Classic Vanilla Cupcake

It was my god daughters 1^st birthday last month so I decided to make some pink cupcakes to celebrate. You really can’t beat a classic vanilla cupcake and they’re so quick and easy to make. I have been making cupcakes / queen cakes for as long as I can remember. Anyone who grew up in an Irish household will surely have grown up eating queen cakes.. which we now call cupcakes thanks to our American friends bringing them across the pond! One of my youngest memories is baking queen cakes with my Nana. I remember standing up on a chair so I could reach the counter and being her little assistant. I firmly believe I get my love of baking (and skills) from both my grandmothers as they were both two wonderful bakers.

Abigail didn't look too sure but she loved it! 

So back to the humble cupcake. All you need is butter, eggs, flour, sugar and a drop of vanilla extract and if you follow my step by step recipe then you can have perfect vanilla cupcakes too. In this recipe I am using a classic buttercream frosting from ‘The Hummingbird Bakery’ cookbook but feel free to use your own favourite frosting recipe. This recipe makes 12 cupcakes.

Ingredients:

170g Self Raising Flour (sifted)

170g Caster Sugar

170g Unsalted Butter (at room temperature)

3 Medium free range eggs

1 tsp of Vanilla Extract

For the Buttercream:

250g Icing Sugar

80g Butter (at room temperature)

25mls Milk

½ tsp of Vanilla Extract

Prepare:

Preheat your oven to 170C and line a 12-hole cupcake/muffin tin with cupcake cases.

Method:

Begin by beating your sugar and butter together until pale and fluffy. This may take a minute or two. Here is where it is so important that your butter is at room temperature or the butter won’t dissolve the sugar and it will just clump together.

Beat in your eggs one at a time and stir in your vanilla extract. Once your eggs and vanilla are all incorporated fold in your flour gently to keep as much air in your batter. Spoon the mix into your cases filling ¾ of the way full. Pop them into your oven and bake for 20-22 mins. You will know your cupcakes are baked when they are golden brown in colour and bounce back to touch. You can also stick a cocktail stick or skewer in and if it comes out clean they are baked.

Leave to cool on a wire rack and begin making your buttercream icing. Start by creaming your butter with your mixer (or hand held whisk) then slowly add your icing sugar. I stress doing this slowly or else you will end up with a face full of icing sugar!! Once your icing sugar has been incorporated add your milk a small drop at a time with your vanilla extract until the icing is smooth and creamy. I used pink gel food colouring here to colour the icing but feel free to use whatever colour you wish. I piped the icing using a star tip and I then decorated them with pink and purple sparkling sprinkles.

Delicious!

Let me know if you try these out yourself. As always you can find me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram or you can leave a comment below.

Happy Baking,

O x

Rainbow Cake

It was my friend, Áine's birthday last week and I decided to make her something special. She mentioned to me nearly a year ago that she loved Rainbow Cakes. This was before I started my blog and she asked me would I ever make her a rainbow cake? Challenge accepted!! What better time to try than for her birthday!! I had never made a rainbow cake before but I was very much looking forward to trying it. Off I went to the wonderful world of the internet. I researched blogs and YouTube tutorials.. finding out what sponge recipe best suited it, what food colouring to use, what size cake tins to use? I found a lot of great tips from a blogger I love Kerry Cooks. It was here I found a great tip to use tin foil flan cases from wilkos to bake the 6 layers of sponge. They were 6" foil cases and they worked out perfectly. Not only did I not have 6 cake tins the same size but I also hate washing up so the idea of just throwing these out after use really appealed to me!! 

(Image- www.wilko.com) 

I forgot to mention that I was against the clock baking this cake. You can by all means bake 2/3 layers at a time if you have the time but unfortunately I had to get all layers in the oven at the same time and cooled within a short time span. You see, we were having a surprise party for Áine on a Friday night so we had to come up with an excuse to get her out of the house for a couple of hours on the Thursday night (she's also my flatmate). We managed this with quite a few lies and I'd like to take this chance to thank everyone involved and sorry again Áine! So that is why I had to bake them all in one go.. which might I add was a bit stressful but worth it in the end!! 

So back to the cake..  When it comes to the food colouring it is very important to use a good quality GEL food colouring. I emphasise the use of a gel food colouring because with a rainbow cake you need good vibrant colours. Liquid food colourings just don't give a strong enough colour and they also water down your batter when you add too much and believe me you don't want to skimp on the food colouring!! I used Squires Kitchen QFC Gel Food Colours that I bought from my local catering store. You can buy these online or I would also recommend Wilton Gel Food Colours available online. I used 5 colours* to achieve my ideal cake colours.. Red, Yellow, Green, Blue and Purple. I mixed my red and yellow to make the Orange so I had 6 colours in total.

(Image- www.squires-shop.com) 

For the sponge I used a Victoria Sponge recipe and filled and covered the cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (of course!). As I mentioned before this cake is quite time consuming but it is so worth the time and effort to see the look on everyone's face when the cake is cut into. I'd also like to take this chance to apologise for the lack of photographs of the making process. As I said, I was really against the clock and it just completely slipped my mind. If I do get the opportunity to bake this cake again I will update this post with more pictures! The below ingredients are for 6 x 6" cake tins. If you are having trouble adjusting the measurements to suit the number / size of cake tins you are using please don't hesitate to contact me either here or on any of the social media platforms I use and I'll try and help you out. 

Ingredients

(sponge)

400g Caster Sugar

400g Butter (at room temp)

8 Eggs

400g Self Raising Flour (sifted)

2 tsp Baking Powder

2 tsp Vanilla Extract

Gel Food Colouring* (see above) 

(frosting)

120g Butter (at room temp)

280g Cream Cheese Frosting (from fridge)

680g Icing Sugar

1+ 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract

Prepare

Grease your cake tins** and preheat your oven to 170C. 

Method

As I mentioned above I cooked 6 layers at once so I made one big batch of batter. I was using a free standing cake mixer with a paddle attachment. I began by beating my butter and sugar together on a medium speed until light and fluffy. I then added my eggs (beaten), flour, baking powder and vanilla extract and continued to mix on a low-medium speed until they were all well incorporated.

I then divided my cake batter evenly between 6 bowls. I did this by using an ice-cream scoop and counting equally between each bowl. I then coloured my batter accordingly and placed them into the prepared cake tins. Like I said before do not skimp on the food colouring and it's also important to note that the colour of the cakes do adjust when baked (become more vibrant) so remember this too. I used a pallet knife to smooth the batter out before placing in the oven and cooking for approximately 22-25 mins. Because I was using small cake tins I had to watch them carefully to ensure they didn't burn. If you are using bigger cake tins just adjust the cooking time accordingly. You will know your cakes are baked when a skewer or cocktail stick inserted in the middle comes out clean and the sides of the cake start coming away from the tin. 

It is very hard to judge the colour of the cakes when they first come out of the oven so do not be deterred if the colour doesn't look great. I was SO disappointed (ask my flatmates) with the colour of mine but cakes do turn a golden brown colour when baked and did not reflect the colour waiting inside!!

Leave your cakes to cool completely before decorating. I left mine over night as I was decorating it the next day. I wrapped them in cling film and placed them in air tight containers over night. When I got home from work on Friday I went straight into my icing!! I started by placing my butter and HALF of my icing sugar into the mixer and mixing on a low speed to begin with. It is so important that your butter is softened for this. Once combined I added the remainder of my icing sugar and continued to mix on a medium speed. If you are using a hand held whisk or have a small mixer you can make this in 2 batches. Once the icing sugar is combined add in your cream cheese and vanilla extract and mix on a medium-high speed for at least 5 mins. 

Now the assembly... This will be extremely difficult if you are working in a hot kitchen so do try to ensure you're working in a cool / dry environment. Begin by leveling your sponges. It will be very hard to stack your cake if your sponges have domes on top! Get a sharp serated knife and put the knife against the cake where you want to start cutting it and gently cutting into the cake turn it slowly and you will get an even level all the way around. Here is a great tutorial I found on YouTube by The Boy Who Bakes on how to level a cake. 

Once you have all your cakes level begin stacking them. Place a small smear of frosting on your cake board or plate and place your first layer of cake onto this (purple) and then spread a thin layer of frosting onto the top of this sponge. Then stack your next layer (blue) and again spread a thin later of frosting on top and repeat until you have your whole cake assembled (green, then yellow, then orange and red on top). Once stacked you can now crumb coat your cake. 

Crumb coating is applying a thin layer of frosting to the top and sides of your cake to catch any crumbs that may lift off your cake when icing it. Again, I found a great tutorial on YouTube from The Boy Who Bakes here. This is where working in a cool / dry environment is so important because you want to keep your cake as straight as possible. If your frosting is too warm or soft your cake layers will start sliding and you will end up with a leaning tower of pisa cake!

Once you have your crumb coat applied place into the fridge for a minimum of 30 mins to one hour. When your cake comes out it should be cool to touch and not leave any finger impression. If it does place back in the fridge for another half hour. Also remember to put the remainder of your cream cheese frosting in the fridge while you're waiting so it won't go too soft but give it a nice stir with a spatula when you take it out again or it may be too hard to spread. 

When your crumb coating has set you can now ice the rest of your cake. It is important to get a nice thick coating of frosting so you cannot see all the layers of cake underneath! You can frost it however you want.. using a piping bag, spatula or just spooning it on and spreading with a knife. I just roughly layered on the frosting evenly and then using my turntable and pallet knife I spun the cake while applying a very light pressure to the frosting and moving the pallet knife gently up the cake. I then decorated it with soft shimmer pearls I got from the Dr Oetker range in my local supermarket.

I know this is such a long blog post but please do not be deterred by this. I can honestly say I thought this cake was going to be a lot harder than it was. I know you're probably thinking "easy for her to say" but I would not put this recipe up on my blog if I didn't think each and everyone of you was capable of making this cake! My blog is called 'Breaking into Baking' after all! 

If you want to bake this cake and are unsure or have any questions please don't hesitate to contact me on facebook, twitter or even instagram. You can even leave your comments down below and I will do my very best to answer all your questions!

Happy Baking,

O x

** If you are using regular cake tins grease and line the bottom of them with parchment paper. If using the disposable ones you only need to grease them.

Vanillla and Passion Fruit Cheesecake

It's SUMMER!!
Wow the weather has been amazing the last few weeks. This weekend has been a bit dull though so I thought I'd brighten up with a little summer bake! I have a new found love and it's with passion fruit.. I am obsessed! It all started with a passion fruit martini and then suddenly passion fruit began dominating my dessert selection when eating out. I cannot get enough of it so I thought I had to try a dessert with passion fruit and that's just what happened today. I am staying with family this weekend in a house where cheesecake is always a winner in the dessert stakes and this time I decided to mix it up a bit. Instead of doing a baked cheesecake which I have done in the past I decided to do a no bake cheesecake. I have to say it was absolutely delicious and so easy to make. The creamy sweet cheesecake with the bite of the passion fruit is in my opinion my yummiest bake I've made this summer! I hope you guys get a chance to try it and like it as much as I do!

Ingredients:

100g Butter

350g Digestive Biscuits

250g Mascarpone Cheese

80g Icing Sugar

2 tsp Vanilla Extract

400ml Creme Fraiche

300ml Double Cream

5 Passion Fruit

Caster Sugar (amount determined by fruit of Passion Fruit)

Prepare:

Grease and line a 9" Springform Cake Tin with parchment baking paper.

Method:

Begin by breaking up your digestive biscuits. You can do this by putting all your biscuits in a ziplock or freezer bag and bashing with a rolling pin (as you can see below). Alternatively you can break them into a food processor and blitz them until they are a sandy consistency.  

Place your butter into a microwaveable bowl and melt in the microwave. This should take about 1-1.5 minutes depending on the wattage of your microwave. When melted combine the butter with the biscuit and mix until you get a wet sand consistency to the biscuit. Then transfer biscuit mix into your cake tin and press firmly down into the base to create an even layer. Leave to set in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

While your base is setting you can prepare the filling. Using a hand held whisk or electric mixer beat your mascarpone cheese and icing sugar until soft then stir in your creme fraiche and vanilla extract until well combined. If you have a free standing mixer you can use this with the paddle attachment on a low speed.

In a separate bowl whisk your double cream until you get soft falling peaks. Be careful not to over mix!! Fold this cream into your cheese and creme fraiche mix. This mix is now ready to spread over your biscuit base. Spread evenly and place in the fridge to set for at least an hour.

You can now begin your coulis. Cut your passion fruits and scrape out the juice (pips included) into a cup or mug. Place this juice into a small saucepan and measure roughly the same amount of caster sugar into the mug. I used a white mug today and filled half the mug with the passion fruit juice so it was pretty easy to see how much caster sugar I needed. Place the sugar into the saucepan with the juice and bring to the boil, stirring often. Once it has come to the boil bring down to simmer and leave for 3-4 minutes. Then turn off the hob and leave to cool. Once the coulis has cooled you can spread it over the cheesecake. I made this a couple of house in advance so I put the coulis over the cheesecake while still in the tin and placed it back in the fridge. If you're stuck for time though the coulis is fine poured over the cheesecake right before serving.

I would love to hear from you if you try this recipe. Take my word for it (and my family's) it was delicious. If you have any questions you can find me on facebook, twitter and instagram. I hope you are all having a lovely summer so far. If you have any requests for summer bakes don't hesitate to contact me and just ask!

Happy Baking,

O x