Caramel Apple Birthday Cake

Why hello you gorgeous people!

So it would seem that all my assessments are over... for now. AND it would also seem that the weather is grey, wet and horrible, perfect for staying indoors. AND it would ALSO seem that it was my dad's birthday yesterday... so what can I say?

The stars aligned. I just had to bake a great big birthday cake.

This cake is a bit of an homage to the transition of the seasons (it was kind of autumn a couple of weeks ago, but now, it's, kind of winter.) I thought the flavour combination, and the rich earthy tones of the icing and caramel would...

Ah I'm just kidding, I just made this cake because my dad really likes apple cake! And I kind of like caramel. So I googled 'caramel apple cake', and there it was, from "baked" (I really like these guys, it's a shame I didn't know about them when I was in New York last year!)

I tweaked the recipe for the icing (I just used Heather from Sprinkle Bakes' salted caramel icing, and also the hard caramel decorations - from her new cookbook, which is amazing!)

This cake looks really impressive, but really, it's not that difficult. And the apple cake is so soft and light, and SO APPLE-Y!

You can also decorate the cake however you want, I had never made hard caramel before, so I just kind of improvised drizzling the stuff all over some baking paper, and stuck it all over the cake however I pleased! You don't even have to make the caramel or the icing if you don't want to, I think the apple cake would be really nice just made as a loaf cake.

But as a whole, the cake and icing and hard caramel are sooooo good. Did I mention it was good?

Folks, you will need to crumb coat this one. See above.

I just love the hard caramel on top of the cake. The organic shapes look really impressive, and they taste good too! Just like the toffees you used to get from the canteen and school fetes when you were young. I made some little caramel droplets too, which I decorated the base with.

Dad had a really good birthday. I love you Papa C!

Caramel Apple Birthday Cake

Makes a big birthday cake, serves 20

Ingredients:

For the apple sauce:

6 red apples, peeled, cored and chopped.

1 cup apple juice

3 tbsp butter

2 tbsp honey

1 tbsp brown sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

For the apple cake:

4 cups plain flour

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

1 tsp cinnamon

180g (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, softened

2 1/2 cups caster sugar

2 large eggs

4 cups home-made apple sauce

For the salted caramel buttercream:

3/4 cup caster sugar

6 tbsp water

3/4 cup lite thickened cream

3 tsp vanilla extract

2 cups unsalted butter

1 tsp salt

3 cups icing (confectioner's) sugar

For the hard caramel:

1 cup caster sugar

1 tbsp lemon juice

Method:

Apple Sauce:

In a medium saucepan, combine all ingredients, and stir to combine. Cook voer medium heat for 15 to 20 minutes, until apples are soft. Allow to cool, then mash with a fork or potato masher until all solids are removed. Cool till room temperature.

Apple Cake:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius. Line 3 round cake tins of the same size with baking paper.

In a large mixing bowl, sift flour, soda, powder, salt and cinnamon. Set aside.

In a medium mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy and combined.

Add eggs, and mix until combined.

Add the sugar mixture to the flour mixture, alternating additions with the apple sauce. Stir until combined, making sure no pockets of flour are left unnoticed!

Divide the batter between cake tins. Smooth tops, and bake for 40-45 minutes, or until an inserted skewer comes out clean. Transfer cakes to a wire rack and allow to cool completely.

Salted Caramel Buttercream:

In a saucepan, stir together sugar and water, bringing to the boil over a medium-high heat. Cook without stirring until the sugar has liquified and has turned a deep amber colour. Be careful of burning it though! You must watch carefully!

Remove from the heat and add in cream and vanilla, stirring to comnbine. Allow to cool until barely warm, yet still pourable.

With an electric mixer, beat sugar, salt and butter until light and fluffy. Reduce speed to low and add icing sugar. Add the caramel, and beat again until misture is light and airy (about 4 minutes). Frosting is now ready to use.

Hard Caramel decorations:

Fill your kitchen sink halfway with icy cold water. Line baking trays with baking paper.

Put sugar and lemon juice in a saucepan and heat over a medium-high heat. Cook without stirring, instead swirling the pan a little, until caramel is a nice amber colour. Remove from the heat and sit the saucepan in the iced water for about 3 seconds to stop further cooking. The pan will sizzle!

Working really quickly, use a spoon to gather caramel in the sauce and drizzle it over the baking paper, in whatever crazy shape you want. You could go for circles, waves or just "abstract" drizzles like I did. Leave to harden.

Assembly:

Place one of the cooled cake layers on a large plate and level off the top using a bread knife. Spread a little of the buttercream over the top so it fully and evenly covers the cake. Repeat with other layers, stacking one upon the other as you go. Put the last layer of cake bottom-side up, so it is nice and flat.

Crumb coat the cake: Using a spatula, spread a thin layer of buttercream over the whole cake. (See photo above). Place in fridge for 30 minutes until the cake is chilled (this will make it easier to ice later).

Once chilled, evenly spread the rest of the icing all over the cake. Now, with the hardened caramel, go crazy! Stick whatever shapes you have all over the cake. Have fun with it!

Congratulations! And also (if applicable), Happy Birthday!

Nutella Muffins

Hello once again :)

Sigh. It's cold. Winter is coming...

And also: yay! Winter's coming! I can wear Ugg boots all day and drink hot drinks all the time and supremely enjoy turning my electric blanket on at night!

I'm not sure what the weather's like at your house, but here at mine, it's blustery and chilly and the air is so clear and fresh. Autumn is one of my favourite times of the year. I just feel so alive! When you breathe in, you appreciate the oxygen filling your lungs, and when you go outside, you can just SMELL THE NATURE! It's so invigorating! It makes me feel like I can run off into the forest and brefriend some big-eyed woodland animals and sing and dance with them while they braid my hair.

...Or maybe, I could just make some muffins?

Ooh! It was my birthday this week. Wednesday the 23rd. I had a lovely birthday, made extremely special by my family and good friends. And my mum made me a cake! All by herself! Made with love, and chocolate! It was amazing, better than any store-bought cake. Maybe you should bake more often, Mum. (Hint.)

Speaking of baking... Muffins! Nutella! Strawberries! More Nutella! To me, it sounds like a recipe for success.

Do I really need to explain these? I think they speak for themselves, loud and clear. To be enjoyed any time, anywhere. Anything with Nutella is bound to be good - but these are friggin' amazing!

I don't usually make muffins, but I saw these in the Nutella cookbook I bought when in Noumea last month. And yes, before you ask, I HAVE A NUTELLA COOKBOOK.

It's in French, but luckily for me, je parle le francais!

So I used these muffins as an excuse to say I was studying French. Which I was. Sort of.

S'il vous plait, faites ces muffins. Vous ne regretterez rien!

P.S. I translated the recipe for you, because I'm really nice.

Nutella Muffins

{Recipe adapted from 'Les Petits Plats' Nutella Cookbook, by Sandra Mahut}

Makes 12

Ingredients:

200g plain flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

100g caster sugar

Pinch of salt

3 eggs

100g melted butter

100ml pouring cream

1 tbsp milk

100g milk chocolate

75g Nutella

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius.

Sift flour and baking powder into a large mixing bowl, and mix in sugar and salt.

In another bowl, beat the eggs with the cream until well combined, then add the melted butter and again, mix well.

In a bain-marie (heatproof bowl over a saucepan of boiling water, making sure water doesn't touch bottom of bowl), melt together the chocolate and milk, stirring until smooth and glossy.

Add the melted chocolate and Nutella to the egg-cream-butter mixture, stirring until combined. Fold into the dry ingredients, incorporating until just combined.

In 12 muffin cases sitting in muffin tins, divide the mixture, filling until cases are 3/4 full.

Bake for 20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Let cool on a wire rack.

{Optional}

Once completely cool, scoop out a little divet in the top of the muffins. Fill with a little nutella, and place a little strawberry in there, as if it were enjoying a realxing, nutella-y bath!

Chocolate Chip - Oat Cookies

Hello again.

Guess what? 11 DAYS TILL MY BIRTHDAY! :D :D :D

... but yeah, life's pretty good.

After a time full of new recipes that didn't quite work out, I am back with a simple, yet reliable and amazingly good, chocolate chip cookie recipe.

It's so good to bake something that you could do in your sleep. It's so relaxing. Baking in general is a good hobby, but with fiddly things that require unwanted thinking and carefulness (pfft!), sometimes you get really tired and stressed - NOT GOOD!

But with these little dandies, not so. I have been making these since I was about 11, and they have never failed me. It's from Bill Granger - you should know by now my worship of him. They're just like plain chocolate chip cookies, but with oats! That means that they're wholesome! (Just tell yourself that).

*I know that these look like ANZAC biscuits in the photos, but trust me, there are LOTS of chocolate chips in those little things! And the light when I took the photos wasn't too crash-hot, so I brightened them up on the computer, and they turned a sort of sepia colour! Forgive me, peoples of the internet!

Anyway, I kind of like the warm tone of the photos. Sue me why don't you!

I joke, I joke, but really, folks, for a nice afternoon bikkie to be enjoyed with a cup of tea and a bowl full of strawberries, you really can't go past these. They're humble and kind and simple and they love it when you eat them! So do these cookies a favour (or two) and have a munch on them!

Chocolate Chip - Oat Cookies

{Recipe from Bill Granger's "Bill's Food" - I didn't adapt, why take away from perfection?}

Makes 30 (I got away with 33!)

Ingredients:

150g unsalted butter, softened

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1 egg, lightly beaten

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup plain flour

I tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

2 1/3 cups rolled oats

1 1/2 cups chocolate chips, or chopped up milk chocolate

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius. Line 3 large baking trays with baking paper.

Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until fluffy and smooth. Add the egg and vanilla, beat until smooth. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into bowl and mix liightly with a wooden spoon. Fold in oats and chocolate chips.

Roll tablespoons of the mixture into balls and place, evenly spaced, on the baking trays. Flatten the balls slightly with a fork dipped in flour. Bake cookies for 20 min, or until light golden. Remove from oven and let cool for 5 min, then transfer to a wire rack.

P.S. If you're wondering about the photos with a shaft of light through them (hint: above this sentence), I went all experimental and postmodern by seeing what the biscuits would look like in the harsh light. Not sure of the outcome... some might call it weird. I think I'm going to call it... ART.

:)

CWA Damper with Clear Apple Jam

Why hello!

It's a hard life, isn't it? Popping over to New Caledonia pour ameliorer ma francais pendant une semaine, coming back to find that your dear mother has bought you an AMAZING PRESENT - the County Women's Association Cookbook (eeeek!), and proceeding to bake... and bake... and bake.

Ah, what a life I lead - oh wait, school goes back tomorrow. Waah! Too much of a good thing, right?

Seeing as my AMAZING mum bought me the CWA cookbook (of biblical standards in the world of Australian baking), and seeing as it's ANZAC day on Wednesday, I thought I would make something simple, and quintessentially Australian - damper. Damper is so easy to make, filling, and goes with a lot of things - this is why it has remained a traditional Australian food for the past 200 or so years. I can just imagine my Nan making it for her 5 kids while Pop was away at war. 

To accompany this glorious bread, I decided to make an Apple "Jelly", or "Clear Apple Jam". We had heaps of apples, and I adore making homemade jams, so I figured, what they hey? I didn't have a muslin cloth to strain the juice through, so it's just a teensy bit cloudy, but I call that 'rustic'. There's a word for everything, you know! So if you do have a muslin cloth, feel free to strain it so the jam is crystal clear!

The flavour of the jam is so fresh. I love bits of fruit in jam, but I really don't think this one needs it. It has enough self-confidence to get by on its own! It complements the damper perfectly - soft, dense bread with the not-too-sweet jam spread on top - perfect for breakfast, lunch or tea!

To tell you the truth, I could just eat the jam on its own! But for the sake of common courtesy, try to refrain from doing so!

CWA Damper with Clear Apple Jam

Makes one large loaf/ 1 1/2 cups of jam

{Recipes from CWA Cookbook "Jam Drops and Marble Cake", and David Lebovitz' Apple Jelly}

Ingredients:

Damper:

450g self-raising flour

1 tsp salt

310ml milk

Jam:

1 kilo red apples

3 cups water

1 cup caster sugar

1 tbsp lemon juice

Method:

We'll do the jam first, because it takes longer.

Peel apples, chop into large chunks, and put into a large, deep saucepan, cores and seeds included. Add the water, cover and bring to the boil. Once bubbling violently, reduce heat to a simmer, leave the lid askew, and let cook for 30 minutes, until apples are soft and cooked through.

Using a fine colander/sieve (with or without a muslin cloth on top) set over a deep, large bowl, sit the apples and liquid over it so that the liquid drips through. Leave for minimum 3 hours WITHOUT PRESSING DOWN ON THE APPLES.

Measure out the juice after the time. I had about one cup, but you might have more if you leave it overnight. Pour into a saucepan, add sugar and lemon juice, and bring to the boil.

Chill a plate in the freezer for 5 minutes. Once you've been boiling the mixture for about 5 minutes, turn the heat off. Now the testing begins. Drop a dab of the jam onto the chilled plate, and place back in the freezer for about 5 minutes. If the jam shrinks and is firm to touch, rather than a liquid, your jam is ready! Pour into a sterilised jar and refrigerate.

Damper:

Preheat the oven to 220 degrees celsius. Line a baking tray with baking paper.

Sift the flour and salt into a large mixing bowl. Add the milk and mix with a butter knife to a dough, not too sticky and with no flour remaining.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and lightly knead to a smooth round. Place on the baking tray, and cut a cross in the top of the dough. Bake for 30 minutes on the bottom shelf of the oven.

Spread warm damper with jam!