Red Velvet





When my boyfriend comes over one of our hobbies is to bake together. It totally isn't my hobby that he's forced into doing. At the mention of "red velvet" and of "cream cheese" J freaked out big time so we (I) thought we'd give this recipe a go.

 

They aren't too rich but they could be accompanied perfectly with ice cream.

 



Red Velvet:
 2 eggs
4oz butter
8oz caster sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2.5oz cocoa powder
1/8 tsp salt
1 tbsp red food colouring
3/4 tsp white wine vinegar
3.5oz plain flour

Cream Cheese:
8oz cream cheese
2oz caster sugar
1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp vanilla

First preheat the oven to about 170 celcius, beat the eggs separately and put them to one side as you won't be needing them for a little while yet, I got my boyfriend helper J to do this.

After you have measured your butter, melt it completely so that you can add the rest of the ingredients.

Add your sugar, vanilla, cocoa, salt, food colouring and vinegar.

Mine looked a little lumpy, never mind, after this mix in the eggs,

Then fold in the flour, which will make it a lot smoother.

Pour into an brownie tin, leaving a couple of tablespoons of the mixture in the bowl.

Now onto the cream cheese, mix the cream cheese together in with the sugar, egg yolk and vanilla.

Spoon this mix on top of the red concoction, then pour the rest of the red on top of the cream cheese, with a knife, swirl between the different layers to create a pattern.

Then put in the oven for about 28 mins, or until a skewer or cocktail stick comes clean. While you're waiting for them to bake, you could wash up, like I did, or lick the bowl, like J did.

It should make 16 tasty brownies.

My boyfriend has the timer around his neck- not some bizarre medalion

They even had J's seal of approval, despite being "so full, I can't eat any more" he ate three.

Chocolate Fudge Cake

It was my little sister's 16th birthday this week, and each year I take it upon myself to bake her a cake and this time I tried to bake the best chocolate cake I could.
My sister's birthday was yesterday, and the cake I made is completely gone already (it wasn't a small cake) so I've remade it, the best bit about this recipe is not that it's a delicious, fudgy, chocolate cake, it's really easy to make!




 You will need:

8oz (225g) plain flour
3oz (85g) coco powder
12 ½ oz (350g) caster sugar
1½ teaspoons baking powder
1½ teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
2 large free-range eggs
250ml (9fl oz) milk
125ml (4½fl oz) sunflower or vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
250ml (9fl oz) boiling water

First measure your flour and coco powder,

 

I'm not a huge fan of dark chocolate, so I used half Bournville Coco Powder and half Dairy Milk Highlights but if you're a fan of dark chocolate, use all Bournville.

Add the caster sugar, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda,

Add your oil and milk, get stirring and put the kettle on, these are used instead of butter as oil will keep the cake really moist,

Add the eggs, make sure these are thoroughly mixed in before adding your water,

Now add your boiling water,

You should be left with what looks like the runniest cake mixture in the world,

This mixture is so runny infact, that I wouldn't advise using a pringform cake tin or one with a removable base.
I made this mistake when I made L's cake, resulting in the mix flowing from the bottom of the tin.

 

I'm using a cake tin about cm wide and two small pudding tins.

 

Grease the cake tin with either butter or oil, and tap some flour around the tin so it sticks to the grease, then line with grease proof paper.

Grease and flour the smaller pots.

Then pour the mix in.
For the smaller bowls, I worked to filling them to about 3/4 full, but if you're using the whole mix for one cake, just pour it all in, the bigger the better.

 

 

Pop these in the oven at 170 celcius, the smaller pots should take about 25 mins, but the cake itself will take considerably longer, so after about 25 mins, I covered the top of the cake tin loosely in foil to stop it burning because no one likes being burnt.

Now, you can leave it there and have a plain cake, throw some buttercream on it, dollop with ice cream or drizzle in fudge sauce... Mmm...
But since I'm actually baking for a lover of cakes that are slathered in cream cheese icing, here is the icing recipe, you may not need all of it, but personally, chocolate fudge cake with cream cheese icing in the middle and on top sounds ideal to me.