Secret centre spooky spider (halloween) cakes

Just finished baking these spider Halloween cakes with my 3 year old. She is so pleased with them I'm not sure how she'll wait for her grandparents to come on Sunday to show them. The poor postman only just managed to get away without being dragged in to see Megan's cakes!

As well as the spider decoration on the top, these cakes also have a hidden jammy centre (and taste fantastic!)



You'll need...

For the cakes

• 12 Cupcake cases
• 2 large eggs
• 120g Self raising flour
• 140g Caster sugar
• 140g Marg or butter
• 30g cocoa powder
• Jam

For the decoration

• 12 Minstrels (or similar, like Maltesers)
• Fruit strings/laces (see footnote)
• (Around) 100g icing sugar
• 5 Blackberries

 
Make the cake mix...

1. Pre heat the oven to 160
2. Whack the caster sugar and butter into a large bowl and whisk until light and fluffy
3. Next sift half the flour into the bowl
4. Add an egg
5. Mix well
6. Add the remaining flour, cocoa powder and egg
7. Mix well

Make now hide the jam!

1. Put 2 teaspoons of the cake mix into each cupcake case
2. Then, into the centre of each case add a teaspoon of jam

1. Gently cover the jam with the remaining cake mix (but try not to overfill)

1. Bake for 25-30 minutes

Now for the decoration

1. Warm the blackberries over a pan of boiling water until they are soft and can be squashed into the icing sugar

1. Keep stirring in icing sugar until you have bright purple lumpy icing that is spreadable but not too runny (add a drop of water if necessary)

1. Ice each of the cakes and allow to set for a couple of minutes while you cut up the laces to make legs

1. Place a Minstrel into the centre of each cake, and then push the legs gently into the icing around the Minstrel (using artist licence about how many legs each spider may have)

Spider (hidden centre) Halloween cupcake recipe

(Little footnote on strings/laces.... I used real fruit strings(see image below) but these could be strawberry laces or liquorish

How to make a Peppa Pig Cake

Peppa Pig Birthday Cake

Peppa Pig - described by Jason Mansford as a 3rd parent to his little girls they love and watch it so much!

My little girl loves her too, so for her 3rd birthday she had a Peppa Pig cake.

Lots of people have admired the cake, so here are some outline instructions on how to make a Peppa Pig Cake

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You will need

• A Peppa shaped tin

Get the tin (link to ebay seller who also have a range of other great tins)

 

For the cake

• 6 medium eggs
• 350g caster sugar
• 350g marg/butter
• 300g self raising flour
• 50g cocoa powder
• (Optional) chocolate chips

For the icing/decoration

• 80g marg/butter
• 300g of icing sugar
• Splash of milk

• 500g of pink icing (Renshaw)
• 250g of red icing (Renshaw)
• Small amount of white icing
• Small amount of black icing

Pre-coloured icing can be bought in Tesco (or for more choice/pack sizes try Hobbycraft/online)

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Making the cake...

1. Pre heat oven to 160C
2. Grease the tin (perhaps consider using a cake release spray - available from Tesco)
3. Put the marg and caster sugar into a large bowl and mix well
4. Break eggs into a measuring jug and beat with a fork
5. Add about a third of the flour and a third of the eggs and mix in
6. Add the cocoa powder, some more flour and some more egg and mix in
7. Repeat 5 until all the egg, flour and cocoa powder is incorporated
8. Finally stir in the chocolate chips
9. Cook for 30 minutes, then check and if necessary cover with tin foil before returning to the oven for a further 10 minutes.
10. Wait 10 minutes after taking the cake out of the oven before turning out onto a large cake board or tray

Before baking

Baked cake

Naked Peppa Pig cake before decoration

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Decorating the cake...

Start by making buttercream with the icing sugar and marg and then roughly covering the cake. This will make the cake taste better and the icing stick.

Next roll out the pink icing to about 3mm thick, making sure that there is sufficient icing in each direction to cover just over half the cake, and the edges.

Don't worry about the neck edge being straight or smooth as this will be covered by the red icing anyway.

Then use a sharp knife to trim around the edges

Next roll out the red icing.

Use the cake tin to gently mark the shape of the body into the icing - again make sure that there is sufficient icing to cover all sides.

This mark will also allow you to neatly cut the neck edge with a knife before lifting it onto the cake

The hard part is now done!

All you need to do now is add the finishing touches.

• Mix a small amount of pink and white icing together and then make a disk shape for each ear and the nose
• From the red icing still rolled out on the worktop, cut a smile (I used the neck edge)
• Mix a small amount of red with either pink or white icing and make a disk for Peppa's rosy cheek
• Make two arms (see picture below)
• Finally add two eyes and two nostrils
• Then you're done - just use a damp paper towel to wipe any stray buttercream/icing sugar off the edge of the tray

Really simple fresh churros (donuts) recipe

Last weekend we took our little family to the beach, where my daughter discovered fresh donuts and loved them!

Today I've just looked up how to make them and actually it's much simpler than I expected. Doesn't need as much oil as I thought either (although I wouldn't make them with my daughter "helping" as it does still need a cm or 2 of hot oil)

You will need

• a small mug (to measure ingredients)
• a sauce pan (to make the mixture in and then fry the donuts in)
• A tablespoon (measuring)
• A wooden spoon (mixing)
• A slotted spoon (retrieving donuts)
• Paper towel (to remove excess oil)
• A piping bag and large nozzle (or whatever they're called!!)

• 1 mug of water
• 2 tablespoons of butter
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1 mug of flour
• 3 eggs
• sugar (and perhaps cinnamon) to coat

Let's do it!

• Add the water, butter and sugar to the sauce pan and bring to the boil
• Reduce the heat and then slowly add the flour, stirring all the time
• Continue stirring until a dough is formed and cook for 2 minutes

• Allow to cool for 15-20 minutes (this is very important or you will end up scrambling your eggs at the next step!)
• Now add the eggs one at a time, stirring constantly. If it looks like it is all going lumpy - stir harder/faster, or get an electric whisk out!

• Next put about 1-2cm of oil into a pan and heat
• Spoon the batter into your piping bag
• To check if the oil is hot enough, drop a small amount of batter into the oil. It should puff up and bubbles form all around it.
• Once the oil is hot enough, pipe short sausages of batter directly into the oil

• Once the donuts are a light golden brown on all sides, remove from the oil and place on paper towel to remove excess oil
• When all of the batter has been cooked, sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon.

Your donuts should be light and fluffy on the inside and just slightly crisp on the outside. Yum Yum!!

Simple freshly made donuts (churros) recipe

 

 

Really easy (but seriously impressive) bakewell slices

This bakewell tart looks really impressive with its clear layers, but by using bought short crust pastry it is actually really simple to make

You will need

• Rectangular tin
• Ready rolled sweet shortcrust pastry
• 4 tbsp of cherry jam (or raspberry if you can't find cherry jam)
• 200g butter or marg (plus a little for greasing)
• 200g caster sugar
• 100g self raising flour
• 1 tsp baking power
• 50g ground almond
• 1/2 tsp of almond extract
• 10 glace cherries
• 200g icing sugar

Getting started

• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C
• Grease your tin and cut the pastry to fit the base, press it gently into the corners and then prick it all over with a fork to prevent it rising too much

 



The use the paper the pastry came off to cover it, and then add baking beans (or pasta)

Bake in the oven for 10 minutes until just cooked, and then remove the paper and beans/pasta and then return to the oven for another 2 minutes

Spread the jam over the pastry and set aside while you begin to make the filling

 

• In a large bowl, combine the butter, sugar, ground almond, flour and baking powder and mix.
• Break the eggs into another bowl, add the almond extract and beat

Slowly incorporate the eggs into the large bowl and mix well until you have a loose cake mix

• Pour this slowly/gently over the pastry (to prevent disturbing the jam layer) and then place in the oven
• After 35 minutes check how things are going and if the middle still wobbles but the edges are cooked, loosely cover with tin foil before returning to the oven for a further 10 minutes

• While the bake is cooling, slice your cherries in two and mix the icing sugar with a little water. Do this slowly, so that the icing has some movement and will slowly run off the back of the spoon but is not too wet.
• Spoon the icing onto the cake and spread to the corners
• Decorate by laying the cherries out in a grid pattern

• The cake can then be cut between the cherries to make slices (2 cherry halves per piece) or smaller squares (with a cherry in the centre)

Finally serve and allow people to admire the perfectly formed layers!

Really cool ice cream cone cakes

Who knew ice cream cones can survive 20 minutes in the oven? Well they do, and look what that means you can do with them...

Really cool ice cream cone cakes - look like ice creams but are really cakes!

 

You will need

(Makes 12)

• 12 (flat bottomed) ice cream cones
• 60g cocoa powder
• 175g of butter
• 175g caster sugar
• 120g self raising flour
• Level a teaspoon of baking powder
• 2 large eggs

To decorate

• 80g of butter
• 200g icing sugar
• Splash of milk
• Hundreds and thousands
• Mini chocolate Flakes (or 4 large Flakes cut into 3)
• Icing bag and large star shaped nozzle (see below)

Getting started

• Pre heat oven to 160 degrees and put your cones onto a baking tray

• In a large bowl, add the sugar, flour, eggs, cocoa powder and baking powder.
• Mix well for around 5 minutes then spoon the mixture into the cones
• Each cone should be between half and 3/4 full to avoid them over rising or not reaching the top of the cone

• Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes, until the cake has risen and is springy

Next to decorate

Make sure that your cakes are completely cool before decorating, or the buttercream will go grainy and may not hold its shape

• Making the buttercream is as simple as adding the butter, icing sugar and milk and beating until thick but smooth. If it doesn't hold a peak in the bowl, then it won't be thick enough to pipe out as "icecream". Add more icing sugar now.
• When piping, start from the outside of each cake and pipe in a spiral into the middle following the shape of the cake underneath. Try to keep the spiral tight so there are no gaps in the icing effect.
• Finally finish with a sprinkle of hundreds and thousands and a chocolate flake.

Possibly the best chocolate cake ever!



Possibly the best chocolate cake recipe ever!
Dark choc icing with milk choc buttons, and Milk choc icing with white choc buttons 

To substantiate that claim... in my real life I manage a team of 10 technical IT analysts/developers (90% of the team is male). Every other month we have a team meeting, and every team meeting at least one person has "reason" they cannot attend (e.g dealing with major incidents/in the middle of an upgrade etc. etc.)

Last month I baked this cake and last month I had 100% attendance!! therefore I've concluded that the cake really must be something special or perhaps has magical powers!

You will need

For the cake

• 230g butter
• 230g caster sugar
• 210g self raising flour
• 30g cocoa
• 4 medium eggs

For the icing

• 100g butter
• 200g icing sugar
• 100g melted (value or cooking) chocolate (or 30g of cocoa and a splash of milk)

To decorate

Chocolate buttons (Tesco and Morrisons both do their own brand 3 packets for £1,  2 packets is just enough)

Or

Maltesers (This is a little extravagant as it would take 3 packets to do this properly. In the pic below I used 2 packets and it would have been better with 3)

 

Getting started with the cake

• Pre heat oven to 180C
• Grease 2 Victoria sponge tins
• Beat together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy and then slow begin adding the flour and eggs.

Next add the cocoa powder, mix some more and  then pour into your greased tins.

Allow your little monster(s) to lick the beaters!

Bake for 30 minutes


Let the cake cool completely before beginning to decorate, otherwise there is a danger the buttercream will begin to melt and slide off.

Icing and decorations

Break the chocolate up and place it in a heatproof bowl. Then microwave for a few seconds (stir and then put back in if necessary). Do this very slowly rather than risk burning it!

To start the icing, add the butter and icing sugar to a bowl. BEFORE you put a mixer in there (and send an icing sugar cloud across your kitchen), take a wooden spoon and slowly and gently mix the sugar and butter together until it looks a little like scrambled eggs.

Add the melted chocolate to your icing. (The first time I did this I really worried that the warm chocolate would melt the butter and it would all go wrong, but it didn't and everything was good!!)

Now mix with your electric mixer until light and fluffy.

You can then begin assembling and decorating your cake.

Place one cake on a plate, and cover the top with around a 3rd of the icing.

Place the other cake on top, and then use the remaining icing to cover the top and sides. It doesn't need to be thick on the side, just enough to hold the buttons on!

Finally begin the decoration, starting from the outside and working in and then down the sides.

Soon the cake will look amazing and also be light, fluffy and absolutely gorgeous to eat.

Yum yum yum. Eat up!

 

Here is the massive 3 tier malteser version I made for my team meeting

And here's what it looked like less than an hour later!