Chocolate Muffins! Yum!

This is my second post for the day! And i made chocolate muffins today!
I love chocolate so i thought i would make a post about something chocloatey.
In the end I found a recipe and made chocolate chip muffins.

I was very impressed with myself and so were my parents who had the delight of trying them first.  They weren't to impressed being test subjects but once they had finished one they were impressed but told me they were a little too rich.

But for my first baking muffin experience the product turned out fairly well.  Here is a picture of one of the muffins.
Enjoy your week everyone!

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Hey guys, Emily here!

For my first anniversary with my boyfriend I decided to make him red velvet cupcakes!
Red velvet cupcakes are soft and light and have an amazing cream cheese icing.

Recipe: http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/26697/red+velvet+cupcakes



Sort of red?

I used my wonderful silicone moulds that worked perfectly including the heart mounds which gorgeous.

A tip for if you make these, don't put the cream cheese icing on until you ready to eat them, leave the icing in the fridge and the cupcakes in the cupboard as I found that the cupcakes lasted quite a while in the cupboard while in the fridge they dried out. Next time, I will add more  food dye as my cupcakes were not quite as red as they were meant to be.

A couple of the cupcakes I made into cute butterfly cakes by cutting off the top and then cutting the top in half flipping the cupcake adding icing and arranging the top to look like wings.

These are a fantastic (and if dyed properly) a stunning, light and fluffy cupcake perfect for any special occasion, or just because you can. Happy Baking!! :D



Yummy!! (The hearts are in the bottom
right, aren't they sweet?!)

Butterfly cupcake cut in half.



RAINBOW MANIA!!! :D

Hey guys!! Emily here, a little late, sorry!!!

Yep that's right, rainbow mania!

My arsenal, mixing colours, in the moulds and finally cooked!

This week I made a super simple packet cupcake mixture (Betty Crocker's Super Moist Vanilla Cupcakes). Packet cakes are a wonderful idea, they're so simple, easy and quick but most important they're really tasty!! I decided to play around with the mixture a bit and make funky rainbow cupcakes.

Before I spooned the mixture in the moulds I split it evenly into 6 bowls and coloured each of them with liquid food dye. Unfortunately the purple (that I mixed myself) wasn't a great colour but that could be solved by buying purple food die or adding more or less of red or blue. I also ran out of orange food die so it was a bit pale, but the colours were still pretty fantastic. I spooned the mixture into the moulds one colour at a time starting with pink, purple, blue, green, yellow and finally orange, a couple of the moulds (the square ones and the 2 middle heart shapes) I slightly "mixed" or marbled with a spoon creating, I think, the best rainbow effect. However, you have to be careful not to marble the colours too much or they become a murky brown colour, yuk!



Inside marble, rainbow crumb and close-up of icing.

As you can see, the moulds I used were not metal, I used silicone moulds. A set of hearts (the joint blue hearts) and some square ones. Previously my family has had some issues with the heart moulds and I had the same problems and they would not come out properly. I ended up ripping the tops off (they were slightly overfilled) and gently running a blunt knife around the edges of the bases. Not using that mound for cupcakes again. The other silicone moulds however were a fantastic success, with no need for buttering or lining they're easy to use. They are a fantastic, no-fuss, easy to clean way to bake, although I caution against using joined moulds (like my hearts).

I added the icing (supplied with the packet) and tried, with my amateur icing hand, to so some nice designs and had a try at some rosettes, most of them I just used a knife to do a nice smooth design that didn't require a steady hand. I was quite happy with the icing and it went better than I thought.

The final result was a fantastic tasting, evidently spectacular array of colour, I couldn't stop grinning everytime I ate one, feeling like a little kid again :D

The finished product, yum!!!

Happy rainbow baking!! -Emily

Mug Meals

Hi Guys, Krissie here!

I’m sure many of you are aware of the ‘mug meals’ trend that was all over the internet a few months ago, but if not, let me update you. Many recipes were devised in which the entire meal could be made in a mug and cooked in the microwave, keeping dirty dishes to a minimum.

The fad started with desserts, the most popular of which were the brownie and the cookie, and it wasn't long until recipes for things like quiches and even meatloaf started popping up online. These meals became extremely popular among university students, as they reduced washing up time, and only required mugs, cutlery and a microwave.

Many of the meals are fairly healthy, and are adaptable to suit personal tastes.  

My Raspberry White Chocolate Cookie in a Mug

Last night, my roommate and I gave the cookie in a mug a go. We searched around for some recipes, and decided on this one, primarily because we already had all of these ingredients in the house. Instead of using choc chips, I decided to use some frozen raspberries, and a few white choc chips. The end results was much more successful than I expected it to be! We also discovered that the cookies are brilliant with some vanilla ice cream (although the ice cream tends to melt through the cookie, but it tastes amazing)!

For more mug meal recipes, you can go here. Enjoy! :)

Until next time,
- K