Earl Grey cupcakes with lemon buttercream

Delicious Earl Grey cupcakes with a subtle lemon buttercream, decorated with a country garden theme.

My manager retired earlier this month and so her leaving party was definitely an opportunity for some special, extra-effort cupcakes. I had to make a Sticky Ginger Cake, as this is my signature bake at work and much loved by my manager. To accompany this, I decided to make Primrose Bakery’s Earl Grey cupcakes, as she is a big fan of Earl Grey tea. The following recipe is my version of these cupcakes – I have made them in the past and found that the tea flavour was rather faint, so I added in an extra tea bag to give them a bit more oomph!

The PB book suggests vanilla buttercream, but I decided to go for a lemon buttercream to give a bit of gentle zing to the cakes – and I feel that lemon works really well with the tea flavour. The lemon buttercream recipe below is a bit more subtle than the one I generally use – as I didn’t want to overwhelm the tea flavour, so I added a bit of milk rather than all lemon juice to the mix.

As my manager is a keen gardener, I decided on a gardening theme. I flicked through Pinterest for some inspiration and then sketched out my design. I decided on the simple dirt path, as this seemed much simpler and quicker than making paving stones as I did on my Magic Garden set of cupcakes. I had some Lakeland citrus sugar, a bit like this one, that I used to scatter on the paths, but they don’t appear to sell it anymore, so I have suggested just using a mix of brown sugars instead. For the grass, you will need a grass piping nozzle that looks something like the one pictured. Mine came in a set from Lakeland that is incredibly useful! 

You can save time on the day by making the fondant flowers, leaves and other decorative items in advance. To make the cauliflower and cabbages, I used a 5 petal flower cutter like that pictured. However, don’t buy cutters like this separately, there are some fantastic deals for plunger cutter sets on Amazon or Ebay. You don’t need to add the tiny butterflies, but I had a tub of butterfly sprinkles in the cupboard and I think that they add a lovely touch.

I was really pleased with how these cakes turned out. They did take quite a bit of effort, but I think that they were worth it! The tea flavour came through well and worked nicely with the subtle lemon buttercream. I was a bit disappointed that the Bergamot flavour of the Earl Grey tea did not come through as strongly as I might have hoped. I’m not sure how to intensify this without over-doing the tea flavour – Google does not seem to give me any answers! I can’t seem to find a bergamot flavouring and I’m not sure about adding pure essential oil to cakes! I used Twinings Earl Grey teabags, but I may try an alternative next time – perhaps even using tea leaves rather than tea bags.

Earl Grey cupcakes with lemon buttercream

(single batch of 12 cupcakes)

Ingredients

1. 175ml semi-skimmed milk, at room temperature
2. 5 Earl Grey tea bags
3. 110g butter, at room temperature
4. 225g golden castor sugar
5. 2 large eggs, beaten
6. 125g self-raising flour, sifted
7. 120g plain flour, sifted

Buttercream:

1. 110g butter, at room temperature
2. 20ml milk, at room temperature
3. 40ml freshly squeezed lemon juice
4. 500g icing sugar, sifted

Method

1. Heat 125ml milk in a saucepan over a medium heat until it just begins to boil.
2. Remove from the heat and add the tea bags.
3. Cover with clingfilm and leave to infuse for about 30 minutes.
4. Discard the tea bags and add the extra 50ml of milk.  
5. Preheat oven to 160C.
6. Line a 12 hole muffin tin with cupcake cases.
7. 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).
8. Add the beaten eggs, a little at a time, mixing for a few minutes after each addition. It should result in a lovely light mousse-like mixture.
9. Combine the plain flour with the self-raising flour and all of the spices in a separate bowl.
10. Add one third of the flours to the creamed mixture and stir gently to combine.
11. Pour in one third of the infused milk and stir gently.
12. Continue to add flours and then milk mixture alternately, stirring gently after each addition, until all have been added.
13. Spoon mixture into the cupcake cases, filling to about 2/3 full.
14. Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes until lightly golden brown. The cakes will spring back lightly when touched, if cooked.
15. 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, lemon juice and half of the icing sugar until smooth.
2. Add the rest of the icing sugar and beat until smooth and creamy.

To decorate

1. Food colouring (preferably pastes rather than liquids)
2. Golden caster sugar / Demerara sugar
3. Ready-to-roll fondant icing – various colours, including green
4. Butterfly sprinkles
5. Writing icing

Method

1. Use plunger cutters to create flowers and leaves and set aside to dry (this can be done several days in advance).
2. Mould additional decorative items, such as wellies, flower pots and vegetables out of fondant icing (see above for tips on cauliflowers and cabbages). (Again, this can be done in advance)
3. Use writing icing to add centre to the flowers
4. Remove ¼ of the buttercream from the bowl and colour this brown.
5. Colour the remaining buttercream green.
6. Use a palette knife to spread the brown buttercream onto some of the cupcakes as a vegetable patch and as a path.
7. Sprinkle a mix of golden and Demerara sugar onto the paths.
8. Place green buttercream in a piping bag with a grass nozzle attached.
9. Pipe grass around the vegetable patches, on either side of the paths and onto the remaining cupcakes.
10. Add flowers, vegetables and other items onto the cupcakes.  

Tutti Pole Tea Shoppe – Hungerford

Today, we ventured along the M4 as far as Hungerford in search of cups and saucers! Sounds strange, but I’ve decided that I would like some vintage/antique tea cups and saucers to use when photographing my cakes. Hungerford is full of antique centres and shops so it seemed like a great place to start the search.

After a bit of a late start (didn’t wake until 12.30!), we didn’t get to Hungerford until about 15.00, so we decided to head straight to get a bite to eat. I’d spotted the Tutti Pole Tea Shoppe sign as we drove through the town and I’m a bit of a sucker for old-fashioned “tea shoppes”! Unfortunately, once inside, the décor was more shabby than chic: the first page of the menu tells that the current owners took over in 1981 – it doesn’t look like they have changed at all since then.  The walls are a rather garish pink and the tables and chairs are dated pine. The cake display on the front counter was also quite unappealing – rather than having whole/partial cakes on display, there was a small, lonely looking slice of each type of cake out as display.

However, walking to our table, I was tempted by the display of huge meringues in an old-school chilled display cabinet and I remained hopeful that the food could be good. The service was a little over-keen, I had barely taken my coat off when we were asked if we were ready to order. We asked for a couple of minutes but were then asked again when we were only half-way through the menu. We had skipped lunch and so we decided to share a sandwich and then have a cake each.  The menu itself did not particularly inspire (both the dated and rather grubby leatherette folder and inserts and the choice of food), again it very much seemed that it hadn’t been updated since the 80s. At this point, I was tempted to get up and leave, but we hadn’t seen anywhere else and it always feels a bit wrong to leave, having sat down at a table and looked at the menu. We decided to stick it out and hope that the food was good.

The sandwich choice was very traditional – cheese, ham, egg, tuna etc and not much tempted. In the end, we decided to share a tuna melt toasted sandwich, EHH went for one of his favourites – bread pudding and I chose one of the huge meringues on display, accompanied, of course, by a pot of tea for two.

EHH's bread pudding

The food and drinks arrived promptly. The pot of tea (expensive at £1.95 per person) came in a 80s style tea set. It easily provided 2 cups of tea each and the extra pot of water would have done an extra cup each, except there weren’t enough tea bags in the pot and so the remaining tea was very weak. We were amused that our toasted sandwich had clearly been done in a 90s toasty-maker, not that we have any objection to this, but it just isn’t something you see very often these days, and very much fitted with our overall impression of the place. The tuna melt toasty itself (pricey for what it was at £4.75) was fine and came accompanied with a little side salad of lettuce, tomato, cucumber and cress – we liked the fact that we had told the waiter that we were sharing and so they had given us half each on our own plate.  

My meringue

EHH’s bread pudding (cheap at about £1.75) was ok but nothing special – it had a good stodgy texture but could have done with more fruit and a bit of spice. My meringue (cheap at £2.75) looked amazing but was really quite disappointing - it was over-sweet and very crisp all the way through, missing the lovely chewy centre that I always look for in a good home-made meringue. It came with a huge amount of cream but only half of a strawberry – would have been nice to have more fruit to balance the extreme sweetness of the meringue. There was no way I could have eaten the whole meringue and so EHH ended up eating half to help me out!

Overall, I was disappointed with Tutti Pole Tea Shoppe – it has so much potential but missed on nearly all aspects.  The pricing of the food and drinks seemed odd – some things quite cheap (particularly the cake) and some really quite expensive. It has a really interesting history, is in a great location and appears to be very much part of the local community (we were touched by a number of pictures on the wall that were given to the place in memory of others) but we spent much of our time in there discussing how it could be updated and improved. We enjoyed our next couple of hours in Hungerford, pottering around the antique centres and will definitely return to the town, but not to the Tutti Pole.

Millionaire’s Shortbread

One of my cousins was visiting for Easter weekend and so I wanted to prepare a few goodies for when she and her boyfriend arrived.  I skimmed through the copy of Delicious magazine that EHH had bought me recently and came across Harlequin rugby player James Johnston’s recipe for millionaire’s shortbread. Mum used to make this for us when we were kids and it is one of EHH’s favourite treats but I’d never attempted it, so I decided to have a go.

The following is my adaptation of the recipe – as I felt that the instructions in Delicious were rather limited. It is really important to keep stirring the caramel while simmering – it didn’t say this in the magazine and my first attempt at the caramel failed dismally – burning at the bottom and turning into a very strange lumpy texture. Second attempt, I kept stirring throughout and it turned out fine – except I think I took it off the heat slightly early, as it didn’t quite taste cooked through and it was lacking a bit of flavour. So make sure that you wait until the caramel has turned a nice dark golden colour before taking it off the heat.

This recipe provides a very thick caramel layer – you could probably just use one tin of condensed milk (although EHH thinks it is perfect with this very thick layer of caramel!). Next time, I may also add in some sea salt flakes to give the caramel a bit of oomph. The shortbread layer itself is incredibly simple to make but has a fantastic flavour and texture. The original recipe had only a dark chocolate topping – I added the white chocolate swirls – mainly just to look pretty!

Update October 2013 - you may also want to try my Billionaire's shortbread with salted caramel. 

Millionaire’s shortbread

Ingredients

1. 175g butter, at room temperature
2. 75g caster sugar
3. 250g plain flour
4. 200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
5. 50g white chocolate, broken into pieces

For the caramel

1. 100g butter
2. 50g light brown sugar
3. 50g golden syrup
4. 2 x 397g tins of condensed milk

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 170C and grease and line a deep 30cm x 20cm baking tin with baking parchment
2. Put the butter and sugar in a large bowl and cream with an electric mixer for about 5 minutes until light and fluffy.
3. Stir in flour until evenly mixed, forming a dough.
4. Press the dough into the prepared tin, then bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden.
5. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely in the tin.
6. In a heavy based, non-stick pan, melt the butter, light brown sugar, golden syrup and condensed milk over a low heat, stirring constantly.
7. Continuing to stir constantly, bring to a simmer and then bubble gently for about 20 minutes, until it turns a dark golden colour.
8. Pour the caramel evenly over the shortbread and leave to set.
9. Put the dark chocolate into a heatproof bowl and melt over a pan of just simmering water (don’t allow the water to touch the bowl). Set aside while you do the same with the white chocolate.
10. Pour the dark chocolate over the caramel and spread evenly.
11. Driizzle the white chocolate over the dark chocolate, and then use a knife to marble the two together.
12. Leave to cool completely and then cut the shortbread into squares.

Whitehall Garden Centre restaurant, Lacock

Ok, I admit it, I secretly quite enjoy a Sunday afternoon at a garden centre. Not that I’m particularly interested in gardening, plants etc, but these days, garden centres tend to have a great selection of housey/gift bits and bobs, decent farm shops and a good range of cake in the café! 

A few of our houseplants were looking decidedly worse for wear and we had nothing much planned for a wet Sunday afternoon, so we decided to pop along to Whitehall Garden Centre for a potter. Having skipped lunch, we decided to head straight to the restaurant to find something to eat.  The restaurant is fairly standard for a garden centre – fairly large, with lots of fairly cheap, modern wooden tables and chairs. There are large conservatory-type windows overlooking the outside plant section of the centre, so the restaurant is light and airy. As you would expect on a rainy Sunday afternoon, it was busy and most of the tables were filled.

Although we were thinking about lunch, the range of paninis was fairly limited and didn’t really tempt me, the only sandwiches available were packaged and, as we had a big roast planned for the evening, I didn’t want something more substantial, so after much deliberation, we decided just to have a slice of cake. There was a good range of cakes available, including about 4 different gluten-free options. I immediately spotted the one for EHH – an enormous hunk of caramel-covered flapjack. After deliberating between carrot cake, Victoria sponge and apple cake, I decided to go for the apple and cinnamon cake. We also opted for the standard pot of tea for two. In all, the bill came to just under £10, which was fairly respectable.

The tea was standard tea bags in a fairly decent-sized pot. It didn’t come with any additional hot water and the milk jug was fairly small, but the staff were very happy to top up the hot water and provide more milk, when asked. EHH really enjoyed his huge piece of caramel-covered flapjack – it was way too sweet for my tastes but he loved it. My apple and cinnamon cake was rather disappointing: I expect apple cake to be very moist and fruity, this was really quite dry and lacked flavour. The cinnamon icing was too sweet and rather overpowered the rest of the cake.

In all, the restaurant is acceptable but not exceptional. We’d probably pop in again if we were back shopping at the garden centre, but wouldn’t visit specifically for the restaurant.

Cordial and Grace tea-rooms, Clifton Village

Last weekend, the pretty Georgian shopping quarter of Clifton Village was bathed in frosty sunlight and looking at its best – definitely a good choice for a stroll and morning coffee with my visiting family.  After a potter over the Clifton Bridge and a bit of window shopping around a few of the fantastic independent boutiques, it was time for a cup of tea and a bite to eat. Unsurprisingly, many of Clifton’s coffee shops were busy and, as there were five of us (Mum, my aunt (R), my brother (D) and his girlfriend (J)), it was a little difficult to find somewhere to seat us all. 

Although a little understated from the outside – possibly accounting for why they were not quite as busy as other places – once inside, Cordial and Grace tea-rooms are bright and modern with a fashionably kitsch feel.  They are a sewing café - apparently following a trend in Paris and Berlin and catering for the increasing market of crafters – and hire sewing machines by the hour as well as holding a wide variety of sewing workshops. 

There was a good variety of cakes available, including three types of mince pies, three different cream teas (including a savoury option), a chocolate and clementine marble cake, apricot and yoghurt cake, peanut butter brownies and home-made cookies. We loved that they had little tasters of a couple of the cakes and a taste of the apricot and yoghurt cake tempted me, J and R. The cake was a decent sized slice and lovely: moist, full of flavour and not-too-sweet – great for a mid-morning snack. D went for a peanut butter brownie – he was slightly disappointed by the size (definitely a girl-sized portion!) but not by the taste – he allowed me a crumb and it was rich, peanutty and delicious. 

I loved that the tea came served in mis-matched teacups and saucers – very fitting with the overall atmosphere of the tea-rooms. The tea itself was proper leaf tea and came with a very cute little egg timer – to let you know when the tea had brewed correctly! D had a big mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows, Mum had a latte and J had a Jasmine tea, which were all good. R ordered a white Americano but it came as a black Americano, but she decided to just use some of the milk provided with my tea, rather than asking for it to be changed.

Overall, I was impressed with this cute little café. Not sure if I’d return with EHH, but I’d definitely bring a couple of my girl friends – who would love it! I’ll definitely be back to Clifton in the near future though – I hadn’t been for a while and I’d love to have a bit more time (without a shopping-averse brother) to potter around all of the brilliant independent shops up there.

Roscoff Deli and Café, Bath

Picture taken from Roscoff website: http://www.roscoff.co.uk/

Hidden away down a little side street in Bath, just up from the Guildhall market, Roscoff Café is a gem worth seeking out. Don’t be swayed by the familiarity of Café Nero or the tempting displays of Patisserie Valerie close by – Roscoff’s food, service and atmosphere beats these places, and pretty much every other café (of which there are many!) in Bath, hands down.

As a tea and cake lover who has lived in Bath for over 8 years, I’ve tried many of the cafes around the town centre, but Roscoff is one of the few I come back to time and again. It is an owner-run establishment and Rosario, the Sicilian owner, is a host in the true sense of the word. From the moment you enter, you are welcomed like an old friend and Rosario is very happy to chat and make recommendations, without ever imposing.

The building is fairly small – there are a few tables outside (lovely in the summer), the counter and a few tables downstairs and more tables upstairs (up a winding, narrow set of wooden steps).  This isn’t a posh Bath tearoom – the décor and crockery is a little rustic, and the tables fairly cramped – but this just fits with the atmosphere and adds to the charm.

This time, we visited on a busy Saturday afternoon in Bath. We were lucky to find a table as it was incredibly busy. We were a little squashed in on a downstairs table, but it was fun to sit and watch people wandering by, the staff bustling about and Rosario greeting and chatting away to customers.  We were only popping in for a drink and bit of cake, but deciding on what to have still took a while as the menu has lots of choice.  There are a wide variety of black and green teas and carefully selected coffees and a good selection of cakes, including 5 different baked cheesecakes (which look fantastic – except I don’t like cheesecake!), gluten-free chocolate brownies and gluten-free Sicilian lemon cake, coffee and walnut cake, carrot cake, traditional Sicilian cannolo (pastry shells filled with a ricotta cream) and many more.  The café also does breakfasts (which, according to TA reviews) are fantastic) and a good variety of lunch options.

In the end, I opted for the House Blend tea and a slice of the GF Sicilian Lemon cake. When ordering the cake, Rosario was quite surprised that I guessed his “secret ingredient” immediately! He says that I’m the only one to have ever guessed – but I’ve made a similar cake myself before! I won’t give away the secret though – you’ll have to go and see if you can work it out yourself. My tea was delicious: fragrant and flavoursome. It came in a small tea pot, with a tea strainer, and gave me two and a half cups of tea.  My lemon cake was moist and zingy with a lovely lemon buttercream-type topping.

EHH chose a latte and the Sicilian Afternoon Tea – a choice of 3 Sicilian mini pastries: he chose a lemon cannolo, a vanilla cannolo and a pistachio aragostina.  His latte was lovely – the coffee is really good here – my only negative is that it came in a large mug rather than a glass (I have a thing that lattes should always come in a glass!). He really enjoyed his pastries, in particular the pistachio aragostina. The flavours were great, although if being ultra picky, the pastry was a little thick – however, this could just be how these are meant to be!

Overall, if you couldn’t tell already, we love this place. It’s the antithesis to the bland, faceless corporate chains that are taking over towns and cities across the country and the food is great. We’ll be back.