Fudgy, Caramelly Cupcakes

When you're with a man who appreciates your baking, his birthday is the perfect excuse to go a bit crazy with calories.
He dropped some not-so-subtle hints about liking caramel, so I ran with the idea and ended up with a fluffy caramel sponge, coated in a lightly salted caramel buttercream and topped it all off with a homemade fudge drizzle and crushed Daim bar. There's nothing like using a little artistic licence, is there?
My cake loving other half is an unashamed patriot, so I decided to place these cakes in both blue gingham cases and some which adorned Union Jacks. This is just a personal touch and you can, of course, dress these gorgeous little cakes as you wish.
After I made them I did have to taste them, just to ensure that they weren't poisonous...I'm a samaritan like that. They certainly weren't, the end result was a taste not too dissimilar to sticky toffee pudding, so if that's a favourite of yours, then this recipe should take a prominent position on your shelf.




                                                                                                    










(Recipe makes 16-20 cupcakes)

Method

For the caramel sauce:

250g golden caster sugar (if you don't have this, you can use normal caster sugar and just add a little light muscovado sugar to the mixture.)
135ml water

• Put the sugar into a heavy bottomed pan and mix with five tablespoons of your water over a low heat, until the sugar has dissolved. 
• Increase the heat for around 10 minutes, until your sugar has turned dark amber in colour. 
• Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool slightly. You can stir the mixture occasionally to help it cool quicker. 
• Once the mixture has cooled slightly, add your remaining water. Take care as the mixture may spit and will be extremely hot. 
• When your sauce has completely cooled, pour into a bowl and cover, until ready to use. You can store this mixture for up to a week if necessary. 

For the sponge:

100g salted butter

120g light, soft brown sugar

120g dark, soft brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

125g self-raising flour, sifted

120g plain flour, sifted

75ml caramel sauce (recipe listed above)

50ml double cream

• Preheat your oven to 160ºC (Gas Mark 3) and place your chosen cupcake cases into muffin trays. 
• Beat all of your ingredients together until all elements are well combined and the mixture is fluffy. 
• Spoon the mixture into your prepared cupcake cases (attempt only fill them half fill so the baked mixture does not spill over the edge of your cases.) 
• Bake in the oven for around 25 minutes, or until your mixture is cooked through. 
• Remove and leave to cool completely before decorating.

For the buttercream:

80g salted butter

7 tbsp semi skimmed milk

250g light, soft brown sugar

260g icing sugar, sifted

1 tsp vanilla extract

A pinch of rock salt

• Melt your butter in a heavy saucepan, along with the brown sugar. Bring the mixture to the boil and boil for one minute. 
• Remove from the heat and stir in half of your icing sugar, before allowing it to cool slightly and adding the remaining icing sugar, rock salt and vanilla extract. Stir until the mixture thickens a little. 
• This icing is best used immediately.

For decoration: 

Fudge sauce:

340g granulated sugar

85g brown sugar

100g cocoa powder

30g plain flour

1/2 tsp salt

400g evaporated milk

250ml water

2 tbsp salted butter

2 tsp vanilla extract

•  Place the granulated and brown sugar, cocoa powder, flour and salt into a saucepan. Add the evaporated milk, water and butter and bring slowly to the boil, stirring constantly. Once boiling, cook for five minutes.
• Remove the sauce from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Stir in the vanilla extract.

Otherwise, simply crush your Daim bars and decorate as you wish. 

I hope these little cakes bring you as much happiness as they did one certain 24 year old man recently. I have every faith that they will.

Enjoy, K x

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Galaxy 'Minstrel' Cupcakes

My very best friend was coming home from uni today for her reading week and, being the dutiful friend that I am, I decided to make her some cupcakes using her favourite chocolate - Galaxy!
     Emily is a fellow university student, so naturally the combination of these cakes being both free AND her favourite chocolate meant they brought her untold amounts of happiness!
     I decided to use a simple chocolate sponge, then infuse the buttercream frosting with a gluttonous amount of Galaxy chocolate...
     To decorate, I used some Kitchen Craft - Sweetly Does It cupcake cases and I then simply decorated each cake with one 'Minstrel' and some of my compulsory edible glitter. For girls and boys alike, glitter is a wonderful thing, so don't be afraid to glitz up your cakey creations!


Now, for the recipe :)

(For the Sponge - Makes 18)


200g plain flour
40g cocoa powder
280g caster sugar
3 tsp baking powder
80g butter
240ml semi skimmed milk
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract



(For the Frosting)

250g butter 
150g icing sugar
250g Galaxy
2 tbsp vanilla essence

• Simply preheat your oven to 170ºC (Gas Mark 3) and bake your cakes for 20-25 minutes.
• Once your cakes are cool, begin melting your chocolate in a bain-marie before adding it to the rest of your buttercream ingredients. 
• Frost, decorate and eat!

Ensure you devour these with a bigger cup of tea than you would usually opt for - I insist you treat yourself to some quality time alone with these sinfully chocolatey cakes!

Enjoy, K x

Macmillan Coffee Morning

On Friday 28th of September I held a Macmillan Coffee Morning at my house, in memory of my Granddad, who I lost to cancer in September 2011. 

I spent the whole of Thursday covered in cake mix (including a slither of cream cheese frosting on the end of my nose that I only got pointed out to me at the very end of the day.) Alas, six hours of baking, one ring cake, a batch of sugar cookies, dozens of marshmallow twizzlers and two tiers of Terry's Chocolate Orange and marshmallow cupcakes later, I was prepared for a cake-filled Friday morning. 

The overall showstopper of the morning was the blueberry ring cake, with everyone having more than one helping. It is a recipe based on one from the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook, however I tend to use a lot more blueberries than suggested, both in the sponge and for decoration. This is because I think they enhance everything and, due to their antioxidant properties, they also make a huge slice of cake seem a little healthier. However, If you don't want to use as many, you don't have to.

Here's the recipe:

(For the Sponge)

350g butter

350g caster sugar

6 eggs

1 tbsp vanilla extract

450g plain flour

2 tbsp + 2 tsp baking powder

280ml soured cream

250g fresh blueberries

(25cm ring mould, greased.)

(For the Frosting)

600g icing sugar

100g butter

250g cream cheese (Such as 

Philadelphia)

Around 250-300g of blueberries, to 

decorate.

• Heat your oven to 170ºC (Gas Mark 3) and ensure you have a well greased ring mould (works beautifully for this cake). 
• Beat all your sponge ingredients together, until light and fluffy.
• Bake for 40 minutes. Skewer your cake at it’s deepest point, if the skewer comes out clean (with no cake mixture on it) then leave to cool. If not, place back into the oven for five minute intervals, until cooked through.
• Remove from the oven and leave to cool completely, before removing from the mould.
• Once totally cool, beat all frosting ingredients together and use a palette knife or spatula to ensure that your cake is completely iced.
• Once frosted, spread the blueberries evenly over the top of the cake to decorate.

Enjoy, K x

P.S - The morning was a great success and it was lovely to see so many familiar faces, all from different walks of life, come together to support my chosen charity. Despite the current economic climate, between only twenty people we managed to raise a truly overwhelming £144.28, over the course of two hours. 

It was a truly heartwarming morning and one my Granddad would certainly loved to have been a part of - he was a fellow cake lover after all.

Cupcake Based on "The Purple One" (Quality Street)

This recipe is relatively complicated, simply because for such a tiny cake, there's a lot of aspects that go in to getting it  perfectly caramelly/chocolatey and to the Quality Street ideal!   If you are creating this cupcake for a nut allergy sufferer, leave off the hazelnut on the top, as there is no other nut products involved in the making!
     I decided to simply encase my cakes in purple foil cases to give the look of "The Purple One" from the beloved Quality Street tin! I then garnished with a drizzle of caramel and one hazelnut, as is found in the centre of the chocolate.

Recipe - Makes 24:

(For The Chocolate Sponge) 

100g plain flour

20g cocoa powder

140g caster sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

40g butter

120ml semi skimmed milk

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

• Preheat oven to 170ºC (Gas Mark 3) and cook for 20-25 minutes. Remove and leave to cool.

(For The Caramel Sauce)

For this you will need a large, heavy bottomed pan.

200g light brown sugar

200g butter

180ml thick cream

• Melt the sugar and butter together in a pan until they are both dissolved. Stir regularly to avoid burning. 
• Once they are both melted take off the heat and stir in your cream until you have a gorgeous, thick caramel cream. 
• Set aside as this will be used for both your frosting and a final caramel drizzle.

(For The Caramel Frosting)

225g butter

125g icing sugar

2 tbsp vanilla essence

225ml preprepared caramel sauce

• Whisk these all together, you may need slightly more icing sugar depending on the density of the cream you used, so just add until your consistency is correct :)
• Once you have done this, use your remaining caramel sauce to drizzle over each cake before placing a hazelnut on the top. 

They're gorgeous,

Enjoy, K x

Champagne Sponge with White Chocolate Buttercream

These little cakes are gorgeous and so decadent! I made them for my best friends mum's 50th birthday party and they went down a treat.
     I decided to use gold foil cases and gold glittery stars to decorate simply because it was a celebratory event and gold is, of course, the colour associated with half a century of anything! And needless to say, anything that in encased in gold is guaranteed to be good :)
     Feel free to substitute the champagne for any other alcohol of your choice, the quantity will work for you, whatever your poison!

My Recipe (Makes 20)

(For The Sponge)

120g plain flour
140g caster sugar
40g butter
20ml semi skimmed milk
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
100ml Champagne
1 free range egg

(For The Frosting)

225g butter 
125g icing sugar
225g white chocolate
2 tbsp vanilla essence

• Cook your sponge in a 170ºC (Gas Mark 3), pre-heated oven for 18-20 minutes, then remove and leave to cool. 
• For the buttercream, melt the white chocolate in a bain-marie and then simply add the melted liquid to your frosting mix (it doesn't matter if this is still warm!)

Decorate as you wish,

Enjoy, K x