Homemade Scones

I have never been fond of shop bought scones as they just never taste anything like homemade. Homemade scones are amazing, especially warm out the oven and covered with jam and a dollop of cream. You can't beat them! They're so easy to make, especially if you have a stand mixer as you don't even have to use your hands! This scone recipe was passed down to me from my mum, and they are the best scones I have ever tasted - a must try!

 

Recipe (Makes about 7-8 large scones)

1 pound Self Raising Flour + pinch of salt
4oz Margarine
2oz Caster Sugar (+4oz Raisins optional)
2 Eggs

Teaspoon of milk.

 

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees°C. Mix together the flour,sugar and salt and then rub in the margarine.

 



 

 

Whisk together the eggs and the milk and slowly add to the mixture, mixing whilst you pour.

 

 

It should now come together as a nice, smooth dough. The trick to a lovely, well risen scone is to roll it about an inch thick. You don't even have to roll it out seeing as you need it so thick, you could simply press it down to the desired thickness.

 

 

Cut out with a circle cutter of your desired size, and put onto a greased tray.

 

 

 

 Brushing the scone with some leftover egg/milk mixture before it goes into the oven helps the top to go nice and brown when cooked. Pop them in for about 20 minutes.

 

 

 And there you have it, beautiful homemade scones ready to enjoy straight from the oven. Spread on some jam and cream and enjoy! :)

 

 

 

Liddie x

Easter Themed Rocky Road

I'm trying to get in some Easter baking this year after not making anything Easter themed last year. Creme eggs and mini eggs are some of my favourite treats so of course I'm going to try and shove them into everything I bake. Today I tried some mini egg rocky road and they turned out great, lovely taste and they set and hold their shape really well. I sort of made up the recipe myself by looking around at the basic measurements of rocky road - the great thing about them is you can swap and choose which ingredients you want. Plus they are so easy - you don't even have to turn your oven on. Have an experiment!

Recipe

200g milk, dark or half and half chocolate.

2 tbsp golden syrup

130g butter

80g mini marshmallows

100g bag of mini eggs

150g digestives

First, melt together the chocolate, butter and golden syrup. I did this in the microwave - just keep an eye on it and stir at each interval.





Put the digestives in a food bag and bash with a rolling pin. Make sure you've got a variety of sizes - crumbs as well as bigger chunks.

Add the marshmallows and half of the mini eggs.

Pour it into a tray and press in the other half of the mini eggs. Then put it in the fridge and let it set for 2-3 hours. It should be firm enough to cut and hold its shape when it comes out.

And there you have it, Easter themed rocky road! Mini eggs taste amazing in this, but you can change them for anything you think will go. Just try and keep the measurements about the same of whatever you swap them for. Enjoy!

Liddie x

Mother's Day Cupcakes

I went to visit my parents this weekend and as I don't see them very often, I decided to make some early mother's day cupcakes to surprise my mum with. Mother's day isn't until the 30th March in the UK but I knew she'd appreciate a homemade present better than me buying her something!

 

 

 

Here are the designs I came up with. I did three with marshmallow fondant toppings and the other three with buttercream. I also made a little happy mothers day sign for one of the cupcakes, with a little bow at the bottom - I thought it was so cute!

 

 

I also used my rose petal nozzle to pipe this rose, and added a couple of fondant leaves. This nozzle has got to be my absolute favourite. It does take a lot longer to do than a simple swirl and so I wouldn't like to do a lot of them, but it's so much fun to do just one or two and they look so pretty. What do you think of the rose petal nozzle?

 

 

My mum is an artist and when I brought her the cupcakes, the first thing she did was to find a matching painting and take a picture of her cupcakes with the painting. How amazing is her art? She is very talented! Feel free to take a look at her page here if you like the look of her paintings. I absolutely loved making her these cupcakes and they are such a cute idea for a homemade present - I hope I might have given you inspiration for your own cupcakes! :D

 

 

 

Liddie x

Easter Baking - Creme Egg Cupcakes

 

I've been hunting on the internet this week for easter inspired recipes, and I have so many ideas. Our fridge is stocked with creme eggs and mini eggs ready for all the easter baking - perfect procrastination for all my assignment deadlines!

 Today I started off with creme egg cupcakes. I haven't got loads of photo's unfortunately - I didn't have enough icing sugar to ice all the cakes I made and so I only managed to cover two! Those silly big nozzles annoy me where all the buttercream hides in the nozzle - I'm sure all you bakers can understand my frustration! :P Anyway, for these cupcakes I adapted my basic cake recipe to make it chocolate (by taking out a quarter of the flour and replacing with cocoa) plus adding a few drops of milk.

 

Recipe - Makes about 12 cupcakes or 6 without creme egg.

2 eggs

4 ounces margarine

4 ounces caster sugar

3 ounces self raising flour

1 ounce cocoa powder

Teaspoon of milk

 

Pre-heat the oven to 170°C. Fill the cases about a quarter full, and then press a creme egg into the mixture (it will work out better if the creme egg is frozen for a few hours before hand). Then cover up with a bit more mixture, but don't go too over the top or the cupcake will overflow in the oven. Cook for 20-25 minutes.

 

 

For the buttercream icing, I used a basic buttercream recipe (half the amount of butter to icing sugar). I coloured half of it yellow. I put the white buttercream in one side of the piping bag and the yellow into the other side, and squished it down into the nozzle to create a two tone effect. I wish I could have piped onto more cupcakes, but I wasn't going to use my lack of photos as an excuse for not posting this great idea onto my blog. Give them a go!

 

 

Liddie x

 

Chewy Triple Chocolate Cookies

 

 

This recipe was such a good find, which I found on Emma's blog CookBakeEat.com. I was always on the look out for a good chocolate cookie recipe, but the ones I tried always came out sort of cake like. I love the chewy kind that you get in supermarkets, and I could never find out how to make them. Then I found this recipe. Amazingly soft and chewy cookies stuffed with both white and dark chocolate chips - absolutely perfect if you're like me and love chewy cookies. Give them a try and you won't be disappointed!

 

Recipe

 

110g Butter

200g Soft light brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp Vanilla extract

165g Plain flour

Pinch of salt

1/2 tsp Baking powder

1/2 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

30g Cocoa Powder

100g white chocolate chips

100g Dark chocolate chips

 

Firstly, pre-heat your oven to 190°C. Whisk together the butter and the sugar, and then add the egg and vanilla and mix well.

 

 

Add the flour, salt, cocoa, bicarb and baking powder.

 

 

 

You can use chocolate chips but I always chop some myself using a bar of chocolate. Chop up your chocolate and add it to the dough.

 

 

 

Next, divide your dough into 12-16 cookies (depending on the size, I did 12 but they were pretty big!) Roll into balls and then place onto a baking tray, pressing down slightly with a fork. Make sure they're evenly spaced like the photo I've shown you below, or they'll all stick together! Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the cookies have started to crack.

 

 

 

 

Let them cool down on the baking tray before you remove or they'll break apart. And there you have it, beautiful soft and chewy chocolate cookies. I don't think I'll ever get a recipe better than this!

 

 

 

 Liddie x

Mini Victoria Sponge Cakes

I just wanted to share some of the mini victoria sponge cakes I made today. Aren't they adorable!? (If I do say so myself!) I had some cream to use up, and some mini heart tins that I got as a present a while back, so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to make some mini victoria sponges. Seeing as it's just me and my boyfriend in my flat, we can never really try out big cakes or we'd probably be the size of a house by now! But these mini cakes are a great idea if there aren't enough of you to help eat a big cake.

 

 

 

There's a quick snap I took of the cakes just out of the oven. How sweet are those tins?

I used my basic cake recipe, a 2 egg mixture. I then split each cake into two, filled with jam and cream and dusted with icing sugar. I always like to make things extra girly, so decided to add a swirl of cream and a fondant rose for added girliness. Simple but lovely little treats!

 

 

 

 

Liddie x