chocolate
100ml Double Cream
Icing Sugar (Optional)

Break the chocolate into a saucepan and add the cream. Heat gently sirring all the time, until the chocolate has melted. Pour into a large heat proof bowl and using an electric hand whisk, beat the mixture for 10 minutes or until thick glossy and cool.

I wanted to sweeten (as the chocolate I had was rather bitter) and thicken my Ganache slightly so whilst beating I also added a little icing sugar to taste. Pipe or spoon the ganache over the centre of the cupcakes and top with a fresh raspberry.

And that's it!

Till next time

Cupcake Kris xxx

Coconut Pineapple Upside down cake

Hey! So in the last blog I mentioned I had a giant pineapple that I wanted to bake something using it. I didn't really feel like anything loaded with sugar or icing, I was more in the mood for something fresh and light that would go perfect with a cup of tea.

So I decided on a pineapple upside down cake as I'd never made one before however all the recipes I had had the sticky pineapple top however the cake part was just pretty plain. So I altered a little, I had some desiccated coconut and thought that that would go perfectly creating a Caribbean style flavour with a hint of spice.

And here it is:

The first slice, just for me!

I really liked this cake, it wasn't to overwhelming or to sickly which meant I could eat even more of it, nomnomnom.

Here's how it's made:

basic technique from the big book of baking:

Coconut Pineapple upside down cake

4 Eggs, beaten

185g Golden caster sugar or light brown soft sugar

1tsp Vanilla extract

170g Plain flour

55g Desiccated coconut

2tsp Baking powder

1 tsp Cinnamon

1/2 tsp Nutmeg freshly grated

125g Unsalted butter, melted.

Topping

40g Unsalted butter

4tbsp Golden Syrup (On baking I realised I didn't have any in so used 4tbsp brown sugar instead)

Canned pineapple rings or fresh pineapple cut into rings

Glace Cherries

Preheat the oven to 160degC and grease and line a cake tin. (I used a 10" round but 9 would have been better)

For the topping, place the butter and syrup into a pan and heat until gently melted. Bring to the boil and boil for 2-3 minutes until slightly thickened and toffee like.

Pour the syrup into the base of the tin and arrange pineapple rings in one layer over the syrup (My pineapple was to large so I had to use 1 ring surrounded by 1/2 rings.) Then place half a glace cherry in the centre of each ring (You will notice I only used one in the centre down to the fact I ate all the cherries and there was only 1 left, ooops)

Place the eggs, sugar and vanilla extract in a heat proof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and whisk with an electric mixer for approx 10-15 mins until thick enough to leave a trail when the whisk is lifted. (I was far to impatient for this so whisked for about 5 - 7 minutes and all was still fine)

Sift in the flour and baking powder and fold these in with the dessicated coconut, nutmeg and cinnamon. Fold the melted butter in until evenly mixed. Spoon into the tin over the pineapple and bake in the oven for 1 hour - 1hour 1/5 mins or until well risen, firm and golden.

Leave to cool in the pan for 10 mins then carefully turn out onto a plate.

And that's it! I really enjoyed this cake but didn't get to eat an awful lot of it as it all magically disappeared in a day!

Ok I've decided it really wasn't a good idea to write this blog when I'm hungry, I've had a lovely dinner but now all I want is cake! and there's none in the house I'm wondering if half 9 at night is to late to start baking? It's like torture I tell you.

Well on that note I'm off to raid the cupboards fora sweet treat and think of what to bake next.

Cupcake Kris xxx

Linked up to sweets for saturday



Cookie dough day! peanut butter cookie dough balls, cupcakes and a classic cookie.

Last week I had no occasion to bake for! No parties, no birthdays, no visiting friends so I had the chance to just bake anything I felt like baking.......at which point, as it always does when I don't have a plan, my mind went blank!

I looked on the board I write all my to do cakes on and I didn't really feel like any of it, and then I remembered what I'd been craving just a few days before... Cookie dough! not just cookies but raw cookie dough, in all its sweet, gooey, chocolate chippy unadulterated naughtiness. And don't try to pretend when making cookies you don't just love to eat the cookie dough. I often have to get the cookies in the oven super fast otherwise boyfriend will eat all the cookie dough.

So I made a really simple super sweet treat of cookie dough balls, of which I didn't get many because boyfriend scoffed loads. These are perfect if you have a really sweet tooth and can't resist eating raw cookie dough, here they are:

and inside:

Mmmm full of cookie dough and tiny chocolate chips. And don't worry for those of you worried about raw egg there's none in this recipe (not that that usually stops me eating the cookie dough)

And here's how they're made:

For the cookie dough  - this recipe makes around 12 cookies or 24 - 30 cookie dough balls depending on size

110g Unsalted butter
175g soft light brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
200g Plain flour
pinch of salt
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
125g plain chocolate chips or chocolate, chopped into small chunks.
2 tbsp peanut butter
50ml Milk
200g of chocolate, melted

Put the butter and sugar in a bowl and beat together until light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla extract and stir in the flour, milk, salt and bicarbonate, mix in the peanut butter until you have a smooth dough, If the dough is to dry add a little more peanut butter, or more flour if the dough is to sticky.

Stir in the chocolate chips until evenly dispensed.

Roll the cookie dough into small balls and arrange on a plate (I found it better to butter the plate to save the dough from sticking) and place these in the freezer to chill.

Melt the chocolate in a bowl over a pan of water and then set this aside to cool slightly. Once the cookie dough balls are chilled take them from the freezer and dip the cookie dough in the chocolate, I find this easiest by using 2 teaspoons and swapping the ball between the two. Then chill these until the chocolate has set. And that's it!

These can also be made into cookie dough pops by dipping the end of a lolly stick into chocolate and inserting it into a cookie dough ball and leaving to set before dipping in the chocolate then using a piece of polystyrene or foam to hold the pops up. This I feel makes the dipping process a whole lot less messier.

But I didn't stop there I had left over cookie dough, I wanted more cookie dough so I also used this eggless dough to make some ordinary peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, using bigger chunks of chocolate:

I didn't like them as much as my usual peanut butter cookie recipe but they were still very yummy.

Oh no and I didn't stop there either I also baked some vanilla cupcakes and dropped a ball of the cookie dough into each cupcake batter before baking to leave a cookie treat at the bottom of the cake:

cut in half without icing.

And here they all are together in all their super sugary cookie dough glory!

Enough to make any ones dentist cry!

Any way that's all for today I'm off to rack my brains for something to bake to use the ridiculously large pineapple that's sitting in my kitchen.

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris xxx

Mojito Cupcakes on a sunny day

So in my last blog I mentioned how my friends really love cake, they also love cocktails, and for the past couple of months ever since I mentioned I found a recipe for a Mojito cupcake I've been pretty much hounded to make them. My lovely friend Mandie even graffitied my noticeboard telling me to make them.

So last week when It was forecast for a sunny day (a rarity at the moment) I decided to invite my friends round for a BBQ and some cocktails and I didn't want to disappoint so I cracked open the rum and got started on the Mojito cupcakes to accompany our cocktails. And that's exactly how they were enjoyed:

The recipe suggested them as mini cupcakes, but I know my friends and unless there was a ridiculous amount of them mini wouldn't go down to well, so I made them slightly smaller than usual as I had cute green polka dot cases but still ample enough size to please!

 These cakes really turned out great and they tasted just like you would expect a Mojito cake to taste like. A soft moist cakes with kicks of lime, mint and sugar and a hint of rum. This recipe really impressed my friends too with one of them declaring them the best cupcakes yet so I will definitely be trying the other cocktail inspired cupcake recipes I have.

Any way here's how they're made: (Recipe from Hummingbird bakery's Cake Days)

Mojito Cupcakes!

Makes 12 medium sized cupcakes or 20-30 mini cakes

For the sponge:

100ml White rum
170g Caster sugar
40g Unsalted butter, softened
120g Plain flour
1/4 tsp Salt
1 1/2 tsp Baking powder
1 tsp Grated lime zest
1 tsp Grated lemon zest
1 tbsp Finely chopped mint
1 large egg
120ml Milk
1/2 tsp Vanilla essence

Preheat oven to 170deg C and line a muffin tin with cases

In a saucepan bring the white rum and 30g of the sugar to the boil, reduce by half and set aside.
Beat together the butter, flour, salt, baking powder, lime and lemon zest, mint and remaining sugar. Mix until you have a crumb like consistency.
Mix together the egg milk and vanilla in a jug and gradually pour this into the dry mix mixing until you have a smooth batter.

Spoon cake batter into the cases up to 2/3 full. Place in the oven and bake for 12-15 min's for mini cupcakes or 15 to 20 for bigger or until the cakes are a light golden brown and springy to the touch.

While the cakes are still warm spoon the rum reduction over them (1/2 tsp for mini cakes 1tsp for bigger approx) Then leave to cool completely!

While the cakes are cooling, make and drink a mojito! ... erm I mean make the frosting!

For the frosting

80g Unsalted butter
250g Icing sugar
1/4 tsp lemon zest
1/4 tsp lime zest
4 tsp milk
4 tsp White rum

1tbsp caster sugar
1 tsp chopped mint or lime zest

Using and electric whisk, beat together the butter, icing sugar, lemon and lime zest until combined in a sandy consistency. Stir together the milk and rum and pour this into the butter mixture while still beating, whisk until light and fluffy.
Divide the frosting between the cakes. To finish, mix together the caster sugar with either 1 tsp of mint or lime zest and sprinkle over the top.

And that's it, the perfect treat to share with friends on a sunny day and because they have rum in the grown ups have no choice but to eat them all before the kids see.
I definitely recommend making these soon.


I've recently had more orders for cupcakes too , and I used this as an excuse to try 2 colour swirl icing for the first time. Making a vanilla cupcake and topping it with half vanilla butter cream and half pink strawberry butter cream. Here's my first attempt:

Not to bad I think. Its done by filling one side of the piping bag with white icing and the other half with pink. I found it easier to hold a knife down the middle of the bag when filling with the two icings.

Here they all are decorated, boxed up and ready to go along with plain pink and more chocolate orange cakes:

How cute are the little cupcake toppers, they were a bargain!

Any way that's it for today, I'm felling in a cookie dough kinda mood so that's what I'll be baking with this week.

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris

xxx

Linked to foodie-friends-friday-linky-party

Chocolate Caramel Marble Bunt Cake.

Phew I feel like I haven't blogged in so long as I've not been able to spend to much time on blogspot the last week I've been a little busy and like a few others I've had a few issues with logging on.

Any way last week I had my friends round for lots and lots of pizza. And even with copious amounts of pizza I knew my friends would expect 1 thing - cake! In fact I didn't even need to second guess this as I got a text message about 2 hours before my friends were due letting me know that there best be cake on offer!

I already had to make some Chocolate Orange cupcakes for an order I had (They seem to be a very popular flavour at the mo) so there was some of them left over but I also needed something else (I have lovely but greedy friends)

I decided on something caramel themed as I had some left over dulce de leche that needed to be used. I also had wanted to make a marbled cake as it was something I'd never made before so I went with a caramel and chocolate marble cake. I used my bunt tin but this recipe could be made in any tin.

The cake turned out really nice soft and just the right mix of caramel and chocolate which gave the outside a deep golden colour. And it didn't last long at all before it was all snatched up! Here it is:

I don't know why I love the shape of Bunt cakes so much. Here's the swirly inside,

I even managed to steal myself a piece before it was all whisked away:

And here's how it's made:

I made more caramel mixture than chocolate as I didn't want the caramel overpowered by to much chocolate. Also depending on the size of your tin you may have a little left over. I had enough to make 6 caramel cupcakes as well.

For the Caramel sponge: (from hummingbirds caramel cupcake recipe)

80g Unsalted Butter
280g Caster sugar (I had almost run out so used 1/2 caster sugar 1/2 soft brown sugar  - worked perfectly)
240g Plain flour
1 tbsp Baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
240ml Whole milk
1/2 tsp Vanilla essence
2 large eggs
150g Dulce de leche

Preheat the oven to 190degC

Whisk or rub together the butter, sugar, flour, baking powder and salt until you have a sandy consistency.
Place the milk and vanilla in a jug with the eggs and whisk together. Pour 3/4 of this into the dry ingredients and whisk together firstly on a slow speed and then increase the speed and whisk till you have a smooth thick batter. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the remaining milk mixture and caramel and mix until all the ingredients are combined.

Put to one side while you make the chocolate mix.

For the chocolate sponge:

100g Plain flour
20g Cocoa Powder
140g Caster Sugar
1 1/2 Tsp Baking Powder
40g Butter
120ml Milk
1 egg
1/4 tsp Vanilla extract

Put the flour, cocoa, baking powder, sugar and butter in a bowl and rub together until you have a sandy consistency.

Whisk the milk, eggs and vanilla together and add slowly to the mixture beating out any lumps. Mix for a couple of minutes till everything is well combined but don't over mix.


Then get your desired cake tin and grease then either line with greaseproof paper or grease and dust with a fine layer of flour to prevent any sticking. I went for about 2/3 caramel mix and 1/3 chocolate and filled the tin approx 2/3 full.

First pour in the desired amount of caramel mixture then on top pour the chocolate mixture. Then take a teaspoon or knife and gently swirl the mixtures together to create a marble effect all the way through.

Then bake in the oven for 40  - 50 minutes (depending on size of cake/tin) or until golden and a skewer inserted comes out clean.

Then serve (Very yummy served warm with custard or cream)

and that's it!

As I said I had a little left over to make 6 caramel cupcakes, I didn't have any icing sugar left so I pricked the top of them and drizzled with toffee sauce to give a really sticky sweet cake:

One thing I love about my friends is that they don't hold back when it comes to cake. After finishing the pizza and easting cupcakes and cake, just before leaving they all ventured into my kitchen got the tin foil out and started cutting and wrapping slices of cake to take home. hehehe. They did leave me a couple of slices though.

I've had to make a lot of cupcakes for orders over the last few weeks but I have a free weekend this weekend so I'm hoping to bake something new. Not that I haven't enjoyed making all the cakes to order and as I said Chocolate Orange is definitely proving to be the favourite, I mean just look at this lot:

And this was just half of the amount of them I made last weekend.

Any way that's it for now!

Until next time, keep baking

Cupcake Kris
xxx