Foodie Friday: Jubilee Cupcakes

Whoaaaa it's been ages since I did a Foodie Friday post. Oops! Today is a special one to celebrate the Queen's upcoming Jubilee. A lot of people are having street parties, so if you're stuck for ideas of what to bring, I thought I'd provide a relatively quick and easy - but totally delicious - suggestion: Jubilee cupcakes!

I found this recipe somewhere on the Internet a couple of years ago but can't remember where. I've tried lots of different recipes and this is definitely my favourite, it makes the cakes so light and fluffy. It makes about 20 cupcakes, depending on the size of the cases you use. Speaking of cake cases, I found some Union Jack and crown cases in Lakeland recently which I highly recommend to make your cakes look even more Jubilicious!

Ingredients:

For the sponge
80g unsalted butter, softened
280g caster sugar
240g plain flour
1 tbsp baking powder
Pinch of salt
240ml milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs

For the icing
250g icing sugar
80g unsalted butter
25ml milk
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Red, white and blue sprinkles

1. Preheat the oven to 190C/375F and line two cupcake tins with cupcakes.
2. Whisk together the butter and sugar until perfectly combined - it should look a bit like breadcrumbs. Add the flour, baking powder and salt and mix well.
3. Put the milk, eggs and vanilla extract in a jug and mix together by hand. With your whisk on a low speed, add three quarters of this to the dry ingredients and combine thoroughly, then add the rest of the mixture and whisk on a medium setting until smooth. It will be quite runny, more like a batter than your usual cake mix, but this is what makes the cakes so fluffy!
4. Spoon the cake mixture into the cases so they're about two-thirds full. Bake for about 20 minutes in the oven - but keep a close eye on them! If the cakes feel springy when you touch them, then they're ready. Leave to cool.
5. In a clean bowl, whisk the icing sugar and butter together until they look sandy (just take my word for it). Add the milk and vanilla extract, and whisk until the icing is light and fluffy. I usually like to do this for at least a couple of minutes. At this point you can add food colouring - red or blue, perhaps? - if you want to, but I chose to leave mine white.
6. Using a knife (or a palette knife, if you have one), spread the icing on the top of the cakes. Finally, add your sprinkles or whatever else you want to use to decorate your cakes (I used red, white and blue sugar sprinkles from Lakeland). I also added little Jubilee flags to each one.
7. Put your feet up and eat one of your delicious cupcakes - for, ahem, quality control purposes, of course!

Foodie Friday: Vanilla Fudge

Happy Foodie Friday! Today I'm going to show you how to make vanilla fudge. I started making fudge in December last year when I was unemployed and broke (now I'm employed and, er, still broke). I couldn't afford to buy everyone amazing Christmas presents and, as I had so much free time on my hands, I decided to go the handmade route instead. It took a bit of practice to get the hang of making fudge, but with my tips and tricks, you'll be able to get it right first time!

I've tried a couple of different recipes in my quest to make perfect fudge, and by far my favourite is Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's from his River Cottage Everyday book. (Off topic: My mum and I adore Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall - we watch all his programmes on the telly. Mum was devastated when he cut his hair short!) The recipe will make 35-40 squares. Like I said, it's Hugh's recipe, but my instructions.

Ingredients:
300g caster sugar
1 tbsp golden syrup
100g unsalted butter
100ml double cream
1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Using butter or margarine, lightly oil a 20x20cm (or similar) baking dish, and line the bottom with greaseproof paper.
2. Put the sugar, golden syrup, butter and cream in a heavy-based saucepan. You want quite a large saucepan as the mixture will bubble up a lot when it boils. Heat very gently and stir frequently until the butter has melted and the sugar has completely dissolved.
3. If you have a sugar thermometer, put it in the pan now. Turn up the heat and let the mixture boil hard - don't stir it at this stage, leave it to do its thing until it has bubbled up nicely. You need to do this until your sugar thermometer registers 116C/240F, which can take several minutes. If you don't have a sugar thermometer (I don't), fear not! Get a glass of cold water and add a few drops of the mixture to it. If you can form these drops into a ball with your fingers, and it flattens when you take your hand out of the water, the fudge is ready. This is called the 'soft ball' stage. Another clue as to when it's ready is that the mixture darkens a bit in colour. Take the saucepan off the heat and leave to stand for about 10 minutes.
4. Add the vanilla extract and beat the mixture hard. You need to do this for quite a while, 10 minutes or more usually, until the mixture thickens and becomes grainy. This is where my fudge kept going wrong - I didn't realise you had to beat it for quite so long, and I lacked the patience (and energy!) to beat it by hand for such a long time, so often my finished product was far too soft and just kind of...melted. I always use an electric whisk now and it's so much easier - you still have to whisk it for about five minutes, but it requires a lot less arm muscle!
5. When the mixture has thickened, pour it into your baking dish and smooth the top with the back of a spoon. Let it harden a bit before marking into squares, and leave to set for 2-4 hours.

So there you have it. A fool-proof fudge recipe. You can make your own variants too, like chocolate or pecan or cherry or whatever. For Christmas last year I put some in cellophane bags I bought from Lakeland and tied them with pretty ribbons to make thoughtful but inexpensive presents. Or you could just eat it all yourself!

Foodie Friday: Amaretti Biscuits

As well as nail polish, one of my other great passions is baking. I love making cakes and biscuits and whatnot - not only because I can eat the end result, but because it gives me great pleasure to see family and friends enjoying my food. I thought I'd share one of my favourite recipes with you today. Not only is it so quick and easy that anyone can do it, but the biscuits taste bloody brilliant, too!

Amaretti biscuits are almond-flavoured macaroons from Italy. The ones you buy in shops tend to be hard and crunchy, but fresh ones are moister and chewier. They go brilliantly with a cup of tea or coffee, but I also like I eat them on their own. This isn't my recipe, I found it online somewhere a few years ago and have been whipping them up regularly ever since. It makes anywhere between 20 to 30 biscuits, depending on what size you choose to make them.

Ingredients:
4 eggs, whites only
340g ground almonds
340g caster sugar
40ml Amaretto liqueur or almond essence

1. Preheat the oven to 170C/gas mark 3. Separate the egg whites into a bowl and beat until firm (I use an electric whisk because I'm lazy!).
2. Mix in the ground almonds and caster sugar gently. The egg whites are the only raising agent in these biscuits, so you want to try and keep as much air in the mixture as possible.
3. Fold in the amaretto liqueur or almond essence until it makes a smooth paste.
4. Place some greaseproof paper on a baking sheet. Put teaspoons of the mixture onto the paper about 2cm apart. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes until golden brown.
5. Eat and enjoy!