The Red Velvet Cupcake

The Red Velvet has a somewhat tangy, chocolate flavour. It's absolutely yummy, and goes perfectly with vanilla cream cheese frosting!

This is definitely one of my staple cupcake recipes, because it's a favourite amongst both adults and people my age.
Source

Ingredients

60g unsalted butter, softened

150g sugar

1 egg

10g cocoa powder

20ml red food colouring

little bit of vanilla

120ml buttermilk

150g plain flour

pinch of salt

1/2 teaspoon of bicarb

1 and a half teaspoons of white wine vinegar

Method

Pre heat the oven to 170C (conventional), and line a muffin tray with 12 paper cases.

Grab the hand mixer, and beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Next, add in the egg and keep beating on low speed.

In a small bowl, combine the vanilla, cocoa, and red food colouring to form a paste, and add this into the batter.

Still beating on slow speed, add in the buttermilk and flour, alternating between the two.

Add in the salt, bicarb and vinegar, and beat on medium speed for another couple of minutes.

Now, spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases and bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes, or until a knife/skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. 

Once out the oven, leave them too cool, and get started on the frosting.

FROSTING

50g butter, softened

125g cream cheese, soft

300g icing sugar

little bit of vanilla

With the hand mixer, beat the butter and cheese together, and slowly add in the icing sugar and vanilla. 

Either pipe or spread over the cupcakes. My method of choice is to pipe.

Also, save one of the cupcakes (preferably one that's gone a little skewed whilst cooking - there's always one!!!) and grate it into crumbs. Use these crumbs to sprinkle on top of the frosted cupcakes - it just adds a lovely touch to them!

 A few I made a while back..

Duo-toned frosting! Yeyyy!!

J xx

The Oreo Cupcake

The Oreo Cupcake, probably my most-used recipe, ever. Fundamentally, it's a vanilla sponge cake with Oreos added in, plus a ridiculously yummy vanilla cream cheese frosting which marries all the flavours together and brings a smile to anyone who eats it, usually leading them to follow with an 'omg, this is heavenly!'.

Adapted from this

Ingredients
170g unsalted butter, softened
120g caster sugar
35g brown sugar
1/2tsp vanilla extract
3 eggs plus 1 egg yolk
170g flour
1teasp baking powder
pinch of salt

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C, and line a cupcake tray with 12 liners. Get 12 Oreos, and twist them apart. Place the half with the cream, cream-side up at the bottom of each liner. 

If you don't fancy lining them this way, you can always break up the whole Oreos and fold them into the batter before spooning into cases.

This is how they'll come out

Beat the butter and sugars on low speed until light and fluffy. Add in the eggs one at a time, plus the vanilla extract, still beating. Next, get rid of the hand mixer, and fold in the dry ingredients with a spatula. The batter will get a little bit stiff, and might look a tad curdled, but this is normal. Just keep folding it gently until all the ingredients are combined.
Spoon the batter into the cases. I use an ice cream scoop to create uniform size cupcakes, but whatever you have is fine. Fill them around 2/3 of the way full - keep in mind, they do rise a little bit.
Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a skewer/knife inserted into the centre comes out clean. The cupcakes will be dense, and bounce back when you poke them with your finger.
Take out the oven, and leave to cool.

FROSTING
125g cream cheese, softened
50g unsalted butter, soft
300g icing sugar
little bit of vanilla extract

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl and beat together.
Be careful, it gets messy!
Pipe or spread onto the cupcakes. For a finishing touch, I like to take half of an entire Oreo and place it on top of the frosting.
Make these for the people you know and love, and you won't be forgotten!

Of course, you can decorate it any way you like, and this recipe is open to so many variations.

Or, finely crush some Oreos into the frosting and pipe.

For those without a piping bag, just spoon the frosting onto the cupcake!

Hope you enjoy!

J x

Decadent Chocolate Cake

Hiiiiiii

To my lovely followers (one of them being my Dad), sorry that I take so much time to update this blog! I've baked literally one thing in the last two months.. Hopefully this post will make up for things.

So, it was my friend Kristina's birthday yesterday, and I know how much she likes chocolate cake - I planned a yummy surprise for her. We all went out to an Indian restaurant for dinner (ate too much, as per usual), and just as we're all too stuffed to shovel in more food, the cake comes out (along with a lovely sing song of happy birthday)!!!

Here's the story.

I'd never used this cake recipe before, and knew that everyone in my household would want a piece of it anyway. So, I made two.

The first one (made on Sunday) went really well, and was devoured within about 48 hours. It's just a really rich, yummy dark chocolate cake with the creamiest, fudgiest chocolate frosting. This is definitely the holy grail of chocolate cakes.

The recipe is really easy, and it's pretty quick to prepare - in fact, it doesn't actually require that much effort (it's not like you need to get a piping bag out for the frosting).

Ingredients (usually I quote things in ounces/grams, but the recipe used cup measurements)

From the Hershey's Kitchen - this website has the most fantastic recipes!

2 cups of sugar

1 and 3/4 cups of plain flour

1 and a half teaspoons of baking powder

1 and a half teaspoons of bicarbonate of soda

1 teaspoon of salt

3/4 cup of cocoa powder (I like Bourneville)

1 cup of milk

2 eggs

1/2 cup of vegetable oil

2 teaspoons of vanilla extract

1 cup of boiling water

Method

Preheat your oven to 180C, or 160C ish if you have a crap fan oven (like I do).

Line two 9inch cake pans with baking paper and flour the sides.

Combine all the dry ingredients in a large bowl (sugar, flour, cocoa, bicarb, baking powder, salt) and whisk together until combined.

Now, add in the milk, oil, eggs, vanilla and beat on medium speed until incorporated. With a spatula/spoon, mix in the boiling water. The consistency of the batter will be quite runny, so it'll drizzle into the cake pans with ease. Now, pop it in the oven for about 30-35 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the centre comes out clean. Time varies for all ovens.

I actually only own one cake pan, and my oven only has room (on the optimum shelf) for one. The typical individual (or student) isn't likely to own more than one anyway, so I figured a way around it. Before mixing the wet ingredients into the dry, evenly divide the dry mixture between two bowls (I weighed it all out with scales). Then, with your first bowl of dry matter, mix in half of the wet ingredients (i.e the recipe calls for 2 eggs and 1 cup of milk, so make a well in the middle and add in 1 egg and half a cup of milk, and so on).

Obviously, baking time will be overall longer because you have to wait longer for the cakes to cook individually and for them to cool.

In my oven, each half of the cake took around 40 minutes to cook, but this will obviously vary if you have a better oven. Typically, any where between 30-45 minutes will make sense.

Once they're done, remove from the oven and leave to cool, and then transfer onto some other plate/rack to cool further. 

FROSTING

1/2 cup of unsalted butter (around 115 grams)

2/3 cup cocoa powder

3cups icing sugar

1/3 cup of milk

teaspoon of vanilla

Melt the butter, and mix in the cocoa. Then, alternating icing sugar and milk, beat with a handmixer until lovely and creamy, and add in the vanilla. 

Then, assemble the cake!

Bottom half....

Oh my.

Heaven eh?

Just smoothed on the frosting with a rubber spatula - no effort required!

I made the one for Kristina on Monday afternoon, just in time for dinner in the evening!

It's been likened to 'Brucey Cake' (like the one from Matilda)...

And clearly, everyone loved it. Because this is what was left by the time we'd paid the bill.

Quite impressive!! (although there were 12 of us at the table..)..

Anyway, exams are on the way.

It's around 3am right now, and I've been up writing an essay for the last three hours. And the sad thing is, there's no more chocolate cake left in the kitchen, so I have nothing to snack on during breaks!!

I can probably think of a way to resolve this..

:D

Jen xx

Victoria Sponge

Yo (in the words of Joel Mullish)

Hope you're all having a lovely start to March - wow, time flies!!

It's almost the end of the first year of university; and apart from the entries in this blog and a few hundred photos of drunken nights out, I don't really have much to show for it. Better crack down on the reading..

Loads of stuff going on this month, very exciting.

A few weeks back I went home for the weekend to surprise my (amazing) mum for her 25th birthday (just kidding, she's really 24)... I managed to get all the way from Leeds to London without ruining the surprise, and came back via underground, hoping to walk home and surprise her. I had it all planned out in my head, and in my view, nothing could go wrong. My dad was in on the surprise, and I was chatting with him throughout the day so he could help me follow through with it all in a sneaky fashion.. But, this is where it all gets ridiculously stupid. On the train home, I texted my dad letting him know that I was at a certain stop, and that I'd be home soon. Cleverly, he left the phone on Loud, and in plain sight of my mum who was chilling in the kitchen, and she SAW THE TEXT! 

He tried to be all clever by saying 'oh yeah, it's an old text, she's definitely not coming home..', but my mum isn't that gullible.

But, she was still extremely happy to see me, and everyone seems to be really proud that I managed to make it so far without ruining the surprise earlier on. Good one me...

Anyway, I made a Victoria Sponge for my housemate Jack's birthday. And it must have been absolutely yummy because it only took around 15 hours for the entire thing to be demolished. Definitely a new record. Such an easy cake to make, and tastes amazing! The only downside - my uni oven burns EVERYTHING.. It's so unfair. I actually had to throw out a batch of cupcakes the other day because the oven just went mental and ruined everything.. And even with this cake, the outer layer was ever so slightly burnt, but you couldn't notice it too much. The problem is, none of us can figure out what setting the oven should be on.. It has like 6 different notches, and it's so unclear. My housemate Rebecca even googled the make of the oven and made a key to represent what meant what.. But it's WRONG!!! Half the settings on the key aren't even on the oven. It's like playing roulette, but with food. We just have to guess which setting is which, and pray that our dinner comes out decently cooked/not poisonous.. 

Just a standard recipe..

Very easy to follow - pretty much foolproof (as long as you have a decent oven)..

 Good jam.. I chose raspberry by accident, I planned on strawberry. But evidently I need to get my eyesight checked because I picked up the first jar I saw.

Slather on the buttercream. In this instance, less is NOT more!

I would have taken a photo of the cake once cut, but it wasn't around long enough for me the grab my camera..

Oh, and this is Jack - the belated birthday boy..

This is our standard pose.. And I think we look quite snazzy all dressed up.. Look at him in his bow tie!!

Obviously I've got a few (way more) embarrassing photos of him, but they aren't for the eyes of the internet - it's too harsh.. In time, maybe..

J x

Hummingbird Carrot Cake

It was my sister's birthday last week, and she had a little dinner-do with a few friends.. So, we spent the entire day cooking and baking. The main desert - carrot cake. I've had the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook for a while now, and there are just so many amazing recipes in here. Keep an eye out for future posts where I try all these amazing cake recipes out!

It's a really moist cake, and keeps you going back for more!! Little bit dangerous in my opinion..

Ingredients

300g light brown sugar

3 eggs

300ml sunflower oil

300g plain flour

1tsp bicarb

1tsp baking powder

1tsp ground cinnamon

1/2tsp ground ginger

1/2tsp salt

1/4tsp vanilla extract

300g carrots, grated

100g walnuts, chopped

First, preheat the oven to 170C, and line three 20cm cake pans (I only had two, so I made this a two tier cake instead. I just didn't use all the mixture, and with the excess I made a couple of extra cupcakes.. If you have three cake tins, use them!)

Beat the sugar, eggs and oil together using a hand-mixer (or free-standing, whichever you have). Add in the flour, bicarb, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, salt, vanilla and keep beating.

Stir in the carrots and walnuts using a spatula, and then pour into the baking pans.

Bake for about 20-25 mins until golden and bouncy.

Once cooled a little, turn onto a cooling rack and leave for a little longer.

Now, frosting.

Because I only had two layers, I used a little less than called for by the book..

But, it should be okay. 

I just used my standard cream-cheese frosting - this stuff is heavenly. In the past, I've actually had requests from friends for a bowl of the frosting, without the cake!! Mmmmm

50g unsalted butter, softened

125g cream cheese, soft

300g icing sugar - don't even bother sifting.. EFFORT

little splash of vanilla

Beat the ingredients together until light and creamy. And then once the cake layers are cooled, assemble the cake!

Sandwich the layers together, and then cover the entire cake with frosting.

After, get some more whole walnuts and sprinkle them on top, along with a little dusting of cinnamon - YUM

Amazing.

And also, for desert, we had a few chocolate covered strawberries. I think I've mastered the technique to letting them dry without leaving marks.

Get wooden skewers, poke each one, and dip. And then somehow balance them like this. It was all well and good until my lovely mum came into the kitchen and accidentally knocked them all over!!! Oh well, they still tasted good.

Can't stop thinking about this cake...

Cupcakes For SammyJo

Hello again!!!

Okay, I know it's been a very long time, but I've been very busy!

I finished my first university term in December, and stupidly enough left all of my baking equipment up in Yorkshire when I went back to London.. So, I couldn't really make anything too extravagant. 

And, on another note, I've officially started a no-carb diet (let's see how long this lasts). I'm going to be a Maid of Honour next year for my sister's wedding, so I need to find myself a lovely dress, preferably in a size 2.. Thus, DIET STARTS NOW

I just got back up to uni, and have given in all my assignments (thank god) - don't think I've ever written so much crap in my life. As I write this post, it's been around 45 minutes since I submitted one of my elective essays online. A 3000 word essay on the two models of criminal justice - literally the biggest amount of blabble and waffle known to man. Not in a rush to get my grade back anytime soon.

But, I'VE FINISHED. Finally, after tons of moaning and whining, a few cans of red bull, and the majority of a Dairy Milk bar double the size of my head, I'm DONE!!

I've also persuaded my housemates to help me keep on track with the diet; so whenever they see me eating carbs they're supposed to slap me. Although just before, there was a little bit of an incident. I needed a bit of energy to somehow pull 1500 words of essay out of my ass in 5 hours, so grabbed an energy drink and a bit of the chocolate from the kitchen. And, as I'm standing in the corridor of my flat, red bull in one hand and choccie in the other, I'm spotted.. 

It's nice that they care so much, because they literally charged towards me, snatched the chocolate out of my hands as I curled into a ball on the floor, and walked away. But hey, cruel to be kind I guess..

Anyway, over the weekend I made a bunch of cupcakes for my friend SammyJo's birthday (and no, I didn't eat any, just in case you were wondering)..

I made three batches, using my three favourite tried and tested recipes - red velvet, oreo, and chocolate.

Also, my sister was in the kitchen with me, attempting to help me out but in reality sabotaging my every move. Whenever I turn my back, she creeps up behind me and in an instance a third of the cake batter has magically disappeared. And don't even get me started on the cream cheese frosting. 

Albeit, she was nice company and helpful-ish.. She seemed quite happy that I allowed her to line the baking tins with the paper cases. But also, she was in charge of taking photos of the process, so obviously there were a few silly photos of the plantpots and bananas on the kitchen surface, and for some daft reason, extreme closeups of egg shells and broken oreos. 

Oh, and this.

This happens way too much. Basically all our holiday albums from Florida consist of scenic photos, and snapshots of her feet.

And here she is..

Can't help but love her.

Anyway, back to the cupcakes.

 Left Red Velvet, Middle Chocolate, Right Oreo

I just love taking photos of cupcakes; maybe I should do this for a living...

Enjoy!!x

Oreo Muffins (among other things)..

Hi!!

Haven't blogged in quite a while (but that doesn't mean I haven't baked a lot..)

I'm all moved into to university, and absolutely loving the freedom - I do miss being at home, but this way, I get to make brownies at 1 in the morning and no one shouts at me!
Anyway, last night I made some Oreo Muffins (because that's all there is to do on a Tuesday evening when no one in your flat wants to go out...)

So, let's get started..


Ingredients


For the streusel topping.
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp plain flour
4-5 oreos, coarsely chopped/crumbled - do it with a knife, or in a food processor, or in a bag with a rolling pin; any way works.


For the actual muffin mix
2 cups plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
113g butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs, room temp
little bit of vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk 
and around 8-10 Oreos (rough chop) - if using a normal sized package or Oreos, just use 4 for the streusel topping and the remainder for the batter.


Method
Making the topping.
Firstly, cut up all the lovely Oreos.

Mix the ingredients together in a little bowl. A spoon or spatula works, but I used my hands.

Put the streusel in the fridge until you need it.


Making the batter:
Combine the flour and baking powder in a medium bowl.
Next, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, and then add in the eggs one by one, beating well after each addition.
Add in the vanilla, and then all of the flour/baking powder. Add in the milk and Oreo chunks and fold in until just combined.
Spoon into muffin cases (this batter made around 12 muffins), and grab the streusel mix out of the fridge and crumble on top of each one.

Make sure your oven is preheated. Here's the issue - my university oven is absolutely awful and burns everything. So, I put it on a lower heat. Normally these would go in at around 200C, but for our convection oven, I put them in at 180C ish for around 15 minutes.. In a conventional oven, it'd likely take a few minutes longer.

MMMMM Yummy!!!

And here's Rebecca; being incredibly helpful while I clear up the mess in the kitchen.

On a separate note..

Oreo Cupcakes - made for my friend Hannie (who's also a brilliant baker!!)

She made "Yummy Cookie Dough Muffins" and they really lived up to their name..

Mars Bar cupcakes..
A chocolate base, with cream cheese frosting and a slice of Mars on top. Although I do find it annoying when the toppings miraculously disappear, thanks to a certain someone! (Yes Joel, I'm talking to you!).. This happened about 5 times when I made Malteser Cupcakes a few weeks back, so I'm pretty used to it by now..

Here's a batch of brownies made at around 1.30 am on a Saturday morning.. No one realised that you actually have to wait for a brownie to cool before eating it, so they just dug their forks in. Fair do's, I guess. The few that were left over the next morning were amazing! Although they weren't around for long; nothing ever is in this house!!

Bye for now! x