Pink and Sparkly....

A friend of mine recently gave me the above title as a brief for her daughter's first birthday cake. Uttering the words 'pink' and 'sparkly' to me is like holding the proverbial red rag to the bull. Three tiers and lots of glitter later I had created this....Three tiers of sponge layered with pink butter icing and piped with yet more butter icing complete with glitter and spray painted flowers.
Initially I was very happy with the results but then it began to lean to one side. I could have cried. I have drawn a few conclusions on the matter....Firstly - that a basic sponge recipe is too delicate to bear weight like this - I had added to this problem by dividing each tier into three. But my husband on seeing the cake said "Wow I love the lean" - he thought I'd been really clever and designed it that way....I knew there was a reason I married him.
Also I felt the flowers lacked a little vibrancy - This may seem as if I'm ripping myself to pieces but I am a perfectionist and also I need to learn from these errors in order to progress!

Anyway..after all the self-depreciation. My friend was ever so impressed and said that the cake was delicious which is of course the most important thing!!!

But of course you'll need filling with that....

To fill your Whoopies I suggest....

(Sufficient to fill the previously posted Whoopie recipe)

150g Philadelphia
150g Butter
10ml Vanilla icing
500g Icing sugar

Mix together either manually or using an electric mixer (remember to start off slowly to avoid icing sugar snow showers!!). Consistency should be creamy and thick enough to pipe.

A whoopie recipe!!

Alas this is not one of my own, but it is brilliant thus I shall share! This recipe came from 'The Times - The Table' Supplement a few weeks ago and is wonderful!

Ingredients:
115g Soft butter
200g Brown sugar
1 Egg
225ml Buttermilk (Or 225ml milk mixed with lemon juice..my sneaky tip)
60g Cocoa Powder
5g Bicarbonate of Soda
190g Plain flour
5ml Vanilla essence

Method:
* Preheat the oven to 200*C.
* Grease your baking trays / Use parchment.
* Cream together butter and sugar.
* Add the egg to the mix.
* Add the vanilla to the mix.
* Sift the dry ingredients - flour, cocoa and bicarbonate of soda - twice (Though I am not one for faffing this is well worth doing as it adds air to the mix and a lightness of texture).
* Add half the flour to the wet mixture (eggs etc.). Fold in lightly.
* Add half the buttermilk to the mixture. Fold in lightly.
* Add the remaining half of the flour to the mix. Fold in lightly.
* Add the remaining milk and fold in lightly. Your mix should resemble a very stiff sponge almost a cookie mix.
* Spoon the mixture onto a baking tray. For a biscuit sized Whoopie use a teaspoon and cook for 7 minutes. For a traditional burger sized Whoopie use a tablespoon and cook for 9 minutes (Cooking times may slightly vary with different ovens).

A FEW LITTLE HINTS:
* Work lightly with this mix as it shouldn't be overmixed.
* Use a large metal spoon to fold to avoid overmixing.
* It may seem there are a lot of steps but they are well worth following as there are hardly any mixing agents used and this adds air and lightness in their place.
* Take the time to 'quenelle' the Whoopie mixture onto the tray as otherwise they have a tendency to burn around the edges.

GO FORTH AND MAKE WHOOPIE!!

So I'm sure by this point you're wondering....

Where do the shovels come into it?
Well those would be used on our allotment. I'm hoping that with time my baking and the produce of the allotment will become inextricably linked. I'd like to imagine myself a little later making beautiful strawberry cream teas or butternut squash tarts...however the reality may be me weeping over a few limp stalks.

It's very very early days yet and very much trial and error. We spent our first full day there the other day and put in some seeds and seedlings. Seed wise we put in radishes and rainbow chard as these are both supposed to have a quick turnover. We put in peas, dwarf french beans, cabbages and sprouts in seedling form as well as a young blackcurrant and blueberry. We inherited a strawberry patch and millions of raspberries canes which was a bonus...

Very much wing and a prayer at the moment but I shall keep you all updated!!

A whoopie epiphany!

In the past few weeks I feel as if I've had a little light shone upon me from baking heaven.

First big realisation – To get ahead in baking it's all about your baking personnae. What do I mean by this? Well having had a little scoot around the web it appears that it's not all about bake and eat. No, no, no far from it. It's now about the minutiae of each bake – method, textures, colours. Followed by photography that 'Good Food' would be proud of.

Second realisation – The possibilities provided by wholemeal flour. Oh how I have dismissed it for being heavy before. My eyes were well and truly opened at a local food fair where a stall was selling their flour and demonstrating it's capabilities by offering beautiful light sponges. Also, not to be fickle but it ticks all the 'PC' boxes. It's local, it's organic and my goodness me I can even go gluten free!

Third realisation – The death of the cupcake and the 'Whoopie' rising phoenix like from it's ashes. Now for those of you not in the know a 'Whoopie' is a cookie/cake hybrid which had been living modestly in America until recently being brought to the dizzying heights of Harrods and Marks and Spencer. It's about hamburger sized and is filled generally with a marshmallow based icing. There is a lot of controversy as to whether or not they should be decorated with traditionalists saying they are beautiful in their natural state.

So what have I done with these little nuggets of knowledge I hear you ask (if you're still reading of course...).

Well...with regards the first...this looks rather like the beginning of a big and flashy food related blog to me...

The second remains to be fulfilled..mainly as noone has been tot hat part of the county in very recent times...but be assured I have a plethora of ideas at the ready!

Ahhh...the 'Whoopie'. I have made my own. Traditional chocolate based ones and British twist vanilla ones with jam and buttercream filling – an homage to the ubiquitous Victoria sponge.

These are far easier than their cupcake predecessors I have to say. The mix doesn't require careful creaming of ingredients, in fact, quite the opposite. Being as it has to retain a biscuit quality then the less mixing the better.

There is also no delicate placing into cases. I personally found they worked best when the spoonfuls of mix were shaped into a rounded quenelle using two spoons but this is easy peasy!

The speed of the cake gratification is also wonderful – ten minutes and they're cooked. A quick swirl of icing in the centre and they're decorated – genius.

Although.....having said that...I may have gone against the traditionalists....as you will see...there is a smidgen of pink icing on the vanilla Whoopies...and I also may have slipped with some sprinkles..

Now I shall leave you with, I hope, some fabulous chintzy photos of my efforts.....