Viennese Fingers

Today I came home with the desperate desire to bake.  I've been working at the primary school this week, helping prepare for a show tomorrow.  It's been a bit stressful for all involved.  I knew I wanted to make crispy cakes, and I did, but they were not enough to relax me entirely.  I am craving iced buns but thought they'd take too long.  They would also have to be eaten the same day and I was wanting something I could perhaps take for my lunch.  After looking at what ingredients we had to hand, I settled on a favourite: Viennese fingers.  This has become one of the things people love me to bake.  They always go down well and never last long.  They're also fairly simple, especially since I've now acquired a decent sized piping nozzle.

This recipe was one I found on another blog, called Cooking at Marystow, which sadly does not exist any more.  At least as far as I know.  It's not at the blog location anyway.  It is apparently a Mary Berry recipe but I have her Baking Bible and the recipe in there is different.  I also added vanilla essence to it, since I like adding vanilla to things.

Recipe:

The number I end up with varies every time I do it.  Usually somewhere between 16 and 24.

• 175g/6oz butter
• 60g/2oz caster sugar
•  175g/6oz self-raising flour
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 90g/3oz milk or dark chocolate 

1. Prepare two or three baking trays, either by greasing or laying down grease-proof paper.
2. Preheat the oven to 160°C/320°F/Gas Mark 3. 
3. Beat the butter and sugar together until pale and creamy.  Takes 5-10 minutes of stirring.
4. Add the vanilla and mix in.
5. Sift in the flour and stir until well combined.
6. Using a piping bag and a medium star nozzle, pipe the biscuit dough onto the prepared trays.  Biscuits are usually about 10cm long and made up of 2 or 3 lines, depending on how big you want them and how many.  Fewer lines per biscuit means more biscuits in total.  Space them a reasonable distance apart because they do get a bit bigger when cooking.  You can use a smaller nozzle if you want, you just have to pipe more lines per biscuit.  I usually did about 5, layering 2 lines on top of 3 to make them thicker.
7. Bake the biscuits for about 20 minutes.  Watch them near the end to stop them catching.  They should be a nice goldy colour.  They will be soft to the touch so don't press them too hard.
8. Remove from oven and leave to cool on the trays for about 15 minutes, giving them time to firm up before moving them to cooling racks to finish cooling.
9. Meanwhile, melt the chocolate in a glass bowl over a saucepan of simmering water.  Don't let the bowl touch the water.
10. Carefully dip the ends of the biscuits in the chocolate.  Be gentle because these biscuits are very fragile. (This was the first batch I've made where I've not broken any).
11. Leave to set on the cooling racks.  Once set, be careful removing from the racks as some of the ends may have stuck and the biscuit will snap if you pull too hard. 

Shortbread

My Jammie Dodger-ish jam tarts gave me cravings for the actual thing so I wanted to try and make a home made version.  Looking into exactly what type of biscuit a Jammie Dodger is, I learnt it is shortbread.  Thus I went hunting for a shortbread recipe.  Turns out, originally it was just flour, butter and sugar.  However, over time other things were added to create different textures.  I ended up going with a recipe that incorporated cornflour because it makes a nice melt-in-the-mouth biscuit.  And it does.  Unfortunately, the dough I ended up with was too soft to cut shapes from so in the end I just had to make shortbread.  No Jammie Dodger clones this time but it is still on my to-do list.  I'll just need to find a different recipe.

Recipe - adapted from Sue Lawrence's Recipe

Made 32 small petticoat tails

• 175g/6oz butter
• 85g/3oz caster sugar
• 200g/7oz plain flour
• 50g/1.75oz cornflour

1. Preheat the oven to 150°C/300°F/Gas Mark 2 and grease/line two 18cm/7 inch circular tins or two baking trays (I did the latter because I was expecting to make something else).
2. Cream the butter and sugar together until really smooth and creamy.  This takes about 10 minutes by hand and results in a sore arm.
3. Sift the two flours together in a separate bowl.
4. Add the flour to the butter mix a spoonful at a time and mix.  Only add the next spoonful after the first is fully incorporated.
5. When all the flour is in, bring it together with your hands and split into two balls. 
6. Gently roll out into two circles just smaller than your tins (if you're using them).   I put mine between clingfilm to stop them sticking to the rolling pin.  It also made transferring it to the trays easier.
7. Prick all over with a fork, making sure the fork goes right through to the bottom.  The press around the edges, again with a fork.
8. Put in the oven.  The recipe says to bake for 35-40 minutes but I'd say you could leave it in a bit longer as I don't think mine cooked right the way through.  Only another 2-5 minutes though.
9. When it's removed from the oven it will still be soft so be careful.  Leave on the trays/in the tins but place them on wire racks.  At this point you should cut each circle into 16 pieces.  If you want to, sprinkle sugar over them.  Leave to cool for 20 minutes.
10. After 20 minutes, carefully remove from tins/trays and place on the wire racks to finish cooling.  They harden up as they cool.

 

Consensus was that these were yummy.  Shame the box I put them in wasn't very good since they'd gone soft today.

Gingernut Biscuits, take two

Yesterday I did two lots of baking.  One was my first ever batch of shortbread, which I will be posting about shortly.  The other was a second batch of gingernut biscuits, though this time with wheat and gluten free flour.  Learning from last time I made sure to keep a good eye on them in the oven.  I also didn't put too much syrup in this time, so that probably helped too.  They certainly came out much better.  None of them caught.  They didn't flatten out as much as they did in the previous batch but that's not too bad.  They are still delicious apparently.

So, recipe can be seen here. And if you want to make them gluten/wheat free, just replace the flour with a free from equivalent.

Jam Tarts

Last week I was down in Essex visiting my family as I'd not seen them since November and not been home since August.  For some reason, being home resulted into a brief nostalgia moment as I thought to myself 'I've not made jam tarts'.  Jam tarts are one of my Dad's favourite things but I don't remember them being made in our house since I was a little girl.  My mother used to make them quite often.  I did consider trying my hand at them whilst there, but alas we had no jam.  I also don't trust the oven.  It's too complicated for my liking.  A shame since I would have liked to make jam tarts for my Dad.  Maybe next time.  I think I need more practice anyway.

However, once back in Scotland I still felt a need to try them and we have a stockpile of jam in this house.  So today I made 12 little tarts, 6 with raspberry jam and 6 with strawberry.  The pastry recipe came from The Best of Mrs Beeton's Cakes and Baking, which was sitting in our kitchen in Essex.  I made note of a few recipes I wanted to try, the shortcrust pastry among them.

The result....was not quite right.  I left them in the oven much longer than I should have done since I wasn't sure if the pastry was cooked properly.  It wasn't soggy or anything but it didn't seem to be changing colour, which is what I expected it to do.  This meant that they ended up having the consistency of Jammy Dodgers.  Of course, my boyfriend and I like Jammy Dodgers so we didn't see this as a bad thing.  Unfortunately, not very jam tartish.  Next time I'll take them out the oven when I'm meant to.

I also decided to try using a wheat and gluten free flour for the pastry, since my boyfriend's Mum isn't eating wheat at the moment.  Despite Jammy Dodger texture, I believe it worked fine as a substitute.

Recipe - Adapted from Mrs Beeton's Lemon Tartlets

Makes about 12 6cm diameter tarts

• 100g/4oz plain flour (either regular or wheat free)
• 50g/2oz butter
• Pinch of salt
• Some water
• About 18 tsp worth of jam in the flavour of your choice

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C/395°F/Gas 6.
2. Grease a 12 shallow holed baking tray.
3. Sift the flour and salt into a bowl.
4. Add the butter and rub together between your fingers until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.
5. Add water until you get a stiff dough.  I ended up using about 7 tsp of water.  Just add a couple of tsp at a time until you get the right consistency.  Press dough together with your fingers after each addition of water.
6. Roll the dough out on a floured surface and use cookie cutters to cut out the tarts.  This can be really tricky and you may need to add tiny bits of water to stop the dough drying out too much due to the flour on the surface.  You should have enough dough for 12 without any leftovers.
7. Spoon 1.5 tsp of jam into each tart.  As I said, I did 6 each or strawberry and raspberry jam.  No need for blind baking as nothing went soggy.
8. Put in the oven and bake for 15-20 minutes. (I had mine in for about 45, which is why I got Jammy Dodger tarts instead).
9. Cool on a rack.  Do not eat straight from the oven as the jam will be very, very hot.

Easter Cupcakes

This Easter I made 48 vanilla cupcakes (see my recipe here), 36 with one decoration and 12 with another.  The first 36 were made last week and were a treat for the class my boyfriend's mum teaches at the local primary school.  She provided me with what she wanted to go on them and I baked and put them together.  They were not anything very fancy but they still looked good and the kids loved them.

As I said, the decoration for this was very simple.  It is essentially a ring of green icing, a Cadbury mini egg and a little bunny decoration from Poundland held down with a dab more green icing.  The bunny is not edible but apparently the kids spent the rest of the day playing with them.

The other 12 were a result of me wanting to take my usual Easter cupcakes one step further in terms of decoration.  Usually I just ice them with melted Cadbury's Dairy Milk (because I always try to use good quality chocolate since it makes a huge difference in taste) and put a couple of mini eggs on top.  They've always gone down well with everyone and are pretty much seasonal since I can only get mini eggs (or at least the Cadbury ones) first quarter of the year.

Anyway, when I was working at WH Smith I encountered a lot of baking magazines.  I've recently started to collect the Cake Decorating one that just came out, and I always sort of had my eye on Baked and Delicious.  The latter was not one we sold though, just one a customer had on order.  However, we did get the spring special in.  I saw it sitting in the same place we kept all the big collectable magazines.  I ummed and ahhed for about a week before I eventually caved and bought it.  The main draw being the lovely Easter themed silicone moulds, one of the shapes being for chicks, which is where the advancement idea came from.  If I already have eggs on my cakes, then why not a chick too?  And if I've got eggs and chicks, why not a nest as well?  And what makes a good nest?  Why, cornflake and chocolate crispy cakes of course!  So here they are, my lovely Easter nest cupcakes:

Admittedly, when making the cake mix I ended up with too much egg from the two I used (they were a bit big) so I had to add 2oz of everything else to balance it out (so 6oz sugar rather than the usual 4oz).  I still spread it out across 12 cakes though rather than making 18.  They obviously just came out a bit bigger than usual. They were really yummy!  Using good quality chocolate always makes crispy cakes taste so amazing so I recommend using your favourite chocolate for them.  And chocolate with vanilla cake is always scrummy. Decoration Recipe - for 12 cakes:   80g/3oz white chocolate Yellow tinting powder 200g/7oz milk chocolate 100g/3.5oz cornflakes 100g packet of Cadbury mini eggs Chick mould Rubber spatula Start by melting the white chocolate in a bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Once melted add the yellow tinting powder and stir until you get an even colour through the chocolate.  Put into 12 chick moulds, using a toothpick to push the chocolate into any corners, then place in the fridge to set.  I only have 6 little moulds so I had to do mine in two batches.  When one was done I put them on a plate and left them in the fridge so they didn't soften. Now melt the milk chocolate. Measure out the cornflakes into a large bowl and add most of the melted chocolate.  I suggest keeping some aside to help fix things to the top of the cakes.  Mix in with the rubber spatula.  It may not look like enough but keep mixing and it will coat it all. When evenly coated build nests on top of the cakes.  Use the remaining melted chocolate to coat the top of the cakes. When putting on the cornflakes, I used two teaspoons to pick up a piece and place and push them together on the cake.  Just make a ring around the outside.  It's a bit fiddly and the crispies will slip about a bit but just persevere! When the nests are done, put two mini eggs in the nests, resting them against the nest if you can as the chocolate will hold them in place once it sets. Take the set chicks out the fridge and place in the nests too. Put cake in the fridge for about 10 minutes or until chocolate has set completely. And if you end up with spare nest mixture like I did, make crispy cakes!

Vanilla Sponge Cake Pops

Until recently I'd never heard of cake pops.  Then they showed up in Baking Heaven and I was intrigued.  A little while afterwards I was reading through one of the cake books I got for my birthday last year and there they were again.  And then I've been perusing various baking blogs and they were there too!  So when my first sponge for the flowered birthday cake didn't quite turn out how I wanted but still tasted great I knew I wanted to use it when I tried my own hand at it.  And today there was another birthday party which was the perfect excuse.  So yes, the sponge used for this cake comes from that recipe, though I only used two eggs and my boyfriend ate a bit so in the end I only had about 260g of cake.  Despite that though I got 41 pops. 

The recipe ended up being a mish-mash of a couple of recipes from the magazine and the book.  I had to adjust amounts and such because I didn't have the same amount of sponge and I wanted to mix up the toppings.  Admittedly, when making these I missed an important part of the method.  I really don't know how I failed to read it in all the recipes.  After shaping the balls I should have put in the fridge to firm up before putting the sticks in.  I didn't and consequently I lost a few when decorating because they were not strong enough to support the weight.  I also wouldn't recommend toothpicks.  You definitely need thicker sticks, like lollipop sticks, to support the weight.  Nothing with pointed tips because that amount of weight on a tiny point means that the balls can slide down and sometimes split.  Very annoying!

General consensus was that these were very yummy.  Personally I thought the white chocolate ones were the best, even though the milk chocolate were more popular.  When I make them again I want to make dark chocolate ones too.  Obviously, adjust the amounts of chocolate to 80g/2.75oz of each type for that.

Recipe - made 41 cake pops:

• 260g/9oz vanilla sponge
• 1-2 tsp vanilla extract
• 65g/2.3oz unsalted butter
• 90g/3oz icing sugar
• 120g/4oz white chocolate
• 120g/4oz milk chocolate
• Another 100g/3.5oz icing sugar 
• Pink food colouring (or colour of your choice)
• A little bit of water
• Decorations of your choice (I've got chocolate sprinkles and white chocolate stars)
• Lollipop sticks or something similar (don't use toothpicks/cocktail sticks)
• Something to hold them in, like a polystyrene block 

1. Put the butter and first lot of icing sugar in a bowl with the vanilla extract and beat until smooth and creamy.
2. Add the sponge and mix well to combine evenly with the buttercream.
3. Put some greaseproof paper on a tray or two, it needs to be able to fit in your fridge. 
4. Take 2 teaspoons of sponge mix, make into a ball and place on the tray.  Repeat until you run out of sponge.  You should get about 40 balls.
5. Put the balls in the fridge for 30 minutes to an hour so the balls firm up. (In bold because I forgot this bit).
6. Melt the chocolate in two separate bowls over hot water.
7. Take the trays out of the fridge, dip the tips of the sticks in the chocolate (half in one and half in the other) and insert one into each ball.  Put the trays back in the fridge for about 10 minutes so the chocolate sets and the balls are secure.
8. When you think they are secure, take them back out and dip half the balls in the white chocolate and half in the milk chocolate.  Stick them in your polystyrene block (or equivalent) after you dip each one.  If you have trouble with the dipping (such as they fall off like mine did) you can put it on with a spoon instead.
9. Let the chocolate set.  If you can fit it in your fridge, put it in since it'll set faster.
10. Make up the icing with the second lot of icing sugar.  Add a couple of drops of colouring before the water.  Then add the water a little at a time until you get a good consistency.  You don't want it too runny or it will go everywhere.  It should just be able to pour off your spoon.
11. Take out the set balls and put a bit of icing on top of each, easing it down the sides if necessary.
12. Add your decorations. 

Gingernut Biscuits

Today's weather is truly horrific, and quite the contrast to last week.  Strange to think that just two days ago it was beautifully sunny and Scotland reached record breaking temperatures for this time of year.  Then today we've had snow, sleet and hail.  Yuck.  Very much not something you want to go out in.  But a perfect excuse for baking.  

This recipe was something my boyfriend's Mum found in Good Housekeeping magazine.  She likes gingernut biscuits and since we had all the ingredients to hand I whipped a batch up.  It's a very simple recipe though unfortunately a number of them caught in the oven, so are a bit singed around the edges.  One was completely burnt.  The temperature in our oven varies greatly so in future I'll need to keep a closer eye on them.

Both my boyfriend's Mum and her mother tried the biscuits after I made them.  The consensus was that they were delicious and wonderfully crunchy. 

Recipe - adapted from Good Housekeeping May 2012 - makes 16

• 100g/3.5oz self-raising flour
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 2 tsp caster sugar
• 50g/2oz butter
• 75g/3oz golden syrup

1. Prepare two baking trays with greaseproof paper and preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/Gas mark 5.
2. In a large-ish bowl, sift all the dry ingredients together (so everything except the butter and syrup).
3. In a small saucepan put the butter and the syrup and heat until the butter melts.
4. Pour syrup mix into the dry ingredients and stir well to make a dough.  It'll be a bit sticky.
5. With lightly floured hands, break off some of the dough, roll into a ball (about 3cm in diameter) and place on the tray.  Space them out well and flatten slightly.  Keep going until you have 16 biscuits or you use up all your mixture.
6. Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes.  It depends on how crunchy you want them to be.  The longer they are in, the harder they will be.  Do watch them carefully though as they catch really easily.  They will come out the oven soft but harden as they cool.
7. Allow to cool before serving, preferably with a warm drink.   

Flowered Birthday Cake - Vanilla Sponge

Today was the birthday of my boyfriend's Gran and I was asked to make the cake for the occasion.  Now, it has to be said that big cakes are not something I consider myself to be very good at.  My layers always come out ridiculously thin and it frustrates me to no end.  However, for my birthday last year I found a somewhat different way of making one which turned out rather successful.  It has since become my go-to method for baking large cakes.  Admittedly I've only made it twice before but have always been happy with the result.

Unfortunately, I ended up making this particular cake twice and still was not entirely happy with the final result.  It just did not seem to rise as well as the previous times.  The first attempt at this cake was a complete disaster.  The layers were too thin and they stuck to my pan!  I now know that despite investing in a lovely silicone baking set, I'm sill going to have to grease it for cakes.  Luckily, despite falling apart, the sponge still tasted good (according to my boyfriend who kept stealing pieces of it) so I've put it in a bag in the freezer to use for a later project.

I put the thinness of the first attempt, in part, down to the size of tin.  The ones I used were slightly bigger than the ones I used to use.  I went back to the old tins on my second try.  I also put the lack of thickness down to having slightly less batter due to the amount of ingredients used being dependent on the weight of the eggs.  For the first attempt I used shop bought eggs, which were about 20g less in weight than the eggs provided by our hens.  I know that does not sound like much but trust me, it made a difference.  Anyway, after my first attempt failed I had a bit of a sulk and a cuddle (I really don't like it when things go wrong) and then tried again.  The second attempt certainly came out better but I still think it came out shorter than my other cakes made with this recipe. Reviewing the recipe I realised my mistake.  I was meant to use 3 eggs.  I only used 2.  Oops.  Obviously I should not do things from memory unless I actually know it properly, like my vanilla cupcake recipe.  I've made sure to correct that in the recipe below.

The cake is a very simple sponge cake with a vanilla buttercream and jam filling and then ready to roll fondant icing for the decoration.  Originally I envisioned something more elaborate for the design involving piped flowers but that did not work out too well so modelling everything out of fondant was the way I had to go.

Recipe:

Cake - adapted from a post on The Good Food Channel

• 3 eggs
• Caster sugar - weight equal to that of the 3 eggs in their shells
• Unsalted butter - weight equal to that of the 3 eggs in their shells
• Self raising flour - weight equal to that of the 3 eggs in their shells
• 2 tsp vanilla extract 

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4.
2. Prepare two 7inch/20cm cake tins.
3. Weigh the 3 eggs together so you know how much of the other ingredients you require. 
4. Separate the eggs and use a whisk to beat the egg whites until the soft peak stage (this means when you pull the whisk out on the mixture it will form a peak but the tip will fall over).  DO NOT OVERWHISK!
5. Put the butter and sugar in a bowl and mix with a wooden spoon until fluffy and pale in colour.  Usually this is about 5-10 minutes of beating by hand.  The paler the mix the better incorporated the sugar is with the butter.
6. Whisk the egg yolks and vanilla together and add to the butter mix a little at a time, folding it in to add air to the mixture.
7. Sift in the flour and fold that in also.
8. Add the egg whites and fold those in too (lots of folding in this recipe) until you cannot see any white in the mixture.
9. Pour half the mixture into each tin and then put in the over for about 30 minutes.  Do not open the oven before 20 minutes have past.
10. Once baked. removed and let stand in the tins for a couple of minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

Filling:

• 2oz/60g icing sugar
• 1oz/30g unsalted butter
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 heaped tbsp raspberry jam (or other fruit jam of your choice)

1. In a bowl mix the butter and icing sugar until it makes a nice, creamy looking paste.
2. Add the vanilla and mix in.
3. On one of the cooled cake halves, spread the buttercream out in an even layer.
4. On the other one, spread out the jam.
5. Sandwich the two halves together.

 

Decoration:

• 415g packet of ready to roll fondant icing
• Green food colouring
• Pink pearl cake decorations (or something similar)
• 1 heaped tbsp apricot jam
• Lots of icing sugar
• Some water

1. I recommend making the flowers first.  My cake has 30 flowers on it.  They are made by taking small pieces of the fondant icing and shaping into diamonds by pinching the ends into points with my fingers.  Make five of these and then gently push them together to make a flower shape.  Then place one of the pearl decorations into the centre, pushing it down gently so it stays in place.  Set the flower aside to set.
2. Repeat until you have as many flowers as you want.  With this amount of fondant icing though, 35 is probably the maximum amount.  If the icing gets too dry due to constant handling, just add a tiny amount of water to your fingers.
3. In a small saucepan, boil the jam for a couple of minutes (without burning) and then set aside to cool.
4. With the rest of the icing, add the green food colouring and knead to spread the colour evenly throughout.  Keep adding colouring until you are satisfied with the colour.  Be warned, it will stain your hands so you may want to wear gloves and protective clothing.  The food colouring will make the icing very sticky if using a water based one so you'll have to roll and knead it in icing sugar to combat this, especially when rolling it out.
5. Roll out the icing into as even a circle as possible, making sure it is big enough to cover the top and sides of the cake.
6. Plate up the cake and cover the top with the cooled jam.
7. Carefully lift the rolled out icing.  You'll probably need to use your rolling pin to support some of the weight.  Drape over the cake and then gently smooth it down, starting at the centre and then working down the sides.  Trim off the excess icing.  It doesn't matter if you trim a bit too much off.  That's what the bow is for!
8. To make the bow, add more food colouring to the remaining icing to dye it a slightly darker green than the 'grass'.  Again, add icing sugar to stop it become too sticky. 
9. Break off a smallish piece to use for the bow and roll out the remaining icing into a sausage long enough to wrap around the base of the cake.  Transferring it to the cake is quite tricky.  It took me several attempts before I got it around without it breaking in transit.
10. Fashion the bow out of what is left.  I made a bow pretzel and a separate 'knot' to hide where the bow joined the cake.  I used a bit of leftover jam to stick the bow edges to the top of the cake.
11. In a small bowl mix up some icing sugar with a teeny bit of water to make a thin paste.  You don't need very much.  Using something with a thin tip (I used a knife) put a small blob on the bottom of each flower and place on top of the cake wherever you like.  Repeat until all the flowers are stuck down.