New Make/Bake 38 - Carrot Cake Cupcakes

I have never made a carrot cake. I feel better now I have I have confessed this fact as it appears to be something which should be in every keen home bakers repertoire. I love carrot cake so it does seem odd that I have never attempted one.

I had been showing my boss some pictures of my cakes in the office and he asked if I was bringing cakes to the next team meeting. I guessed that he was hinting and asked if he had any requests. After some though he requested carrot cake, specifically with cream cheese frosting!

After much thought I decided to go for cupcakes, I wasn't sure if a cake would be enough for all of us and I found a lovely looking recipe on BBC Good Food for Carrot and Cream Cheese Cupcakes.

Makes 12

Ingredients

• 175g brown muscovado sugar
• 100g wholemeal self-raising flour
• 100g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp mixed spice
• zest 1 orange
• 2 eggs
• 150ml sunflower oil
• 200g carrots , grated
• orange coloured sprinkles , to decorate - I used Little Jelly Orange Slices

For the Icing

• 100g butter , softened
• 300g soft cheese
• 100g icing sugar , sifted
• 1 tsp vanilla extract 

Method

1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4 and line a 12-hole muffin tin with cases. In a large mixing bowl, mix the sugar, flours, bicarbonate of soda, mixed spice and orange zest. Whisk together the eggs and oil, then stir into the dry ingredients with the grated carrot. Divide the mixture between cases and bake for 20-22 mins until a skewer poked in comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack before icing.
2. For the icing, beat the butter until really soft, then beat in the soft cheese, icing sugar and vanilla. Use a palette or cutlery knife to swirl the icing on top of the cakes, then sprinkle with decorations. I piped my icing on using a large open nozzle which looked quite effective!

 Taken from BBC Good Food

I thought that for my very first attempt at Carrot cake, they were yummy - M wasn't impressed, apparently he thinks that carrot shouldn't go in cake - hmmm!

My work colleagues however felt otherwise thankfully and all 12 cupcakes went that morning, with some of them being taken home for partners to sample. I have even had a repeat order from my manager for a cake for his wedding anniversary - blog post coming soon :)

New Make/Bake 37 - Strawberry Cheesecake Cupcakes, Double Chocolate Fudge Cookies and Black and White Brownies

A few weekends ago it was M's birthday. It's traditional that you bring cakes into the office for your birthday and apparently the supermarket cakes just wouldn't cut it. Initially he just requested cupcakes, then he decided cookies as well would be nice, and then finally a few brownies, just for good measure! This along with his request for a Victoria Sponge cake meant I would be spending a good few hours in the kitchen to fulfil this order!

After I'd finished the sponge cake I started with the cupcakes. I had Strawberry Cheesecake Cupcakes (from the amazing Hummingbird Bakery)  made these before so not a true new make bake but for the first time I piped the cream cheese frosting, rather just scooping it on top. They taste amazing, so simple and effective, I think this is why the request came in for a repeat make/bake!

The next recipe I attempted was from Nigella's "How to be a Domestic Goddess". As I had purchased quite a bit of cream cheese (it was on offer, it would be rude to say no) I thought I'd try her "Black and White" brownies. It's basically a normal brownie mix (melted chocolate and butter) with flour and sugar,but you dollop in bits of cream cheese, it must be the full fat version, with brownies there is no point holding back!

These were my favourite - I'm a sucker for brownies and these were divine. So tasty and cream and very indulgent. One to be saved for special occasions!

The last thing I made was the Cookies. The was a recipe from "Cox, Cookies & Cakes" by Eric Lanlard and Patrick Cox. It was a basic cookie dough mix with cocoa and dark chocolate chunks. It was supposed to include toffee, however I had some fudge pieces which needed using so I swapped those instead. I look making cookies as they are so flexible and you can mix and match different ingredients according to what you have in the cupboard.

These were quite tasty! The fudge did melt a bit so they were crunchy in places but the added texture was quite nice.


 Feedback was very positive, I'm glad the workers enjoyed them so it was a very successful, if not slightly exhausting, day spent baking!

New Make/Bake 36 - Smoky bean, bacon & eggy bread bake

M loves comfort food, anything stodgy is always a winner for him. However he has been reluctant to try one of my personal favourite comfort foods, eggy bread, otherwise known as french toast. One of the best foods when served piping hot, and covered with cinnamon sugar and jam - yummy! Apparently he thinks it's weird and that egg shouldn't go with sweet things. To try and tempt him into trying it I decided to try and make a savoury eggy bread!

I found this recipe in one of the BBC Good Food mag and it looked very tasty - as always I had to give it a tweak!

Smoky bean, bacon & eggy bread bake

Serves 6

Ingredients

• 3 x 400g cans haricot bean , drained and rinsed- I only had 2 so I added a tin of Cannellin beans
• 500g passata
• ½ tbsp sweet smoked paprika
• 1 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 1 tbsp dark muscovado sugar
• 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 200g bacon lardons
• 5 eggs
• 125ml milk
• 10 slices white bread , crusts removed and halved to make triangles 
• 100g grated cheddar cheese ( comfort food is always better with cheese!)

 Method

1. Heat oven to 220C/200C fan/gas 7. Tip the beans into a large baking dish with the passata, paprika, vinegar, sugar and Worcestershire sauce. Season and mix well. Scatter the lardons over the top, cover with foil and bake for 30 mins.
2. Remove the beans from the oven, take off the foil and stir well. Return to the oven, uncovered, for 10 mins to crisp up the bacon. You can now cool and chill the beans for up to 2 days, or freeze for up to 3 months. Just defrost and warm through before continuing.
3. Whisk the eggs and milk with some seasoning. Dip the bread triangles into the egg mix, then layer them over the surface of the beans. Pour the rest of the egg over the bread, sprinkle with cheese and cook for 20 mins, or until the bread is puffed and the cheese is golden. 

M thought it was lovely, the beans perhaps needed a bit longer to soften as they had quite a bite to them. I also might play a bit more with the flavours as it wasn't a strong enough BBQ flavour which I think would have been lovely. I think eggy bread with jam is the next step :)

New Make/Bake 35 - Full English frittata

Apologies for a long delay of posts. I have been new make/baking but haven't had the time to blog - it's been a busy few weeks! Hopefully I'll catch up!

As part of a health kick I've been trying to eat tasty but lower calorie things - it's not going terribly well but now the sun appears to be here, I'm hoping salads and BBQ will be more common - hooray!

Here is one of the new recipes I tried - adapted from by favourite site

Full English frittata

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 2 low-fat sausages , sliced
• 4 rashers smoked bacon medallions, chopped
• 150g pack button mushrooms , halved, or larger ones quartered
• 8 egg whites - I'm not a fan of whites so I used whole 6 eggs instead
• 3 tbsp milk
• 140g cherry tomatoes , halved
• small bunch chives , snipped 

Method

1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Line a roasting tin about the size of A4 paper with enough baking parchment to cover the base and sides. Fry the sausages and bacon in a non-stick pan until golden, stirring them often to stop them sticking. Scoop into the tin.
2. Place the pan back on the heat and fry the mushrooms for about 5 mins until golden, then add these to the tray, too. Whisk the egg with the milk and lots of seasoning. Pour into the tin, then dot the tomatoes on top.
3. Bake in the oven for 20-25 mins, until set. Scatter the frittata with the chives and serve with salad (or the recipe suggested smoky beans which is a tin of baked beans and 1.5 tsp smoked paprika)

Make/Bake 34 - Beef Chow Mein and Sweet and Sticky Stir Fry Chicken

M won't eat Chinese food. It's not that he doesn't like it but apparently after every time he's tried it, he's felt really ill, which is quite off putting I can imagine. We have no idea what causes it and unsurprisingly he's not willing to try it much to test it out!

This problem  does cause a few grumbles as Chinese is probably one of my favourite foods so I only ever get to eat it on very rare occasions - booo. To compensate for this Ma greed to let me try a few home-made versions of dishes to see if they had the same effect and I'm very pleased to say that they don't - hooray!!!

I started off with simple stir-fries and found he liked Hoisin and Chow Mein sauce and also noodles and stir-fried veggies. I think made my own stir-fry sauces which were a big success. No pictures at the moment but my favourite is as follows:

Sweet and Sticky Stir Fry Chicken

Serves 2

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts cut into chunks
4 tsp cornflour
1 tbsp oil - I use rapeseed but any flavourless oil would do
2 tbsp Light Soy Sauce
2 tbsp Rice Vinegar
1 tbsp honey
1 packet of stir fry vegetables
 noodles or rice to serve

Method
1. Coat the chicken with the cornflour. Mix the Soy Sauce, Vinegar and Honey and set aside.
2. Heat the oil in a wok and then fry the chicken until it's golden brown.
3. Add the vegetables and cook for 3-4 minutes
4. Add the Soy mixture and cook for another 2-3 minutes until thickened and sticky.

 
To follow on from this success I decided to try another recipe from one of my favourite books - The Takeaway Secret. I've blogged about this book a few times, it's brilliant! The recipes are so spot on to some the the popular foods but better as they can be much healthier.

I decided to give the Beef Chow Mein a go as M likes beef and noodles. Personally I tend to prefer Chicken but after this I could be converted! Very tasty indeed and very simple and quick.

You marinade the beef in soy sauce, garlic powder, ginger powder and vegetable oil for five minutes then mix in cornflour and leave for 10 minutes. Whilst the meat rests you make the chow mein sauce by combining oyster sauce, soy sauce, chicken stock and cornflour.

Meanwhile cook egg noodles according to the packet (usually boil in water for 3-5 minutes) and then drain, rinse and toss with toasted sesame oil.

The meat is then lightly fried, until just brown and then set aside whilst you fry some garlic, ginger, sliced onion and bean sprouts for 2-3 minutes. You then add the noodles and beef and prepared sauce for another 2-3 minutes and then season with pepper and serve.

Yummy. M liked it so much he's requested it another night - success!