Dan Lepard's Fresh Ginger and Coffee Cake

This is looking like a cake just for the connoisseur rather than a crowd.  Initially attracting a lot of admiring glances, my trusty cake box hadn't had its lid removed once by the time I lifted the lid today.  I'm assuming that perhaps people were put off by the flavour rather than that they were just snubbing me and my cake.  But it's their loss because with just three more days at work before I bring this challenge to its conclusion, it's the very last time they'll be getting cake.

Coffee cake is admittedly a bit of a marmite choice.  You either love it or hate it.  In a room of a hundred people, you'll probably have around half of them eschewing coffee in favour of tea or soft drinks.  Working in IT as I do and being one of the many who mainlines caffeine on a regular basis, I figured that this slight boundary push was a risk worth taking.  And so far, it's spectacularly failed.

Much as they eat a lot of cake, they don't have a passion for Dan Lepard cakes as I do.  Or at least they really like them, but couldn't care less whose recipe it is that I'm using.  The recipe is one from the Guardian website and I chose it purely because I was interested in the flavour combination.

Having baked the sponge late yesterday, I was up at 5am icing it.  For once, I cut a piece out of the whole cake for photographic purposes and I decided to try a bit as I was curious.  The flavour combination works.  My brain struggled a little to compute all the flavours as they were going in but it works so well together, the cake is a taste sensation for anyone who doesn't think that Mr Kipling is the be-all and end-all of cake making*.


Filled with chopped pistachios and both fresh and stem ginger; and speckled with real, rather than instant coffee, the flavours are subtle enough to compliment each other and the lemon-cream cheese icing on the top adds another subtle dimension.

Coffee cake is one of my all time favourites and if I'm honest, I'd probably make a bog standard coffee sponge with coffee buttercream for nine out of ten coffee cakes but this is definitely something I'd share at cake club in the future.

The cake was slightly drier than I would've expected but this may be to do with me baking it in a rectangular rather than the recommended square tin.  I had to extend the cooking time a little to ensure it cooked through and of course, it's the corner pieces that always pay the price for an extended baking time.  Lesson learned - but the square tin had my disasterous marshmallows in it.

If you fancy testing your cake connoisseur credentials, you can find the recipe here.

*My father in law does

Olympic Food Challenge: Mousse de Limão - Portugal

Yet another amazing day for Team GB.  Finally, Vicky Pendleton got the opportunity to shine and take gold.  More glory for the men's team sprint.  And sadly, I missed the lot as it's the Mothership's birthday and Olympics appears to be a dirty word in her house.  So much so that my step father keeps sneakily looking at the results on Teletext (or whatever the red button text service is now known as) with the same kind of furtiveness as an alcoholic taking sneaky sips from their stash of gin (he's a bit henpecked).

Summer on a plate

Still, Portugal were represented at tonight's birthday barbecue through a lovely lemon mousse from the fabulous Kerstin's Kitchen.  I met Kerstin through Twitter a while back.  She runs her own business, catering for dinner parties and selling amazing sounding home made products.  I so wish I lived closer to her so I could sample some of her wares.  Earlier in the week, we were tweeting about the OFC and she kindly sent me a couple of recipes to help me out.  The first being the aforementioned lemon mousse which was the perfect alternative to the calorie-laden, super-rich chocolate and coconut layer cake that I managed to rustle up as the star attraction.  I will write about the choc-coconut on my new blog which will be going live in October.

I was a little nervous about making a baked mousse - Kerstin likened it to a souffle, which is something I've managed to avoid making this year - but in all honesty, it was a complete doddle.  Whip up some eggs, flavour with lemon, pop in ramekins, bake et voila.  Fresh, light pudding.  I did have one small problem in that I appeared to lose my egg-separating capabilities and ended up wasting three (omelette anyone) by dropping a yolk into the whites and subsequently bursting it when I tried to carefully fish it back out.  But other than that, they rose beautifully and got rave reviews from my Uncle Jeffrey.

Because I'm still trying to be good, I forewent the cakeage too and was really pleased to have this light alternative.  After a rather meat-heavy meal, it was nice to have something sweet to cleanse the palate without feeling like my jeans were fit to burst with after a massive slice of cake.

Decorated with summer berries, this is really the perfect summer dinner party dessert and I will definitely be making this again when I want to impress.  The plus side is that you can also serve it hot or cold so you can make it ahead or eat it straight from the oven.  I would love to try lining the bottom of the ramekins with some homemade lemon curd, just to give it a little something else - but that will be a later experiment when I'm not trying to impress anyone other than myself.

Thank you so much Kerstin for the recipe and do please pop over to her website to take a look or if your on Twitter, give her a follow (@KerstinsKitchen).  She's a lovely lady to chat to.

As for Portugal, they've sent 77 athletes to London 2012 and are completing in 13 disciplines.  Rather sensibly, they too have avoided fielding anyone to compete in the track cycling.  Last time they were in London, they took a silver in Sailing and a Bronze in Equestrian. So far, they've failed to win any medals this time round, but who knows how they'll fare in week two?

If I was awarding a medal for the recipe, it would get a gold for showoffiness, ease of making and taste, however I'd award the gold to Kerstin rather than Portugal :o)

BBC Good Food Lemon and Courgette

Today's quick and dirty recipe was a Good Food special.  I've been so busy pondering the Olympic Food Challenge (OFC) and researching my nineteen recipes that I forgot that I had to cook something different today.  And then I forgot that I actually have to blog about it too.  I've heard the rule of thumb for learning to do something is that you have to do it twenty times before it becomes habit.  I've done this 306 times.  You'd think it would be second nature by now.

And whilst I was busy neglecting the regular blog for the OFC, I also failed to note that it starts tomorrow and not on Thursday.  B*gger!  I had what I needed for tomorrow's recipe which was going to be a rhubarb crumble cake and I was going to start on Thursday with a dish from the Solomon Islands.  I've now had to reshuffle things and will be making a souffle tomorrow - cue manic panic because I've been strategically avoiding that one all year.  Tuna and papaya salad on Thursday.  Rhubarb crumble cake?  Well let's just say that I may not be getting good feedback from my boss at my mid-year review now.

Hmmm...it wasn't that yellow in reality... #instagram

Ah well.  So the blog is going to be short and sweet tonight as I go into panic mode.  I picked this recipe up from a chicken recipe book that came with Good Food this month.  It's also been languishing in my binder on the Good Food website for over a year as something to make in an emergency on a hot sunny day.  It ticked all the boxes today.

Some of the reviews weren't great so based on advice, I added some garlic to the courgettes while they were cooking and with the lemon and lots of seasoning, I could've just eaten a massive pile of them as they were.  That would actually work really well as a low carb alternative to spaghetti if you grated them lengthways (as I did) rather than across the round end.  Sprinkle on a few parmesan shavings and you'd have an ace, low-fat, low carb meal.

With a pile of well seasoned couscous and a well seasoned chicken breast, this made a quick, simple tasty meal that I will definitely make time and again.  I even got Miss A eating chicken today by telling her it might just turn her into a butterfly (yes I do own a copy of Great Lies to Tell Small Kids although that's not in the book).  Couscous wasn't proffered because even the dogs are rubbish at cleaning that off the floor and I wasn't in the mood to clean up.  Hubby doesn't like couscous so this is definitely one for me and me alone but I'm happy I have something healthy and low fat that I can quickly cook alongside other meals.

You can find the recipe here.

Lil Ms Squirrel's Lemon Amaretto Bakewell

My current boss is about to move on up the ladder towards the top of what is affectionately known as The Ivory Tower and so as a final farewell, I decided to make him a Bakewell tart.  He's long been a fan of my Bakewells, ever since we had a bake sale at work years ago and he said he couldn't possibly partake as it was all going to be chocolate and he'd given it up for Lent.  I baked a Bakewell so he had to put his hand in his pocket (he would've done so anyway!) and he declared it to be the best Bakewell he'd ever eaten.

Since then, when anyone needs him to do something, there's a bit of a standing joke that I need to make a Bakewell for him first to distract him from the awkward question that's about to be asked.  So it seemed appropriate to make one to celebrate his promotion.

Today's new toddler skill - blind baking a pastry case

Of course, Miss A hasn't baked since we were on holiday so I had to let her help me out.  Therefore, it's by no means the most photogenic Bakewell ever, but for a two year old, she's not done too bad a job of decorating the top.  The pastry is a bit squiffy - I'll take the blame for that.  More haste and less speed needed.  I used ready-bought pastry and failed to notice that Ocado only sell frozen pastry.  When the Ocado man turned up at 5pm with my delivery, I had to delay proceedings for an hour while the pastry defrosted.  But we got there in the end.

On a slight side note about Miss A, I rarely get the opportunity to drop her off at or pick her up from nursery as she only does 9am - 4pm.  But recently,  I went to the nursery Jubilee party.  Her key worker approached me and asked for a word - the phrase that strikes fear into the heart of every parent.

In the split second between the request and the story, I panicked that she was behind in her learning or she'd been doing something naughty that toddlers do (biting, pinching etc) but no, my delightful little two-year-old has been in the home corner teaching all the other two year olds how to bake.  She's stands there with some authority explaining how to correctly attempt to crack the rubber eggs, that you need to cream the butter and sugar first and that it needs to be soft.  That you weigh the flour out carefully with a spoon and then it goes into a tin and into the oven but you have to ask Mummy or one of the assorted pets to do it as the oven is too hot for children to touch.  Such a proud mummy moment. I now expect that tomorrow, all the children in the Ocean room will know how to blind bake a pastry case :o)

Ooops, there's a crack in the pastry

Anyway, bake to the bake.  So I replaced the jam with lemon curd - a good way to use up all the egg yolks getting left over from  the egg-white omelette extravaganza - and Disarronno into the sponge and topped it with Amaretti biscuits.  I had intended to crush them and sprinkle them on, but my little helper insisted that we placed them on the top as they were.  I'm worried they'll be too hard to cut, but we'll see tomorrow afternoon - if Leaving Boss decides to share it with the team that is!

As for Incoming Boss, well I know him pretty well.  And I'm well aware of his culinary peccadilloes.  He's already tried most of the cakes on this blog that have been earmarked for the office and has been complimentary about all of them.  Even Nigella's Bacon Brownies - and he's not a brownie fan.  I hope he didn't take the job just so he could have special cakes made for him!

The recipe I adapted for this came from my mum and I blogged about it here.  This is the recipe for my twist on the original.

• 250g qty shortcrust pastry
• 125g softened butter
• 125g caster sugar
• 2 medium eggs (rough weight 125g)
• 125g self raising flour
• 50g ground almonds
• 1tbsp Disaronno Amaretto or 1/2 tsp almond essence
• 2t bsp milk
• half a jar of lemon curd



Beautifully decorated, two-year-old-stylee

• 8-10 amaretti biscuits, crushed

• Essential equipment - 9" loose bottomed flan tin

1. Preheat the oven to 180c/160c fan/gas 4
2. Roll the pastry to 5mm thick and large enough to cover the base and sides of your flan tin.
3. Line the tin with the pastry, prick the base over with a fork, add a circle of parchment weighed down with baking beans and bake for 25 mins.
4. Meanwhile, cream the butter and sugar in a large bowl until light and fluffy.
5. Beat in the eggs one at a time, adding 1tbsp of the flour with each addition to prevent curdling.
6. Add in the Disaronno Amaretto or almond essence then beat in the almonds and flour and 2tbsp of milk.
7. Remove the baking beans and parchment and bake for a further 10 minutes.
8. Remove the pastry case from the oven, cover the base with the curd and then top with the sponge mixture.
9. Sprinkle the sponge with the crushed amaretti biscuits.
10. Change the oven temp to 190c/170 fan/gas 5 bake until golden and springy to the touch - approx 25 minutes.
11. Leave to cool in the tin until completely cold then transfer to the serving dish.

Rachel Khoo's Asparagus with Lemon and Mint Vinagrette

During a recent meeting at work, I was accused by my colleagues as being a control freak because I'd taken possession of both the remote control for the overhead projector and the air conditioning.  Despite the fact that I was leading the meeting, they (all males) seemed to think it was because I wear the trousers at home and naturally assume control of the telly zapper and, consequently control the viewing of my household.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

Between 7am and 7pm, if the telly is on, it will either be tuned to CBeebies, football or cricket.  With Miss A and the husband doing battle for supremacy if there is a conflict of interests.  After 7pm, the husband is in sole control of what is shown on the lounge telly.  It's one of about three things.  Football.  Reality TV.  Or CSI/NCIS/Law and Order/insert other annoying American drama series in this space.

I am sometimes permitted to join the viewing of programmes, provided I limit my commentary about poor continuity, improbable circumstances and '(s)he is the killer' (usually said within the first five minutes and proving to be correct fifty minutes later) to a minimum.  Likewise, I get red-carded from the football if I utter 'Didn't he used to play for....?', 'Isn't that....?' or 'xyz used to play for Southampton. All the good footballers played for Southampton once upon a time'.

The only time I've ever been able to convince the hubby to watch something out of the ordinary was when I introduced him to Michael McIntyre.  The husband doesn't do funny.  Invariably, I have to explain jokes to him which then means they lose their humour.  But one rare night when I did manage to get a hold of the remote, I tuned in to Comedy Roadshow and because MM was doing his routine about his kids and the husband now gets the harassed parent references, he actually laughed.  And so once in a blue moon, I'm allowed to now watch that too.

Of course, if I had my way, the viewing would predominantly include food programmes.  And comedy.  But certainly at the moment, mostly food.  I used to love Saturday Kitchen (I have a thing for James Martin) but of course, now if I put the telly on on a Saturday, James is rapidly replaced by Justin (aka Timmy the sheep, Mr Tumble, Jake the Tweeny, the man from Gigglebiz etc etc....).  When I was on maternity leave and snowed in (pre baby) I whiled away the hours watching so many back-to-back episodes of Come Dine With Me that I started dreaming about it.  Now, I just fill the Sky box with episodes that never get watched.

And so it will be no surprise to you that I've never seen Little Paris Kitchen.  I know of Rachel Khoo because many of my Twitter friends have raved about her cooking and her amazing sense of style.  I've read articles in Good Food about her.  I meant to Sky + the series, but knew I'd only get to watch it if I got up at 2am to get my mitts on the remote.  And then the dogs would probably pounce on me and insist on watching re-runs of Crufts or something.

Today's recipe is by Khoo, but only because I was desperately Googling at 3am (couldn't sleep - should've caught up with CDWM back catalogue) to find something to do with the bunch of asparagus that was slowly wilting in my fridge, coupled with the now meagre other contents of the fridge which is being cleaned out in preparation for the holiday.

Luckily, I managed to tick all of the boxes, save for lemons (purchased on the way to work).  And even got further use out of my little pack of mint that I bought for Monday's recipe and used again yesterday.  Am pleased with self for being thrifty and actually using up nearly a whole pack of fresh herbs rather than letting them wilt into submission.  In fact, I should declare this as National Mint Week.  Or 366 Recipe Challenge's Mint Week.  Or ....Mint Four Days as I now only have enough left to cover tomorrow's recipe.

Anyway, I'm aware that I've done a whole lot of waffle and so without further ado, this makes a really lovely starter (or main if you're greedy like me) and brings out the best in seasonal asparagus with a few simple ingredients.  Will definitely make again and again.  I just love asparagus and goats cheese.  It pressed all my buttons.  Only had regular green asparagus, and I used a crumbly Chevre with it.  Served with the last bit of the foccacia I made the other day.  Winning tea.

You can find the recipe here (and no, I didn't see it on the One Show!)

Dan Lepard's Lemon Butter Cake

The Queen was fifty-one when I was born.  At eighty-six, she's spent the weekend in the spotlight, travelling up the Thames on a freezing cold barge; listening to a quite frankly terrible concert (was it bad sound on the BBC or was it just that the majority of the performers can't sing live without auto-tune?); and then attending a series of services to celebrate her sixty years on the throne.  I'm worn out just thinking about her doing all that!

This evening I'm suffering from Jubilee fatigue.  In the same way that come December 27th, most of us will happily see out of the year without further turkey/chocolate/alcohol/party food.  I just wanted to eat something light for tea.  We've not indulged in the same way that we would at Christmas; but having spent the last couple of weeks eating salads every day, I'm struggling with all the meat I've eaten these past three days.

If all else fails, there's always lemon icing!

I'd planned to make the Telegraph's Diamond Jubilee salad - a modernisation of Coronation Chicken - but when push came to shove, I realised that I'd be happier with a bowl of berries and Greek yogurt. 

Luckily, I got guilted into baking a cake to take to my colleagues at my home site when I paid a cake-less visit to them kast week.  This got me out of today's hole of trying something new.

I've made several different lemon cakes (sorry, the previous link is to 'lemon' so it will pick up the lemon lamb recipe too!) since I started my blog, with my favourite being Dan's Lemon and Poppy Seed Cake.  I picked this one, not because I'm a huge fan of lemon cake but because I had an open tin of condensed milk in the fridge that needed using up.  Lepard says in the blurb that this keeps the cake moist.  I can't confirm that because the cake is now boxed up and ready for serious testing at work tomorrow.

The batter follows a very different method to pretty much any other cake I've made before.  It involves making a meringue from the egg whites and folding this into a mixture of egg yolks, melted butter, condensed milk, sugar and flour.  It had a really strange texture.  I would've expected the meringue to go in before the flour and found it quite hard to get an even mix through the batter.  I was also worried about losing the volume from the egg whites, but it baked okay.  I'll be interested to see how it comes out when it's cut and I'll update this post with the verdict tomorrow.

In the meantime, you can find the recipe on the Guardian Website. 

Lil Ms Squirrel's Jubilee Lemon, Blueberry and Raspberry Bundt

Just after the last Clandestine Cake Club and my epic raspberry cake, I got really excited about the idea of making a bundt cake for my next CCC bake.  I think it was a bit of random, middle-of-the-night web surfing that lit the spark - a couple of the recipes I read were by lovely ladies who I follow on Twitter - @Roswensian of Roswensian and @Philosophobia of Cake and Feminism.

Jubilee bundt

Bundt cakes for the uninitiated are those big, doughnut shaped cakes you often see on the continent.  You can get some really fancy bundt tins if you're serious about this and willing to invest upwards of £30 in just one cake tin, but as I was fairly sceptical about my level of success with a shaped tin, I bought one for a tenner on Amazon and am currently hoping for the best as I type because it's down in the oven baking.

I've been planning this cake ever since I got the tin so that I can have a practise run before the next CCC.  You'd've thought with so much forethought that I'd've come up with a timed plan to actually make the cake, but no, here I am at 8pm on a Friday night rushing through the baking.  

I've had one of those weeks where I feel I've bitten off more than I can chew with keeping this blog up on a daily basis.  But of course now, I'm too close to the finish line to quit.  The day was written off first with work, then a party at Miss A's nursery to celebrate the Jubilee and finally a trip to the vets with the Little Dog for her boosters.

I managed to whip up the cake batter whilst tea was cooking and get it into the oven.  I have to write the blog now because I've still got work to do for work and I'm running the risk of falling asleep over my keyboard and burning the cake.  It won't get iced until the morning now.  I'm still not sure how exactly I'm going to give it a jubilee theme - and it may all go a bit Pete Tong.  But the good news is that the batter tastes bloody marvellous so hopefully it will still taste great even if it looks a bit pants (I've seen some stunning cakes on Twitter this past week).

Because Bundt cakes seem to be more popular Stateside and on the Continent than in the UK, I had a Google around for a recipe to try out.  Because I'd planned to use blueberries and raspberries (for the patriotic colours), I happened across a Martha Stewart recipe that seemed to fit the bill.  A recipe from the Queen of American baking to adapt for the Queen of England's Jubilee?  Check!

Creative icing

On the way home from work, I stopped off at Morrisons to specifically buy some sour cream.  I came away with a bottle of Pimms, a bottle of wine, an electric mixer, some Hula Hoops, some frankfurters, some Dettol wipes, some bananas and some mushrooms but no sour cream.  Mr Ocado then came with the weekly order and he didn't have any sour cream either (I'd forgotten to order it, hence the stop at Morrisons) and so I had to spuddle around looking for an alternative.

Luckily Greek yogurt fits the bill and I happen to always have a tub of it in the fridge (except for now as I used it all in the cake).  As it was low fat, I compensated with a little extra butter.  

I mostly followed the rest of the recipe, aside from the fruit.  Stewart folds her fruit into the batter but I wanted to try and get some distinction between the raspberries and blueberries so I layered the cake mix in three sections with the fruit in between - blueberries between layer one and two and raspberries between layers two and three.

My one other problem was being that it was an American recipe, all the measurements were in cups.  I finally bought a set of cups several months ago and fully appreciate this method was used back in the day before scales were readily available but I just find the measurements a pain in the pants.  And it must be harder if you're making your own recipe up.  Some volumes are just 'a cup', some are 'a firmly packed cup'.  Confusing.  And how do you measure a cup of butter without melting it?  The alternative measure was sticks.  FML! So I diligently measured out my cups- and packed cups-ful and weighed out each one so I can bring you the metric version of the recipe.

Which I'll post later.  When I know that the cake was a success even with my adaptations.  No point giving you a duff recipe.  In the meantime, you'll have to make do with a pic of me layering the fruit in and if you're interested keep an eye out on Twitter for the grand-turning out picture.

Gotta scoot now, before I fall asleep.  More tomorrow :)

Updated - 2nd June 2012 @ 07:37

At about 9pm last night I successfully retrieved my bundt from the oven.  It had risen and cooked through perfectly.  I was a little surprised as the cake was so huge but then I figured it was because of the greater surface area exposed to heat by the tube bit in the middle (geek alert!)

Bundts don't really lend themselves to much icing so I settled on a drizzled red, white and blue effect; scattered with gold star edible glitter - which is now attached to just about everything including me and my phone.

The cake is about to head out on a journey to Winchester so when it's finally been cut, I'll post a pic of the inside - hopefully with lots of red and 'blue' from the raspberries and blueberries.  Fingers x'd.

I'm entering this into the Homemade by Fleur jubilee competition, sponsored by Appliances Online

Lemon, blueberry and raspberry bundt (adapted from a recipe by Martha Stewart)

Out of the oven

Fills a 25cm (10") bundt tin

• 400g plain flour plus 1 tsp (reserve this for coating the fruit)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 250g unsalted butter, softened
• 200g light muscavado sugar
• 175g caster sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 300g low fat Greek yogurt (if using full fat, reduce the butter by 25g)
• 1 tsp vanilla bean paste
• 200g blueberries (I used Waitrose Essential Frozen Blueberries, defrosted)
• 200g fresh raspberries
• zest of one unwaxed lemon

For the icing

• 75g icing sugar
• Juice of half a lemon
• red and blue food colouring (optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 180c/160c fan/350F. Use a small knob of the butter to butter the bundt tin well.
2. Mix the flour, baking powder and salt together in a bowl.
3. Beat the flour and sugars together until light and fluffy.
4. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well in between additions.  Beat in the vanilla bean paste.
5. Sift in one third of the flour and mix until well incorporated. Mix in half of the Greek yogurt.  Repeat this process until all of the flour and yogurt are used up.  Add the lemon zest and mix well.
6. Put about a third of the batter into the pan and smooth down.
7. Mix the blueberries with half a tsp of the reserved flour and scatter on the top of the batter in the pan.
8. Add another third of the batter and spread evenly around the tin, ensuring the blueberries are covered. 
9. Coat the raspberries in the remaining flour then scatter on top of the batter in the pan.
10. Add the rest of the batter, smooth the surface.  Bake for 60-70 minutes until a skewer inserted comes out with only a few cake crumbs stuck to the end.
11. Cool in the tin for 20 minutes and then turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.
12. To make the icing, sift the icing sugar into a bowl and then add the lemon juice to make a runny icing.  You may need a little more liquid depending on the juciness of your lemon half but only add this a few drops at a time because the icing will change rapidly change consistency.  You can always recitfy too runny icing with a little more icing sugar.
13. To get the drizzle effect, I split the icing into three bowls, coloured two of them using red and blue gel food colouring (the liquid ones will change the consistency of the icing too much).  I then put a teaspoonful of icing into the corner of a ziploc bag, snipped the tiniest bit off of the end and then just drizzled it randomly over the cake.

Updated 6th June 2012 @ 19:55 

I've had a few requests for people to see the inside of the cake so here's a picture.

You'll notice that the fruit has roughly stayed put, although the raspberries on the left hand side are definitely lower (or higher depending on which way you class as up in an inverted cake!) than when I placed them.  It's most probably because I floured the blueberries before adding them, but forgot to do so with the raspberries.  I've also upped the quantities a little as a few areas were sparse in the fruit area.

The cake also kept well - the last piece was eaten four days after it was baked and was still beautifully moist.  The only downside was that by then, the glaze had sunk into the cake; leaving the outside striped with red and blue food colouring.

Will definitely be using the cake recipe again and adapting with a variety of fruits and glazes.

Olive Magazine Roast Lemon and Thyme Lamb

As I mentioned yesterday, I've been staying with my mum and asked if she might be so kind this weekend as to let me cook roast lamb for the family sunday lunch.  I've mentioned before that I have an aversion to eating lamb products.  It's not really anything to do with any veggie tendencies, more that I was probably scarred for life in the eighties by Bernard Matthews' Lamb Roasts.  I blogged about this trauma a while back so won't repeat it again, but if you're interested, you can read about it here.

Lunch. Mum's roasties are ace :)

The need to do this was akin to the cravings I had when I was expecting Miss A.  I never craved anything really random but I'd be struck by moments when I absolutely had to eat something - the one I remember is my grandmother's homemade scotch eggs - but by the time I got said food, it made my stomach roil.  It was the same with the lamb.  When I made Dan Lepard's Perfect Plain Pita the other day, the idea of stuffing it full of cold roast lamb, tzatziki and salad got me all excited.  Yet this morning, when I was faced with having to remove a couple of kilos of lamb leg from its bloody resting place and stab it full of holes to stuff with lemon and thyme, my stomach persuaded my brain it wasn't such a bright idea.

I'm one of those meat eaters who will eat meat so long as it doesn't look like the thing it came from.  The easiest way to turn me veggie would be to demand that I look at a picture of the cute fluffy thing it once was before tucking in to my dinner.  My mother traumatised me further as a child (as if the Matthews roasts weren't enough) by once chasing me round our lounge with a fish that still had its head on, beady eyes staring balefully at me, before taking it into the kitchen and cleaving its head off in one clean move with the massive butchers knife she kept for such occasions.  After that I'd only eat fish fingers because with the logic that only a six-year-old can have, they quite clearly won't made from fish.

Oven ready

Anyhow, once I got over myself and cooked the lamb, and rejoiced in being allowed to make the matching gravy rather than using good old Bisto I got to sit down to a really lovely roast lamb lunch that I would happily eat again.  Well I would cook it again if I'd not had to drive back over Salisbury Plain watching all the sad, bedraggled lambs trying to gaily skip through quagmires.  I'm not sure if I'd feel more guilty eating a lamb who lived through this miserable spring or one who had the fortune to gambol amongst daffodils during one of our rare, sun-shiny Springs.

When I was small and we used to go out in the car, my grandfather taught me to shout 'mint sauce' when we passed a field of sheep and 'Yorkshire puddings' on passing cows.  When I realised what he meant, I went through a phase of only eating peanut butter sandwiches and eschewing any meat that wasn't mechanically recovered (six-year-old fish finger logic at work here).  Miss A was happily bleating from the rear of the car today every time we passed a field of sheep.  I am in no doubt that the child who happily ripped the head from the dog on her birthday cake (and swallowed it in one bite) will have any problems with whether or not to eat meat when she's older.

Back to the lamb, it got rave reviews from all the family so it wasn't sacrificed in vain.  I only hope it's other legs were treated so kindly in the afterlife.

As far as I know, my mum just normally shoves her lamb in the oven completely 'naked'.  It then gets slathered with mint sauce (something else I can't stand after overeating it as a child).  So the idea of giving my fussy grandfather lamb with lemon in it, no mint sauce and gravy that wasn't Bisto was quite daunting.  But he ate it, had seconds and even commented that he'd liked the lemony bits.  Result!

Resting before dinner

My mum enjoyed it so much that she asked if she could comment on the blog when I'd written it.  So hopefully she won't be too mad at me for revealing my childhood traumas to all and sundry.  And she'd told me I'm even allowed to go back again if I cook a Sunday roast like that again.  She'll have to wait another few months for that yet because I've still got around 150 posts to write for this blog.  She's going to be subjected to Beef Wellington next time.

Oh and we ate the rest of yesterday's Cinnamon and Blackberry cake for pudding.  Kept really well in the fridge overnight - wasn't covered up and still just as soft as yesterday.  Top eating weekend had by all.

Recipe - serves 6 From Olive Magazine

• 3 onions cut into large rings
• olive oil
• 1 lemon , zest peeled off and cut into 15-20 pieces
• 3 large sprigs thyme , broken into 15-20 small sprigs
• leg of lamb about 1.75kg

1. Heat the oven to 200C/fan 180C/gas 6. Put the onion rings and garlic halves in a roasting tray with 4 tbsp water. Sit the lamb on top and rub the surface of the meat with oil.
2. Stab the skin side of the lamb 15-20 times with a small, sharp knife, twisting to make small holes. Stuff the lemon zest and thyme sprigs into the holes. Season well.
3. Roast for 1 hour 15 minutes for medium rare, 1 hour 30 minutes for medium, 1 hour 45 minutes for medium-well done and 2 hours for well done. Baste the lamb 3-4 times with the juices in the base of the tin as it cooks.
4. Once cooked, rest on a plate or board for 20-30 minutes under foil. 

For the Gravy

Pour excess fat from the tin, then sit it on the hob over a high heat. Stir 1 tbsp flour and 2 tbsp redcurrant jelly into the onions until the jelly melts. Add 175ml red wine. Boil for 30 seconds, add 350ml stock. Bring to a simmer and cook for 2-3 minutes until thickened slightly. Season then strain through a sieve.

Dan Lepard's Lemon and Poppy Seed Cake

When I buy certain things - especially non-essentials (all food is essential!) - I justify the spend by how much the item costs per use.  For example - my running shoes are good value.  At roughly £85 per pair, I will run around 500 miles before replacing them meaning they cost just 17p per mile.  Bargain!  Likewise my car.  It wasn't new.  I purchased it for around £4,000.  Since I've had it, I've driven it around 10,000 miles so that's 40p per mile (ignoring trivialities like insurance, petrol and wear and tear).  Take my glasses (only figuratively because if you do so literally, I won't be able to see to type this post).  Cost £400.  I've had them for 3 years.  I wear them every day without fail.  36p per day and falling.

The dress I bought to wear to a black and white ball when I cruised from New York to Southampton with my Grandad.  Cost £200.  Worn once.  Cost per wear = £200.  Ridiculously extravagant but I can't bear to part with it on eBay even though I'll probably never fit into it again.  I often buy random bits of clothing in the sale and wear them once as bad it was a bad fashion choice, before guiltily stuffing them into a charity bag.  Again, extoritionate.  But if I buy a modestly expensive work dress (say £75-£100) and wear it once a week for a year, that's quite a good deal, isn't it?

Finished cake - note the zest, poppy seeds and sugar topping

Becks, where are you going with this, I hear you ask?  Well to Dan Lepard, of course.  At the time of writing this post, I've used Short and Sweet 19 times.  It cost me just £8.  So that's 42p per recipe I've used.  The per recipe cost will decrease over time as I continue to try new ones and repeat-bake ones I've already blogged about.  Whereas the James Martin book I bought as a bargain 75% off and costing just a fiver has worked out at £5 per recipe because somehow I've managed to lose the book.  And despite making a vow to use lots of different books on this blog, I've still got a few that I've never cooked from meaning their Total Cost of Ownership (TCO, yet another TLA*) remains sky high.

Why did I choose Dan Lepard yet again?  Well last week the Divisional Financial Controller popped up next to my desk and practically begged me for cake.  For once, I didn't have any and so in a show of sisterly solidarity in the testosterone-fuelled environment we inhabit, I promised I'd bake a cake especially for her this week and she could choose what I made.  She picked lemon drizzle.  Not normally a problem, as I made a really good lemon drizzle cake.  But if I was going to blog about it, I'd have to find yet-another-lemon-cake-recipe as I have baked, and blogged about, several different lemon cakes over the past few weeks and thought I'd exhausted the options.

Not so.  I hadn't thought to try one of Dan's recipes before.  He offered up two - one is a lemon butter cake, containing condensed milk and the other a lemon and poppy seed cake.  I hummed and haaahed for a while as I couldn't really get my head round the idea of seeds in a cake.  I then thought about making it without seeds, but where was the adventure in that.  Re-reading the blurb before the recipe, I was sold on the line that this "the sort (of cake) you dream you'll find in a corner sandwich bar but never (OK, rarely) do".  I had to test this theory.

The batter contains a whole host of ingredients.  Fragrant lemon zest, the usual suspects of butter, oil, sugar, eggs, flour and baking powder.  The ubiquitous poppy seeds (which make the mixture look like it contains mashed dragon fruit) and oatmeal.  That's right.  Finely milled oatmeal.  This apparently lends a slightly chewy texture to the finished bake.  To me, chewy usually means something that will give you jaw ache.  That couldn't be further from the truth of this lovely, slightly crumbly, butter-soft cake.

Holy speckled cake batter, Batman!

Topped with a zingy lemon syrup that makes your cheeks tingle and then a beautiful crunchy  layer of sugar, this cake won't do your teeth or waistline any favours.  But if you're going to break the rules and have cake, this is the kind of cake you want to have.  I'm so often disappointed by overly sweet lemon cakes that have lost their bite, but this cake has it in spades.  I will admit that I am not sure if this is down to the ratio of sugar to lemon juice in the syrup because I took my eye off the pan and paid attention to my Pritt-stick wielding toddler at the critical moment and my syrup reduced by about a third and was really intense.  It didn't sink into the cake as far as I would've expected based on Lepard's instruction to heat until the sugar disolved, but the top half-centimetre of the cake was stunning.  That's not to say the rest isn't, but that layer is in a whole other league.

Of course, the husband likes cake but regular readers will know that a couple of my baking attempts have received scathing reviews from him (Mary Berry's Hokey Pokey Coffee Cake and Nigella's Chocolate Cake spring to mind) but this cake has rocketed to the top of the lemon cake league and apparently I'm now only allowed to make this cake for him and nothing else.

Whether Sarah will get a piece of cake tomorrow is anybody's guess.  It's packed in tin ready to take to the office, but I have a feeling that there may be a few pieces less in the tin by the morning.  The recipe is available online and I suggest you give this a go.  The seeds just work as part of the whole and so long as you check your teeth in the mirror once you've finished munching, there is zero reason not to include them.

* TLA - Three Letter Acronym.  I work in IT.  We adore TLAs and management buzz words.

Updated: Mary Berry's Lemon Yogurt Cake

A couple of weeks ago, this cake was cake of the week for the Weekly Bake Off.  Sadly, I missed out because being that it was Miss A's epic five-day birthday celebration, there just wasn't enough time to make any more cake.  Well not when you have a full time job and a toddler to look after too.

My work colleagues barely spoke to me that week.  For a few hours, every question seemed to be answered with just a grunt or a shrug.  It took me a while to work it out, but finally I realised that they'd gone from enjoying cake as a treat to expecting it.  So based on the reviews this cake got from the bake off, I decided that this will be my redeeming bake to regain some of the friendliness.*

Work in progress

On any given day, my favourite flavour cake varies.  Lemon or a decent coffee cake are definitely way up there.  Lemon cake is the very first cake I actually remember eating.  We were on holiday in Wales when I was about four and stopped in a little tea room run by a lady called Dulcie in a place called Solva.  The cake was beautifully moist and had snow white, lemon-sharp icing which crackled as you put your fork through it before softly yielding to the cake.  And being it was the very early eighties, it was adorned with lemon jelly slices.  I don't think I've ever eaten such a memorable piece of cake since.  Maybe I never will.

If I'm making lemon cake myself, I normally use a four egg sponge, laced with lemon zest and the juice of a lemon.  Once baked and cooled, I then slice and fill it with lemon curd (it will always be home made curd since I tried Nigel Slater's recipe) and top with a thick royal icing made with lemon juice rather than water.  And of course, lemon jelly slices on the top.  It's retro-chic.

My other top lemon cake recipe is the Hummingbird Bakery's Lemon Loaf from the original Hummingbird Bakery book.  I've made this countless times and it always turns out really well.  I think once it didn't rise quite as much as normal but the bake was still fine.  Although I've given my mum this recipe and after three attempts, she's never managed to get it to work for her.  They all went in the bin (and she's a trained chef!)

And then, of course, there's now Maria's Lemon Celebration cake to add to this list.  It formed the base of Miss A's birthday cake and I really enjoyed this.  To the point that I may make it my regular large lemon bake instead of my four-egg mix.

Hummingbird Lemon Loaf

For once, I made this cake entirely by hand rather than with my Kenwood.  Mostly because I had to bake after tea and this is the husband's telly-watching time when all other noise is banned.  So no chance of getting away with the noise of the Kenwood.  It was actually really satisfying to bake in this way.  I've always had a hand mixer even before the Kenwood but it was really nice to cream the sugar and eggs and whip the egg whites with only the most basic of utensils.  The old fashioned way.  In fact, that's one thing I like about Berry's recipes.  Unlike the current fashion for insisting that one must mix their cakes in a stand mixer or not use the recipe, Berry simply tells you to beat or mix or whisk without insisting you have expensive gadgets (okay so this is my own interpretation of certain books, but there does seem to be a bit of snobbyness in some books if you don't have the exact right equipment).

So this cake has a lot to live up to.  I could smell it baking away even though I'm two floors up from the kitchen.  And it's smelling pretty good.  Just as I was about to click publish, the hour of baking was up and I have a perfectly risen, nicely browned cake although the crust feels a little firm and I'm so tempted to put a drizzle over it.  But I'm having faith in the Berry that it doesn't need it.

Fresh from the oven

Of course, because I had to bake so late I won't be able to ice it before bed time as I doubt it will cool down before I go to sleep.  So final pics will have to come in the morning.  But if you want to get an idea of how it does look, hop over to the Weekly Bake Off and look at all the stunning entries there.  Mine will never look as stunning as those because I'll have to decorate it at 5am and it's for a bunch of guys who won't care that it doesn't look fancy so long as it fills their bellies.

If you want great advice on baking this yourself, you should also take a look at Jaim's Kitchen where she has written about her experience with this bake.  She tested it for breakfast which I think is an amazing idea and I may just do myself.  Just for research purposes of course.

Will update tomorrow with a finished pic and the verdict from the hungry hoardes.

Update: 29th March 2012

Well that's the last time I'm taking cake into work.  I couldn't give it away!  Okay so I got stuck in a meeting and by the time I was liberated, the office was pretty much desserted so half of the cake came home with me again.  I've still not had a bit but those that did said it was really good.  It looks to have quite a dense texture but was much moister than I was expecting as it felt quite crusty when I took it out of the oven.

As for the icing, well I'm back on my rant that Miss Berry is tight on the icing front.  I went for 25% more icing and this still wasn't enough in my opinion to get a thick even coating to the cake.  If you look at the picture, you'll see that the poor artificial lighting in my kitchen exposes the lack of icing coverage in place.  I would definitely use a bit more in the future to get a perfect white coating.  Definitely a bake again one.

* Okay, I fibbed.  I revealed the lack of cake during the lunchtime bakery run so the sulk lasted the five seconds it took to choose something else from the vast array in the bakery :)

Updated: Lemon Celebration Cake

This recipe has been filled with pitfall after pitfall.  But I'm placing my faith in it tasting better than it currently looks.  Please keep your fingers crossed for me.

Finished Cake

If you're a regular follower, you'll know I'm on a bit of a baking jag this week to mark Miss A's second birthday.  We've had a Hummingbird Bakery cupcake dachshund, Mary Berry's Iced Gems, ladybird cupcakes (I did end up using the Mary Berry vanilla cupcakes that I froze as I didn't get time to bake any more) and finally the big cake for tomorrow.

Originally I was going with chocolate, but having been left cold by Nigella's Chocolate Fudge Cake, I was inspired to switch to lemon after reading about the celebration cake the lovely Maria Kelly made to celebrate the half way mark of her blog Maria's Kitchen.

I met Maria through Twitter and she's on a mission to try one new elaborate bake each week for a year.  She bakes, photographs and eats some amazingly stunning cakes.  I'm hoping that she'll open a tea room soon after the challenge and send me a VIP invite.  Her cakes make me want to lick my screen.  Anyway, hop over and read her blog (lemon cake is week #26) and make sure you look at the recipe section for the low down on how to recreate the bakes.

Miss A's birthday tea

The lemon cake is well documented and I was really excited to give it a go as Maria's looked so amazing. But of course, I tried to fit mine in after a full day at work, with an Ocado delivery in the middle and an egg-cracking child desperate to root through said shopping to see if I'd bought any more eggs for her to crack and then having to cook the husband's dinner before the cake could be baked (after it was already mixed) and get it all in the oven before the football started.  Stressful.

My first failure was to not make sure the lining in the tin was straight so consequently, there's a huge dip on one part.  Thankfully, turning the cake upside down and slathering lots of buttercream on it has hidden the worst of the damage.


Secondly, I forgot to take a picture of the baked sponge. It looked beautiful.  As I don't own a 15cm tin like Maria, I upscaled the recipe by a third to fit my 20cm tin.  Miss A was happy as she got to crack four eggs rather than three.  It got syruped, sliced and cooled and the first layer of buttercream is on and it's now chilling in the fridge.  Of course, a flat buttercreamed sponge doesn't take a good photo.  So you'll have to wait until tomorrow morning when I've finished decorating for a picture and then a further pic will be posted with feedback on the taste test later tomorrow.

With the syrup, the recipe doesn't tell you to heat it but I was worried about the crunchy texture making the icing all knobbly (forgot that the buttercream layer would disguise this) so I heated up my sugar and lemon and reduced by a third to make a thick, sticky syrup.

Final mistake was when I re-layered the sponge after filling with butter cream and lemon curd, I forgot to make sure it was flat on the top.  Consequently, it's a little uneven but hopefully the decorations will hide that.  And after all, it's only being judged by a toddler and my greedy family who will all say nice things even if it looks rubbish.  On this occasion I will choose not to request the husband's feedback.  If it's really that amazing, he'll tell me.  If not, I just don't want to know.

Anyway if you want some amazing pics of this cake, hop over to Maria's blog and give her a a follow on Twitter too.  She's ace.

Update: 17th March 2012 - The Verdict


When I posted last night, the cake was merely covered in sky blue buttercream.  This morning, I got up early to decorate it with a doggy theme.  There was a minor disaster when the sugarpaste dog I crafted the other day had stuck to the plate he's been living on and disintegrated as I tried to prise him off.  Cue frantic rush to make new doggy before Miss A got up.

Doggie in a garden

I had originally planned to ice with white regal icing and do a dalmatian themed cake, but after making the original sugarpaste doggie, I just wanted something a bit more fun.  So with my new grass icing nozzle and some pink sugar flowers, the cake became 'Dog in the garden' instead.

Although I'm not artistic, everyone (including the husband) recognised it as being a dog and Miss A's face when she saw the cake was a picture.  A moment I will definitely treasure.

When it came to the cutting and eating of the cake, I'd become so fond of my creation that I was reluctant to let it go.  But Miss A dove straight in there the second the candles had been blown out and ripped poor doggie's head off and popped it in her mouth.  She quite clearly gets her sentimentality genes from her father.  If it was up to me, doggie would've been removed from the cake and left to live somewhere in the kitchen until he got too dusty.  I'm a sucker for anything animal shaped that's edible.  I have an Easter rabbit still in its box from when I was gifted it some twenty-five years ago (obviously I was just two at the time!) because I couldn't bring myself to unwrap and eat him.

The biggest surprise of all was when the husband said 'It was a really lovely cake'.  It took me about ten minutes to compose myself after this comment.  If you're a regular reader, you'll know that his criticism really bites.  If he liked food and was a restaurant critic, he'd be likened to Anne Robinson crossed with a Rottweiler.  In fact, his damning criticism of my attempt at Mary Berry's Hokey Pokey Coffee Cake nearly put people off entering the Weekly Bake Off challenge a few weeks back.

After the beheading

It's definitely on the make again list although I would tweak it slightly.  And here's what I'd do and why.

1) I used shop-bought lemon curd.  Although I used a good quality one (Waitrose) it still wasn't quite sharp enough to contrast with the huge amount of buttercream so I'd probably make my own again if I had the time.

2) I would definitely use regal icing as the amount of buttercream was just too sweet.  Or, I would try to remember to add a touch of salt to the buttercream - I use unsalted butter and I think just a touch would take the edge off the sickliness.

3) The drizzle was great but for me, it didn't sink right in.  Maybe because I heated mine up to a syrup.  And as I turned my cake upside down to try to disguise the big missing lump where I didn't get my baking paper straight, all the good lemony drizzle bit was at the base of the cake.  So if I did it again, I'd probably drizzle both top and bottom.

All in all, one of my favourite bakes.  Thank you once again Maria for sharing the recipe xx

Recipe (for a 20cm tin)


For the cake:

• 225g unsalted butter
• 225g golden caster
• 225g self-raising flour
• 1.5 tsp baking powder
• 4 medium eggs
• 3 lemons, zested and juiced
• 100ml milk
• 1.5tsp vanilla extract

For the syrup:

• juice of 3 lemons
• 125g granulated sugar

For the buttercream:

• 200g soft unsalted butter
• 400g icing sugar
• seeds from 1 vanilla pod
• 200g lemon curd

1. Grease and line a 20cm round tin and turn oven to 180c/160c fan/Gas 4.
2. Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy then add the rest of the ingredients and mix to a fairly runny mixture.
3. Bake for 1 hour (surprisingly, my cake was done after an hour when the smaller cake took 55 mins). Meanwhile combine the granulated sugar and lemon juice for the glaze.  Heat in a small saucepan until reduced by about a third.
4. When the cake is ready take it from oven and skewer it. Pour over the syrup and allow it to cool in the tin.
5. Prepare the butter cream by first beating the butter for 1 minute then add the icing and mix carefully at first. Mix in the vanilla beans, then the lemon curd.
6. When the cake is completely cold, place in the fridge for 30 minutes to firm up - this gives it a firmer texture for slicing which works really well in warm weather.  Remove from the fridge and slice into three layers.  Spread the bottom layer with lemon curd.  Replace the middle layer and spread this with a thin layer of buttercream.  
7. Add the top layer and then use around half of the remaining buttercream to ice the top and sides of the cake.  Refrigerate for thirty minutes and then use the buttercream to coat a second time for a smooth finish.

Mary Berry's Little Iced Gems

Day two of baking for Miss A's birthday.  Today is the actual day and I've taken the day off of work so we can do something special.  Special for me (rather selfishly) meant not waking up at stupid o'clock for work.  And yet I was awake at 3:37am.  No matter how hard I tried to get back to the lovely dream I was having, it just wasn't going to happen.  Isn't that always the way when you're interrupted in the middle of a lovely dream??

Jellybean-tastic

Anyway, I decided to capitalise on yet another early start by baking the mini cupcakes for her to take in to nursery tomorrow.  I feel like I'm entering into that competitive motherhood thing which I so despise.  I don't get why the sisterhood feels the need to compete against each other in that alpha mummy way.  I'm a slummy mummy and I try to be proud of it.  But she's come home with so many boxes of funsize smarties and tiny slivers of shop bought cake that I feel compelled to provide something.

So the Little Iced gems from Mary Berry's 100 Cakes and Bakes seemed to fit the bill.  Basically it's cupcakes made in petit fours cases.  Personally I felt that even for toddlers the petits fours cases to be a bit stingy so I used mini muffin cases from PME.

Because the cases were so tiny, I used a disposable piping bag to help me fill them rather than faffing around with teaspoonsful of mixture.  I ended up with thirty rather than the sixty five indicated by the recipe.

Tiny cupcakes

Berry indicates that you should just lay the cases out on a baking sheet with no need to use a special tin.  I found that this made the cakes a little misshapen.  It may be because I slightly overfilled them.  But they look home made and so in my book, that's good.  They cook really quickly, the texture is light and spongy (yes I ate cake at 5am but they are tiny!)  I much preferred this recipe to her standard-sized vanilla cupcakes which you can find a blog about here.

Because they'd risen to the top, I used a thicker icing than normal to decorate.  Normally I'd use a runny icing and let it flood to the edge of the case but here it would've dripped right off so I just smooshed a bit on with the back of a teaspoon and topped off with a jelly bean to make them look funky.

A great idea for baking for a children's party or as dessert if you're doing a nibbles type party.

Recipe

• 75g butter, softened
• 2 large eggs
• 100g self-raising flour
• 1 level tsp baking powder
• 75g caster sugar
• 1 tbsp milk

For the icing

• 100g icing sugar, sifted
• about 1 tbsp lemon jice
• sweets to decorate

1. Preheat the oven to 180c/160c fan/gas4.  Arrange the mini cake cases on baking sheets.
2. Beat all the cake ingredients together until thoroughly blended.  Spoon scant teaspoonsfuls of mixture into the cases, being careful not to overfill.
3. Bake for 15-20 minutes until well risen and golden brown.  Cool on a wire rack.
4. To make the icing, measure the icing sugar into a bowl and add enough lemon juice to give a spreading consistency.  Spoon a little on top of each cake and spread out with the back of a teaspoon.  When the icing has almost set, top with a sweet.

Lemon Curd

I've loved lemons for as long as I can remember.  In fact, one of my earliest memories is being out for a fish and chip dinner with my family, somewhere in deepest Wales and bugging everyone to let me have the lemon wedges from their plates to suck on.  In fact, some people may attribute my countenance to that very moment.  And that's probably why my teeth are as bad as they are from all that citric acid.

Anyway, give me a choice of three cake flavours on any given day and I would pick - in no particular order - lemon, chocolate and coffee.  Three cake flavours I both love and excel at.  My cupcake of the moment is lemon-scented sponge with a lemon curd centre, topped with lemon royal icing.  Not as trendy as the big, fancy butter cream swirls that most people expect to see topping cupcakes, but once you've had one you'll understand why.

I come from a family where the motto is 'the sharper the better' when it comes to anything lemon-based.  I adore tarte au citron (on the list of things to make this year if I ever get people coming for dinner - which will be never) but can't stand it when the lemon is beaten into submission by far too much sugar.  What's the point.

So when it came to making my own  lemon curd to go inside the cupcakes - I have yet to find a beautifully sharp shop bought variety - I spent some time looking for a really good recipe and settled on one by Mr Nigel Slater.

There were many similar recipes with almost identical methods, but Slater's used half as much sugar as all the rest.  Okay, so the yield was only just over one 1lb jar, making it quite an expensive jar of lemon curd but it's so lemony, it makes your cheeks tingle.  It's also a gorgeous, bright yellow colour which has been sadly disguised by my attempt to use Flickr on my phone as Instagram don't do Android.

Flickr for Android just isn't as good as Instagram

To get the best from the lemons, I stuck them into the oven on 100c for ten mins while I was sterilising my jam jars and then used a lemon reamer - far more satisfying to a stressed out mother than the citrus press that came with my Kenwood mixer.

Can't wait to try it in the cupcakes which I still need to make later today.  I have to confess to already having tried it mixed into a little bowl of whipped double cream that was hanging around the fridge.  What an amazing pudding that would make for unexpected guests with some of the lovely soft lemon curd amaretti biscuits I made a while ago.

Recipe

"Most lemon curd recipes instruct you to stir the mixture with a wooden spoon. I find that stirring lightly with a whisk introduces just a little more lightness into the curd, making it slightly less solid and more wobbly." - Nigel Slater

Makes 2 small jam jars (or one 1lb jar with a little left over)

• zest and juice of 4 unwaxed lemons
• 200g sugar
• 100g butter
• 3 eggs and 1 egg yolk

Put the lemon zest and juice, the sugar and the butter, cut into cubes, into a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water, making sure that the bottom of the basin doesn't touch the water. Stir with a whisk from time to time until the butter has melted.

Mix the eggs and egg yolk lightly with a fork, then stir into the lemon mixture. Let the curd cook, stirring regularly, for about 10 minutes, until it is thick and custard-like. It should feel heavy on the whisk.

Remove from the heat and stir occasionally as it cools. Pour into spotlessly clean jars and seal. It will keep for a couple of weeks in the refrigerator.