Birthday cakes 

As far as I'm concerned, it isn't a cake if it isn't chocolate - with perhaps some fruit to balance the rich flavour - such as these excellent examples ....


More chocolate and less cream seems to work the best.  

I also have a theory that it doesn't matter what a cake looks like, so long as it tastes good.  

However, I'm not sure if I'd feel the same if my birthday cake had been decorated by one of the people pictured on this website "some people really shouldn't decorate birthday cakes" - http://www.buzzfeed.com/briangalindo/24-people-who-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-decorate-cakes#.cv3yNvl95k

As it's summer and we've been out and about we've eaten cakes in several venues.  The best bay far was when we went to Kathy Fairweather's Open Garden in Belper*.  Not only was the garden excellent but the cakes were fab, in fact so good that I had two pieces!  I may be slightly biased as have known Kathy for many years but I don't think so.

Surprisingly, some of the less good have been at National Trust properties.  At one place the scone was dry and as heavy as a stone, at another the cake was so light, and again it was so dry, that it just fell apart and was difficult to actually get from plate to mouth.  And the National Trust certainly know how to charge!

So here are a few baking tips from Mary Berry, both for me and for the National Trust! http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/mary-berrys-top-10-baking-tips

When I drove over to Belper to see Kathy's garden, on one of the Open Days, I was surprised at the size of their garden as it's the size of a normal garden ... but then goes off at right angles behind lots of houses - so it's enormous!  And it was all immaculate.  
Photos of their garden hardly do it justice.  Kathy seems to have the knack of knowing which plants to put together, and it must be so hard to get everything to look at its best all at once.  Here are a few I took at the Open Day back in June.
  


* http://www.belpernews.co.uk/news/local/green-fingered-kathy-starred-in-popular-gardening-show-1-7069575

PS Had a nice cake and cup of coffee at Renishaw Hall today (20 August).  At it's an RHS Partner Garden admission was free today, just £1 to park the car. http://www.renishaw-hall.co.uk/

Tea Bread

ha ha!

Now that we're definitely moving I'm sorting out cupboards, especially in the kitchen.  I've come across the bottom of lots of packets of shreddies, shredded wheat and all bran, the bits which no-one wants to eat. 

No-one seems to like to eat the bits at the bottom of the packets, probably because, although they're perfectly alright, they tend to go soggy when the milk's added.  So am going make a fruit loaf with them.

Here's my take on the classic All-Bran tea bread recipe:

5oz cereal (mine was mixture of shredded wheat, shreddies and all bran)

5oz raisins or sultanans

10 fl oz tea, milk or orange juice

2 oz sugar

6 oz SR flour

2 eggs

1. Soak cereal in tea/milk/juice for a couple of hours.  
2. Add dried fruit, sugar and eggs.  Stir in flour.
3. Cook about an hour at about 190C.
4. Eat: sliced, and spread with lots of butter.

Summer Berry Cake

Prep time 50mins

Bake time 35mins

175g Caster Sugar

6 Eggs

zest 1 large Orange

175g Self Raising Flour

For filling and topping

300g pots of Greek Yoghurt

200g Greek Style Natural Yoghurt with Honey

Vanilla Pod

2 tablespoons of Icing Sugar

Raspberry jam

570g mixed Summer Berries

1. Preheat oven to 180C.  
2. Warm the sugar in a heatproof dish in oven for 10 mins whilst the oven is heating up.
3. Meanwhile, fill a large bowel with boiling water, then tip out the water and dry the bowel.  
4. Break the eggs into the bowel and add the orange zest and sugar.
5. Whisk at high speed until thick and creamy (about 8 mins).
6. Fold in the flour.
7. Put mixture into 25cm cake tin and bake on middle shelf for 35mins.
8. For the filling: Mix together yoghurts, icing sugar and all seeds from the vanilla pod.  
9. When cool, cut the cake in half horizontally and stick back together with jam and half of yoghurt mixture. 
10. Put remaining yoghurt mixture onto the cake and top with summer fruits.

Autumn ideas from The Co-operative (Good with Food) Magazine

Baked corn with chilli and lime: Preheat the oven to 200C. Mix 30g butter, zest of a lime, 1 chopped red chilli and a handful of chopped coriander.  Place four corn cobs on foil sheets on a baking tray and dot with the butter. Close up foil and cook for 30 minutes. (or, if some of these ingredients are not to hand, cook the cobs just with the butter). Serves 4: 130 calories.

Sweet roasted butternut squash: Preheat oven to 300C. Cut one butternut squash into chunks (skin on), discarding seeds. Put on roasting tin, skindown, drizzle with 2 tbsp olive oil, 2 tbsp maple syrup, 1/2 tsp cinnamon. Roast for one hour, basting occasionally. Serves 6: 90 calories.

Easy cheesy muffin scones
7 sundried tomatoes (45g) or cherry tomatoes
250g SR flour
80g lighter mature cheese, grated
Handful fresh chopped herbs (optional)
200ml low fat yoghurt
1 large egg
3tbsp olive oil

1. Preheat oven to 190C and lightly grease a 12 hole muffin tin.
2. Cut tomatoes into small pieces
3. Put flour into a bowl, add tomatoes, cheese and herbs.
4. Put yoghurt into a jug, add the egg and oil and stir.
5. Add this to the flour mix and blend lightly
6. Spoon into the muffin tins and bake for 20-25 minutes or until light golden
7. Makes 12: 170 calories each.

Spiced loaf with fresh pear

50g baking margarine

50g vegetable oil

85g light brown sugar

85g black treacle

2 eggs

170g plain flour

1 tsp ground cinnamon

2 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp bicarb

140ml milk, warmed

To serve: fresh ripe pear

1. Preheat oven to 140C. 
2. Grease 900g loaf tin and line the base with greaseproof paper
3. Heat margarine, oil, sugar and treacle gently until melted
4. Cool slightly and stir in eggs, flour, cinnamon and ginger.
5. Add bicarb to warmed milk and pour this over the mixture and stir well.
6. Pour mixture into tin and bake for 50 - 55 minutes.
7. The top of the loaf should have a slight crust .
8. Ideal for picnics
9. Serves 12, 185 calories a slice

Home-made baked beans

1 celery stick, finely chopped

2 carrots, julienne

1 tbsp olive oil

2 onions, finely chopped

2 cloves garlic, crushed

Pinch chilli powder (optional - why is it that chilli is put into everything these days?)

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp mustard

400 tin cannellini beans, rinsed

400 tin haricot beans, rinsed

2 x 400g tins chopped tomatoes

1 tbsp treacle or light soft brown sugar

1. In pan cook onions, celery and carrots in the oil until soft.
2. Add garlic, chilli powder, paprika and mustard and cook for 10 minutes.
3. Add beans, tomatoes and treacle/sugar, stir and simmer gently for another 20 minutes.
4. Serves 8: 110 calories.

to be continued . ...

Best-Ever chocolate Layer Cake

Ingredients


175g self-raising flour
3 tbsp cocoa
1 tsp coffee powder (optional)
175g butter (softened)
175g caster sugar
1tsp baking powder
3 eggs
4 tbsp milk
100g 70% dark chocolate (melted)

Mix everything together, add cooled chocolate.
Put in three shallow 7" cake tins and cook at about 180C for 20 mins.
Cool on wire rack.


Icing
300ml double cream
300g chocolate (broken up)


Heat cream add chocolate.
Cool, sandwich between layers of cake and enjoy


(adapted from BBC Good Food website)


Ps  make sure the cake is completely cold before you put the icing on or all the icing will flow off!

Pauline's Chocolate Cake

Chocolate sandwich

Heat oven to 325F, 160C or gas mk 3.

grease and line ( with greaseproof) 2 x 8 inch straight sided sandwich tins.

Ingredients.

6 1/2 ozs Plain flour

5 ozs Castor sugar

2 tbs cocoa

1 level tsp bicarb of soda

1 level tsp baking powder

2 tbs golden syrup

2 beaten eggs

1/4 pint olive oil

1/4 pint milk.

ICING. (optional)

2 oz butter

4 level tbs cocoa

3 tbs milk

5 oz Icing sugar.

sift all dry ingredients into a large bowl. Make a well in centre and add syrup, eggs, oil & milk.

Beat well and pour into tins.

Bake in oven for 30 -35 mins.(until cake springs back when touched with fingers).

turn out and cool on rack. (without paper)

For icing.

Melt butter in a saucepan, add cocoa, and stir to blend. Cook for 1 minute. Stir in milk and icing sugar, remove from heat and mix well. Leave on side to cool, stirring occasionally. Sandwich cake halves together with half of icing and then spread remainder on top.

If not using icing then sandwich together with jam or butter icing. 

 For a treat I use cherries in kirsch and whipped cream for the filling, YUMMY.

Union Flag Fruit Cake

Recent front page of  weekend Telegraph supplement - yum, yum!

I don't know if this is a tea towel - if not it certainly should be.

(Comparatively) Healthy Cakes! - and a Chocolate cake recipe ...

Today at work a (very kind!) colleague brought in a Beetroot and Chocolate Cake for us to share and it was absolutely yummy! and apparently beetroot is incredibly good for us, see: http://len7288.hubpages.com/hub/Health_Benefits_of_Red_Beets  and http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=49.
So am now going to try and track down the recipe to share here .....


Well to start with here is Nigel Slater's offering and I always love his recipes (however this one has coffee in, which I can't take, so will keep looking):


Chocolate Beetroot Cake with Creme Fraiche and Poppy Seeds


200g fine dark chocolate (70 per cent cocoa solids)

4 tbsp hot espresso

200g butter

135g plain flour

a heaped tsp baking powder

3 tbsp good-quality cocoa powder

5 eggs

190g golden caster sugar

crème fraîche and poppy seeds, to serve

Lightly butter a 20cm loose-bottomed cake tin and line the base with a disc of baking parchment. Set the oven to 180C/gas mark 4.

Cook the beetroot, whole and unpeeled, in boiling unsalted water. Depending on their size, they will be knifepoint tender within 30 to 40 minutes. Young ones may take slightly less. Drain them, let them cool under running water, then peel them, slice out their stem and root, and blitz to a rough purée.

Melt the chocolate, snapped into small pieces, in a small bowl resting over a pot of simmering water. Don’t stir. When the chocolate looks almost melted, pour the hot coffee over it and stir once. Cut the butter into small pieces – the smaller the better –and add to the melted chocolate. Dip the butter down under the surface of the chocolate with a spoon (as best you can) and leave to soften.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and cocoa. Separate the eggs; put the whites in a mixing bowl. Stir the yolks together.

Now, working quickly but gently, remove the bowl of chocolate from the heat and stir until the butter has melted into the chocolate. Leave for a few minutes, then stir in the egg yolks. Do this quickly, mixing firmly so the eggs blend into the mixture. Fold in the beetroot. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then fold in the sugar. Firmly but tenderly fold the beaten egg whites and sugar into the chocolate mixture. A large metal spoon is what you want; work in a deep, figure-of-eight movement but take care not to over-mix. Fold in the flour and cocoa.

Transfer quickly to the prepared cake tin and put in the oven, turning the heat down immediately to 160C/gas mark 3. Bake for 40 minutes. The rim of the cake will feel spongy, the inner part should still wobble a little when gently shaken.

Leave to cool (it will sink a tad in the centre), loosening it around the edges with a palette knife after half an hour or so. It is not a good idea to remove the cake from its tin until it is completely cold. Serve in thick slices, with crème fraîche and poppy seeds.

Here's Tesco's equivalent: http://www.tescorealfood.com/recipes/beetroot-and-chocolate-cake.html






An idea of what to do with all those carrots you've grown

Carrot Cake

• 75g grated carrot
• 75g sugar
• 50g chopped nuts and seeds
• 75g self raising flour
• 1 tsp tsp cinnamon
• 75 oz oil
• 1 egg

Mix together and then cook at No 4 for 50 mins.

Now we have a surplus of courgettes - they're rather like buses, none for ages and then there's a glut, so a friend recommended

Courgette Cake  
(recipe taken from Reconnect magazine)

18.9.11 - I cooked this cake today and all agreed it was wonderful! There was no way anyone would realise they were eating courgettes!

8 oz courgettes 
(grated - peel if you don't want a green cake (peelings can be put in the soup))
5 oz butter
9 oz sugar
4 eggs
11oz self-raising flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon or mixed spice
4 oz seedless raisins
3 oz chopped nuts
2 tsp vanilla essence

• Preheat oven - No 4 / about 180C 
• Grease 2 x 1 lb tins (or trays). They may be lined with greaseproof paper.
• Cream butter and sugar 
• Beat the eggs.
• Add flour alternately with eggs, mixing well.
• Add cinnamon, courgettes, raisins, nuts and vanilla essence.
• Put into oven and cook for about an hour.
• Cool cake when you remove from the oven.
• Gently ease cake out of tin.

We don't grow apricots or bananas but here are a couple of nice recipes:

No-Sugar Apricot Cake

• 150g dried apricots (I prefer the dark ones)
• 1/2 pint orange juice
• 150g flour
• 1 tsp bicarb
• 6 tbsp oil
• 3 eggs

1. Oil 8" diameter cake tin.
2. Put apricots and orange juice into a saucepan and bring to the boil, leave to soak 4 hours.
3. Drain apricots and liquidise with 6 tbsp liquid.
4. Put flour into bowl, make a well in the middle and add the fruit, eggs and oil.
5. Beat the batter until thick.
6. Put mixture into tin and cook for about 20 mins at No 4.
7. Turn onto wire rack.

We don't grow any bananas on our allotment, but here's a wonderful recipe for Banana Cake, passed on by a friend:

Banana Cake
3 oz butter
2 oz sugar
8 oz SR flour
1 lb mashed bananas (after removal of skins.  Tip: scatter chopped banana skins under roses to give the roses much-needed potassium)
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence

• Cream butter and sugar
• Add beaten eggs
• Add flour and bananas
• Cook at No 4 in a lined 2 lb tin
• ** Variation - could add some ginger.
• Cook at 190/170C/gas 3/4 for about 25 mins for buns, more for a loaf.

Baked Pudding Antonio 
(no idea why Antonio!)

4 oz margarine
3 oz brown sugar
1 egg
1 tbsp black treacle
5 oz SR flour
1 tsp mixed spice
2 oz breadcrumbs
2 oz sultanas
2 oz mixed peel
1 oz chopped apple

1. Cream margarine and sugar
2. Add egg and 1 tbsp water and treacle.
3. Fold in rest of ingredients
4. Bake at No 5/375 for 30 mins.

Serve hot as a pudding with custard or cream - or eat cold as a cake

Chocolate Cake

• 250g butter
• 300g light muscovado sugar
• 100g plain flour
• 100g self-raising flour
• 5 eggs
• 300g dark chocolate

Icing

• 200g dark chocolate
• 200ml double cream (or natural yoghurt)

1. Heat the oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3. 
2. Butter and line a 20cm cake tin. 
3. Using an electric whisk, beat together butter and light muscovado sugar in a large bowl until fluffy. 
4. Measure out plain flour and self-raising flour. 
5. Beat in 5 eggs one at a time, adding 1 or 2 tbsp flour if the mixture starts to split. 
6. Pour 300g melted and slightly cooled dark chocolate into the mixture, beating as you do so. 
7. Fold in the rest of the flour. 
8. Spoon into the tin and bake for 1 hour 30 minutes; the cake should be risen with a crust on top. 
9. Cool and then take out of the tin. Split the cake horizontally.
10. To make the icing, gently melt together dark chocolate with double cream. 
11. Cool until thickened slightly. 
12. Fill the cake with icing, then spread the rest over the outside.

However, I read today that putting in cocoa powder instead of actual chocolate makes chocolate cakes lighter - will investigate this!

Almond and Orange Cake (from BBC Good Food, always a good site)

• 250g butter
• 200g golden caster sugar
• 2 oranges , zest and juice
• 4 eggs
• 50g plain flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 250g semolina
• 200g ground almonds
• 120g Greek yogurt
• crème fraîche to serve (optional)

• 2 oranges , zested and juiced
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 275g sugar 

1. To make the syrup put all the syrup ingredients in a pan with 500ml water and bring slowly to a simmer, stirring until all the sugar has dissolved. Reduce the heat and simmer until syrupy, about 10 minutes.
2. Heat the oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3. Butter and base line a 20cm springform cake tin. Cream the butter, sugar and orange zest until pale and fluffy. Beat the eggs then whisk in one at a time.
3. Sift in the flour and baking powder and fold through along with the orange zest, semolina and almonds. Add the orange juice and yogurt and stir gently. Pour into the prepared tin and cook for about 1 hour or until firm to the touch and a skewer comes out clean when inserted into the centre.
4. Remove the cake from the oven and pierce all over with a skewer. Pour half the hot syrup over the warm cake. Leave to cool.
5. Drizzle the cake with the remaining syrup and serve with a large spoonful of crème fraîche if you like

Finally, I don't know whether a G&T Cake comes into this category (healthy?) but it does sound fun:  (http://www.puddinglaneblog.co.uk/2014/06/gin-and-tonic-cake.html?m=1)

THE INGREDIENTS

4 eggs, weighed in their shells

equal weight of:

butter

caster sugar

self-raising flour

2 lemons

8-10 shots of your favourite gin

dash tonic water (optional)

150g granulated sugar

Hemp Ginger Cake (not tried it yet) http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/feb/12/hemp-ginger-cake-recipe-lepard