Sticky Ginger Tray Bake

There is something about Autumn that makes me want to use lots of spices in my baking. This cross between a flapjack and a ginger cake, originally from food magazine, is the perfect recipe with lots of ginger and cinnamon for the change of season. I was desperate to get back to baking after my long travels and this was a great recipe to start with as they are so simple. These cakes get more sticky over time (nom!) so you need to separate the squares with grease proof paper to prevent them from sticking together. 

To make them you will need:

150ml milk
40g black treacle
80g butter
55g plain flour 
1 tbsp of ginger (I really love ginger)
3 tsp of cinnamon
1/2 tsp of bicarbonate of soda
150g granulated sugar
100g porridge oats 

You will also need a 18cm x 28cm tray lined with baking paper. You can use a larger one if you don't have this size (I had to do this) though I think they ginger squares would be better a bit thicker. 

Preheat the oven to 150°c. The actual recipe is super simple, begin by melting the butter with the milk and treacle over a low heat in a saucepan:

Then in a mixing bowl place all the other ingredients. Give the butter mixture time to cool a little and then mix it with the dry ingredients in the bowl. Once all the ingredients are mixed together then spread the mixture evenly in your lined tin and bake for 45 minutes. 

After removing the tray from the oven allow the cake to cool a little before cutting into squares. If you can possibly resist then leave just a few for the following day as they gets stickier and super delicious. 

Happy baking xxx

ps. for the love baking now has its own twitter account (exciting!) give it a follow for make cakey updates.

Cardamon and Vanilla Crème Brûlée

Whilst these are not technically a cake or cookie they were so delicious I wanted to share. I made them for my mum's birthday meal and they were another gem from my fave the sainsbury's magazine. The contrast between the crispy caramlised sugar on top with the creamy delicious custard below is amazing. 

To make these you will need:

600ml of double cream

1 vanilla pod

30 cardamon pods

50g sugar (plus extra for the topping)

6 medium egg yolks 

6x150ml ramekins

1 roasting tin 

Begin by preheating the oven to 140°c or gas mark 1. De-seed the vanilla pod and remove the husks from the cardamon pods so only the black seeds remain. Put the cream, vanilla seeds, vanilla pod and cardamon seeds in a pan. Bring the mixture to the boil and then let simmer for five minutes. 

While the cream is simmering whisk the egg yolks and the sugar together for about two minutes until the mixture becomes lighter in colour and texture.

Pour the hot cream mixture on top of the egg and sugar mixture whisking continuously. Then strain the combined mixture through a sieve into a jug. Place the ramekins in the roasting tin and then fill them with the custard mixture. Pour boiling water into roasting tin so that it comes about halfway up the side of the ramkins (very similar to how you would cook a vanilla cheesecake). Very carefully transfer the roasting tin to the oven and bake for 35 minutes until the custards are just set.  Remove the ramekins from the water and allow them to cool for at least two hours or over night. Just before serving sprinkle one teaspoon of sugar over the surface of each custard and caramelise either using a blowtorch or under the grill. 

Happy Baking xxx

Fondant flowers

These beautiful flowers are so easy to make and they can make quite a plain cake look lovely. I made them to decorate my mum's birthday cake, she doesn't really like icing, so any decoration had to be easily removable. 

I make my own homemade fondant icing but it can easily be bought online. If you are using your own fondant then begin by colouring it using gel colouring and knead a little tylo powder into the fondant so that it hardens up. After you have prepared the fondant then roll it out so that it is a  few millimeters thick. For each flower you need three different sized petals and four of each size. I used a petal cutter to achieve this but you could easily freestyle or use a cardboard template. 

Next use the round tipped modelling tool to thin out the edge of the petals to make them look more realistic. 

Whilst the petals are still soft begin layering them up. I normally start by making a cross shape for the bottom layer made of the largest petals. Then just add petals where the gaps are until you are happy with your flower. Use edible glue made from tylo powder and water to stick the petals together. If your petals are not keeping their shape then use small balls of kitchen towel to prop them up until they are dry. 

Add a few edible pearls to the center of the flower and then leave them to dry. I found a really good place to leave them is in the holes of a cupcake tray as they then keep a really nice round shape. 

As always, I would love to know what cake you decorated with your flowers and how you got along with making them. I can recommend them with a lemon loaf:

Happy Baking xxx

Lemon Loaf Cake

I made this delicious cake for my mum's birthday. She is not a massive sweet fan so I couldn't make a traditional birthday cake with lots of icing like I did for my sister. Lemon cake is one of the few cakes my mum likes and this Raymond Blanc one is fancier than your average lemon loaf (it has double cream and rum in the ingredients!!).

You will need:

5 eggs
300g sugar (caster preferably)
140ml double cream
4 lemons
2 tbsp dark rum
80g butter
240g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
150g icing sugar
3 tbsp apricot jam

You will also need a 26cm x 9cm x 8cm loaf tin lined with grease proof paper. 

Begin by mixing the eggs, sugar, cream, zest of 3 lemons, rum, butter, flour and baking powder together. The mixture should look like this:

Pour the mixture into the lined loaf tin and bake for 55 minutes or until a skewer can be inserted into the center of the cake and come out clean. Turn the cake onto a wire rack to let it cool for 10 minutes before glazing. While the cake is cooling warm the apricot jam up in the microwave. Also mix the juice and zest of a lemon and the icing sugar together in a pan over a low heat. Gently brush the warmed jam over the cake and then brush the lemon/icing mixture over the top. Place the cake on a baking tray and return it to the oven to set the glaze. This should take about 5 minutes and the glaze should become clear. 

As my mum is not a big icing fan I decorated this cake with fondant flowers which could easily be removed. 

Happy Baking xxx

Painted Roses on Fondant

Over the last few posts I have been showing you how I made the chocolate sponge and covered it with fondant icing for my little sister's birthday cake. I saw this really simple little trick of how to paint roses on fondant icing on pinterest ages ago and could not wait to give it a try. I went for a more Cath Kidston look for my cake (its more my sister's style) but check out the cake blog to see a sharper version.

To start with you will need a cake that has been covered with fondant, pink and green gel food colouring, elastic bands, kitchen towel and a bunch of celery that is still attached at the base (I know it sounds strange - bear with me). 

Begin by wrapping elastic bands around your bunch a celery and then using a sharp knife cut the bottom of the bunch off so that it looks like this:

Water your food colouring down as much as your like. The more watery it is the more vintagey your roses will turn out, if you go for a thicker food colouring the roses will come out sharper. Using your celery as a stamp, dip the end into the food colouring ensuring that all the stamp is covered in colouring. Then just briefly touch the stamp on some kitchen towel to remove some of the excess before stamping the cake. Rock the celery back and forth a bit to ensure that the whole pattern is transferred. 

Interlink two celery stalks and keep them together using an elastic band to make the leaf stamp and then stamp as above using green food colouring. You can then use a single celery stalk to add any extra petals or leaves.

Allow the food colouring to dry, before sticking your candles on and serving the cake up:

Happy baking xxx

Covering a Cake With Fondant Icing

So in my chocolate birthday cake post I promised I would show you how to cover a cake with fondant. I make my own fondant using marshmallows but you can buy roll out fondant really easily online if you would prefer. Remember when you are working with fondant that you need to keep it double wrapped in clingfilm when you are not using it or it goes all horrible and crusty.

To cover a cake in fondant you first need to cover it in two layers of butter cream. I literally just use a icing sugar and butter mixture for this as it is only being used to prepare the surface of the cake for the fondant. The first layer of butter cream is used to create a smooth surface and should be left to crust and dry before the second layer is applied. The second layer is to make the surface of the cake slightly tacky so the fondant sticks to the cake.

Next you need to measure the sides and top of the cake and add these amounts together to work out how large a piece of fondant icing you need to roll out. Knead your fondant icing until its a workable consistency. If its a bit sticky then knead a bit of icing powder into it. Roll out the fondant so its a few millimeters thick. Measure the fondant to ensure its the right kind of size in all directions. If the fondant is a lot bigger than required then trim it down to nearer the right size as this will make it easier to transfer to the cake. When it is evenly rolled out then fold you fondant over the rolling pin and transfer to the cake. 

Start smoothing the fondant down using a fondant smoother. Do not pull the fondant down on the sides as this will cause it to break, instead lift and tuck the fondant until it the surface is smooth. Once you are happy with the fondant then trim round the base and pop any air bubbles that have formed using a pin. 

Hopefully your cake should look like the one above. Covering a cake with fondant is definitely a skill that you perfect over time so don't have really high expectations for your first go. If you are covering a cake for an important occasion then maybe have a practice run first. If you are unhappy with the fondant then do not try taking it off and having another go; trust me it always looks worse on the second attempt. I am still learning to cover cakes so any tips that you might have would be wonderful.

You now essentially have a blank slate and you can decorate it however you would like. I used a really easy trick to paint roses onto my cake that I will share with you in my next post (here is a sneaky preview though:)

Happy baking xxx

Delicious Chocolate Birthday Cake

So recently I decided to take on the challenge of making a birthday cake for my sister's 20th. We normally buy shop bought cakes for birthday's so the goal was to make a cake that would be better than a bought one in both taste and looks. I decided to take a bit of a risk and try a recipe for a cake sponge that I hadn't used before. Luckily it turned out to be a great recipe and the chocolate cake was delicious, really moist but firm enough to cover with fondant icing.

To make this cake you will need: 

350g sugar (caster)
85g cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
225g plain flour
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
2 eggs
250 ml milk
125 ml vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
250ml boiling water

You will also need two 20cm sandwich tins (or you could make just one cake and halve the ingredients)

Prepare to make your cake by lining the sandwich tins with grease proof paper and preheating the oven to 180°c or gas mark 4. The actual cake is super easy to make. Start by mixing all the ingredients, except the boiling water, together. Make sure all the ingredients are well incorporated, it should look like this: 

Then mix in the boiling water little by little. The mixture should then become quite liquid. Divide it between the two sandwich tins and bake for between 25 to 35 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. 

Turn the cakes out onto a cooling wire and wait until they are completely cool before attempting any decoration. From here there are so many decorating options (this cake is so wonderfully versatile!). I put chocolate butter cream between the layers of cake and then covered the cake with fondant icing and decorated the fondant. I will show you how to cover a cake with fondant and paint on roses in my next couple of posts. You could also cover the cake with butter cream or ganache or just fill the middle and leave the rest of the cake plain. I am always keen for new ideas so if you try this cake post some pictures of how you decorated it. 

Happy baking xxx