Passionfruit Gems

How do you spend your Sunday night's?  Personally, I like to try and escape the enveloping darkness of doom (i.e. returning to work!) by picking a book from the shelf and loosing myself in its pages for a few hours.  Not a 'novel' kind of a book either, not a page turner of a book with characters and storyline's, no siree, its always a recipe book!  Yes I am one of those people who has a pile of cookbooks beside my bed and I feel no shame in admitting that ;0)

So this recipe comes from one of my Sunday night musings, a book my Mum sent me for Christmas last year called quite simply 'Cookies'.  Its an Australian Women's Weekly publication and is stuffed full of amazing looking cookies.  It comes as no surprise that the ones to catch my eye use Passionfruit which has got to be one of my all time favourite flavours ever.

Passionfruit Gems
150g plain flour
75g SR flour
2 tbsp custard powder
110g icing sugar
90g cold butter, chopped
1 egg yolk
60ml passionfruit pulp (about 1 1/2 passionfruits)
Butter Icing
125g unsalted butter, softened
240g icing sugar
2 tbsp milk

Process the dry ingredients and butter together until crumbly; add egg yolk and passionfruit pulp, pulse until ingredients come together.

Loving that colour!

Knead dough on a floured surface until smooth.  Roll between sheets of baking paper until 5mm thick; refrigerate for 30 mins.

Preheat the oven to 180C/fan 160C.  Grease oven trays; line with baking paper (I hate greasing oven trays and as I had run out of baking paper I floured the tray's instead).

Using a 4cm round flower shaped cutter, cut rounds from dough.  Place about 3cm apart on oven trays.

Bake for about 10 mins.  Cool on wire racks.

Make the butter icing; beat the butter in a small bowl with an electric mixer until it is as white as possible.  Gradually beat in half the sifted icing sugar, milk, then the remaining icing sugar.  (I still had half a passionfruit left over so I added this to the icing and reduced the amount of milk accordingly).

Spoon the icing into a piping bag fitted with a small fluted tube.  Pipe stars onto cookies.

Makes 70
'Cookies' Australian Women's Weekly

These are yummy!  However, I have a few points to highlight.  I got far less than 70 cookies from the dough, which I am prepared to admit is probably down to me [ahem] firstly I need to readdress my idea of what 5mm looks like, secondly the smallest cutter I have is 48mm so my cookies were not only thicker but bigger too - I don't mind this though.  And then I discovered that along with running out of baking paper I also had an empty packet of piping bags sat in my draw, very helpful!  So I had to spoon the icing onto the cookies, they don;t look as pretty as they should but thankfully that doesn't affect the flavour at all ;0)

Wedding Cupckes ~ The Final Installment

As well as those Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cupcakes, the bride also requested White Chocolate and Raspberry cupcakes, which were made with the recipe as normal, but this time I made two icings, one plain and the other flavoured with a couple of tablespoons of raspberry sauce that I made by reducing raspberries with some sugar to taste.  I then used the sauce in place of the milk in the normal buttercream icing recipe.  To a piping bag fitted with a large nozzle I added the plain icing to one side only, then filled the other side with the raspberry icing and piped the icing on top of the cupcakes.  These were then sprinkled with some little white chocolate hearts.

The final choice of cupcake were the Dulce de Leche ones and this is how I made them;

Dulce de Leche Cupcakes
110g unsalted butter, at room temp
110g caster sugar
2 large eggs
110g SR flour
1 tsp baking powder
3 tsp Dulce de Leche
1 tin condensed milk, caramelised (I bought mine already made!)

Preheat the oven to 180C.  Fill a 12 hole non stick muffin tin with paper muffin cases.

Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy.  Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well between each addition.  Sift the flour and baking powder together and add this, a third at a time, to the butter, follow this with the dulce de leche.

Place in the centre of the oven and bake for about 20 mins until the cakes are springy to the touch and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.  Place on a wire rack and leave to cool.  Once cool, scoop a hole in the centre with a melon baller or a teaspoon and fill the gap with a spoonful of the caramelised condensed milk.

Makes 12
Adapted from Eat Me

Dulce de Leche Icing

125g butter, softened

240g icing sugar

3-4 tbsp Dulce de Leche

 

Beat the butter in a small bowl with an electric mixer until as white as possible. Gradually beat in half the icing sugar (good idea to sift it in), milk, then the remaining icing sugar.

 

Makes enough to generously ice one batch of cupcakes

Adapted from The Australian Women's Weekly Kid's Party Cakes

 

 

Once these little babies were all iced and packaged I sprinkled over some caramel flavoured chocolate curls.

The Wedding and Those Cupcakes Too

It's a done deal, Miss KH is now Mrs KS!  She was the most beautiful bride I have ever seen, I had fully intended to turn and watch her groom's face as he saw his bride for the first time (one of my favourite parts of a wedding) but my gorgeous friend was just too stunning to miss a second of her entrance!

Here she is on her Dad's arm with her little sister holding her train just as she was about to walk down the aisle, complete with thunder, lightening and rain!  The ceremony moved indoors shortly after her arrival.

Mr and Mrs S!



And here is how the cupcakes ended up looking too;

They look OK huh?  I was really pleased with how they had been laid out by the catering company.

The Groom's Mum made the top cake for cutting, a traditional fruit cake with a marzipan covering.

So I guess I had better add a cupcake recipe, and there is no better place to start than with the bride's choice!

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cupcakes
225g unsalted butter
150g plain chocolate, 85% cocoa solids
4 large eggs
225g soft dark brown sugar
3 tbsp cocoa powder
410g can evaporated milk
225g SR flour
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 bag Hershey's Reese's pieces

Preheat the oven to 170C.  Line two 12 hole muffin tins with paper cases.

Melt the butter and chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water, or chop the chocolate and place in a bowl in the microwave for 90 seconds.

When the chocolate is melted, beat in the eggs, one at a time, then the sugar.  Stir the cocoa into the evaporated milk and add half of it to the chocolate mixture.  Sift the flour and bicarbonate and add half to the mixture.  Then add the remaining milk and the rest of the flour.

Divide the mixture between the paper cases and add 3 or 4 Reese's pieces to each cupcake.  Bake in the centre of the preheated oven for 20-25 mins until springy to the touch.  Remove and place the cakes on a wire rack to cool.

Makes 24
Adapted from a recipe in Eat Me

I managed to get 36 cupcakes out of this recipe! 

Peanut Butter Icing
70g butter
80g smooth peanut butter
260g icing sugar
25-40ml milk

Make sure the butter is soft. Cream the butter together with the peanut butter until smooth and well combined.

Add the icing sugar (Katie says to do this a third at a time ... but I have to admit I whacked it all in at once, by this point I just wanted it done!) and mix well until it is incorporated with the butters. Add the milk as and when needed if it becomes a bit stiff.

Use more milk to slacken the frosting to the right piping consistency (I used a fair amount).

Fill a piping bag fitted with a large nozzle. Pipe on top of your chosen cupcakes and decorate with shards of peanut brittle.

Makes enough for 12 cupcakes

I stole this recipe from the wonderful Apple and Spice.  Thank you Katie!

Salted Peanut Brittle
200g roasted and salted peanuts
200g caster sugar

Add the caster sugar to a frying pan and gently shake to ensure it melts evenly.  When it reaches a lovely amber colour add the peanuts and stir to ensure they are all coated in the caramel.  Spread onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper and leave to set hard.

Once set break into shards and place on top of the cupcakes.

Makes enough to decorate 50 cupcakes

All In White Whoopie Pies

When it comes to the new Whoopie Pie craze I concluded that I had resisted long enough.  As much as my loyalties lie with cupcakes I kinda felt it was time I should make an informed decision.  Cleverly disguised as part of Hubby's anniversary present I have ventured into the world of Whoopie Pies and .... I think I really like them!  OK, I'll admit these guys are a little on the 'rustic' side of pretty but as far as taste goes I was pretty impressed and Hubby loves them.  I expected them to be more cake like but they are more of a cross between a cake and a sweet soft biscuit with a very definite sugar rush.  And as far as presentation goes then I reckon practice will make perfect!

I have done a bit of research on the Whoopie Pie phenomenon and apart from reading the usual facts and figures, made by the Amish from leftover cake batter and when the lucky recipients opened their lunchboxes they exclaimed 'Whoopie!' I also found that they are traditionally made with vegetable fat.  This put me off a bit.  I'd rather eat a block of butter than a block of vegetable fat any old day!  When Dan Lepard's recipe for Whoopie Pies appeared in last months Sainsbury's Magazine vegetable fat free things were looking up.

All In White Whoopie Pies
The Vanilla Whoopie
75g unsalted butter
1 large egg
150g caster sugar
125g soured cream
25ml cold milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda
275g plain flour
The Marshmallow Cream
100g mini or regular white marshmallows
50ml milk
125g very soft unsalted butter
The Icing
200g icing sugar
Sugar balls, or sprinkles, to decorate

Line a large baking tray with non stick baking paper and preheated the oven to 180C.

Melt the 75g of butter and set aside.  Using an electric hand mixer, whisk the egg until light and fluffy.  Beat in the sugar, a third at a time, until thick and glossy.

Beat in the melted butter, soured cream, milk and vanilla.  Sift the bicarbonate of soda and flour into the bowl and beat until smooth.  Using a wide piping nozzle or spoon, pipe or spoon the mixture on to the tray in small walnut sized balls, 3-4cm apart.  You'll need to bake in batches.

Bake for 13-14 mins until almost evenly golden on top.  Leave to cool for a few mins, then transfer to a cooling rack and bake the remaining mixture.

For the cream, heat the marshmallows and milk in a saucepan over a low heat, stirring until smooth, then cool.  Beat the butter until creamy and soft then gradually beat into the marshmallow cream.

For the icing, mix the icing sugar with 2-3 tbsp of cold water.  Spread a little on each whoopie.  Decorate with mimosa balls and leave to set.  They will keep for up to 6 hours once filled and iced.

Makes 28 individual whoopies or 14 sandwich whoopies
Dan Lepard, Sainsbury's Mag, June 10

Dan has noted that the cakes can be made up to 2 days ahead or can be frozen (unfilled).  I also popped over to his website and he has a slightly different recipe for a Marshmallow Buttercream that I would quite like to try.  The magazine has quite a few variations to the basic recipe that I can't wait to try, first on the list is the Passionfruit Whoopie. 

I used a small-ish ice cream scoop to measure the mixture out onto the trays.  Even with this though I still ended up with sizes ranging from extra large to petit.  Next time I'll try piping the mixture.

Gratitude Cookies aka 'Nigella's Chocolate Mint Cookies' - CBC 11

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.

It turns what we have into enough, and more.

It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity.

It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.

-- Melody Beattie

One batch of these babies and you will be very grateful for the time and care you have taken to make them!  One mouthful and all the stresses and rages of the work day will fade away and you will be thankful you don't have to live in your office ... although if my office was my kitchen I reckon I would be pretty happy right about now!

Gratitude Cookies
100g soft butter
150g light brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg
150g plain flour
35g cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder
200g dark chocolate chips (I used milk chocolate)
For The Glaze
75g icing sugar
1 tbsp cocoa, sieved
2 tbsp boiling water
1/4 tsp peppermint extract

Preheat the oven to 180C.

Cream the butter and brown sugar in a freestanding mixer, then beat in the vanilla extract and the egg.

Mix the flour, cocoa and baking powder in a bowl and gradually beat in to the creamed mixture.  finally, fold in the chocolate chips.

Using a rounded tbsp measure (I used an ice cream scoop), spoon out scoops of cookie dough and place on a lined baking sheet, leaving a little space in between each one.  (They will spread!)

Bake in the oven for 12 mins and then let them sit on the baking sheet for a couple of mins before moving  them to a cooling rack, with some newspaper on the surface underneath to catch any escaping glaze later.

Put the glaze ingredients into a saucepan and heat until combined.

Using a teaspoon, zig zag the glaze over each cookie.

Makes 26 cookies for Nigella and 23 for me
Taken from Nigella Express

More Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes

What is your favorite flavour of ice cream?

When I was little I loved Choc Chip Ice Cream, not choc chip is in a choc chip cookie, the chocolate was almost grated, like small flakes scattered through vanilla ice cream.  A bowl of this and I was putty in my parents hands!

Later my tastes 'grew' to bubble gum flavoured ice cream.  I can freely admit now though that it was nothing to do with the flavour of the ice cream but the reaction from grown ups when they saw the bowl of lurid colours swirled together that really captured my imagination.  How do you get hot pink, lime green and ocean blue ice cream anyway?  Maybe it was all those E numbers that really had the adults running for cover!

Ben and Jerry's and Haagen Dazs have all tried to woo my affections.  In some cases they have done a pretty good job, a scoop of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, Mint Chocolate Chunk and Caramel Chew Chew are a hard to resist treat when I go to the movies.  And I remember being in Barcelona with friends scoffing Haggen Dazs most nights on the way to salsa clubs.

But if it is no longer possible to have the Chocolate Chip Ice Cream of my childhood (just can't seem to find a decent replacement for it in the UK sadly!) then Mint Choc Chip Ice Cream or Raspberry Swirl will suit me just fine!

To make my favourite ice cream flavours in cupcake form all I did was add some colouring (there's those E numbers again!) and flavourings to plain buttercream icing;

For Raspberry Ripple I added raspberry flavour and mixed well.  I then added the colour and tried not to blend it to much so that it would be rippled - I'll need to practice that some more!  Some sprinkles over the top once piped onto the cupcakes and my Raspberry Ripple Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes were complete.

For Mint Choc Chip I added peppermint flavouring and green food colouring to the plain buttercream and mixed well.  Once an even colour was reached I piped the icing onto the cupcakes and covered with some chocolate sprinkles to replicate the chocolate chips.

This One Is For You Choclette - CBC's 9 & 10

I promised Choclette from the Chocolate Log Blog a cake recipe ... so you maybe wondering why you see a 99 cone before you? 
Summer seems to have reappeared today in Edinburgh, and there is nothing better on a hot summer's day than an ice cream.  But then the weather can change so quickly in this part of the world that no sooner have you got that wonderful treat and the heavens open, so maybe a cake would be better?  These little guys have the bases covered, they are really cupcakes 'cleverly' disguised as ice creams.  Kitsch I know!  Couldn't help myself, they have been on my want to bake list for quite some time but I got put off by reports of exploding ice cream cones, overflowing batter and then finally soggy ice cream cones so there was nothing else for it but to have a try myself.

I kept in mind the comments of overflowing batter and made sure that I left about 2cm from the top of the ice cream cones, they still billowed over the top though so next time I'll only half fill them.  The cones didn't explode in the oven, though I guess if you fill them full of the batter then they may crack as the batter cooks and expands.  As for soggy cones ... well they maybe aren't as crisp as they are straight from the packet but I wouldn't call them exactly soggy either. 

These were loads of fun to make, and I've managed to tick off two Cook Book Challenges as well, the original idea came from Fiona Cairn's 'Bake and Decorate' while the cupcake recipe came from Jennifer Graham's 'The Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Cookbook'.  When I first got this book I read it cover to cover a couple of times over and employee all the tips for making cupcakes but I realised that I've never actually made any of the cupcakes.  I opted for plain vanilla cupcakes so as I could play about with the icings, next time I'll check on the old supplies of icing sugar before I start, I only had enough for one batch of buttercream which has only gone far enough to ice 8 of the cones.  Never-mind though, the rest of the cones are safely store din my cupcake carrier until I can get back to the shops and then I can play around with icing flavours to my heart's content.  Watch this space for the creations!

Crabapple Bakery's Vanilla Cakes
2 3/4 cups plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
200g softened unsalted butter
1 3/4 cups caster sugar
4 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 cup milk
Ice cream cones (I've not given a quantity because it depends on how big the cones are)
Buttercream
Flakes - I got the 99 ones

Preheat the oven to 170C/fan 160C.  Place one flat bottomed ice cream cone into each hole of a muffin tray.

Sift together the flour and baking powder.  In a separate bowl, cream the butter for 1-2 mins.  Add the caster sugar a third at a time, beating for 2 mins after each addition.  After the last addition, beat until the mixture is light and fluffy and the sugar has almost dissolved.  Add eggs one at a time, beating for 1 min after each addition or until mixture is light and fluffy.  Add the vanilla extract and beat until combined.

Add a third of the flour to the creamed mixture and beat on low speed until combined.  Add half of the milk and beat until combined.  Repeat this process.  Add the remaining third of the flour and beat until thoroughly combined; do not over beat as this will toughen the mixture.

Spoon mixture into the ice cream cones (leave lots of room for them to expand!).  Bake for 20-25 mins or until a fine skewer inserted comes out clean.  Remove the cupcakes from the trays immediately and cool on a wire rack for 30 mins before frosting.

To decorate, i made one batch of vanilla buttercream and piped it on top of the cones in a soft serve style (or as close as my piping skills will ever get to a soft serve style!) and then added a 99 flake.

Made 23 ice cream cone cupcakes (though next time this amount will probably double!) and the buttercream made enough to ice 8 cones

The Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Cookbook

2010 Cupckaes

Here it is - my last post for 2009 and I know it has to be a good for the grand finale. Miss SD is having a Hogmanay party tonight and I promised her before Christmas that I would make her a batch of her favourite White Chocolate Truffles for the party. Thankfully my back is easing up enough to let me into the kitchen today and a 3 day absence from baking meant I had a serious itch to scratch!!!!

Because all those new year resolutions for loosing weight technically won't start until tomorrow I decided to make some White Chocolate Mud Cupcakes to go along with the truffles - white chocolate is Miss SD's favourite kind of chocolate so I know they are going to a good home.

White Chocolate Mud Cupcakes

125g butter, chopped

100g good quality white chocolate

215g caster sugar

125ml milk

1 egg, lightly whisked

115g plain flour

75g SR flour

1 tsp vanilla bean paste or seeds from 1 vanilla pod

Bling like sprinkles to decorate

Preheat oven to 160C. Line 12 x 80ml capacity muffin pans with paper cases.

Combine the butter, chocolate, sugar and milk in a medium saucepan over low heat. Cook, stirring, for 5 mins or until the chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Remove from heat. Transfer to a medium heatproof bowl and set aside for 5 mins to cool slightly.

Use a balloon whisk to gently whisk in the egg. Sift the combined flours over the chocolate mixture and gently whisk until just combined. Stir in the vanilla bean paste. Pour mixture evenly among prepared muffin pans. Bake in preheated oven for 30 mins or until a skewer inserted into the centres comes out clean. Turn onto a wire rack and set aside for 1 hour to cool completely.

* You can make these cupcakes up to 2 days ahead. Store in an airtight container out of direct sunlight.

Makes 12

Australian Taste Website

I iced these with a double batch of plain Buttercream icing. I figured the white chocolate and vanilla in the cupcakes would be sweet enough. To make sure they were properly dressed for the party they were then 'artistically' blinged up with some gold, silver and pearl sprinkles. The icing is a little wonky but for my first ever attempt at the 'Soft Serve' style I'm pretty chuffed. And I know that Miss SD will love them for the imperfections just as mush as she will for their white chocolate.

Happy Hogmanay everyone. Have a good one ;0)