Of gnomes and various cakes

As well as baking cakes, we also painted a gnome

The bad news is that I keep forgetting to update my blog, but the good news is that my friends and I have been baking the occasional cake so I'm updating my blog now. Ooh, also, I turned vegan again. It was my new year's resolution and is going pretty well so far. In terms of resolutions, I tend to only go for things I was thinking of doing anyway, so I usually stick to them. It just gives me a kick into actually doing the thing I intended to do since I can take a while to get round to things sometimes... Anyhow, without further ado, on with the cakes!

Ginger and pineapple upside down cake

• Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 5.
• Melt 20g vegan margarine in a pan and add 4 tbsp syrup.
• Heat over a high heat until thickened.
• Pour into a greased baking tray and level out.
• Next add a layer of 2 grated pieces of stem ginger and 150g tinned pineapple, chopped.
• In a separate bowl, mix 250g self-raising flour, 1 tbsp baking powder, 1 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp ground cinnamon and 115g sugar.
• Blend soya milk, oil, 300g tinned pineapple and banana until almost smooth.
• Add blended mixture to flour mixture, mix thoroughly and cover pineapple, ginger and syrup in tin.
• Bake for 45 minutes or until skewer/sharp knife comes out clean.
• Leave to cool, then place serving plate over tin and turn upside down. (The syrup should be on top of the cake.)
• Serve hot or cold with custard or soya cream.

Ginger and pineapple goodness

Recipe source: 'The Vegan Cookbook' by Nicola Graimes

Chestnut and chocolate mousse

• Heat 75g of sugar in a pan with a few tbsp water and bring to boil.
• Simmer until the caramel becomes runnier, then pour over the bottom of a greased oven dish.
• Mix together 420g unsweetened chestnut purée and 175g sugar in a pan.
• Add 350ml soya milk a bit at a time.
• Whisk over a moderate heat until mixture comes to the boil; simmer until it thickens slightly.
• Leave to cool for 5 minutes, then whisk in 200g broken pieces of dark chocolate until they melt.
• Pour mixture over caramel and leave in fridge for 6 hours or more.
• Enjoy!

Chestnutty goodness

Recipe source: Vegan Perv-Nerds

Apricot and brazil nut flapjack
Preheat the oven to 160°C/Gas Mark 3.
Over a low heat, melt 175g dairy free margarine in a pan with 150g sugar and 2 tbsp golden syrup.
Add 100g dried apricots (cut into pieces) and brazil nuts, 125g muesli and 125g oats and mix thoroughly.
Spread the mixture into a greased baking tin.
Bake for 35 minutes or until golden brown.
Leave to cool for 15 minutes.
Cut into squares and leave to cool completely, or enjoy warm.

Flapjacky goodness

Recipe source: 'Beyond Baked Beans Green' by Fiona Beckett
(This is a great vegetarian cook book with little 'v's for all the vegan recipes, as well as estimates for how long each recipe will take.)

More chocolate brownies

I've tried various recipes for chocolate brownies, and thought I'd try another. These ones were sadly less exciting than the last ones we made but they were still pretty good.

• Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 4/170°C.
• Mash two bananas in a mixing bowl (it generally helps if they're quite ripe).
  Mix in 170g flour and 2tbsp cocoa and 115 sugar.
• Dissolve 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda in 140ml water, then add to the mix with 140ml vegetable oil. The mixture will be pretty runny, but don't worry about that.
• At this point, we added a handful of walnuts and I reckon chocolate chips would be a good addition too.
• Pour the mixture into a pre-greased tin and bake for 40 minutes.
• If you made it in a round tin, cut off the edges and eat them. After all, brownies are meant to be square, right?

Brownies and berries

Recipe source: The Vegan Society

Kim and Tim make brownies

Best birthday cake ever

A little while ago, me and my housemates made chocolate orange ginger hazelnut brownies. Well, I say "we" made them, but I seem to remember that Tim and Kim, two friends of ours, made them whilst I gave them instructions. Not that I'm bossy at all, or taking advantage of the little competition between the two of them to get them to make my cake... Anyway, we had a couchsurfer called Renato staying with us that night and as it happened to be his birthday, we presented this to him as a birthday cake. We all really enjoyed it, so here's the recipe...

• Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 5/180°C.
• Cream together 250ml sugar, 240g soya/sunflower spread and 1tsp salt (if you have a blender you could use it now, but we didn't).
• Add 3 tbsp cocoa powder and 125g self raising flour (if you don't have self raising flour, just add baking powder to plain flour, about 3tsp for every 225g).
• Stir in 100g melted chocolate (be careful not to burn it), 120ml orange juice and a handful of chocolate chips/nuts/crystalised ginger/anything else you want to add. Be careful not to over-mix it!
• Line a square tin with greaseproof paper and pour in the mix.
• Bake for 25 minutes. It should still look a bit squishy, but cools harder.
• Enjoy! It's possibly one of the best brownies I've ever tasted...

Recipe source: Return of the Cake Scoffer

Emma finally updates her blog (part three)

Who knows how old Emma's Dad is...?

When we got home from Matlock, we were greeted by the smell of freshly baked spiced apple cake. Yep, more cake! My Dad really should have more birthdays... Mum made the cake using a recipe from her vegan cook book so that I'd be able to eat it too. It tasted amazing, though, so no one could say that they missed out at all. Here's the recipe...

• Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4.
• Cream together 115g soya/vegetable spread and 115g sugar.
• Stir in 55g raisins, 55g sultanas and 55g chopped nuts (save a handful of chopped nuts for later, though).
• In a separate bowl, dissolve 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda in 3 tbs boiling water, then add to the first mixture.
• Mix in 200ml apple purée.
• Next add 225g plain flour, 1 tsp cinnamon and 1/2 tsp mixed spices.
• The dough should be heavy and moist; if not, add a drop of apple juice or other liquid.
• Spoon into a pre-greased baking tin and sprinkle with chopped nuts.
• Bake for around an hour.
• Enjoy!

Recipe source: The Caring Cook

Emma and Genevieve try out old and new recipes

Banana loaf and slightly grilled cookies (oops...)

This afternoon, Genevieve, a friend from the Lishi (tai chi) class at the university came over to listen to Beatles records, have a tour of our new house and meet some of the resident spiders. Oh yes, and most importantly of all, to bake cake! First, we made a banana loaf which a friendly cake baker called Melina recommended to me through a vegetarian/vegan couchsurfing group. Melina says that this one is her favourite, plus, cakes are a great way to use up very ripe bananas. And the end result was yummylicious! Genevieve and I also made some coconut and cashew cookies. These are from a recipe which contains egg, and up til now I've just cheated and used egg replacer because I was scared of messing up the cookies... Today, though, we used flaxseed (a great source of Omega 3 which can be added to anything you may be cooking) and my fears turned out to be unfounded; the cookies taste great! Anyhow, without further ado, on with the recipes... :)

Melina's banana cake

• Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4.
• Mix together the following ingredients: 225g soya/vegetable spread, 250g sugar or agave syrup, 2-3 very ripe bananas, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp nutmeg, 1 tsp baking powder.
• Next stir in 250g flour (Melina recommends a mix of dinkel and amaranth flour).
• Finally, stir in (optional) 50g crushed walnuts and 25g chocolate pieces (we used cacao nibs and came to the conclusion that whilst slightly odd on their own, they're not so bad in cake).
• Pour into loaf/cake tins.
• As a finishing touch, Melina adds a few clove heads, spread evenly across the top.

Coconut and cashew cookies

• Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4.
• Cream together 150g vegetable/soya spread with 135g sugar.
• Mix 1 tbsp ground flaxseed with 3 tbsp water (This is roughly equivalent to 1 egg. There are various other ways of replacing egg, like with banana for example. If in doubt, Google it!) and add to the sugar mix.
• Stir in 150g self raising flour (if you don't have self raising, just add 1 tsp baking powder for every 75g).
• Next, add 100g dessicated or grated creamed coconut (either works well, it just depends what kind of texture you want), 2 tsp ground ginger (optional) and 200g cashews.
• Add small balls of mixture (it'll be fairly sticky) to a greased baking tray and bake for around 15 minutes.
• Eat!

Recipe source for banana loaf: Melina (Thanks!)
Recipe source for cookies: Vegetarian Nosh 4 Students (This book has some really great recipes, although a lot of them do contain quite a bit of cheese.)