Cupcakes and Cava!

Hellooo sorry it’s been a while but I’ve been a bit busy destroying my liver/having a nervous breakdown about my dissertation. Last Monday was my 21^st and I had a ridiculously good time and I love all of my friends so much! Let’s just say lots of Cava was drank, lots of cake was eaten and then we danced it all off until we were forced to leave.

Now for the important bits…CAKE. My friend Olivia made a lovely orange marble cake which I stupidly didn’t take a photo of so I can’t show you. However, my beautiful lovely housemate made me this AMAZING owl cake!

If you’ve read this blog before then you’ll know that birthday cakes are a big deal to us. Although since we’re usually the ones that make it I sort of assumed I wouldn’t get one. Jenna sneakily slaved away in our friend’s kitchen however, so I got my very own cake :’) Baking wise it’s a sponge with jam in the middle and chocolate spread on top. BEST PRESENT EVER.

I made two types of cupcakes for my party (why make life easy , right?) I am back to my sad, broken camera so I apologise for the lack of shiny bright photos!

Lemon Cupcakes

I got to use my new scales for the very first time to do these which was a treat! Also, yay for my new uni oven being electric because my old gas one used to burn everythinggggg.

Ingredients

4 eggs

8 oz self-raising flour

8 oz butter

8oz caster sugar

2 tsp baking powder

Splash of milk

Zest of 2 lemons

For Icing

Cream cheese

Butter

Icing sugar

Juice of 2 lemons

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C. In a large mixing bowl add all the ingredients except for the lemon zest and combine using an electric mixer.

Grate the zest of the lemons over the batter and carefully fold it in using a spatula.

Line a 12 hole tin with cupcakes cases and plop a large spoonful in each.

Bake for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown and springy to the touch.

To make the icing cream a big blob of cream cheese with a big blob of butter. Sift in a large amount of icing sugar and add the lemon juice. The consistency should be thick enough to hold its shape but not too thick that it’s impossible to pipe. If you’re wondering how much icing you’re going to need to make, basically A LOT. Also sorry there are no photos of this stage but it all got a bit hectic as I frantically tried to get everything piped so I could have a birthday cocktail. (Strawberry Mojito in case you were wondering.)

Raspberry Cupcakes

I’d never actually made these before, or actually looked at a recipe but I thought I’d throw some raspberries into a cake mix and see what happens. What happens is the mixture goes a lovely pinkish colour and is quite tasty! As one of my housemates remarked however, they were VERY raspberry so I think next time I’d add some white chocolate too.

Ingredients

4 eggs

8oz self-raising flour

8oz butter

8oz caster sugar

2 tsp baking powder

A good handful of raspberries

For Icing

Cream cheese

Butter

Icing sugar

More raspberries

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C. In a large mixing bowl combine all the ingredients except for the raspberries using an electric whisk.

Wash the raspberries then pat them down with kitchen paper. Add them to the mixture and whizz your mixer a couple of times to break them up and distribute the fruit.

Spoon the mixture into cupcake cases and bake for 12-15 minutes or until brown and springy to the touch. Leave to cool.

To make the icing cream together some cream cheese and butter. Sift in a large amount of icing sugar. The raspberries will make the icing mixture wet so add these quite early on so that you can compensate with the right amount of icing sugar. When the mixture is the right consistency pipe a massive swirl on every cupcake! One thing I forgot to mention in the lemon ones, after I finished piping I then very liberally sprinkled edible glitter all over them. I might be 21 now but I still love a bit of glitter.

Speaking of glitter here’s a quick snap of my presents from my family which include my amazing sparkly handbag and new cake stand. And also a picture of me in my sparkly top I wore for my party (see a theme here?) because it was a bit of a mad Topshop-overpriced-impulse buy but I laaaaave it.

My 21st Cake

This is just a quick post to say sorry I haven’t posted in a while; I’ve been really busy working at Bestival and packing for my third year at Uni! And to show you the beaut of a cake my mum and sister made for me as an early 21^st present.

They made it using a giant cupcake mould from Lakeland. It was already gorgeous on the outside but when I cut into it this happened…

Amazing! It’s basically a Piñata cake. Cutting a slice was a bit of an issue though.

Now, here’s a picture of my present. It’s really nerdy in a baking way but I reeeeeallly wanted old fashioned weighing scales. They have a guarantee of a HUNDRED years. I can’t wait to christen them in our new kitchen.

I’m moving back to Uni in 2 days so I probably won’t be able to post for a while. Also my camera broke (booo) and I won’t have my dad’s fancy one to use so sorry if the pictures from now on look a bit crap, because I’ll have to take them with my phone.

I’m having a Cupcakes and Cava party on Monday for my birthday so I’ll try and get a few snaps to post on here : )

Banana Bread

Everyone needs a good banana bread recipe. It’s so simple to make but delectable nonetheless. It’s for times when you’ve neglected your bananas for a bit and they’ve gone completely black and you think shit. Now you can look at those black beauties and think yesssssssss banana bread.

Ingredients

4 ripe bananas, mashed

250g caster sugar

125g butter

2 eggs

250g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

100g walnuts, roughly chopped

Preheat the oven to 190⁰C. Line a loaf tin with baking paper.

In a large mixing bowl first mash your bananas.

Cream the bananas with the sugar using an electric whisk.

Beat in the butter.

Add the eggs, one at a time with a little bit of flour, mixing as you go.

Pour in the remaining flour and baking powder, folding everything together with a spatula.

Stir in the walnut pieces.

Pour the mixture into the tin and bake until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. This depends a lot on how big your bananas are. Mine were pretty monstrous so it took almost an hour and a half to cook properly. 45 mins to an hour is a good estimate but everyone’s ovens, and bananas, are different so keep an eye on it. When it’s baked, remove from the tin and cool on a wire rack.

A slice of this is amazing with a spread of nutella.

Whole-Wheat Onion Bagels

I loveee fresh bagels, especially toasted and buttered, but I’d never thought about making them before. Then The Great British Bake Off, a.k.a. socially-acceptable-porn-to-bakers, demonstrates some show stopping bagels. HAPPY DAYS! Last week I had the absolute joy of a whole day alone in the house so I had a rare jubly day of baking and listening to loud country music, as you do.

Anyway, that day I made these onion bagels. I’m a tad obsessed with onions and generally think they go with everythinggg. The only reason I made them whole-wheat was because we’d ran out of strong white bread flour, so feel free to completely ignore that aspect. You’ll see from the pictures that my bagels are misshapen, oddly proven, tiny holed balls of oniony goodness but bare with me because this was the first time I’d ever made bagels, so obviously they weren’t going to look like the amazing array on GBBO! Most importantly despite their funky appearance they still tasted amazing and I will definitely be trying them again.

Ingredients

450g bread flour

7g sachet instant yeast

4 tbsp sugar

2 tsp salt

1 large onion

In a large mixing bowl tip in the yeast and 1 tbsp of the sugar then pour over 100ml of warm water. Leave for about 10 minutes until the mixture becomes frothy.

Pour 200ml of warm water into the mix. Stir in the salt and about half of the flour.

Continue to add the remaining flour a little at a time until a soft but not sticky dough is formed.

Knead for a good 10 minutes until the dough feels smooth and elastic.

Pop the dough into a lightly oiled bowl, cover with clingfilm and leave in a warm place to prove for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.

Whilst the dough is proving, prepare the onions. I had half a red onion knocking about so used that with half of a white onion, chopping it all into chunks. I like my chunks chunky but if you’re not as much of an onion nut like me you could whizz the onion in a food processor for a bit to get smaller pieces. Dry fry the onion for a few minutes until they start to turn clear- this gives the bagels a glorious savoury sweet flavour! Leave them on the side to cool.

Heat the oven to 200⁰C. Lightly flour your work surface and knead the cooked onion into your dough. Now for this next bit I’m sorry there are no photos but my dad would kill me if I got dough all over his expensive camera…

Divide the dough into 10 equal balls. To make the bagel shape roll the dough into a small ball, then flatten it with the palm of your hand. Take a wooden spoon and pop the handle through the middle of the ball. Lift the spoon into the air, dough still on the end and twirl it around like you’re going a bit mad at a Britney concert. I’m actually quite glad there’s no photo evidence of me doing this because it was all a bit of a shambles really. Quite a few times the dough flew right off my spoon across the kitchen. Don’t let this put you off however, I think it’s just one of those practise makes perfect things.

When you have 10 perfect bagels (hah) cover them with a clean tea towel and leave them to stand for half an hour.

Now it’s time to poach the bagels! Bring a large pan of water to boil with the remaining 3 tbsp of sugar. Slip the bagels into the boiling water, about 3 at a time. Poach them for 2 minutes, turning them over after 1 minute. Remove them from the water with a slotted spoon and leave the dry on a cooling rack.

Line two trays with baking parchment and plop the poached bagels on. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes or until browned and hollow sounding when tapped.

I wanted my bagels to be a bit more poofy so I think next time I try them I’ll prove them for longer maybe? Also as you can see my holes are a bit small so that my bagels kind of resemble oddly shaped bread rolls, so I need to work on that. They’re great for breakfast…if they last that long!