My Brownie Recipe

Hi everyone, thought I'd post another recipe. This time it's brownies...I made these a few weeks a go and took them into work (lucky colleagues getting all the yummies). The recipe is a bit of mix and match from all the ones I've used in the past and I find this makes them delicious! But don't overcook - brownies are supposed to be gooey!! You'll need:

250g butter (I use stork)

350g golden caster sugar

60g plain flour

1tsp baking powder

250g  dark chocolate (Tesco do an own brand good quality one that I use - 70% cocoa)

80g cocoa powder

large bar of galaxy and large bar of milkyway (cut into chunks) - this is optional by the way! Chocoholics only :D

4 large free range eggs

80g walnuts

Start by melting the butter and dark chocolate together, most recipes state using a bowl over a pan of boiling water, but I just use the microwave on a very low heat. It works just as well :) Pop the flour (sifted) and baking powder into a bowl with the sugar and add in the melted chocolate mix. Whisk the eggs and add them a bit at a time, whisking well. Once silky, add in the walnuts and chunks of chocolate.

Bake on gas mark 4 for about 25-30 mins. Use a square or rectangular tin lined with greaseproof paper. I'm not too particular with tins, if the sides are higher, bake for slightly longer. If the tin is quite large, you will have shallower brownies. That's why I like to use quite a deep one - massive brownies :D

I didn't take a picture of these though - apologies!

x

Giant Valentines Cupcake

Here's one I made for my friend Lea for Valentines Day! Very proud of this one :)

This one is made with the chocolate sponge recipe and decorated with dark pink (was supposed to be red) buttercream style icing. The little hearts are haribo and I used sugarpaste coloured with gel colouring, rolled out and chilled and then cut into different size heart shapes for a romantic look! Voilaaa.

Made a bit of effort with the stand too, used margarine to stick individual little confetti hearts! <3

Wish list!!

Feeling bitter about my lame baking equipment (I don't even have an electric whisk!) Thought I'd make a wee wishlist of all the expensive things I'd like :) :)

Pink Stand Mixer in John Lewis - stupidly expensive but amazing!!

Amazing cupcake cases!!

Proper scales

And that's about it!! Maybe when I have some extra moneys I can buy some better equipment, but for now my 20 year old wooden spoon will suffice :D

Cupcakes!

Made these yesterday before work as I was superrr bored. Took them into work afterwards and they were gone in 10 minutes! Used my standard sponge recipe and the same frosting as the giant cupcake seen below. 

They were decorated with sprinkles and little white chocolate stars! Popped them on my cupcake stand as I hadn't used it yet! Tadaaa x

Giant Cupcakes

So I got a giant cupcake mould as a present and decided to try it out by making a Valentines cupcake! I've had lots of interest in these since posting them up on Facebook. It was quite difficult to get the timing right as there is no recipe with the mould and the sponge was slightly undercooked in the centre (still nommy though). I used my typical sponge recipe, but added some good quality cocoa powder (not really, it's Tesco stuff!)..but you should use good quality! This made it chocolately! yummm.

This is the one I have:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B004DEWBOM/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_3?pf_rd_p=103612307&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B003ULZEBG&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=048BXGCRYM1QVP5HHBJE

This is the one I want next:

http://www.wilton.com/store/site/product.cfm?id=4018F320-423B-522D-F5ECDA6F3A2ABB5E

Looks a bit better!!

Anyway here is the finished result:

Valentines cupcake! Decorated using standard vanilla buttercream coloured with a VERY small amount of red food colour to make a lovely pink! I basically shoveled it on with a spoon because I'm not good with piping bags. I think this looks better though, nice and rustic! Lots of Love Hearts were used to make the trim, and I stuck some around too. A little sprinkle of sugar bits and some non edible heart confetti to decorate the plate as well. It was really simple! Hoping to make some more for people who have requested one for valentines, so pictures will follow once they have been made!

Perfect sponge recipe

This is the recipe I always use, and my mum is always asking me to make this sponge cake for her to take into work for everyone!

You'll need:

350g plain flour

350g stork

350g caster sugar

6 eggs

5 tsp baking powder

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 tbsp milk

First, cream together butter and sugar (make sure butter has been sat out for a while to make it easier if you don't have an electric whisk, which I don't!)

In a seperate bowl, whisk together the eggs.

Once the butter and sugar mixture is creamy and fluffy, add the eggs slowly, small amounts at a time. This bit takes ages because there's so much egg!!

add the vanilla extract

Sift in the flower. Do half first, fold in, then add the other half.

Add in the milk (if the mixture looks thick, add more milk)

Cook on gas mark 4 for about 30 mins

.....and it's done :D

I like to fill the sponge with raspberry jam and whipped cream!

ENJOY!

Owl Cake

I got this design idea from the UKTV food website and decided to make it for my sisters 23rd birthday! Everyone thought it looked great :)



The cake was made using my standard sponge recipe in quite large tins. I made a chocolate frosting to go between the sponges as well as to cover the cake. Once the frosting was chilled to stop everything sliding off, I started to decorate. This involved giant chocolate buttons for feathers, flake feet, mars bar nose and wings, grated chocolate face and more buttons for the eyes.

It was super yummy too!!

Waybaloo Cake

This is a cake I made for my friends Laura and Mandy and their son Izak, for his first birthday! My sister helped a lot with this one and it was the first time I'd ever tried to colour ready to roll icing (very messy!) It's not perfect, a bit lump and bumpy but Izak loved it (even though he didn't really know what it was) :D

I did the cake by making two standard round sponges with the recipe I always use (really simple) = 350g butter, 350g caster sugar, 350g flour, 6 eggs, 5tsp baking powder, 2tsp of vanilla extract, 2 tbsp of room temperature milk. Makes a really good sponge!!

We used the edges of one cake and 'stuck' them on to a complete round one to try and make an oval shape. It was all pasted together with huge amounts of chocolate spread. The ready to roll icing that was coloured blue with paste (not liquid food colouring) was placed on top and tided up. Then another oval of icing was placed over, this time coloured 'teddy bear brown'. Mouth, eyes and chocolate button pupils made up the face and two little cupcake ears completed the look!

This was my first ever attempt at anything like this so not bad I think! Mostly all of the tins, icing and colouring I used was from Kitchens (on Whiteladies Road).