National Trust Challenge part 3 - The classic Victoria Sponge

The first cake I can remember making was a Victoria Sponge. I think it is most peoples first cake, mine was from my mum's recipe book that I think comes from the 1970's but it worked and tasted great. When I started Little Sprinkles I spent time looking at the different sponge recipes out there and tried several before deciding on the one from the Hummingbird Bakery  cookbook. I like it because it is really light and fluffy and it doesn't use a lot of butter. So when I saw a very different recipe in the National Trust Cookbook I thought I would give it a go. 

The first thing that struck me as odd was the fact I had to weigh my eggs, something I have never done before in any kind of baking. But I did it.

Then I had to use the same weight of butter, sugar and flour and make sure I was beating them for a long time, I say I, but what I mean is my kMix. 

Any good cake maker know that the longer you beat the sugar and the butter the lighter the cake, I do beat them for quite a long time but as this recipe told me to beat them for at least 5 minuets I decided to time it, this is something that I will keep doing as I think it does make a difference. 

The resulting batter was much thicker than the one I am used to and it took double the cooking time. It cake out looking very nice but seems really heavy weigh wise and when it was cooled it had a crispy outside. 

I know that the traditional filling for a Victoria sponge is jam but I LOVE fruit curds and the National Trust do such an amazing range of them, I have not dared try some of them especially the Raspberry curd as I know that if I did, I would not be able to go a day without eating it! I have been known to go to a National Trust property just to buy another pot of curd! If you can't get to a National Trust property, I have just found out that you can buy them online here this is very dangerous information to me. 

Unfortunately I was not able to get to my local National Trust property (Montacute House) so I had to make do with the lemon curd I could find in the supermarket. Added to that a nice layer of buttercream.

A simple dusting of icing sugar and it was finished. 

I must say that even though this was a nice recipe to make, I do not like the cake. It is too heavy and buttery for me. 

National Trust challenge part 2 - Scones

I must confess I do enjoy eating a cream tea whenever the opportunity presents itself but I do not often make scones. The last batch I remember baking was some cheese scones for my husband as a valentines present 2 or 3 years ago so I thought that they would be a good challenge for me. After deciding I was going to do a sweet recipe rather than a savoury one I decided on the Ulster Scones recipe (I would like to say that was a nod to St Patrick's day, but I did not realise that when I chose it) 

Again I was able to use the wholemeal flour from Anglesey Abbey but I decided to halve the recipe which meant I had to do some creative working as I have never attempted to halve an egg and I never will. It was a nice easy recipe to follow and I put my ever trusty kMix to good use.

I had a little helper who wanted to cut out the shapes for me, I decided to break away from tradition and use other cutters as well as my round one to cut out the scone. Mainly because I have such a large selection of cutter I have to make sure I use them at every possible event.

Here is my version of the recipe, the original one is from The National Trust Complete Traditional Recipe Book by Sarah Edington

140g wholemeal flour

110g strong white flour

1/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda 

35g caster sugar

30g glace cherries chopped

40g butter

140ml buttermilk

1 egg. 

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees, sift together the flours, bicarbonate of soda and sugar, mix in cherries. Rub in butter and add buttermilk and egg. Kneed until it comes together. Do not over work the dough (I did and  you can taste it in the finished scone) Roll out to about 2.5cm thick and cut out scones. Put on baking tray and bake for between 10 - 15 minutes until risen and golden brown.  

For more National Trust recipes click here

These scones were very tasty and to prove it, I made them yesterday morning and there are none left today!

Bundt love

Over the past couple of months I have noticed that bundt cakes have become more predominate on social media and more people have been posting new recipes for them. I have therefore spent the last few months looking at all the different bundt pans and wishing I had one! 
Now for those of you who have no clue what a bundt cake is then here is the Wikipedia description: "A cake that is baked in a Bundt pan, shaping it into a distinctive ring shape. The shape is inspired by a traditional European fruitcake known as Gugelhupf, but Bundt cakes are not generally associated with any single recipe. The style of mold in North America was popularised in the 1950s and 60s, after cookware manufacturer Nordic Ware trademarked the name "Bundt" and began producing Bundt pans from cast aluminum"  

Now I have also spent many hours looking at the Nordic Ware website trying to pick one pan so I can find out how much the shipping is over to the UK but failing, there are so many fantastic shapes that picking one is proving too hard to do. At the moment I have got it down to 2, the Heritage and the Jubilee

 

But this does change on a daily basis!

I have found in my extensive collection of cake tins a mini bundt pan which is the size of a cupcake tray and have 6 mini bundt holes in it so I have been using this to try out some of the recipes I have seen. 

Last week I made chocolate bundts and added micro eggs and decorated them in a Cadbury's Cream egg style 

Tonight I came home and was going to make banana bundt cakes I had put a bunch of very ripe bananas in the freezer a few weeks ago to try and save them rather than throwing them away but when I got home having got them out of the freezer this morning they were pretty much liquid so I had to change my plans and decided on an apple and cinnamon recipe from the Martha Stewart website   

I halved the recipe after I had converted all the measurements into grams to make my easier, again it was a very easy recipe. I think it took me more time to peal and chop the apples than it did to mix everything together. My greasing the tin was not very good this time (must buy myself some Cake Release) so they did not come out as easily as the last lot but I'm sure it will not spoil the taste. 

And my biggest critic was happy as he polished one off for his pudding tonight. 

I have promised myself that I will treat myself to a bundt pan as soon as I can decide which one I want!

Ginger and Orange cake

As I was getting the ingredients out of the cupboard ready to start baking, I realised that the wholemeal flour that I have is milled at Lode Mill which is at Anglesey Abbey a National Trust property in Cambridge near my parents. So this is very much a National Trust cake. 

I my option any cake recipe that starts melt the butter, brown sugar and treacle in a saucepan is a winner. This has to be one of the easiest cakes I have made, it took no time at all and the batter was ready for the oven 

I spent the hour it took to bake potting seeds with Nathan in the beautiful spring sunshine. The smells coming out of my kitchen were amazing, really deep and treacly. 

I had to create my own buttercream recipe as I wanted to add the orange to it, I added the zest of one orange and the juiced half of it and added it to the buttercream a small bit at a time to make sure it was not too runny. The piping is always fun for me as it do enjoy it. 

Here is the recipe for you if you want to try it, the main cake recipe came from The National Trust's Complete Traditional Recipe Book by Sarah Eddington. I did make an adjustment as I removed the mixed fruit from the recipe.

110g butter

110g brown sugar

125ml black treacle

1 egg, beaten 

150ml warm milk

110g plain flour

110g wholemeal flour

2 teaspoons ginger

2 teaspoons cinnamon 

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

50g dried fruit (I did not include these) 

Melt the butter, sugar and treacle in a saucepan, cool and add egg and warm milk. 

Sift flours, spices and bicarbonate of soda into a bowl, make a well in the middle and pour in the treacle mixture (add the dried fruit here if you are using it) beat very throughly and pour into a greased 8 inch (20 cm) cake tin. Place in oven preheated to 150C (300F or gas mark 2) and bake for about an hour. Cool in tin for a few minuets then transfer to cooling rack. 

I baked mine for 55 minuets and that was just right in my fan oven. 

For the buttercream 

80g butter

300g icing sugar

zest of 1 orange 

1 tablespoon of orange juice. 

Cream butter and icing sugar until they are starting to come together, add zest and then add the juice a small bit at a time until the buttercream comes together. Place in piping bag, cut cake in half and pipe half the buttercream onto the bottom section and place the top half on top and pipe the rest of the buttercream on top.  

Having now tasted it, it is a lovely moist cake a little bit on yhe heavy side but the buttercreambreaks it up. The over riding flavour is treacle so if I was to bake it again I think I would use less treacle and maybe a bit mire ginger. 

There are lots of other National Trust recipes here

I have to start looking at what I will do next as I fight off certain people to make sure I get more than one piece of cake!

National Trust Baking Challenge

I remember spending hours complaining as my brother and I were dragged round National Trust properties by our parents when we were children and having spoken to my husband it seams we are not the only ones. Fast forward 20 years and we are now members of the National Trust and have started taking our little boy along to National Trust properties. Although we have not yet tried to take him inside as I don't think the beautiful old furniture and items could cope with our very inquisitive 3 year old climbing on them and picking things up!

About 2 years ago I picked up this book in a NT gift shop and thought that it was a book I would use on a weekly basis and HAD to buy it.

So far it has sat on my ever-growing cookbook book case (yes I have a book case just for cookbooks and yes it is almost full) and I can not remember making any recipes out of it.    

Yesterday I got one of my regular emails from the Food Network with a link entitled "21 Cakes That Should Be Illegal" so I had to click on it and found this amazing cake 

http://www.foodnetwork.co.uk/recipes/gingerbread-layer-cake-raspberries-and-lemon-buttercream.html 

Having looked at the American recipe and not knowing where I could get hold of Molasses and Maple Syrup in the middle of nowhere in Somerset I decided to find another option as I have to make this cake this weekend. I found a recipe for a ginger cake on another website which had orange icing and an idea started forming in my mind. 

This morning in between making a packed lunch, getting a 3 year old dressed and ready for pre school I managed to find a couple of minutes to think about the cake and wondered if I had any recipes in any of my cookbooks. I found this one,

and will be adapting it to make the cake and will be adding orange buttercream icing. I then started flicking through the book and found lots more fantastic recipes I want to try. So I have decided to give myself the challenge of making one recipe from this book each week for the next 6 weeks. I will let you all know how I get on starting with the Gingerbread with orange icing.