Marie Helene's apple cake

Recipe adapted from Tiffin Tales on Instagram

Plain flour- 3/4th cup (95gms)

Baking powder- 3/4th tsp

Salt- 1/8th tsp

Cinnamon powder- 1/4 tsp

Eggs- 2 large

Caster sugar- 2/3rd cup

Dark rum- 2 tbsp (optional)

Vanilla extract- 1/2 tsp

Unsalted butter- 115gms, melted and cooled

Apples- 2 cups, peeled, cored and cubed (around 1 1/2 to 2 apples)

Preheat oven to 175c (fan assisted 160c and line an 8inch pan with baking paper

Whisk together plain flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon till well combined.

Break the eggs into a larger bowl and add the sugar to it.

Beat/ whisk well till thick and pale. The batter will leave trails when lifted.

Into it add the rum and vanilla extract and mix well.

Tip in half of the flour and fold slowly followed by half the melted butter.

Repeat with the remaining flour and butter by folding them carefully.

You should have a smooth batter that will fall in ribbons.

Finally, fold in the apple and pour the batter into the cake pan.

Gently press the apple pieces down so none of them are poking put.

Bake in the middle shelf of the oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the batter comes out clean.

Cool on a rack for about 10 minutes, and then dust with icing sugar and serve warm.

Notes: The first time, my eggs were large and the batter was nice pourable consistency. The second time the eggs were really small and i thought the batter was a bit stiff, so i added around 1 1/2 tbsp of milk to loosen it a bit.

Original recipe called for 3 apples, which i thought was a bit too much, but feel free to use 3.

The cake doesnt rise too much so dont get alarmed.

Mine was done in exactly 45 minutes both times.

Hot milk-coffee cake

Recipe adapted from here

Eggs- 2 large

Demerara sugar- 1 cup

Vanilla extract- 1 tsp

Plain flour- 1 cup + 2 tbsp

Baking powder- 1 tsp (slightly heaped)

Salt- 1/4 tsp

Milk- 1/2 cup + 1 tbsp

Unsalted butter- 5 tbsp

Instant coffee powder- 2 tsp

Beat the eggs on medium-high speed for about 3 to 5 minutes, either using your hand held mixer or using the whisk attachment of a free standing mixer.

Once the eggs turn light yellow and thick, add the sugar bit by bit till the mixture is light and fluffy, it should take another 4 to 5 minutes to get to this stage. Dont skip this bit, it really does make a difference to how to cake turns out.

I turned my free standing mixer on and by the time the eggs were done, i got the other ingredients ready.

Preheat oven to 170C and grease and line an 8 inch cake tin.

Mix together the plain flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Keep aside.

Heat the milk and butter in a saucepan along with the coffee powder, just until all the butter melts. Keep aside.

Once the eggs reach its thick consistency, reduce speed to low and add the flour and mix until smooth without any visible traces of flour combined. 

With the mixer still on low speed, gradually add the hot milk to the batter and beat until well combined.

Pour into the cake tin and bake for 40 minutes or till a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. (mine was done in 42 minutes).

Place on a cooling rack and once completely cool. store at room temperature in an air tight container.

Notes: You can replace demerara with granulated sugar

You can also use a square cake tin for this cake (in fact i think it would be a better option). If so, i would say reduce the cooking time to about 30-35 minutes.

If you dont add the instant coffee, you get yourself a good ol fashioned hot milk cake.

Here's the recipe for my coffee walnut cake 

Butternut squash loaf cake

I am part of The Happy Egg Co. Taste 100 Blogger network comprising of taste makers and I absolutely love it. They send us challenges every month with of course a winning prize, and its one of those emails i absolutely look forward to. In fact I won the May challenge which was photography and styling oriented and was pretty stoked to have Marte Marie Forsberg select my post as the winning entry. I won an 8 course tasting menu meal for two at the award winning L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon and i cant wait to check out the place (waiting for an occasion to celebrate to make a booking).

 

In July The Happy Egg Co. decided to rustle things up a bit and organised a baking masterclass for bloggers at the Central Street Cookery School. It was conducted by Bee Berrie of Bee's Bakery and it was an afternoon filled with baking. We made a sponge cake and went berserk flavouring it, layering it and decorating it, an Eton Mess, an easy version of puff pastry and Custard tarts. By the end of the evening we were all in a sugar coma, but absolutely satisfied with our work and went back home loaded with all the goodies.

 

The fact that i had to distribute my custard tarts on the bus back home and among friends that weekend is another thing (I would have ended up eating it all on my own if i hadn't done that). I now use only Happy Eggs at home (thanks for the vouchers) and love the sizes they come in. I had some left over butternut squash after the gnocchi expedition and I put it to good use in this super moist butternut squash loaf cake with all the flavours (and colours) of autumn, not to mention how easy it was to put this together.

Recipe adapted from here (makes 2 large loaves or 3 small loaves)

 

Plain flour- 1 3/4 cups

Baking powder- 1 tsp

Baking soda- 1/2 tsp

Salt- 1/2 tsp

Ground cinnamon- 1/2 tbsp

Ground nutmeg- 1/2 tsp

Ground allspice- 1/2 tsp

Granulated sugar- 1 1/4 cups

Eggs- 2 large

Vegetable oil- 1/2 cup (any flavourless oil can be used)

Milk- 2 tbsp (refer notes)

Vanilla extract- 1/2 tsp

Butternut squash purée- 7 1/2 oz ( a little less than 1 cup) (refer notes)

Preheat oven to 175C and line your baking pans with baking paper.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice together till well combined.

In another bowl whisk together the sugar, eggs, oil, milk and vanilla until well combined. This may need a bit of work, but absolutely achievable by hand and you don't need an electric mixer.

Add the squash puree and continue to mix well.

In batches, add the flour and fold until just combined, and no traces of flour is visible. Resist the urge to over mix.

Pour into the prepared cake tins and bake in the middle shelf of the oven for 35 to 40 minutes (for small loaves and around 1 hr for a large loaf) or till a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

Cool completely on racks, after which you can wrap them in cling film and refrigerate for up to a week.

Notes: The butternut squash can be replaced with pumpkin purée, mango puree or any fruit purée for a different flavoured cake.

To make butternut squash purée, slice the squash into two, apply some oil on each side and roast in a 200C oven for about an hour or until tender. Keep aside to cool and scoop the flesh into a food processor/blender and make into a purée.

If you find that your purée is quite watery, avoid adding the milk.

With thanks to The Happy Egg Co. for inviting me to the baking masterclass and for the vouchers to be redeemed at supermarkets.

Brownie butter cake

Brownie and a butter cake together. Need i say more? Yeah, didn't think so. Every other day Ro asks me, whats for dessert, do we have cake, whats for tea and the answer to this most of the time is, er chocolates? fruit? He gets distracted with those options most of the time, but otherwise he makes a face and pretends like I've deprived him of his basic necessities.

I made my custard cake sometime last month on a whim, (mostly to finish off the last of the custard powder and baking soda that had gone past expiry) and I wasn't sure it would work because expired baking soda fetches the most horrid cakes. To my surprise however, this one turned out so so good, much better than the first time and it stayed perfectly moist at room temperature for about 5 days- all i did was cover the cake pan with foil.

 

I put Ro through the torture of watching Great British Bake Off and about 2 weeks back on a Sunday evening he wanted to eat cake and trying to get me off the couch challenged me to bake a cake in 1 hr. He did the whole GBBO intro line and all, and me like an idiot fell for it. So i got around baking my mums beat and bake chocolate cake- a cake id grown up with, but never managed to get right for some strange reason. This time I was so hasty with the recipe and couldn't care if it turned out nice or not cos 1- I'm not a chocolate cake fan and 2- Ro would eat anything with chocolate, no matter how it turns out. Surprise, surprise I'd made the most perfect chocolate cake in less than an hour. I was so proud of myself, not because i did it in time, but because i managed to get the taste bang on- the taste of the cake just as i remember from my childhood. Needless to say, the husband polished it all off in no time.

Since the cake luck was prevailing right now, I decided to bake a cake again, today. When I'm in the cake baking mood, its almost always a new recipe I put to test (along with my patience). I'd bookmarked Bee's brownie butter cake ages back and had completely forgotten about it till this morning when i was scouting my bookmarked list. I checked if i had all the ingredients, and except for brown sugar, i had all the other things needed. I still decided to go ahead, substituting brown sugar for demerara sugar.

I initially thought it was going to take time, but nope, had it all done in under an hour again and its a cake that can actually make someone say wow. I am not a big fan of brownies, so i really didn't care too much for that layer, but omg the butter cake was so so good. Moist like nobody's business and so darn tasty. I must remember to make just that one of these days.

Recipe adapted from here

 

For the brownie base

Dark chocolate- 140 gms, chopped into small pieces

Unsalted butter- 50 gms

Demerera sugar- 50 gms

Egg- 1, at room temperature

Plain flour- 35 gms

For the butter cake

Unsalted butter- 120 gms, at room temperature

Granulated sugar- 100 gms

Vanilla extract- 1/2 tsp

Eggs- 2, at room temperature

Plain flour- 120 gms

Baking powder- 1/2 tsp

Milk- 50 ml

Preheat the oven to 180C and line a 20 x 10 cm loaf pan with baking paper.

On a bain marie melt the chocolate and butter till nice and smooth.

Take it off heat, leave aside for a couple of minutes and into it add the sugar. Whisk well

Break the egg into it, and beat till well combined.

Pour into the greased and lined loaf pan and chuck into the oven.

Bake for 15 minutes

While the brownie is baking, get on with the butter cake.

Cream together the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl till light and fluffy. You can either use a hand held blender or a spatula. I wanted it to be as simple as possible, so i didn't use my free standing mixer. Feel free to do so.

In goes the vanilla extract followed by eggs one after the other, beating well after each addition. The mix may look a bit curdled, but don't worry, the flour would sort this out.

Whisk together the plain flour and baking powder in a separate bowl and add it to the batter, alternating with the milk. 

Once the brownie comes out of the oven, reduce heat to 160C and pour the cake batter on top and immediately even it out with a spatula.

Chuck it back into the oven and bake for a further 30 minutes or till a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean.

Once done, cool the cake on a rack and let the cake settle before slicing.

Notes: Like i mentioned earlier i didn't have brown sugar, so used demerara instead. Please use brown sugar if you have it.

The brownie bit was still very gooey when i cut into it around 15 minutes later. But was fine when i went back to slice it around an hour later. Yes it was torture waiting to dig in. Using a serrated knife helps.

The cake batter when poured on top of the hot brownie melts immediately. Don't panic, just don't wait but try and do the deed as quickly as possible.

One bowl passion fruit-yogurt cupcakes

I made macarons a couple of days back. Well..tried to make would be more apt. I started with major enthusiasm but by the time I was done with sifting the damn ground almonds twice, all I could think of was a nice glass of wine and a movie. I somehow wanted to get it over and done with, which resulted in macs with feet, oh yes, but crinkled tops and weirdly shaped ones. While the macs were set aside to rest for an hour, Ro came by the kitchen and he even had the audacity to say 'looks like rats pissed in small pools.' Thank you very much, you shall sleep on the couch today, was my reply! Anyhoo, the macarons were a disaster and they are still on my table, waiting to go into the bin, but I'm waiting, for what? I don't know. I should just go chuck it right this minute. 

So after my macaron disaster I was a bit bummed because the sun was out shining and it was perfect for photography. I had major plans with the macs and was a lil disappointed. And then, I decided to browse (my own blog that is, how vain right?) and I came upon my all time favourite recipe..the French Yoghurt Cake. Of course, I shall just make these to prove that some things do come out nice, was my first thought. So I went and did one quick check to see if I had all the ingredients. Other than 1 egg, I had everything else. And then my second thought, why not improvise? Something I'm not very comfortable doing, especially with cakes, but what the hell...if it was a day of disasters, then I shall add fuel to fire. 

So I got hold of some passion fruit lying around (begging to be used) and decided to make a cake. In between all this I convinced (begged) Ro to go out to the store and buy me eggs. The fact that he came back with a whole grocery bag full of rubbish is another story, but hey I got my eggs, I shall not complain. 

These lil darlings are so so so so so good, you will finish it all up in one go. They are also so easy to put together..no beating things separately, put it all into one bowl and there, you have the batter. You don't even need a beater. The recipe has never failed me and now that I know it can be improvised, its a winner. They are the softest, moistest cupcakes I have ever had and its because of this same reason that I use them as the base for all my upside down cakes. No fail recipe peeps, no fail. Even for amateur bakers, this is a brainless one, so do try it and tell me how it was. Here's the recipe.

Makes 7 to 8 medium size cupcakes or 1, 9inch cake

Granulated sugar- 1/2 cup

Eggs- 2 small

Vanilla extract- 1/2 tsp

Plain yoghurt- 1/4 cup (I used Total Greek Yoghurt)

Passion fruit pulp/juice- 2 1/2 tbsp * (from 3 small passion fruit)

Plain flour- 1/2 cup

Baking powder- 1 tsp

Salt- a pinch

Flavourless oil- 1/4 cup

 

Into a mixing bowl whisk together (using a wire whisk, or even a wooden ladle) the first five ingredients till pale and well mixed.

Sift over the flour, baking powder and salt and continue to whisk, making sure no traces of flour is visible.

Add the oil and fold it all together to get a smooth, slightly loose batter.

Arrange the cupcake liners into the tray and fill each cup with the batter, till about 3/4th full.

Place the cupcake tin on a tray and bake in an oven pre-heated at 175C for about 20 to 22 minutes. I accidentally keep it for about 3 minutes longer and the tops began to brown. You know your oven best, so bake accordingly.

Do the skewer test and if it comes out clean, take the tin out of the oven and leave to cool for about 5 minutes after which you can carefully remove the cupcakes from the tin and leave to cool completely on a wire rack.

Serve along with tea and biscuits or store in an air tight container at room temperature for about 2 to 3 

days.

 

Notes: Feel free to experiment with any type of fruit juice. Replace passion fruit with orange juice, lemon juice (maybe a little less than the mentioned amount), or even honey to get a different flavour.

Also add some lemon/ orange zest to the batter.

If you cant find fresh passion fruit, you can use passion fruit juice instead. May be a bit on the sweeter side, so adjust sugar accordingly. 

*Scoop out the flesh from the fruit and run it through a sieve to get the juice.

The seeds and pulp taste yum, so don't throw it off. You can eat it all up (like I did) or mix with some confectioners sugar to do a glaze and pour over the cupcakes.

PS: On a different note... in case you are wondering what all this Sponsored Posts and videos are doing on my blog, its just that I have registered with a few marketing sites and they pay me to put up articles on certain products. Its just some pocket money generation for the blog to quench my prop shopping, ingredients sourcing fetish. So on and off you will find these posts and please don't be disheartened by the recurrence. If it is becoming a hindrance, I shall be the first one to take them off. Thanks for understanding.