Posted in Cakes, Slices, tagged Australia day, chocolate, chocolate lamingtons, food, humor, lamington recipe, lamingtons, recipce on 17 February 2013| 14 Comments »
Here is a blog post Lord Lamington himself could get behind! Seriously. There was such a guy. And you guessed it, this chocolate covered sponge cake rolled in coconut is named after his lordship.
Lord Lammo, as I shall affectionately refer to him (for all Australians take proper words and then add an ‘o’ to the end, as in the case of lamington to lammo), was Governor of Queensland from 1896 to 1901.
Posted in Cakes, tagged cake, cream cheese frosting, humour, recipe, Red velvet, red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Cake on 5 February 2013| 15 Comments »
With Valentine’s Day around the corner there a lot of amazing recipes springing up. I have had this red velvet cake waiting in the wings for a while now. Unsure when it would be appropriate to share it and all its quirkiness.
Now I see it’s a perfect contrast to the other more typical Valentine Day recipes around.
And of course, what you bake for your loved one will say a lot about you, and your relationship. Actually, in this bloggers opinion, that’s a load of bollocks. If pizza, a bottle of bubbles and a DVD is your thing – then you rock that. If you love fancy restaurants, degustation menus and shiny jewellery – then own that (and book ahead!).
In this case if you like clowning around. May I suggest red velvet MONSTER cake! (more…)
Posted in Cakes, tagged blueberry, blueberry upside down cake, cake, cakes, food, recipes, upside down cake on 21 August 2012| 18 Comments »
I made this blueberry upside down cake for my brother as a goodbye and good luck cake. He is now in Europe, and will be gone for many months. I felt a cake that is made upside down is appropriate when someone is putting their life in a bag and travelling to the other side of the globe.
Because I am hi-lar-ious I told him that when he comes back I’ll make him a cake that’s up the right way. (more…)
Posted in Cakes, Desserts, tagged buttercream frosting, cake, chocolate, chocolate cake, chocolate mudcake, food, frosting, humor, layer cakes, mudcake, recipe, Swiss meringue buttercream frosting on 29 May 2012| 26 Comments »
It takes a village to make a chocolate layer mudcake with swiss meringue buttercream frosting.
It takes a village to even say something that long.
I hadn’t made a layer cake or swisse meringue buttercream frosting before, so this took a bit of research.
Posted in Cakes, Desserts, Festive food, tagged cake, food, fruit and pumpkin cake, pumpkin cake, recipes on 8 August 2011| 21 Comments »
This recipe was passed on to me by an Aunty. It was passed to her by her Grandma. And now I’m passing it on to you!
Great-grandma Beatrice was a farmers wife with four sons and one daughter. Practical recession-busting recipes like this were very much the go. But this recipe is by no means cheap on taste.
The pumpkin makes this cake lovely and moist, and the spices and mixed fruit remind me of Christmas.
I never met my Great-grandma as she passed away before I was born. I really like the idea of making a cake that she made. This to me is what cooking is all about.
To complete the little loop I’ll be taking some of this cake with me on a walk in the English countryside with the Aunt who gave me the recipe. Then it’s all tied up with a nice little bow.
Note: I used dried cranberries, dried cherries, almond, sultanas and the rind of a lemon and orange for my mixed fruit component. I’d usually use a bag of mixed fruit, but the bag of mixed fruit at the supermarket was 80% sultanas and 15% currents. How is that mixed? That’s just sultanas and currents. Pffft. And yea, I know almonds aren’t fruit. But I like them, so they went in.
I also didn’t have mixed spice and am trying hard to not accumulate things as I’m leaving London so soon, so used a combo of ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg. It was lovely. I hope my Great-grandma was OK with all this. I think she would be.
Mixed fruit and the rind of a lemon and orange for extra zest
Ingredients
250 grams pumpkin, cooked and mashed
¼ cup butter
2 eggs
¾ cup sugar
250 grams of mixed fruit
1 teaspoon mixed spice (lacking this – I used a combination of ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg)
1 ½ cups self-raising flour
¼ teaspoon baking powder dissolved in 1 tablespoon vinegar
Method
Healthy? Cut up into 16 peices to take to work with tea makes them 165 calories a slice. The whole cake is 2,650 depending on your fruit choices.
Gluten free? I think you could easily swap in a GF flour and it would bind well. But I haven’t tried it.
Storage: In an airtight container. It also freezes beautifully.
Clever muffin 