Pink Ribbon Cupcakes

I wanted to make something for Pink Ribbon day but was was in a bit of a hurry and didn't really have time to come up with something fun and interesting. As you can see, my frosting efforts need A LOT of practice. Considering this was the first time I'd made cupcakes in a very long time and the first time I'd used a piping bag in a very long time I don't think they look too awful and anyway, people were so enchanted by the pink sugar glitter they didn't notice anything else.



Liz’s Carrot and Banana Cupcakes

Ingredients
150ml/ 1/4 pint mild flavoured oil (I used rice bran)
250g/8oz self raising wholemeal flour
2 tsp baking powder
150g/5oz light muscovado sugar (I used brown sugar)
60g/2 oz walnuts, coarsely chopped
125g/4oz carrots, grated (I used 2 medium sized carrots)
2 ripe bananas, mashed
2 eggs
1 tablespoon milk

Method
Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl
Mix well until thoroughly combined
Spoon into cupcake papers
Bake at 180C/350F for 20-30 minutes or until they test done
Note - this will depend on the size of your cupcakes. Mine were quite large as I only got 10 cakes from the mixture. They took about 30 minutes
Transfer to a wire rack to cool
Decorate as desired

ANZAC Self-saucing Pudding

I'm really behind in my posting and completely overdue to share my adventures in the kitchen creating the Daring Bakers' April Challenge. To tide you over here's a recipe I made over ANZAC weekend in keeping with the ANZAC-ey theme of coconut and rolled oats. It's a really old fashioned, comforting pud and when my husband takes a second helping of dessert it's high praise indeed. Golden syrup, butter and hot water form a delicious caramel-like sauce. You could probably substitute maple syrup if you're unable to find golden syrup where you live. The recipe says it serves 4-5 and while that's true, I feel that the recipe doesn't make enough sauce for my taste. Your options? Half the pudding or double the sauce! I didn't decide to half the recipe until I had all the dry ingredients in the bowl so all I did was divide it in half and put one portion in a ziplock bag in the freezer. I then halved the milk measurement but used a whole egg as it's kinda hard to half a raw egg.

You'll find the recipe on the Taste magazine website.

But wait.... there's more .....

The next weekend when I was again in the mood to make a warming winter pud I got creative with the leftover batch of pudding mix. I melted some butter (about 100g I think) and mixed it with some brown sugar which I spread over the bottom of a pyrex baking dish. Then I sliced some bananas which were past their best for eating and squeezed over some fresh lime juice to cut the richness of the butter and sugar. I added milk and egg to the pudding mix and blobbed it over the top. No time for photos after it was baked but here's what it looked like prior to the addition of the pudding. It was very nice but I think I prefer my ANZAC self-saucing pudding straight up.

A Taste of Yellow

Finally updated with photos..........

Barbara of Winos and Foodies has organised this one off event in support of LiveSTRONG Day.

LiveSTRONG Day is the Lance Armstrong Foundation's (LAF) grassroots advocacy initiative to unify people affected by cancer and to raise awareness about cancer survivorship issues on a national level and in local communities across the country. LiveSTRONG Day 2007 will occur on Wednesday, May 16.

The A Taste of Yellow has been approved by the Lance Armstrong Foundation as an official LiveSTRONG Day event. Barbara is organising the event to raise awareness of cancer. However if you wish to make a donation you can do so by visiting the Lance Armstrong Foundation donation page.

Barbara's challenge was to make something using a yellow ingredient and the first thing that sprung to my mind was of course cake! I had 6 egg yolks left from the latest Daring Bakers challenge which just cried out to be used for a "yellow cake". Unfortunately I wasn't really paying attention to the recipe which called for sifted flour as opposed to flour, siftted and yes it does make a difference. The first clue was when the batter was so thick my beater was struggling to mix it. Usually when I have a bit of a disaster I just tell everyone that my recipe was experimental and I've never had any complaints but this cake was a little on the dry side. I thought that if I slathered it in chocolate frosting people might not notice but even frosted with a delicious chocolate "gana-icing" (a combination of some leftover ganache and some icing sugar) the cake was not good. In doing my research on yellow cakes I discovered that the traditional frosting is chocolate and I can't quite work that out. The taste of the cake is plainish with a hint of vanilla. I would have used a lemon frosting.


Since I was getting ready to go on vacation time was marching on and I worried that I wouldn't have anything to contribute to this event but then I remembered something I'd saved as a draft. It's a potato and lentil curry and the lentils are the yellow kind so technically it still fits with the theme. The recipe is from Taste magazine and you can find it here. Basically it's a thick, soupy concoction of spices, lentils, tomatoes and potatoes. It's quite delicious and I'll be making it again especially now our weather is getting cooler.



I served it with poppadums and some raita which I made without a recipe. The instructions go a little like this.

Raita

Ingredients
Lebanese cucumber
Plain unsweetened yoghurt
Pinch of chilli
Salt
Cumin seeds

Method
Grate a quantity of Lebanese cucumber and squeeze it with your hands to expel as much liquid as possible
Mix in plain yoghurt to desired consistency
Season to taste

OK so I weakened; I really wanted to do something cakey for this event. I had some bananas in my fruit bowl which were going nicely spotty and soft. A banana is yellow is it not? I used Dorie Greenspan's recipe which I first heard of through Lisa. It is THE moistest banana cake you'll ever make. Due no doubt to the cup of sour cream in the mixture. Most of Dorie's recipes call for a 12 cup bundt pan and mine is a lot smaller. As luck would have it my mother recently gave me - ok - so I spied it in her cupboard and said "oh look a baby bundt pan" and of course mum offered it to me. It belonged to Nana and is one of those old fashioned light coloured aluminium ones. The combination of my regular bundt pan and the mini one were perfect for Dorie's recipe.


You can find the recipe on Lisa's blog at La Mia Cucina. I know I'm being lazy today but I guess that's what being 2 hours away from catching a plane does to you.

Muffin Monday - Banana Chocolate Chip

I saw an announcement on Is My Blog Burning? for a one off event called Muffin Monday hosted by Elena of experiments and I thought to myself - hey something I can actually do! Instead of using Elena's basic recipe I went with something from one of my trusted recipe books. Only thing was that I didn't have any eggs. Did I let that stop me? No way! I decided to go for a banana muffin recipe because I figured that the bananas would do a fine job of keeping the muffins moist. While I didn't try the finished product myself as I'm restricting my intake of sweet stuff, my co-workers all pronounced the muffins "yummy". I know you'd be disappointed if I hadn't played around with the dairy and I haven't let you down today. I had some left over lite evaporated milk in the fridge so used half a cup of that together with half a cup of non fat milk. Whether that made any difference to the finished product I'll never know. Also, I took Lis's suggestion of adding some cinnamon to the mix. One taster commented on it so it must have been a pleasant addition.


Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins
Adapted from Simon and Alison Holst's 100 Muffins and Slices cookbook
Makes 12 muffins

Ingredients
100 grams (3 1/2 oz) butter, melted
2-3 ripe bananas (you need approx 1 cup)
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Method
In a large bowl mix together melted butter, mashed banana, vanilla essence and milk
In another bowl mix together the flour, baking powder, sugar and chocolate chips
Tip the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and mix until just combined
Do not overmix or else you will end up with tough, peak topped muffins
Spoon into prepared muffin pan
Bake in a preheated 220 C/430 F oven for 10-12 minutes
Leave in muffin pan for 5 minutes before turning out to cool on a wire rack