Raspberry and Lemon No-Bake Cheesecake

These are great for a summer dinner party or BBQ! This is a fresher, creamier take on the cheesecake mousse I made last year. They are quick to whip up and can be made in advance so that all you have to do come dessert time is bring them out to impress your guests!

Ingredients:
’Cheesecake’
250 grams cream cheese, softened
200 grams mascarpone
zest of a small lemon
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon vanilla paste
1/2 cup frozen raspberries, partially thawed
Base
10 double choc cookies
2 tablespoons butter, melted

Method:
To make the base place your biscuits into a food processor and whizz until they are crumb like. Place in a bowl and combine with melted butter.
Evenly divide your biscuit crumbs into four serving glasses and set aside.
Beat lemon zest and sugar together, this will infuse flavour.
Add cream cheese to your lemon infused sugar and mix until smooth.
Add vanilla, lemon juice and half mascarpone and mix.
Fold through the rest of the mascarpone.
Fold through raspberries.
Divide the mix between your four serving glasses and refrigerate for at least 2 hours. The thawed raspberries will firm up again which is perfect!
These can be served as is or jazzed up with a spring of mint and some chocolate sticks as shown here,

Pear, Walnut and White Chocolate Muffins

These Pear, Walnut and White Chocolate Muffins are delish; the pear makes them really moist and the walnut and white chocolate compliments the fruit perfectly.  We had some pears sitting around going uneaten, but once transformed into these muffins, they were gone in a flash!  My Nana tried them while she was up in Auckland over Christmas and I have had to send her the recipe too.

Ingredients:
½ cup walnuts, finely chopped
1 cup flour
⅓ cup wholemeal flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
⅔ cup packed brown sugar
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
1 cup plain yogurt
1 large egg
1 ½ cups finely diced peeled pears
½ cup white chocolate bits
1 tablespoon sugar
½ teaspoon cinnamon

Method:
Preheat the oven to 180°C.  Grease or line a 12 cup muffin tin with muffin papers.
In a medium sized bowl, mix the flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt together. Stir in the walnuts and make a well in centre of mixture.
Combine the brown sugar, oil, vanilla essence, yogurt and egg in a small bowl.  Add the wet mixture to the flour mixture, stirring just until moist.  Fold in diced pear and white chocolate.
Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin tin.  Mix together the sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar over the muffin batter.  Bake the muffins for 20 minutes or until the muffins spring back when touched lightly in centre.  Leave to cool in the muffin tin for five minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

It’s A Party Y’all!

If you have been following our blog for a while you will know that I am big on parties, I love birthdays (Christmas, Easter – anything that calls for gatherings, decorations and food!) and having Max makes birthdays so much cooler. It wasn’t long after last year’s ‘Robots and Rockets’ party that we decided on a cowboy party for Max’s second birthday, I pinned up lots of cute ideas which helped me put the party together.

I decided on a red, blue and bright green colour scheme – these colours come out of the tee-pee we got Max for Christmas which was at the centre of our ‘campsite’ area and was surrounded by hay bales which helped to set the tone/look of the party. Other decorations included some balloons in our colour scheme with the addition of a cow print balloon with each bunch. I made two buntings, one to go along the railing of our deck out of red and blue bandanas and one made from an old coffee sack which I painted Max’s name onto and placed on the food table. I also made some cacti and directional signs made from old moving boxes and painted with test pots from our local paint shop.

In terms of food I made cowboy cookies, red velvet cupcakes (the cute gingham cupcake cases are from The Pretty Baker, which is also what was used to make the bunting on the cake – they have an amazing selection of things that will make your party that much more special) and smores pops, we put together fruit platters, made fairy bread shaped like cacti and Marmite sandwiches in the shape of cows. We served savouries in the form of cheerios, sausage rolls, chicken nuggets and wedges with sour cream and bacon. I served popcorn in cute recycled wood cones, they are from PopRoc Parties as are the crates. Drinks were all served out of mini milk bottles with stripped paper straws and wrapped with bakers twine.

The cake was a four layer easy peasy chocolate cake sandwiched together and covered with vanilla butter cream. I used black fondant to cut out splotches so it created a cow pattern and placed M&M’s around the base.

We decided on a pick n mix your own loot bag station it was fun for the adults and the kids and much more cost effective than buying little toys to thank each of the kids for coming.

For fun we set up a photo booth using a cheap white sheet and our clothes line, there was a shooting range where the kids used a water gun to shoot tin cans, a watering hole for paddling in and some home made hobby horses using this template.

Max seemed to have a great day which is the most important thing and I as happy with how everything turned out. Now I’m thinking about next year! What are your favourite themes for kids parties? Leave us a comment here or on facebook to let us know.

KitchenAid Giveaway Winner

The lucky person to win our KitchenAid giveaway is…

Jeanna Berriman

We used a random number generator to pick our winner at random – it spat out number 57 at us, which counting down the comments gives us Jeanna.  Congratulations Jeanna!

Thank you so very much to everyone who entered.  It was really heart warming reading your comments and finding out what recipes you enjoy off the blog.

Please, if you haven’t already, help us say thank you for such a great prize by sending the folk at KitchenAid an appreciative message on twitter.  If you want to get dreaming about all the attachments you want to go with your new mixer, check out the KitchenAid website or sign up to their newsletter to get all the latest KitchenAid recipes and info to your inbox.

Once again, thank you to everyone who entered and to KitchenAid, and congratulations to Jeanna.

Strawberry Champagne Cupcakes

Don’t they sound amazing? The tasted pretty darn good too! My gorgeous cousin Ree got married a couple of weekends ago and a few weeks before the wedding I was asked to do some baking for her bridal shower, it was a lovely afternoon and I wanted to make something that had a summery yet celebratory/romantic flavour and feel, strawberries are quintessentially summer and it’s not a celebration without bubbly. These are so easy to whip up because I kinda cheated… Because of the quickness and ease of this recipe they might be good to whip up for Valentine’s Day this week – you can always enjoy any left over bubbly with a loved one!

Ingredients:
Cupcakes
1 box Betty Crocker Strawberry and Cream cake mix
3/4 cup Champagne (in place of water)
3 Eggs
1/4 cup canola oil
2-3 drops pink food colouring

Champagne Butter Cream
150 grams butter, softened
3-4 cups icing sugar
1/3 cup champagne
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
4-6 drops pink food colouring

Method:
Pre-heat your oven to 150°C and place 18-20 cupcake papers into muffin tins.
Follow the instructions on the package replacing the water with champagne.
Once you have made your batter half fill each cupcake cake (you would generally fill to 2/3 but the champagne seems to give a lighter higher cupcake).
Bake for 12-15 minutes or until you can touch a cupcake in the centre and they bounce back or you can insert a skewer and it is removed cleanly.
Remove from the oven and cool on wire racks.
Once your cupcakes are cool make your buttercream.
To make the buttercream beat butter until it is light and fluffy. Add 2 cups icing sugar, vanilla and half the champagne and beat until smooth. Add remaining icing sugar and champagne and mix. Drop in food colouring until you have the colour you desire. Spread or pipe (I used a Wilton 2D tip) onto cupcakes, decorate as you desire.


I think these cupcakes are perfect for a girly celebration! They are beautifully moist and if you have any left they will keep well for a few days in an airtight container. I also thought I’d share the above picture with you all, at the bridal shower I got to hang out with Amanda, the lovely lady behind The Vintage Table, she provided all the gorgeous trios that we sipped tea from between glasses of punch and bubbles – turns out here in NZ there really is only two degrees of separation – Amanda and Ree have known each other since primary school! The vintage trios really helped set the tone for what was a lovely afternoon, celebrating one of the loveliest ladies I know.

Congratualtions on your marriage Ree and Carl xox

French Potato Tart

We had an amazing Christmas last year! Shane, Max and I ended up hosting my Mum and sisters at our house for a delicious lunch, my sister Meredith did an amazing ham and I did desserts and side dishes. One of the side dishes was this potato tart, it was inspired by a recipe in the Christmas edition of Food Magazine – Meredith and I had a great time scouring magazines for food ideas. I changed it up a bit to suit our tastes and it was a hit, easy and delicious! It is the perfect addition to your table next time you are entertaining guests.

Ingredients:
2 sheets flaky puff pastry, thawed
1 egg lightly beaten
2-3 medium-large sized potatoes, thinly sliced
150 grams of spreadable cream cheese
2 sprigs of fresh rosemary, finely cut
1/2 cup grated cheese
A drizzle of olive oil
shavings of parmesan to sprinkle on top
salt and pepper to season

Method:
Pre-heat your oven to 180°C and line a baking tray with wax paper.
Place pastry sheets on top, overlapping each other in the middle , seal with beaten egg. Fold all sides in 1cm and brush with egg and press with a fork to seal. Prick the base all over with a fork and press the fork, this will stop the pastry from rising.
Spread the cream cheese all over the base, sprinkle with half the rosemary and salt and pepper.
Place potatoes in a single layer so that they just overlap. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle the grated cheese and remaining rosemary, season with salt and pepper.
Bake for 30-35 minutes until pastry is puffed and golden and the potatoes are cooked.
To serve cut into 8 large squares and sprinkle shaving of parmesan.

KitchenAid Giveaway!

It's our birthday this month!  Can you believe that BMTB is 3?!  Over the last few years we have shared over 300 recipes with you all, many of them have been made in our freestanding mixers.  We both believe that these little beauties really do make baking better and freestanding mixers don't come any better than the KitchenAid Stand Mixers.
So even though it is our birthday, one of you lucky readers are going to get the best present any baker could ask for…

A KitchenAid Artisan Stand Mixer!

We are very excited to announce that KitchenAid have given us one of their KitchenAid Artisan Stand Mixers (RRP NZ$995.00) to giveaway.  And, the winner gets to choose what colour they would like.  There’s White, Almond Cream, Empire Red, Black, Cobalt Blue, Yellow Pepper or Green Apple to pick from.  Cool huh?!


A KitchenAid Stand Mixer is a baker’s dream come true.  It will save you time and energy, while providing outstanding results.  In fact, the unique planetary mixing action allows the beater to spiral to 67 different points on the bowl for quick and complete mixing.  That’s the highest beater-to-bowl coverage in the industry!  Also, the trademark hub allows for the attachment of numerous accessories, allowing your mixer to be transformed into a pasta machine, meat grinder, ice cream machine, vegetable slice, sausage maker and much more.

Help us say thank you for such a great prize by sending the folk at KitchenAid an appreciative message on twitter.  If you want to get dreaming about all the attachments you want to go with your new mixer, check out the KitchenAid website or sign up to their newsletter to get all the latest KitchenAid recipes and info to your inbox.

To enter, leave us a comment below (click where it says ‘comments’ next to the ‘posted by’ information) telling us what colour you would like and your favourite recipe from Baking Makes Things Better.  Make sure you include your name and either leave your email address, like us on facebook or follow the blog so you can find out if you have won.
The giveaway closes 5pm Thursday 14th February.  We will announce the winner on Friday 15th February on our blog and facebook.  The giveaway is open to New Zealand residents only. The winner will be chosen at random and contacted once the competition closes. If we have not been able to contact a winner by 5pm Monday 18th February, the prize will be re-drawn.