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.  

Sheep cupcakes (apple and cinnamon)

Bake number two for the Welsh hen do! Having done a quick skim through Pinterest for Welsh-themed cupcakes, I decided that marshmallow-topped sheep cupcakes were definitely the way forward!

Having chosen lemon and blueberry mini loaf cakes as my other bake, I decided to make apple and cinnamon  flavoured cupcakes, using some apple puree left in the freezer from last Autumn’s glut of Bramley apples. I made apple and cinnamon cupcakes about a year ago, but the texture of the cakes didn’t turn out quite right (although they tasted fab!). This time, I decided to make cinnamon cupcakes and fill them with apple purée. The cinnamon cupcakes were an adaptation of the Primrose Bakery vanilla cupcakes –simply with the addition of two teaspoons of cinnamon. I added a teaspoon of vanilla extract as this helps to soften the cinnamon and give a more rounded flavour. The apple puree was added to the cooked cupcakes as a filling. I’ve recently discovered the joy of American pancakes with maple syrup and, inspired by these, decided to make a maple syrup buttercream to top these cupcakes.

To create the sheep, I made the black sheep heads out of fondant icing the night before making the cakes. This takes quite a while so it is better done in advance. However, having made them all in advance – I managed to lose one! I didn’t have the time or inclination to make another, but fortunately, EHH came to the rescue with a fab suggestion – I rolled four small thin sausages of black fondant and turned them into feet – creating an upside-down sheep!  Pushing the marshmallows into the buttercream was easy but took longer than expected – so allow plenty of time!

Once complete, I was fairly happy with these cupcakes – they tasted great and looked pretty good! The bride-to-be loved them too! The maple buttercream worked really well with the apple and cinnamon – definitely a good combination!

Cinnamon cupcakes with apple purée and maple syrup 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. 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 

To decorate

1. Mini marshmallows
2. Black fondant icing
3. White fondant icing
4. Black writing icing (optional)

To make the sheep heads:

(These can be made ahead of time and stored in a cool dry place until they are needed).

1. Knead the black fondant until pliable.
2. Make 12 teardrop shaped lumps of icing (approximately the size of the top segment of your index finger)
3. Use a small ball tool to make indents on either side of the rounded end of each teardrop.
4. Use the same tool to make indents for the eyes.
5. Roll 24 small lumps of black fondant for the ears.
6. Roll 24 small balls of white fondant for the eyes.
7. Use a paintbrush to dampen the indents with water.
8. Push the eyes and ears into place.
9. Use the writing icing (or tiny balls of black fondant – but this will be very fiddly!) to add pupils to each eye. 
10. Use a skewer to add two nostrils to each head.
11. Set aside to dry.

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 large round 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 pureed apple and then replace a cake disk onto each cake to seal the hole.
4. Pipe the butter cream into a small flat swirl on each cupcake.
5. Push the mini marshmallows into the buttercream, leaving space for the heads.
6. Push the heads into place.  

Mini lemon and blueberry loaf cakes

What do you make for an afternoon tea in a Medieval manor house? As part of an action-packed hen weekend in Wales (which also included The Crystal Maze, a Medieval Banquet, crazy golf and a 1930s Paris-themed evening), Saturday afternoon was dedicated to a moment of calm in the form of a vintage afternoon tea, complete with tea dresses and scrumptious delicacies prepared by the hens.  Victoria sponge, Welsh cakes, scones, banana cupcakes, chocolate brownies, blondies and macaroons were all on the menu already so I needed to come up with something different for my contribution.

I’d already decided that sheep cupcakes were a definite (surely an essential for a hen do in Wales, with a very Welsh hen?!): these were going to take quite a bit of effort and so, for my second contribution, I decided to make some mini lemon and blueberry loaf cakes: they’re delicious, quick and easy to make and you can’t have an afternoon tea without lemon cake!

The recipe is almost identical to the mini lemon loaf cakes from the Lakeland website that I made in February, except this time, I used the juice of two lemons rather than also adding milk. This upped the intensity of the lemon in the cakes and had no impact on the texture of the cake. Blueberries are one of my favourite fruit and they go beautifully in these lemon cakes – think that I’ll have to make these for my mum!

As with the mini lemon loaf cakes, this recipe uses medium eggs – which I never buy! If, like me, you only have large eggs, just break the eggs into a bowl, whisk and weigh out 160g of the whisked egg to add to the cake mix, discarding any left over.

Mini lemon and blueberry loaf cakes

Ingredients

1. 200g unsalted butter, softened, plus extra to grease
2. 175g golden caster sugar
3. 3 unwaxed lemons
4. 3 medium eggs, beaten
5. 200g plain flour
6. 2 level tsps baking powder
7. Pinch of salt
8. 50g ground almonds
9. 100g blueberries
10. 150g icing sugar, sifted 

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F.
2. Lightly grease the mini loaf tin (ideally, spray with cake release spray).
3. Cream together the butter and caster sugar until pale, light and fluffy.
4. Grate the zest from two of the lemons and add to the mixture.
5. Gradually add the beaten eggs, mixing well between each addition.
6. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.
7. Fold these dry ingredients into the cake mixture.
8. Fold in the ground almonds.
9. Add the juice from two lemons and mix until smooth.
10. Mix in the blueberries.
11. Divide the mixture between the tin holes and level with a teaspoon.
12. Bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown and springy, turning the tin after about 18 minutes to ensure that the cakes bake evenly.  
13. Leave the cakes to cool in the tin for 10 minutes then ease out onto a wire rack and leave until completely cool.
14. Meanwhile, zest and squeeze the juice from the remaining lemon.
15. Mix the lemon juice into the icing sugar a little at a time, until the icing is smooth and runny and will coat the back of a spoon (it will need to be thicker – about the consistency of toothpaste – if you want to pipe the icing).
16. Drizzle the icing over the cakes and sprinkle with the remaining zest.

Rainbow cupcakes

Birthday time again – and my turn to make cakes for the Friday cake meeting at work. I decided to use up one of the small Christmas cakes that I had left over from Christmas (still well preserved in a mixture of sloe gin / cherry brandy / plum liqueur!) and make a couple of complementary cakes. As there is a coeliac amongst my colleagues, I made the very delicious gluten-free carrot, coconut and pistachio cake that I last made in October again.

Cupcakes are generally seen as one of my specialities and I hadn’t made any for a while, so I decided that I would make some lemon cupcakes, filled with passion fruit curd (as I had some in the fridge!) and topped with lemon buttercream.

Given the never-ending rain that we have all had recently, I was inspired by some rainbow-themed cupcakes that I had seen on Pinterest. When it came to decorating the cakes, I tried just smoothing the buttercream on with a pallet knife but my pallet knife skills are not the best and it looked a bit scruffy to me. I decided to go with my ever-reliable  Wilton 2D nozzle and pipe roses. The clouds were piped with a small round nozzle. The rainbows themselves were fizzy multi-coloured belt sweets – cut in half and then stuck down into the clouds.

These cupcakes always taste fantastic – I just love the tangy passion fruit curd combined with the zingy lemon cake and buttercream. When they were first complete, I wasn’t that happy with the finished look but the next morning, I did feel a bit more confident about them – and everyone at work loved them!  If I were to do them again (maybe with a bit more time), I’d love to add little pots of gold to these!