Coffee Kisses

This is a fab, quick recipe, using store cupboard ingredients, that makes delicious biscuits! Perfect as a snack with your morning coffee, or at any time of day! 

A couple of weeks ago, my in-laws were popping down for the day and I realised the night before that I should probably whizz up something to offer them. I didn’t have the time or energy to go to the shop and so I needed to make something with the stuff that I had in the cupboards. I also wanted to make something that tasted fab, looked like I had made an effort but was actually quick and simple to make! Having made these biscuits a few times before, they came straight to mind and the decision was made.

The recipe comes from the original GBBO book “The Great British Book of Baking”. However, I’ve made a couple of adaptations – added a bit of extra flour and divided the mixture into far smaller balls: they recommend 16 but I’ve followed this recipe and the biscuits are crazily huge! I also rest the dough in the fridge for 20 minutes before baking, which helps the biscuits to keep their domed shape, rather than flattening out.

Give them a go – they’re delicious!

Coffee Kisses

Ingredients

1. 200g self-raising flour
2. 100g caster sugar
3. 100g butter, chilled and diced
4. 2 tsp instant coffee granules or powder
5. 1 medium egg

For the buttercream

1. 75g very soft butter
2. 150g icing sugar
3. 4 tsp cocoa powder

Method

1. Line two baking trays with baking parchment.
2. Combine the flour and the sugar in a mixing bowl.
3. Add the butter and rub into the flour mixture until it resembles breadcrumbs.
4. Dissolve the coffee in 2 tsp of boiling water.
5. Beat the egg until frothy and mix in the coffee.
6. Add to the bowl and stir with a wooden spoon to make a firm dough.
7. Flour your hands well and then divide the dough into 30 pieces.
8. Shape each piece into a neat ball.
9. Arrange the balls on the baking trays, allowing space for them to spread.
10. Place the trays in the fridge for 20 minutes.
11. Pre-heat the oven to 170C.
12. Take the baking trays out of the fridge and place in the oven.
13. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until light golden and firm to the touch.
14. Leave to cool for a few minutes and then transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool completely.
15. Beat the butter with the icing sugar and cocoa powder until very light and smooth.
16. Use the buttercream to sandwich the biscuits in pairs.  

Peppa Pig cupcakes

My friend’s little girl is obsessed with Peppa Pig! So, for her fourth birthday, the whole family travelled over from Guernsey for a holiday on “the Mainland” culminating in a two-day visit to Peppa Pig World. First though, they visited us here in Bath, so I decided to make some Peppa Pig cupcakes (and, as my rhubarb in the garden was ripe for picking, some rhubarb crumble muffins) to welcome them!

I had a quick flick through Pinterest for some inspiration and as I didn’t have loads of time, I decided to keep it reasonably simple: decorating 6 cupcakes with the Peppa theme and 6 with a simple pink rose swirl.

I made the Peppa cupcake toppers the night before making the cakes: this allows the icing to dry and firm and means that it is less likely to absorb the moisture from the buttercream and go floppy! Getting the right thickness is difficult – mine were too thick! I’d probably aim for about 1-2mm thick. For the images on top, I used cutters from this set. 

This set is fantastic! I have a rather huge collection of fondant cutters and plunger cutters, but this set is the one that I use time and time again! I don’t have a set of number cutters (must buy some!) so I cut the number fours from a triangle of icing.

As the cakes were for a four-year-old, I decided to go for a very simple vanilla cupcake, filled with raspberry jam to liven them up and help them last a bit longer. Adding a filling like jam to cupcakes not only boosts the flavour, but it also helps to increase the life of the cakes: as the cakes age, they tend to dry out a bit and so the jam adds moisture.

The final result: well, the Birthday girl loved them (and so did her mum!), which was the main thing! For me, they weren’t the best thing that I have ever made – the red outline on Peppa doesn’t quite work right – it should be pink (but I don’t have a pink food colour pen!) and the blue disks were way too thick! However, the cake was light and fluffy and tasted good – which is the main thing!  

Vanilla cupcakes with raspberry jam and vanilla buttercream

Ingredients

1. 110g butter, at room temperature
2. 225g golden castor sugar
3. 2 large eggs
4. 150g self-raising flour, sifted
5. 125g plain flour, sifted
6. 120ml semi-skimmed milk
7. 1 tsp vanilla extract
8. 4 tblsp raspberry jam

Buttercream:

1. 110g butter, at room temperature and very soft
2. 500g icing sugar, sifted
3. 1 tsp vanilla extract
4. 60ml milk 
5. Pink paste food colouring

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160C/350F/GM4.
2. Line a 12 hole muffin tin with cupcake cases.
3. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy this will take at least 5 minutes with an electric hand mixer – don’t rush this stage).
4. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing for a few minutes after each addition. It should result in a lovely light mousse-like mixture.
5. Combine the two flours in a separate bowl.
6. Combine the milk and vanilla extract in a jug.
7. Add one third of the flours to the creamed mixture and stir gently to combine.
8. Pour in one third of the milk mixture and stir gently.
9. Continue to add flours and then milk mixture alternately, stirring gently after each addition, until all have been added.
10. Spoon mixture into the cupcake cases, filling to about 2/3 full.
11. Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes until lightly golden brown. The cakes will spring back lightly when touched, if cooked.
12. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in tin for about 10 minutes, before carefully placing on a wire rack to finish cooling.

While the cakes are in the oven, make up the buttercream:

1. In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter, milk, vanilla extract and half of the icing sugar until smooth.
2. Add the rest of the icing sugar and beat until smooth and creamy.
3. Put buttercream into a piping bag with a large star nozzle.

Once cakes are cooked and cooled:

1. Use a tea spoon to cut a cone out from the centre of the cakes.
2. Cut the top disk off each cone and retain.
3. Fill the hole in each cake with a teaspoon of raspberry jam and then replace a cake disk onto each cake to seal the hole.
4. Pipe rose swirls onto all of the cupcakes.
5. Top cakes with a Peppa disk.

Peppa-themed cupcake toppers

1. Pale blue, yellow, pink, red and white fondant icing
2. Black writing icing / black food colour pen
3. Red food colouring
4. Pink food colour pen

Method

1. Roll out the blue fondant icing to 1-2mm thick and cut out 6 circles with a 75mm round cutter.

For the sun cupcakes:

1. Roll out the yellow fondant to about 1mm thick
2. Cut out two 25mm circles and 16 small rectangles.
3. Use a paintbrush and a very small amount of tap water to stick the suns to the blue disks.

For the cloud cupcakes:

1. Roll out the white fondant to 2-3mm thick.
2. Cut out two flowers and then carefully roll over each flower in one direction with a rolling pin.
3. Use a number or a letter cutter to cut out an age or initial.
4. Use a paintbrush and a very small amount of tap water to stick the clouds to the blue disks and then the numbers to the clouds.

For the Peppa cupcakes:

1. Roll out red fondant to about 1mm thick.
2. Cut out two triangles.
3. Use a circle cutter to cut off one corner (to sit the head on) and to round off the opposite edge of the triangle (to sit against the side of the blue disk).
4. Repeat for the second triangle
5. Roll out pink fondant to 1mm thick.
6. Cut out two ellipses.
7. Use a knife to turn the ellipses into Peppa heads (whistle-shaped!)
8. Use a paintbrush and a very small amount of tap water to stick the red dress shapes to the blue disks and then stick on the Peppa heads in the correct position.
9. Roll four very small balls of pink fondant and flatten each slightly.
10. Stick these flattened balls in place as ears.
11. Roll very thin sausages of pink fondant and then stick in place as arms.
12. Use the pink food colour pen to outline Peppa’s head and ears, and define the nose, nostrils and mouth.
13. Add eyes with the black food colour pen.
14. Dilute a tiny amount of red food colouring in a tiny amount of water.
15. Using a paintbrush, use this diluted food colouring to paint on Peppa’s flushed cheeks.  

Easy Berry Sauce

I found this quick and easy recipe for a berry sauce whilst flicking through my many and varied cookery books for dinner party dessert inspiration. The sauce was an accompaniment to a blackberry buttermilk sponge and I did consider making this for my dessert (with raspberries rather than blackberries, given the season). However, I then came across Mary Berry's lemon tart and decided to make that instead. However, I love berries with lemon tart and so decided to adapt the recipe to make this sauce to complement my tart. 

The original sauce was made with 150g each of blackberries and raspberries but I had blueberries and strawberries in the fridge and some frozen raspberries, so I decided to use these instead. 

This sauce is incredibly simple to make and tastes fantastic! It went brilliantly with the lemon tart, but would also be fantastic with ice cream, meringues, pancakes and lots of other desserts! I used the leftover sauce on my yoghurt and granola for breakfast!

Easy berry sauce
Ingredients

1. 300g berries (I used 100g each of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries)
2. 2 tsp cornflour
3. 2 tblsp caster sugar

Method

1. Put all of the ingredients in a medium-sized pan and mix gently with a wooden spoon so that all of the berries are coated with sugar and cornflour.
2. Set the pan on a low heat and stir frequently until the juices start to run.
3. Increase the heat slightly and simmer gently, stirring regularly, until the fruit has softened and the juices have thickened to make a sauce.
4. Taste the sauce and add more sugar if required.
5. Add a splash of water if the sauce is too thick. 
6. Serve hot, warm or cold. 

Monster cupcakes (apple and cinnamon)

The monsters! 

These apple and cinnamon cupcakes were actually made back in February - before I used the same recipe to make the Sheep Cupcakes for my friend’s hen weekend – I just haven’t gotten around to writing them up!  These cupcakes were made for a visit to see my sister, brother-in-law and 18-month-old nephew. I wanted to make something fun and remembered having pinned monster cupcakes to my Cupcake Inspiration board on Pinterest.

I experimented with different piping nozzles for the buttercream – making spiky monsters with a small round nozzle, hairy monsters using a grass effect nozzle, and wiggly wormy-like monsters with a medium round nozzle. I chose purple and green buttercream to contrast, but you could make any colour monsters!

To decorate the cupcakes, I made circles out of white fondant icing for the eyes and mouths out of black fondant icing. I have this small cutter set, which has lots of basic shapes and is very useful! Making the teeth and sticking them on was quite fiddly – as they are tiny pieces of fondant – but worth the effort! The easiest way to make tiny triangles is to cut out stars using a star cutter, and the cut the triangles off each star. The tongues were made from fizzy belt sweets, cut with a pair of kitchen sweets and then inserted through the mouths – again a bit fiddly! The hair/antennae were simply made from strawberry pencil sweets, cut into short lengths. You could experiment with various different sweets for different hair-types / antennae.

If you wanted to make these cupcakes as a fun activity with kids, you could use white chocolate buttons for the eyes, teeth / lip / fang sweets for the mouths and various different types of sweets for the hair!

These cakes tasted fantastic, but the cake / icing didn’t really go with the strong taste of the sweets on top! If I were to make monster cupcakes again, I’d probably go for a simple vanilla cupcake, or a strawberry cupcake to go with the sweets!

Cinnamon cupcakes with apple puree and maple syrup buttercream 

(makes 12 cupcakes and 4-6 mini cupcakes)

Ingredients

1. 110g butter, at room temperature
2. 225g golden castor sugar
3. 2 large eggs
4. 150g self-raising flour, sifted
5. 125g plain flour, sifted
6. 120ml semi-skimmed milk
7. 2 tsp cinnamon
8. 1 tsp vanilla extract
9. 2 large / 3 small Bramley apples
10. ½ - 1 tblsp soft brown sugar

Buttercream:

1. 115g butter, at room temperature
2. 500g icing sugar, sifted
3. 2 tblsp maple syrup
4. 2 tblsp milk
5. Food colouring

To decorate

1. Sweets (I used fizzy belt sweets and strawberry cables)
2. White fondant icing
3. Black fondant icing
4. Black writing icing (optional)
5. Red food colour pen (optional)

For the eyes and mouths (this can all be done in advance):

1. Roll out a small amount of white fondant icing.
2. Use various circle cutters to cut out different sized eyes.
3. Use a star-shaped cutter to cut out several stars and then use a knife to cut these stars into small triangles for teeth.
4. Cut out small rectangles for additional teeth.
5. Roll out a small amount of black fondant icing.
6. Use an oval cutter to cut out mouths and shape as desired.
7. Use a paint brush dipped in a tiny amount of water to attach the teeth to the mouths.
8. Use scissors to cut tongue shapes from the belt sweets.
9. Cut small slits in the mouths and then push tongues through these.
10. Use black writing icing or a black food colour pen to add pupils to the eyes.

For the cakes:

1. Peel and chop the Bramley apples.
2. Place the chopped apples in a saucepan with two tablespoons of water and half a tablespoon of soft brown sugar.
3. Cook over a low heat until softened and mostly pureed ( a few small lumps is fine).
4. Taste and add extra brown sugar as required.
5. Place to one side to cool.
6. Preheat oven to 160C.
7. Line a 12 hole muffin tin with cupcake cases.
8. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (this will take at least 5 minutes with an electric hand /stand mixer – don’t rush this stage).
9. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing for a few minutes after each addition. It should result in a lovely light mousse-like mixture.
10. Combine the two flours and the cinnamon in a separate bowl.
11. Combine the milk and vanilla extract in a jug.
12. Add one third of the flour mixture to the creamed mixture and stir gently to combine.
13. Pour in one third of the milk mixture and stir gently.
14. Continue to add flours and then milk mixture alternately, stirring gently after each addition, until all have been added.
15. Spoon mixture into the cupcake cases, filling to about 2/3 full.
16. Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes until lightly golden brown. The cakes will spring back lightly when touched, if cooked.
17. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in tin for about 10 minutes, before carefully placing on a wire rack to finish cooling.

While the cakes are in the oven, make up the buttercream:

1. In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter, maple syrup and half of the icing sugar until smooth.
2. Add the rest of the icing sugar and beat until smooth and creamy.
3. Add milk (if needed to bring the buttercream to a piping consistency) and beat again.
4. Put buttercream into a piping bag with a nozzle adaptor.

Once cakes are cooked and cooled: 

1. Use a tea spoon to cut a cone out from the centre of the cakes.
2. Cut the top disk off each cone and retain.
3. Fill the hole in each cake with a teaspoon of pureed apple and then replace a cake disk onto each cake to seal the hole.
4. Pipe the butter cream onto the cakes using various nozzles.
5. Add eyes, mouths and hair / antennae.