Meal Planning Monday - the salad edition!

I'm not ACTUALLY going to say it's too hot but yes, it's a bit warm, isn't it? I have no inclination to turn on ovens and I'm having a bit of a reaction to a busy weekend of Missy Woo's birthday followed by the Wimbledon final, which felt interminable to me, so heavens only knows how it felt to the players!

As a result, I'm going to attempt to make most of the weather and just do as many salads and grilled food as possible. Some are our favourites, some are new ones.

Here goes. I am literally planning this as I type this post so it really is hot off the press.

Monday - Bean, ham and egg salad
Tuesday - Sausages in buns or wraps with corn relish
Wednesday - Spicy salmon tabbouleh
Thursday - Sandwiches
Friday - Loaded mushroom burgers
Saturday - Omelette wedges
Sunday - keeping free for cake club!

Err, that's it. Click badge above etc.

Ice Tea?

 Not really the drink for the time of year (well, the weather at the moment at least), but I'm not actually talking about the drink. No, no, no. We were invited to a tea party by the people from Ice and it seemed like a good idea for a trip out during the school holidays. I mean, cake is something my children never turn down so free cake is even better, right?

The venue for the tea party was Farmer Copley's in West Yorkshire, a farm shop who is a member of the Ice scheme, more of which in a moment. They have a fab cafe which produces huge slabs of yummy cakes, a farm shop and lots of fun activities at weekends, although sadly, the weather had put paid to a lot of their outdoor Easter activities.

Still, there were baby chicks to hold. Missy was surprisingly keen to hold them - the chick pecking her hand made her laugh.

I was there, with some other lovely bloggers, to learn about the Ice loyalty scheme. It's a loyalty card, just like the supermarkets have, but one with a difference. Ice aims to be different. They want their loyalty scheme to be beneficial to the environment. Most of its retailers are farm shops, offering mostly locally grown or made produce. Others are public transport operators, as well as some larger national brands like John Lewis and Marks and Spencer. All of them have good environmental credentials - something they must have for Ice to allow them into the scheme.

Points can be earned and spent at the farm shops or by visiting the retailer's sites via the Ice website. Points can be redeemed as total or part payment for purchases, rather than having to cover the total cost like some insist. If you forget to redeem your points - you get 3 years to redeem them - the money is put towards projects that benefit the environment. In terms of the environment, it's a win all round. As a shopper, you're getting to do your bit and perhaps get something back too. It's particularly great to have local farm shops as part of the scheme as it will encourage people to buy local produce, perhaps over buying everything from the supermarket. There aren't too many farm shops across the country at the moment, but hopefully, more will continue to sign up. There are a couple in the North West, including one about half an hour from me which I've been meaning to visit and has a great reputation so I'll be making tracks up there soon.

The kids got to enjoy some Easter fun, doing an egg hunt and quiz around the farm, which gave them the opportunity to see some more animals, and then to meet Jasper the Easter bunny. I think Monkey and Missy Woo cleaned them out of eggs and chocolate bunnies, judging by the amount of chocolate that ended up in my bag.

Ice were kind enough to give us a card already loaded with points, so we had a mooch around the farm shop before we went, taking home some lovely treats, including pork and black pudding sausages and smoked bacon for brunch. It was the best bacon we'd ever tasted, that cooked without leaking all that horrible white liquid all over the pan that cheap stuff does.

If you don't usually shop at a farm shop, it's really worth trying to find a good one in your area. If they're members of Ice, you can register here and start to earn points. And if they're not, suggest they sign up to the scheme so that everyone can start to benefit.

Thanks to Tots 100 and Ice for inviting us, and to Farmer Copleys for being fantastic hosts and providing fantastic cakes. Ice gave me a reward card loaded with some points to spend as I choose. 

Cake of the Week - Tennis ball cake

So it was Monkey's birthday at the weekend. Eight. Bloody hell!

Apart from the chocolate oat flips that we have to eat the night before his birthday (we bought some in Booths when we were told to go for a walk when I was progressing and in Preston and in my mind, they are forever associated with his birth!), of course we have to have a cake. This year, Monkey had a tennis party for his birthday so, rather than do yet ANOTHER Barcelona cake, I talked him into a tennis ball cake to fit the theme.

Fitting in making a cake shouldn't have been hard but Monkey insisted he helped me make the cake and the evenings were mad last week. In the end, I pre-weighed everything so we could mix and bung into the oven before bed on Wednesday. And then it was Friday night before I managed to finish it off after the children went to bed. Talking about leaving it late, but we got there.

And here it is.

I decided on this because it's a simple design. Underneath is a standard chocolate cake recipe from my lovely friend Ruth - in her book, the chocolate cake recipe is scaleable according to the size of pan which I find so helpful. The recipe is easy and it always works. Then I split it and filled with a standard buttercream, covered it and chilled. It's then filled with lime green sugarpaste. Some wag on Facebook said aren't tennis balls yellow but yellow sugarpaste was too sunny so I went for the lime green as it's a yellowy green.

Then, I used some white sugarpaste to finish the decorations. I tried to find a way to extrude and if I'd found a way, I would have done so. Instead, I had to make do with rolling it out sausage style and sticking it on with water. A final 8 pressed out with a cutter finished the cake.

My birthday hazelnut meringue cake!

If you saw my birthday post, you'll know I made my own birthday cake. I promised a few people I would blog the recipe.

Part of the reason I wanted to make my own cake was that my joint Christmas and birthday present, which I got very early, was a stand mixer. A red K-Mix. I love it. I've made a few things in it in the meantime but so far, not meringue. I therefore developed the idea of making a meringue cake - especially as we had tons of eggs in the house, as we didn't seem to get through many over Christmas. I also had some hazelnuts in the cupboard so I looked around for hazelnut meringue cake recipes. I have one that is years old in my folder but that used blackberries. I decided I would add some soft fruit and cream to the cake filling and then also add some chocolate ganache.  The final cake is a mix of recipes from different sources so I think I can claim it as my own!

I popped to the shop and found that not only was there some cream reduced, there were also some milk chocolate santas reduced to 19p each! The ganache is good made with dark or milk chocolate but obviously, the darker the chocolate, the darker and less sweet the ganache. I decided to give my ganache a hazelnut flavouring which you could do by adding ground hazelnuts or praline paste. I however, had some hazelnut coffee syrup so used that instead. The ganache was a little firm so I have added more cream here to soften the ganache. If it's too runny, you can whip slightly until it firms up. Don't be scared by the term ganache - it's deceptively easy to make!

We chose strawberries as we decided that they travelled the least distance (Monkey was shocked that the blackberries had come from Mexico, but the strawberries had come from Egypt); it would be good with other soft fruit, like blueberries, raspberries, blackberries etc.

You can make the meringue layers in advance but store them in an airtight container to keep them crisp. This is best assembled on the day you're going to eat it, but if you have to assemble the night before, it will not be the end of the world. It might just be a little softer around the edges.

The one thing to remember when making meringues is that fat is not your friend. Ensure the beaters or whisk and the bowl in which you mix the egg whites is very clean or the whites will not whisk properly.

This is NOT a low calorie cake, but it was my birthday, right?!

Kate's birthday hazelnut meringue cake with strawberries, ganache and cream
Cuts into about 10 pieces

Ingredients

For the cake layers:
50g/2oz roasted chopped hazelnuts (Waitrose do them or roast your own)
5 large eggs
280g / 10oz caster sugar
1 tbsp white vinegar
 A little flavourless oil

For the hazelnut ganache:
200-250g / 7-9oz dark or milk chocolate
125ml  / 4.5 fl oz double cream
2 - 3 tbsp hazelnut syrup (don't fret if you can't get it)

For the filling:
375ml / 13 fl oz double cream
400g strawberries, hulled and halved (or 300g smaller soft fruits, like raspberries)

1. First, prepare two 18-20cm springform or loose bottomed tins. Line them both with foil, and brush the foil with a little oil. Preheat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas 5. Whizz the hazelnuts in a food processor until finely ground.

2. Separate your eggs. I do them one at a time into a small bowl, ensure no egg yolk has got into the bowl, and then tip it into my mixing bowl. Better that than the fifth egg yolk breaking and you having to start all over again!

3. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, dry peaks form. Add the sugar one spoonful at a time whilst continuing to whisk until you get a shiny but stiff meringue. Stir the remaining sugar into the nuts then fold them into the meringue carefully with the vinegar. Use a metal spoon to do the folding and do it slowly and carefully.

4. Divide the mixture between the two tins and level out the tops. Bake for about 35 mins then turn the oven off and leave the meringues to cool in the oven. Once cool, remove from the tins, peel off the foil and store in an airtight tin until you need the cake.

5. Make the ganache at least a few hours before you assemble the cake as it will need to cool. Break the chocolate into small pieces and place in a bowl. Place the cream in a pan and heat until nearly boiling. Remove from the heat and pour over the chocolate. Leave to stand for a few minutes, then whisk until the chocolate is fully melted and the texture is smooth and uniform. Add the hazelnut syrup and stir until fully combined. Leave to cool - refrigerate if you like. If the ganache is too firm when you need it for the cake, heat it in 10-20 second blasts until it reaches the desired consistency. If it's too runny, whisk it gently with a hand whisk until it firms up.

6. When you are ready to assemble your cake, whip the remaining cream until it reaches soft peaks (don't overwhip, so do keep an eye on it). Place one of the meringues on a plate and spread with the ganache. Top  with some of the strawberries and about a third of the whipped cream. Place the other cake layer on top, spread the rest of the cream on top and finish with the rest of the strawberries, which are best placed neatly cut side down so they form a pattern.

Enjoy - although beware, once you start cutting into the cake, it may not be particularly structurally sound!

Another birthday.

Yes, it's my birthday today. When you get to my age, you kind of stop thinking about the numbers.

As I lay in bed last night, trying to fall asleep at the start of yet another birthday, I started reflecting. On things I've done - trying to stay positive rather than dwell on the inevitable mistakes I've made in my life.

Of all the things I've done, I decided that what I'm most proud of are my children. Yes, they drive me nuts sometimes - Monkey is particularly challenging and hard work quite a bit although he decided off his own back to make "be nice" his New Year's resolution. They are however gorgeous, funny, intelligent and loving. I've had oodles of birthday cuddles today and they count for way more than any present ever would.

In other matters, do you like my cake? Made it myself. It's a bit of a monster - hazelnut meringue cake with hazelnut ganache, strawberries and cream.

Happy birthday to me!

Yes, it's November so I can mention the C word!

I made Christmas cakes on Sunday. Yes, cakes. I'm not really a domestic goddess, I made baked bean tin Christmas cakes from this post by Jules. Actually, it was a bit of a long process. First, I bought the fruit and started soaking it a couple of weeks ago, in brandy.

We also had to eat our way through 12 little baked bean tins. The children enjoyed this challenge, discovering new flavours of pasta and beans with sausages, but not Dora the Explorer pasta. I'm not daft, it would cost me a fortune as small tins of beans and pasta seem to cost approximately twice as much as large tins.

Once washed out and all the ingredients purchased, I set aside Sunday afternoon to do this. Jules warns in her post that lining the tins is fiddly and boy, she is not wrong. I started at about half past two and even with Missy Woo "helping" me, I didn't finish lining the tins until 4.45 - at which point, I thought I had better make tea for everyone then get on with the actual mixing and baking. (Do as Jules says if you do this - buy paperclips to hold the paper in place, it really helps.

The recipe is quite generous in amounts. That or I've got small tins! I tried not to overload the tins but went back round to fill them nicely. And finally, just before the Strictly dance-off, the tins finally reached the oven. Interestingly, the cake mixture rises quite a bit - which surprised me as the flour is plain and there is no baking powder added either, so it must be the eggs or something. I placed whole almonds on the top of a few cakes before I put the cakes in the oven, so that they can be left plain as not everyone likes marzipan and icing.

Once cooked, I left them to cool and they were still warm at midnight. I was therefore removing them from tins at 1am, before putting them into storage boxes. These are being saved for Christmas presents, some for teachers, some for family and I'll get the kids to help me decorate them.

Also, on the theme of Christmas preparations, I have damson vodka hiding in the airing cupboard, and some recipes ready to hand to make in the run up to Christmas. And yes, I've bought some presents with some to buy but that's boring. I like making Christmas presents for people to eat.

How about you?

Chocolate and Raspberry Trick-or-Treat cake

One thing is for sure - going to Clandestine Cake Club certainly stretches your baking capabilities! Every time I see the theme for our local group, I start thinking about what to do and try to come up with something different.

This time, however, I thought I was going to have to give the group a miss as it fell on the day that husband was due to be running the Guild Marathon. However, he had to drop back to the half due to a problem with his knee swelling up over the summer and we worked out it was just about possible to get me there on time if we did some slightly complicated juggling of children.

This time, the theme was Trick or Treat which posed a problem. I don't do fancy or intricate cake decoration - I'm just not cut out for it. That means no cakes in the shape of witches etc, so I had to take a different tack.

I came up with the idea of doing a normal cake but one that bleeds when you cut into it. To me, that meant raspberry and what goes better with raspberry than chocolate? Chocolate cake it was. I tend to stick to the same recipes so Googled a bit and found one I thought would work. It had a raspberry ganache with it but I thought it looked lumpy so went for adding a bit of raspberry flavour to it whilst keeping it smooth. I've never made ganache before so I was a bit tentative about it. Some more Googling offered up the way to get the blood into the middle of the cake - make some raspberry coulis (easy), scoop out the middle of your cake, and "line" it with some buttercream to stop the coulis soaking into the cake. Phew...that gave me a few things to do, which made planning it a bit of a nightmare as I had no time on Sunday to finish off and I was out all of Saturday. So, I had to make my coulis on Thursday, cake and buttercream on Friday, then make my ganache on Saturday and finish it all off.

When I made the cake, the top went a bit mad and bust away from the rest of the cake, which when picked away, left a big dip in the cake, so all I had to do was add the buttercream, spoon in the coulis and sandwich the cakes together. Some of the coulis dribbled down the edges and I was dubious that this was going to work but having procrastinated all evening, I made the ganache and ended up whipping it to thicken it enough to spread. The result was a normal looking cake which gave no clue to its hidden secret.

At our meeting, the cake looked very plain until people started cutting into it and the dark red coulis started oozing out. I usually try my cake first at cake club (just to taste it's OK!) so it took all my self-control not to do so. And it was a huge success - this is yet another cake not for the faint hearted, very rich and certainly, with four chocolate bars in it, not the sort of cake you make every day. But it's really, really worth a go to trick your friends on Hallowe'en which turns out to be a delicious treat.

This was my most popular cake so far at any of the meetings I've gone to - after everyone had taken cake to take home, there was only a quarter left.

Why don't you give my cake a try? Maybe not if you're on a diet, eh?

Chocolate and Raspberry Trick-or-Treat Cake

Serves 16-20 probably - you don't need a huge piece

Ingredients

For the raspberry coulis:
200g raspberries
50g icing sugar (or to taste)
lemon juice, to taste
1-2 tsp cocoa powder (optional)

For the cake:
200g dark plain chocolate, preferably 70% cocoa solids, broken into pieces
200g butter, cut into pieces
125ml freshly brewed (ie hot) espresso, as strong as you can bear
85g self-raising flour
85g plain flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
200g muscovado sugar, preferably dark but light will do
200g caster sugar, preferably golden
3 eggs
1tbsp natural yogurt (I used fat free Greek)
100g frozen raspberries

For the chocolate buttercream:
100g butter, softened
200g icing sugar
2 heaped tbsp cocoa powder
1-2 tbsp milk

For the ganache:
200g dark chocolate, chopped into pieces
300g double cream
1 tbsp light soft muscovado sugar

1. First, make the raspberry coulis. Whizz the ingredients in a blender or food processor, or mash the raspberries with a masher and stir in the icing sugar and lemon. Press the mixture through a fine metal sieve to  remove the pips. Taste and add more sugar or lemon as desired. Sprinkle over the cocoa powder if using, and stir into the coulis - this will help to darken it slightly to make it more like blood, and it will take a bit of stirring to mix right in.  Refrigerate until needed whilst you make the cake.

2. Next, make the cake. Preheat the oven to 160C/Gas3. Butter the sides of a 20cm deep round baking tin ( I use cake release spray) and line the base with baking parchment. Place the broken chocolate into a heatproof bowl and sit this on top of a pan half filled with hot water, taking care to ensure that the water is not touching the bottom of the bowl. Add the butter and the hot espresso, and heat gently until everything is just melted. You can do this in the microwave by heating on medium for around 4 mins, stirring every couple of minutes.

3. Whilst the chocolate melts, mix together the flours, baking powder, sugars and cocoa in a big bowl until evenly distributed. In another bowl, beat the eggs together and stir in the yogurt.

4. Pour both the melted chocolate and the egg mixtures into the dry ingredients, mixing carefully but slowly and stopping as soon as all the ingredients are mixed together. Scrape carefully because the dry ingredients tend to get stuck to the bottom of the bowl! The cake batter will be smooth but quite runny.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin, tapping gently to remove air bubbles and level the mixture. Press frozen raspberries into the batter evenly across the tin then place in the oven. Cook for 1.5 hours, until a skewer comes out clean. Don't worry if the cake cracks on top. Leave to cool in the tin for a little while, then remove from the tin and leave to cool completely on a wire rack. Place in the fridge to get it really firm, then slice the cake into two. Scoop out some of the one of the halves - choose the less even of the two halves. Leave at least a 2cm gap all the way around the edge of the this half or your cake will not sit evenly.

6. Make your chocolate buttercream. First, beat the butter until smooth, either by hand or with a mixer. Sift in the icing sugar and cocoa powder, mixing thoroughly. Add the milk until you get a light but spreadable consistency.

7. Next, assemble your cake. Place the scooped out half on a plate or board. Spread the buttercream all over the indentation left by your scooping - not too thickly but ensure you have a solid layer of buttercream or the coulis will leak through into the cake. Spread buttercream around the edge as well as this will stick the cakes together.

8. We're now ready to fill the hole with "blood". First, take out 1-2 tbsp of the coulis and reserve for later. Then, carefully spoon the coulis into the buttercream lined hole as close to the brim as you dare. Top with the other half, press down gently. At this point, some coulis may leak out of the sides so it's best to leave this in the fridge to "set" the dribbles. The cake can be refrigerated until you need it. I also spread some leftover coulis over the top of the cake to soak in and add to the raspberry flavour.

9. When you are ready to cover your cake, make the ganache. Place the chopped chocolate into a bowl. Place the cream into a pan with the muscovado sugar and heat until it is about to boil. Remove from the heat and pour over the chocolate, stirring together until everything melts. Stir in the reserved coulis then leave to cool until it is thick enough to spread. If the ganache is not thick enough, you may whisk it with a balloon whisk for a minute or two until it begins to thicken. Beware as the ganache will continue to thicken after you have stopped whisking so stop just short of soft peaks - I whisked until it felt thicker but was leaving a slight trail in the bowl but it soon firmed up further.

10. Remove the cake from the fridge and spread the ganache over the top and sides of the cake, smoothing it with a palette knife. (If you want to get really fancy at this point, you can grate chocolate over the top or decorate with fresh raspberries but I didn't!). Refrigerate to "set" the ganache then transfer to a serving plate. Take the cake out of the fridge about an hour or so before serving to enjoy it at its best. If you end up with any spare coulis, you can always bring it out to pour over the top once the surprise has been revealed!

Linked up to Dollybakes Calendar Challenge for October.

Preston - a city in cake!

If you live in the north of England, you might have heard the expression "once every Preston Guild". If you haven't, it of course means very infrequently. This is because the Preston Guild, the only Guild merchant still celebrated in the UK, only happens every 20 years with the main festivities occurring in the first week of September. It's an ancient celebration, believed to date back to 1179.

This year's Guild - the first one in the twenty first century and the first since Preston was made a city in 2002 for the queen's Golden Jubilee - included a Vintage Guild, curated by Wayne Hemingway which included a food festival in Winckley Square. As part of that, bakers from around the region were invited to build Preston landmarks in cake for the Preston Cake City project.

When I first heard about it, I never thought I'd get involved. I don't consider myself an expert baker - I'm way more confident than I used to be and my cakes taste good but never look that fancy. I mean, I only first covered a cake with sugarpaste properly last Christmas!

But then I got collared by some of the ladies I know through Clandestine Cake Club. Some of them had thought of baking a cake and had chosen this building. It is the control building at Preston Docks from where the swingbridge is controlled at the entrance to the marina.

When I was first asked, I looked at it. A pyramid. What? So I said it wasn't anything I was any good at. I got told that they just needed people to bake cakes, make buttercream, etc, and found myself agreeing to do it.

Over the next few weeks, we had a number of meetings to work out a plan how we would do it and who would do what. Thankfully, Linzi who was organising us, got her hubby to draw a plan so we knew what size to make everything. The cake was based on 20cm square madeira cakes. I was allocated the job of doing the top part. Yes, the pyramid. What?

As the cakes were to be delivered on Sunday morning, the bottom half of the cake was built on Friday and on Saturday, I met Linzi and another lady, Hazel, at Linzi's house to finish it off. This is how the cake looked when I arrived.

There is another layer that is not visible underneath the grey already decorated with brick coloured sugarpaste, windows and doors. The blue strut was there for measuring and is actually Blackpool rock!

Our first task was to cut a small square and cover it with more brick coloured sugarpaste. Being the old hand that I was (!), I helped her cut the cake to size and explained how to cover it with the sugarpaste. That just left the pyramid to cut. First I had to cut another square to the proportion on the plan and actually cut it straight which is harder than it sounds! Then, Ian (Linzi's husband) suggest I cut two opposite side to make a Toblerone type shape then the other two. We had a pyramid - which to my eye, looked slightly wonky. Never mind, I was going to cover it with grey sugarpaste.  I did this by rolling out the paste to the required thickness, cutting it in half and laying the pieces along the edges of the pyramid over the apex. Then I blended the edges together. After pressing down with a nifty tool to make a tiled effect, this was the result.

Then we had to get the cakes on the top. The square cake had to have a hole put in the middle to get it in place then my masterpiece (ahem) went on top). As you can see, Hazel had added windows in blue sugarpaste and in the meantime, Ian had cut the big sticks of rock to size.

Phew, it looked OK! Now it was down to details. I cut some licorice to size and it was stuck to the grey sugarpaste with edible glue to make the roof windows. And my final job was to cut some cherry laces to size and stick that to the edge of my little pyramid. This proved to be the hardest task of all as the laces wanted to curl up and pinged off the cake. After holding it with as many hands as possible, we stuck it with cocktail sticks whilst the glue went off and eventually, it stuck down. With the addition of some sticks for the railings, we were done!

The finished cake was delivered to Preston the next morning and placed on an edible map. Over 40 cakes were brought in total. We arrived as a family to see the finished result, just as they were putting the last few cakes out and completing the cityscape.

Once the cakes were all laid out, all of the cakes were introduced to the crowd and the bakers asked to make themselves known. Each baker and team voted for their favourite cake and a Baker's Choice announced by the town crier once they had randomly had a fitness instructor do a routine with the assembled throng. For the last part, once the cakes that were being taken home were being removed, the rest of the cakes were cut up and given away to anyone that wanted it.

In the above photo, you can see the two winners - on the left, the Black Bull inn and next to it, St Walberge's  (with the grey spire) which came a close second and was baked by someone else from cake club, who did it all by herself. The detailing on it was fabulous - it was my favourite cake.

This was a great event and all the cakes were amazing - it just goes to show what you can do with cake. Our cake fared very well and I got lots of positive comments about it when talking to people at the event. If you would like to see a full set of photos from the event, you can see them here.

Finally, a huge thanks to Dewlay, Artisan Foodworks, Foodlink Lancashire  and the Egg Man Mick Brooks for donating various ingredients, to Linzi's husband Ian for drawing up the designs, the other bakers Sue, Carla, Jo, Hazel and last but not least Linzi who kept us all in line and organised us to such good effect. 

It was quite some effort! I'd definitely do one again, although I'm not quite ready to do one by myself just yet. 

(We were provided as a team with some ingredients by the above mentioned suppliers in return for a mention.)

Mocha crunch cake - a totally over-the-top birthday cake

Sunday was the first birthday event of the local Clandestine Cake Club. If you don't know what it is, see here - basically, you book onto an event, make a cake to fit the theme, then turn up at the venue (which is kept a secret until a few days before), eat lots of cake, chat with cakey people and get to take cake home. What is not to like?

So, as I said, it was our first birthday event. I have been going since the second meeting ever so I missed the first and although I haven't been every time, I'm a fairly established regular attendee, this being my fifth event.

The theme was, of course, Happy Birthday and I wanted to make a decadent, over the top cake for a special occasion that would be suitable for a grown up birthday. In our house, that means chocolate cake, by and large. I found the original recipe for chocolate crunch cake in a booklet from a Good Food magazine but I wanted to do more to it so I have combined with details from a coffee crunch cake on the Good Food website and added my own details.

I wasn't totally convinced that this would work, particularly as the cake batter was quite runny so it is a bit of  leap of faith, but the meringue stayed on top and baked nicely. I have tweaked the amount of water going into the cake batter as the cake took a lot longer to cook than it should have done. If you find the mixture a bit stiff, loosen the batter with a drop of water.

Just feet from cake club venue.

This is probably best made on the day you want to eat it. I couldn't because logistics didn't allow for it - I was at Body Pump until an hour before. So I made the cakes, stored them in plastic containers overnight, then filled with the cream just before I left for the event, which was held a few feet from Bradley Wiggins's other golden postbox. The cream softened the meringue very quickly, so if you want to keep the crunchy effect of the crisp meringue, I would recommend filling it with cream at the very last minute. And then you have every excuse for finishing it off on the day you make it.

Mocha Crunch Cake
Cuts into about 12-16 pieces

Ingredients

For the cake batter
50g good quality cocoa powder
175ml hot water
100g butter, softened
280g caster sugar, preferably golden
2 large eggs
175g self-raising flour
1/2 tsp (2.5ml) bicarbonate of soda

For the meringue topping
2 egg whites
100g caster sugar, again preferably golden
Coffee flavouring (see below)

For the cake filling
284ml double cream
2-3 tbsp icing sugar
Coffee flavouring (see below)

Also required
100g dark chocolate drops

1, Start by making the coffee flavouring. I make a small cup of double strength espresso from our coffee machine and allow to cool. If you can't make fresh coffee, use as much instant coffee as you dare and dissolve in 100ml hot water. You may need a little more than this but the stronger you make it, the less you will need. Also before you start, place the cocoa powder in a jug or bowl, pour over the hot water and whisk until you have a fairly uniform lump free liquid. Place on one side to cool while you get the cake ready.

2. Grease and line the bases of 2 20cm (8in in old money) sandwich tins with baking parchment and grease the linings. I find the best way to do this is to use cake release spray but you can use softened butter if you like.

3. Place the butter and sugar in a bowl and whisk for 2-3 mins, preferably with an electric hand or stand mixer. There is a lot of sugar in this mix, so it won't go all pale and fluffy like it normally does but do not panic. Add the eggs, one at a time, whisking after each addition and this time, it will go all pale, light and fluffy. Pour the cooled cocoa mixture on top, and then sift in the flour and bicarbonate of soda. Fold everything together gently until thoroughly mixed and smooth. Divide the mixture equally between the two tins. Smooth the tops if necessary. Place the tins on the side whilst you prepare the meringue topping.

4. Preheat the oven to 160C/Fan 150C/Gas 3. You will need to reuse your mixer to make the meringue unless you are very strong or like me, possess two mixers! If you have to clean it first, clean the beaters very well to remove all traces of fat or the eggs will not whisk. Make sure you have a clean bowl too and when you separate your eggs that not a trace of yolk has got into it. (I find it easier to separate the eggs into a small bowl first before adding to the mixing bowl. Whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks - when you lift the beaters out, the eggs should make a peak that stays formed very easily. Add half of the sugar to the bowl and whisk again until the mixture becomes glossy. Gently fold in the rest of the sugar and 1-2 tsp of your coffee flavouring.

5. When combined, spoon half of the meringue on top of the cake mixture. Leave a 2cm gap around the edge of the tin as the meringue will spread as it cooks. The tins are now ready to go into the preheated oven.

6. Bake for 40 minutes, or until the meringue is crisp and the cake cooked. Use a long skewer at an angle to test the cake under the middle of the meringue. If the cake needs longer cooking, check how the meringue looks - if it is looking like it will burn, turn the oven down to about 140C and keep in there until the cake is finally done.

Cakes cooling after baking

7. Remove the tins from the oven and leave the cakes to cool in their tins for 5 minutes. Then, really carefully remove the cakes from the tins - this is where loose bottomed tins come into their own! Peel off the paper and leave to cool completely, meringue topping uppermost.

8. When it's time to eat the cake, make the cream filling. You'll need your mixer beaters again - cold if possible (I put clean ones in the fridge to chill) as this makes better whipped cream. Whisk the cream until it forms soft peaks. Sift in the icing sugar and add 1-2 tbsp of coffee flavouring, folding both gently into the cream. Add more coffee or sugar to taste, folding gently as before. You can do this an hour or so ahead if you want and store in the fridge.

9. Right, cake building time. Decide which cake has the best looking topping and reserve that for the top. Place the other cake carefully on a plate and spread thickly with the coffee flavoured cream. Scatter about half the chocolate drops on top of the cream.

Cream on top of bottom layer, with chocolate chips

10. Make some coffee drizzle icing. Place 2-3 tbsp icing sugar in a bowl and add about 1-2 tsp coffee flavouring then mix together. You need an icing that is runny enough to drizzle but thick enough for it to set quite quickly and not dribble over the sides.  You may need to add more icing sugar - mine was too runny but I didn't have time to thicken it further! Drizzle the icing over the top of the cake, then scatter the remaining chocolate drops over the top so they stick to the icing. A final dusting of some icing sugar is completely optional - I didn't bother as I was out of the door within a minute with the cake in a box.

You may like to try other combinations with the chocolate - I can think of using orange juice and an orange liqueur to make a chocolate orange cake or peppermint essence to make mint choc cake. How about some chopped hazelnuts folded gently into the meringue with some frangelico in the cream? Or even some squashed berries in the cream! The possibilities are endless.

Thanks to Susan and Linzi for organising today's event.

Missy's birthday surprises

I have been a bit quiet recently, thanks to work, and life. Oh yes, and birthdays. Well, one in particular. Missy Woo was six last Thursday and I had a few days of lining up surprises and then carrying them out.

You see, she is a child that doesn't want for much. Yes, she does always want new toys but she's just as happy with small ones (and usually tat at that). We bought her a bike last year, she doesn't always want new games for her DS, and the thing she likes to do most is draw, colour and make things. She is very difficult to buy for if you want to spend more than a tenner.

She told us she wanted a scooter but she said this when we were in Devon and my sister offered to buy it for her. Still no closer.

The only thing I had to go on was her love of dancing. I tried to look for London shows but then we were at the other extreme of cost. With added hotel and travel costs, I couldn't justify it. Then I discovered a show in Manchester on the weekend of her birthday, featuring ballet and streetdance. And the tickets were £15, so two were purchased very quickly after consultation with her that she wanted to go.

Opening her presents

This didn't feel like much of a birthday surprise so we decided to extend her trip by booking a night in a hotel after the show. Given that the show was at the Palace Theatre, I booked a room at the Palace Hotel across the road. Then I typed up a note to her from Hello Kitty telling her about this to put in with the tickets she was expecting to open on the day. We managed to find a few smaller bits and bobs for her to open - mostly with a Hello Kitty theme - on the day.

So, on the big day itself, she had a few nice presents to open, but didn't look as much as it did on Monkey's birthday. (He got a bike this year). She was very excited about her "sleepover" in a hotel, had a special breakfast and got to speak to grandparents before school, where she got to wear the Birthday Hat all day and gave sweets out at the end of the day. Granny met us there on a flying surprise visit, bringing presents and giving her a big hug before hopping back on the bus home. For we were off on our usual Thursday odyssey - Monkey to football, Missy Woo to her dance lessons - as she had insisted that she was really looking forward to going to dance on her birthday. Mainly so she could be centre of attention, for the first thing they did was sing her Happy Birthday.

Then, and only then, and after a quick change, we went out for tea where she could make her own pizza! This meant a bit of a late night on a school night for both her and Monkey, which I suspect was the motive for insisting on going to her dance lessons!

Saturday was a big day, despite it not being her birthday. She had her party here - 9 girls and poor old Monkey totally outnumbered! One of the girls coming was a girl she used to play with before she went to school and hadn't seen for ages but I had kept from her that she was coming and the little girl didn't know she was coming either! That was another little surprise which she enjoyed.

She was very excited about her cake which she had helped to mix the day before. This was not my idea - I got it from Susan's post and it seemed really easy yet effective. I had to source non-Nestlé equivalent to Smarties but I discovered all the supermarkets did them. These are from Asda. My tip, if you want to make it yourself, is get your Cadbury's fingers from Aldi or Lidl and put the cake on a bigger plate than you think you need because the fingers increase the size of the cake quite substantially.

Once the party was finished, it was all systems go to get to Manchester. We took the train in, Missy adopting a granny we met in the station along the way and insisting on sitting next to her on the train. We popped into the hotel before the show to check in and the room was WOW. Look at this. The ceilings were about 20 feet high and the windows went right up to the ceiling.

Unfortunately, because the room was on the main road and at the same level as the railway track not 20 feet away, it was too noisy, necessitating a move to a new room later in the evening when Missy tried and failed to sleep.

The show was brilliant. It was called Against Time. I would urge you to go to see it but sadly, the performances in Manchester were the last ones and it's now finished. The promo video gives you a flavour of it here. It was a collaboration between English National Ballet and Flawless, who were on Britain's Got Talent.



Missy was mesmerised and loved every minute of it, especially there was a lot of familiar and contemporary music. She joined in with the clapping and was singing along to the songs too. I asked her what she thought of the show during the interval and she just said "Fab".

Chilling after the show.

After the show, and finding her new adopted granny to say goodbye to, we went out for tea to a nearby Italian before retiring to our room and attempting to get Missy to sleep, as I mentioned before. By the time we moved to a new room, it was nearly 10pm but once we were settled, she was asleep in a couple of minutes. In the morning, she was awake before me and got up to play with her sticker book and watch telly. When I did wake up, she told me off for snoring! We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast, at which she discovered fried bread and sautéed potatoes, and followed it up with a quick coffee before heading home to piles of leftover pizza and birthday cake.

All in all, it was a fun weekend and Missy took away some fabulous memories of her sixth birthday, that will hopefully stay with her for a long time. I got to enjoy time with my little girl and it reminded me how much I enjoy just being with her. And for now, I'm revelling in that, because these experiences can be all too fleeting.

Happy birthday Missy Woo. We love you.

Cakes through the post? Go on then!

As I mentioned the other day, Missy Woo's birthday is this week and her party is on Saturday. I've managed to talk her into a really simple but fab-looking cake as she had grand plans for a cake that she had drawn and I just knew was going to involve lots of sugarpaste and fancy decoration that is beyond my skill level.

Then we were given the chance to review a letterbox cake from Baker Days. They do two types of cake - a small one that literally can go through your letterbox or a larger cake that is perfect for a party (which won't fit through your letterbox).

Now, all this was arranged via an email through a PR so my experience didn't involve ordering via their site but I showed some to Missy Woo with the intention of having a little cake on her birthday. She chose two designs but one of them didn't fit with the wording we wanted. There is a massive range of designs, plus you can design your own or upload your own photo to go on the cakes too. We kept with one of the standard designs.

I told the PR when Missy's birthday was and left it at that. The cake then appeared a day or so later, much much sooner than I had anticipated. The cakes can be stored for up to a fortnight, but as the children wanted to see in it and then try the cake, we had to open it there and then.

The letterbox cake comes packaged in its own little tin.

Inside, there was this:

Hmm. My name wasn't supposed to be on that! As I say, it wasn't ordered through the site, rather by email but I thought I'd make it clear in the message who it was for. Ah well. The cake is really quite small. It literally is just enough for 4-5 people to have - so suitable for a small informal celebration.  Some of the design looked a bit blurred and the sugar paste was a bit creased as you can see but Missy loved it (apart from the fact it didn't have her name on it).

I' chose double chocolate chip for the cake (which costs an extra £2.00) and it was delicious. There are a range of options - including a gluten free and wheat free option which is nice to see.

My main issue with it is the price and this is where my cheapskate head gets put on. £14.99 for a small cake that only serves 4-5 is a lot to me, and it's £16.99 if you want chocolate cake. That is an awful lot of money. The party cakes seem a lot better value - as they serve up to 16 for about another £12. Thankfully, the prices include delivery - which are sent out next working day if you order before 1pm or the following day if ordered after that.

I can foresee situations where I would use this, but as I said, my main reservation is the price. Still, the range is huge and you can be almost assured of finding something that is perfect for your intended recipient but I would only do it for someone a long way from me. Someone closer by, I'm more likely to bake a cake for them and give it to them myself.

(I was sent the above letterbox cake for the purposes of a review. All opinions are mine and genuinely held)


Edited to add - Baker Days have been in touch to apologise for putting the company name on there and offering to send a new one to see if the design can be improved. 


Also, they have given me a voucher code to pass on to you that will enable you to get a 20% discount on orders from their website. That would bring the cost of a letterbox cake down to around £12.


The code is 5My6Co - enjoy!

Cake of the week - A (Blackpool) football cake

This is one of those cakes that I thought up at the last minute. As I mentioned last week, it was husband's birthday on Tuesday and needed to make a cake. I decided I was going to cover it and do some design but I wasn't really sure what.

Suddenly I thought that perhaps I could make a Blackpool cake - for which I'd need tangerine (bright orange in other words) sugar paste. As I am not good at piping or intricate designs, I struggled as to what to do when I came up with the idea of using hexagonal tiles to make it look like a football, allowing some of the tangerine shine through.

All I had to do was make it. The cake was actually chocolate, from Ruth's recipe. As I have her book, I was so glad to see she's included a scaleable version of it in her new book with different quantities and cooking times for different sized tins because sometimes, you just don't have the right sized tin. I make this recipe a lot now; it's easy and it never lets me down.

Having made it and left it to cool on Monday afternoon, I decided I had better get it covered with sugarpaste that evening as I wouldn't have too much time to do cake decorating the next day. I am so glad I did as it then took me most of the rest of the evening. First, I had to colour my sugarpaste. This proved to be way harder than I thought and however much I added, it never seemed to reach the required shade, even when wrapping it and leaving for 10 mins to let the colour develop, as Ruth advises. And trying to work it in to the paste was harder work than kneading bread dough! Eventually, I gave up and settled for a pale orange colour - or maybe it's more peach. Lesson learned - bright colours need huge amounts of food colour.

Then I followed Ruth's instructions for covering the cake with sugarpaste. I now know that the secret is keeping the sugarpaste quite thick as this makes it easier to handle. After a big deep breath, I got it on the cake without rips or holes, and it looked pretty good. Result! By this time, it was past midnight but I thought I had better plough on.

The hexagonal tiles were a challenge. I would have preferred a hexagonal cutter but had no time to get one so I scaled a hexagon to the size I wanted, printed it out then once cut out, used it as a template to cut around, having rolled out some black and white sugarpaste. I placed the tiles gently on the top of the cake to figure out the pattern and after a few goes, I came up with a pattern I was happy with and I brushed where I was sticking each tile with a little water to stick them to the cake. By the time I'd finished, it was way past 1am and my kitchen looked like a bomb had hit it. According to Helen, that's early for cake makers! I left everything as I was very tired by then, but I went to bed with a sense of achievement that it looked quite good. And it tasted nice too!

What do you think?

Linking up with Helen's Cake of the Week feature.

Blogger Wedding Album - Five Fs stylee!

Often midweek, you'll find posts from me taking part in the Gallery. Well, there is none this week but you have to watch that Tara. She has a week off and then she opens the Blogger Wedding Album, so she gets us finding pictures from our wedding and sending them to her or blogging about them. As I have already used this picture once for The Gallery, I'll use it again and tell you a little bit more about the story behind the picture.

Our wedding took place in Key West in Florida. We wanted to get married abroad but research told me that trying to get married in Italy or Spain may have given me grey hairs with all the hoops you have to jump through, and extra cost. Some friends of ours had got married in Orlando but had honeymooned in Key West and sung its praises. As the paperwork required and the process to get a marriage licence was straightforward, we decided to go for it. We invited the family but offered to pay for our parents' flights. They were the only family members who did come to the wedding - but we liked it that way. We got married on the beach at Fort Zachary Taylor State Historic Park at sunset and it was lovely (even though it was trying to rain!).

Not having the rest of our family present for the wedding, we decided to have a wedding party after we returned to celebrate with them and our friends. We were lucky to get a really good venue - a local hotel which has a strange location but was actually lovely, the staff were great and they accommodated all our needs without charging the earth. They organised pretty much everything for us and all we had to do was bring a cake - which turned into a £9.99 personalised half sheet cake from Costco.

The party was a really fantastic occasion - it was a chance to wear my dress again, which I love (although actually, it's a top and skirt), catch up with family and friends all in one place without having to schlep all over the country to do so, and generally have a good time. The DJ did a fab job and the food was lovely. Not that I think I had a lot to eat. And then, someone - I forget who - took this picture of us cutting our very expensive Costco cake. And yes, it was in a corridor as they set the food up just outside the party room. Everything was perfect. I'd recommend the hotel to you all, but it got sold and then closed a few years later and lies empty. We tried to explain to the children its significance the other day, but they couldn't get the concept of us having a party without them. Bless.

So, there you go, Tara, that's my entry into your Blogger Wedding Album. Hope you like it.

Cake of the Week - a chocolate Barca cake (in away colours)

Of course, my cake of the week just HAD to be Monkey's birthday cake. The origins of this cake go back a whole year actually, and I like to think comparing these two cakes will give you an idea of where I have gone with baking over the last year and also displays how great tutorials and recipes from other bloggers can really make a difference.

So, last year, when Monkey turned 6, we took him to Barcelona for the weekend as husband was running his first marathon and he had asked to go. Whilst we were there, we took him to see Barcelona play and I took him to the museum during the morning of the marathon, once husband had run past where we were staying and before we went to see him cross the finish line.

His birthday wasn't until just after we came back so I had time to make him a cake and I came up with the idea of turning into a Barcelona cake like this:

Which at the time, I was pretty impressed with. All I did was buy some ready to roll icing and the blue and red seemed to be close to Barcelona home colours and then of course, cut out the 6 from yellow icing, adding an offcut that looks mysteriously NOT like a football. Monkey loved it, especially as he had no idea I was making it and it was a bit of a spur of the moment late night decision which I basically winged my way through. 

At the time, we teased Monkey that if he'd been a year older, he could have had a David Villa cake as his squad number was 7. This is because when we were out there, he chose an away shirt with David Villa's name on the back as a present. You can see him in it here. 

Fast forward a year, and when I asked Monkey what kind of cake he wanted, his answer was unequivocal: a David Villa cake, in the away colours of his shirt, which is now so last season. Hey ho. So, this is how I did it, with links to recipes or instructions that I used. 

First, I made a chocolate cake. My go to recipe at the moment is on The Pink Whisk by the lovely Ruth. Yes, the recipe is for chocolate muffins but Ruth says you can use the same quantities to split between two 20cm/8 inch sandwich tins. I actually make it in a single tin, cook it for about an hour. I allow it to cool in the tin, so that I can shave the top level, then slice it in two, admittedly not very straight. 

Then, I referred again to Ruth's blog to follow instructions for covering the cake with sugarpaste. This can be summarised by saying having levelled and sliced it, I sandwiched the cakes with chocolate buttercream, chilled the cake, topped it with icing and spread it around the sides then chilled it again. Having bought the same pack of ready to roll icing, I realised my mistake in that there was far too little green for the job, but I ran out to the supermarket and bought some white sugarpaste and kneaded about half of it into the green and very quickly, it became evenly coloured. It probably was about right as the green needed to be lighter than the stuff in the packet. I rolled it out, and learned that I need to keep turning it or it sticks very easily, even if you have lightly dusted your workspace! Placing it on the cake is always a nervy moment but I get there and it's never as perfect as Ruth's final result but it will do. 

Next, I needed to do the red and blue flash that was on the front. For this, Monkey had given me his shirt for me to work from which was actually quite handy. I rolled out the red icing into an oblong shape, then trimmed it to the width I wanted and cutting it to the desired angle on the right hand side. I rolled out the blue icing and again trimmed it to the width I needed, overlapped it onto the red icing so I made sure when I cut that side, it was at the same angle. Then I fixed them both to the bottom third of the cake, using a few dabs of water from a clean paintbrush, another trick I learned from Ruth. I made sure they lined up against each other. 

For the lettering, I had thought ahead enough to go and buy number and letter cutters from Dunelm Mill a few days before, so I rolled out the rest of the blue icing, cut out the lettering I needed, and again fixed them to the cake with a bit of water. This was the nerviest part, making sure I got the spacing about right and I wished that I'd made a bigger cake at this point! 

Once it was done, I was ready to go for a lie down. 

And here it is, with candles on Monkey's big day.

And do take a look at Cake of the Week, over on Helen's blog.

Cake of the Week - a chocolatey Jaffa drizzle cake!

Randomly, I decided to bake at the weekend with Missy Woo and this cake jumped out at me from a booklet with this month's Good Food magazine as I had everything I needed to hand, and it celebrated two things she loves foodwise - chocolate and citrus. This is the little girl that will literally lick the cut edge of lemons and enjoy it.

The original recipe is for a loaf cake but I thought I would share my unique method of preparation with you. As I didn't have a large enough loaf tin (it specified a 1.2 litre loaf tin), I used a 7 or 8 inch round deep baking tin which really requires adjustments of cooking time, which I have given here. Also, I wasn't sure the cake would be orangey enough so I took inspiration from Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries, which has an orange drizzle loaf cake recipe using marmalade, so I bunged that in too.

Jaffa Drizzle Cake 

Ingredients
(Cuts into 10-12)

For the cake:
140g/5oz butter, softened
200g/7oz self-raising flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
200g/7oz caster sugar
3 large eggs
6 tbsp milk
75g any marmalade - shredless is best
1 large orange

For the syrup:
3 tbsp orange juice (from the orange)
50g/2oz caster sugar

To top the cake:
75g/3oz dark chocolate (the darker, the better - 70% cocoa solids is good)

This is how I actually did it.

1. Heat your oven to 180C/160C fan/Gas 4. Butter and line the base of either a 20cm/8" deep round tin or a 1.2l loaf tin with baking parchment.

2. Measure your butter, and place in microwave ready to soften.

3. Place all the cake ingredients into a mixing bowl and start to beat with hand whisk. Realise you haven't grated in the zest of the orange, so stop and finely grate the zest into the bowl.

4. Recommence beating with hand whisk for 3-5 mins and wonder why it's not gone light and fluffy as expected, but more like a cake batter. Realise baking powder has not been added, add that in and mix again.

5. Realise your cake mixture is not going to go light and fluffy. Shrug. Pour cake batter into tin and go to place cake in oven. Turn towards microwave and ..... OH MY GOD! The butter. It's STILL in the microwave. Turn microwave on to soften butter.

6. Wrestle cake bowl that children were about to start licking from small hands, pour cake batter into bowl. Quickly wash out tin, discarding cake parchment. Re-butter and re-line the base of the tin.

7. Add now softened butter. Mix again, and realise that butter was indeed the missing ingredient and the mixture finally becomes light and fluffy. Place in the tin, level the top.

8. Bake in the oven until risen and firm to the touch, should be about 50-55 mins if you use a round tin, 40-50 mins if you are using the loaf tin. In the last few mins of cooking, place the orange juice and sugar in a pan  over a gentle heat, and stir until all the sugar dissolved. Try to keep warm, but don't allow to bubble too much or the liquid will evaporate and dry too hard. (Ahem.)

9. Remove cake from the oven and spoon over the syrup. Leave to cool in the tin. Remove from the tin, using ingenuity and some force to ease the solidified syrup from the top of the cake. Leave to cool completely.

10. Break the chocolate into small pieces and either melt in a bowl over a pan of simmering water, ensuring the water does not touch the bowl or microwave in 30 second bursts and stirring vigorously between. Drizzle over the cake and leave to set.

Thankfully, this is a fairly forgiving cake. It's an all-in-one sponge, so all you do is place ingredients in the bowl and just mix them together. Missing the butter out initially didn't mean the final cake suffered - it was actually light and fluffy, even though it sank back quite some distance after removing from the oven, although the syrup might be the culprit there. It smells gorgeous, even cold. I wondered if you could add some cocoa powder to the sponge to make it fully chocolate and orange flavoured; that might be a step too far but it may be an experiment for another day.

Linking this up with Helen's Cake of the Week feature once again, just because I love her cakes!

Cake of the Week - Victoria Sandwich with jam and cream

Every now and then, I like to get involved with Cake of the Week at Casa Costello. Helen is a very talented cake maker who makes beautiful cakes for a living. She has some brilliant cakes on her Cake of the Week feature and she encourages people to join in and link up their own cakes.This week, she has a fantastic Very Hungry Caterpillar cake that she made for her own daughter's 1st birthday which is gorgeous.

This is mine. I promised Monkey I would bake with him as I only ever seem to bake with Missy Woo these days. Not only that, I had a new mixer to try out - I won a Kenwood K-Mix hand mixer for our Christmas Cake - you can see all the winners here. It arrived on Friday so I was itching to get making with it but I had no plans for the weekend and cakes on the horizon. And Monkey was being notoriously elusive - forever out playing with his friends.

Then, all of a sudden, a window of opportunity presented itself. The only problem was, I didn't have much in. So, what do we make? A Victoria Sandwich, as that needs no special ingredients. However, we decided we wanted cream AND jam in the middle, so my husband and Missy Woo popped to the shop, whilst I stayed at home to make the cake. I used Mary Berry's all-in-one recipe so very very simple and all I did different was whip some cream for the filling and spread it on top of the jam. The handmixer was great although different to what I'm used to and will take a bit of adjustment, especially as the pulse function is next to off, so I kept turning it off and switching it back on by mistake!

So here is my cake. We made it late in the afternoon, so we had it for pudding - well, half is still in the fridge and it's calling to me. And I say we - Monkey had two pieces and asked for a third so had more than his fair share but Missy Woo is still claiming she doesn't like cream so only had a tiny piece then claimed she was "full" and didn't finish it. This is the child that loves yogurt. It is very nice and I hope a worthy addition to Cake of the Week this week.

Do you have a Cake of the Week? Why not join in with Helen's linky?

Peanut butter cake? Oh yes!

A short post to show you the cake I made for my second meeting of the local Clandestine Cake Club group that I'd attended. The theme was "Full of beans" in honour of the coffee shop we were meeting in. And yes, I chose peanut butter cake. As a get out, it had chocolate on the top but peanuts are actually legumes, or beans so I thought it would pass.

The recipe was not mine - I got it from BBC Good Food and you can find it here. I didn't want to reproduce the recipe as I followed it pretty religiously and I didn't put my own spin on it. The cake itself was pretty simple (mix all wet ingredients until creamy, fold in flour, bake) and the filling was simple too -once I'd found a caramel sauce in place of dulce de leche that I couldn't find anywhere. The topping required melting chocolate which was fine and the only thing I'd do different is make the sugary covering on the peanuts a bit wetter as the shiny caramel bit never really materialised but still. Oh, and I'd watch the timings - I took it out two minutes early and the very outside of some of it was a tad dry and just about to burn.

The cake went down really well. I got lots of nice compliments from other people and only got about a quarter to take home (people take bits of cakes they like home to have another time because you get very yfull very quickly). Missy Woo tried it and declared she didn't like it but what was left was gone quickly. I'd definitely make it again for a cake that is slightly different, but I guess it's rubbish if you've got to be careful about allergies.

And for good measure, here are all the cakes in all their glory laid out ready to be eaten! You really have to pace yourself to try everything and you don't want to miss anything because sometimes, the simplest looking cakes are the best ones!

The ultimate Christmas meme

I can't deny I'm beginning to feel rather Christmassy, whatever that entails. With 3 days to go (I don't do sleeps), it's allowable to bang on about it in detail and not get snarled at. So, I was tagged by The Boy and Me to complete this meme, so I thought I'd give this a go.

The Christmas song I can even listen to in June is…

This one.



Hot chocolate, egg nog or mulled wine?

Mulled wine. I cannot abide egg nog, but I do drink hot chocolate. Winter pimms warmed with a star anise and a cinnamon stick and some cloudy apple juice is also very nice and similar in taste and smell to mulled wine. And if I'm being teetotal, Copella Winter Warmer and Bottlegreen Spiced Berry Cordial are suitable alternatives!

When do you put your decorations up?

We (*cough* my husband *cough*) put them up last week, somewhere around the 15th/16th. We never do it particularly early as I don't want the children to get too giddy too early, they're giddy enough as it is. I know people who have their trees up on or before 1st December. I couldn't do it.

They come down early too. My birthday is 6th January when the decorations traditionally come down. It's depressing enough, so we take them down a day or two early and we have chance to get used to it again. Ok, me, not the rest. One year, we took them down on New Year's  Eve, but we were going away straight after New Year.


What are you having for Christmas dinner?

Starter: Smoked Salmon, tho I may make something with it but it will be low effort.

Main: Turkey crown, my Dad's chestnut stuffing (it is a must in my house), pigs in blankets, freeze-ahead roasties, roast parsnips, sprouts, carrots, cranberry sauce a la Nigella, bread sauce (out of a packet, I cannot master home made), gravy. There is a possibility the kids will demand Yorkshires. I blame school dinners.

Dessert: Golden Christmas meringues from Ruth's gorgeous blog, with an adaptation for Missy Woo who claims not to like mincemeat or cream, so I'm doing a bananas and yogurt version of the filling for her) or possibly some of our Christmas cake, also from Ruth's blog with design by Missy Woo and me. D'you like it?

And I really, really do enjoy doing it. I don't get fazed by it all but I do write a full list working backwards from proposed eating time of EVERYTHING I have to do but all the peeling gets done before the big day. The last time I didn't cook Christmas dinner, I didn't really enjoy it - maybe I've got used to doing it my way.

What’s your favourite Christmas tradition?

On Christmas Eve, the children have hot chocolate before bed, husband reads them a story, and they watch Polar Express. That, or making my Dad's chestnut stuffing recipe. Or is it having Chinese on Christmas Eve? We did that as a kid and we've resurrected doing that in the last few years.

Have you ever gone carol singing?

Not actually door-to-door but I used to belong to a choir and I've done a few midnight masses at the village church and a few carol concerts. That count?

When did you discover the truth about Santa?

Well, of course he's real but one year, we had our Chinese at the International and something upset my stomach or didn't agree with me, so I couldn't sleep. I was perturbed to hear that Santa putting presents out sounded very much like my parents.

How do you decorate your Christmas tree?

With baubles, silly. Seriously, when I moved house in the 90s, I bought a set of blue and gold baubles. Over the years, we've now added to them - some are things made by the children, or chosen by them. Other colours have crept in and I think it looks very homely. The tree is artificial and pre-lit. What? I don't care. I don't like the hassle of dealing with real trees and the mess. There is no such thing as a no-drop real tree. And the price these days is shocking. We quite often go out late on Christmas Eve and pick up some bargains and one year, our tree was at a knock-down price in Asda. It's been going 3 years and looks like it will last for many years to come. What do you think?

All I want for Christmas is…

A KitchenAid, some form of tablet (not the pharmaceutical sort) and half the Lakeland catalogue.

Oh, to tag, it is now my solemn duty.

I tag

Claire at Ninja Killer Cat (who I still can't believe came and said hello when we were at the same event!)
Menai at Menai's Posterous
Choc at Chocolate is Therapy who needs a blogging push and anyway, she knows my brother-in-law and my sister-in-law.

but feel free to tag yourself if you want to join in and no-one else has. The above 3 saw my plea on Twitter and responded, that is all.

And if you're not around the online world over the festive season, have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!