Carrot and Walnut Cake

Last year I set myself the task of finding the ultimate carrot cake - and I am very pleased to report that I have now found it. The cake that inspired me to find a new recipe was from the Cottonrake Bakery in Glasgow which - in my opinion - has the best carrot cake ever. It's dark brown in colour - which gives it almost a caramel quality to it, contains walnuts (always a plus), its never too dry, and the cream cheese icing isn't overly sweet and has a slight tang to it. Eating it transformed carrot cake for me and turned it into one of my favourite types of cake. In fact, I received an entire one for my 21st birthday earlier in the year and I'm (almost) embarrassed at the amount of it I ate by myself... It really is fantastic and if you're ever in Glasgow then I insist that you go and try for yourself. This recipe however is the closest thing that I've found to Cottonrake's.

the wonderful cake at Cottonrake

I have to say, I felt very proud when I served this cake to my family - it was exactly what I wanted it to be and it has now become my staple carrot cake. It also got rave reviews from my family - in particular my mum who said it was best carrot cake she'd ever had (I know she's my mum and so she may be a tad biased BUT she's also very honest so theres that!). So I hope this works for you, because I am over the moon that I came across this recipe.

My version of the recipe is adapted from The Brick Kitchen's Favourite Carrot Cake - I am very grateful that you posted this.

INGREDIENTS

For the cake:

200g plain flour
1 ½ teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon mixed spice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 eggs
170g caster sugar
170g dark brown sugar
275ml vegetable oil
150g grated carrot
100g walnuts, roughly chopped
70g crushed pineapple (weight after remaining liquid removed)

For the icing:

125g cream cheese
125g mascarpone
35g icing sugar
zest of 1 orange

DIRECTIONS

Cake
1. Preheat oven to 170°C/150°C fan and line a cake tin.
2.Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and spices.
3. Add the remaining ingredients and mix for one minute on a slow speed, scrape the sides and then mix for a further 3 minutes. (I used a standing mixer for this, so you may want to mix for longer if you're using a handheld mixer. Just make sure that it's all well incorporated.)
4. Pour into the lined tin and bake for 1 hour and a half.

Finish
5. Allow the cake to cool - this will take a while as it is a big cake, I would allow 2 hours or so. When I did it I was very impatient and put it in the fridge, then iced it when it was still slightly warm BUT it tasted good anyway.
6. For the icing - simply whisk all of the ingredients together until you have a smooth icing. I think it's sweet enough, but feel free to add more sugar if you think it needs it, it will only make it slightly thicker.
7. To ice, I just add the icing to the top, smooth it out and dust on some cinnamon to serve.

I hope you enjoy, let me know if you do.

Zoe

ps. apologies for the bad iPhone photos - but needs must!

One Step Espresso Ice Cream

This is my absolute go-to recipe when it comes to an easy ice cream. I've been using this recipe for over a year, long before I got an ice cream maker, and every time (even when I make slight errors) it seems to work. Although I do enjoy making ice cream with a custard etc, this is the only espresso ice cream I've ever attempted.

My parents are definite coffee lovers, and so this doesn't seem to stick around long in our house. I had mine with brownie crumbs as there was some in the tin from when I made brownies this week - but you can eat it however you want. The recipe comes from Nigella Lawson - and she eats hers in brioche buns which sounds good, but I'm yet to try. I think I might put it in a blender and add milk to make an iced coffee, but we'll see.

I've actually doubled the recipe here as I had a 600ml tub of cream and knew the other 300 would end up going to waste, the original recipe yields around 1 pint, so I am assuming this makes 2 pints? I've also used coffee that's a little too grainy here - I'd usually make it a bit finer but I was being lazy (as per) and so I didn't bother. I don't mind, I quite like how speckled it is but it's up to yourself how you have it.

The original recipe is from here.

INGREDIENTS:

600ml of double cream
350g of condensed milk
4 tablespoons of espresso powder (as fine as you can find)
4 tablespoons of coffee liqueur (I used Tia Maria this time, but whatever you have)

DIRECTIONS:

STEP 1: Place all of the ingredients into a large bowl and whisk until still peaks form, then transfer into a freezable container and freeze for a minimum of 6 hours.

It's almost embarrassing how easy it is??

Setting GBBO Goals

As everyone knows, today is the much-anticipated return of the Great British Bake Off. I am very excited (who isn’t) and in anticipation I have been going through my Grandma’s old recipe books writing down my favourite ones, all whilst browsing the Lakeland website (obviously). The Bake Off is something that I usually watch with my mum (it’s our thing yo) but this week I’m with my grandparents so I’ll be watching without her (sob). Anyway, we’ll see how it goes but I might post about it later. Or maybe I’ll just tweet. Chances are I’ll just tweet actually. You can see my real time reactions (so insightful I’m sure) on my twitter here.

Last year I actually planned to blog through the GBBO but moving to uni got in the way, and so this year I’ll (hopefully) complete a series of blog posts. In these posts I will bake following the GBBO. So, I’ll make my own version of the signature dish, attempt the blind bake (although –luckily- with more instructions), and do my own showstopper (although this will definitely be a downsized version). I’m not sure what day these will be posted, most likely on Sunday’s but we’ll see how it goes. I do like a challenge in baking, and so maybe this will help my skills?? So yes, it will have a name soon as I only have 15 minutes to get my GBBO snack on.

I don’t think anyone is reading this yet (much like most of the time I am speaking to myself ha) but I’m quite interested myself to see what the results will be!

Zoe

Sea Salt & Black Pepper Pretzels

I think the first time that I had one of these soft dough pretzels was when I went to New York a few years ago, and since then I have been a huge fan. Bread is always a good shout in my books, and these are one of my favourite variants. They remind me mostly of winter and Christmas time - partly because it was at Christmas that I was in New York and partly because I always have one every year at the Edinburgh German Christmas Market. (I think the small, more crisp-like ones are popular in the UK, and while those are delicious, and this these ones are the best of the two.) However, winter it is not and the kitchen was slightly warm yesterday so I decided to make some.

These are an absolute first attempt for me, and I have to say I'm pretty pleased with them. Although they aren't the prettiest (I need to work on my dough shaping skills), they tasted good. This recipe made 8, however they are already gone with my brother asking me when I'm making more - a clear success.

The recipe came from The Brown Eyed Baker, one of my personal favourite baking/cooking blogs - I didn't stick to the recipe entirely.

INGREDIENTS:

1 ½ cups of warm water
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1 packet of yeast
4 ½ cups of plain flour
*4 tablespoons of melted, unsalted butter
10 cups of water
2/3 cups of bicarbonate of soda (I didn't have enough but it worked fine.)
1 egg yolk mixed with 1 tablespoon of water for egg wash
As much coarse sea salt and black pepper to cover with as you wish

*or 2oz, or 57g (I find tablespoons of butter so awkward to measure out.)

DIRECTIONS:

STEP 1: Put the warm water, sugar and salt in a large bowl together. Sprinkle over the yeast and leave for 5 minutes. (at this point it is supposed to foam – I didn’t really find this happened but after 2 attempts with no foam, I went ahead with it and it seemed to work anyway.)

STEP 2: Add the flour and melted butter and knead. It should be ready when it comes away from the side of the bowl but I think you can feel when it’s ready when you handle it. In order to do this I used a dough hook and it took around 5 minutes, however without the hook it would depend on your strength and kneading skills I imagine? Place in an oiled bowl and cover with clingfilm, and leave it somewhere warm for about an hour. (It should double in size.)

STEP 3: Preheat the oven to 230°C, and then line 2 baking trays with baking paper and lightly brush with oil. Then put the water and bicarbonate of water in a large pan and leave to reach boiling.

STEP 4: As the water is warming up, use this time to shape the dough. (Lightly oil your surface first.) I got 8 pretzels from this, and I weighed each piece of dough exactly (as I am a loser) – but just 8 similar portions would be fine. Roll each piece into a long rope and then twist into a pretzel shape. (Make a U and then fold over). Once they’ve been shaped put them on the trays.

STEP 5: (The fun part.) The water should be boiling at this point. Place each pretzel in the water - one at a time – for 30 seconds each. Then using a utensil that allows for the water to drain (I used a draining spoon, funnily enough) take them out and place on the tray. After this, brush them with the egg/water wash and sprinkle with salt and pepper. I added lots of pepper as I love it, but it’s really up to your own taste.

STEP 6: Bake in the oven for 12-14 minutes, until they are golden brown.

These are super good warm, but not hot as burning your tongue is not much fun at all.... trust me.

Until next time,
Zoe