Alphabakes roundup - H - May 2012

Here's what you've all been waiting for.... the round-up of fabulous entries we've had for this month's Alphabakes, where the letter we asked you to incorporate into your bakes was H.

I was expecting plenty of honey and hazelnut recipes and we did get a few of those- but all unique in their own way. In addition, there were some really imaginative entries!

Dave from Baking Beats kicked us off in style this month with a Chocolate and Hazelnut cake. The simple name belies the elaborate decoration – I love the pattern and the caramelised hazelnuts on top!

 

Dom from Belleau Kitchen used honey as his ‘H’ ingredient and sent us this Honey, Almond and Orange Cake, which he describes as “bloody amazing” – and I think we would all agree with you there, Dom!

My entry was next and this month’s letter was a great opportunity to publish a blog post I hadn’t gotten around to writing, even though I baked the cake a while ago. Believe it or not, under all this bling there is a Hummingbird Cake – read the full post to find out why I thought it would be a good idea to spray it gold!

LilMsSquirrel (aka Becks) went for a branded product beginning with H for her main ingredients – let’s hear it for these Hellman’s Banana and Raspberry Blondies! Using mayonnaise is a way to make brownies or blondies lower in fat and this is something I think I will definitely have to try; Becks says these come in at only 92 calories a piece!

 

Suelle from MainlyBaking made these Rhubarb and Hazelnut Tarts with a delicious-sounding hazelnut frangipane, and she says the combination of flavours was definitely a success. I might have to make a note of rhubarb if “r” comes up as the Alphabakes letter!

 

I couldn’t let my crazy gold cake be my only entry for Alphabakes this month, and purely by chance one week in May at my cake decorating class we made… handbag cakes! 

 

Zoe from Bake for Happy Kids sent us these Honey Walnut Cakes, which look relatively easy to make so would be great for a family baking session! And if you want to add a sophisticated topping, she also gives a recipe for honey roasted nuts – yum!

Anuja from Simple Baking gave us this Wholewheat and Honey Cake which she made in a bundt tin, which I think looks just wonderful when it’s sliced. In fact can I have a piece of this now please? :-)

 

I was hoping we would get one of these for Alphabakes, and Kate from Turquoise Lemons didn’t let us down! Have you heard of Herman the German friendship cake? Herman is a sourdough starter that you feed until he makes enough for you to pass on the starter to three friends – as well as making the cake of course! The cake is apple and cinnamon flavour and looks delicious – if anyone has a spare Herman starter they want to send my way!

Ros’s mum Pat made us this beautiful honey cake with honey buttercream icing, decorated with honey bees – aren’t they cute?

Helen from Fuss Free Flavours sent us this Heritage wheat loaf with crimson raisins. The loaf uses einkorn wheat which is a “heritage” wheat -  read her post for an explanation! It’s nice to have a few savoury bakes among all the sweet stuff too!

One thing I like about Alphabakes is that as well as getting ideas for new bakes and ingredients that I might not have made before or used in a while, I’m also discovering totally new things that I’d never even heard of! One of these is haupia – apparently a traditional coconut-based Hawaiian dessert. As I said, I’d never heard of it before, so it was a pleasant surprise to get not one but two of these entered into Alphabakes!

The wonderfully named Cupcake Crazy Gem sent us a Hawaiian Haupia Chocolate Pie which looks absolutely delicious:

And that was immediately followed by Kit fromi-Lost In Austen’s Okinawan Sweet Potato Haupia Pie. I love the fact that you can combine the basic Haupia recipe with all sorts of things whether it’s chocolate or sweet potato or something else. This one has an amazing purple colour which is just a joy to behold.

PiggyBakes (aka Sally) sent us these very more-ish Apple, Sultana and Honey Oat Cookies, just perfect to go with a cup of tea:

  Jen from Blue Kitchen Bakes picked up the savoury baton and sent us this Ham, leek and potato pie – check out the pie dish her boyfriend bought her!

Another new discovery for me is halva cake – have you come across this before? Denise from Magnolia Verandah made this lovely orange halva cake for Mothers’ Day (which in the US was in May – it’s in March in the UK for some reason!). I’m sure her mother-in-law, who was the recipient of the cake, was really impressed.

Jacqueline – otherwise known as my mum – is a keen Alphabakes participant and sent us a sticky honey and ginger cake. Unfortunately I wasn’t there to try any of it –maybe next time!

Herman the German made a second appearance (he’s been a busy little cake!) from a new Alphabakes participant, Jean from Bakingin Franglais. I love the idea of a friendship cake and Herman makes me smile every time. I'm quite curious about what it tastes like now as well!

Another new participant, Snowy from CookbooksGalore, sent us these spelt and honey cakes which look very tempting

   I wasn’t intending to enter my own challenge three times, but in May I had a picnic with my family at Beaulieu and wanted to bake something savoury to take along, so I made these ham and cheese scones. They went down very well!

Hob nobs are one of my favourite biscuits and I can’t believe I never thought of them when I was brainstorming the letter H… luckily Credit Munched was cleverer than me and baked this fabulous batch of homemade hob nobs! Apparently they didn’t last very long in her house….

The wonderfully original Baking Addict – my co-host for Alphabakes – had a brainwave and made us these Hamburgers for this month’s challenge. Look closely however and you will see they are actually cake! Check out her post to see how all the elements came together. Wouldn’t these be great for a Jubilee street party?

  Fleur from Homemade by Fleur used one of my favourite types of chocolate – toblerone – paired with honey to make this toblerone-inspired dinner party dessert. I envy her dinner party guests!

Laure (aka #puddingfairy) from Les Recettes deLorette did us proud with this Heston Blumenthal explosive chocolate cake. It’s frankly outstanding and you must check out the video of her using the paint gun on the cake!

Claire from Under the Blue Gum Tree used herbs for the letter h, and sent us this delicious-looking Courgette, Goats Cheese and Garden Herb Pesto Bread. Looks perfect for a summer picnic!

You can’t have H without Hershey’s and Lottie from Lottie’s World of Cakes and Bakes made us this Hershey’s Kisses Chocolate Tray Bake. I love the pink and chocolate ruffle icing! And the Hershey’s kisses are a lovely finishing touch.

Here’s the second entry from my co-host Ros, aka Baking Addict: Hummingbird Cupcakes with dried pineapple flowers.  I’ve never seen pineapple flowers before but they look relatively simple to make, and go perfectly with the flavours of this cake.

Another bread-based entry and one that sounds absolutely delicious is this hazelnut, apricot and honey wholemeal loaf, from Janice of Farmersgirl Kitchen.

I’m a big fan of chocolate mousse so it’s great to see that Kelly of American Cupcake in London hit upon the idea of a Honeycomb Chocolate Mousse for this month’s Alphabakes. She says it can be easily adapted to be dairy free as well.

  Honey is turning out to be one of the most popular ingredients for this month, but everyone has used it in a very different way. Angela from Garden Tea Cakes and Me baked Honey and Rose Cupcakes, which would be perfect for a summer garden party.

Fiona from Sweet Thing You Make My Heart Sing was excited to be participating in alphabakes for the first time- welcome! What’s more, she tackled my nemesis and made hazelnut macarons, and they turned out really well! Look forward to seeing you next month, Fiona!

Karen from Lavender and Lovage wrote a very interesting blog post on Fair Trade, which sparked off a lot of debate – check it out if you’re interested. It was prompted by the ingredients she used for her Honey, banana and blueberry breakfast buns – yum!

Cookie Sleuth sent us these hazelnut and chocolate chip cookies which look so delicious I’m sure I couldn’t stop at one – or probably half a dozen either!

Something else I’d never heard of but is apparently quite popular in America (which means it will be taking off here soon!) is hi-hat cakes – I think the name refers to the fact that the icing is piled or piped as high as possible! Baking Addict Ros made this her third entry this month and sent in these very impressive Hi-Hat Marshmallow cupcakes. I bet you get marshmallow all over your nose when you try to eat these!

I was just waiting for someone to pair honey with figs and Lucas @ CoverVersions.tv has done just that, with this delicious honey, fig and blue cheese tart. Did I mention I love blue cheese as well?

Ros’s mum Pat sent us a second entry as well - she sent in a Harvest pie – a shorcrust pastry pie filled with 'harvest' vegetables - onion, red pepper, green pepper, pumpkin, potato, broccoli and carrot. And is that cheese I spy on top as well? It sounds very tasty!

Mel of Sharky Oven Gloves indulged us with a Pear and apple hazelnut crumble. I love anything with a crumble topping!

Remember Fiona from Sweet Thing You Make MyHeart Sing’s hazelnut macarons? She used the leftovers to make Hazelnut Brownies. What a great way to use up leftovers- you can never go wrong with brownies!

Chaya from Bizzy Bakes says she “threw together” this Hash Brown Cake – it looks really tasty and again is something I wouldn’t have thought of for this month’s challenge, even though I love hash browns!

Sarah from Sarah Bakes used Hershey’s kisses in her recipe for these Hershey’s Almond Kiss Cookies – they look very moreish and really cute!

Ros’s mum Pat can’t be outdone by her daughter and sent us a third entry herself! She made hazelnut spirals – these are cookie dough made with ground hazelnuts with a hazelnut spread (nutella) swirl. Extremely chocolatey!

Sarah from Maison Cupcake  made honey and lemon cream cheese popovers – popovers are what we call Yorkshire puddings in the UK (at least I think so!) and I’ve heard they are sometimes served sweet. These sound really lovely – I love her mini bundt tin too!

Another new participant, Debbi from Debbi doesDinner Healthy made a slightly more unhealthy recipe for this month’s Alphabakes – her Hot dog, ham and grilled cheese sandwich looks pretty indulgent but pretty good!

Caroline from Cake, Crumbs and Cooking made us a lovely Floral Honey Cake which looks really moist and delicious and she said her whole house smelled of honey while it was baking.

Daisy from Never Too Sweet for Me introduced me to these Honey Joys – an Australian dessert that remind me a little of cornflake cakes, only nicer!

  The final entry that got in just before the deadline was from my sister Clare, who made these honey lemon cupcakes. I love the piping pattern on the top!

So that's it for this month's Alphabakes - we had an amazing 46 entries, we seem to be getting more every time, even though the letter was a little more difficult this time! I can't wait to find out what the letter for June is - check out Ros's blog on June 1st!

Not an Aston Martin car cake

I was really looking forward to this week's cake decorating class as we were making a car cake - and I'd already decided I wanted to make my boyfriend a car cake for his next birthday! Admittedly we were making a generic car, and not an Aston Martin which is what I want to make for him, but the same basic principles would apply - and I do have 11 months to perfect my technique!

A madeira cake is one of the best kinds of cake to use if you are carving or shaping. Lorna, my cake decorating class teacher, gave us her tried-and-tested recipe for a madeira cake, which turned out perfectly. What follows is pretty much the step-by-step process I followed - we were shown how to do the basic car cake in the class then I sort of freestyled and finished it off at home!

Slice equal widths off the sides of your cake as shown below, then place the pieces you have cut off on top of the cake.

You can level the top of the cake if it isn't particularly flat - in fact Lorna told us to do this. But I liked the curved effect that the raised top of the cake gave, as I didn't think the bonnet of the car should be completely flat.

Next slice through the top sections at an angle as shown - this will be the top of the car and the windscreen.

Viewed from the front

We used a round cookie cutter to cut out holes in the bottom of the cake to make the wheels. To be honest I don't think it would matter if you didn't do this but it does look quite nice. I think my wheels are a bit too close together too - but I don't own a car so that's my excuse for not knowing what one looks like ;-)

Stick the top pieces on with buttercream then cover the whole cake in buttercream. I should probably have covered it with vanilla rather than chocolate buttercream but I didn't have time to make any and used a tub of Betty Crocker - and discovered at the last minute that I only had chocolate!

Then cover in roll-out fondant. Everyone else in the class used coloured sugar paste - a few of them used red as the cars did end up looking quite cute and cartoon-y and the red ones looked a lot like the ones from the movie Cars. But I covered mine in white fondant, as I had a plan up my sleeve!

Then Lorna told us to add windows, wheels, whatever we wanted and to generally bling up our cars. I used my phone to go online (note to self: clean icing sugar off phone!) and look at pictures of my boyfriend's Aston Martin (did I mention my boyfriend has an Aston Martin? lol). I wanted to make sure that the bumper and windows were the right shape. I made them from black fondant that I had from a previous cake and had just the right amount left over (well, almost!).

Adding the bumper, window and lights at the front

To make the wheels I made a thick disc of fondant - it had to be pretty thick to fit inside the holes I had cut into the cake. This is why I don't think you necessarily need to cut holes. I also had the idea of using a piece of licorice wound round into a circle but I didn't have any and I wanted to finish this cake the same evening.
I also ran out of black sugarpaste right at the end so coloured some with black gel - but it's very hard to get a true black colour when you do that, which is why the side windows look more grey than black!

I was quite pleased with it! I think from the front it looks like a black and white police 'panda' car!

This was as far as I got in the class. As I said, I'd had an idea which was basically to spray the car silver with edible lustre spray, but I didn't think of this beforehand so didn't take my spray to the class. While I would otherwise have sprayed the car before adding the windows and bumper, I didn't want to take them off again - so I decided to cover them in foil to protect them while I sprayed the rest of the car!

Here's the spray that I used - I actually bought it for my Jubilee cake but it's good to get more use out of it! You can't quite see on the front of the can but I promise you it is called "Edible lustre spray" and says at the bottom "for cakes"!

Here it is, in all its spray-painted glory!

I tried to make a little Aston Martin logo but it was so small and quite fiddly - I think next time I would have to make the cake itself bigger so I could make the logo bigger.
I also made a registration and used an edible ink pen to write on the number plate.

The finished car - my boyfriend really liked it! He didn't get to eat any though!
We've all had rather too much cake lately so I gave it to his mum to take into her workplace, and she said it went down very well :-)

It's not a true Aston Martin shape as the bonnet needs to be longer and wider but this isn't a bad stab at my first car cake!