Chocolate treats

For a birthday treat last month, I baked a yummy chocolate cake.  It is my usual go to chocolate cake recipe which always makes a moist cake that keeps well (not that it has much chance to!).  I decided to break with tradition and have a Cadbury's Flake on the top, rather than Chocolate Buttons.  It was delicious and didn't last long!

I follow Rebecca at Railway Cottage on Youtube and she has been trying a WWII diet.  She provided a recipe for Crumb Fudge which uses dry breadcrumbs mixed with margarine, cocoa powder, sugar and golden syrup.  This mix was one Mum always used with Cornflakes to make us Cornflake cakes for parties.  I think I may have had too many breadcrumbs as the base is a bit dry, not soft and squidgy as it should be.  I had some left over chocolate so topped the 'fudge' with it.  It is a recipe I will try again (great use for left over bread) but with fewer breadcrumbs this time!

It does taste good, but best eaten accompanied by a cup of tea!

12 Days of Christmas Swap - the results!

 The Twelve Days of Christmas have some to an end and so has the swap, organised by Jo at Through the Keyhole.  I was partnered up with Sally at Crafty Northerner.  We did the usual checking each other's blogs and emailing to find out particular likes and dislikes and then got making, buying, wrapping and posting.  I really enjoyed this swap and received some wonderful gifts.

 A week planner and pencil; snowman socks; Star Baker notebook (perfect for special recipes), hundreds and thousands and a cake fridge magnet; heart ribbon and Christmas baubles ribbon.

 Then there was: a bag of glass beads; some gorgeous red and white Scandi inspired material; The Miniaturist novel; a red bead bracelet.

 The final four gifts were: a bag of assorted pretty buttons and a crocheted star brooch; a felt Christmas tree decoration; magnetic pegs; some luxurious glitter paper.  Didn't I do well?  Sally managed this despite having a house for sale and getting sorted, so a HUGE thank you goes to her!

It's interesting how similar some of the things we sent were. Sally told me she liked flamingos, blue, making cards and baking, so off I went...  I sent her a little pack of papers and card making bits and pieces; some ribbon; some magnets and magnet pegs; a notebook with a flamingo painted on it; a set of Christmas cake cases with some chocs, a blue bracelet; a pair of earrings; a blue keyring; some pens; a felt star decoration; flamingo bunting and a cuddly flamingo (yes, there was a little bit of a theme!)

I was especially pleased to have been able to find the different flamingo material and Chris liked the finished bunting, suggesting that we should have some for us as well!
Many thanks go to Jo for doing all the organising (I really hope she'll run the swap again next year because it was lovely to put together all the gifts and made Christmas last just that little bit longer) and also to Sally for being such a great swap partner.

Lavender Shortbread

 I have had some lovely blog swaps this year and you may remember I received a lavender shortbread mix in my 'From My Home to Yours' swap from Emma in Jersey. Chris not so subtly reminded me that I hadn't made the shortbread, so I thought I should get on with it.

However, I was a little nervous as I remembered Norman's lavender meringue (photo from telegraph.co.uk) from this year's Great British Bake Off and I hoped that the lavender flavouring wouldn't be quite so strident as that.  Mary Berry said she hadn't tried lavender meringue before and didn't want to again!  In the dry mix, the lavender wasn't really that evident, but once the butter was added, it showed itself!

 The biscuits were absolutely delicious, with a delicate but definite taste of lavender.

We took some to work and our colleagues agreed how lovely they were.  Many thanks to Emma for sending me the mix as I'm not sure I would have tried it otherwise and I would have been missing a treat!

Apricot Rock Cakes

As you may know, I have an aversion to raisins and sultanas (although I like grapes).  I'm not that keen on dried fruit much at all, but, for some reason, I do like dried apricots.  I have made and posted about apricot rock cakes before but can't remember whether I posted the recipe.  If I did, apologies, but actually, it is so nice and easy and gives such good results, it is worth posting again.  For anyone who doesn't know what they are, they are a cakey-biscuity-chewy treat (I am sure that is a very helpful description!) and of course, they have fruit in them, so could possibly be thought of as healthy (!)

Ingredients:
225g/8oz self raising flour
110g/4oz margarine
110g/4oz granulated sugar
175g/6oz dried but ready to eat apricots
1 egg
a little milk to mix
brown sugar to sprinkle on tops

Makes 18 cakes.

1. Heat oven to gas mark 7/220 degrees centigrade/435 degrees fahrenheit. Lightly grease 2 baking trays.
2. Sift flour into mixing bowl and rub in the margarine.
3. Add sugar and apricots. Make a well in the centre.
4. Beat the egg, then add to dry ingredients with a little milk, to make a stiff consistency.
5. Place the mixture in rough heaps on the baking trays, leaving a little space between them as they will spread a bit. Sprinkle on some brown sugar
6. Bake for approx 10 mins (mine take longer but I have a very old oven) until golden brown.
7. Cool on wire rack.  Once cool, test quality of rock cakes (cook's prerogative) and enjoy!

Of course, if you don't have problems with dried fruit, you can put whatever you like in the cakes; traditionally it is mixed dried fruit. Dried cranberries, dried blueberries... Chocolate chips might be a nice addition too...

My new baking best friend

I know that this is not a very exciting photo, but I wanted to share my new baking best friend with you.  No doubt, all you seasoned bakers will be shaking your heads and asking where have I been since this product was introduced, ages ago.  I can only say that it had passed me by.  However, that has all changed.  I first bought it for a craft project using Angelina fibres, as you need to trap the fibres inside baking parchment before ironing them. I then used the baking parchment for its designed use when I made a banana and apple loaf.  My baking tins have seen better days and I am used to fighting with them in order to release my baking but with a lined tin, the banana and apple loaf could be lifted whole out of the tin with no fighting required.  This is when I realised that baking parchment was brilliant.  Since then, I have made two batches of flapjack which lifted straight out of the tin too. I know it is only a little thing, but it has made such a difference!
(My friends Katy and Alison laughed at me when I said I was going to write this post, extolling the wonders of baking parchment, but here it is anyway.)

Blueberry cakes

So, with the weekend here, I got on with my baking.  I used a normal cake recipe, enough for 12 little cakes and added the blueberries as the final ingredient. 

They looked lovely in their raw state...

 ...and even lovelier once cooked.

 The blueberries are much juicier after cooking and have just a touch of tartness, which contrasts well with the sweet cake.

Of course, I needed to test one, just to make sure they were up to standard before offering them to Chris.  The verdict?  Yum, yum, yum!  Thank you to my little blueberry bush.

Aprons and baking

 Here is my lovely apron won in the giveaway, which arrived yesterday, much to my excitement!  It was wrapped beautifully in tissue paper and tied with the flowery ribbon you can see in the photo.

 Here it is hanging on the door.

 A close-up of the two different materials used in its creation.

 With the apron, there was a very thoughtful hand made card.

 In the apron pocket, there was a surprise present of this crocheted egg in very Spring-like colours. Again, huge thanks to Elizabeth of http://mrsthomasinatittlemouse.blogspot.co.uk/   for this wonderful gift.
Once I had received the apron and pranced about in it for a while, I decided I needed to bake something to christen it with.  Scones were deemed to be the ideal choice and then this developed into scones with cream and jam for a cream tea at the morning break.

 I made two batches of scones - the ones above were made with vegan marg and soya milk (I nearly had a catastrophe due to not remembering milk was a major ingredient in scones and promising to make vegan ones specially, but luckily, the local shop was open and even more luckily, they had soya milk!)

The finished scones, some vegan, some vegetarian.  I took them to work today and added some Channel Island very thick double cream and raspberry jam.  I have to say they tasted wonderful!  The vegan option was vegan spread and raspberry jam, but from the comments later, they were yummy too.  So, my gorgeous apron has been christened and we have enjoyed (rather too much in my case) a proper cream tea.  All in all, two very good days.

Christmas baking (part one)

Having called this post 'Christmas baking', I know these little butterfly cakes don't look particularly Christmassy.  However, they were baked as a Christmas thank you for the Porters, Maintenance and Gardeners team at work, to let them know that what they do is appreciated.  I was going to give them a box of chocolates, but Chris suggested that they would like these cakes much more, so I undertook a baking session yesterday.  They are a simple sponge recipe and the icing is butter cream (in my book, it has to be butter - margarine just doesn't taste anywhere near as nice). 

They do look quite appetising but I didn't even taste one - usually I have to test everything I bake to ensure that they are up to standard, but I forgot.  No doubt Chris will let me know!