In searching for a recipe for this week's bake I was not only looking for something that met my two usual criteria of 1) a recipe I haven’t tried before 2) a recipe that has roughly 15 ingredients or less (I have found that any more than this that the recipe is probably going to be too complicated which reduces the fun factor of the baking experience!), but also an additional third criteria: a cake with the right structural composition that it could be shaped into an exact replica of an Ambulance... Yes that’s right, this week I made an Ambulance cake. Let me set the scene...
My relentless baking over the last 29 weeks has proven too much for myself and my husband Dave to eat at home, so I often take my baked goods into work to share with my colleagues. A couple of months ago whilst sharing one of my bakes, a colleague suggested an inter-office “Great British Bake Off” style weekly competition. Every Friday one of our teams brings work-themed baked goods into the office and at the end of the series we all get to vote for our favourite, judged in terms of bake, presentation and theme. I work for an organisation which is delivering a major sporting event in Glasgow next year, so needless to say I work with a whole host of sporty people and sporty people are competitive people - even it seems when it comes to cakes!! Those of you who know me know that I am the least sporty and the least competitive person around hence my surprise that people's competitive spirit can extend to the seemingly basic task of eggs and flour being mixed together!!!
My team, which looks after Medical and Anti-Doping services, were up this week and the stakes were high. The teams over the last five weeks had put in an impressive array of sport themed cakes so we needed to raise the bar with our entries. The lemon curd and blueberry loaf cake turned out to be the perfect choice for making my Ambulance. The recipe was from the reliably wonderful BBC Good Food website, by far the best place I have found to get easy baking recipes from.
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/358609/lemon-curd-and-blueberry-loaf-cake
Ingredients
· 175g softened butter, plus extra for greasing
· 500ml tub Greek yoghurt (you need 100ml/3½ fl oz in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 300g jar good lemon curd (you need 2 tbsp in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 3 eggs
· zest and juice 1 lemon, plus extra zest to serve, if you like
· 200g self-raising flour
· 175g golden caster sugar
· 200g punnet of blueberries (you need 85g/3oz in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 140g icing sugar
Method
My relentless baking over the last 29 weeks has proven too much for myself and my husband Dave to eat at home, so I often take my baked goods into work to share with my colleagues. A couple of months ago whilst sharing one of my bakes, a colleague suggested an inter-office “Great British Bake Off” style weekly competition. Every Friday one of our teams brings work-themed baked goods into the office and at the end of the series we all get to vote for our favourite, judged in terms of bake, presentation and theme. I work for an organisation which is delivering a major sporting event in Glasgow next year, so needless to say I work with a whole host of sporty people and sporty people are competitive people - even it seems when it comes to cakes!! Those of you who know me know that I am the least sporty and the least competitive person around hence my surprise that people's competitive spirit can extend to the seemingly basic task of eggs and flour being mixed together!!!
My team, which looks after Medical and Anti-Doping services, were up this week and the stakes were high. The teams over the last five weeks had put in an impressive array of sport themed cakes so we needed to raise the bar with our entries. The lemon curd and blueberry loaf cake turned out to be the perfect choice for making my Ambulance. The recipe was from the reliably wonderful BBC Good Food website, by far the best place I have found to get easy baking recipes from.
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/358609/lemon-curd-and-blueberry-loaf-cake
Ingredients
· 175g softened butter, plus extra for greasing
· 500ml tub Greek yoghurt (you need 100ml/3½ fl oz in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 300g jar good lemon curd (you need 2 tbsp in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 3 eggs
· zest and juice 1 lemon, plus extra zest to serve, if you like
· 200g self-raising flour
· 175g golden caster sugar
· 200g punnet of blueberries (you need 85g/3oz in the cake, the rest to serve)
· 140g icing sugar
Method
- Heat oven to 160C (my oven is fan assisted but seems to run a bit cool so I had the temperature at 180C)/140C fan/gas 3.
- Grease a 2lb loaf tin and line with a long strip of baking parchment. Put 100g yoghurt, 2 tbsp lemon curd, the softened butter, eggs, lemon zest, flour and caster sugar into a large mixing bowl. Quickly mix with an electric whisk until the batter just comes together. Scrape half into the prepared tin.
- Weigh 85g blueberries from the punnet and sprinkle half into the tin (a few people had commented on the recipe that the blueberries tended to sink to the bottom of the cake so I borrow one of the tips and rolled the blueberries in a little bit of self raising flour before I put them into the mixture and sure enough the berries stayed right at the top), scrape the rest of the batter on top, then scatter the other half of the 85g berries on top. Bake for 1 hr 10 mins-1 hr 15 mins until golden, and a skewer poked into the centre comes out clean. Like a few others who commented on the recipe the cake took about an extra 10 minutes to cook than the recipe suggested and I also turned up my oven towards the end to try to speed things up because I was keen to get the second of the two loafs needed for the Ambulance in the oven!
- Cool in the tin, then carefully lift onto a serving plate to ice. Sift the icing sugar into a bowl and stir in enough lemon juice to make a thick, smooth icing. Spread over the top of the cake, then decorate with lemon zest and edible flowers, if you like. Serve in slices with extra lemon curd, Greek yoghurt and blueberries.
Clearly I didn't follow the recommended serving suggestions in this case but I would make the cake again. The small slice I managed to wrestle away from my hungry colleagues was fresh and tangy, which was a nice treat in this unusually warm Scottish weather and I agree that it would be yummy served with extra Greek yoghurt and/or lemon curd.
Fingers crossed my workmates thought the Ambulance and the other cakes (made by my amazing colleagues Liz, Katya, Jeanette, Sarah, Nuala and Jonny's wife Jules) made the grade in terms of taste and presentation. You can see the whole ensemble below, along with the team in their appropriate uniforms for delivering and serving the cakes!! I think you will agree that we might have gone a little over the top but it will all be worth it when we are crowned office Bake Off champions!!
Fingers crossed my workmates thought the Ambulance and the other cakes (made by my amazing colleagues Liz, Katya, Jeanette, Sarah, Nuala and Jonny's wife Jules) made the grade in terms of taste and presentation. You can see the whole ensemble below, along with the team in their appropriate uniforms for delivering and serving the cakes!! I think you will agree that we might have gone a little over the top but it will all be worth it when we are crowned office Bake Off champions!!
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| Loaf number one before its transformation... |
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| The Ambulance from above, blueberries for the blue flashing lights |
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| Anti-Doping cake, complete with lemon jelly urine samples! |
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| First Aid cake with fondant plasters. |
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| Polyclinic (hospital) cake with patient in a pink wafer bed, x-ray man and edible optometry, podiatry and dental departments! |
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| Recovery cake with jelly baby athletes in marshmallow ice baths and fondant icing towels. |
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| The surgical team ready to start the cutting of the cakes procedure! |
See you next week for what I am sure will be a slightly less competitive but equally yummy bake.
Xx Linds xx
Xx Linds xx
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