Capt. Cakeman - explains melting sugar and misshapen loaves! (And Competition Winner)

Firstly - Congratulations to Saran from Bognor Regis who won the Heart to Home Giveaway. Thank you to all who entered and don't forget you can still get 10% off purchases at Heart To Home online using the Cakeyboi discount code! Simply enter CAKEYBOI at the checkout where it says 'Apply Discount Code'.

Now, Captain Cakeman is back to answer your questions...

Great question Kat – as melting sugar is notoriously difficult. Let’s break it down into some easy steps; dig out a heavy bottom saucepan. Place the amount of sugar you need in the pan, add cold water – exactly half the weight of the sugar you are using.

Place over a medium heat and stir the mixture until the sugar has dissolved. Brush the sides of the pan to push down any sparks of sugar – this stops crystals forming on the side of the pan which can ruin the entire mixture.

When the sugar has dissolved – STOP STRIRRING! Continuing to stir can also cause crystals to form. Now pop in a sugar thermometer, crank up the heat and allow the sugar to boil to whatever temp you need depending on your recipe.

I hope this has helped!

Silicone tins have mixed reviews Becca. It can depend on the thickness of the silicone used in the ‘tin’. If it’s too flexible, more than likely it will lead to a deformed loaf. When purchasing, go for a thicker, hard feeling silicone. One trick when using a silicone loaf pan is placing a metal tin either side to act as stabilisers – but then you would just be as well using a metal tin! When it comes to silicone other people comment on lingering smells, sticking, difficulty in cleaning – they are not for everyone!

Capt. Cakeman tries to be accurate when answering questions, but if you can expand or come up with another explanation, please comment below. We love all of your comments!

If you have a question for Captain Cakeman, simply email mrcakeyboi@gmail.com, leave a message over at www.facebook.com/cakeyboi or tweet @MrCakeyBoi. Bye for now!

Parmesan and Black Pepper Pretzels

Yes, you read correctly - Cakeyboi delves into the world of savoury again!

It’s another recipe inspired by something I had on our trip to New York (which seems like a lifetime ago now!). One of the first places we pitched up when we got to Times Square was Starbucks. Not surprisingly really, Disneyboi and I are huge fans of the coffee chain, as you may know.

The food in the US ‘bucks is a lot different to the range of eats available in the UK. Disneyboi went for a Raspberry Swirl coffee cake, whilst I was in a savoury mood and plumped for an asiago and parmesan pretzel. A big dough pretzel with lots of cheese, it was delicious and chewy, very good to go with my grande filter, with cinnamon dolce syrup and soymilk.

The other day I was craving the taste of that cheesy pretzel again, and we are lucky to even get salted pretzels here in Scotland, so I was going to have to try and make my own. Asiago was a no-no, I couldn’t find it, although there is a cheese shop in Dundee I should have tried,….I digress. I went for full on parmesan and black pepper. A great taste combination that I love. The creamy umami taste of the parmesan with the deep spice of the fresh cracked pepper, work very well together.

I was looking for a pretzel recipe online, thinking it would be very complicated with boiling the dough etc. But, I came across a very easy pretzel recipe at Sally’s Baking Addiction blog. Easy 30-minute pretzels that I could adapt into cheesy knots of delight. Although yeast is involved in the making of these, there is no proving time, and you have warm delicious treats in no time. Here’s how I made them:

Yield: 10-12 pretzels

Ingredients:

375 ml warm water

1 sachet of fast-acting dry active yeast

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon sugar

I teaspoon ground black pepper

200 grams plain flour

300 grams wholemeal flour

100 grams, grated parmesan cheese

1 egg

Adapted from Sally’s Baking Addiction

Method:

Preheat your oven to 220^oC. Line a baking sheet with greaseproof paper or a silicon sheet.

In a bowl mix the water and yeast. Add the pepper, sugar and salt and stir until the mixtures starts to bubble a little bit. Add the plain flour, mix until combined, then add the wholemeal flour and mix until a non-sticky dough forms. Add a tad more plain flour if it seems too sticky. Add 50 grams of the parmesan then begin kneading it through.

Knead for 2 minute then add 25 grams more of the parmesan and knead for 3 minutes more. Next, take balls of dough, about 85 grams in weight each, and roll into snakes with your hands. Mines were about 40cm in length. Twist the ‘snake’ into a pretzel shape – it gets better with practice but take a look below to get an idea on what to achieve.

Place the egg in a bowl and mix with a fork. Dunk each pretzel in the egg on both sides and place onto the prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle each knot with the remaining parmesan and grind more black pepper onto each one. I also grinded some sea-salt onto each one, as well.

Pop into the oven for 10 minutes and then knock the heat back to 200^oC, bake for 5 minutes more. Remove from the oven and allow them to cool. Although they are good eaten warm, they are just as good eaten cold. I put a bit of mustard on mine like Sally did in her recipe when devouring. Delish!! Enjoy :0)

Note: Don't grate the parmesan fine, big flakes are best, else they melt away too much.

Cartoon Time - Pie in the Sky

It's the return of Pie, last seen in the Cakeyboi Alphabet...

Bumbleberry Muffins for Breakfast

You may have read my recent post of Bumbleberry Eton Mess. We had friends staying over and this was a nice and easy dessert to literally whip up. Bumbleberry, it turns out is what you call a mix of three or more berries in a recipe. I love the name and think it should be used way more often.

Apparently it stems from pioneer cooking times, where it was a way of using whatever ingredients were on hand.  For my Eton Mess, I’d used strawberries, rasps and blueberries. I had some leftover and didn’t want to waste them of course. So I decided to pop them into delicious muffins with a crunchy sugary crust on top.

We had the muffins warm for breakfast the next day, so it actually complimented the dessert of the night before. We can forget about the copious amounts of wine in-between!

The muffins are very light and moist, thanks to the use of vegetable oil and buttermilk. Here’s how I made them:

Yield: 6 large American style muffins, or 12 smaller ones

Ingredients:

300 grams plain flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

115 grams granulated sugar

1 large egg

250 ml buttermilk

4 tablespoons vegetable oil

150 grams mixed berries

Sugar crystals for sprinkling

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180oC. Line a muffin tin with paper liners. In a bowl, place all of the dry ingredients, in a bowl and whisk together. In a jug, whisk together the egg, buttermilk and oil. Add the wet to the dry and mix just until combined.

In a separate bowl, much the berries slightly with a fork, then add them to the muffin batter. Mix  through with a wooden spoon and then using a scoop, fill the muffin liners about two-thirds full. Sprinkle sugar crystals over the top of each muffin.

Place into the oven for 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean from the centre. Remove and allow to cool for 10 minutes or so. These are best eaten when warm, so if you are eating them the following day, pop them into the oven (at about 150oC) for 5 minutes to warm through. Enjoy :0)

Capt. Cakeman answers your questions - this week raising agents and synthetic cream

Welcome to the first week of 'Ask Captain Cakeman'! You have sent many questions and it will take a few weeks to get through them, so if you don't see your question just yet, stay tuned!

Self-rising flour is plain flour with baking powder added. Baking powder is a combination of bicarbonate of soda, cream of tartar and drying agent. This combination causes a chemical reaction that enables a cake to rise. A recipe may call for an extra bit of lift in the early stages of baking, so both self-rising flour and baking powder are required.  Another reason may be the other ingredients are alkaline which can neutralise the acidic cream of tartar, hence more is required to get the rise going. A bit scientific there Heather but I hope that answers your question!

Thanks Jac, the cream you are referring to is often called confectioner’s cream or ‘Holland’ cream, used in doughnuts and cream horns amongst other delicacies. There are so many recipes for this ‘cream’ out there I couldn’t pinpoint just one. Most are dairy free and some even contain gelatin (did you know that Vegetarians?), therefore ensuring a longer shelf-life. When I need a cream substitute, I use good old Bird’s Dream Topping – very retro!

Capt. Cakeman tries to be accurate when answering questions, but if you can expand or come up with another explanation, please comment below. We love all of your comments!

If you have a question for Captain Cakeman, simply email mrcakeyboi@gmail.com, leave a message over at www.facebook.com/cakeyboi or tweet @MrCakeyBoi. Bye for now!

Gooey Caramel Bacon Brownies

Who doesn’t love bacon (even some vegetarians, I am told)? I recently came across The Bacon Book, an e-cookbook that has recipes from a few fellow bloggers. And of course all the recipes contain bacon, some savoury and some sweet.

When I saw a recipe for Caramel Bacon Brownies, I knew I had to give it a go. I had previously made Bacon Chocolate Chop cookies, which weren’t a huge hit I have to be honest. And the bacon flavoured chocolate bar I had from Dylan’s Candy Bar recently was something of an acquired taste. But I wanted to persevere with this fad for baking with bacon!

The recipe was from Stephsbitebybite.com. I have to be honest and say I found some of the measurements way off – I used a third of the cream recommended in the recipe and still had a whole jar of caramel bacon sauce left over (not a bad thing)! I also cut the recommended baking time down to 30 minutes – any longer and they would have burned. I used bacon lardons instead of bacon slices and used my own brownie recipe. So we can probably say my brownies were inspired by Steph’s.

Bacon Caramel Ingredients:

200 grams smoked bacon lardons

Reserved fat of the above bacon

250 ml double cream

225 grams granulated sugar

85 grams unsalted butter

Adapted from Stephsbitebybite.com

Brownie Recipe (omit the Rolos and frosting!)

Method:

In a frying pan, fry off the bacon lardons until darker in colour and crisp. Remove the lardons with tongs, onto a plate lined with kitchen paper. Keep the bacon fat in the pan and whisk in the cream. Allow to cool to room temperature.

In a large saucepan, melt the sugar over high heat and when it reaches an amber colour, remove from the heat and stir in the butter and bacon cream. It will splatter a wee bit but keep stirring until the butter has melted. Stir in 100 – 150 grams of the bacon lardons and allow to sauce to cool to room temp.

Preheat the oven to 180^oC, line an 8”x8” pan with foil and prepare the brownies as directed in the recipe (without the Rolos of course).  Pour half the brownie batter into the pan and smooth out. Dollop about a quarter of the bacon caramel sauce on top of the brownies and smooth it out as much as possible. Pour the remaining brownie batter on top and smooth out. Lastly, spoon 5 to 6 tablespoons of the bacon caramel on top of the brownies and with a knife or the end of a teaspoon, swirl the caramel with the brownie batter. 

Pop into the oven for 30 minutes, the edges will start to look dry, so you can tell it is cooked. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely.

Remove from the pan and foil, cutting the brownies into squares. These brownies are very gooey and are best eaten on a plate with a fork. They are delicious and the fudginess of the brownies compliments the slightly salty caramel sauce, and the chew of the bacon. Like I said you will have caramel sauce left over – good to drizzle on ice cream, or just eat with a spoon. Enjoy :0)

Pop over to have a look at The Bacon Book for more great recipes such as Bacon Cinnamon Buns, Pepper and Bacon Risotto, Bacon Polenta Pancakes!

Cartoon Time - Chip 'n' Dale

We haven't seen Cakeyboi's chocolate chip dog Chip lately...

(if you are not from the UK - the man is TV presenter Dale Winton...)