Cup cakes...literally

 Before I go any further, I would like to mention that although I have a microwave, I am not all that fond of it. Other than the occasional last minute defrost or a quick fix for frozen veggies, I dont really use it much. But when I found a recipe for microwave chocolate cake - in a cup - i was sold. Any time cake! Bliss! So here it goes -

This is really easy and quick. I added all the ingredients to my braun "mixing bowl", wizzed it all up for a couple seconds chopped up some cherries and chocolate

 
 ...and poured it into the little espresso cups....

...and cooked it for 2 min (YES 2 MIN!!!!) in the microwave! And they were done...

Their texture was pretty dense and all the chocolate and cherries sank to the bottom, but in terms of effort, these were incredible!

The hardest part was the icing, and here again I really don't usually do this, but I bought a packet of the new Hullets ready made chocolate icing (it comes in 3 flavours - strawberry, cappuccino and chocolate WITH a pipping bag and 2 nozzles - all you do its mix with butter), which made the icing part a breeze :)

These would make a super fantastic warm dessert when you have no time (thats pretty much all the time ), just add a generous blob of fresh whipped cream!

 

This is also a great recipe for little budding bakers, it requires a bit of supervision with the measuring and the microwave time, but other then that they can make their own cakes!

Please excuse the *VERY* high iso in these pictures, the light was awful (it was a cold rainy day - how could I resit chocolate) but i just had to share!

Download the Recipe Card here:

Chocolate Microwave Mug Cake

Have an awesome week end everyone! 

xxx

*Almost* Red Velvet Cupcakes

Cupcake. That is one of my most favourite words. Beautiful, scrumptious, wonderful little cakes. Oh how I love cupcakes! *Confession* - up until two years ago, when I stumbled upon Bakerella’s blog, I had never heard of a red velvet cake?!?! It seems to be one of the MOST common cupcakes, and I had never heard of it! So I attempted to make one for my husband’s birthday, which also happens to be Valentines Day (explains why I chose a red cake). It was a disaster!!!It was like a red piece of foam, DENSE foam. I tossed the recipe to the back of my recipe file and forgot about it. 

That was until I am Baker sent out an offer to be part of her new project “Baking With…” series. She said if anyone wanted to take part to leave a comment with a link to your blog. I couldn’t resit, I checked out all the links that people left, and I am so glad I did! I came across the most DIVINE recipe for Red Velvet Cupcakes  on Fat Girl Trapped in A SkinnyBody’s Blog…

They were super easy to make, and if I had followed the direction properly, they would have been perfect. My inability to follow directions exactly, is profound ! At least they tasted wonderful – they were just too BROWN due to TOO MUCH cocoa! I was able to use my hand-held-single-beater mixer (my Kenwood will be on the mend soon) – making this recipe a real anybody-can-make recipe!

 

It made it even easier that I came across these little cupcake holders at Bake-A-Ton. They make baking cupcakes or muffins so much easier – they stand on their own. No need for cupcake pans, so you can fit more in the oven at a time.

 

Plus, with the high sides you fill these a little more than you would do for normal liners (although the mixture doesn’t go as far). They are also awesome because they don’t get all greasy and go transparent-ish during the baking process!

Note: at this point these should actually be more red, but as discussed already  -  I almost always have difficulty following recipes as I should.

They were super moist and ultra tasty. I didn’t make the traditional cream cheese frosting for these, I opted rather for butter cream icing, made with butter – hence the yellow tinge to the icing! I swear butter gives the icing a MUCH better taste! 

We etta dem alllll! :) (see this,)

Thanks Bakerella, I am Baker and  Fat Girl Trapped in a Skinny Body  for all your inspiration! 

I really admire you guys!

 

To see how real Red Velvet Cupcakes should look and to get the REAL recipe – go here

or to try my version....

Recipe for more-chocolatey-not-so-red Velvet Cupcakes:

Makes 18 large cupcakes

2½ cups  flour
1½ cups sugar
1 tsp bicarb
5 tbsp cocoa powder
1/2 tsp. salt
2  eggs
1½ cups oil
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp  vanilla extract
1 tsp  lemon juice
red food coloring

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl
In another bowl combine wet ingredients with an electric beater
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until smooth
Bake for 20min @ 180°C  

Download the Recipe Card:

More-chocolatey-not-so-red Velvet Cupcakes

Peppermint Crisp Dessert

Saturday 24th September was Heritage Day. What a bummer to have a public holiday on a Saturday! We did, however, make the most of it! Saturday started out so sunny and warm, but by the time we had hauled out the braai and some juicy t-bone steaks, the rain was not only pelting down but practically coming right through our front door (yes we do have a verandah!). But we did enjoy our t-bone and honey glazed rashers.... :)

Any hoo, as part of the mini celebration, I decided to make a typical *delicious* SA dessert...

Peppermint Crisp Tart,
Totally Divine.
Rich.
Just Plain Yummy.
And so easy to make!

It needs four items...

- Tennis Biscuits (these mini ones were just too cute!)
- Fresh Whipped Cream
- Caramel Treat (I still maintain the best version of this is a tin of condensed milk boiled in a pot of water for
  2 hours, but for the sake of convience, I used the ready made version)
- Mint Chocolate

And in 5 easy steps...


....crush the biscuits...

...whip the cream...
...mix half the cream with the caramel until smooth...
...chop the chocolate... (I added peppermint crisp bars too for some extra 'greeness')

...layer the 4 ingredients...

...And VOILA!

The layering doesn't have to happen in any particular order. If you are using glasses to serve this as a dessert, the easiest way to ensure the layers are defined, pipe the cream and caramel into the glasses instead of spooning it.

This is a VERY impressive dessert that only took 30min to make!

To make it look super impressive, add some cherries to the top!
Cheers!

Download the Recipe Card:
Peppermint Crisp Recipe Card

Christmas Time ... in September!

I love baking! I really do. I sit all day (at work) and dream of what I should make for pudding, or what treat I should bake later. I seldom actually make half of what I dream up. Then there is my love for design… I get to design all day. It’s my job. My real job.

Yesterday I got a request to design a Christmas poster…YIP, you read right! CHRISTMAS POSTERS – in september! Don’t get me wrong – I LOVE christmas, heck I may even be its biggest fan, but it just caught me by surprise this year! I think Christmas: I think family, food, holidays, summer and sea. Here is SA we may not have a white Christmas, but we do have borewors, biltong and braais (which make up for it :) )

 SO when looking for inspiration for the poster, I downloaded a vector with this little cute guy...

 ....and some other really cute characters and just had to use them, so I made this set of cards

    
...and these tags...

 ..and because Christmas is all about giving....

 

I thought these would really add cheer to the build up to this wonderful season. If you would like a chance to win this set, 6 cards and envelopes plus 9 tags,  just leave a comment about your favourite thing about Christmas! I will "random.org" it on Monday 26 September, 8.00am (GMT +2). Cant wait to see what you all LOVE about my favourite season...

Rhubarb Crumble

Rhubarb pie reminds me of summer days at my grans house in Eshowe, she often used to make the most divine pie smothered in vanilla custard and ice cream *swoon*, so seeing as spring has horded in the hot weather, and my gran had given me a pile of peeled (yey) rhubarb stalks, the natural thing seemed to bake some Rhubarb Crumble.

I chopped the rhubarb into small pieces (about 5cm ish)

Since this was a first attempt, I just assumed that the rhubarb had to be boiled first, but i am sure that you can just adjust the baking time and put the stalks in raw (maybe chopped a bit smaller).

The crumble was super easy to make, literally took me 10min and since my Kenwood mixer is in need of repair, I just mixed this with my hand held Braun mixer....oh so easy!

The recipe didn't call for it, but i just sprinkled a teeny weeny bit of cinnamon (mmmmmmm) and a dash of extra sugar on top.

Was totally heavenly with a dollop (ok maybe more) of cream and a dash of vanilla custard.

Makes 1 large crumble. (I made 6 individual crumbles)

Rhubarb:

Fresh Rhubarb Stalks (use as many as required)

Boil these in some water with generous amounts of sugar

Crumble:

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour

2tsp baking power

¾ cup sugar (plus extra for sprinkling)

1 beaten egg

125g melted butter

Put all ingredients, except the melted butter, into a bowl and mix until ‘crumbly’ texture is achived

Place rhubarb in a greased, oven proof container

Sprinkle extra sugar over mixture

Crumble crumb over rhubarb

Sprinkle a bit of cinnamon and sugar over the crumb topping

Pour melted butter over the top of the crumble

Bake for about 25 min in a 200 degree Celsius oven

Enjoy with generous amounts of ice-cream, custard or fresh cream (or ALL of them :) OH YEAH)

Download the recipe card here:
Rubarb Crumble Recipe Card

Download the Front and Back cover fore the folder here:
Folder Covers

Pecan Nut Pie

Ok, so i know it is hasty posting again so soon, but i had prepared this ages ago (note my working Kenwood mixer) so here it goes....

I really (heart) pecan nut pie! It is one of my all time favorites as well as being a really classic dessert. This is one of my grans recipes - one that all my sisters have in their recipe files, and have probably never made it...tsk tsk (just kidding guys)

The base was pretty easy to make, the recipe calls for you to make, chill for an hour, roll it and then blind bake it, but I just mixed it, pressed it, baked it (no beans or beads :) ) for about 10 min and then poured my pecan nut pie mixture into it. NO FUSS! It turned out really good!

After pouring in the pie mixture, I baked for a couple minutes so that the nuts on top could be arranged in a circular pattern without sinking to the bottom.

I covered the top of the pie with some foil so that it would turn out nice and brown, but not too brown.

It was DIVINE, with dollops of cream!

To download the recipe card: Pecan Nut Pie Card