sister act: cupcakes and butterfly cakes

although there are four of us in this house, it's very rare that we are all in at the same time. we all have different work schedules and social commitments, so when i get to spend some time with my siblings it has become precious (especially as now we see each other less, there is less fighting!)

therefore it was really great to spend some time with my sister the other weekend and have a catch up (mostly moaning about being working girls).

we kept things simple with a basic sponge mix. this is such a good thing to have memorised - you want to work in 2oz measurements and for every 2oz of ingredients you need one egg. i think i made 8oz because i wanted two batches of cakes so it went something like this:

8oz of self raising flour
8oz caster sugar
8oz butter or baking spread (softened)
2 tsps baking powder
4 eggs
splash of vanilla essence

once you've grasped this basic recipe you can work wonders with it. for example if you are making it into a chocolate cake, sub out some of the flour for cocoa powder and add a little more baking powder.

it can be flavoured in different ways too, although vanilla provides a good base for staple sponge.

i always go all in one with this, literally throw it all in a bowl and whisk together! add a splash of milk if it's a little dry. it always comes out moist and spongy, a fail safe result!

 in it all goes, you're looking for the consistency below: nice and smooth, leaving the trails of the whisk

the other great thing about cup/fairy cakes is how quickly they cook (although not that great when you get distracted playing games on your phone and have to run to the oven...) so you can whip up a few batches in no time. the fun part is what you do after this

 pretty cases are a must for cupcakes, these are from tesco

so i had two things i wanted to try out here:

firstly was a beautiful piping set that my friend louise got me for my birthday and i hadn't actually got around to using. i forgot to take a photo so i will put one up when i remember! it's a really professional set and gave great results.

 my piping skills are definitely something i want to work on (as well as my photography, apologies for the out of focus images!) - in particular starting at the edge of the cake, rather than trying to backfill this in!

 

 so much concentration!

 

cheeky baking selfie!

and with that photo i introduce my sister, the widge to my nen (just roll with the weird nicknames). we paired up to make that british tea time classic - butterfly cakes.

instead of using a berry jam, i wanted to use the passionfruit curd i had bought at a national trust property (history nerd forever). this added a zing to the cakes that would have been missing otherwise, and contrasted well with the sweet buttercream. it was a simple yet effective way to update a classic combo.

i'm a sucker for that packaging too

 scooping out the insides to make the wings

 my glamorous assistant whipping up the buttercream

 production line assembled: i was in charge of cutting and wing placement, widge provided the fillings

 just look at the colour on that curd!

 

 and the finished result

these went down a treat in the office. everyone loved the zing from the passionfruit and they were a perfect little mid morning or afternoon pick me up!

i'd love to see what you guys do with your basic sponge recipes! share your pictures on facebook or twitter

love,

nen

student sunshine cupcakes.

so the title of this post refers to my latest venture into the world of baking. my lovely housemate anna gave me a book of cupcake recipes for my birthday, which has some recipes and combinations i haven't seen before. one of these was the 'hot and spicy' cupcakes. a quick scan of the ingredients revealed chili, mango and vodka as the primary ingredients. i was immediately intrigued and thought straight away of april, who i thought would also love this combination! as she was returning this weekend and had been away for her 21st birthday i decided to whip up a batch for her return.

the recipe is really easy to follow. it's essentially just a normal cake mixture with one finely chopped chili and 125g of chopped dried mango thrown in. the recipe does call for placing half a chili (sliced length ways) across the top of each cupcake but i thought this might be a bit too much! so i left them out, but next time would but a bit more chili in the mixture to give it a little more heat.

chopping up the chili and mango

stir the mango into the mixture by hand

the mixture was also slightly dense so next time i think i would add a splash of boiling water to break it down a little bit.

so i decided to rename these cupcakes 'student and sunshine' for a few reasons. the mango, chili and lime combination are such great summer flavours which are perfect for when the weather is as glorious as it is at the moment (naturally as it's revision season...). the student part comes from the cakes' topping - vodka!

under-rated cake ingredients!

you first make a vodka syrup by dissolving sugar in water (i think it was 50g of sugar and two tablespoons of water). you bring the mixture gently to the boil for a few minutes before adding four tablespoons of vodka (please be careful at this point as it does splutter a bit, and boiling sugar is hot!). you use a skewer to pierce the cakes and pour this syrup over the top so it soaks into the sponge.

making the syrup

glistening with the vodka!

the final touch is to mix icing sugar and vodka for the drizzle. this is where the student in me took over... the icing was too thick and i was aware there wasn't much vodka left in the bottle so i poured the entire remainder in. turns out there was more than i thought! so these cupcakes had quite a serious kick! although thankfully as the icing set this diminished slightly! so this explains the student aspect. a grating of lime finishes these cakes off nicely.

once you get over the initial hit of the vodka these are really good cakes, the dried mango becomes slightly more moist from being in the mixture and adds a lovely sweet, chewy dimension to the kick. combined with the subtle chili and the heat of the vodka this really is great for a summer afternoon. which is precisely what we did when we moved our little table to the garden and had a mini tea party. complete with the absolutely delicious brownies that april baked. this really was the perfect revision break!

living the revision high life

i would now like to take this opportunity to save a massive thank you to emma white and the girls at her campus exeter for their recommendation of my blog! it means a lot so thank you! and please check out the list of other exeter student blogs as there is such an amazing quality and diversity out there. http://www.hercampus.com/school/exeter/best-exeter-student-blogs

for now i hope you enjoy the sunshine, i'll be returning to my revision grotto!

love,
nen
x

farewell to my teenage years...

so here it is - my last post as a teenager as on tuesday i enter a new decade (and quite possibly a quarter life crisis...!) i'm not entirely sure how this has happened so fast, but let's make the most of these last couple of days with some chocolate fudge cupcakes!

my school friends grace and louise came round the other day for a lunch and baking session (including a few cheeky lunch time glasses of rose - see i'm totally sophisticated enough to be in my twenties!!) once the lunch had been consumed (french bread with brie, ham and smoked mackerel pate) and gossip swapped we entered the kitchen to whip up a fresh batch of chocolate cupcakes.

we followed an equal quantities mixture of six ounces. to make the cakes chocolate you substitute two ounces of self raising flour for cocoa powder.

 spooning the mixture out

the tricky part of making chocolate cake is making sure it stays moist - as cocoa powder can dry the mixture out - however these came out sooooo moist and light! you opened your mouth to take a massive bite and your teeth just sank into little more than air, perfection!

 a complicated spooning out process...

also most people know i'm not normally one for raw cake mixture - but chocolate cake is definitely an exception!

waste not, want not!

 fresh out of the oven and smelling good 

the natural topping of choice was butter icing. the butter was nice and soft and i was able to demonstrate the back-of-spoon motion that is needed for creaming. louise asked why we didn't put it in the electric whisk, however (speaking from a lot of experience) putting a motorised whisk into a bowl of icing sugar tends to end in a lot of mess!

but once you've got a more paste like substance developing it is possible to then use an electric whisk. this is necessary if you want to make really light icing as it's impossible to get that much air in by hand. however we were going for a 'rustic' look and wanted to minimise the making-to-mouth time so did a basic mix by hand, taking turns.

i had a rummage through my baking box and found some fudge pieces from sainsburys that we decided we could put on the top of the cakes (after each sampling!)









the decorating process

so with justin timberlake playing in the background, grace and louise iced the cakes and i sprinkled the fudge pieces on top.

being as impatient as ever the cakes were cool enough to ice but still warm in the middle - which was absolutely perfect!

so while they may not be things of great beauty, they sure did taste fantastic and have kept me going while we've been tidying the house up.

all it remains for me to do is bid you a final farewell from my teenage self - i'll see you on the other side!

love,
nen
x



back to business & butterfly cakes

now i'm sure you were all very panicked that i was going to miss my one blog post a week goal, but never fear i am here! and i can assure you that it feels so nice to be able to sit down and indulge my procrastinatory tendencies. this week has been absolutely hectic and it feels as if my feet have barely touched the ground. so naturally after a 'slightly' heavy one last night today has been a make-up free onsie day where i have been in bed longer that out! so i am feeling refreshed and ready to go...

part of this week's schedule was the new term bakesoc meeting. armed with vegetable crisps and several bottles of wine we sat down for two hours to plan out the term ahead. i can promise you it is looking very exciting and i have a couple of projects that i am rearing to get my teeth in to - but no spoilers! it was so nice to catch up with the girls and hear all the baking delights people made and received over the festive period.

before the week got underway i managed to squeeze in a therapeutic baking session on sunday afternoon. the bake of the day was chocolate butterfly cakes. these are cakes i completely associate with my mum (both the chocolate and vanilla variety) and the best thing was to come home from school on fridays to a freshly baked batch.

while i can't claim for certain that the chocolate twist is entirely my mum's own invention i will! this replaces the usual jam and butter icing filling with nutella and butter icing! it is soooo indulgent and super scrummy - the hazelnut centre adds something really special.

to make butterfly cakes make a batch of fairy cakes as usual (they work best in muffin sized cases so you have enough cake to scoop out).

WAIT for them to cool before attempting the assembly (we were far too impatient and so they were too crumbly and the results were not all that dainty!)

there are two methods depending on how your cakes have risen. if they have a defined peak then cut this off and then in half to form the wings. however most of the time you need to use a knife (or teaspoon) to cut a well in the centre of the cake, which you then cut in half for the wings.

april and i had a production line going - she was in charge of shaping and i did the filling (excuse the pile of cutlery!)

using a teaspoon place firstly a small amount of nutella in the well and then cover with a layer of butter icing.

one of the most heavenly substances...

finally rest the wings on top. if you have the patience (and there is not a crowd of hungry students gathered, dust the cakes with icing sugar for the ultimate finishing touch).

an example of the finished result (they didn't stay around long enough for me to get a final photo!)

these cakes are a perfect sunday afternoon treat if you are looking for some baking inspiration this weekend!

enjoy your week

love,

nen

x

ps. to keep up with blog posts and for other baking happenings follow this blog on twitter at @NensBakery or like it on facebook www.facebook.com/NensBakery

classic cupcakes.

once again my apologies for the gap in posts - i spent a few days away with a few of my friends from university which was really lovely! however it does mean i've had this post brewing for a while and some photos that need sharing!

possibly my favourite thing to bake are classic vanilla cupcakes. as usual i follow the hummingbird recipe!

my bible!

this involves making a mixture like breadcrumbs with the dry ingredients and butter before slowly adding the milk and egg. my mum has a freestanding mixture so i had the excitement of using that!

i like to create a variety of sizes when making cupcakes - partly as an excuse to use different patterned cases! but i also think it looks nice on a stand or display when there is difference. i especially love making teeny tiny cakes!

these cases are so beautiful!

the best part of making cupcakes is the decorating! i always take a while to decide on my icing colour and decoration combination - of course taking into account the pattern/colours on the cases! (it's a very complex operation...) this time i went for blue and yellow and combined this with raspberry sherbet and hundreds and thousands respectively.

possibly my favourite thing ever - buttercream! 

blue with pink sherbet

yellow with hundreds and thousands

baby cakes with sugar butterflies

experimenting with different designs and looks is so much fun - i hope the girls in my house next year are prepared for becoming my new guinea pigs!

love,
nen
x