Week 34 and 35 - Orange and white chocolate cake AND Boozy raspberry victoria sponge

Well last week was a double header for cakes because there were two very important occasions...the prize giving/final of the inter office bake off and my lovely friend Claire's hen party so there was nothing else for it, I simply had to do a double bake week!

Bake 34

Orange and white chocolate cake

You will remember from week 29 that my work were having a weekly inter office cake off bake off and this past week was the prize giving for the winners which obviously had to be cake! I offered to help out my colleague Gemma who organised the competition by baking the prize, and being a sporting organisation the only thing appropriate was to make a winners podium cake. I made the first position (a triple layer cake) while Gemma made the second (a two layer chocolate cake) and a single layer victoria sponge for the third position. All three were topped with cream coloured icing (traditional butter cream for Gems and white chocolate crème fraîche for mine) and then sprayed gold with edible cake glitter.

The final touch was the ginger bread athletes made by Gemma, decorated with their medals, proudly standing on top of their winners podium.

The results were announced in Eurovision style reverse order and slightly embarrassingly for me as I was reading them out my team won! The medical and anti-doping cakes were victorious!!

So importantly though how do you make a winners podium cake....

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/5524/orange-and-white-chocolate-sponge

Ingredients

(I used double of all of these quantities because I was making a triple layer cake, I kept the fourth cake for us to enjoy at home but I thought I would leave the quantities as standard here in case you want to try it for your self)

• 175g butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
• 175g golden caster sugar
• finely grated zest 4 orange and juice of 1
• 4 egg, separated
• 100g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 100g ground almonds (a member of the team at work is allergic to nuts so I was going to try to take the almonds out but some of the comments on the recipe said you have to replace this with flour because it can impact on the rise so I decided against trying to take it out on the first attempt. I had to disappoint my colleague but I thought it was best to follow Mary Berry’s advice to never change a recipe before you have tried it the traditional way the first time).

For the icing

• 200g white chocolate
• 200ml crème fraîche

Method

1. Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Butter two 20cm round sandwich tins and line the bases with baking parchment. Tip the sugar into a mixing bowl and add the softened butter and orange zest. Beat for 1 min or so until pale and fluffy, then beat in the egg yolks. Sift the flour and baking powder over the cake mixture and fold in lightly. Finally, fold in the almonds and orange juice. Whisk the egg whites until they just hold their shape. Fold one-third of the egg white into the cake mix, using the whisk. Repeat with another third, then the final third. Take care not to over-mix or you will lose the lightness of the egg whites.
2. Divide the cake mix between the prepared tins and bake for 30-35 mins. Cool in the tin for 5 mins, then turn out onto a wire rack, peel off the lining paper and leave to cool.
3. To make the icing, melt the chocolate over a pan of barely simmering water or in the microwave on High for 1½ mins, stirring every 30 secs, then leave to cool. Whip the crème fraîche until thick, then fold in the white chocolate. Set one cake on a serving plate or cake stand. Spoon half the icing onto the cake and top with the other cake. Spread with the rest of the icing, then allow to set in the fridge for at least 1 hr.
4. If you want to make the decorative curls, melt the chocolate in a bowl over simmering water or in a microwave and spread thinly over a baking tray. Leave the tray in the fridge for the chocolate to harden a bit, then use a fish slice or angled knife blade to scrape chocolate curls. Pile the curls in the middle of the cake and serve cut into slices.

As I had to double the recipe to get the triple layers I did have to spend quite a long time zesting the 8 oranges which was less than ideal but other than that it was relatively straightforward. The cakes didn't really rise very much though so I think if you did just have the two standard layers then it might be a bit small looking.

Also, with the icing having crème fraîche in it I wasn't really sure if you were supposed to store the cake in the fridge the whole time?!? I did keep it in the fridge and it was still good but it does take away a bit of the fluffy, lightness of the cake but in general it was zesty and yummy, a bit like carrot cake really.

Victory in the cake off felt sweet but being the gracious winners we are we shared it with the whole team so really everyone who took part were the winners and got to enjoy the cake.

Now for the second bake of the week....officially week 35’s

Boozy raspberry Victoria sponge

After coming down from the high of victory the weekend was spent having a wonderful time making some new friends and celebrating at my old colleague Claire's hen party. It was only fair that I brought her a bake as she is a blog reader and with it being her hen it deserved a little drop of something boozy to liven up the usual mix!! I got the idea from one of my best friends Lydia who writes a wonderful blog called 'Todays the day I....' in which she does something new everyday in New York. A few weeks ago Lydia had alcoholic cupcakes for the first time so I thought I could give the concept a go myself. A bit of google searching didn't really provide many recipes so I thought I would throw caution to the wind and just wing it by adding some liquor and fresh raspberries to a normal victoria sponge recipe .....Well there were mixed results.

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1997/classic-victoria-sandwich

Ingredients

For the cake

• 200g caster sugar
• 200g softened butter
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 200g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp milk
• I had no idea if adding these would be a good idea but....
• Handful of fresh raspberries
• 1.5tbsp (ish) Chambord

For the filling

• 200g white chocolate
• 200ml crème fraîche
• 340g jar good-quality raspberry jam
• Fresh raspberries soaked in Chambord
• 3 tsp (ish) Chambord

Method

1. Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5. Butter two 20cm sandwich tins and line with non-stick baking paper. In a large bowl, beat all the cake ingredients together until you have a smooth, soft batter.
2. Divide the mixture between the tins, smooth the surface with a spatula or the back of a spoon, then bake for about 20 mins until golden and the cake springs back when pressed. Turn onto a cooling rack and leave to cool completely.
3. To make the filling, beat the butter until smooth and creamy, then gradually beat in icing sugar. Beat in vanilla extract if you’re using it. Spread the butter cream over the bottom of one of the sponges, top it with jam and sandwich the second sponge on top. Dust with a little icing sugar before serving. Keep in an airtight container and eat within 2 days.

The lovely bride to be!

As I was just guessing quantities I had no idea how it would turn out until we cut into it and to be honest I was a bit disappointed with it. The alcoholic raspberries were tasty but the cake turned out a bit heavy which might have been the raspberries in the batter changing the consistency/quantities and making it lose some of its fluffiness.

The icing had a hint if an alcoholic taste but I probably could have been braver with my quantities. It would also have been nice if it had a more of a pink colour so maybe I should have added food colouring to help the alcohol along.

Anyway, all the hens made the right yummy noises but I'm not convinced it was very good. At least we had a super fun weekend and the champagne that went along with the cake went down a treat!

The double bake this week means I have one in the bank for this week so there might be a week off for the blog. See you in two! Linds Xx

Week 33 – Rocky Road

This week’s bake was done at 8.30am this morning, in my p-j’s, accompanied by a nice brew - what a way to start a Sunday hey!? This week I decided to make a fave of mine, Rocky Road. There we loads of recipes out there which were fundamentally very similar, so in the end I opted for Nigella Lawson’s Rocky Road Crunch Bars http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/rocky-road-crunch-bars-25. 

I chose this one because it has rich tea biscuits in it. Now they might be plain, humble biscuits but I love them, yep just can’t get enough of them. This is really because my Papa (our family’s, and many other Scottish families' term for Granddad, in this case my mum’s dad) always used to have them with a cup of tea so whenever I have them I remember him. Anyway, getting to use them in a recipe just gave me the chance to stop and remember him and my Gran who sadly passed away early this year. So Papa biscuits at the ready, (I kept one spare to have with my brew!) I got started.

Ingredients

• 125 grams soft butter
• 300 grams best-quality dark chocolate - broken into pieces (As I have said before I am not a huge dark chocolate fan so I used 200g of milk chocolate and 100g of dark)
• 3 tablespoons golden syrup
• 200 grams rich tea biscuits
• 100 grams mini marshmallows (I know all marshmallows are a bit strange and artificial-tasting but I think the mini ones are particularly weird, so I just used normal pink and white marshmallows and cut them up with scissors)
• I added 2 handfuls of dried cranberries, I just thought it might be a nice addition! Sorry Nigella, don’t mean to step on your toes or suggest it’s not a great recipe I just thought I could do with a bit of something extra!
• 2 teaspoons icing sugar (for dusting)

Method

1.    Melt the butter, chocolate and golden syrup in a heavy-based saucepan. Scoop out about 125ml / ½ cup of this melted mixture and put to one side.

2.    Put the biscuits into a freezer bag and then bash them with a rolling pin. You are aiming for both crumbs and pieces of biscuits.

3.    Fold the biscuit pieces and crumbs into the melted chocolate mixture in the saucepan, and then add the marshmallows. (Having the chopped up marshmallows meant they sort of melted a bit at this stage which I think made the mixture a bit gooier than expected but it still turned out OK)

4.    Tip into a foil tray (24cm / 9 inch square); flatten as best you can with a spatula. Pour the reserved 125ml / ½ cup of melted chocolate mixture over the marshmallow mixture and smooth the top.

5.    Refrigerate for about 2 hours or overnight. (2 hours was long enough, so thank goodness you don’t have to wait too long for the tasty treat!)

6.    Cut into 24 fingers and dust with icing sugar by pushing it gently through a tea strainer or small sieve.

Mmmm

 As Nigella says herself these would make a great snack to add to a lunchbox. I proved that they do travel well because I took a couple of slices for my friend Rachel and her husband Alex this afternoon and have just had a text to say they were delicious! It was a super quick tray bake to whip up and a nice way to start a Sunday thinking about my Papa.

Have a happy, baking full week,

Xx Linds xx

Week 32 – Baked lemon cheesecake with baked plums and blackberries

Ingredients looking promising.

Well another busy week and weekend has flown by. Between visits to the Edinburgh fringe and the UCI Juniors Track World Championship cycling at the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome in Glasgow I yet again didn't have time to try to make pastry! One of these days... But I did venture into the new world of pairing cakes with wine.

This past weekend I had my in-laws visiting and as they are avid readers of the blog I felt the need to make something quite impressive!! The BBC Good Food magazine came up trumps with a baked lemon cheesecake with blackberry and plum topping.

Ingredients

200g shortbread biscuits
25g melted butter
600g full-fat cream cheese
75g golden caster sugar
4 large eggs
3 tsp vanilla extract
100ml soured cream

For the baked fruit:
8 plums, halved, stone removed, then cut into wedges
300g blackberries
100g light muscavado sugar

Method

1. Heat oven to 160C/140C fan/gas 2. Line base of a 22cm round, springform tin with baking parchment. Put the biscuits in a food processor and whizz to fine crumbs. Tip into a bowl, add the melted butter and mix well. Press the biscuits into the base of the cake tin and put in the fridge to chill.

2. Beat together the cream cheese and sugar with an electric hand whisk until smooth. Carefully add the eggs, one at a time, with the lemon zest and vanilla extract until well mixed, but don't overwhisk (I really hate it when recipes say this, how are you supposed to know if you have overwhisked it if you are not a master baker? And if you do overwhisk, what will happen?!?!?) Pour the mixture onto the chilled biscuit base and bake in the middle of the oven for 50 mins until just set (I baked mine for 60 minutes). Set aside to cool for 10 mins, the remove from the tin and allow to cool completely.

3. Meanwhile, turn the oven up to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Put the plums, blackberries and sugar in a large roasting tin and toss together well. Bake in the oven for 10-12 mins until the fruits have collapsed and the sauce is syrupy. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.

4. When the cheescake is completely cooled, spoon the soured cream over the top and spread in a thin layer. Serve in wedges topped with some of the baked plums and blackerries, and the rest of the side.

The texture of a baked cheesecake always surprises me because I feel like its sort of cheesecake but also sort of a firm sweet omelette/scrambled egg concoction which I’m just not sure about. I was worried that it wouldn't be lemony enough with only the zest of one lemon but to my surprise it was quite zingy. Fortunately we happened to open a bottle of red wine (that we found in the back of a cupboard) after dinner which turned out to be a lovely accompaniment to the berry/plum topping and the freshness of the cake. I have heard of pairing wines with meats/fish/cheese but not really cakes and bakes so maybe this is an untapped market and one I need to explore further, maybe with a Saturday morning TV show?? Could this be my next career move??

Overall it looked impressive, it had a nice flavour but it wasn't my favourite bake, I'm just not sure the baked cheesecake is the way to go over the traditional variety. Anyway, worth a try!

Happy baking, see you next week for another tasty treat!

Linds xx

Week 31 – Beer Bread

This last week culminated with a very busy but fun weekend: my brother-in-law Nick and his wife Erin came up from Oxford to visit and we took a lovely trip to one of my absolute favourite places in the world, St Andrews. And what better to do in the home of golf than watch some top class competition, the Women's British Open to be exact (won by American Stacy Lewis).

With the baking challenge in mind my first instinct was to try to make something golf related or themed and I found some amazing looking golf ball ‘cake pops’ on the food and drink section of Pinterest http://pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=golf%20cake%20pop .If you haven't heard of or been on Pinterest it's just like a big online version of an old fashioned notice board where you can 'pin' your fave photos of things. Every pinned photo is linked to the relevant website where the image/product/recipe etc. came from, it's super fun and quite addictive. I haven't made cake pops yet and they seem to be the trendy thing in the cake world at the moment so I was quite keen, but sadly I couldn't seem to get hold of the golf ball moulds anywhere in the UK so that was off the cards.

Back on the quest of a new recipe I continued to browse on Pinterest and found a few bread recipes and decided I would give it a go! I have long been saying I need to try to expand my savoury range and bread seemed like a good way to go. The recipe that caught my eye was for beer bread, it was from an American website food.com and it had some seriously good reviews from people who had made before it so I thought I would give it a whirl. Brilliantly it only had 4 ingredients, I think it is probably the fewest number of ingredients I've ever baked with which made it incredibly straightforward.
http://www.food.com/recipe/sweet-beer-bread-70366?mode=metric&scaleto=1.0&st=null

Ingredients

• 3 cups self-raising flour

• 1/2 cup sugar

• 1 x (12 ounce) bottle beer (Non-Alcoholic or Light Beer may be substituted) I used Kronenbourg 1664, because that’s what we had in the house. I saw on another recipe that its best to use a warm beer for beer bread so I did that and then popped what was left in the fridge for Dave to enjoy later!

• 1/4 cup butter or 1/4 cup margarine, melted. I used salted butter which seemed to add a nice salty/sweet taste to the crust.

All these ingredients are measured in the American cups measures. I happen to have a set of cups from my time living in the US (you can buy them over here relatively cheaply so it’s probably worth the investment for a few pounds if you want to use a few American recipes) but if you don’t you can google the conversion to ml’s/grams quite easily on websites like

http://allrecipes.com/howto/cup-to-gram-conversions/

Method

1.  Stir together first 3 ingredients; pour into a lightly greased 9 x 5 inch loaf pan.

2.  Bake at 350 for 35 minutes.
3.  Pour melted butter over top.
4.  Bake 10 more minutes. I took my loaf out after the 45 minutes and noticed it had a slightly soggy bottom (tut tut tut Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry would not be happy) and was a bit doughy when I cut a slice so I popped it back in the oven for another 10-15 minutes until it was a little bit more firmer and crispy. 

Well I have to say the bread went down a treat according to Dave, Nick and Erin who all had several slices over the weekend! It tasted a bit like corn bread in that it was sweet and salty at the same time, there was a slight hint of beer but it wasn’t overwhelming which was good because I’m not a big beer drinker.  You could use it with savoury things like paté but it toasted well so we enjoyed it for breakfast with jam.

All in all for my first adventure into the world of bread it went remarkably well. I’m not sure Paul Hollywood would really call it bread because you didn’t have to use yeast (that’s because you can cheat with the beer) and there is no kneading but it looked like bread and had a surprisingly bready texture so I say it is bread! 

See you next week for another yummy bake x

Linds xx