Back to School - Sweetie favourites

 

 

 

I love cake club. What is better than talk & eat cake with fellow cake & bake enthusiasts.

Well actually for me it is the baking itself. I love to bake!!

My lastest bake for our Clandestine Cake Club Back to School - Sweetie favourites is a lemony lemonade cake. Based on a classic lemon drizzle cake recipe but with a CCC twist.

 

Ingredients

 

175 gr (6oz) soft unsalted butter

175 gr (6oz) caster sugar

Grated zest of 1 large lemon

2 large eggs beaten

175 gr (6oz) self-raising flour

4 tbsp lemonade

 

For the topping

 

25 gr (1oz) butter

25 gr (1oz) lemonade

Juice of the lemon

225 gr (8oz) icing sugar

Jelly beans or any kind of sweets to decorate

 

 

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4 and lightly grease and line a 20cm/8” tin.

 

Mix butter, caster sugar and lemon zest together until light and fluffy. Add the beated eggs and fold in the flour then add the lemonade.

 

Pour in the prepared tin and drop the tin from about 20cm/8” above the work surface to help level the mixture out. Bake for about 35 minutes until an inserted metal skewer comes out clean. 

 

Meanwhile prepare the topping

 

Melt butter and sugar together over a low heat, stir in the lemon juice and mix in the icing sugar until you have a smooth pouring consistency

 

Leave the cake for about 10 to 15 minutes before removing from the tin and put on a wire rack with baking tray under neat to catch any of the topping that runs of the cake.

 

Spoon half of the topping onto the cake and leave to run of the sides. Leave for another 10 or 15 minutes and repeat with the rest of the topping.

Decorate the cake with any kind of sweets you like.

 

 

The Clandestine Cake Club Cookbook - Lynn Hill

Earlier this week I received my copy of the Clandestine Cake Club Cookbook in the post courtesy of Quercus books. After the initial giddyness and excitement of seeing two of my recipes in this book, I started looking through the recipes that were submitted by fellow Clandestine Cake Club members.

I was amazed and delighted by the variation of the recipes in the book. There are so many delicious recipes to choose from that I just did not know where to start. With names like raspberry cakewell, magic bean cake, cayman mango cake, strawberry butterfly bundt and citrus sunbeam layer cake the mind was in cakey overdrive. I decided I'd leave it up to my other half to choose which one I'd bake first and I was given the options of scrumptious sticky toffee cake (surprise, surprise!) or dark chocolate marmelade cake. Seeing I had all the ingredients for the latter, this is the one I made - but I am sure many more of the recipes will follow soon.

This cake is rich and truly scrumptious. A must try for all chocoholics. I can heartily recommend this book to all bakers of all abilities, there is something for everyone. It will be available from all good book stores from the 14th February, but can already be pre-ordered on line. I have not been paid or requested to do a review of this book and the views expressed are mine alone.

Appeltaart

I have seriously neglected my blogging for sometime, but as today saw another South Lancashire Clandestine Cake Club meeting I thought I'd blog the cake I made for the meeting.
The recipe is from the very first cookbook I ever owned. It was given to me by my mum when I left home aged 18. It is called basis kookboek, which I think even non-linguists will recognise to be basic cookbook.
The recipe I choose is called Appeltaart aka Dutch Applecake.
You will need an approx 22 cm springform to bake this in.

Ingredients:

200 gr plain flour
225 gr unsalted butter (straight from the fridge)
140 gr caster sugar
pinch of salt
grated zest of 1 lemon
2 sachets of vanilla sugar

For the filling
500 gr granny smith apples
the juice of the lemon
80 gr currants, raisins or sultanas (or a mixture)
50 gr caster sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon custard powder
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1 egg
2 tablespoons of milk

Preparation
Preheat the oven to 170C/gas 4
Sift the flour into a bowl and mix in the sugar, salt, vanilla sugar & lemon zest.
Cube the butter and rub it in the flour mixture. Once the butter is evenly distributed, knead it all into a soft and supple dough. Wrap in cling film and leave in the fridge for about half an hour.
Butter your springform
Peel and thinly slice the apples and sprinkle with the lemon juice to prevent it from colouring.
Roll out the dough between two sheets of cling film (keeping a little seperate for the lattice top) and if time put back in the fridge for another 20 to 30 minutes.
Mix the dried fruit, sugar, cinnamon, custard powder and fennel seeds with the slices of apple.
Line the baking tin with the rolled out dough and spoon in the apple mixture.
Beat the egg and mix with 1 tbsp of the milk, pour over the apples.
Roll out the rest of the dough and cut into thin strips. Top the apple cake with the strips and brush it all with the other tbsp of milk.
Bake in the middle of the oven for about 1 hour - 1hour 10 minutes