A word to the wise . . . .

When baking, if a recipe calls for stiffly beaten egg whites to help make to make it light and fluffy:

• Do not cheat! 
• Do not experiment with a recipe that you know works, when you are time poor and have a 40+ cupcakes to bake for a birthday!
• Do not think that you know bwtter than Martha Stewart and her esteemed guests.
• Do not, I repeat, do not expect this to work as a substitute for fresh egg whites.

Now I'm sure it makes a perfectly lovely pavlova. The mixture was thick and glossy, but it certainly didn't work in this capacity . . . for me anyway. Maybe it's just me. Maybe it's the humid weather. I don't know, but this is how they turned out:

I know what you're thinking . . . "Just fill that ridiculously huge sink-hole with frosting and no one will ever know!" right? Believe me folks, there ain't enough frosting in the world to fill these craters :(

So methinks it is off to Woolies for a pack of these for the birthday boy to take to class on Thursday.

Recipe Share -Sunday Pancakes

Alternative Post Title: Too good not to be shared :) So both boys are out of the house this morning, so we girls decided we would have a pancake breakfast! I don't know about you, but I love a good pancake. But for me it has to be light, fluffy, piping hot and melt in your mouth and at least a centimeter and a half high. Do you know how hard it is to get a GOOD pancake when out for breakfast? Most places I have been to they end up being rubbery, flat, cold and good for nothing but Frisbee frankly! Well, no more! Put down that "Shake'n'Pour" because I have the mother of all pancake recipes. I found this probably eight or nine years ago and I can honestly say that I have never ordered pancakes form a breakfast menu again! (Except for twice from the Pancake Parlour while on holidays. And let's face it, if an establishment specialises in pancakes we can pretty much guarantee that they are going to be good.  The reason I have never again ordered pancakes from a breakfast menu or buffet? While I am perusing the menu I am thinking to myself "Don't do it, you know you're going to be disappointed, it doesn't matter how good they claim to be - you know yours are better!"  and so I move on to Eggs Benedict or the pastry basket! Yes this recipe really is that good! Sunday Pancakes Ingredients: Dry Ingredients     ¾ cup plain (all-purpose) flour, (cake flour is excellent!)         ¾ cup plain wholemeal flour         1 tablespoon sugar, heaped         1 tablespoon baking powder, heaped         pinch salt Wet Ingredients     1¼ cups milk         1 egg         2 teaspoons vanlla extract         2 egg yolks, from separated eggs         2 egg whites, beaten stiff         unsalted butter and oil for frying For Serving     Maple Syrup, best quality         cream         butter         icecream         jam         cinnamon sugar Directions: Sift (or whisk) the dry ingredients into a bowl. Combine the wet ingredients Whisk the wet ingredients into the dry until just combined. Gently fold the egg whites into the batter. Place a large frying pan/skillet over a low heat. Heat until the pan is hot enough so that droplets of water "dance" for a second or two. Add a teaspoon each of butter and oil to the pan and swirl around until meted Pour in half ladle sized portions an when bubbles rise to the top, flip and cook for a further 30-60 seconds. I like to keep a baking dish covered with foil in the oven on the "keep warm" setting. Pop the cooked pancakes in here to stay warm until all the batter has been cooked. Serve in stacks with butter, maple syrup, fresh seasonal fruit, cream, icecream, jam or cinnamon sugar (or all of the above!). Makes 12-14 10cm diameter pancakes (Serves 4-6) Print Friendly Version But don't take my word for it. The proof is in the eating as they say

Recipe Share - Banana Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

This seems to be our family's stand by for using up over-ripe bananas. In fact I suspect that some bananas get left to go bad just so that I have to make this :) The original recipe for the cake comes from Donna Hay Modern Classics 2. The cream cheese frosting is my own addition, and a rework on an old classic. The inclusion of vanilla makes this extra special and irresistible.

Banana Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
For the Cake

• 125 g unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup caster sugar
• ¼ cup brown sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2 cups plain (all-purpose) flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• ¾ cup sour cream
• 1 cup roughly mashed banana

For the Frosting

• 60 g Cream cheese, softened
• 30 g unsalted butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup icing sugar
• 1-2 teaspoon lemon juice
• lemon zest

Directions:
For the Cake
Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Place the butter, caster sugar and brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until light and creamy. Gradually add the eggs and beat well. Sift the flour and baking powder over the mixture. Add the cinnamon, sour cream and banana and stir to combine. Spoon the mixture into a greased 26cm (10 in) fluted ring tin. Bake for 40 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer. Cool on a wire rack.

For the Frosting
In a small bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter and cream cheese until smooth and well combined. Add the vanilla. Gradually add the icing sugar, beating well between additions. Add enough lemon juice to bring the mixture to a smooth, but firm consistency.
Spread generously over the cooled cake, sprinkle with lemon zest and just try to resist!

(Serves 8)

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{Not Quite} Neiman Marcus

I'm not sure if you are familiar with the urban legend surrounding this cookie receipe. Long story short a Neiman Marcus customer claims she was charged $250 when she asked for the recipe of a cookie she enjoyed in the retailers cafe. Outraged, she proceeded to email the recipe to everyone in her address book and so on. According to SNOPES (a site I personally find useful to sort the wheat from the chaff in my own inbox) the story is totally bogus. Even Neiman Marcus themselves have got in on the act though and posted the cookie recipe on their website - Brilliant! It's true what they say . . . "There's no such thing as bad publicity":)

I digress :) So this recipe is inspired by the genuine version of the recipe from the NM website.

I have played around with this one quite a lot but here is the version that I love the best.

From Food

Choc Chip Cookies

Ingredients:

½ cup unsalted butter, softened

1 cup light brown sugar

3 tbsp white sugar

1 large egg

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 ¾ cups plain white flour

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 ½ tsp instant espresso powder

¾ cup white chocolate chips

¾ cup milk chocolate chips

Directions:

Preheat oven to 160℃

In the bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter sugars until fluffy

Beat in the egg and vanilla, then espresso powder

In another mixing bowl, sift together the dry ingredients and beat into the butter mixture at low speed until just combined. Add the chocolate chips.

Place 2tbs drops of dough onto a greased cookie sheet allowing room for the cookies to spread. Gently press down on the dough with the back of spoon to spread out into a 5cm circle.

Bake for about 20 minutes or until nicely browned around the edges.

I like my cookies soft and chewy, but they are equally nice as a crispy treat too. I also like to replicate the "just out of the oven" warm and gooey feeling so I zap them in the microwave for a few seconds - like 10 seconds :)

(Makes 20 - 24 cookies)

Omit coffee (or limit servings!) for children :)

You won't believe how good these are . . .

I was introduced to these amazing little treats when we held a scrapbooking night at our home last Christmas. Kayleen brought these along and was inundated with requests for the recipe. So thanks for sharing Kayleen :)

BEWARE: One is not enough - in fact, consider making a double batch, you won't believe how good they are!

From Food

Christmas Pecan Tarts

Ingredients:

1 package Pampas Sweet Pastry Shells

¾ cup pecans, chopped

¼ cup brown sugar

2 teaspoons plain flour

½ cup maple syrup

2 teaspoons unsalted butter, melted

1 egg

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 180°C fan forced 170°C.
Spread pecans on a baking tray and toast in the oven for 5 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool.
In the bowl of an electric mixer place eggs, syrup, sugar and butter and flour. Beat gently until well combined. Stir in pecans.
Place pastry cases onto a large baking tray.
Spoon 1 tablespoon of the mixture into each pastry case.
Bake in a slow oven for 25 – 30 minutes or until pastry is golden brown.

As with any baking, the quality of the ingredients makes a big difference to the outcome here. I use best quality (real) maple syrup, and dark muscavado sugar.

Martha . . . Meet Nigella

From Food

What do you do on a stormy Friday morning when you are entertaining two little girls? Why bake of course.

So here is what we made today. Martha Stewart's White Cupcake recipe, with Nigella's Royal Icing:

VANILLA CUPCAKES

Ingredients:

3 cups cake flour (not self-rising)

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 ½ cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

2 ¼ cups sugar

½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup milk

8 large egg whites

Directions:

Preheat oven to 170℃. Line two standard 12-cup muffin pans with paper liners; set aside.
In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter and 2 cups sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes, scraping down sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in vanilla. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the milk and beginning and ending with the flour; beat until just combined. Transfer mixture to a large bowl; set aside.

In the clean bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat egg whites on low speed until foamy. With mixer running, gradually add remaining 1/4 cup sugar; beat on high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form, about 4 minutes. Do not overbeat. Gently fold 1/3 of the egg-white mixture into the butter-flour mixture until combined. Gently fold in remaining egg-white mixture.

Divide batter evenly among the muffin cups, filling each with a heaping 1/4 cup batter. Bake, rotating pans halfway through, until the cupcakes are golden brown and a cake tester inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes. Transfer pans to a wire rack. Invert cupcakes onto rack; then reinvert and let cool completely, top sides up.

I know these seem complicated and fiddly compared to other cupcake recipes, but they are oh so worth it! You have never tasted a more moist cupcake that is buttery, light and sweet all at the same time!

From Food

ROYAL ICING

Ingredients:

2 large egg whites

3 cups pure icing sugar

1 teaspoon lemon juice

Directions:

Combine the egg whites and confectioners' sugar in a medium-size mixing bowl and whip with an electric mixer on medium speed until opaque and shiny, about 5 minutes. Whisk in the lemon juice, this will thin out the icing. Beat for another couple of minutes until you reach the right spreading consistency for the cupcakes.

But of course it wouldn't have been the same without my little helper

From Life

From Life

From Life

Now - the dishes, Yuck!

Little Drops of Heaven

I have a confession . . . I love to bake. But even more than that I love to eat what I bake.

Usually I'm not really a fan of biscuits. Let's get real though, if someone puts a Tim Tam in front of me I'm not going to say no. But a home baked biscuit - now that is an entire different matter. I simply cannot get enough. Usually in our house it's double chocolate chip (which I will share another day). But this week it's Jam Drops.

Jam Drops with . . . wait for it . . . home made plum jam. Now before you go judging me as some 1950's stepford wife I totally cheated LOL. CHeck out this idiot proof recipe for super fast jam. I works equally well for any of the usual preserving fruits (I just happened to have plums that I wanted to use up). The secret is in the setting sugar.

Super Fast Jam

Crush 1kg cleaned fruit of your choice coarsely with a potato masher or blender.
Place fruit and 1kg CSR Jam Setting Sugar (1kg = 1 pack) into a large heavy based pot.
Heat mixture over low heat until sugar is dissolved – do not allow to boil.
Add knob of butter and increase heat, to bring to a full rolling boil (a boil that cannot be stirred down).
Boil for 4 minutes only. Remove from heat, skim off any foam and test for set. To test for a set: remove pot from heat; put a small amount of jam on a chilled plate or saucer. Allow to cool and gently push a finger through this. If the surface wrinkles, the setting point has been reached. If not, return to boil and retest at 2 minute intervals.
Once you are happy with the set, bottle in *pre-sterilised jars immediately

Recipe from CSR

* I sterilise my jars by putting them in the dishwasher :)

Jam Drops

Ingredients

180g Butter Softened

1 Cup Caster Sugar

1 Egg

2 Cups Plain Flour (sifted)

1/2 Teaspoon Baking Powder

Jam to Decorate

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius
Place butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until light and fluffy
Add the egg and beat well
Stir through the flower and baking powder and mix to a dough
Roll two teaspoons of the mixture into balls
Place on a tray lined with non-stick baking powder, allowing room for the biscuits to spread and flatten slightly
Press a finger into the middle of the dough to make an indent.
Fill the hole with jam
Bake for 10 minutes or until golden
Add a little more jam to the holes while the cookies are hot
Cool on wire racks

Makes 60

Recipe from Donna Hay's Modern Classics 2

I love that these bickies can be made up virtually out of the pantry. Most home bakers would have this stuff hanging around.

And although 3 and 5 year olds are not known for their discerning taste, I was pleased to hear my kidlets heaping praises on these cookies like: "Mmmm, these are so good!" and "Yeah, they're the best!". BEWARE though, the kids are not the only ones that will be begging for more :) You have been warned!