Upside Down Nectarine Cake

I’m in great pain. My legs hurt but not as much as The Thew’s – probably because he runs faster than me and is officially the fastest Woodrow. I’m the slowest but it’s a role I fill bravely and with style! The Brentwood half marathon felt like a good idea at the time but I did have a couple of glasses of champagne inside me along with a glass of wine when I agreed to do it. Most things start to seem like a good idea at that point. The worrying thing is that I have a harder half marathon in less than two weeks when I go to Ireland to see my family. Once again it seemed like a good idea at the time to combine a boozy family trip to Connemara with a race. Thinking back I was probably drunk. 

However alcohol cannot explain why on Sunday evening, in pain from the half marathon I just ran, I signed up for a 100km walk. That’s explained by friendship which is a much better reason. My good friend Lorna has a friend who has cancer and she’s doing the walk to raise money for research into cancer. Lorna is one of those amazing people who will fight any battle to the maximum that she believes is worth fighting – she’s like a super hero on the side of all that is right and just. If she could shrink into a space ship, like Dennis Quaid in Innerspace, and fight cancer head on inside bodies she’d be doing it. Because she can’t, and because she’s one lady who won’t sit idly by, she’s going to walk 100km. Because she’s my friend, and it’s important to her, I’m walking it too.  

The above has very little to do with my baking this week apart from forgetting about baking because of the run, then realising I had some nectarines to use up and that I had the ingredients for a sponge. I’m awful at turning out upside down cakes so was happy this one worked! You can use any soft fruit here really but I think it’s worth the extra time to do a nice pattern in the top. 

Ingredients

Topping

50g butter

75g caster sugar

5 nectarines, chopped (I did slices – 6 per nectarine – but you could just half them if you prefer) 

Cake

150g butter

150g caster sugar

3 large eggs

60 ml milk

1 tsp vanilla

150g self-raising flour 

1.    Preheat an oven to 180°C/GM4.

2.    Use the 50g of butter to coat the bottom of a tin – I used 23” but you can use any size really. Make sure it’s kind of evenly spread and grease the sides lightly. Sprinkle the 75g of sugar over the butter. Then arrange your fruit on it.

3.    Cream the butter and sugar together, then add the eggs one at a time mixing well.

4.    Put in half the flour, mix, then mix in the milk and vanilla, then mix in the last of the flour.

5.    Cover the fruit with the batter and bake for about 35 minutes, testing to check it’s cooked. If you’ve used a smaller sized tin you may need another few minutes.

6.    You can serve this hot or cold so either cool completely, or if serving hot, leave for about 10 minutes before turning the tin upside down on a plate and hoping it comes out well!

Shamrock Fairy Cakes

Stupid picture won't rotate!

Things are fairly hectic at the moment. I'm having my bathroom redone which means the flat is in a constant mess and everything is covered in dust. Work is busy and I've managed to stall mid introduction to a creative pitch because I've suddenly worried about the delivery of my toilet. Sadly I then went on to talk about the reason I stalled and can only be thankful that it's was a client that knows me and doesn't think random tangents of my thinking are standard.  

Anyway I baked on Sunday as it was St. Patrick's Day and I wanted to bring some baking into work on Monday for it. This was made more interesting because I was hung over from attending a brilliant wedding the day before so had to battle through that and tiredness. Added to the intensity was the fact that I'd been inspired by a link my friend Claire had sent me to make shamrock shaped fairy cakes. This meant that I had to think a bit, which was the one skill I was having difficulty with. Oh well.  

Now you'll need some ceramic baking beads to make these which you may not already have. These are vital but you can use the when making pastry cases etc so good to have. Make sure you have bake safe food colouring - I used Wilton's icing paste stuff in Leaf Green. The recipe is fairly basic and I cheated on the frosting but when you're making luminous green cakes I think that's ok as they're more novelty item than something that will win Bake Off. 

Ingredients 

Cakes

100g caster sugar

100g butter

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

100g self-raising flour

1/2 tsp green food colouring 

Icing

1/2 tub of frosting (I used Betty Crocker vanilla icing)

Slightly less than 1/2 tsp green food colouring 

1.    Line a deep muffin tin with paper cases. A fairy cake, shallow tin, won’t work. Place three ceramic beads between the tin and case - spaced equally around the edge. This will push the case into a shamrock shape. Don't worry if it's not exact - people will get the general idea! (See below for how you need them to look before baking).

2.    Preheat an oven to 180°C/GM4.

3.    Cream the butter and sugar together.

4.    Add the eggs and vanilla mixing well. Then mix in the flour followed by the green food colouring. 

5.    Divide the batter between the cases. This will make 12. Don't worry if you don't get batter fully into each leaf shape as it will spread while cooking.

6.    Bake for about 15-20 minutes testing that they are cooked with a skewer. They're done if it comes out clean.

7.    Cool them completely and remove the paper cases.

8.    Mix the green food colouring into the icing and using a piping bag (I know, I'm sorry, it's fiddly but you need to distinguish between the leaves) squirt some on each of the three leaves so people understand what you've created! Then they're done. Serve with Cidona or red lemonade.

 

Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

People can be so unaware of their surrounding and the effect they have on others. I always think of 'Sliding Doors' when something happens which could start off a chain of events. The bus driver who refuses to open the middle doors of a bus for a dad with a pram, the pedestrian whose random change of direction causes a bike to swerve, a delivery driver seeing no issue with changing a delivery time by a couple of hours.  

What could happen? I'm a pessimist so I see a missed appointment, an accident waiting to happen and a crisis at work that gets worse because you're not around. In reality this is how we live our lives - randomly bumping, or not, into each other and getting nudged ever so slightly, or not, into different directions. I was thinking about this as at work one of the creative team mentioned 'the nudge effect' in respect to a brief we are working on. I'm lucky enough to work with some ridiculously talented creative people who spend all day thinking about things and coming up with cool ideas. How the hell I got into this job still baffles me and when I think of some of the amazing experiences I've had during my working life I can't help but be very happy that I got nudged along (special thanks here has to go to Lorna for seeing that job at Emap many moons ago and getting me out of media sales - before anyone takes offence it wasn't for me, I personally didn't enjoy it and wasn't that amazing at it).

So we come to baking. My slight obsession with finding a good red food colouring that stays red when baked, remembering that I have a tall cake box at home I got from work and the front cover of 'Jamie's' magazine all nudged me to bake a three (I know!) tiered red velvet cake. The quantities look scary but they should - it's three tiers of substantial cake covered in cream cheese frosting!!!! Let's see how creative the team gets when hopped up on aggressive red food colouring sourced from the US ... 

Ingredients

Cakes

250g softened butter

600g caster sugar

4 large eggs

40g cocoa powder

80ml or 80g of bake safe red food colouring (Dr. Oetker red gel works)

2 tsp vanilla extract

600g plain flour

2 tsp salt

2 x 284ml pots of buttermilk (Waitrose is the only place I can find it or 2 parts natural yogurt to 1 part whole milk)

2 tbsp white wine vinegar

2 tsp bicarb of soda 

Frosting

200g softened butter

900g icing sugar

400g full fat cream cheese 

1.    Preheat the oven to GM4.

2.    If you have three 20cm sandwich tins then grease and line the bottoms. I only have two so you'll need to use one twice.

3.    Cream butter and sugar in a big bowl. It won't properly cream together but just make sure it's all mixed up. Add the eggs one by one, scraping down the sides.

4.    Put the food colouring, cocoa powder (I don't bother to sift) and vanilla in a bowl and mix together. Add to the batter and combine.

5.    Then add the salt and about 1/3 of the flour. Mix. Then add one of the pots of buttermilk, mix, then 1/3 flour, mix, then second buttermilk pot, mix, then the last of the flour.

6.    Mix the vinegar and bicarb in a bowl and add to the batter. Mix well.

7.    The batter allows you about 800g per layer so weigh it out in a bowl and put in the sandwich tins. Obviously if you just have two then keep some back.

8.    Bake for about 35 to 40 minutes. If you have a gas oven you'll want to switch the tins around on the shelves half way through if doing two together. Test with a knife or skewer and if it comes out clean leave them to cool.

9.    The frosting is easy but icing sugar is so messy. If I had an outside  I'd do it there but I don't so I use a good processor. The quantities pack it to the max and you can of course use a hand held whisk or freestanding. So put the butter in with the sugar and mix until combined through. Add the cream cheese and you're done.

10.  Once the cakes are cool layer them together with frosting - there is enough for a fairly generous layer between each. Remember to do this on your serving plate, stand etc as you won't be able to move it once finished! Choose your most evenly rounded top for the top one and smooth out any random bumps or wonkiness by using a sharp bread knife to gently cut then away. When it comes to frosting a palette knife is your friend. Build the coverage of the sides up slowly by doing a little at a time until you can't see any cake. Crumble up some of the cut off cake and sprinkle on the top. Voila!  

N.B. When frosting, to get a nice finish on the bottom, gently put strips of baking paper slightly under the bottom layer and once you are finished slowly remove them. It will give you a clean finish.