Dad's Birthday cake

I said I would upload some pics of my dad's cake so here they are!

I followed a very simple recipe from delicious magazine for this chocolate fudge cake. I only own a small cake tin so I had lots of mixture left and decided to put it to good use and make some cupcakes with it. I added a few of them for decoration after dipping them in icing and coconut....yum! It tasted great, the only mistake i made was whisking the icing, it ended up as a ganache which actually turned out very well...phew! I'll stick to the original recipe next time and see how it turns out.

Here's how to do it:

Ingredients

100g spreadable butter, plus extra for greasing
250ml milk
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
100g plain chocolate, melted
15g cocoa powder, sifted
300g self-raising flour, sifted
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda, sifted
225g golden caster sugar
2 eggs
For the icing
225g plain chocolate, broken up
100g butter
142ml carton double cream

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/fan160C/gas 4. Grease a 20cm round, deep cake tin and line with baking paper. Mix the milk and vinegar. Place all the other cake ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Pour in the milk mixture and beat with an electric hand whisk, until smooth. Spread into the cake tin and bake for 1 hour, until firm in the centre. Cool for 10 minutes, then turn out on a rack to cool completely.
2. Meanwhile, make the icing. Melt the chocolate and butter together in the microwave for 3 minutes on medium, stirring halfway through. Alternatively, melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of just simmering water. Stir until smooth, then beat in the cream. Cool slightly.
3. Halve the cake through the middle. Spread a quarter of the icing on 1 half and sandwich together. Spread the rest over the top and sides.

The cake will keep for up to 3 days in an airtight box.

A model painter...

This is one of many haunting scenes created by artist Amy Bennet. She makes miniature 3D models with similar themes of loss, isolation and transition, then paints the story onto canvas. I think they are eerie and beautiful at the same time.

Yummy Jewellery

Hi readers, if there are in fact any of you out there!

I had a lovely weekend, its my Dad's birthday so I made him and my mum some fish pie and a chocolate fudge cake...delicious! Photo of the cake to follow as soon as I get organised!

The sun is shining today so I thought I'd put up some gorgeous, happy little images to reflect my mood.

These are examples of jewellery by Géraldine Klein, lots of beautiful things to look at on her site and you can buy them at very reasonable prices. They are perfect for foodies like myself!

Cupcakes

It was my sister's 25th birthday at the weekend and one of her favourite things is cupcakes, so being broke, i decided to bake a batch for her present. She loves the Magnolia Bakery in New York, we went there a couple of years ago but didn't make it to the bakery so I thought I would bring it to her!

Here is the recipe that I found online:

• CUPCAKES:

• 1 1/2 cups self-rising flour

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

• 2 cups sugar

• 4 large eggs, at room temperature

• 1 cup milk

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Line two 12-cup muffin tins with cupcake papers.

3. In a small bowl, combine the flours. Set aside.

4. In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugar gradually and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the dry ingredients in three parts, alternating with the milk and vanilla. With each addition, beat until the ingredients are incorporated but do not overbeat. Using a rubber spatula, scrape down the batter in the bowl to make sure the ingredients are well blended. Carefully spoon the batter into the cupcake liners, filling them about three-quarters full. Bake for 20–25 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of the cupcake comes out clean.

5. Cool the cupcakes in the tins for 15 minutes. Remove from the tins and cool completely on a wire rack before icing. At the bakery we ice the cupcakes with either Vanilla Buttercream or Chocolate Buttercream.

I cheated with the icing and bought some good quality buttercream icing and the used some red food colouring to get the candy pink colour.

They went down a treat!