Coconut Raspberry Slice!

Keeping to the 'tradition' of baking something red/pink for the month of February, I decided to bake this coconut raspberry slice. This recipe is made up of three layers - the base is a dough of flour, sugar, butter, egg and vanilla extract, the second is a layer of raspberry conserve and the top layer is a mix of eggs, sugar and dessicated coconut.

The dough base smelled so delicious while it was baking that the Husband offered me a pound if I would let him have a piece before I was done spreading the raspberry conserve! The dough base is baked for 20 mins before the raspberry conserve is spread. The topping is then also spread on top before being baked for another 30 mins.

The Husband has pronounced it 'pretty good'!

Mini Baked Donuts!

I had this mini donut recipe for quite a while and this weekend, I thought it will be a good idea to try baking them and see what they taste like. Rumour has it baked donuts are healthier than fried ones!

I go these chocolate and rainbow sprinkles as a belated Christmas present and it was also quite coincidental that these 30 mini donuts used up both packets of sprinkles!

These mini donuts were baked in a mini muffin tin and I thought they looked rather sweet. I have yet to test them on the Husband, so will update on taste later!

Valentine's Day II!

Lovely surprise coming home from work! Husband has gone and got me flowers during lunchtime, brought them home and left them on the kitchen table to surprise me! He has also printed out his favourite honeymoon photo to finally be able to display a photo of us at home!

Lemon Kisses!

One final baking for the weekend, lemon kisses to round up the Valentine's Day theme. I assume these were called lemon kisses as two cookie rounds are sandwiched with lemon curd to 'kiss' each other. :)

Lemon kisses are made out of caster sugar, egg yolk, vanilla extract, lemon zest and butter stirred together before mixing in the flour to form the dough. The cut-out rounds were then meant to be chilled for 30 mins before baking which I forgot until the second batch, so will see how each batch tastes in the end. They were then drizzled with lemon icing.

The Husband has concluded that this week's baking was of a very high standard and that the lemon kisses were his favourites!

Fudgy Coconut Brownies!

And of course, how can one celebrate Valentine's Day without chocolate? In a previous post, I mentioned a friend who is a huge fan of chocolate and coconut so I thought I will try to find a recipe that combines both. This lovely fudgy coconut brownie was made out of 250g butter, 100g cocoa powder, 4 eggs, 500g golden caster, 4 eggs, 100g self-raising flour and 100g desiccated coconut. I wondered why the recipe called for a large saucepan to melt the first three ingredients together and realised my saucepan was definitely not big enough when I started burning the sugar and cocoa!

However, the final brownie batter seemed to have survived the experience as the baked product was quite delicious. The Husband was quite keen to taste it before it went out to the public as he claimed I might have burnt the entire batter and rendered it inedible. Luckily, he pronounced it 'pretty good.'

Shortbread Hearts!

Happy Valentine's Day! To mark the occasion, heart shaped cookies are a must! These lovely shortbread hearts are made out of butter, icing sugar, plain flour, cornflour and ground almonds. The batter is really crumbly and an hour in the fridge did help but some of the hearts still 'mutated' in the oven. Ten minutes into baking, the hearts are gently indented with a bottle top and raspberry jam spooned in it before baking for another 2 mins.

The Husband said he thought it tasted a tad undercooked but I thought it was just quite crumbly and shortbready. Will update on taste tomorrow!

Red Velvet Whoopie Pies with Peppermint Filling!

In the spirit of Chinese New Year, I decided any baking in February should have some colour of pink or red in it. This weekend, I was going through a baking magazine when I saw this red velvet whoopie pie recipe.

First of all, what is a whoopie pie? According to Wikipedia, "the Whoopie pie (alternatively called a gob, black-and-white, bob, or "BFO" for Big Fat Oreo) is an American baked good that may be considered either a cookie, pie, or cake. It is made of two round mound-shaped pieces of chocolate cake, or sometimes pumpkin cake, with a sweet, creamy filling or frosting sandwiched between them."

I have tried store-bought whoopie pies which taste quite artifical but I did think they look quite cute and bite-sized. I have shunted away from making them myself though as I thought it was quite fiddly with the cookie mix and the filling.

However, I decided a new year means new challenges, so I might as well take it on with my baking! The red velvet cookies are baked out of buttermilk, brown sugar, butter, flour, an egg, bicarbonate of soda, vanilla extract and natural red food colouring. The filling is a mixture of cream cheese, butter and peppermint extract and it came out really sweet and creamy. As usual though, the recommended quantity of filling was way too much and I have to remember to halve it next time if these whoopie pies are well received.

Good feedback in general although I think vanilla cream cheese filling might be preferred. The Husband was quite taken with them!

Blueberry Gingerbread Muffins!

This weekend, I was thinking of baking an old favourite - lemon and blueberry cake but I really wanted to bake something new and I have already purchased the blueberries that were on sale, so I chose this blueberry gingerbread recipe.

The Husband is a fan of gingerbread so I am interested in what he thinks of this gingerbread combination. This recipe calls for treacle, ground cloves, ground cinnamon, allspice, ground ginger, flour, sugar, buttermilk and milk and of course, blueberries stirred in last!

I ended up with 13 little cakes. Unfortunately, the Husband has pronounced them 'awful'! I tried one and realised it was rather bland but still edible. Mixed reviews from the Office although one colleague thought it was really good and broke his diet to eat two!