So last Friday I turned 27. It’s one of those crappy 20′s birthdays when I realise I am hurtling towards 30. Still, I fared better than last year where I totally freaked out about suddenly having to say I was in my late twenties. I was treated to brunch at Betty’s tea toom in Ilkley, then we popped to the sugarcraft supplies shop so I could pick up some new sugarpaste to make the flowers on my cake and also stopped by the lovely Swillington Organic Farm where I picked up some rind-on bacon (my favourite) and a rack of organic lamb. In the evening we went for a v. tasty meal at Pinche Pinche mexican restaurant who catered for a blogger event I ran at work.

The day before I was at a web design conference with Mr LTT and as he’s self employed and had taken both that day and my birthday off, I was left to my own devices for most of the weekend so I had full time to devote to making myself a birthday cake. I had loads of ideas what I wanted to do but I knew I wanted to try a few things like making a proper zebra cake, using swiss meringue buttercream (a year since I made it for my last birthday cake) and having a play with sugarpaste flowers which I hadn’t done since I did my course a while back.

I started making the flowers and quickly realised there was no way I was going to be able to make enough in time, so I cut it down to three although I would’ve liked more, but I saw the light fading and realised I was going to have to act fast if I wanted to capture the light to take the photos.

The cake itself was quite easy. I initially made one following the recipe I first found for zebra cake but it used olive oil which I’m not especially keen on and even though I cake tested it and it seemed fine, once it’d cooled and I went to slice it, it turned out it wasn’t cooked in the middle. So I sighed, cleared down the kitchen and started again. This time I used my usual sponge cake recipe (x4) but I melted the butter to make it a bit more runny and it worked out great! When I split the batter to colour, I used bright pink gel food colouring and blue gel food colouring. I used two 9 inch tins by the way. I used a cake wire to slice the cakes in half.

For the buttercream I used Sweetapolita’s swiss meringue buttercream but even though we both have KitchenAid mixers she must have a much bigger one by the look of the photos, because halfway through making it my egg whites were nearly overflowing the bowl! I took half the mix out and slowly added it back in as I added in the butter. I then mixed in blue food colouring (Sugarflair). I then filled between two of the layers with buttercream and also some apricot jam for a bit more flavour and apricot jam is totally my favourite. Let’s face it, if you can’t have what you want on your birthday then when can you?

I used my Wilton 1M star tip to pipe the roses like on I am baker’s rose cake tutorial. Then I used some white normal buttercream to pipe in the gaps and add another colour to the cake. I popped the sugarpaste flowers in the top too.

I think the best thing about this cake was taking it to work today – everyone ooohed and aahed and couldn’t believe I’d made it. There’s such excitement in having a pretty buttercream and having a more exciting colouring inside I think! It was great because everyone managed to have a slice and as the swiss meringue buttercream isn’t nearly so sweet, it was possibly to have a slice without questioning whether it would leave you with type II diabetes. I didn’t use all the buttercream by the way, I used about ⅔ of it and put the rest in an airtight tub in the freeer.

Do you want to know how much of the main ingredients I used? OK, this will make me feel a bit ill but I’m going to!

• 1.356kg butter
• 1kg sugar
• 225g flour
• 4 eggs plus 15 egg whites

On that note, I’m going to return to diet…

Macarons…the final frontier of baking, one of the few things I haven’t made before. Cherries are now in season so I bought a few from the lovely greengrocer in Headingley and wondered what on earth I could bake with them. My mum bought me Lorraine Pascale’s Baking Made Easy book and having watched her make macarons on the tv, I was sure it couldn’t be THAT hard. Four attempts later I finally had a mixture that I could pipe onto the baking sheet. Her instructions lack detail PLUS having looked up the video on Youtube, the weight for the egg whites for the meringue differs from that in the book. I adapted her recipe and I will give you more detailed instructions so that hopefully, you’ll be able to get them right sooner than I did!

{Makes about 12 macarons}

1 hour 45 mins (including cooling time) – Prep time: 30 mins – Cooking time: 15mins – Resting and cooling time: 1 hour

Ingredients

For the macarons

• 125g icing sugar
• 115g ground almonds
• 10g good quality cocoa powder
• 40g egg whites
• 110g caster sugar
• 2tbsp water
• 50g egg whites

For the cherry buttercream filling

• 70g pitted cherries, sliced roughly
• 2tbsp cherry brandy
• 2tbsp milk
• 1tbsp caster sugar
• 45g butter, room temperature
• 80g icing sugar
• You’ll also need a piping bag

Instructions

1. In a large bowl mix the icing sugar, ground almonds and 40g egg whites in a large mixing bowl and make into a paste.
2. Whisk the 50g egg whites in a metal bowl until nearly stiff peaks are formed.
3. In a small saucepan, combine the caster sugar and water until all the sugar has dissolved and the mixture starts to thicken – if you take it off the heat too soon then your meringue won’t form stiff peaks, too late and you’ll get hardened sugar bits in the meringue.
4. With the electric whisk on, gently pour the sugar water into the egg whites and mix until stiff peaks form and the meringue looks glossy.
5. Gently tip the meringue onto the almond paste mixture, not the other way around as this knocks the air out of the meringue and it will go sloppy (trust me from experience here).
6. Start folding the meringue into the almond paste with a plastic spatula, then give it a good stir once it’s all started to mix in. Don’t use an electric whisk as this will also affect the consistency. The mixture should have the consistency of tomato ketchup.
7. Line 2 baking trays with parchment/greaseproof paper and fill a piping bag with a round small/medium with your macaroon mixture.
8. With the piping bag upright, pipe circles 4cm wide, 2cm apart onto the tray. When pulling up from each circle it will leave a slightly raise lump. Once you’ve finished piping the circle, lift the tray off the surface and drop down a couple of times to help smooth them out.
9. Leave for 30 minutes to stand and pre-heat your oven to 170°C/Gas Mark 5.
10. Place in the oven for about 15 minutes with the door ajar (to prevent humidity in the oven) until they feel good and crisp on the top.
11. Move the whole sheet onto a cooling rack and peel the macarons off once cooled completely.
12. To make the buttercream: In a small saucepan, place the cherries, caster sugar and 1tbsp cherry brandy and simmer gently for a few minutes. Mash with a fork and cook for a minute or two longer.
13. Remove from the heat and run the mixture through a sieve into a large bowl to extract juices, then add the bits left in the sieve to the juice too. Add the butter, milk, icing sugar and leftover cherry brandy and beat well until smooth. The mixture will be slightly runny.
14. Spoon a large teaspoonful onto a macaroon and sandwich another on top, until all the macarons are done. I decorated mine with edible hearts.

I made these for the Iron Cupcake competition in Leeds for the theme “summer berries”. I took the idea of the traditional Eton Mess (fresh cream, meringue and strawberries) but used buttercream. The inside of the cupcake is stripy, which is a nice surprise when you bite into it!

60mins – Prep time: 40 mins – Cooking time: 20mins

Ingredients

Cupcakes

• 4oz golden caster sugar
• 4oz margarine (I use Stork)
• 4oz self raising flour
• 2 medium/large eggs (get them out of the fridge beforehand to warm up to room temp)
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste/3 drops vanilla essence
• Red food colouring

Buttercream

• 100g butter
• 220g icing sugar
• 1tsp vanilla essence

Strawberry sauce

• 15 strawberries
• 2 tbsp soft brown sugar

Decorations

• Meringues – you could make your own or you could just use one of those meringue nests you can buy from the supermarket
• Strawberries to decorate – try to use the smaller ones for decoration and larger ones for the sauce

Instructions

Oven temp: 160°C/320°F

1. Before making the cupcakes, make the strawberry sauce. Remove stalks and slice strawberries into about 6 pieces each. Place them in a saucepan with the sugar and simmer over a gentle heat for about 10 minutes with the lid on, stirring occasionally. The strawberries will go very slushy.
2. Use a masher to gently squash all the strawberries and simmer with the lid off for another 2 minutes.
3. Run the sauce through a sieve to remove all the pips and pulp and leave to cool.
4. Lay out cupcake cases. If you use silicon you can lay them on a flat baking tray, if you use paper ones, I advise using a bun tin to make the cakes hold their shape
5. Whisk the eggs and sugar for at least 4 minutes with an electric hand whisk and beat air into the mix so it fluffs up.
6. Bit by bit, sieve in the flour and baking powder and add bits of butter, whisking the mixture each time to ensure a smooth texture, until fully mixed, then mix in the vanilla paste or essence.
7. Divide the mixture evenly into two bowls. In one bowl mix 4tbsp of strawberry sauce. Add red food colouring the batter is strongly coloured.
8. Take a spoonful of the white batter and spoon into the middle. Gently make a well with the base of a spoon in the middle. Repeat with pink mixture. Fill cupcake cases about two thirds full.
9. Put the cupcakes into the oven for 15-20 minutes until they feel spongey and the tops have got some colour.
10. Once out of the oven, place on a wire cooling rack to cool down
11. To make the buttercream, cream the butter on its own for a couple of minutes using an electric hand mixer, then add the icing sugar and vanilla essence and beat until light and fluffy.
12. Make a cupcake swirl, but after you’ve scooped the buttercream on, gently drip on strawberry sauce so that it gently makes a strawberry ripple in buttercream.

    Need help learning the swirl? Watch this fab video from youtube

13. Take your meringues and crumble it – I made my meringue quite fine to show off the sauce underneath but you can make it as chunky as you like. Sprinkle over the top of the buttercream.
14. Garnish with a strawberry, then try not to eat them all at once!

This is a recipe that’s been handed down from my grandma, I’ve adapted it a little bit and used individual ramekins but you can also use a larger dish and serve it as one dish.

1hr 40mins – Prep time: 20 mins – Cooking time: 1hr – 1 1/2hrs

{Serves: 3-4}

Ingredients

Sauce

• 1oz plain unsalted butter
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 tsp caster sugar
• 1 small tin of pineapple rings (roughly 140g)
• 1/2 pint milk
• 2 dessert spoon plain flour

Meringue

• 4oz caster sugar
• 2 egg whites

Instructions

1. Seperate pineapple rings from juice. Save juice for later. Chop up pineapple into small slices.
2. Heat milk until warm, but not boiling
3. In a seperate pan, melt the butter on a low heat. Mix flour in slowly whisking out any lumps. Cook for a further minute or so until the mixture goes like bread crumbs when whisked to make a roux.
4. Add the juice to the milk and stir. The total liquid should be 1/2 pint. If there’s not enough, add more milk.
5. Stir milk/pineapple juice mixture slowly into the roux whisking to prevent lumps. Stir in sugar and egg yolk.
6. Heat for a further 2 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mixture thickens. Stir in pineapple slices.
7. Divide mixture between 3 or 4 ramekins.
8. Whisk egg whites and sugar together until stiff peaks form.
9. Divide meringue between dishes and smooth out with a spoon.
10. Put ramekins on a baking tray and cook in the oven for 1-1 1/2 hours until meringue is hard on top and has gently browned on top.
11. Serve with vanilla ice-cream if desired.