Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting and Chocolate Ganache

This chocolate cake is absolutely delicious. I don't usually enjoy chocolate cake but this one was so soft, light and moist. Then there is ganache. I love ganache. This cake not only has a buttercream frosting, it also has chocolate ganache poured on top. Chocolate cake..with chocolate ganache. It was very good. Not to mention I had left over ganache that I greedily ate.

This recipe is taken from legendary cake pop creator, Bakerella (2012). Trust me folks, this is a chocolate cake to try. It was very easy to make and so delicious. 

1 1/2 cups plain (all purpose) flour

2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable

2 tsp vanilla 

3/4 cup milk

2/3 hot water

Preheat oven to 180'C (350'F). 

Grease 6 4" or 10cm cake tins with the removable bottoms. Sift dry ingredients together and put in a large bowl. Add eggs, oil, milk, vanilla and beat until combined. Add hot water and mix. Pour into cake tins and bake for 28-30 minutes. Transfer to wire rack to cool.

Buttercream Frosting

1 1/2 cups butter

1 tsp vanilla

6 cups icing sugar

4-8 tbs milk

Beat butter until smooth and add vanilla until combined. Add icing sugar in several additions. Add milk a tablespoon at a time and mix until you get a smooth consistency.

Chocolate Ganache

3/4 cup thickened (heavy) cream

1/4 cup butter

3/4 cup semi sweet chocolate morsels ( I used waaay more than 3/4 cup but start off with that and add more if you want)

Heat cream and butter in a saucepan until melted and remove. Put chocolate in a bowl and poor hot cream mixture on top. Whisk by hand until completely smooth. Let cool until thick.

Putting it together

Cool the cakes in the freezer. Take out and carefully cut the tops off so the cakes are level. Put a dollap of frosting on one cake and put another cake on top. Do a crumb coat by covering the cake in a light layer of frosting so all the crumbs get caught. Let them cool and then put a thicker layer of the frosting on the cakes until you can't see any colour. When the ganache is thick, pour on top slowly. Make sure not to let it all pool around the bottom of the cake.

Bakerella. (2012). Just a Cake. Retrieved from http://www.bakerella.com/just-a-cake/

Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

I love the deep red of Red Velvet Cake! It looks amazing with the white contrast of cream cheese icing or frosting. This recipe made a beautiful, soft and moist cake AND I didn't get food colouring anywhere. Trust me, that is a quite a feat. 

It was hard to find a recipe I was happy with, but I am so glad I used this one from Pinch My Salt (2008). 

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 tbs cocoa powder
59ml (2oz) red food colouring
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
1 tsp white vinegar
1 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 180'C (350'F) and butter and flour 6 4" or 10cm cake tins that have the removable base. 

Sift together cake flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. In another bowl, mix food colouring and cocoa powder until there are no lumps. Set aside. In a large bowl, beat in eggs one at a time, then add vanilla and red cocoa mix. Add one third of flour mix to the butter mix and beat well, then beat in half the buttermilk. Beat in another third of the flour, then the second half of buttermilk. End with the flour mix and beat until well combined. 

In a small bowl, mix vinegar and baking soda. Quickly add it to the cake batter and combine. Divide the batter evenly between the cake tins. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until you can insert a skewer into the centre with it coming out clean. Cool the cakes on a wire rack.

Cream Cheese Frosting

2 packages of cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted

Blend together cream cheese and butter until smooth. On a low speed blend the icing sugar and vanilla. Turn on high and beat until light and fluffy. 

Putting it together

Put the cakes in the freezer for 5 minutes to make them a bit harder. When cold, taken them out and carefully cut the top off so the cake is level. Place a nice dollop of the frosting on one of the cakes and place the other cake on top. I found the easiest way to frost the cakes was to do the crumb coating. Do a light icing coat on the cakes and let sit. This will pick up all the crumbs on the cake. Do another thicker layer of the frosting until you can't see the colour of the cake anymore.

Pinch My Salt. (2008). Red Velvet Cake. Retrieved from http://pinchmysalt.com/red-velvet-cake-recipe/

Donna Hay's Blueberry Pie

Having friends over was the perfect excuse to make a delicious pie! This recipe for blueberry pie is taken from Donna Hay's Seasons cookbook (Donna Hay 2009). It was originally for 6 small pies but I decided to just make a nice big one and serve it with some cream and ice cream. This pie has a beautiful almond meal and sugar bottom layer that gives the pie a nice flavour and crunch. 

Ingredients:

 2x 200g sheets store-bought shortcrust pastry, thawed
 375g blueberries
 2 tbs caster (superfine) sugar
 1 tsp lemon juice
 1/2 cup (60g) almond meal
 2 tbs plain (all-purpose) flour
 1/4 cup (55g) caster (superfine) sugar, extra
 40g butter, melted
 1 tsp vanilla extract
 1 tsp finely grated lemon rind
 1 egg lightly beaten
 granulated sugar, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 180'C (355'F).

Combine blueberries, sugar and lemon juice in a bowl. Set aside. Combine almond meal, flour, extra sugar, butter, vanilla and lemon rind in a bowl. Set aside. Line a lightly greased pie dish with one sheet of shortcrust pastry and cut to fit. With the other sheet of pastry, cut it into strips and set aside. 

Place the almond meal and sugar mixture in the pie dish and spread evenly. Pour blueberry mix on top and place strips on top in a lattice shape. Brush the pie with the egg and sprinkle with granulated sugar. 

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the top is golden. 

Donna Hay (2009). Donna Hay Seasons: the best of donna hay magazine. Sydney, Australia: HarperCollinsPublishers.

Creamy Caprese

Sometimes, when we are desperate, and I mean REALLY desperate after I finish work, we grab a quick dinner at Fasta Pasta. I hate Fasta Pasta. The dishes all taste the same, bland and bland. Very bland. Anyway, so if we do end up there, the only dish my boyfriend gets is the Caprese. I tried it and bet him that I could make a more delicious version of it. That's exactly what I did. The recipe I found from 'how sweet it is' (How sweet it is 2011) said to use 1 cup of your favourite pasta sauce, instead I just made a batch of my homemade tomato pasta sauce. The result? Very, very good. I mean, incredibly good. However, thanks to the huge amount of cheese in it, this is only an occasional dish. 

4x small cake tins lightly greased (if you want individual portions)
500g  pasta (penne works best)
1 batch of pasta sauce
1/3 cup heavy cream
1/3 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese + more for garnish
200g fresh mozzarella, cut into cubes
1 punnet of cherry tomatoes (half left whole and the rest cut in half)
10 fresh basil leaves, ripped

Pasta Sauce

1 tbs vegetable oil
1/2 red onion, diced
1 clove of garlic diced (or as much as you prefer)
1x 400g tin of diced tomatoes
1/2 cup of vegetable stock
1/2 cup of beef stock
3/4 tbs of dried mixed spaghetti herbs (oregano, basil, garlic, thyme, red bell peppers and parsley)

Preheat oven to 180'C(350'F) degrees F. 

Boil water and cook pasta according to directions. Sautee onion and garlic in a pan with the oil over a medium heat until soft and brown. Add the tomatoes, stock and herbs. Stir and let simmer. When reduced and thick stir in cream and parmesan.

Once pasta is cooked, drain and add to sauce. Mix and turn off heat. Add mozzarella cubes, tomatoes and basil leaves. Separate mixture evenly into the small cake tins. Alternatively, add mixture to oven proof dish. Top with mozzarella rounds and bake for 25 mins or until cheese is golden and bubbly.

How sweet it is. (2011). Creamy Caprese Pasta. Retrieved from http://www.howsweeteats.com/2011/05/creamy-caprese-pasta/ 

Dark Brown Sugar Chocolate Cupcakes

I love using brown sugar instead of caster (superfine) sugar. This time, I tried it with dark brown sugar. It gave the cupcakes this amazing molasses type quality. Very good. So good in fact, we ate them all in one night. I also swapped the cocoa powder for hot chocolate powder as I don't like my chocolate cupcakes too chocolatey but you can ignore that and just use cocoa. 

115g (4oz) butter, softened115g 
(4oz) caster (superfine) sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
90g (3oz) self-raising flour
2 tbs hot chocolate powder

Icing

2 tbs cocoa powder
1 cup icing sugar
2 tbs water


I didn't actually measure anything when I did the icing. However, I am pretty sure that this is what I did or at least will be close. 


This is a generic cupcake recipe from the Love Food collection (Susanna, T. 2009). 

Preheat oven to 190'C (375'F) and line a 1 one dozen muffin tray with patty pans. Place butter and sugar in a bowl and beat until light and fluffy. Gradually beat in the eggs. Sift in the flour and hot chocolate powder/cocoa powder and fold into mixture. Spoon mix into the patty pans and bake in oven for 15-20 minutes or you can put a skewer inside and it comes out clean. Mix the icing sugar and cocoa powder with water. If mixture is to wet, add more icing sugar.  If mixture is too dry, add a tiny bit of water. Wait until the cupcakes cool and pour the icing on top.

Susanna, T. (2009). 1001 Cupcakes, Cookies & other tempting treats. Parragon Books Ltd. 

Mini Apple Crumbles

I used a Dutch apple pie recipe from Food.com (Food.com 2002) to make these mini apple crumbles for my boyfriend's work. They were a hit! Crunchy on the outside and juicy inside, everyone said they loved them. The recipe made about 2 dozen, but we kept 1 dozen for ourselves...You know, to make sure they tasted good.

Filling

2x 200g sheets store-bought shortcrust pastry, thawed
5 1/2 cups peeled, cored and sliced into small pieces, cooking apples (I used Granny Smith for their delicious sourness) 
1 tbs lemon juice
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
3 tbs flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

Topping

3/4 cup plain (multipurpose) flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/3 cup butter, room temperature

Preheat oven to 185'C (375'F).

Fill a one dozen mini cupcake tray with patty pans. Cut circles out of shortcrust pastry to fit inside patty pans. Combine apples, lemon juice, both sugars, flour, cinnamon and nutmeg. Evenly separate mixture into patty pans

In another bowl, mix flour, both sugars and butter with fork until resembles breadcrumbs. Sprinkle evenly onto the pattypans.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden. 

Food.com (2002). Dutch Apple Pie. Retrieved from http://www.food.com/recipe/dutch-apple-pie-43990