Baby announcement cupcakes and an easy buttercream recipe

My sister-in-law has had a baby girl! Yay! She will now be lost in the world of princesses, tiaras, dressing up and then later - handbags, shoes, jewellery etc. It's never-ending! My two daughters have recently taken an interest in nail polish, lord save me!

So before I get side-tracked.

My sister-in-law wanted to announce the birth of the baby in a thoughtful way. One which involves something that we share a common interest in.....Cupcakes! Once again - Yay!! Close family and friends would get a box of cupcakes with a tag announcing the birth. Erm....the final figure was 110 cupcakes in total. No pressure :-/

4 vanilla cupcakes and 2 raspberry cupcakes.

There was madness, there was mayhem. But the end product was worth it all!

The madness happened the night before when I received a text from my post-labour, still pregnancy hormonal and sleep-deprived sister-in-law. It read "It's all going wrong.".

We had decided to divide the baking of the cupcakes between us and bake them the night before. That meant 55 cupcakes each (I preferred to see it more as 2 large batches of cake mixture) and definately psychologically seemed more manageable.

My cupcakes were going well and stress-free. I rang my sister-in-law to find out what was going wrong. I wasn't prepared for what she was about to say - "Erm...I think I forgot to put margarine in the cupcake batter. The cupcakes seem quite dry."

(cough cough - ahem) LOL.

Then she says, " I think I forgot to give sugar in the other batch."

LOOOL!

Poor woman, I told her to go to bed!

 We had a good laugh about it and we both had made more than 55 each so it was fine. We had decided on the basic easy buttercream because we wanted something that would pipe well, easy to make and would last for a while.

More than anything, we had fun making these even though it was a very long and chaotic process and we can happily look back and laugh now.

The buttercream piped quite nicely and the trick was to get enough milk in there to give the buttercream icing the perfect, smooth consistency. There are a few different ratios out there for butter to icing sugar. I prefer the ratio of 1:2 so the icing sugar is double the weight of the butter because it's alot more smooth. And this is the one that you will find when you click down. 

See you soon xx

Easy buttercream icing  - makes 12 cupcakes

140g/5oz butter, softened
280g/10oz icing sugar
1-2 tbsp milk
1/2 tsp vanilla or chosen flavouring
few drops food colouring
Preparation method
1.Beat the butter in a large bowl until soft. Add half of the icing sugar and beat until smooth. Cover bowl with a tea towel or similar or you'll be in the middle of a cloud of icing sugar!!

2. Add the remaining icing sugar and one tablespoon of the milk and beat the mixture until creamy and smooth. Beat in some more milk, if necessary, to loosen the mixture.
3.Stir in the food colouring (optional) and flavouring until well combined.

Cheesecake Bars

Sincere apologies for the lengthy break, I didn't mean to. I did miss blogging while I was away.


The thing is, my grandma passed away. She was so dear to me, it still pains me now when I realise she's gone. Luckily we were all around her in her last moments and have had a share of her love and kindness. She really was one of a kind.


While I'm writing this, I cant help thinking about her love for a piece of sponge cake whilst still warm from the oven. Will be doing the victoria sponge cake post soon.

But now, for my first (fashionably late) entry of 2011, I bring you Strawberry-vanilla cheesecake bars which has been patiently waiting on my to-bake list for a while!

With a chocolate digestive crumb base, a creamy vanilla cheesecake filling and a ruby red strawberry jelly glaze, it was striking in a simple form.

These bars were made for a friend who had just returned from overseas and I knew she loved my sweet treats! I can confirm that they were well received and enjoyed by the recipient and her husband.

I chose to make a baked cheesecake so the filling would be more firmer. It was the safe option seeing that I would need to pour quite warm, if not hot, strawberry jelly on top.

The jelly didn't seep into the cheesecake filling, unlike all the nightmares I was imagining. It came out surprisingly quite well. Probably next time, I will play around with flavours and colours and maybe even try mini bites to put in cupcake cases but soo glad I can tick that off the list now, phew!

I'm back to blogging now so hope to catch up on all the blogs soon. xx 

Find the recipe after the jump

Daring Baker's December 2010 Challenge: Stollen Wreath

Didn't think I would like it....

I'm weird. I don't like raisins, sultanas or currants. I don't like candied peel either.

You probably guessed - I'm not a fruitcake person.

But there was loads of fellow Daring Bakers who don't like raisins! And there's me thinking I was a rare breed! And on the forum there were so many ideas flying around for ideas without the usual dried suspects and I was liking it!

I needed to take something in to my daughter's last week of nursery before the holidays. So the stollen seemed like the best idea. I decided to make a date, cranberry, marzipan and cinnamon stollen. I soaked the dates and cranberries in orange juice with some orange zest overnight with a cinnamon stick. It turned out very heavy once baked and quite dense :-(

But I brushed the melted butter on top and the several dustings of icing sugar hoping it will soften the stollen but it didn't unfortunately. I'm sure I followed the recipe but I was rushing things so I can't blame the recipe! I couldn't give that in to the teachers! Instead I went for the easy and chilled out route of a tin of chocolates. Bet they weren't expecting that from moi, Mrs WWW!

The next morning I must've woke up on the 'good' side of bed. I went downstairs and decided to saw into the stollen for breakfast. I used my Kitchen Devils serrated knife and managed to slice up nice thick, even slices. I then toasted them up golden brown and crisp.

I then buttered them well with salted butter to add flavour to the sweet bread. I had grated the marzipan into the stollen dough to have it distributed throughout the bread and you can see the flecks in the picture. I loved that touch.

And would you believe it?!!

It. Was. Absolutely. Gorgeous!

Seriously, I'm not even kidding. They were soooo delish.... I feel like lickin' my lips as I type...mmmm....

And the lovely icing top slightly caramelised accentuated the sweetness with the salted buttery gorgeousness.

I will be definitely be doing this again with different flavour variations and a thorough read of the recipe instructions.
I wont be adding the recipe below as it is quite lengthy but you can find the recipe in the link below with tips as well as seeing all the lovely and well-executed challenges from my fellow daring bakers.

CLICK HERE FOR THE DARING BAKERS CHALLENGE STOLLEN RECIPE

Chocolate and Hazelnut Sandwich cookies

About time, right?

My sincere apologies for not blogging for 3 whole weeks, truth is I thought it had only been just past one week since I wrote the Daring Baker's Crostata post.

But I'm gonna make it up to you right now. I sure am! Have a look at these.....:

I present to you Hazelnut Sandwich Cookies!

I found this recipe at a blog by the lovely Allison called Dolcetto Confections, all her posts are simply drool-worthy but once I saw the post on the Hazelnut cookies, I knew I just had to try it! So many reasons for wanting to try them now:

1. It's very cold outside, the best way to relax at home is a nice cup of coffee and a nutty chocolate cookie

2. they look so pretty when given as a gift, with a few being held together with ribbon

3. And the time was right because I was going to visit a friend the next day.

I wasn't wrong. Because I tried one.

They were so noticeably aromatic, the nutty smell was so perfect, so right...mmmmm....

I sooo could've had another one. But I didnt.

Well not then anyway because I was yet to sandwich them with the hazelnut-chocolate filling. Not that they need sandwiching, these cookies are just so scrummy all on their own!

And how was it? I hear you ask. It was the perfect combination. I mean you can ask anyone, even a stranger on the street (I would suggest you don't ask a stranger on the street) and they would tell you that hazelnut and chocolate go together like how salt and pepper go together, how cheese and tomato go together, how Laurel and Hardy go together - one always complements the other.

Mr WWW prefered them before they were sandwiched but he's not a sweet person (ppor guy, doesn't know what he's missing!). They were really delicious and would be well received by any sweet-loving person. My friend loved them and I would certainly have a stash of these in my kitchen all the time if I could.

Talking about cookies in the kitchen, if I listen really really carefully I can hear the stash of hazelnut cookies that are in my biscuit tin right now calling me..... Must dash!

Make sure to try these gorgeous cookies. xx