Mother's Day Cupcakes

This post is slightly late in the making but you've still got time!! Mothers day is on Sunday if you have forgotten, but it's hard to with all these adverts everywhere! If you were thinking of getting your mum something from of the shelf... something she could probably predict, or useless cheap pamper box sets don't bother! This is much cheaper, more heart felt and delicious.. of course!

Kinder Bueno Cupcakes

We've moved! Still crazy recipes, indulgent cakes at Spinach and Specs :) 

I love love love Kinder Bueno's and I've been meaning to try this for ages! It's so creamy and reminds me of being younger with the kinder eggs and playing with the toys. I wanted to capture this so I hid a few little toys in the cupcakes too... well I wish I had but no they aren't that cool. :( Oh well! I think if your going to do this, be prepared to fill your kitchen with hundreds of Bueno bars because its so hard to get that flavour just right! If you like the mix of white and milk chocolate with a hint of hazelnut that's the recipe I have here! But if you really want the proper full flavour, you'll need to use a lot more crushed bars than me.. I'm going to try again. You haven't defeated me yet Mr Bueno.

Valentines Day Cupcakes

I'm not sure if I believe in all this commercial Valentines day stuff. But I do think its great to have a day with your partner and just chill out and be romantic. This really doesn't mean being romantic, making time for each other and buying gifts should be limited to one day. But for all you gooey, loved up ladies. Here's a cute recipe to make for your loved ones this February. 

Pina Colada Procrastination Cupcakes

Happy New Year to all my readers! I've been away revising for exams... or not. But I'm back with the first post of 2013! I'm going to save you the cliche 'here are my resolutions'. Along with many of you, I've spent the majority of my days procrastinating. I mean to an extreme! But here's one that turned out worth while... Pina Colada Cupcakes.

Mango... because I forgot to keep some pineapple! 

Recipe:

300g flour

230g soft butter

220g sugar

4 eggs

200ml coconut milk

40ml dark rum

140g pineapple, into chunks

Icing:

230g soft butter

90ml coconut milk

1tsp vanilla extract

580g icing sugar

20ml dark rum

100g desiccated coconut

Pre-heat oven to 180 degrees.

1. Cream butter and sugar

2. Add eggs and mix well after each addition

3. Mix in flour and coconut milk in thirds alternating

4. Fill a third of each cupcake case, top with pineapple chunks

5. Cover pineapple with more cake batter

6. Cook for 20 minutes or until stick comes out clean

7. Mix all icing ingredients together in a clean bowl

8. On a low heat, gently toast half the sprinkling coconut 

9. Wait for cakes to cool before piping

10. Pipe and sprinkle half non toasting and half toasting coconut

If anyone was wondering what tip I used for this, Its just a plain open tip. I will get a photo soon! I apologise in advance for all those who have started their New Years 'diet'. Give up and join us on the dark side!

Until Next Time xo

Banoffee Coma

Experimenting with one of my favourite desserts, banoffee pie. It seems the most successful cupcake recipes derive some classics stuffed into miniature cupcake form. So I thought, why not? It went down amazingly well apart from the toffee stuffing. I attempted the old condensed milk heated toffee, but it soon crystallised and the texture was a horrible sandy feeling. Bar this small problem they were delicious!

I had to show you a picture of the pipping since this was my first time using one and I've been addicted to buying all the nozzles ever since. For this particular frosting I used a nozzle similar to the Wilton 1M. I thought I'd got away with saving £4 by buying a different brand, but I later learnt that the Wilton's are more expensive as they're stronger. But I'll leave that decision up to you. 

Recipe:

• 225g plain flour
• 1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 110g butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 bananas (mashed up)
• 55ml milk, or buttermilk
• 2 eggs
• 115g caster sugar

Cream the butter sugar and eggs. Then add mashed bananas, milk, sugar, salt, baking and bicarbonate. Slowly fold the flour before mixing well. Bake at 170 degrees for 15 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. I used a simple butter cream recipe that you can find anywhere online.

You may want to use actual cupcake cups rather than like me muffin cups as they were so big and sweet it was overkill!

Until Next Time xo

Dear Readers...

... As many of you would have noticed my blogging had come to a complete stand still. Thank you all for coming and checking daily to see if there were any new posts. The only explanation I can offer you is one you would know yourselves, life being completely unpredictable has its ups and for that, has to have its downs. This was something that blogging among other things had to come second to. But the support from my friends, patience from my readers, PR contacts and companies I was in the middle of working with is so much appreciated. From today expect the usual random rants, strange fashion statements and some delicious/some disgusting recipes from my kitchen.

So, here we go with the first. A few weeks back I went with James' sister to a cupcake decorating class. The baker was a friend of the family so luckily we got in last minute. Since I'd been watching so many youtube tutorials I didn't think I would learn a lot. 

But I was wrong, cake toppers look so easy but actually they take a lot of skill. Depending on the design of course but it was lots of fun and I'd recommend it! All the tools you've always wanted to use were provided as well as some edible glitter spray which everyone was immediately addicted to. Those small flowers that you would usually purchase from the supermarket are very cheap to make but so fiddly as you want them to dry hard but that means they become so brittle!

How professional are these? We were very impressed and stuffed after a delicious tea and cake break. 

If your local and would like to try you can click here. The next class will be held on the 10th of December, for £30 you have 3 hours of decorating 12 cakes which you will take home. As well as the tea and cake break in between.

Until Next Time xo

Carrot Cupcakes

I love carrot cake, its one of my favourites. The name just makes it feel slightly less naughty when you've got your feet up with a cup of tea and a large slice. But when I looked up a few recipes online the name is very deceiving. The recipe I took uses 200ml of sunflower oil?! I was really unsure if it was   just a typo or a joke. It felt pretty disgusting putting that much oil just on top of eggs and mixing! But as Ive learnt from so many disasters in the past, always follow the recipe! Especially if like me, your just a home baker haha. If you not like me and count your calories daily then you may want to cut down on your carrot cake intake!

I wish I had picked up a few little carrot fondant decorations to make it a bit more obvious but hey ho. I used around 200g of grated carrots but it still didn't quite give the taste, I think if you try this then 1 whole tablespoon of cinnamon would be advised. It brings out the taste of the carrot a lot more.

Recipe
275g caster sugar
200ml sunflower oil
4 medium eggs
300g carrot (more or less)
150g nuts or dried fruit
225g wholemeal or plain flour
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tbsp cocoa powder

Cheese frosting:
125g unsalted butter,
125g full-fat cream cheese
275g icing sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
Edible decorations 

1.Cream the eggs and oil together
2. Mix in carrots
3. Add sugar and flour
4. Mix in nuts
5. fold in cinnamon and cocoa powder
6. Cook for 15 minutes at 170 degrees
7. Mix all frosting ingredients together and spread over cooled cakes

Ferrero Rocher Cupcakes

I stumbled upon a lovely food blog and found an amazing ferrero rocher recipe. How could I not make these? They looked amazing with the gold wrapping and hazel nut topping. I couldn't find any of the gold cases and being my impatient self could not wait to look around and find them. So a quick pop to ASDA after university and picked up a few key ingredients... Nutella. Bloody delicious chocolate spread as I couldn't find any hazelnut syrup. They are relatively easy to make, the only complicated part if you are new to baking is the ganache. These are extremely indulgent but worth the calories, they are freaking delicious! My new favourite version of cookies and milk.

Original Recipe

Recipe:
6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
110g milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
150g Nutella
200g Butter
7 tablespoons dark brown sugar
6 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 large eggs
240g all purpose flour
100g hazelnuts
1 bar of bakers chocolate
50ml double cream

Cake mix, mmm.

1. Melt cocoa powder and nutella with hot water in bowl
2. Cream the butter and sugar 
3. Add eggs and vanilla
4. Add chocolate mix and flour into butter mixture until all folded in
5. Fold in milk
6. Add half the ground hazelnuts
Bake at 170 degrees for 15 minutes or until skewer comes out clean
7. After the cakes have cooled, use a teaspoon to hollow out the cake
8. Spoon in Nutella and replace cake top
Break the bakers chocolate into a bowl. Boil the cream and pour over the chocolate until melted and shiny.
9. Pour gently over cupcakes 
10. Sprinkle nuts to decorate

I hate to brag, but these are amazing. 

Tip - Practising new recipes in a cheap case saves a lot of money!

Until next time xo

Zombie Cupcakes

I'd love to take credit for this monstrosity but I stole the idea from yoyomax12 from youtube click to watch. She's a baking mad mum who makes some amazing cupcakes which I'm obsessed with copying. Instead of using green icing for grass, I made a pandan cake instead. Which is an Asian cake using pandan leaf extract and coconut milk. It tastes amazing, which I thought was more interesting than just chocolate.

Ingredients:

120g unsalted butter

220g caster sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp pandan paste

250ml coconut milk

300g plain flour

Chocolate biscuits

Chewit sweets

Biscuits

Icing sugar

Jam

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 170 deg C

2. Whisk butter and sugar until pale and light

3. Add egg one at a time until well mixed

4. In a small bowl mix the pandan paste with some coconut milk until dissolved 

5. Add the pandan mix to the butter mixture and mix well

6. Add the remaining coconut milk and flour alternating, careful not to curdle. Fold in

7. Fill cupcakes 3/4 way full

8. Cook for 25 minutes

9. Skewer the cakes, a clean stick is a cooked cake.

10. Watch video for decorating tutorial

These look so gross but they taste amazing! 

Until next time xo

Banana Cake and Melting Moments

My Auntie gave me a massive bunch of bananas today, they had just gone past their firm stage. She's been so busy she hasn't had a chance to eat them. If this has happened to you, do not bin them! Just grab a simple viccy sponge mix and add the banana's. Perfect. This is a really great bake for children too, I made this with my Brother, Nye. He had so much fun, he tried eating some raw vanilla essence too behind my back! Don't know how nice that tasted, he didn't try to do it again. haha.

Looking a bit scruff, some naughty fingers stole a few when I went to get the camera! They really need some crushed walnuts for next time I think. I decided, the oven was hot and I'd seen these on tv recently so hey, why not... some Viennese whirls.

More naughty fingers, my little brother named this 'the big mini mac sandwich' I wouldn't recommend it, but he managed to get it down in one. I decided to make teeny tiny ones, just because they're alot easier to pipe. The mixture started drying in the piping bag and it got really stiff. But they still tasted really nommy.

Banana cake Recipe
1 egg
3 ripe bananas
170g caster/granulated sugar
170g self raising flour
170g soft margarine (butter is fine too)
1 tablespoon vanilla essence

1. In a large bowl, mix the butter and sugar well until pale and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla continue mixing. Then sift in flour mix well. Once you can no longer see any white flour, chop 2 bananas roughly and mix again until the chunks are smaller about 1/2cm. Or just look like little drops of banana :)
2. Preheat oven to 160 degrees.
3. Spoon a teaspoon of mixture into well greased cupcake trays. (I used spraying oil to get a better coverage, but butter is fine too!) 
4. Slice the 3rd banana thinly and add 1 layer to each cupcake. 
5. Fill the cupcake with a tablespoon of mixture over the banana.
6. Cook for 25 minutes or until golden brown.

Tip - if you can't get your cupcakes out easily, you didn't grease enough! Grab a tablespoon to help scoop them out.

                                                                                                                               

Viennese Whirl Recipe
250g unsalted butter
60g icing sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
60g corn flour
250g plain flour

1. (Preheat oven at 180 degrees) Beat the icing sugar and butter with a wooden spoon or electric mixer until light, pale and fluffy.
2. Add the vanilla and beat again. Now add both flours by sifting and mix well until smooth.
3. Spoon mixture into pipping bag and pipe onto baking parchment or grease proof paper.
4. Cook for 10 minutes or until golden brown. This will vary with size. 5cm diameter whirls take 12 minutes.

For the filling - 
Some jam
100ml semi skimmed milk
2 tablespoons plain flour
100g caster/granulated sugar
100g butter 
1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence

1. Simmer milk and add flour. Stir until all flour has dissolved. Lay onto plate and cover with cling film until warm/cool.
2. Whisk together sugar, butter and vanilla essence until very pale and light. (15 minutes by hand or 6 minutes by electronic)
3. Add in the milk mixture to your butter and sugar, whisk well until all is mixed it.
4.  After your whirls have cooled spread a thin layer of jam to one side, then some cream mixture to the other and squish together.

Hope you enjoyed todays bake! Until next time xo

Mario Cupcakes

I made these for my little brothers birthday. He's obsessed with Mario and we all know why! He's so cute and awesome, although I prefer Luigi. I originally wanted to make the figures from scratch out of icing, but I ran out of time. I ordered these little motifs on eBay, they cost £1.98 with free shipping! They're basically made from rice paper and coloured with icing. Theres loads of different designs to choose from so if you need to make something quirky fast, this is a great option! To stick them to your cuppy cakes, cut around the design (as they come as a large sheet of paper) ice your cupcake however you want, but make sure it is wet when your sticking the motif on. Apply slight pressure around the whole picture and TA-DA. Magical mario cupcakes.


Sorry its not very detailed, getting back to uni this week! Then everything will be explained and there'll be more gorgeous clothes and foodies. Until next time xo