Marie Curie Blooming Great Tea Party.

Well we had our Blooming Great Tea Party.  We had a really lovely day.  A good few friends, family and neighbours popped in for a cuppa and some home baking and, as it was a beautiful day, we sat in the garden and had a good natter.

And as an extra bonus, we managed to raise just over £300 for Marie Curie Cancer Care so I am delighted.

I kept the baking simple and tried to have something that would appeal to everyone.  I also tried to make a mixture of things that could be made in the days leading up to the event so I wasn't trying to do everything last minute.

Here is my baking schedule just in case it helps anyone else who is new to baking and wants to do a tea party.

I started with the cookie doughs.  I made two types of cookie (well, Steve made one of them).  We did a rye and raisin one from Dan Lepard and a peanut butter and chocolate chunk one from ... We made the doughs then scooped out balls of about 30gs each of the mixture, rolled into balls, froze flat then transferred into bags to keep in the freezer.  These could then be just taken out, popped onto baking sheets and baked for 12 minutes to give fresh cookies on the day.

About 3 days before the tea party, I then made shortbread and kept this in an airtight container until needed.

2 days before I made batches of cupcakes from Cupcake Magic (for recipe - see this post), my three carrot cake layers (Dan Lepard - recipe here) and a batch of Mars Bar Squares.

On the day before, I iced and decorated my cupcakes.  I must mention here the gorgeous daffodils I bought for the top of my cakes for the Marie Curie theme. I got them from carolsyummybakes which I found on eBay and I have to say that she couldn't have been more helpful and I was seriously impressed with the quality of the decorations.

I iced the carrot cake with lemon cream cheese frosting and kept in the fridge.

I made two batches of brownies (one with and one without walnuts) and two lemon drizzle cakes.

On the day itself, I made a Victoria sponge and laid everything out for a 10am start.

I had plenty of baking - too much in fact -  and everything seemed to go down well.

This was my JustGiving page and if I add all the donations given to me on the day, it comes to just over £300.  Very happy to donate to such a brilliant charity.

Thank you so much to all my family and friends who contributed.

I had a wonderful day and would recommend having your own Blooming Great Tea Party either this year or next year.  See the website for details.

The Cake Slice Bakers - Challenge 1 - October 2010 - Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Pound Cake.

This is my first challenge as a new member of The Cake Slice Bakers.

I believe they cook a recipe each month from a book for a year.  The book they have chosen for this year is  Cake Keeper Cakes by Lauren Chattman.

I got myself a copy of this from Amazon and I'm really glad I did.  The main idea of the book seems to be for people who like to bake fairly simple cakes but have a cake on the go all the time.  What a lovely idea - just to keep a cake on the counter (in a beautiful glass cake stand with dome, of course, wee Christmas hint to my husband if he is reading) for anyone to help themselves to at any time.

The chapters divide the book into - snacking cakes, round cakes, loaf cakes, Bundt cakes, crumb cakes and angel food and chiffon cakes.  No, I have no idea what those last two are but I'm looking forward to finding out.  I think I will probably have to buy my first Bundt tin at some point too.

It is an American book so I have bought myself some cup measurements and thought I would try baking the American way.  I have already started scribbling notes inside the book to remind me where a conversion is needed.  Most importantly, I now know a stick of butter = 4oz = 113g.  Previous to this, I would have just dismissed any book which used US measurements so this opens a whole new world of baking to me.  I think that's the whole point of a baking challenge isn't it?  To broaden my horizons.  And, of course, I would never have ever used pumpkin in baking before either, so two "firsts" with my first challenge. 

So, the first recipe - Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Pound Cake is brilliantly seasonal.  The only problem was getting hold of any tinned pumpkin as it is not really available in the UK and all the online shops importing stuff from the US were out of stock due to a shortage.  I just kept pestering them, though, and finally managed to get myself a couple of tins.

The cake was really easy and quick to make and it came out well.  Easy to slice, looked good and tasted perfect for Autumn - a little bit earthy but sweet and with oozing dark chocolate.  Lovely and moist too.  It lasted less than a day.  We all ate a fair bit earlier in the day and then my in-laws unexpectedly came round so it was great having a freshly baked treat just sitting there to serve to them.  Once I get my lovely cake stand with the glass dome, this will definitely be one of the cakes I will have sitting at the ready inside it.

Recipe below.

Recipe.

Serves 8.

9" X 5" loaf tin.

Ingredients - 

1 3/4 cups plain flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground cloves

pinch nutmeg

1 stick (4oz) unsalted butter, softened

1 1/4 cups sugar

3 large eggs

1 cup canned pumpkin puree

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1/3 cup milk

1 cup miniature dark chocolate chips

1 cup chopped walnuts

Method - 

1. Preheat the oven to 350F, 180C, GM 4.   Grease and flour a 9" X 5" loaf tin.

2. Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, cloves and nutmeg in a medium mixing bowl.

3. Combine the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl and cream with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 3 mins.

4. With the mixer on medium-low speed, add the eggs, one at a time.  

5. Stir in the chocolate chips and walnuts.

6. Scrape the batter into the prepared tin and smooth the top with a rubber spatula.  Bake the cake until it is firm to the touch and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean, 55mins to an hour.

7. Let the cake cool in the tin for 5 minutes, invert it onto a wire rack, and then turn it right side up to cool completely.

8. Store uneaten cake in a cake keeper at room temperature for up to 3 days or in the fridge, wrapped in plastic, for up to 1 week.

To see the results of the challenge by other Cake Slice Bakers, visit the the cake slice blogroll.

Can't wait for the next challenge. 

Bread From My Husband.

Well, yesterday was our 8 year anniversary.  One of the things I most appreciate about my husband is that he cooks wonderful things for us.

His favourite is to bake bread.  Lately he has been using this book.  

He loves this book and can be found sitting reading it at all times of day.

This morning I came down into the kitchen and found this waiting for me - 

It tastes great.  The kids and I have just had some as part of a ploughman's lunch.  I think I'll toast some later to have with scrambled eggs for tea.  Nice to have simple fare to go with freshly baked home-made bread.

At the weekend he made brioche.  He made the dough on the Saturday night and he baked half of it then.  We both devoured it completely straight out of the oven.  He then baked the rest of it in the morning for our breakfast.

And, as I mentioned in a previous post, he made pain au chocolate the weekend before.

He has been a little disappointed with the dried yeast recently so he ordered some fresh yeast from an online shop.  The bread we had today was the first batch he made with the fresh yeast and I think he's much happier with it.  

It's a shame that he doesn't have as much time as he would like to cook and bake for us.  I only work two days per week and the rest of the time I am the "housewife".  I'm sure if Steve were the "housewife" we would probably eat much better.  Certainly, our house would be tidier!

The Cake Slice Group.

I am very pleased to say that I have been welcomed into The Cake Slice Bakers.  

They bake a different recipe every month form their current chosen baking book and all post their results on the 20th of the month.

I am really looking forward to joining them, broadening my baking horizons and developing my skills.

Can't wait.

Jam Roly-poly.

I love all the old-fashioned suet puddings so I got my son to help me make a jam rolypoly for the nostalgia of it.  Perfect timing too as it has recently turned very autumnal here and a bit chilly.  

Recipe from BBC GoodFood Oct 2010.

Serves 6

Prep 15 mins.

Cook 1 hr.

50g salted butter, cold and cut into chunks

250g SR flour

1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped out

50g shredded suet

150ml milk

100g raspberry jam

1. Put a deep roasting tin onto bottom shelf of oven with another shelf directly above it.  Fill two thirds with boiling water.  Heat oven to 180C/gas 4.

2. Tear off a large sheet of foil and greaseproof paper (about 30X40cm).  Sit the greaseproof on top of the foil and butter it.

3. Tip flour, butter and vanilla into a food processor and pulse until butter has disappeared. (We don't have a processor so we just rubbed the butter into the flour.)  

4. Tip into a mixing bowl and stir through the suet.  Pour in the milk and work together with a cutlery knife to get a sticky dough.

5.  Tip out onto a floured surface.  Pat together to smooth then roll out to a square roughly 25X25cm.

6.  Spread the jam all over leaving a gap along one edge.  Roll up from the opposite edge.  Pinch the jam free edge into the dough where it meets and pinch the ends too.

7.  Carefully lift onto the greased paper, join-side down.  Loosely bring up the paper and foil around it and scrunch together along the edges and the ends.

8. Lift directly onto the rack above the tin and cook for one hour.