Chocolate Baby Cakes

Hello my name's Chocolate Cake Recipe..

You might remember me from such things as this bundt cake post and the recent baby shower...!!

Ingredients :

220g butter

220g dark chocolate, chopped

25g coffee granules

125g self-raising flour

125g plain flour

50g unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 tsp bicarb soda

480g caster sugar

4 eggs

7 tsps vegetable oil

100ml buttermilk.

This time, I iced the cupcake with a cream cheese frosting which I could have eaten out of the bowl..

227g cream cheese, room temperature

1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

4 cups sifted icing sugar

1/2 cup cocoa powder

Mix cream cheese and butter until smooth and creamy.

Mix in icing sugar, one cup at a time.

Mix in cocoa powder.

Just a quick note - if you plan on piping this frosting onto your cupcakes, go easy on the icing sugar! I merrily added the entire 4 cups before it dawned on me that I would not be able to pipe the mixture, hence the 'choc-top appearance' of my cupcakes (definitely not the look I was going for..) But it was delicious all the same.

xx

White Chocolate Raspberry Tarts

More Baby Shower Recipes

Today's recipe is bought to you by the letter T for Tart. 

White Chocolate Raspberry Tarts

These were soooo easy. And the end product is soooo cute.

Give them a try if you ever need to take a cute little dessert to an event. These little treats are sure to impress.

Ingredients

165g butter, softened

1/2 C icing sugar

1 + 1/2 C flour

283g white chocolate, melted & cooled

1/4 C thickened cream

227g cream cheese

How to make them ??

First, prepare the pastry.

In a small mixing bowl, cream butter and icing sugar until light & fluffy.

Gradually add flour; mix well.

Press into an ungreased tart pan.

Bake at 180 degrees for 25 minutes or until lightly browned.

Cool on a wire rack.....

For filling, in a small mixing bowl, beat melted chocolate and cream.

Add cream cheese and beat until smooth.

Spread (or pipe) into individual pastry cases.

Refridgerate for 30 minutes.

Arrange raspberries over the filling.

Serve.

xx

The Baby Cake

Here we begin the first of many posts as I recap the sweets I made for Mel's sisters baby shower.

I provided a dessert table including -
White Chocolate Raspberry Tarts;
Raspberry Jelly Slice;
Choc Caramel Slice;
Melting Moments; and
Chocolate Cupcakes.

But the Main Attraction of the event was of course -

The Cake

O R A N G E   A N D   A L M O N D   M E A L   C A K E

(This is a version of the birthday cake I made for Miss Pip.)

125g butter, softened
2/3 cup caster sugar
1 large orange, rind finely grated, juiced
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 cup self-raising flour
3/4 cup almond meal (ground almonds)

Preheat oven to 180°C. Grease cake pan.

Using electric hand beaters, beat butter, sugar and orange rind for 5 minutes or until pale and creamy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition.

Sift flour over butter mixture. Add almond meal and 1/4 cup orange juice. Gently fold to combine. Pour mixture into pre-greased cake pan.

Bake. Timing till vary. (The original recipe is for mini cupcakes, in which case bake for 15 to 18 minutes or until a skewer inserted into centre comes out clean.) 

If you're baking one cake, the total time in oven will be approx 1.5 hours.

I frosted it with an orange frosting :

1/3 cup butter

1 + 1/2 cup icing sugar

2 tbs orange juice

1/2 tsp orange zest

xx

Sugar Baby

So... I catered the sweets for a Baby Shower on Saturday

(Remember how I blogged about being asked to help out and then collected some of my ideas here?)

Well I took Friday off work and spent some quality time in my kitchen.

First of all, let me say I do love to bake. Most of you know that already..

But there is definately an increased pressure when you're doing it for

A) Someone you don't know very well (I have never met the Guest of Honour of the Shower) and;

B) A special event (rather than just because I had a craving for a particular cookie or cake).

Rather than go into too much detail about how and why, let me show you the end result. Because despite an entire cake sinking in the middle like a donut everything turned out well.

Ta-Dah....

Three cheers to Miss Pip for being a lifesaver and making me a cake bunting and cupcake flags - Aren't they the cutest decorations you've ever seen ?! (And a BIG thanks to Jodie of LukaMish who donated her fabric scraps to this project. BTW - Jodie makes amazing products with her fabric so check it out.)

And just so that you can fully understand the mayhem that was my kitchen, here's a pic to show how much stuff I can have spread across my kitchen bench at one time -

I will be doing individual posts about each of these sweets complete with recipes. Stay tuned.

xx

It's Raining Babies

Baby Showers..

The mere thought of one has me feeling a little unwell. When presented with an invitation to such an event, my mind goes into over-drive, desperately trying to think of a reasonable excuse for why I can't go along and play games that include tasting baby food and guessing the size of a pregnant belly.

Don't get me wrong - babies should be celebrated and I do enjoy shopping for the perfect baby shower gift.. but at a typical shower there are usually lots of children running around demanding attention and the tacky games make me cringe.

I heard Melanie Brown (aka Scary Spice) on the radio over the weekend describe her recent baby shower, which she referred to as a party in celebration of her baby - she hired nanny's to take care of her guests children and put on an amazing spread of both gourmet and finger food. She wanted a party atmosphere - "People take baby showers way to seriously... At the end of the day, I want to sit down, watch my friends get drunk and have a bit of fun". If only all new Mums-to-Be had an attitude like Mel.

So at this point, you're thinking - "Why are you blogging about baby showers if you have such a strong opinion about them," right?!

Well, I have been asked to assist with the catering of a baby shower in a few weeks. Including the cake.

What a huge responsibility.

As you know, I love to share my baked goods with people (usually those I work with) but aside from family gatherings, I have never baked for a specific purpose before.

So imagine my fear excitement when I received a text from Mel at MOSC asking if I would make the sweets for her sisters baby shower later this month. (On a side note - If you live in Adelaide and ever need your hair and/or makeup done for an event, Mel is Ah-Mazing!! Tell her I said HI!)

Mel's request was simple (or so I thought) - Cake and sweet treats required. 20 guests. Sex of the baby unknown. No theme.

Turns out that having such creative freedom can be a bad thing. Where do I start ?!

Enter my latest Pinterest Board!!



I'm now merrily pinning inspiration for cakes, cake bunting and cupcakes..

Which has me thinking - Maybe this whole baby shower thing isn't so bad?!

But I'm at a loss as to what else to make. I bake alllll the time and yet I suddenly can't think of a single baby shower appropriate treat to make.

In the hopes of finding some ideas, I'm off to do some more pinning!

xx