All posts in category cakes

Singing Baker Brownies

I know the secret to making the best brownies in the world.

teapot

Yes, you have to do all the usual stuff like preparing the pan and weighing the ingredients …

firststeps

… and using those fiddly little teaspoons …

teaspoons

… and cracking the eggs …

crackingeggs

… and stirring.

stirring

But should I tell you the secret?

Okay. But only if you promise not to tell anyone.

Here’s the secret …

The secret is …

You did promise not to tell, right?

Okay, here goes.

The secret is …

… finding the right song!

Which is how he made the best brownies in the world.

bestbrownies

Singing Baker Brownies

5 oz butter
9 oz castor sugar
3 oz cocoa powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 oz plain flour

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C.

Grease and line the base of an 8″ square pan with baking parchment.

Melt the butter, sugar, cocoa and salt together in a bowl over a pan of hot water. It will look like it’s never going to come together, but it does … if you know the right song 😉

Remove the bowl from the heat and stir in the eggs, one at a time. Stir in the vanilla.

Fold in the flour, then give the batter a good stir for about 5 seconds to strengthen it a little (there isn’t much flour in the recipe, so it’s okay to develop a bit of gluten to give the brownies some structure).

Scrape into the prepared pan and level the top.

Bake for 30 minutes or until it’s still a bit gooey (but not sloppy).

Cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then remove to a wire rack. Cut into squares.

7 Comments
by amerrierworld on February 5, 2014  •  Permalink
Posted in cakes, chocolate, traybakes and slices
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Posted by amerrierworld on February 5, 2014

https://amerrierworld.com/2014/02/05/singing-baker-brownies/

Me, You and the Cake

meyouandthecake

Mum: How come you get to come first in the title?

L: Because I’m awesome.

Mum: And I am …?

L: Do you really want me to answer that?

Mum: Hmmm. Perhaps not.

L: Anyway, you should be asking how come the cake comes last. It’s the most important thing here.

Mum: Aaahhh …

fruitcake

Here’s the story. Yesterday, I decided to clear out my baking cupboard. I found … golden and flame raisins (left over from the Haroseth I made for a school Passover meal), cranberries (left over from something I definitely made to do with cranberries), dates (left over from a sticky toffee pudding I made for Boxing Day), apricots (left over from the jewelled rice we also ate on Boxing Day). These all went into a large casserole pan. The dried mango-that-went-out-of-date went into the bin.

I hunted around the kitchen and came up with three clementines, a lemon, a lime, a bottle of whisky and a bottle of sherry. I added the fruit juices and good glugs of alcohol to the pan. I stirred in some molasses sugar, light muscovado sugar, vegetable suet, cinnamon, ginger and mace, then put the whole pot in the oven for three hours.

Mincemeat!

Now … over to L for the rest of the story ….

Mum didn’t know what to do with all the mincemeat that was left over so I said, “I love mince pies, but I’ve had a lot of them lately. Maybe we could put them into something else I really love like… fruit cake! So that is how it came into being – ME! Mum said shed. No, that looks wrong. Try again. Mum said she’d (that’s better) make up a recipe if I took some photos. I told her she looked like she had a long neck like a giraffe in the jumper she was wearing, so she’d have to change if she wanted me to take any photos of her. Mum said she didn’t want photos of HER … she wanted photos of THE CAKE. I said whatevs and she went to change.

madewithlove

Ha mum, a photo of you!

So, I took a photo of Mum with some eggs …

eggs

… Mum mixing up some batter …

batter

… Mum with a pile of dirty dishes …

mwl

… and oh, look! There’s me!

Made with Love Fruitcake

3 1/2 oz unsalted butter
7 oz golden caster sugar
4 large eggs
10 1/2 oz self-raising flour
14 oz mincemeat

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.

Grease and line an 8″ square baking pan.

Cream the butter and sugar, then beat in the eggs. Fold in the flour and mincemeat until evenly combined.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and level the top.

Bake in the centre of the oven for 35 to 45 minutes until golden brown, risen and springy to touch.

Turn out and cool on a wire rack.

Serve as slices of cake with glasses of sherry … or with dollops of custard or ice cream for a pudding.

4 Comments
by amerrierworld on January 1, 2014  •  Permalink
Posted in cakes, puddings, traybakes and slices
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Posted by amerrierworld on January 1, 2014

https://amerrierworld.com/2014/01/01/me-you-and-the-cake/

Mum, You Need to do Your Own Baking!

flumpies

Children can be very direct. My daughters especially seem to have an ability to cut straight to the heart of the matter. I remember once trying to help L with her Maths homework (I’ve given up on that one now, by the way – Year 7 Maths is way too hard for me!). Here’s how it went …

Me: If it costs £2.40 for 4 pens, how much does it cost for 1 pen?
L: It usually tells you how much it is for one. This is a rubbish shop.

So when they try to tell you that Maths is an essential life skill, you know what? They’re lying.

makingflumpies

M has the same habit. She’s been working very hard at school and filling her evenings with six hours of ballet every week. Unsurprisingly, she reached yesterday morning and wanted to just ‘chill out’ for a bit. I took pity on her, boiled her an egg and allowed her to eat it in the living room so she could watch TV. Here’s how that one went …

Me: Try not to spill your egg.
M: But Mum, I was going to try to spill it coz I really like spilling egg on the sofa.

Okay, okay. Give me break. And she’s only 8 years old … we still have the teenage years to navigate.

flumpiesslice

Yesterday afternoon had its own ‘get real, Mum’ moment too. M was writing up a post for her own blog about a cake she invented last weekend …

M: I really like this. Can I write about it on A Merrier World too?
M: Mum, you need to do your own baking.

As I said – straight to the heart of the matter. But her cake is so lovely, I begged, pleaded, threatened and eventually bribed her until she agreed to let me show it to you over here …

madmu

Flumpies (by Madmu)

6 oz butter
3 large eggs
6 oz castor sugar
6 oz self raising flour
1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder

raspberry jam
marshmallow flumps

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.

Grease and line an 8 inch round cake pan (and also line 6 to 8 cupcake holders with cases. This recipe makes 2 x 7″ round cakes, so there’s a bit left over for cupcakes if you just make one 8″ round Flumpie cake).

Make sure that the butter is very soft – beat it for a bit first in the mixer.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl.

Add all the other ingredients.

Beat on medium speed for a minute until everything is smooth and mixed together.

Fill the cake pan no more than 2/3 full and divide the rest of the batter between the cupcake cases.

Bake in the centre of the oven for 25 to 30 minutes.

Remove and leave to cool on a wire rack.

Spread raspberry jam on top of the cake.

Cut up some marshmallow flumps and make a star with them on top of the cake.

4 Comments
by amerrierworld on September 22, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by amerrierworld on September 22, 2013

https://amerrierworld.com/2013/09/22/mum-you-need-to-do-your-own-baking/

My Broken Kitchen

My 8-year-old daughter has been food blogging for four days. On her second day of blogging, she apologised to her readers … “I am not cooking because of my kitchen – it is broken!”

I’m sorry. I have been blogging for six years and despite writing only sporadic posts over the last several months, I have not had even the slightest bit of decent courtesy to explain that I haven’t been cooking because my kitchen is broken.

But it’s true. My kitchen is broken.

In times well past, there was once a family kitchen complete with unidentifiable fridge and very raidable cupboards.

familykitchen

But then something terrible happened. We ran out of wine.

Oh. Sorry – no. Getting sidetracked. It was something much, much more terrible than even that.

We lost the plot.

We couldn’t find it anywhere.

wrecking

We were totally devastated.

destruction

It was so bad, we soon realised there was only one thing that could possibly save us now.

Chocolate cake.

But the baking gods were against us …

notmuchbaking

… and our kitchen was still falling down …

stillwrecking

… and there was nowhere to put a cake pan.

oodlesofspace

But sometimes you just have to laugh in the face of impossibility (and ceiling dust and plaster dust and all the other sorts of dust that hang in the air and make you cough lots), especially when there’s a birthday …

birthdaycake

… and especially when your 8-year-old daughter is determined …

bakingspludge

… to bake some Spludge.

photoshoot

Go visit Madmu for the recipe.

You’ll make her day if you leave her a comment there. She’s one excited little baker-blogger!

7 Comments
by amerrierworld on August 25, 2013  •  Permalink
Posted in cakes, chocolate, out and about, traybakes and slices
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Posted by amerrierworld on August 25, 2013

https://amerrierworld.com/2013/08/25/my-broken-kitchen/

Diet of Worms

I wonder how many History students will end up on this page …

Unfortunately, I can tell you zip all about the events of 1521 at the Imperial Diet of Worms in the Holy Roman Empire. My A-level History teacher was obviously wasting her time in trying to educate me on that one.

No, these are the right sorts of worms – the sort that interest T.

gardenworms

As far as I know, he has never actually eaten a worm, although that isn’t saying much. As far as I know, he has never eaten any peas, cheese, pasta or mashed potato … and he will not ever never eat a tomato. Not even if you call it a moonsquirter.

Nevertheless, it was T’s idea to bake a worm cake.

wormcaketop

That’s why I can’t offer any fluffy chicks or cute bunnies on this Easter weekend.

Only worms.

wormcake

Worm Cake

Take a basic chocolate Easter egg nest recipe, press it all into the base of a circular pan and decorate with jelly worms (or snakes that do a good impression of worms).

3 Comments
by amerrierworld on March 30, 2013  •  Permalink
Posted in cakes, chocolate
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Posted by amerrierworld on March 30, 2013

https://amerrierworld.com/2013/03/30/diet-of-worms/

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