Ice Cream Cake

There is a book which has been on my Amazon wish list for a while called 'Rose's Heavenly Cakes' by Rose Levy Beranbaum so imagine my surprise when I came across a blog called 'Heavenly Cake Baker' - where a bunch of very talented bakers are 'Julie and Julia-ing' their way through this book. That's something I'd quite like to do at some point but I need to find a baking book that I love so much that I literally want to try every single recipe. Perhaps Rose's book will be it.

Anyway, I digress - one of the cakes they made was a chocolate ice cream cake. As soon as I saw pictures, I was determined to make an ice cream cake and when a friend's birthday came up, my mind immediately went to the ice cream cake. Now try as I might, I couldn't find a recipe for Rose's version - I guess I just have to buy the book - so I decided to improvise and I used Nigella Lawson's Victoria Sponge recipe from 'How to be a Domestic Goddess' because it's just an incredibly simple yet flavourful recipe. I used Carte D'or's 'Vanilla' and 'Chocolate Inspiration' ice creams as they were buy one get one free but if you're feeling flush, I'd recommend buying a luxury brand of ice cream like Green & Blacks or Waitrose's Seriously Creamy Range. The great thing with this is you can mix it up as you feel like. I'll probably always have a layer of vanilla in mine but perhaps make the second layer coconut and lime ice cream in summer or use just different chocolate ice creams when I am having an intense chocolate craving. The spring form pan is your oyster! Go crazy!

Serves 10 – 12

Prepare about 24 hours before you intend to serve it.

Ingredients

Cake

338g unsalted butter, very soft

338g caster sugar

3 teaspoons vanilla extract

6 large eggs

300g self raising flour

38g corn flour

1 and a half teaspoons baking powder

6 tablespoons of milk

12 inch spring form pan

Filling

2 litres of ice cream - I used 1 litre each of two flavours

Fudge sauce

200g milk chocolate

100g white chocolate

300ml single cream

Whole milk

Cake

1 - Grease and flour your baking tin

2 - Preheat the oven to 180ºC/gas mark 4

3 - Cream the butter and sugar together till the butter has turned white. 

4 - Add the vanilla and then the eggs, one at a time, adding a spoonful of flour between each.

5 - Fold in the rest of the flour and the corn flour, adding no baking powder, and when all is incorporated, add the milk as you need.

6 - Pour and scrape the batter into the tin and bake for about 40 minutes until the cake is beginning to come away at the edges, is springy to the touch on top and a cake-tester comes out clean. 

7 - Take out cake and leave to cool for an hour.

Assembly

1 - When you take out the cake from the oven, take out your ice cream from the freezer.

2 - When cake is completely cool (about an hour), remove it from the spring form pan, and slice in half horizontally (Tip: Sticking toothpicks into the side of the cake at the halfway mark at regular intervals all the way around will help you guide your knife and cut it evenly)

3 - Put the bottom half back into the spring form pan (exposed side facing up). Handle the cake carefully as it will be delicate but don't worry too much about mistakes as you can cover a multitude of sins with the ice cream and fudge sauce.

4 - Evenly spread the first layer (1 litre) of ice cream on top of the half cake in the baking tin, making sure to spread it all the way to the edges. Follow with the second flavour, again spreading evenly and round the edges.

5 - Cover with the top half of the cake. Wrap the tin in cling film and place back into the freezer.

Fudge sauce

Make the fudge sauce about 10 minutes before you intend to serve the cake.

1 - Break the chocolate up and melt it (I melt chocolate in a Pyrex bowl placed in a wok partially filled with water)

2 - When melted, take the chocolate off the heat and stir in the cream, stirring continuously.

3 - You want it quite liquid as it will harden once it is poured onto the frozen cake so add milk to get it to a liquid consistency (think the consistency of gravy).

4 - When you are ready to serve the cake, place spring form tin on a large plate, open up the clasp and lift the side of the tin off the cake. 

5 - Pour the hot fudge sauce over the top, drizzling some down the sides. I kept half of the fudge sauce and poured a bit over each individual slice.

Tip: To cut the ice cream cake, have a pitcher of hot water nearby and dip the knife into it in between cutting each slice

Irene's Meat Pies

I don't need to explain meat pies to any Nigerian readers. For non-Nigerian readers, meat pies are a snack food similar to Jamaican Patties (but I think all Nigerians would agree that meat pies are better ;p). We had them during our lunch breaks at school, bought them from Mr. Biggs (a Nigerian fast food joint), they form an integral part of any good 'small chops' plate - in fact meat pies are to Nigerians what cold water is to garri. Hmmm, okay, for a non- Nigerian metaphor ... okay, got one, meat pies are to Nigerians what a tea bag is to tea - absolutely essential! Good comparison huh ;p

Despite being so 'essential', I might have made them once in home economics class at school but never since. I got my meat pie fixes from parties and Chicken Republic on my yearly visits to Nigeria and from my friend Irene in between. Irene makes great meat pies (not often enough by any means) but enough that I never felt the need to learn how to make them myself. In fact, she gave me this recipe a long while ago, after she first made them for us, but I never felt the need to use it till now. 'Why?' I hear you ask. Because friends, my 'friend' Irene decided to move back to Nigeria! Did she stop to think of the consequences this would have on her meat pie loving friends??? Nope! Luckily, I stepped up, tried Irene's recipe and realised that in lieu of her actually being here to make them, she had left the next best thing; a great recipe. So without further ado, here it is!

I'd never made pastry before but following Irene's instructions, it was easy peasy.

Makes approximately 18 pies

Ingredients

Pastry

500g plain flour

5 tablespoons of cold butter

1 level teaspoon salt

1 level teaspoon nutmeg

Warm water

Filling

250g beef mince

1 onion, finely cubed

2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

2 large potatoes (not baking potatoes), peeled and finely cubed

1 carrot, peeled and finely cubed

Handful of peas and sweetcorn

Seasoning (thyme, black pepper, salt)

Assembly

Flour

One egg, beaten with a dash of milk

Pastry

1 - Measure the flour into a clean, dry bowl. Add the salt and nutmeg and stir together

2 - Break off the 5 tablespoons of butter (large spoon fulls) and add to the flour

3 - With your hands, rub the butter into the flour piece by piece until it all disappears and the flour is crumbly. Add one more tablespoon of butter if necessary. The flour should be crumbly but light. This process should take you at least 10 minutes. Any quicker and you're being too heavy handed.  As you rub the butter into the flour, lift it and let it fall back into the bowl, this is to allow air into it.

4 - Add water to the mix, tablespoons at a time kneading it with your hands until the dough bonds together completely leaving the bowl clean. You don't want the pastry too dry so it is crumbly; you need to be able to roll it out.

5 - Wrap it in cling film and put it in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

 Meat pies are all about the pastry, practice makes perfect

Preheat oven to 180ºC

Filling

1 - In a pan or wok, heat up 4 tablespoons of oil, and on low heat, add the onions and garlic.

2 - When browned, add the mince and fry for a couple of minutes till mince is cooked.

3 - Add a cup of water and the rest of the vegetables and leave to simmer for a few minutes then add seasoning to taste. Season however you want; add chillies if you want it spicy.

4 - Leave to cook on low heat until all the water is absorbed and the potatoes and carrots are cooked and tender. Turn off and allow to cool.

Assembly

1 - Clean and dry a counter surface and sprinkle with flour.

2 - I roll all the pastry out in one go but you can do it in two lots if your surface isn't big enough. Dust your rolling pin with flour and roll out your pastry. Not too thin.

3 - Cut using a cutter - I use a large mug to get relatively small pies. If you want larger pies, use something larger to cut. I make circles over all of the rolled out dough and then gather the in between pieces into a ball ready to roll out for the next batch.

4 - Fill (but don't over fill) your pastry on one side with mix. Keep mix away from edges. Keeping a small bowl of water nearby and dipping one finger in, run your wet finger in a semi circle round the edge of your circle where you intend the ends of the meat pie to meet. This helps bond the dough when you fold the empty half of your pastry circle over the half with the filling.

5 - Using your fingers, press down on the ends and then using a fork, seal all the way round and pierce a couple of times in the middle to allow the heat to escape when baking.

6 - Repeat until all your pies are ready. Place pies on a baking tray and using a small brush, brush lightly with beaten egg and milk.

7 - Bake in pre-heated oven for 20 - 25 minutes or until golden brown.

My Baking Adventures!

I have always loved baking and because I know my creations taste great, I have never been too fussed about how they look. My housemate (who is very into baked goods and their appearances) has actually laughed at my cakes a few times. This one time, at band camp it was a Victoria Sponge which had risen in the oven and then fallen as soon as I took it out so it was too thin to slice in two. 'No biggie', I thought, 'I'll just put the cream and strawberries on top in the manner of a tart'. And I was perfectly happy with this until my housemate came in, took one look at it, pointed with one hand and burst out laughing while trying to stifle his laughter with the other hand. Another time, I had made a layer cake but only had enough frosting to cover the top of it so the sides were frosting-less - he said it looked half naked! But it never bothered me ... until I started baking cupcakes. Because let's be honest, cupcakes are all about appearances! A layer cake will always taste better than a cupcake but what cupcakes have is the potential to look so amazing that you actually have a pang of regret when you bite into them. And now I'm very into appearances, not just of my cupcakes but all my cakes!

There are some really talented bakers around like Faithy The Baker and 4 Goodness Cake and they have inspired me to work on learning to frost cakes so that one day I too might make incredible cake creations just like theirs! But practice makes perfect so there is a lot of baking and frosting in my future before I'm even close. Starting with a cupcake decorating course at the make lounge in November - I can't wait! If anyone knows of any other good cake decorating or even baking courses in London, please do let me know! I might invest in a 'cake decorating for dummies' book after in order to continue learning and progressing. Again, if anybody can recommend any good BEGINNERS cake decorating books, then please let me know.

I'm sure it's not coincidence that I'm trying to improve my craft around the same time that I have realised that I would like to take this baking thing more seriously and start baking for parties and events from home. I had a taste of mass baking the last couple of weekends. I made a huge, rather rude cake for a friend's Hen Party a couple of weekends ago despite much initial protest on my part that I had never made a willy cake and wouldn't even know where to start. After much discussion with my cousin (who begged, pleaded and cajoled me into making the cake), I decided to make a vanilla sponge cake with a strawberry cream filling and vanilla buttercream icing using the recipe for the vanilla cupcakes I blogged about here. And then for the piece de resistance, we bought a willy mould into which I poured melted chocolate and voila – an 8 inch chocolate willy! Due to the fact that I’d like my blog to have a U rating, I’m not going to post pictures but email me if you’d like to see one!

My baking the following weekend was more family friendly – 60 cupcakes; half of them vanilla with vanilla buttercream frosting (as per my previous post) and half red velvet with cream cheese frosting (which I’ll blog about in the future). Despite only being able to bake 12 at a time, I really enjoyed the process and it seemed everyone really enjoyed the results!

So if you’re in London and you need some cupcakes, a cake, anything baked really, for an event or party, let me know!

In other news, Nigella has a new book out; Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home which has been promptly added to my Amazon wish list! Bring on Christmas or Amazon might send me an angry email telling me to stop adding books to my wish list unless I start buying books from it!

Have an amazing weekend and week people!

Not-Blah-At-All Vanilla Cupcakes

For everyone who thinks vanilla is kinda blah - myself included - prepare to be proved wrong! Yeah, I said it! 

I've never tried to make vanilla cake/cupcakes/anything. Vanilla is just soooo ... vanilla! Or so I thought. But then a friend asked me to make 60 cupcakes for her engagement/fiancé’s birthday party - half of them red velvet and half of them vanilla, and not relishing the thought of having 30 crappy cupcakes on my hand on the day of the party and delivering only half (the red velvet which I've made before) to the party, I realised I'd have to try out a recipe or four (as many as it took to get them right) before my cupcake-athon (great idea by the way, I could raise money for charity by eating erm, I meant baking, cakes for charity - just an insight into how my ingenious mind works! ;p). 

So now that the decision was made, all that was left was to find a few recipes and choose which one to try first. Easy. Right? Ummm, No! I have LOTS of cake books but do you know I could not find a single vanilla cupcake recipe??? And I refuse to turn to the Internet when I currently must have about a gazillion (rough estimate) cake recipes on my bookshelf which I haven't yet tried. So finally (as is always the way, it was where I looked last) I turned to a book I had never used; The Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Book by Jennifer Graham. And right there on the very first page was a recipe for vanilla cupcakes. Yay! And what cupcakes they were; fluffy and so tasty that I still find it hard to believe they came from such a simple recipe! This is officially my new favourite cupcake book - sorry Martha Stewart! 

If you live in Victoria, Australia (which must be a fantastic place, judging by the name ;p), then you have to check out the Crabapple Bakery because even if their cakes are only just as good as their recipes, then they must be amazing! 

I was also practising my icing technique which needs so much work; but more on that in a later post.  If you were ever going to try making cupcakes; I suggest you start with these :D

Sorry measurements are all in cups! But to be honest, a lot of the best recipes are American or Australian so if you're a keen baker, I suggest you invest in a set.

Ingredients for the cupcakes                                      

2 and three quarters cups plain flour                               

2 teaspoons baking powder                                           

200g softened unsalted butter                                         

1 and three quarters cups caster sugar (I used golden)     

4 eggs                                                                             

1 tablespoon vanilla extract (I used 2)

1 cup milk

Makes: 24                                                                   

Keeps: 2 days                                                               

Freezes: 2 months

Ingredients for Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

200g softened unsalted butter

1/2 cup milk

1 tablespoon vanilla extract (I used 2)

8 cups icing sugar (I found I only needed around 6 and a half)

Makes: Enough for 24 cupcakes

Keeps: 1 week

Cupcakes

1 - Preheat oven to 170ºC. Line two 12-hole muffin trays with cupcake papers

2 - Mix together the flour and the baking powder

3 - In a separate bowl, cream the butter for 1 - 2 minutes. Add the caster sugar a third at a time, beating for 2 minutes after each addition. After the last addition, beat until the mixture is light and fluffy and the sugar has almost dissolved

4 - Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each addition or until mixture is light and fluffy. Add the vanilla extract and beat until combined

5 - Add a third of the flour to the creamed mixture and beat on low speed until combined. Add half the milk and beat until combined. Repeat this process. Add the remaining third of the flour and beat thoroughly until combined; do not over-beat as this will toughen the mixture

6 - Spoon mixture into cupcake papers, filling each about three-quarters full. Bake for 18-20 minutes or until a fine skewer inserted comes out clean

7 - Remove cupcakes from trays immediately and cool on a wire rack for 30 minutes before frosting

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

1 - Cream the butter for 1-2 minutes.

2 - Add the milk, vanilla extract and half of the sifted icing sugar, and beat for at least 3 minutes or until the mixture is light and fluffy.

3 - Add the remaining icing sugar and beat for a further 3 minutes or until the mixture is light and fluffy and of a spreadable consistency. Add extra milk if the mixture is too dry or extra icing sugar if it is too wet.

If you wish to colour/flavour the buttercream, this is the best time to do it. Add a drop at a time and beat in until you reach the required colour and/or flavour.

Good-For-You Granola

Firstly, let's get this out of the way ... Is granola good for you?? Answer: It can be great for you!  Containing slow release carbohydrates (oats) and protein (nut and seeds), the one thing to watch out for is that like most cereals, some brands contain a lot of sugar. Granola is not low fat by any means, but the fats it does have are good fats like nuts. It is a very healthful food that keeps you full for ages. However, if you are on a low-fat diet, please look away now and return to your bowl of Special K.


I've loved granola since I was introduced to it in Canada several years ago, and I still eat it like I ate it then; with yoghurt. My current favourite lunch is a bowl of blueberries, topped with Onken wholegrain strawberry yoghurt and a layer of granola on the top ... yum! Before the last couple of years, there weren't many brands of granola available to buy in supermarkets in the UK though that looks to be changing. Dorset Cereals have had Honey Granola for a while and have now introduced three new new granola flavours; Marmalade, Chocolate and Chocolate Granola and Macadamia nuts. I recently tried the Chocolate and Macadamia nuts flavour and I wasn't too impressed. Their honey granola is good though; almost as good as mine ;p I also liked a granola by 'Lizi's Good Carb Company'.
However, after deciding to look up a recipe and try making it about a year ago, I only buy granola when I can't be bothered to make my own which is a silly excuse since it is very easy to make! I've only tried this BBC Good Food recipe and it's so good, I literally have to stop myself just snacking on it. Especially when it has just come out of the oven as it smells heavenly!


The great thing about this recipe - or any granola recipe, I imagine - is that you can pick and choose what goes into it according to your preferences. I, for example, don't put dried berries or any fruit for that matter in my granola (Hey, hey, hey! Don't judge me. Like I said, my granola usually tops a huge bowl of blueberries that is two portions of my 5-a-day thank you very much :D) But I've discovered that pecans taste INCREDIBLE in it so I usually just replace the flaked almonds and dried berries with pecans. And I always throw in a few handfuls of flax seed or linseed (even though they're more or less the same thing) for good measure and it doesn't alter the taste one bit! While I love it with vanilla extract like the BBC recipe, I recently made a batch replacing the vanilla with nutmeg and cinammon and that was fab too. And I intend to plagiarise from Dorset cereals and try making it with marmalade some day :D It's pretty much win win win!


As somewhat of a seasoned making-my-own-granola-from-this-recipe pro, here are a couple of tips to guide you newbies on your way:

Honey/Maple syrup/sunflower oil/vanilla 

 1) You'll need to at least double the cooking time in   the recipe. Stir every 15 minutes and aim for it to be crunchy but not browned.
 2) I recommend making twice the recipe as you'll get through it very quickly ...it's that tasty! Cook in two batches if you do this.
 3) If adding dried fruit, leave it till the last 15 minutes and add it with the coconut or else it goes quite hard and gummy.

Happy granola making and eating!

Anna's Peanut Butter Cupcakes

These are actually called 'Reese's Peanut Butter Cupcakes' but I've named them after my friend Anna who first made them, and gave me the recipe and is a whole load of unfulfilled baking talent in one little person. Anna can bake, won't bake. Oh occasionally, a couple of times a year, just enough to leave you wanting more, she'll churn out a spectacular coconut and raspberry cake (that she just 'threw' together from two different recipes) or chocolate filled cookies or these amazing cupcakes but it is only usually after months of begging, pleading and threatening then resorting to throwing a tea party (and asking everyone to bring something) before she'll actually bake. My hope is that she'll read this and be guilted into baking for me once a week. Okay, okay, once a month.


These are really lovely! The recipe is actually by Gizzi Erskine and was featured in a sunday paper as part of a 'We heart SATC' feature (so you know they're going to be good!) The cupcake is chocolate flavoured with bits of Reese's cups in them and the frosting is peanut butter flavoured ... yum! 


Makes: 18 (I found it made 12)
Prep time: 15 mins
Calories per cupcake: 328 (Why you need this info I have no idea! But they've supplied it, so I'm giving it)
Fat per cupcake: 21g (All you need to know is I took out all the calories and fat before I wrote down this recipe so no need to worry about that ;D)


Ingredients
170g softened butter
170g golden caster sugar
3 large free-range eggs
170g self-raising flour
3tbsp cocoa powder
1tsp baking powder
3-4tbsp milk
1tsp vanilla extract (I use flavouring so I used 2 tsps)
6 Reese's peanut butter cups or 1/2 Snickers Bar, chopped into small pieces


For the peanut butter frosting
200g peanut butter
170g icing sugar
150ml full-fat cream cheese


To decorate 
Reese's Peanut Butter cups or peanuts (I used 3 Reese's cups, chopped up)


1 - Preheat the oven to 170ºC/325ºF/Gas Mark 3.
2 - Put 18 Cupcake cases in the holes of 2 Yorkshire pudding or muffin tins
3 - Place the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl and beat with an electric whisk for around 5 minutes, or until pale and creamy.

4 - Whisk in the eggs, one by one. you may find the mixture curdles a little when you pop in your last egg but it should come together again when you add the flour.
5 - Sift over the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and stir in. Loosen the mixture with the milk and the vanilla extract. You want the batter to fall off the spoon easily - if you think it's too thick, add another tbsp on milk.

6 - Stir in the chopped Reese's Peanut Butter cups or Snickers. Divide the mixture between the cupcake cases and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until golden and cooked through. You can check this by sliding a skewer into the cake - if it comes out clean, they're done.

7 - Leave the cakes to cook in the tin for 10 minutes, then transfer them carefully to a wire rack to cool completely.

8 - To make the peanut butter frosting, beat the peanut butter with the icing sugar and cream cheese for a few minutes, or until smooth

There are no rules when it comes to icing a cupcake except to pile it on thick, so whether you want to use a knife or piping bag, give them some shape or make them smooth, the choice is yours. Decorate with chopped Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or peanuts.

Banana Wholemeal Muffins

I have an embarrassing confession - I can't bake muffins and cookies. And I know you're all thinking what all good muffin bakers say to me; 'Muffins are the easiest thing to make, you just put all the ingredients together and don't over stir!'. Yeah, yeah, I've heard it all before and I personally think that is all just a ginormous conspiracy to make me realise how inadequate a baker I am! Okay, so in actual fact I've only attempted muffins once before now so perhaps I judged myself to hastily. But I can make three-layer cakes dammit! I can't believe I was stumped by a silly orange muffin! (In case you're wondering what was wrong with it, it tasted good but was hard as a rock cake!). And I've only made cookies once too,  a very long time ago, and I can't even remember how bad they were but I'm going to go with very bad if I blocked it out of my memory - forgetting food is not something I do often!

On a related aside, when I worked at Penguin, there was this thing called a pulp shelf - basically, all Penguin books that weren't sold in book stores are returned to the publisher and it was cheaper to get rid of (pulp) them than it was to take them back to the warehouse and sort them out so our pulp shelves were stocked every day and we were allowed to take 2 books a day. That was probably the best perk of the job for a bookaholic like me! However, all the books usually went within 10 minutes of the shelves being stocked so luck played a part too. My friend Ben saw and took this book 'Muffin Bible' before I did but after some shameless begging, he let me have it on the condition that I bake them all muffins from the book - bet he regretted that when I brought in my chocolate orange rock cakes muffins! It's an amazing book with lots of different recipes that all look great! Now that I've made my first successful batch of muffins, I might give some of the others a go.

Say hello to my 'You're not a failure' muffins! I liked to think they are pretty healthy as they don't have much sugar (and what they do contain is brown) and they use wholemeal flour so I had them for breakfast for a week! They're not too sweet and were soft and fluffy, just like other people's muffins are! Yay me! And perhaps all those bakers are right, they were very easy to make ;p

Ingredients

2 ripe banana
1 egg
75g butter, melted
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup hot milk
1 1/2 cups wholemeal flour
2tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup sultanas

1 - Mash bananas and add egg, butter and baking soda dissolved in milk
2 - Add remaining ingredients and mix until just combined
3 - Three-quarters fill well-greased muffin pans and bake at 200ºC for 15-20 minutes.