Last year for the first time I made my own Christmas cake flavoured with chocolate and cherries. It was meant to be a little different, but to be honest it wasn’t that different from a traditional Christmas Fruit Cake.
This year I am trying again to go a little on to the unusual side. In this case by using Indian spice blend Garam Masala instead of just the usual Christmas spice collection: cinnamon, ginger, cloves and all spice.
I am following this recipe for Garam Masala Christmas Cake.
Today I have a bit of a treat for you – CoffeeMuffin’s first guest post! This guest post is from Simone Gribble author of Grrr. Cupcake. (cupcakes for men). As you may know I hate the craze for cupcakes with huge amounts of frosting. Thankfully now Simone has people like me covered with her latest ebook.
The cupcake craze has been raging since the 1990s and hit Edinburgh a few years ago with the opening of a few specialist cupcake bakeries in the city centre. I’ve been baking my own cakes ever since I was a little girl and resisted additive and preservative rich store bought cakes. My icing skills weren’t as good though so when these speciality shops opened, professing to sell handmade cupcakes, I thought I should give them a try, for research purposes, you know.
I bought two. One was a banana caramel cupcake with two inches of icing and a dried banana chip on top. It sure looked pretty. Imagine my disgust when I bit into the cake only to find that the banana and caramel flavour existed only in the icing – the cupcake itself was pretty bland. The second cupcake, whose flavours I don’t even remember, fared no better.
I’ve just started a sewing class, you know to learn how to use a sewing machine and make a skirt. It’s a Sunday night class, because I can’t make the ones during the week, and it turns out these things take concentration.
Sewing in a straight line takes focus and sewing a curve is worse. By the time I leave with a skirt full of unpicking to do… it’s blowing a gale outside, it’s dark and raining. I want something to eat but I know we have nothing in the cupboards.
Then I get into the house, it’s bright and warm, my husband asks me as I enter the front door if I want a hot drink, and suddenly I relax. I know what I am going to make.
Although I am not immune to a little Christmas excitement in late October – I am already thinking about how to ice my Christmas Cake this year and if I can hand make Christmas Decorations to give out as gifts. I feel it is still to early for those heavy Christmas spices, ginger, allspice, cloves etc and you need to ease yourself in gently with some autumnal cinnamon first!
I have an apple tree in my garden. It has a special place in my heart because seeing its blossoms in the spring time lift my mood, and remind me that summer is on its way. Secondly, it’s the only thing likely, after many attempts, to bare fruit in my garden this year.
I’ve always loved a fresh cream strawberry tart, topped with that gloopy sweet glaze and fresh strawberries (that haven’t been frozen first).
When looking for Strawberry tart recipes getting the proper glaze was the hardest part, as they are almost always listed as jam / preserve based glaze. This is not what I had from local bakeries growing up, and was never going to replace my Tesco strawberry tart habit!
My Mum makes Chocolate Tiffin every Christmas, and every year I promise that I will steal her recipe and make it for myself. I always forget.
However when I was thinking about recipes that I could make in the evenings after work, chocolate tiffin came to mind as it’s simple and it doesn’t involve the oven and timings and stress.
I have made a lot of hot cross buns in my time, for example these wholewheat hot cross buns and my even healthier hot cross buns a couple of years later.
However I really really like Hot Cross Buns, so I felt it necessary to bake them again this year. To me it feels a little like Christmas baking. You know with the oven on, baking, cinnamon, mixed spice, sultanas etc. Admittedly in previous years at Easter it wasn’t so cold that it actually felt like Christmas!
I was lucky enough to receive a “The Connoisseur” Easter Egg from Hotel Chocolat, earlier this month to try.
The box was impressive, highlighting the quality of the chocolate within, no thin cardboard boxes here. This chocolate egg is well protected.
This isn’t your average run of the mill chocolate easter egg, it is an extra thick dark chocolate easter egg.
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