Cox Cookies & Cake

Pop Art Cupcakes 

Macho macho man!

So with the help of the map function on my iphone the boyf and I managed to break free of our normal day out in London zone (Covent garden & Oxford St) and brave it into Soho on an exploratory mission seeking out Cox Cookies and Cakes the new bakery run by Patrick Cox (of manly loafer fame) and Eric Lanlard (Cake Boy.)

And find it we did! It was much smaller than I had imagined - tiny in fact! I also can't pretend that the boyf didn't laugh out loud when he noticed the sales assistant wearing a leather studded apron (!!)

But the cake was gooooooooood!!!!!

I went for a "Beef Cake"

and the boyf opted for a marginally more man friendly "Cola Cake"which came with a bag of cola flavoured popping candy!

Hoping to pick up the book to match later on today!

Bank holiday bake

Well I started the day intending to bake caramel cupcakes (I had all the ingredients and therefore didn't need to leave the house!) but before I knew what was happening I was hustled off to Waitrose to get blueberries so that I would have more options! So my caramel cupcakes stood aside to make way for a more substantial creature...

Blueberry crumble loaf adapted from The Hummingbird Bakery: Cake days

You will need:
190g butter and the same again of both plain flour and caster sugar
3 eggs
1tsp baking powder
pinch salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
25ml whole milk
100g blueberries
50g chopped pecans


and for the topping:
25g plain flour
10g butter
15g soft light brown sugar
20g chopped pecans
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

A smallish deep loaf tin (mine was approx 4"x8" but I'd use a slightly bigger one next time)

Method:

Line the loaf tin with baking paper (you won't stand a chance of getting it out unscathed otherwise!) and preheat your oven to 170 C

To make the topping you need to rub the butter and sugar together before adding all other ingredients.

Once the topping is prepared you can get on with the main event! Cream the butter and sugar in your mixer until it's paler in colour and fluffy. The eggs need to be added one at a time, make sure you mix well after each one!

The sifted dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt) should be added in 3 lots followed by the milk. Mixing thoroughly after each section.

Finally, mix in the blueberries and pecans by hand before spooning into the loaf tin and sprinkling with the topping (in future I won't use all the topping as I think it would be better in a nice thin, crisp layer)

Bake for 60-70 mins until a skewer comes out clean.

As you can see the cake outgrew my tin in the oven!! All that's left to do is wait for the cooling rack to do it's job and then enjoy with a nice cuppa!

Show off corner!

Here is my new measuring jug by Joseph Joseph. I couldn't resist nabbing myself one after having spotted it on TV in the kitchens of Eric Lanlard and Thomasina Miers! It has meant far less washing up as measuring spoons aren't needed for liquids - just turn the jug upside down and use the mini measurer for teaspoons and the like - GENIUS!! 

Plain and simple

Here is my most recent creation for the Wedding Anniversary of a colleague's parents.

I kept it mega simple with plain white icing so that the gold decorations would really stand out. This is the first time that I'd tried making sugarpaste roses since I was shown how to make them at my evening class over a year ago and I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. The gold dust was fab, really easy to brush on with a paintbrush and layer up. It was hard not to get carried away actually!!

Popping candy chocolate cake

For his birthday this year the boyf demanded a Heston Blumenthal popping candy number - and very yummy it was too. More mousse than cake, although it was inhaled at such an alarming rate when removed from the fridge that I don't think anyone actually experienced it's true moussey potential. I was a bit worried that the popping candy would lose it's POP but I needn't have worried!