Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes.

I am feeling very Christmassy today, I went out for turkey carvery yesterday with some lovely friend and today I have decorated my house, put my tree up and when I finish writing this I'm going to wrap a few presents. I'm definitely getting in the Christmas mood. I've already made 2 batches of mince pies (All of which have already been eaten).  

So last week I was asked to make 36 cupcakes for an Irish themed night at my friends work and it was a perfect opportunity to make a cake flavour I've been wanting to try for ages. So I made 18 Vanilla cupcakes with Green Vanilla frosting and 18 Chocolate Guinness cupcakes with cream cheese icing.

As I'd said I wanted to make chocolate Guinness cake for a long time now and they didn't disappoint They were really rich with a dense chocolaty taste and just the perfect hint of Guinness, and the frosting perfectly compliments them. Now I don't like Guinness so if that's what you thinking don't let that put you off this recipe as this has fast become my new favourite chocolate cake recipe, because of the rich indulgent flavours.

any way here they are:

 I apologise for the terrible photographs, I was in a rush.

Or just spread the icing on top like the top of a pint of Guinness.

Just look at the dark, dense colour of the cakes (I had to cut this in half, and subsequently eat for photo purposes, oh well haha)

Any way here's how they're made

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes:

Makes about 24 (can be easily halved)

250ml Guinness
250g unsalted butter, cut into pieces
75g cocoa
400g caster sugar
142ml sour cream
2 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
275g plain flour
2 ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda

Preheat the oven to 180˚C.
Pour the Guinness into a large saucepan and add the butter; heat until the butter's melted, then whisk in the cocoa and sugar. Beat the sour cream with eggs and vanilla and then pour into the pan of buttery beer and finally whisk in the flour and bicarbonate of soda.

Pour the batter into a tin lined with cake cases ¾ of the way up and bake for 18 to 20 minutes or until risen and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tins for 20 minutes and then cool completely on a wire rack.

Once the cakes are completely cool ice with the cream cheese frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting: enough for 12 cakes

300g Icing Sugar
50g Unsalted butter, at room temperature
125g Cream cheese. 

Beat together the icing sugar and butter with an electric whisk and then beat in the cream cheese until smooth.

Ice the cakes as desired. I wanted to then top mine with a little green shamrock however I couldn't get hold of  a decent cutter in time.

And that's it! This week I am going to ice my Christmas cake and start on my list of other treat I plan to make for Christmas as well as fill a few cupcake orders I have.

Until next time

Cupcake Kris xxx

Linked up to sweet as sugar cookies

Christmas Cake Leftover Blondies.

This week I have been doing a lot of decorating and for once it's not cakes, it's my living room. I decided to paint one big wall in the room a deep red colour, so cue lots of red paint everywhere, including a ton in my hair and just the right amount on the walls. The end result makes the room look warmer and the colour gets me in the mood for Christmas, and cuddling up watching Christmas films on the couch with hot chocolate and cakes.

however I have also been baking and about 7 weeks ago now I started the first of my Christmas baking by soaking all the fruit for my Christmas cake and last week it was time to bake the cake. Both the boozy fruit and the cake recipe was taken from the pink whisk  and as she explains if you are late starting it can still work with just soaking the fruit for a week. Any way here is my completed cake.

 Just have to feed it with brandy regularly before decorating ready for Christmas.

I also mentioned in my last blog how there had been quite a few birthdays recently and the latest ones where my boyfriend's and my friend Mandie, they fall just a day apart and we went for tepenyaki and then on to a tiki themed bar with cocktails served  in treasure chests  and pineapples. any way the day before we went out everyone was coming round to my house to give the birthday girl and boy their presents and I decided way to late to make 2 little cakes, one each. So they really were a rush job but hey they still tasted like cake and hey that's all that counts. Any way Mandie thankfully took a few photos on her phone as I didn't think to so here they are, not the best photos or decorating but here you go:

Any way Amanda's cake was a small cupcake shaped cake decorated with leftover Icing from my bazinga cake in the last blog. And Neil's cake was a heart shaped chocolate cake iced to look like a box of chocolates and topped with chocolates, this cake is a shoddy thrown together copy of a cake I saw on Bakerella.com a while back.

Anyway onto this weeks baking, After soaking my fruit for my Christmas cake I was left with little bits of this and little bits of that, but not enough of one thing to make anything so I decided to combine all the leftovers with a little spice to make a easy traybake that uses all my leftovers but still tastes good. I first followed a basic recipe for Blondie's and amended it to fit my flavours. The result I was a soft yummy cake that could easily be sliced into bars. It had warming flavours perfect for the winter and ensured my leftovers didn't go to waste. The Blondie's themselves turned out a little more cakey than I had expected, soft and light rather than gooey but that was fine. Also even though I used all my leftovers this recipe definitely could have fitted more fruit in if you wanted to pack your blondie's. Any way here they are:

And here's how they're made:

125g Butter
220g Light brown sugar
2 Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
125g Flour
(Little bit of milk if needed)
1tsp Treacle
2 tsps Golden Syrup
About 10 Cherries  (As I said before with the fruit use as much as you want or have left)
25g Dried Cranberries
25g Flaked almonds, broken up.
50g Dried Mixed fruit (Raisins, sultanas, mixed peel)
2 Tbs Brandy (Optional) 
1 Tsp Mixed Spice
A good grating (1/4 tsp) of fresh nutmeg


First of all I soaked the dried mixed fruit in the brandy (this I think made the fruit sink lower in the cake so can be left out or added separately)
Cream the butter and sugar together until light and creamy, beat in the eggs one at a time. Add the vanilla extract and fold in the flour, mixed spice and nutmeg, If the mixture is a little dry/ thick add a touch of milk if needed.
Stir in the treacle, syrup and all your left over fruit and nuts, including the brandy if your using that. To stop any dry fruit from sinking to the bottom, try tossing it in a little flour first.
Pour the prepared mixture into a brownie tin and bake at 180 degC until the Blondie's are baked through. As usual I forgot to time this but it was between 15- 20 minutes.

And that's it, these definitely got me ready for the build up to Christmas.

I've entered this to the The Pink Whisk November Challenge

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris xxx

Linked up to  Sweets for Saturday

A Big Bang Birthday Bash!

I feel I have abandoned my poor blog of late, however that doesn't mean I haven't been baking, in fact I have had to bake a lot recently as there have been some birthdays the past few weeks. I have been baking plenty of tried and tested recipes and also decorating birthday cakes which is something I don't do very often and still need a lot of practice at. I have also been soaking fruit for a few weeks now and will be baking my Christmas cake this weekend. I Love Christmas cake with a capital L so making one then having to wait so long before eating is torture for me, only with a tasty reward at the end.

Any way onto the Birthday's in question recently it has been 2 of my best friends Birthdays (Jen and Mandie's) as well as the boyfriends birthday so there have been much celebrations, drinking, present giving, trifle (courtesy of my fabulous friend Alex, who makes yummy trifle) and of course, cake!

Today I'm blogging to tell you about Jens Birthday (well what I can remember of it) and the cake. The Birthday itself involved, pre meal cocktails, a meal at a restaurant called Damons which serve the tastiest ribs that just fall of the bone, during meal cocktails and then many, many post meal cocktails and tasty dessert back at Jens house followed by yet more cocktails (can you see where this is going?) 

Any way I had planned this cake for a few weeks before and already got approval from her fiancee that she would love it. So (last minute as usual) I bought the alphabet cutters I needed and set to work. 

You see one of Jens favourite television shows is The Big Bang Theory and her favourite character in said show is Sheldon, so I decided to incorporate a slogan of his onto the cake. I copied the design form a t-shirt her Fiancee had with it on. Any way if you aren't a fan of the show you probably wont really get the cake but that's what made it so great as I knew Jen in particular would love it. any way here it is: 

I haven't iced a big cake for around 8 years or so and was a very disappointed with parts of this and learned a lot along the way, I definitely need more practice but none of that mattered as long as the Birthday girl was happy, which she was and she loved her cakey surprise! 

The cake itself was plain vanilla with a strawberry buttercream filling. 

any way that's it for today next week I'll make sure to post all about the other Birthdays and the progression of my Christmas cake. 

Until then 

Bazinga! 

Cupcake Kris xxx

Oreo cupcakes with fresh cream frosting

I went Go Karting with my friends last week and was far too busy making all of them eat my dust to blog. I was surprised as anyone that I actually did really well and won especially considering I'm the non-driver of the group.

So any way this blog is a little delayed as I made these cupcakes a few weeks back when I was popping round to visit a friend. Have I mentioned how cupcakes are demanded by my friends at every gathering even just going to someones house. I was requested to make the raspberry and white chocolate cupcakes for go karting, and this time I topped each one with a raspberry as well as a square of white chocolate. Well for this gathering at my fabulous friends Jen and Chris's house I made a cupcake that has been on my to do list for months, Oreo cupcakes. And here they are:

If your wondering why the two in the middle don't have Oreo's on well that's because they were made for two of my friends each with a special message written on top one says screw work and the other says don't crash as one friend had just passed her driving test (I have an odd sense of humor) I do love my new letter sprinkles.

and here's how they're made, recipe adapted from one by 'Baking Made Easy' author Lorraine Pascale.

Oreo cupcakes

150g Butter
150g Caster sugar
3 Eggs
150g Plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
3/4 to 1 Pack of Oreo biscuits

Preheat the oven to 180 degC. Line a 12 hole cupcake tray with cases. Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Then add the eggs one by one, beating together after each addition.

Add the flour baking powder and salt and mix. Crush up the Oreos and fold these into the mixture.

Divide between 12 cases and bake in the oven for 20 - 25 minutes until risen, golden and baked trough.

And that's it for the cakes. I really love this recipe, the cakes are light and you get a really nice taste of the cookies coming though and I love way they look all speckled with crushed up cookie. Most of the recipes I found for Oreo cookies just involved a plain chocolate cupcake with a whole Oreo baked inside so this one seemed a little different. Here they are out of the oven without frosting:

And now for the frosting, the Lorraine Pascale recipe called for butter cream however I wanted more of a cookies and cream taste so I went for fresh cream frosting, recipe adapted via Bakergirl's Blog

1 3/4 cups whipping cream
4 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
6 tablespoons Oreo cookies, finely crushed

Whip all the ingredients together until the cream stiffens, pipe onto cakes and then decorate with Oreos. These are definitely my new favorite I could just eat the cream alone and really do prefer that to the Butter icing on these cakes.

And that's it!

Any way that's all for now but before I go just one more think, I said before how I love me some alphabet sprinkles, now I know they are just meant to be sprinkled over cakes but I just cant help spelling things out on my cupcakes, like so:

Any way until next time

Cupcake Kris xx

Coconut Jam Sandwich Bars

Hello, I've totally had the holiday blues last week and have been cheering myself up with lots of baking and all the lovely blogs I read as well as going out with friends and generally keeping busy.

A couple of weeks ago I went to the Hope Street Feast festival where I stocked up on yummy food and enjoyed some delish Thai red curry from my new favorite restaurant in Liverpool Host . I also got the funniest picture of the boyfriend and my friend Jen tucking into some chocolate fountain dipped treats. (although I'd be in trouble if I posted it here)

There were loads of cake stand there but as I had a myriad of cakes at home I mostly stuck to buying savory treats such as champagne and strawberry cheese, homemade calzone's and sourdough bread, although I did indulge and bought some home made fudge.

Speaking of fudge I was kindly emailed a recipe by a friend that comes all the way from his family in Australia, I cant wait to try these tried and trusted recipes  but I've been sworn to keep them a secret hehehe.

Any way onto recent baking. The other week I was going out to visit a friend leaving boyfriend by himself to enjoy a bit of peace and quiet for once. I decided to make him some tasty snacks for his night in and it also gave me the opportunity to try a recipe I had been looking at for a while. Coconut jam sandwiches. When I first saw the recipe it struck me as something that boyfriend would choose however they never really appealed to me, so this provided the perfect opportunity to make them. the first layer is sort of like a biscuit then this is topped with a layer of jam and then finished of with a coconut mixture for a lovely taste and texture on top. Here they are: 

I made quite a few of these so even though boyfriend scoffed loads of them I still got to try a couple, and I have to say I enjoyed them much more than expected, perfect for after lunch with a cup of tea.

I used way more jam than the recipe called for as I wanted a proper layer of jam and not just a little scraping. I also upped all the other ingredients just a little as my pan was slightly bigger than advised.

any way here's how they're made:

Coconut Jam Sandwich Bars (Via Hummingbird Bakery, Cake Days)

For the base:
30g Unsalted Butter
175g Plain Flour
1/2 Tsp Baking Powder
50g Caster Sugar
2 Large Egg Yolks

For the topping:

175g Desiccated Coconut
175g Caster Sugar
4 Egg Whites
50g Plain Flour
150g Strawberry Jam (I used around 300g)

(9 x 12 inch Baking tray)

Preheat oven to 170deg C and line a tray with greaseproof paper.
Mix together the butter, flour and baking powder until you have a crumb like consistency. Add the sugar and stir in. Tip the egg yolks into a jug and stir with 2 Tbsp of water, pour into the dry ingredients and mix well.
Press the mixture into the tin and bake for 12-15 mins or until a light golden colour. Leave to cool completely (leave the oven on)  

In a saucepan mix together the coconut, sugar and one egg white with 2 Tbsps of water. Stir over a low heat until the sugar has dissolved and the ingredients form a thick paste. Add the flour and cook for a further 1 minute whilst stirring. Tip into a bowl and set aside to cool slightly.

Whip the remaining 3 egg whites until stiff stir one third into the coconut mix then fold in the remaining egg whites with  a metal spoon.

Spread the jam over the base then top with the coconut mix and bake for 25-30 minutes until golden brown.

And that's it.

And that's it for today, I'm looking forward to my next blog as it involves cupcakes I've been meaning to make for ages, and their my new favorite.

Bye for now

Cupcake Kris xxx

White Chocolate and Raspberry Cupcakes

So I feel like I've pretty much abandoned the blogging world for the last few weeks but I have been of having a fab time in Spain with the boyfriend and some friends. And then this past week I've been busy recovering from said holiday.

However the last few days I've definite got my baking bug back, baking something new for 4 days in a row from a disaster with my first attempt at fudge from new cupcake flavours.

I had a whole load of Raspberry's in the garden that needed picking and It does seem that every summer I am looking for different recipes to use them up. I know raspberry's are perfectly matched with white chocolate and as I really love white chocolate I went searching for a white chocolate and raspberry cupcake recipe and found a perfect one over at mias bakehouse It really did have the perfect mix of tart raspberry and creamy white chocolate and the frosting is just divine. On making my batch I upped the chocolate content because well I'm just plain greedy and I also added a few more raspberry's as I needed to use all I had left so just tipped them all in.    

any way here they are :

My friends mum who always likes to try my cupcakes have declared these as her new favorite, surpassing her previous favorite, the chocolate orange cupcakes.

any way here's how they're made:

White Chocolate and Raspberry Cupcakes   (Adapted from Mia's Bakehouse)


125g Butter, softened
125g Caster sugar
125g Plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
2 large eggs
1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
3 tbsps milk
80g raspberries (I probably used around 90- 100)
70g white chocolate (melted)

Pre heat oven to 180degC
Beat together the butter and caster sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
Gradually stir in the flour, baking powder, milk and vanilla until ingredients are just incorporated.
Add the raspberry's and melted chocolate and gently stir into the mixture.
divide the mixture between 12 cupcake liners and bake in the preheated oven for around 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
Leave to cool completely whilst you make the frosting.

White Chocolate frosting

100g Butter, softened
200g Icing Sugar (adding a little more if the frosting is to soft)
70g White Chocolate (melted)
1-2 tablespoons milk

Melt the chocolate in a bowl over a pan of water and leave to cool.
Beat together the butter and sugar until combined then beat in the cooled chocolate and milk making sure you don't over beat the mixture, and adding a little more icing sugar if the frosting is to soft. Chill in the fridge and the top the cakes and finish with a fresh raspberry or a drizzle of raspberry syrup.

And that's it, these cakes are really good and have fast become one of my favorite flavour combinations, The white chocolate makes them really sweet but that's fine with me, Clyro the dog was sulking he didn't get one though, see:

 Not for puppies, all for me! hehehe.

Any way that's It for today apart from a plea to send me a link to your favorite fudge recipe, I've unsuccessfully tried to make fudge this week and it is something I'm hoping to get right so I need good tried and tested recipes and tips. 

Keep Baking


Cupcake Kris xxx
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Chocolate and Peanut Butter Brownies and Amaretto Cupcakes

As I said in my last blog I have recently been seeing lots of fantastic recipes on every one's blog recently and this next recipe is no exception. I saw this recipe on one of my favorite blogs Chocolate Teapot. So many great recipes on this blog definitely check it out.

This recipe for Chocolate Peanut butter Brownies is such a simple one so easy to make and it was a perfect treat to cook for the boyfriend (who loves peanut butter)after work on a Friday night. And he must have liked them as the whole tray didn't last more than 24 hours (Ok I did sneak a few myself). I will definitely be making these again and again, any way here are mine:

They were so moist and the perfect mix of Peanut Butter. I had a little problem with my peanut butter as it was a brand I had never used before and it really didn't want to melt but I managed to get round that little problem.

Any way here's how they're made:

225g Crunchy Peanut Butter
200g Plain Chocolate broken into pieces
280g Soft light brown sugar
3 Medium eggs
100g Self raising flour

Set aside 50g of both the peanut butter and the chocolate. Heat the oven to 180 degC and grease and line a brownie tin. I didn't have any lining left so just greased the tin and dusted with flour and that worked fine.

Gently melt the remaining peanut butter, chocolate and all the sugar in a pan, stirring until the sugar has just about melted.  This is where I encountered my first problem with the whole lot just clumping, I don't know why it happened but adding a splash of milk and stirring, fixed the problem and loosened up the mix.

Turn off the heat and use a wooden spoon to beat in the eggs one by one. Stir in the flour and scrape into the tin.

Melt the reserved peanut butter in a microwave for 45 seconds or in a pan, until runny then drizzle over the Brownie (I don't have a microwave and again my peanut butter wouldn't melt in the pan so i simply spread / dolloped mine over which still worked perfectly)

Bake until the brownie has a crust but the middle still seems slightly uncooked, Chele recommended 30-35 minutes but I had a shallower wider brownie pan so I went for around 25 Mins. And they were the perfect mix of crust and gooeyness. 

Melt the reserved chocolate and drizzle over the brownie then chill before cutting into squares. I on the other hand couldn't wait, they smelled so good so i cut one out before the chocolate had even hardened.

And that was the brownies, such a quick treat to make but they also disappear just as quickly.

Also recently I have revisited one of my past recipes but this time I feel they worked a lot better, these were Amaretto cupcakes for a friends mums birthday and this time I topped them with an amaretti  biscuit. She also ordered 6 chocolate orange as these are her favourites. any way here they are:

Any way the recipe was tweaked slightly and I felt it wasn't as dry as last time

Chocolate Amaretto Cupcakes
Makes 12.
100g Plain flour
20g Cocoa Powder
140g Caster Sugar
1 1/2 Tsp Baking Powder
40g Unsalted Butter
1Egg
20 ml Milk
approx 100ml Amaretto  -Until you have a nice consistency and strong but not to overpowering taste.
Few drops of Vanilla extract
Few drops of Almond extract


Preheat the oven to 170 deg . Mix all the dry ingredients together and rub in the butter until you have a sandy consistency.
Whisk the Eggs, Vanilla and almond together in a jug and pour about into the dry mix and beat to combine.Then add the milk and Amaretto gradually until the mixture is smooth, free of lumps and off a good consistency.
Spoon the mixture into paper cases two thirds full and bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes until the cake springs back when lightly pressed.

For the Amaretto butter cream.
250g Icing Sugar
80g Unsalted Butter
2-3 Tbs Milk
3-4 Tbs Amaretto

Blitz all ingredients together until you get the right consistency  - add more Icing sugar, and Amaretto as needed.

They definitely looked a lot better than last time as I didn't mess the icing up.

Before I go for today I just want to show you one last thing. A birthday present I got a little late but was hand made by my sister so made up for it here it is:

It's all cross stitched and she even painted the frame herself! how cute huh!

Any way that's all for today, no baking this weekend as I'm off to finish packing as I'm off to Spain on Saturday morning with the boyfriend and some of my lovely friends to try all the cocktails and food they have to offer.

so bye for now and keep baking xxx