Movie Night Cupcakes

These cupcakes were actually designed with Eurovision in mind. For those of you who are oblivious to this annual event, Eurovision is a pop competition where each country in Europe enters their 'best' pop act, the more zany their attire the better, and at the end of the final every country tallies up their respective (politically biased) results in order to select a winner. England is notoriously unpopular, and famously received zero votes a few years ago. As I say, the votes are very biased, and many countries vote for their neighbours or allies. England apparently has no friends in political Europe, though because the winning country has to host the event the following year, a friend of mine joked that maybe we'll get more votes this year because nobody wants to have to pay for it.

Anyway, the main draw of the event is the vast array of song choices and the outfits that the performers wear. I've not watched Eurovision for a few years because it's no fun watching it alone and mocking to yourself, but this year I'm lucky enough to have found some equally enthusiastic friends to sit and watch the event with.

So, onto the cupcakes. These are chocolate cupcakes, filled with salted caramel (recipe adapted from BBC Food) and topped with chocolate buttercream and popcorn. I had entertained the idea of putting popcorn into the cake mixture too, but I didn't think the texture would work very well. I got the idea for incorporating popcorn into baked goods when I saw this recipe for Popcorn Cookies from Pink Patisserie, and then the idea for these diet-ruining monstrosities slowly came at me like a tsunami on my mind. Don't get me wrong -  these taste incredible, but it is hard to stop at one!

Makes 12
Ingredients
For the cakes

• 200g Caster Sugar
• 200g Butter
• 3 Eggs
• 150g Plain Flour
• 50g Cocoa Powder
• 1 Tsp Baking Powder
• 50mL Milk

For the salted caramel

• 100mL Double Cream
• 75g Dark Muscovado Sugar
• 2 Tsp Salt

For the chocolate buttercream

• 400g Icing Sugar
• 100g Cocoa Powder
• 150g Butter
• 2 Tbsp Milk
• 25g Sweetened or Plain Popcorn

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan and line a cupcake tray with cupcake cases.
• To make the cakes: cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, then beat in the eggs until smooth. Sieve the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder into the batter and fold in. Fold in enough milk to give a soft dropping consistency. Divide the batter between the cupcake cases and bake in the oven for 22 mins, or until a skewer comes out clean. Place on a wire rack to cool.
• To make the salted caramel, place the muscovado sugar in a heavy-bottomed pan and cover with cold water. Heat on a low heat until the sugar has melted and is bubbling, then leave for another 2 minutes. Remove from the heat and slowly whisk in the cream. Return to the heat and whisk until it starts to simmer, then remove from the heat and leave to cool. Whisk in the salt. 
• To make the chocolate buttercream, place the icing sugar, cocoa powder and butter in a mixing bowl and whisk until well combined. Add the milk, then whisk for another 2 minutes.
• To assemble the cupcakes, place the salted caramel in a piping bag that has been fitted with a small nozzle, then insert the nozzle into the cupcake's centre and squeeze some of the salted caramel into it. use a second piping bag filled with the chocolate buttercream to ice the top, then decorate with the popcorn.

You can reduce the impact of these cupcakes on your waistline, as I did, by using low fat cream, butter and sugar substitutes like Truvia or fruit sugar. Take a look at Healthy(ish) Baking to find out more.

Ginger & Limoncello Bites

Today is my mum's birthday. Though I'm at the opposite end of the country to her, I sent a parcel containing a bottle of wine from my travels in Southern France and a bag of these Ginger & Limoncello Bites.

My mum doesn't have the biggest sweet tooth, but she does enjoy the occasional treat. One of her favourite flavours is ginger, so I knew I had to base her present around that. Both she and my grandad are very big fans of limoncello - she went on a trip to Italy a few years ago and came back raving about the stuff. My grandad had memories of limoncello from his days serving in Italy in World War II, and didn't know that it was available in the UK until about two years ago. I'm sure he was happy to revisit this flavourful spirit after such a long time.

Personally, I am not the biggest fan of limoncello as a beverage, but I do enjoy the flavour that it imparts to baked goods. Before packaging up these Ginger & Limoncello bites I might have tried one or two, and can confirm that they taste very good. The limoncello's flavour takes a bit of a back seat to the ginger, but the two compliment each other nicely.

The theme for this month's Baking With Spirit challenge is limoncello, so this is my entry. For those of you unfamiliar with the challenge, Baking With Spirit is a monthly challenge run by me where every month a type of alcohol is chosen. The challenge is then to try and bake with it. All of the entries are included in a round-up at the end of the month, so it's a great way to expose your blog to new readers. There are two weeks left to enter the challenge, so if you think you might want to take part there's still time!

Makes 18
Ingredients

• 3 Pieces Crystallised Ginger
• 100g Butter
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 100g Plain Flour
• 1 Egg
• 50g Icing Sugar
• 20mL Limoncello

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan and line two baking trays with baking parchment.
• Cream the butter and sugar together until smooth, then beat in the egg.
• Finely chop the crystallised ginger, then stir into the batter.
• Stir in the flour to form a dough.
• Pull small pieces off the dough and place on the baking parchment. You can use your fingers to give them a more uniform shape.
• Bake in the oven for 10-12 minutes, or until the bites are starting to brown.
• Transfer the bites to a wire rack and allow to cool completely.
• Put the icing sugar in a bowl and stir in the limoncello. The icing should be fairly liquid.
• Place a piece of baking parchment underneath the wire rack, then use a teaspoon to drizzle the icing over the Ginger Bites.
• Allow to set completely before serving.

Chocolate Dipped Mango Cookies

Juicy mangoes and bitter dark chocolate are not something that I would think to pair together, but sometimes the most unlikely matches are the best kind. This month's We Should Cocoa, hosted by Shaheen at Allotment 2 Kitchen (though the challenge was created by Choclette at Chocolate Log Blog and Chele at Chocolate Teapot) is all about pairing chocolate and mangoes. Though I've failed a couple of times this year already, this is the one challenge I try to enter every month, so I took a leap of faith that Shaheen knew what she was doing when she set the challenge.

                   

Luckily, Shaheen was correct. I decided to used dried mango in these cookies because mangoes are so moist and I didn't want them to end up too soft. I don't often cook with dark chocolate, but it worked very well here in contrast with the sweet pieces of dried mango. Rather than chop the chocolate into the cookies, I decided to dip them into it. This was partly to shake things up a bit, and partly because it looked more interesting.

These are very moreish, and would make a good snack or post-lunch treat. I think the dark chocolate could be exchanged for milk, but white might be too sweet.

Makes 8

Ingredients

• 100g Plain Flour
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 100g Butter
• 1 Egg
• 80g Dried Mango
• 80g Dark Chocolate

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan, and line two baking trays with parchment paper.
• Finely chop the mango, or use scissors to cut it into small pieces. Place it to one side.
• Cream the butter and sugar together, then beat in the egg.
• Stir in the mango pieces, followed by the flour to form a sticky dough.
• Use a tablespoon to measure out chunks of the dough, placing them onto the parchment paper. Use the back of the spoon to flatten the dough.
• Bake in the oven for 15 minutes, or until the cookies are just starting to firm up. Place on a wire rack to cool.
• Melt the chocolate by breaking it up into small chunks and placing them in a microwaveable bowl. Put the bowl in the microwave for 30 seconds at a time, stirring in between.
• Dip the cookies into the chocolate, using a teaspoon to help cover the sides. Place the cookies back onto the wire rack, placing a sheet of parchment paper underneath to catch any excess chocolate.
• Leave the cookies until the chocolate has set.

I'm posting something special on Wednesday because it's my mum's birthday, so make sure you check back then!

Lemon & Blueberry Bars

I've had my eye on these Lemon Blueberry Bars from Two Peas And Their Pod (a great blog which is worth checking out, especially for the sheer variety of cookies) for quite some time, and since the blueberries sitting in my freezer were begging to be used up, I decided that this weekend I have a go at adapting it for my kitchen.

I've seen a fair few varieties of lemon bar swirling through the blogosphere, but this post caught my attention because of the blueberries studded through it. Lemons and blueberries make a knockout combination (check out this cake from Sweetapolita if you don't believe me), so they gave the recipe a greater pull than the traditional lemon bar.

Originally, I was going to make a limoncello sauce of some kind and drizzle it over the top, but my search for mini bottles in the local market proved unsuccessful, and I'm not really in a financial position to buy an entire bottle. A quiet fear is slowly taking grasp of my heart as, despite applying to them since September, I don't a job lined up yet despite graduating in just over two months, my tenancy runs out the day after graduation so I either must find a job by then or move back in with my parents. Though they are lovely and I'm sure wouldn't mind too much, I need my independence so I'm clinging to every coin I can earn until I find something.

Actually, while we're off topic, I have a story that should act as a lesson to all recruiters. I got a call on Thursday asking if I could do a phone interview the next day for a one year placement. Cue excitement about potential imminent employment. The next day, one minute into the interview, the interviewer suddenly realised that I'm a soon-to-be graduate and not a second year undergraduate. He promptly ended the interview and said he'd pass my details onto the graduate team. Cue crushing disappointment. I know I wouldn't have necessary got the job, but this was the first interview I'd been given in months and to have it snatched away was disenchanting to say the least. So, if any recruiters are reading this, make sure check the candidate is suitable for the role before offering them an interview!

Anyway, back onto the topic of these Lemon & Blueberry bars, when I decided that using limoncello was out of the window I thought it might be fun to try the bruléed method used by Annalise at Completely Delicious on her Brûléed Meyer Lemon Bars. It turned out, though, that the bars looked so good when they came out of the oven that any topping at all was unnecessary. The only slight flaw is that the volume of blueberries makes the bars a bit crumbly, so next time I would like to increase the volume of the lemon filling.These are definitely worth a try though, and would go brilliantly with a hot summer day.

Makes 6
Ingredients

• 3 Lemons
• 397g Can Sweetened Condensed Milk
• 125g Oat Biscuits (like Hobnobs)
• 25g Butter
• 3 Egg Yolks
• 225g Frozen Blueberries (approx 125g fresh)

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 200C/180C and line a 9in x 9in cake pan
• If you have a food processor, blend the biscuits until fine, add the butter and blend until well combined. If you don't, put the biscuits in a bag and use a rolling pin to bash until fine. Melt the butter in a pan and then stir into the biscuits.
• Press the biscuits into the cake pan using the back of a wooden spoon, then place in the fridge until needed.
• Empty the can of condensed milk into a saucepan, then add the egg yolks.
• Grate the zest of the lemons into the saucepan, then slice them in half and hold them over a sieve whilst squeezing their juice into the saucepan (the sieve catches the seeds).
• Set the pan over a low heat and stir continuously until the mixture starts to simmer. Remove from the heat and stir in the frozen blueberries.
• Pour the lemon and blueberry mixture on top of the biscuit base in the cake tin, then place in the oven and bake for 30 minutes, or until set.
• Allow to cool completely before placing in the fridge overnight, then slice into nine.

Ok, I admit it, I ate a couple of slices before placing the remaining bars in the fridge overnight.

Baking With Spirit: The May Challenge

Recently my Chinese housemate and I were discussing the bad weather we'd been having. She's not used to UK weather so she asked me when the good weather starts - I told her May. She then asked when the good weather ends... I told her May.

Now that we've entered the one and only guaranteed sunshine month of the year in the UK, I thought it was appropriate to bring out a sunshine-filled challenge. I even googled 'alcoholic sunshine in a bottle'. When it popped up, I wondered how I hadn't thought of it myself, as both my mother and my late grandfather are known for being keen on it.

This month's challenge is limoncello.

I'm quite excited about this, as lemon flavours can be paired with many things. Get your talented minds whirring! Here's a basic set of the rules, but a more complex version can be found here.

• Bake something containing raspberry liqueur, blog about it and email the link to cakeoftheweek@hotmail.co.uk
• The deadline is midnight GMT on 28th April
• If you're on twitter you can tweet me with your post @CakeOfTheWeek and I will retweet you.

I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone comes up with.

Baking With Spirit: The Raspberry Liqueur Round Up

This month's challenge was to bake with raspberry liqueur and, as always, I've had some very tasty looking entries. My plan was that if we used something summery it would entice the weather to warm up a little, and I think we've been successful! Let's take a look at what these talented bloggers have made, shall we?

Caroline at Caroline Makes... made this intriguing Chocolate Mousse With Chambord Black Raspberry  Liqueur With Bols Foam. I've never heard of Bols foam before but it looks pretty exciting, and chocolate mousse flavoured with raspberry liqueur must taste superb.

Though it was originally intended to be a pavlova, Craig's Accidental Raspberry Eton Mess over at The Usual Saucepans had me drooling. He made the Eton Mess with a home-made raspberry liqueur of sorts, using gin to make a sauce. Sounds good to me!

Next, I made these Honey Cupcakes with Raspberry Liqueur Icing. Unfortunately the icing split a little bit from the quantity of liquid added, but they still tasted pretty good.

Finally, the lovely Ellen at Bake It With Booze made these pretty Raspberry Amaretto Mini Cheesecakes. She made her own raspberry puree using the liqueur and swirled it into the cheesecake. I think I would have trouble sticking to just one of these!

A big thank you to all of you who took part! Check back tomorrow to find out the challenge for May.

Campfire Cake

In the UK it may not be traditional to pair marshmallows with chocolate and biscuits to make s'mores, but for the purposes of this cake let's just say we do. In the heat of a self-imposed sugar ban, my sugar deprived mind started whirring, and the concept of this monster of a cake was born.

As with most cakes that I plan for a while before actually making, in the beginning this cake was no more than a vague idea for something involving marshmallow fluff and chocolate buttercream, but over the past few weeks the idea developed: the marshmallow fluff would be toasted for the toasted marshmallow campfire feeling; I would use probably the best chocolate icing ever, chocolate French buttercream; the cake would be a chocolate cake.

Finally, yesterday I made it. Campfire Cake is nine inches and three layers of chocolate cake, sandwiched with toasted marshmallow fluff, chocolate French buttercream and mini marshmallow, then smothered in more chocolate buttercream and piled with more mini marshmallows. I told you it was a beast!

Beasty as it is, I had some help in reducing the sugar high you might expect after eating something like this using Truvia Baking Blend*. I've been a big fan of Truvia, which is a calorie free sweetener made from the stevia leaf, ever since I was sent some to sample last summer. Sugar plays an important role in baking though, so Truvia Baking Blend combines the sweetener and traditional cane sugar so that the structure of your cake won't be compromised in exchange for looking after yourself. It worked really well in this cake, and I can't taste any difference to a normal cake. The packaging even comes with a handy conversion chart; because Truvia is three times sweeter than cane sugar, you don't need to use as much as you normally would.

This would make a great cake for parties, and could even be served at a summer barbequeue in homage to its name sake. If you'd rather use cane sugar, just substitute 200g caster sugar for the Truvia. The cake make look great, but it doesn't take very long to make. While the cake bakes you can make the icing, then all you have to do is wait for the cake to cool before you decorate it.

Ingredients
For the cake

• 200g Butter
• 150g Plain Flour
• 50g Cocoa Powder
• 100g Truvia Baking Blend
• 1 Tsp Baking Powder
• 3 Eggs
• 50mL Milk

For the chocolate French buttercream

• 12 Egg Yolks
• 120g Caster Sugar
• 250g Good Quality Butter
• 50g Cocoa Powder

• 1 Tub Marshmallow Fluff (Approx 200g)
• 1 Packet Mini Marshmallows

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 160C/140C fan and line three 9" cake tins with baking parchment.
• To make the cake, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time until the mixture is smooth.
• Sieve the flour, baking powder and cocoa powder into the cake batter and fold in until well combined. 
• Add enough milk to give a soft dropping consistency, then divide the batter between the cake tins and bake in the oven for 22 mins, or until a skewer comes out clean.
• Meanwhile make the French buttercream: prepare a bain marie or 'double boiler' by placing a bowl over a saucepan filled with a small amount of hot water. Make sure that the bottom of the bowl doesn't touch the water.
• Place the egg yolks and sugar in the bowl and place the saucepan over a medium heat. Whisk the egg yolks constantly with a fork until they start to steam, then pour them into a mixing bowl.
• Whisk the yolk mixture with an electric whisk until it doubles in size.
• Chop the butter into small cubes and place into a microwaveable bowl. Microwave on the defrost setting, checking every 30 seconds until the chunks are soft enough that they can be cut in half without applying any pressure to a knife.
• Whisk the cubes of butter, one at a time, into the egg yolk mixture until it is thick and glossy.
• Add the cocoa powder and whisk until well combined.
• Transfer the marshmallow fluff to a heatproof mixing bowl, and place under a grill that has been preheated to a medium heat. Let the fluff brown, then remove it and stir before placing back under the grill. Repeat this a few more times, until the marshmallow fluff tastes like toasted marshmallows (yes, you'll have to taste some...)
• Once the cakes have completely cooled, place one on your serving dish and smear half of the marshmallow fluff over the top. Follow with the buttercream, then sprinkle with mini marshmallows before placing another of the cakes on top. Repeat the process. 
• Once the third cake is on top, smooth the buttercream over the top and sides in a thick layer. Pile the marshmallows on top (I take a handful, then hold them in both hands. I then move my hands close to the centre of the cake and open them from the bottom so that the marshmallows have no choice but to pile up.)

My one problem with this cake is that the marshmallow fluff did not live up to expectations. Next time I think I'll just use regular marshmallows, as they will keep their thickness and will take up a better toasted flavour.

I've got fruity plans for next week - you'll have to tune in to find out what I have in store!

*I was sent some Truvia Baking Blend to test out, but all views are my own.