Cakes 31 and 32, The Blueberry Things

Well, it's been a while since I baked things.... and even longer since I blogged about them. Due to the excess punnets of fresh "gourmet" blueberries in the fridge (which nobody ate), I took it upon myself to make things with them. I made blueberry muffins and a blueberry streusel cake. I always forget how much of a difference it makes cooking with fresh blueberries - the batter doesn't end up a yucky concrete-grey, but stays golden and luscious with little dots of purpley-blue. Mmm...

Blueberry Muffins (from my mother's cookbook - probably originally Alison Holst... who puts Ido Drent to shame - she's the real Queen of Puddings. But anyway.)

Preheat the oven to 220C, the muffin temperature, and grease/pattycase-line a muffin tray.

In a large bowl, combine:
2 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup sugar

In another bowl, beat together:
100g melted butter
1 cup milk
1 egg

Combine the wet and dry, don't mix it too much, then stir in 1 - 1 1/2 cups blueberries.
Spoon into the waiting patty cases, and bake for 12-15 minutes.

(Cranberry and) Blueberry Streusel Cake (from my most awesome cookbook "Fruit")

Preheat the oven to 190C and grease/line a cake tin.
Cream 175g of soft butter and 1/2 cup sugar until smooth, then rub in 3 cups of plain flour with your fingertips until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Set aside a generous 1 cup of this mixture.

Into the remaining floury muck, beat 2 large eggs, 1 tsp baking powder and 1 tsp vanilla essence "until soft and creamy". My mixture ended up more like a firm pastry... so i added a dash of milk to try and soften it up, but it didn't really help. I wonder if perhaps my eggs weren't big enough, or maybe I didn't take out enough of the the floury stuff... Anyhow, I'm not sure quite what went wrong, but perhaps more butter would have been a good idea (it always is).

Spoon/force this "creamy" mixture into the base of the tin and spread evenly. Arrange 1 cup each of cranberries (didn't have any) and blueberries on top, and sprinkle over 1/2 cup light muscovado sugar (I just used soft brown). Stir 1/2 tsp crushed cardamom seeds (not something I generally have on hand) into the reserved flour mixture, then scatter evenly on top of the fruit.

Bake for 50-60 minutes (I think I did it for a bit less, it was starting to burn on top by 40 mins) or until the topping is golden.

I really liked it, but it was way denser than I anticipated. It was more shortbread-y than cake-y. I don't think I've ever had streusel before, so maybe it's meant to be like that. This cake is most definitely best scoffed hot. As most things are :)

Cake 25, The Cake I Only Kinda Made (Fruit)

Cake Team Effort, meaning somebody else made most of it.

Easy-mix Fruit and Rum Cake

another Alison Holst classic from my mother's collection

1 kg small dark raisins (I used a combination of raisins, currants, cranberries, prunes and glace cherries)

1/2 cup liquid (cranberry juice for me, no brandy at hand)

200g butter

2 cups flour

1 cup sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup golden syrup

1/2 cup milk

2 large eggs

Soak the fruit in the liquid for 24-48 hours, until all the liquid has been soaked up. Alison recommends putting the liquid and fruit into a snaplock bag so none of the alcoholic goodness can evaporate. 

Rub the butter into the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt using a food processor or your digits. 

Warm syrup and milk just enough to combine them, beat in the eggs, then mix this liquid into the fruit and dry mixture. Pour into a lined 20cm square tin.

Decorate the top with almonds and cherries etc. 

Bake at 150C for 2 1/4 - 2 1/2 hours, until a skewer comes out clean. 

My camera batteries died right after taking the first photo. Bonus: evidence of how the cockroach was eventually killed.

Cake 1, Day 1

I'll be stoked past my teeth if I can keep this cake-making habit up for a few months.

Since I'm meant to be studying for my final exam, I thought it best to start off with a cake that doesn't take too long. I've still managed to drag it out into a few hours worth of procrastination... This is my standard cake recipe, it's just so easy to make, and easy to adjust if you're missing an ingredient. It can overcome all kinds of things (sugar added at the last minute, grilling instead of baking, part rice flour instead of regular). This time I actually used half wholemeal flour, just to give the cake a heavier texture. Anyhow, here's the first recipe:

Vegan Chocolate Cake

Grease/line a large cake tin (it's quite a big mix) and preheat the oven to 190 C
Mix together the following ingredients in a large bowl:
3 cups flour (today I went half white, half wholemeal)
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
2 tsp baking soda (I recommend sifting this, otherwise you end up with little lumps of it all through the cake)
1 tsp salt

Next, mix the following wet ingredients in a separate bowl:
2 cups hot coffee (a great opportunity to use up those sachets of instant decaf)
2 tsp white vinegar
2/3 cup vegetable oil (use something which doesn't taste too strong, like canola or sunflower)
2 tsp vanilla

Pour the wet into the dry, and combine. Don't overmix. Pour into the tin, and bake for 20-25 minutes. I found it took a lot longer using the gas oven I have at the moment, but at any rate the cake is done when it springs back to the touch.

I thought mine turned out okay today, it's not too sweet, and the wholemeal makes it "dense and moist", according to my tasters.