Tag: baking

05Dec

Whisky and caramel cake bites

I will very rarely admit defeat when it comes to recipes. In the last few months I have developed a couple of cake recipes, baked them and failed them. Eventually I got the ingredients and methods rights but that meant a few flat, mushy attempts had to be foiled up and sent to the cake morgue, a.k.a. my bottom freezer drawer. The morgue was getting really packed and this was causing marital tensions. My husband is a minimalist when it comes to storage of any kind. So what’s a girl to do with all this cake? Cake pops, naturally.  Bad idea. I watched dozens of videos, researched what was the best brand of candy melts and was the biggest visitor to Bakerella’s site last month. And yet they were a complete failure. I wanted to make something special for my nephews birthday and it went catastrophically bad, to the point I was covered in yellow candy melt, ferociously throwing away all of the jelly tots cut out in the shape of pooh’s ears. And the question remained…what to do with all this cake? Cake pops’s closest (and low maintenance) relative, cake bites. And a grown up one at that.Maybe good
2 mins read
1141 Views
27Sep

Chocolate yoghurt cake

It has been more than a month since my last post. It was not planned – I said I was going to do a whole month of Brazilian food to celebrate the Olympics – but it did not turned out that way.  After a break in Cornwall and then a string of family members coming over to stay, it felt like I left life up in the air, and when I arrived back home it all came crashing down. You know, piles of unopened letters, cleaning to do, I couldn’t even start to think about recipes for the blog. In fact this has been the first week in a whole month that I have opened my computer. Then I don’t know why but amidst the chaos I decided to make one of my least favourite baking recipes: cake. I am cake’s biggest fan, just have a look at my Pinterest page and you will see beautiful cakes, frosted like a sculpture, with the perfect rise and colour. I dream of emulating that, however this is rare as I am by nature a chaotic cook. But baking cakes is almost like a science, you need to do things by the book.
3 mins read
931 Views
24May

Blueberry muffins with lime streusel

When people ask if I have a hobby I answer “baking”. Sounds like a cop out but I really don’t have the want to put my time into much else. My husband is a diver, which is a genuine hobby in my eyes, and one that requires you to have genuinely expensive equipment. Sure, the type of diving equipment you buy can make a life or death difference, but I have argued with his diver friends that baking trumps diving when it comes to cost. Obviously they rolled on the floor laughing after I said that, but until you become a serious baker, you’ll never understand how expensive it is to trial new recipes. Sure you can eat the products of your hobby, but all the testing I have done recently makes my freezer look like a cake morgue. In this muffin recipe I like to lightly poke the blueberries, I find this is a nice trick so that your blueberries don’t sick to the bottom. This recipe developed from a cherry cheesecake muffin that ended up exploding in my oven (currently in the freezer). Don’t you agree baking can beat many other hobbies in the money stakes? Blueberry muffin
3 mins read
818 Views
06May

Applesauce banana loaf [Dairy Free]

I am sitting here trying to describe how I have been feeling in these last few days. Tired is the first adjective that comes to mind. At first I thought the word was so salient in my mind because of how the physical side of my job had left me sore in my legs and arms, with 5 am starts thrown in the mix too.  The first course of action for me to counteract this was to dive into a diet of spirulina smoothies and sugar free snacks. The food has given me an energy boost, but on my days off I can’t shake off the wanna-be-in-bed-all-day feeling, so I had to think a little harder about what else I was be doing wrong. Thinking being the key word here, I was in my head too much. I have an emotional job, where you make decisions about people’s lives, and that is something that can be highly rewarding at times, but on the other hands it makes me over analyse every decision I make. It leads to a very judgemental cycle in my head and by the time i get home I am in this deep emotional pit, no one can rescue
3 mins read
898 Views
28Jan

Harissa wholemeal loaf {Dairy free}

My grandmother always told me winter is not a good time to bake bread. Yeast don’t like cold, that’s what she used to say to me.  She is right, bread struggles to prove during the winter but the trick with this wholemeal loaf is to prove the loaf next to the radiator, covered in a damp cloth. So thank God for central heating, eh? This loaf was born from a flat bread recipe that did not go so well but proved itself to be a great loaf in the end! This is a triple tested recipe. In fact more than triple because it has become a favourite around the house. It’s inexpensive to make (I am sure most people have the ingredients ready in their cupboard) and as a rookie bread-maker this worked out way better than I expected. Plus is dairy free for all of you not-so-lactose-friendly people! A toasted slice of this spicy loaf topped with a good lashing of butter will put a smile on anyone’s face, believe me, even if the weather outside proves unpalatable. I have tried to make a whole 700g loaf and also by dividing it into two small loaf tins, it bakes quicker and there’s
3 mins read
752 Views
12Nov

Briochettes with toasted coconut

This attempt to make a nice brioche was inspired by my early days in England, when me and my family were still wide-eyed about all the new things around us. Back on those days my mum used to go to Aldi, a famous low-budget supermarket in Europe where you can find anything from baked beans to venison. She religiously brought home every week brioche rolls that had crème patisserie  swirled in them and were topped with icing sugar. It was heaven. Back in those days I had very little to look forward to, I hated school I had left all my mates back in Brazil and was struggling to express myself in a foreign language so I have very little cheerful memories from those first months in England.That brioche is one of my earliest happy memories. Now brace yourselves because this is a messy recipe. Clear your kitchen surfaces of clutter, have your flour ready and your butter cubbed (maybe get a minder for your kids and husband) because halfway through it you will have a ”oh my goodness!” moment but it is perfectly normal, know it will be alright. I have made this recipe six times and have adapted it slightly
4 mins read
1040 Views