Cupcakes

 I made these with a standard 6663 recipe: 6oz butter, 6oz self raising flour, 6oz sugar & 3 eggs (I don't know if it's a common thing or just something my family say?)

The icing bag is a disposable plastic one. These are brilliant! I always found fabric icing bags horribly awkward to wash out. I got these after I had to throw my last one away and I'm definitely not going back!

As for the frosting, I whisked the butter and sugar with a little bit of milk. I've never thought to use milk before and it makes the frosting so much lighter. I used the quantities in Mary Berry's cupcake recipe (6oz butter, 12 oz sugar) but this was quite a bit too much. I now have a bag of frosting in the fridge... wonder what I could do with it?? :)

 I dyed half the frosting a delicate pink and put the 2 colours side by side in the icing bag. I really like this effect but I should have used a deeper pink (you can't really see the two colours at all in the photograph).

I may have to make some more of these to use up the rest of the icing!

Chocolate Brownies

 These yummy treats were made with the BBC GoodFood recipe. I love brownies and how they never look perfect but as delicious as they are, the ingredients are ridiculously unhealthy so I won't be making these too often! The instructions in this recipe I found particularly good. Each step is clearly explained with tips for technique. They seemed more complicated to make than I remembered but still not difficult.

It said to leave them in the tin after baking until cool... Is it just me who thinks this is impossible? I cut out a small piece to 'test' after they came out of the oven but I think it caused them to collapse away from the sides, unless that usually happens? It didn't seem to matter though, they still taste delicious! I would recommend that you wait and actually let them cool in the tin but that's probably a bit unrealistic!

For those of you who like your brownies gooey rather cakey, I would definitely recommend this recipe. It definitely deserves it's title of 'best ever brownies'!

Recipe:http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1223/bestever-brownies

New Oven!!!!!

We Finally have a new oven!! I can actually know the temperature now! 

No more blaming the oven when things go wrong!

Baked Alaska

These are one of the best things I've made! They're fun to make and taste absolute amazing!! I used the recipe in the Great British Bake Off book (is there a theme developing here??). The meringue can be made a while before you construct and cook the pudding which is very convenient. I was surprised at how long the recipe said to whisk the egg whites for (over 20 minutes in total) but it really works. You whisk the egg whites and sugar over a pan of hot water so that the meringue cooks which seems to make it take longer to whisk to stiff peaks. Then you keep whisking while it returns to room temperature and it goes so thick and creamy, it's wonderful! I think this is the same as marshmallow? Don't taste it before you've scraped it all out of the bowl to use or you will lose all motivation to get as much as possible off of the whisks! Never mind the baked alaska, I could have just eaten a bowl of the meringue! You are going to need as much of the meringue off of the whisks and bowl etc. because the icecream has to be fully covered so that it doesn't melt in the oven. As for the cake bit, the recipe says to use 1 slice of home made swiss roll per pudding. I didn't want to go through the fuss of making a swiss roll so bought one instead but these are significantly smaller than a home made one so I used two slices rather than one which worked pretty well size-wise. They're a little fiddly to assemble but they only take 3-4 minutes in the oven (great for if you're very impatient!). I would definitely recommend these. They're not too difficult to make and will guarantee happy noshing! Absolutely my new favourite pudding!

Quote of the day: "I think it's the happiest pudding I've ever had!"

Risotto

I didn't really follow a recipe to make this. I used Mary Berry's mushroom risotto as a guideline for how to make it but added different ingredients for a chicken risotto and another veggie version. The chicken risotto contained 1/2 an onion, 1/2 pepper, 2 mushrooms and 250g chicken breast. These quantities worked pretty well. The vegetable risotto had 1 pepper, 3 mushrooms, 1 stick of celery and 1/2 an onion.   I didn't have much of a plan so I just threw all the vegetables in to the pan at the same time and fried the chicken in a separate pan.I didn't have enough white wine so made up the difference with extra stock  but this overwhelmed the flavour in the veggie risotto but it was ok in the chicken one. The rice in the vegetable one also seemed to have a slightly odd texture (still tasted good though!). As usual, I didn't follow an instruction properly; I didn't add the stock a bit at a time which might've caused the rice to go a little gloopy but that only happened in the veggie one so I'm not sure. Despite a few hiccoughs along the way, it tasted good and was definitely a popular meal at home. How much more can you ask for?

Scones

These were made from the BBC Food scone recipe. This is a good no-fuss recipe for scones. I thought the dough seemed a little wet but I can't remember what it's supposed to be like. I think I got a bit carried away with the kneading which I think is why my scones weren't as tall as they're supposed to be. Note to self: listen to the recipe when it says knead lightly!

Enjoy with cream, jam and a cup of tea!

Recipe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/scones_1285

Iced Fingers

I used Paul Hollywood's recipe featured on The Great British Bake Off. The bread is made of an enriched dough that contains milk, butter and sugar as well as the standard bread ingredients. It is a very sticky dough so when you start kneading beware; most of the dough ends up on your fingers! It is supposed to be wet so try to use as little flour as possible on the surface but I probably used too much flour and it didn't seem to change the texture too much and the bread turned out surprisingly well. After the first few minutes, the dough becomes much softer and easier to work with so try and be patient.

 Think about a suitable warm place to leave your dough to prove. A grill above the oven is perfect because you can preheat your oven and some of the heat rises into the grill but any warm place will do. I had my dough proving in the bathroom because it was warm from the towel heaters!

 Although they take a long time to prove, you won't be tortured waiting for too long once they're in the oven as they only take 10 minutes to bake. Mine turned out a darker colour than I wanted but the bread inside was baked well and it still had a nice, soft texture on the outside as well as the inside.

As for the cream, I needed quite a lot more than it said to use. Depending how much filling you want, you may need up to double what it says on the recipe. For the icing, just make sure it's not too runny. If you like the slightly messier look that mine has (lets call it rustic) then you can add a little more water than the recipe says. If you prefer a neater finish then stick to the recipe!

These iced fingers were fun to make, the recipe works and has good, clear instructions. This was the first time I'd made them and they certainly tasted good and went down very well at home! The dough is a little tricky to work with though so if you've never worked with dough before then try making normal bread before attempting these yummy treats!

Recipe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/iced_fingers_34133