Giant Vanilla Ice Cream Cupcake Recipe

Get a load of that in your cake hole. If it will fit, that is.

This giant cupcake was fun to bake and a joy to eat. My son requested this cake for his 7th birthday. Once we had the concept it was simply a case of  working out how to make it happen. Here is some guidance, followed by the recipe and detailed construction instructions.

To start with you will need a giant cupcake baking tin. Mine was just £5 from good old Aldi.

Once cooled, it's a good idea to cut the base in half so you can fit more jam and butter cream inside.

Re-assemble, sandwiching each layer with strawberry jam and vanilla butter cream.

Then stick ice cream wafers on the sides with (more) butter cream, to resemble a giant cone.

Swirl generously with vanilla butter cream, so you get a Mr. Whippy effect. Add sauce and sprinkles. More is more...

Then, of course, you need to add some flakes...

Look at all that awesome CAKE.

Can you manage a whole slice? Of course I did...

Giant Vanilla Ice Cream Cupcake

Vanilla Sponge Cake

Ingredients

375g Butter, at room temperature

375g Caster sugar

2 tsp Vanilla Extract

6 large Eggs

375g Self-Raising Flour
2 tbsp Milk, if required

Method

Spray your tin thoroughly with cake release spray (or grease it, old style). Cut a circle of grease proof paper or baking parchment and place it at the bottom of the base part of the tin.

Heat oven to 140 fan or gas mark 3.

In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and the sugar. I use a handheld electric whisk, although you could use a wooden spoon and plenty of elbow grease.

Add the vanilla extract and then whisk in the eggs, one at a time.

Fold in the flour, one heaped tablespoon at a time. Use a metal spoon for this. You are aiming to keep as much air in the mixture as possible. This is a big cake and you want the sponge to be light and fluffy.

If the mixture feels a bit heavy, carefully stir in some milk at this point.

Pour the batter into the two sides of the tin, leaving at least a couple of centimetres at the top to allow room for the cakes to rise.

Bake in the centre of the pre-heated oven for 75 minutes, until a metal skewer or cake tester comes out clean.

Leave to cool in the tins for a good ten minutes before turning out onto a cooling rack. Remove the circle of paper.


Vanilla Butter Cream

Ingredients

500g Butter, at room temperature
1kg Icing Sugar
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
2 tbsp Milk


Method

Carefully place all the ingredients into the bowl of your mixer (I use a Kenwood Prospero, with the K-beater). You could do this by hand, but you'll have stronger arm muscles than I do.

Top Tip: Before you even think about switching your mixer on, cover it with a damp tea towel. The icing sugar will try to escape and nobody wants a kitchen covered with icing sugar...

Mix for five minutes. Open the mixer and scrape the edges of the bowl with a spatula. Mix again for another minute.


Assembling your Giant Vanilla Ice Cream Cupcake

Once the cakes are cool, slice the base in half horizontally. I use a cake wire, but you can easily use a knife here. Top Tip: place cocktail sticks above and below where you are going to cut, so you can align the two pieces easily.

Starting with the bottom layer, spread generously with strawberry jam. Then dollop butter cream on top, spreading it almost to the edges. Repeat with the next layer.

Use butter cream to stick ice cream wafers around the outside of your cake.

Put the remaining butter cream into a piping bag. Top Tip: stand your bag in a pint glass, with the sides folded down over the glass to make it easier to fill. I use Lakeland disposable bags and a Wilton No.1 nozzle.

Now the tricky part, the icing. Start at the top of the wafers and slowly and steadily pipe butter cream in one massive swirl. Go round and round, with no gaps, until you get to the top. You should have plenty of butter cream left, so be generous.

Now decorate with strawberry sauce (I use Tate & Lyle) and large sprinkles (Aldi).

Finally stick a few Flakes in and your cake is finished.

And, ta-daa, here is your giant vanilla ice cream cupcake in all its glory. It's a showstopper and one that is guaranteed to get some ooh's and ah's of appreciation.

Ooh, ah, etc.





Linking up with Casa Costello, click on the badge to find out more...

Giant Vanilla Ice Cream Cupcake Recipe

Why Everybody Needs An Apron, and an Easy Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Whether you're four or forty four, there's nothing more pleasurable than shoving your hand in a bowl of sweet smelling, sticky cookie dough. 

This is why children need aprons.

Yes, I realise I should have rolled their sleeves up...

But why does everybody need an apron?

Surely as an adult you can keep yourself clean?

Hmm. Maybe. There are three reasons why I need an apron:

1. I have, erm, a large shelf on my front that collects drips and crumbs from whatever I'm eating, and I eat while I'm cooking... 
2. I have two children who enjoy baking, and cookie dough and Nutella will transfer from them to me, even though they deny touching anything with mucky hands.
3. These beauties, designed by Henry Holland and worn by yours truly, are available from Home Sense or online and are raising money for a good cause, for Comic Relief.
4. 
   

I now wear my apron from the second I start cooking, until I've loaded the dishwasher and washed up the bits that aren't allowed in it. It's no exaggeration to say that it has changed my life and saved my clothes.

Easy Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Ingredients

125g Butter, at room temperature

100g Sugar (any soft brown sugar will do, you can even use caster)

1 Egg, beaten

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

225g Self Raising Flour (or Plain Flour with 1tsp Baking Powder)

200g Chocolate Chips

Method

1. Heat the oven to 160 fan.
2. Mix the butter and sugar with a wooden spoon (or your hands, if you're four).
3. Add the egg and vanilla essence, mix.
4. Add the flour, mix.
5. Add the chocolate chips (some may fall into your mouth at this stage).
6. Form the cookie dough into small balls by rolling a lump around in your hands.
7. Place on a baking tray, leaving room for the cookies to spread.
8. Bake for about 10 minutes until golden brown.

We decorated ours with Nutella and white chocolate stars, but you can use anything you fancy or just leave them plain. Either way, they won't last long.

Disclosure:

This is a sponsored post, although I will be giving my fee to Comic Relief for Red Nose day. The Comic Relief Danceathon is only one month away.

If you would like also to sponsor me for the Danceathon, that would be amazing. I will be dancing for six hours to raise money that really makes a #LastingChange.

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Why Everybody Needs An Apron, and an Easy Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Recipe: Slimming World Rice Pudding

Sometimes you just need a big bowl of the warm creamy comfort food that is rice pudding.

When you're trying to eat healthily and lose weight, you would think that rice pudding would be off the menu. Think again. If you make it yourself, from scratch, you can make it without sugar or even milk.

There is one rice pudding recipe doing the rounds at Slimming World where you cook pudding rice in diet cream soda to make a rice pudding. This used to be free on Slimming World, but it is now considered a "tweak".

There are lots of tweaks in Slimming World. People tweak the plan by combining free foods to make other foods. Eventually Slimming World catch on and allocate syn values to these foods (you can have between 5 and 15 Syns per day). Fair enough. You're only kidding yourself if you think you can lose weight if you eat your own body weight in - for instance - cooked lasagne sheets (free), coated in spray oil (also free) and baked in the oven. They're kind of like Doritos, but they're not a filling healthy meal. Tweaks are essentially free foods, but you're not eating them as intended, so they are given a Syn value. Pudding rice is a free food, but rice pudding (made with milk or diet drinks) is not.

I've made the cream soda rice pudding and it's okay. One day I realised I didn't have enough cream soda to make it, so I improvised and came up with a new method that is just as delicious and - most importantly - SYN FREE*.

*The small print. My recipe could be considered a tweak (although after a Google search I can't find an official statement by Slimming World about it), UNLESS you make it part of a food-optimised meal, i.e. one third of the meal is Super-Free. I'm yawning just typing this. In a nutshell - I think - if you have a plenty of veg on your plate for your dinner you can have this as a pudding if you serve it with fruit. Whatever. You don't really care about all that, you just want me to tell you how to make my rice pudding.


Sandy's Recipe for Slimming World Rice Pudding

Serves 4
Takes 20-30 minutes

Ingredients

• 6oz Pudding Rice (usually found in the baking aisle of the supermarket)
• 1 litre cold water
• Artificial Sweetener (to taste)
• Flavourings (we'll come to that later)

Method

1. Put the rice, water and sweetener in a large saucepan and stir
2. Bring to the boil
3. Cook for 20-25 minutes
4. Stir occasionally, gradually reducing the heat down to a gentle simmer 
5. The rice pudding is ready when almost all of the liquid is absorbed by the rice
6. You can serve it warm or cold

Flavourings

This is where you can be a little creative.

I sometimes add a few drops of custard, banana or buttery caramel flavouring to my rice pudding. I love Lakeland Natural Flavours (usually £3.99, but currently on offer - buy one, get one half price). I was just getting the link for you when I saw two new flavours: mulled wine and Christmas pudding. Oh my.

Lakeland Natural Flavours also work well mixed into that other Slimming World favourite, Quark.

If you like cinnamon in your rice pudding, add cinnamon. I can't think of anything more revolting, but it's your rice pudding.

I also like to stir through a teaspoon  - who am I kidding? -  a tablespoon of jam (2 Syns). Just like school dinners in the 1970's.

My other favourite is to add a heaped teaspoon of Options Belgian Chocolate powder to the cooked rice pudding while it's still in the pan (2 Syns-ish, that makes it approximately 1/2 a Syn per bowl).

Syn Free (probably) Slimming World Rice Pudding.

You're welcome.




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Recipe: Slimming World Rice Pudding

Easy Apple Cake

There are many ways you can support Team Honk. You could take part in the blogger relay, make a donation, be a social supporter, run a mile, or even, er... bake.

Yes, there is a Team Honk Great Blogger Bake Off.

There is a Sport Relief/Sporty/Team Honk Relay/ Red Nose theme, that I'm going to take an enormous liberty with. I knew there was going to be a bake off, so had already photographed this easy apple cake and drafted the recipe before I heard about the theme. But I will make it fit. In the Team Honk blogger Relay, I handed the baton to an elephant. Elephants eat fruit. Apples are fruit. I made an apple cake. See. I shoehorned it in. Just about.

This apple cake is simple to bake and has a fruity, spicy, apple-y taste and is extremely moist, and moreish.


Ingredients

125g Butter or Margarine
125g Caster Sugar
2 Eggs
125g Plain Flour
2 tbsp Milk
1tsp Baking Powder
1tsp Cinnamon
60g Sultanas
3 Apples, peeled, cored and chopped into small cubes


Method

Preheat your oven to 180 (fan).
Spray a 23cm loose bottom cake tin with Cake Release Spray.
With an electric mixer, mix the butter, sugar, eggs, flour, milk, baking powder and cinnamon for a couple of minutes.
Stir in the sultanas and apple.
Pour mixture into cake tin and bake for 25 minutes.

Serve on it's own for a teatime treat or with custard as an easy family pudding.

Other easy recipes you may like:

Treacle Sponge Pudding

Risotto

Roasted Veg

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Easy Apple Cake

CAKEZILLA

A few weeks ago I made the cake to beat all cakes for the boys' birthday party - even if I do say so myself. 

We called it Cakezilla and you can see why.

It was huge, and I'm really rather pleased with it. I think it was my most liked ever Facebook update and Instagram photograph.

It was two regular vanilla sponges sandwiched together with chocolate butter cream. I'd also covered it in chocolate butter cream, placed chocolate finger biscuits all around the sides, and put giant chocolate buttons and assorted sprinkes on the top. 

If I hadn't made it up as I went along I would have made the cake chocolate, but it was yumminess on a plate anyway.

I had some butter cream, giant chocolate buttons and sprinkles left over, so I also decorated these 12-for-60p fairy cakes from Morrisons to serve at the party. They went down very well too. 

Recipe for Cakezilla Vanilla Sponge

1. Weigh 4 eggs in their shells. Use this weight for the plain flour, butter or marg, and caster sugar.
2. Add baking powder and vanilla essence.
3. Make an all-in-one batter. I use an electric hand whisk.
4. Add a drop of milk if the batter is too thick.
5. Cook in a 9" spring cake tin, sprayed with cake release spray, for 30-40 minutes at 180. The cake is done when a knife or skewer poked in the centre comes out clean.

Repeat steps 1-5 for the second cake (if the first simply isn't high enough).

Recipe for Cakezilla Chocolate Butter Cream

1. Put 250g of salted butter, 50g of cocoa powder and 450g of icing sugar in the bowl of your mixer.
2. Cover your mixer with a tea-towel to stop the icing sugar from escaping.
3. Mix slowly at first, then at full speed for 5 minutes.
4. Scrape the sides of the bowl to incorporate all of the ingredients.
5. Add some milk if your icing is too thick. Mix for a final 2 minutes.
6. Clean up the icing sugar that still managed to escape from your mixer.

Do let me know if you make anything similar. I can guarantee you will have a queue of children - and grown-ups - waiting for a slice of your Cakezilla.

Linking up with Romanian Mum's Foodie Friday.

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CAKEZILLA

Slimming World Ice Cream

Ingredients
Fat free yogurt

Method
Put it in the freezer for a couple of hours


Okay, so it's not technically ice cream.

A little ice may form at the top, but underneath the frozen yogurt is creamy and tastes like ice cream.

It's syn free at Slimming World too.

You're welcome.



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Slimming World Ice Cream

Recipe for Cheat's Treacle Sponge Pudding

There's something so warming and comforting about a sticky sweet treacle sponge.

I love baking, but I haven't got the time or inclination to steam a sponge pudding. You have to steam it for hours, watching so that doesn't boil dry. No, not my idea of baking fun - but oh the oozing golden syrup and the warm sponge. There has to be a better way...

... and there is. I give you is my mother-in-law's recipe for a cheat's treacle sponge pudding. It is easy peasy. In fact it's so simple you'll wonder why you didn't think of it.

Ingredients 

2 eggs (weigh them in their shells, this will be the weight you use for the next three ingredients)
Butter
Caster sugar
Self-raising flour (or plain flour and 1tsp baking powder)
Milk, 1-2 tbsps
Golden syrup, 150-200ml (less than half a tin)

Method 

Heat the oven to 180/gas 4.

Make an all-in-one sponge batter by whisking the eggs, butter, sugar, flour and milk for a couple of minutes.

Pour the golden syrup into the bottom of a heatproof serving dish.

Carefully spoon the cake batter over the syrup. I use two spoons; one to scoop, one to push off (as if adding mashed potato to a cottage pie). Smooth the top with the back of a spoon. 

Bake for 35-45 minutes, until a knife inserted into the centre of the sponge comes out clear.

Allow to cool a little.

Serve with custard.

You can substitute the golden syrup for a generous layer of jam if you like. 

Recipe for Cheat's Treacle Sponge Pudding

One of My Recipes is in The Hallmark Advent Calendar

I was delighted to be asked to contribute something Christmassy to the Hallmark Advent Calendar.

Behind every door is a top tip, craft idea or a recipe. You'll have to wait until 21st December to see my contribution, but I can tell you it's a simple recipe for something that your child could make for Santa. My boys love putting cookies and carrots on a plate for Santa on Christmas Eve. Last year they thought the big man would like a glass of milk as well. This year we may make some boozy suggestions, after all it is freezing at night.

There are some great ideas hiding behind the doors for the first couple of weeks of Advent, you may recognise some of the names of the contributors. I can't wait to see what's behind the other doors.


Disclosure: I was paid for my contribution to the calendar and to publish this post.

One of My Recipes is in The Hallmark Advent Calendar

Bake it for Babies - Changing the World One Cupcake at a Time

It's amazing what a few bloggers can do in a short space of time.

We were inspired by a Save the Children blogging conference. We had thrown around fundraising ideas and in addition to the Blog it for Babies campaign and tour, some bloggers decided to create a cook book. Jenny created a Save the Children cupcake based on the peanut paste that is given to malnourished children by Save the Children.

A few of us submitted recipes and ta da, the result is the beautifully illustrated Bake it for Babies Cook Book. I'm delighted to have a recipe published. I made these cakes, from my recipe, for the boys' birthday, for the children to take home from the party at our local farm centre.

The best indictment of how wonderful this book is, is that when I lent it to my mum she didn't realise that I was showing her because I had a recipe published (her noisy grandchildren had just arrived). When she returned the book a week later she said she'd copied down four of the recipes to try.

It would make a lovely xmas present....

Bake it for Babies is available from Lulu. All proceeds to Save the Children.

Bake it for Babies - Changing the World One Cupcake at a Time

Recipe for Chocolate Cupcakes with a Salted Butter Fudge Frosting

My friend, Jen, reminded me today that I never used to bake. I've only really been a wannabe domestic goddess for a few months. Now I made cookies, cakes and soda bread on a regular basis. I have two willing assistants too. Presley and Cash love to measure all of the ingredients (and taste each one while my back is turned). They love mixing and rolling and cutting and shaping and - of course - licking the spoon.

I'd rather my children ate something home made instead of shop bought (if they're having a sweet treat). We're getting there.

Today I made these amazing chocolate cakes. I adapted the recipe from 200 Cupcakes by Joanna Farrow. The cake underneath is dark and quite simply chocolatey, and the frosting is rich and sweet with a hint of salt (from the butter). They are grown-up cupcakes that your children will enjoy too.

Chocolate Cupcakes with a Salted Butter Fudge Frosting

Cupcakes
125g butter
150g soft brown sugar
2 eggs
100g self-raising flour
50g cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking powder

• Preheat over to 180c/Gas mark 4. 
• Put 12 cases in a cake tin.
• Use the all-in-one method and mix all the ingredients until the mixture turns pale and fluffy. I used my hand-held electric mixer.
• Spoon into the cases and bake for 20 minutes.

Frosting
100g milk chocolate, chopped
2 tbsp milk
50g butter
75g icing sugar

• Gently heat the chocolate, milk and butter in a pan, stirring until the chocolate and butter has melted.
• Remove from the heat and vigorously stir in the icing sugar.
• Spread over the cakes while they and the frosting are both still warm.

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Recipe for Chocolate Cupcakes with a Salted Butter Fudge Frosting

The Best Cheese on Toast in the World Ever!

I can read your minds, you know.

"Oh Sandy, why are you telling us how to make cheese on toast? We know how to make cheese on toast."

Of course you do.

We can all make cheese on toast, but this is no ordinary cheese on toast. Oh no, this is the best cheese on toast in the world EVER!

Ingredients
Bread
Butter
Marmite
Salad cream
Sliced tomatoes
Dried mixed herbs
Salt and white pepper (optional)
Sliced or grated cheddar cheese (compulsory)

Method
Toast the bread fully on one side and a tiny bit on the other side to stop it going soggy
Spread with butter, then marmite, then salad cream

Add a layer of tomatoes, a sprinkling of dried mixed herbs, and season

Finally add the cheese and put under the grill

EAT!

You're welcome.



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The Best Cheese on Toast in the World Ever!

Roasted Veg Recipes

I adore roasted veg, although I have to admit it's a little tedious chopping these

into this

When I roast veg I usually use both my roasting tins and make loads and loads and loads.

Did I mention that I adore roasted veg? Aside from the fact that it tastes amazing, it is also good for you. It's vegetables. Depending on your portion size, I'm guessing you could get your five-a-day on your plate quite easily.

My choice of vegetables (chopped into 1cm cubes):

Butternut squash (peeled)
Sweet potato (peeled)
Courgette
Aubergine
Red pepper (deseeded)
Yellow pepper (deseeded)
Green pepper (deseeded)
Onion (peeled)

I season with salt and pepper and add fresh or dried basil.

I then drizzle generously with olive oil and mix well.

I always add a whole bulb of garlic to each tin, as individual, unpeeled cloves. These roast along with the veg and give the most amazing flavour. Roasted garlic tastes different from normal cooked garlic.

I roast my veg at 200 degrees for 40 minutes to an hour, until it's soft.

When the veg is cooked take out the garlic cloves. It is helpful to count them in and out again. Squeeze the soft roasted garlic out of each clove and either simply serve with your roasted veg or use in a sauce.

Here are a few recipe ideas that make the most of all that lovely roasted veg.


Roasted Veg and Pinenut Lasagne

Ingredients:
Roasted veg (as above)
Roasted garlic (as above, mashed)
45g Pinenuts
Lasagne sheets
400g Passata
250g Mascarpone cheese
50g Cheddar cheese (grated)
50g Italian hard cheese (grated)
125g Mozzarella (sliced)

Method:
Heat the mascarpone, stirring until it becomes liquid. Stir in the roasted garlic and the passata

Layer the lasagne in a dish. Start with 1/3 of the roasted veg, sprinkle this with 1/3 of the pinenuts, followed by 1/3 of the lasagne sheets, then 1/3 of the tomato and mascarpone sauce. Repeat this process two more times.

Top with the grated and sliced cheeses

Place in the oven (pre-heated to 200 degrees) for 40 minutes

Serve with salad

Pasta Bake

This uses the same ingredients as the lasagne, but with pasta shapes instead of lasagne sheets.

Method:

Make the tomato and mascarpone sauce (as above)

Stir in cooked pasta (75g per person - dried weight) and the roasted veg

Pour into an oven-proof dish

Top with the grated and sliced cheeses

Place in the oven (pre-heated to 200 degrees) for 30 minutes

In this version the roasted veg will break up as you stir it into the sauce. Perfect for any veg-shy children!

Roasted Veg, Halloumi and Minted Couscous

50g Couscous per person (dried weight)

Chopped fresh mint or a tablespoon of prepared mint sauce

Large knob of butter

Roasted veg

Roasted garlic

75g Halloumi per person

Method:

Prepare the couscous as instructed, then stir in the butter and the mint

Top with hot roasted veg, roasted garlic and roasted Halloumi (chop into 1cm cubes and add to the tin of roasted veg for the last 5 minutes of cooking)

Puff Pastry Tarts

Roll out ready-made puff pastry. Cut into 4 squares (to serve 4). Top with roasted veg, pinenuts and cheese, leaving a 2cm border around the edge. Cook in the oven as per the pastry instructions.

Filo Parcels

Prepare large squares of ready-made filo pastry (a couple of layers should be enough). Fill with roasted veg and cubed feta cheese. Gather up the edges of the pastry and scrunch at the top to seal. Cook in the oven as per the pastry instructions.

Wraps

Roasted veg works really well in wraps. You can also add left-over roast chicken or cheese or couscous or all of the above.

With Salmon and Rice

Bake salmon fillets in the oven for 30 minutes in a tin foil parcel containing lemons, olive oil, butter, a little white wine or water, seasoning and basil.  Serve with rice and roasted veg. This works best with peppers, onion, courgette and aubergine.

Roasted Veg Recipes