I know I’ve been very quiet in the past months. I had another knee surgery coming up and invested my time more in larger baking projects that I wanted to blog about when I am tied to the couch anyway. Nice plan, but didn’t quite turn out that way. In the past four weeks after my surgerey I focussed on fightig my way back in to normal life and the total lack of structure made it difficult for me to motivate myself to actually do something. Last week I made a faithfull attempt to get back to blogging by writing myself a schedule but I couldn’t be bothered for some reason. I miss baking more than I’d admit. Writing about past projects only makes me want to do something of similar complexion again. And I am currently not capable of standing in the kitchen this long. I was looking through my To Bake List for something easy and quick, that I can handle in my current state. I was looking for a fruity all-in cake and found the Lemon-Pear-Polenta-Cake from the Cake Cafe book. Continue reading
Category Archives: Recipes
Best Chocolate Cake ever
I have seen this hilarious list on buzzfeed today and I find myself in this a lot. I love my family and there is a whole lot of people to love. It’s not like the Kelly family but for the average German family I have a lot of siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins. Both my Grandparents insisted that we all gather at Birthdays, Easter and Christmas. Come what may, at least 20 people in one room, eating, talking, having fun. When I was a teenager I rebelled against this bourgeois traditions. I hated those get-togethers, being locked up in a room with people I had nothing in common with but the same blood line, it made no sense to me. I used to say “friends are the best family because you can choose them yourself”. Teenagers… By now it makes totally sense to me and I must confess I was completely wrong back then, I wouldn’t want to miss any minute of the family time I had. I guess losing my Grandfather last year made me change my point of view even more. As you grow older, you understand that even though they may have chosen another path, you still have a lot more in common than blood. Those folks have always been there and always will be there to help and support me without any question. Though it is very stressful and requires a lot of planning, I did not regret it any minute that I had them all over for my birthday. 23 friends and family members sitting/standing/running around, lots of chats and laughter and nice food – a perfect birthday! I am very sad that my Grandpa couldn’t be here with us, I guess he would have loved it and maybe he watched us from above.
I second #12 of the list, I was too slow so I did not get to eat a single piece of my own birthday cake that I baked the night before my birthday. Everyone I asked said it was fantastic, so I made it again to convince myself. Again this recipe comes from my favourite Book, Cupcakes from the Primrose Bakery. Someday I need to get to London, go there and tell ’em how thankful I am. Continue reading
TBL: Chocolate Cupcakes with Coffee Buttercream
Every time I am home alone, I make huge plans. After getting up very early I find myself writing an enormous to do list. On my list are always a lot of tasks that I procrastinate as long as possible. I even start with tasks that I detest in order to avoid something that is even worse. Then I need to trick myself and add a bonus task to my list, something I love doing, that I only allow myself to do after I completed the other skipped tasks. Sounds ridiculous but it kinda works for me. My bonus task was baking cupcakes. I have a very poor time management, once I had finished the cupcakes I had to rush to a Whisky tasting and ended up icing cupcakes at 1pm. But it was totally worth it. It was another recipe from the Primrose Bakery Cupcake book. I LOVE THIS BOOK! Continue reading
TBL: Chocolate Orange Cupcakes
I must confess I couldn’t resist when I found the Primrose Bakery Cupcake Book at TK Maxx in Dublin. I had it on my amazon wishlist forever, but never ordered. I was talking myself out of buying another bake book to go into my shelf, but was made to buy it anyway. Back in the hotel I pulled it out directly, started sneaking through the pages and instantly felt the urge to lick the pages. As you might have noticed the TBL was flooded with recipes from this book ’cause they all look so appealing. After the fantastic Orange Cake from the Cake Cafe I was kind of set to oranges when asked to bake something to bring to work. A simple cake wasn’t enough, it needed to be more fancy pants, so I decided to make Chocolate Orange Cupcakes with a Chocolate Orange Buttercream. Sounds like a Chocolate-Orange-Overkill, he? I did this a while back, just before we were moving so there is no pretty picture. But they taste A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! Seriously, go buy the book!
Chocolate Cookie Bowls
I have seen this idea on Pinterest and kind of fell for it: Small bowls made of cookie dough. All you need to do is turn your muffin pan upside down and place round cut cookie dough on there. I must confess I tried a lot of those life hacks you find on Pinterest with mixed results. Most of the things I tried did not come out as good or easy or at all. But this time it actually worked though I improvised. I was invited to a Party with a Sports theme, so I wanted to bring something cool, awesome to impress but also a little healthy. After consulting Google, this sugar cookie recipe was picked. But I was set on chocolate so I varied the recipe slightly. Continue reading
Swedish for beginners
Easter is a typical time for buns, wreaths and other fine goodies made with yeast. I wanted to make a breaded bun filled with plum jam anyway and as I am smart enough to buy everything double when attempting to prep something on a bank holiday, I had leftover yeast and decided to try out some little swedish delights. It is one dough, that can be varied to different shapes and flavours. I found the recipe in Lecker magazine, written by the one and only Frau Horstmäään from Zucker, Zimt & Liebe. She has a thing for Scandinavia, that is obvious. And in the last Lecker Bakery, there was a special on her scandinavian recipes. I have tried out Kanelbullar and Kanelknuter, both made from the same dough with different fillings and shapes. Yeast doughs are very easy, when you follow some simple rules.
Make sure, that the milk is not warmer that lukewarm, otherwise it might kill the yeast bacteria and your dough will be hard as stone. Do a pre-dough, even though most recipes don’t say so, Grandma taught me, so I’m doing it. Grandma also taught me never to use metal bowls or mixing appliances. Once you’ve mixed everything together, knead for 3 minutes longer. Then give your dough some rest at a warm spot, be patient and let the yeast do the work. There are some shortcuts like filling a bowl with warm water and put the bowl with your dough in there, sprinkle with a little flour and cover with a tea towel. Now on to the recipe, I have made some small adjustments. Continue reading
Cupcake vs. Muffin
People keep asking me what the difference between a muffin and a cupcake is. Some believe the frosting makes the difference, others think it’s the measurements. However I always try to explain them with two simple German words: Muffin=Kuchen (Cake) and Cupcake=Torte. But I learned that this is only half of the truth. The main difference is the method of preparing the dough. While for Cupcakes all ingredients are creamed together, the “wet” ingredients are mixed separately from the “dry” ingredients and only brought together very shortly before baking the Muffins. When creaming things together you try to beat in as much air as possible to “fluff” up while the muffin method relies on a raising agent (mostly baking soda).
I must confess I haven’t baked muffins in a long while because they were often too dry, never rise too much and turn more broader instead of having the typical hat. With all those little bits and pieces of knowledge I acquired over time I finally managed to bake muffins that were well risen and moist, even though they still don’t look like store-bought ones. I totally forgot to take a picture of my blueberry muffins. I took this recipe and made some variations. My brother left a 125g pack of blueberries in the fridge, but some of them were already over ripe. I tossed those, added a little dried super-fruit-mixture (dried cherries, cranberries and arionaberries) and replaced the baking powder by baking soda. I also added a spoonful vinegar with the berries as I once read that baking soda needs acid or at least other sour ingredients to react with in the dough, there again goes chemistry (:
After Brownies the Muffins seem to be the next recipe to reconcile… I am pretty curious what’s next!
TBL: Beer Batter Maple Bacon Cupcake
I came home from Handball one night and was asked if I knew that cupcake show on TV. “It’s about two broke girls that bake Cupcakes to become rich and famous. It is hilarious!”. I sat down and was on fire instantly. Okay, the show is a typical sitcom with below the belt humor, but that’s what I love about it. And in the season 1 finale they finally meet Martha Stewart in a bathroom and she tries this Beer Batter Maple Bacon Cupcake (watch scene). I can totally feel with these two girls, striving to dream and never give up on it. I don’t have the balls to start my own business now, I envy all those people who put everything at stake to follow their dream. But I am not yet ready to quit live as I know it and become rich and famous *lol*.
I do like to play around a little instead, testing my limits and the combination of savoury & sweet is very appealing to me. The idea of something salty together with sweets is inconceivable for many people. While salted caramel is already almost mainstream, the idea of adding bacon to a sweet treat send shivers of disgust through many people. I kind of understand why but you’ll never know if you don’t try as my Granny used to say. And as we had fantastic pancakes with maple syrup and crispy bacon at Avoca in Dublin, the urge to try the Beer Batter Maple Bacon Cupcakes rose within me. And then last week my fellow colleague told me about his holidays in LA, where he went a shooting day of “2 broke girls”. We both saw this as a sign, it is time to do this. Therefore my first blog post for this year is about what makes half of the people ahhhh and the others ewww. Continue reading
Yummy Cookies and sideeffects
My health really gave me a hard time in this past year 2013. Also I’ve done my best to ignore it, my body refuses and partly gives up on me from time to time. This week it was my stomach who refused to let me eat painfree. Luckily there is a pill for everything but sometimes they come with unwanted side effects. Yesterday was Nap-day, I think I had as many naps as a bunny has per day, 17 to be exact. Last nigth and today was rather problematic cause as a side effect of my meds all my muscles decided to hurt like crazy today. I felt like after a constant 2 day workout with a burn in my muscles that just won’t stop. I needed distraction and found it in a note that today was national cookie day in whatever country (I guess it’s America). 
As I did not manage to bake something from the To Bake List in November I found it appropriate, to at least make some new cookies on the cookie day. I decided to give the Salted Caramel + Nutella Stuffed Double Chocolate Chip Cookies I have recently found on topwithcinnamon blog a shot. Izzy is a teenage girl living in London and blogging her fantastic recipes for a few years now. I’ve been following her on Twitter for a while and saw her video together with the guys from SORTED food and fell in <3 with the recipe. I have to admit I am a huge fan of stopmotion, that was one of the first things I had to do as a semester project for design class back in university and I loved it. Actually my stopmotion semester project also involved cake. We had to make a countdown for movies with stop motion and we decided to let a set of false teeth eat up our cake numbers would make a fantastic countdown. But back to Izzy and her fantastic recipes… She is very inspiring, so young and yet so talented, creative and professional. She has an eye for photos and does explain complicated recipes in an easy understandable way. And she’s always wearing funny socks in her pictures and has a great sense of style. And with all due respect I HAD to take a picture with my feet in it, just as she does a lot. (Just a quick shot with the phone as the camera is already boxed…)
I wanted to try out some of her recipes but hadn’t had the time yet. Now that I tasted thos really gorgeous cookies, I WANT MORE. The recipe is very easy and fast to do, you don’t even need a electric mixer (which my sister will appreciate). I used some Cadbury caramel chocolate that I brought from my last trip to Ireland for the center of the cookies and that worked very well. I made 15 cookies out of the recipe, not all containing caramel chocolates. if you place the salt just on the center of the cookies, above the Nutella, it makes a fantastic taste experience.
TBL September: Plum Frangipane Cake
The goldsmith gave me a hell of a minute when telling me on the phone that something went wrong with making our wedding bands smaller. What a joke. It was a huge hassle to make them smaller and in the end we payed nothing. So I decided to pay with a smile and a cake. As September is traditional plum season I went for something with plums and a twist. When I flipped through my marked recipes I stumbled upon a recipe in Lecker magazine: Plum Frangipane Cake
To be honest, the first thing I did was looking up what frangipane is: a filling made of almonds, butter, eggs and sugar. The recipe I used needed marzipan instead of ground almonds. The Scone rolls I tried earlier this year were filled with something similar, not calling it frangipane. Seriously, Marzipan cream and Plums? Hell yeah! Continue reading