Orange and Coconut Cake

Winter has been in full swing over the last week or so and I have been feeling a bit under the weather and craving a boost of vitamin c, this cake was the answer! It is light, moist, delicious and reminds me of summer.

Ingredients:
Cake
125g butter, softened
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
Finely grated zest of one orange
The juice of one orange (4-5 tablespoons)
125g sour cream
1 cup self raising flour
1 cup desiccated coconut

Glaze
2 tablespoons butter, softened
3-5 tablespoons hot water
1-11/2 cups icing sugar, sifted
3 tablespoons orange juice

Method:
Pre-heat your oven to 180C and grease and line a 20cm to square cake tin.
Cream together butter and sugar until it is light and fluffy.
Add in eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
Add orange zest and sour cream and mix until combined.
Fold in the flour and coconut.
Pour the mixture into your prepared tin and bake for 30-35 minutes, until your cake is a light golden colour and you can insert a skewer and remove it cleanly.
Once cooked remove from the oven and cool in the tin for 10-15 minutes before turning the cake out onto a cooling rack to cool completely.
Once cool, pour glaze onto the centre of the cake and use the back of a spoon to move it towards the edges.
To make the glaze place butter, 3 tablespoons of hot water, 1 cup of icing sugar and orange juice in a small bowl and stir to combine. To thicken your glaze add more icing sugar or to thin use a little more hot water.

I hope you enjoy this cake as much as I have, I am sure this is one I will make again and again. This cake is good on its own but can be served with some thick vanilla yoghurt or cream on the side. Also, if you are like me and can’t wait to dig in this cake is amazing warm!

Raspberry and Vanilla Mini Muffins

These Raspberry and Vanilla Mini Muffins are so cute, and so yummy!  They are quick and easy to make and are a great little treat.

Makes 24.

1 ½ cups self raising flour
⅓ cup caster sugar
1 cup reduced fat vanilla yoghurt
80g reduced fat margarine or butter, melted
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
½ cup frozen raspberries

Preheat the oven to 180°C.  Grease two 12 hole mini muffin tins.
Mix the flour and sugar together in a large bowl.  Add the yoghurt, margarine, egg and vanilla to the flour and stir until combined.
Roughly chop the raspberries, and then fold through the mixture.
Fill the muffin holes with the mixture.  Bake for approximately 18 minutes or until the tops of the muffins are golden.  Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.  If you like, dust with icing sugar before serving.

Surprise Cookies

These are another recipe inspired by Pinterest, I stumbled across them while looking for ideas for a cookie swap I am going to next month. From what I have read, the original idea came from domestic goddess Martha Stewart. They are a lovely soft cookie and once iced you have no idea about the treat hidden inside!

Ingredients:
Cookies
2 cups flour
½ cup cocoa
½ teaspoon baking soda
sprinkle of salt
115 grams butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
½ cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
12-14 large marshmallows, cut in half horizontally

Basic Chocolate Icing
2 cups icing sugar, sifted
¼ cup cocoa, sifted
25 grams butter, softened
4-6 tablespoons of hot water

Method:
Preheat oven to 180C and line x2 baking trays with wax baking paper. 
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add egg, milk, and vanilla, and beat until well combined.
Sift in flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt, mix on low speed until combined.
Using a tablespoon or small ice cream scoop, drop dough onto your lined baking trays, about 5cm apart.
Bake until cookies begin to spread and become firm, 10 to 12 minutes.
Remove baking trays from the oven, and place a marshmallow, cut-side down, in the centre of each cookie, pressing down slightly.
Return to oven for 2 minutes so that the marshmallows begin to melt.
Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool completely before frosting.
To make the chocolate icing place butter in a medium sized bowl with the icing sugar and cocoa, add hot water and stir with a large spoon to combine.
Place about 1 tablespoon of chocolate icing on the centre of each cookie (over the marshmallow), spread it outward until marshmallow is covered.

These are easy, delicious and cute! If you wanted to do a gender reveal (and were having a baby girl or could locate/make blue marshmallows) and cakes aren’t your thing these would be a great alternative. Regardless of the reason for making them these special cookies masquerading as a run of the mill chocolate cookie are sure to impress!

PushPan Giveaway Winners

We have our three lucky winners!  Each winner will receive a PushPan pack with three different sized tins, valued at a total of $199.90 each.  The winners (chosen using the random.org number generator) are:

# 90 – Michelle Bird
# 207 – Rachelle Kershaw
# 135 – Samantha Minny

We need to hear from our winners by 5pm on Friday 17th May, or the prize will be re-drawn. 

Thank you to everyone who entered and a huge thank you to PushPan for the prize!  Check out their pinterest boards for plenty of inspiration for beautiful cakes you can make using their pans.

 

Easy Muesli Bars

With school having been back a week already (crazy how fast time goes), I thought I would share another muesli bar recipe.  These Easy Muesli Bars make a great addition to any lunchbox and the recipe makes quite a few, so hopefully you’ll have some for a few days at least!
You can throw whatever nuts and seeds you like into this recipe.  I lazily scooped pre-mixed nuts and seeds out of the bulk bin at the supermarket to use, but you could buy individual quantities of just your favourites.  I added in dried cranberries, but again, you could swap these for your fave dried fruit; apricots, banana chip pieces, sultanas…

2 ½ cups rolled oats
½ cup shredded coconut
2 cups mixed nuts, chopped
1 cup mixed seeds
¼ cup chia seeds
¼ cup chocolate chips, optional
1cup dried cranberries
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup honey
½ cup peanut butter
½ brown sugar*

Preheat the oven to 180°C.  Grease and line a 22 x 22 cm tin with baking paper.
In a large bowl, mix together the oats, coconut, nuts, seeds, chocolate chips and cranberries.
In a medium sized saucepan over a low heat, mix together the salt, cinnamon, vanilla, honey, peanut butter and sugar until smooth.
Pour the syrup mixture into the dry mixture and mix through until all the dry mixture has been coated by the syrup.
Press the mixture into the prepared tin and bake for approximately 30 minutes, until the top is golden.  Allow the muesli slab to cool in the tin before cutting into bars.  Store in an airtight container.

*I used Billington’s Light Muscovado Unrefinded Cane Sugar.  You can use normal brown sugar if you wish.

Baking Basics eBook!

We are so excited to announce that we have produced a Baking Basics eBook that is available for purchase.  The eBook covers some of the basics of baking biscuits, cupcakes and muffins, cakes and slices, what equipment you should have, troubleshooting guides for when things go wrong and 12 easy to follow recipes for those who are new to baking.

This is something we have been working on for a little now.  We are both really proud of the finished product and hope that you love it as much as we do.  Usually, you can purchase your copy here for $8, but, because we love you and want to thank you for the awesome support you show us we are offering a special introductory price of $5 for the next 48 hours!

We want to give a special thanks to go to our family and friends who proofread and gave us feedback on the eBook.  Also, thank you to Amanda from the Vintage Table who lent us some of the lovely pieces you will see our cakes displayed on in the book.  You should also all know that Mel did all the design work for the eBook - isn't she a clever cookie?!  Thank you, if it was left up to me it would have looked pretty boring!

So, want to get yourself a copy?  Or give one as a gift?  Click here to be taken over to our shop.