Valentines day, another excuse to bake away

I am not a very big fan of valentines day, in fact I could make a whole blog post on what I think of valentines day but I shan't  The reason I wont is because despite valentines day being one of the most pointless day of the year, in my opinion, however it does give me a chance to bake lots and lots and lots.

The First cake, well cupcakes that I choose to make where these raspberry and chocolate cupcakes, with a gooey raspberry filling. Let me just tell you how much I cant wait to indulge in these cupcakes tomorrow and nor can my friends! This recipe is the humming birds chocolate cup cake recipe however I added the raspberry jam center to give them a more valentines day feel. The icing is chocolate cream cheese frosting topped with a raspberry on top...nom nom nom.

The second, were these chocolaty cupcakes. The same recipe as before but without the raspberry jam center. The icing is a pink cream cheese frosting and if that isn't good enough I also topped them with chocolate chips. So here's to valentines day,another excuse to bake away!

The day of the panckaes

Two Eggs, 250g of flour and 500ml of milk managed to take over the nation this pancake day. Along with their trusty Chocolate spread, lemons, sugar and jam this day is really the day of the pancakes.

Me exaggerating? Maybe a little. But it is the a day where we can really appreciate a simple recipe with many different toppings and let me just tell you I sure did make the most of pancake day. My pancakes got drowned in virtually any sauce possible but hay ho it is the day of the pancakes after all.

An Apology With Tart

I would like to say sorry for not blogging recently. It has been very stressful with school lately as exams are coming up (I'm 15) and it is hard to keep on top off blogging. However I would like to apologies with this apple tart I made today.

This tart does look very complicated, I must admit when I saw it in Jamie's magazine I gulped. Yet being me I thought I would give it a try. Surprisingly it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. You just have to make sure that you slice the apples thin enough so that they can fold without snapping in the center and so that they cook through. A tip with this recipe is to put the apples in lemon once cut as this stopped them from going brown. You should also keep the skin on as the recipe said to peel it but I thought it would looking more appealing with the skin on, but go with whatever floats your boat.

I have been writing this blog post whilst eating a slice of this apple tart....Now I have reached the end of this post and I still have a full slice...my second slice but shh don't tell.

The little ginger house

As it is very nearly Christmas, today I thought I would have a go at making a gingerbread house as I have never made one before. I wouldn't be exaggerating if I told you it was very time consuming and although fun to decorate the construction was a living nightmare! Never the less I persevered through all the times that my roof would slide of the top of the little ginger house, one of my sides even broke in half so I had to make a new one at the last minute!

After all this my apron  was left covered in white icing and the kitchen was a tip however the little ginger house wasn't half bad in the end. And looking at it now I can tell you it is holding out well and hasn't yet fallen apart! The hardest part of this baking experience is yet to come! Trying not to nibble at it for a day till Christmas day! That would really be a Christmas miracle if it lasts un-touched in my house for a whole day.

An apple a day keeps the doctor away?

I decided that I wanted to make an apple crumble however I did not know a recipe for apple crumble at the time so I decided to improvise and hope for the best.

Luckily everyone in my family loved them! Although I was guttered that we didn't have any eggs so I couldn't make a homemade custard to go with it. Never the less it tasted just fine, well judging by the empty plates anyway.

The recipe for this apple crumble was as follows:

Ingredients:
For the crumble:
150g Rolled Oats (Blitz till fine)
150g Breadcrumbs (I blitz a loaf of fresh wholemeal bread until it resembled breadcrumbs)
150g Butter (Cold from the fridge, diced)
100g Soft Brown Sugar
1-2tsp Ground Cinnamon
A pinch of grated Nutmeg
For the apple filling:
750g Apples (peeled, cored and cut into chunks)
4tbsp Soft Brown Sugar
A squeeze of Orange Juice

1) Preheat the oven to gas mark 5.
2) Firstly to make the crumble topping put all the ingredients into a bowl, excluding the butter and mix till well combined.
3) Add the diced butter to the dry ingredients and using your fingertips blend the ingredients together until it resembles quite large looking breadcrumbs.
4) Set aside until needed.
5) For the apple filling put the apples, sugar, orange juice and the butter into a saucepan and stirring occasionally leave the apples to soften for 5 minutes.
6) In a shallow dish pour the apple mixture inside, get your crumble topping and spread evenly over the top.
7) Bake for 40-45 minutes.
8) Best enjoyed whilst hot.

I included step 8 (best enjoyed whilst hot) because this is very true, it feels so much like comfort food when eating it pipping hot with a mug of warm milk, mmmmmm yum.  However it is still nice the next day, I recommend that you re-heat it as believe me, when it is pipping hot it is very very scrummy. And if the saying an apple a day keeps the doctor away then I will defiantly be making this more often (yes it doesn't count) But I can use that as an excuse for baking apple crumble frequently, cant I?

Its beginning to smell a lot like mince pies

At long last the best 25 days of the year has arrived for baking. I have been waiting to bake lots of Christmasy goods, but have been holding back till the 1st December. FINALLY this day has arrived and I have been able to make one of the many cakes and bakes on my list of cakes and bakes to make in the next 25- 24 days not including Christmas, although I will probably be baking something even then!

From my very long list of things to bake I picked to bake mince pies first as they are a classic after all and everyone in my family loves them. The recipe I settled on was Jamie Olivers' mince pie recipe. It suggested that I add marzipan into the filling and I will defiantly try that next time. However even without the marzipan these mince pies went down a storm in my house. I can now honestly say that its beginning to smell a lot like mince pies in my house. Is it in yours?

The shortbread for the millionaires?

Millionaires shortbread? Why is it called millionaires shortbread? I asked myself whilst looking at Mary Berry's  recipe for this particular baked good. However as I looked at the photo of the crumbly shortbread topped with a gooey looking creamy fudge like topping finished with a layer of melted chocolate my question was answered.

To my surprise we had all the ingredients to make the millionaires shortbread in the house-it must have been destiny. Once I had proceeded on to make this recipe I had found it extremely hard to resist eating the fudge like mixture and the melted chocolate straight from the pan-I'd even go as far as to say that it could be considered torture to some-however I managed to resist; Once I took the millionaires shortbread out of the fridge I cut it into pieces and as I did so I heard the crisp snap of the chocolate and the squelch of the fudge like center. I then delegated a slice to myself immediately.

They were very scrummy however I still don't know if they really are 'millionaires standard' but lets just put it this way; If I was a millionaire I would be more than satisfied if someone was to present these to me.