Cranberry and white chocolate cupcakes

Whilst putting together my "menu" for my charity bake sale last week, I decided that I wanted a couple of different flavours of cupcakes as they are easy to bake in larger batches (to raise more money!! :-) ). I was really tempted by this recipe I saw on the Hummingbird Bakery blog as it seemed nice and Christmassy, and at the same time allowed me to offer a different flavour from the predominantly chocolate cakes in my repertoire.

I made a slight adjustment to the frosting recipe, but that was primarily for a practical reason as I had some "leftover" white chocolate ganache (see below!)

Cranberry and White Chocolate Cupcakes

Adapted from The Hummingbird Bakery Blog

Ingredients:
For the cake:
70g unsalted butter, softened
210g plain flour
250g caster sugar
2 tsp baking powder (the recipe said 1tbsp but I was bit nervous of that!!)
1/2 tsp salt
210 ml milk
2 large eggs
60g dried cranberries
1 tsp grated orange zest

For the frosting: (this differs a bit from the Hummingbird recipe)
2-3 tbsp white chocolate ganache
300g icing sugar, sifted
160g unsalted butter, softened

Equipment:
2 * 12 hole deep muffin tins

Method:
1. Preheat the oven to 170°C/150 C(fan)/Gas Mark 3, and line the muffin tins with cupcake cases. The recipe says it makes 12-16 based on using large American-style muffin cases. I wanted to use Christmas style cases and only had medium ones - my mixture made 21 of these in the end!
2. Mix the butter, sugar, flour, baking powder and salt together using a hand-held or free standing mixer until they form a crumb-like consistency.
3. Whisk together the eggs and milk in a separate jug.
4. Gradually pour half the liquid into the crumb mixture with the mixer on low speed and mix thoroughly until combined. Then turn up the mixer to medium and beat until batter is smooth and thick with no lumps. Then turn down the mixer speed and gradually add the rest of the liquid, continuing to beat until the batter is smooth and combined.
5. Add the cranberries and orange zest, and mix until evenly distributed.
6. Spoon batter into prepared cases, filling each one approx. two-thirds full.

7. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the sponge bounces back when lightly touched.  Leave the cakes to cool for a few minutes in the tin, then place on a wire rack to cool completely.
8. Beat the butter for the frosting until light and whippy, then gradually add in the icing sugar, beating until smooth. Add in the white chocolate ganache (or melted chocolate - approx 60g), then turn up the mixer to high speed and beat until light and fluffy.
9. When the cupcakes are completely cold, smooth a generous amount of frosting onto each one and smooth with a palette knife. Decorate each cupcake with a dried cranberry and sprinkle with a little orange zest.

Observations:
I have always previously made cupcakes using a Victoria sandwich-type recipe, so this was quite different both in the proportions of ingredients and the method of combining. I was a little nervous, but it seemed to work really well. The cupcakes baked really evenly, and rose evenly to give a nice rounded appearance but not too much of a "dome", so they were also easy to decorate.

Personally I though the amount of icing sugar in the original recipe (500g) was a bit excessive so I toned this down, and instead of using melted chocolate I used some chocolate ganache (50% white chocolate, 50% double cream). This was simply because I had originally intended to decorate these with white chocolate ganache, but when I made it it was quite "yellow" in colour and very runny, so I thought I'd better revert to buttercream ... and incorporate the white chocolate flavour so as not to waste it all!!

Overall I was very pleased with these cupcakes - one of them had its wrapper tear in the tin so it was the only cake from my whole charity bake which I kept  back to taste and didn't sell ... I frosted it and then my husband and I split it between us.  The sponge was very light and soft and the flavour yummy .. clearly some of my colleagues agreed as they soon got snapped up!

I would like to enter these Christmas treats into the following challenges:

Treat Petite (December) - Christmas

(hosted this month by Kat at The Baking Explorer, and alternately by Stuart at Cakeyboi)

AlphaBakes (December) - X is for Xmas

(hosted this month by Caroline Makes and alternately by The More Than Occasional  Baker)

Love Cake (December) - December Delights

(hosted by JibberJabber UK)

That's all for today.

Hugs,

Baileys and Chocolate Miniature Cheesecakes

Hi everyone,
I've not been around over the past few weeks for one reason and another ... mostly on account of work, but also because I've had some persistent sinus trouble for the past three months which is not the best recipe for baking!!  I've also done one or two repeat bakes plus had the odd baking disaster (my recent albino Battenberg may have tasted good but it certainly wasn't ready for its close-up!!) so I decided to draw a blogging veil over my recent efforts!

Anyhow I'm feeling quite a bit better right now, and also I've got a bit of a boost to my mojo with the start of series 5 of Bake Off .... so I thought I would make some miniature cakes like they did for this week's showstopper challenge!! Not 36 though ... much as I like cake, I don't think that me and my husband could get through that many lol!!

I have a bottle of Baileys in the cupboard which needs finishing, so I decided to use it to make some miniature cheesecakes, also using my Lakeland 12 cup mini sandwich tin as seen on this week's Bake Off (oh how I would love one of those gadgets that Norman invented to make all the cakes pop out at once ... Lakeland why don't you patent it??)

By the way, please excuse the pictures ... it's been a while since I took pics of my baking, and today I forgot to set my macro on, so the close ups are a bit blurred!!

Baileys & Chocolate Mini Cheesecakes

Taken from: Lakeland website

Ingredients:
100g butter, plus extra to grease
250g digestive biscuits, crushed
600g soft cream cheese
25ml Baileys liqueur
100g icing sugar
300ml double cream, whipped
100g good quality dark chocolate, coarsely grated
100g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

Equipment:
Lakeland 12 Cup Mini Sandwich Tin

Method:
1. Grease the Mini Sandwich Tin with a little butter (I used Cake Release).

2. Crush the biscuits, either in a food processor, or (as I did) by placing in a freezer bag and crushing with a rolling pin.

3. Melt the butter in a pan, add the crushed biscuits and stir well until the biscuits have absorbed all the butter. 

4. Remove from the heat, divide the mixture equally between the cups in the cake tin and press firmly into place. Place in the refrigerator and allow to set for one hour.

5. Lightly whip the cream cheese then beat in the Baileys and icing sugar. Fold in the whipped cream and roughly half of the grated chocolate. 

6. When smooth, spoon evenly onto the biscuit bases. Refrigerate and allow to set for at least two hours.

7. Once set, carefully remove by running a knife dipped in hot water round the edge of each cheesecake and gently pushing up the tin’s loose bases. Just before serving, sprinkle the remaining grated chocolate then the chopped chocolate over each cheesecake.

Observations:
I  made half the recipe amount listed above, with a view to baking a manageable (for eating!) 6  mini cheesecakes ... but it actually made 7, and had so much cheesecake mix I wished I had divided my biscuit base into 8!!  I also found that I needed considerably less than half the amount of chocolate listed in the recipe.

This was only my second ever attempt at cheesecake (my first was a baked cheesecake) and it was incredibly easy  .. the most difficult part was getting it out of the tin.  After 2 1/2 hours it was set enough (just!)  to get  2 out of the pan to eat with our evening meal; but I left the rest in the fridge overnight to firm up more.  I was very pleased with the flavour and texture of the cheesecake mix though .. absolutely delicious!

I'd like to enter this for a couple of baking challenges ....

Firstly, this month's Treat Petite challenge, hosted this month by Stuart at Cakeyboi, and alternate months by Kat aka The Baking Explorer. This month's theme is No Bake - perfect for these little desserts.

Secondly, I'd like to take part in Lucy from Super Golden Bakes' #GBBO Bake Along (Episode 1)

I am of baking along with this week's showstopper challenge of  "miniature British classics". I doubt I'll be troubling the Bake Off tent any time soon, but I still really enjoy it. ... nonetheless I have also tweeted this post to #Extra Slice ... you never know!!

Update: I have just spotted August's Baking With Spirit challenge hosted by Janine at Cake of the Week, which is to go crazy  and do whatever you want with alcohol (oo-er!).

Charity Bake #5 - Easter chocolate cornflake nests

Hi everyone,
Well, easy peasy though these may be, I had never made Easter chocolate cornflake nests before, so as I'm very busy at work at the moment I thought they would be the perfect quick charity bake!

Easter chocolate cornflake nests

Serves: 24

Ingredients:
450g cooking chocolate, broken into small pieces (I used a mixture of milk and dark)
125g butter
200g cornflakes
5 tbsp golden syrup
72 Cadbury's mini eggs

Method:
1. Melt the chocolate and butter gently in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, stirring constantly  until completely smooth.
2. Stir in the golden syrup.
3. Place the cornflakes into a large bowl and pour the chocolate over. Stir gently with a heatproof spatula or wooden spoon to combine.
4. Place paper cases into 2 muffin trays, and spoon the mixture into them, wedging 3 mini eggs into the top of each cake.
5. Place in the refrigerator to cool and set for approx 1 hour.

Observations:
I googled around and found several recipes, all with slightly different proportions of cornflakes and chocolate. Most seemed to use 100g of chocolate and 75-100g of cornflakes for 12 cakes; but several commenters had said this amount of chocolate isn't enough to bind the mixture. I can't emphasize this enough .. it isn't NEARLY enough. You definitely need 200g + of chocolate for each 100g of cornflakes. that's the reason i used a mixture of milk and dark chocolate - I used up the milk choc I intended for the job, and had to pull some dark choc out of the cupboard to top it up!!

Also I used less golden syrup than some recipes which use up to 2 tbsp per 100g of chocolate!  The other thing I would say is that I used medium size cupcake cases (not the largest) and didn't overfill them but this mixture made 19 cakes.

Having said all of the above they were one of the quickest and easiest things I have made, so i hope they'll go down well with my colleagues.

I would like to enter these into a couple of Easter baking challenges as follows:

We Should Cocoa (hosted by Rachel Cotterill) - Easter

Treat Petite (hosted this month by Cakeyboi and also by The Baking Explorer) - Spring Into Easter

Simply Food - Let's Cook Sweet Treats For Easter

That's all for today. I'll be back later with a fundraising update.

Update: well these seemed to go down an Easter treat - they were soon snapped up, and when I tried one I definitely think it was worth using the extra chocolate :-)

Amount raised: £18.00
Hugs,