Cheese Bread

Tonight's post is a perfect midweek recipe. My mum used to make this cheese bread for my lunchbox and every time I smell it cooking I feel like I'm 8 years old again! This is a really easy bread recipe, mixed in one go with no yeast means no rising - in fact it's more like a cake batter than a bread dough which means its super quick to make. Within 30 minutes you'll have a soft, crumbly, cheesy loaf of joy! Amazing when warm spread with melty butter, and even better to look forward to in your lunchbox! 

Ingredients:

75g margarine
225g wholemeal bread flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder 

1 tsp mustard powder
1 tsp paprika

½ tsp salt

1 egg

75g mature cheddar cheese

120ml (8 tbsp) milk

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 190°C, grease and line a loaf tin.

2. Place all the ingredients in a deep bowl and beat together until thoroughly mixed. 

3. Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for 30-35 minutes, adding a little grated cheese to the top of the bread after 20 minutes of baking. Turn onto a wire rack to cool, but this is definitely best eaten warm!

Coffee and Walnut Cake

This cake has always been my dad's favourite - if I ever say I'm going to bake he will always ask for this without fail! It is a lovely classic; light coffee sponge with creamy buttercream and crunchy walnuts and the great thing about it is you can adjust the amount of coffee to suit your taste. This uses the same technique as my Victoria Sponge recipe, where you weigh the eggs first and then weigh each ingredient to the same weight, so its very easy to scale up or down.

Ingredients:

Cake:

3 eggs
Caster sugar
Margarine
Self raising flour
2-4 tbsp homemade coffee extract (see below)
Handful of chopped walnuts - optional but delicious

Coffee Buttercream

50g unsalted butter, softened
150g icing sugar
2tbsp homemade coffee extract
8 whole walnuts, to decorate

Method:

1. First up, make your coffee extract. I do this by dissolving 3 heaped tsps instant coffee in 100ml boiling water then leave until cold - don't use this mixture warm as it will curdle your cake batter! 

2. Preheat the oven to 180 °C. Grease and line two shallow cake tins. Weigh the eggs in their shells. Make a note of what they weigh as this is measurement you'll need for all the other cake ingredients. Weigh your sugar, margarine and flour to this weight, and beat the eggs in a separate bowl or jug.

3. Using either an electric mixture, or by hand, cream together the sugar and margarine in a large bowl until light and fluffy.

4. Mix in the beaten eggs and coffee extract a little at a time, adding a spoonful of flour with each addition to stop the mixture curdling. Use 2 tbsp coffee extract for light hint of coffee, 3 tbsp for a bit more of a hit, and 4tbsp if you like a really deep, rich flavour. 

5. Gently fold the chopped walnuts and remaining flour into the mixture, once its all incorporated pour the mixture into the tins.

6. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the top of the sponge is springy on top and a skewer comes out clean when inserted. Transfer to a wire rack until completely cool.

7. To make the buttercream beat the butter until it is really soft, then add the icing sugar a spoonful at a time, beating well after each addition. When you've added about half of the icing sugar, add the coffee extract, a spoonful at a time. Like the cake, you can add as much or as little coffee as you'd like here, but bear in mind that the more you add the more likely it is you'll need to add more icing sugar as well to keep the buttercream soft and spreadable. 

8. Fill and top the cake with buttercream, decorating with the walnuts and anything else you'd like. Grated white chocolate always goes nicely on a coffee cake, as does a little sifted cocoa powder. Cut into slices and enjoy! 

You can also use this recipe to make coffee cupcakes, just spoon into cupcake cases and reduce cooking time to 15-20 minutes. 

National Baking Week and Millionaire's Shortbread

I feel so guilty having neglected this blog for the past few weeks! I had the craziest busy week last week, but its all a bit more normal now so I'll just brush off the cobwebs and get back to regular posting. This week is National Baking Week, so I'm hoping you'll crack out the mixing bowl and get baking! I've got four shiny new recipes coming up for you over the next four days and each one is simple, quick(ish!) and delicious!

National Baking Week has been designed to not only get the nation baking, but to also raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital through bake sales - all the details of how to do this can be found on the National Baking Week website. Raising money for a great cause, you can eat ALL the treats and not feel guilty at all so there's no excuse not to get involved!

Millionaires Shortbread is my favourite, but I've always been put off baking it because of the time it takes, and I've long been freaked out about making my own caramel (I had one bad experience with an exploding bowl when trying out a microwave recipe and I've never quite recovered from it...) but this one is great as it can be made much more easily and quickly by taking a few short cuts. Using a digestive biscuit base and a pretty foolproof method for making the caramel, the only really time consuming thing here is the chilling, but you could easily do that overnight and all you'll have to do is cover with chocolate the next morning and enjoy!

Ingredients:

Base:

200g digestive biscuits

60g butter, melted

Caramel:

150g butter

150g dark brown soft sugar

1 can (397g) Condensed Milk

Topping:

200g dark chocolate

100g white chocolate

Makes 25 mini squares, or 16 bigger pieces

Method:

1. Crush the digestive biscuits until they resemble crumbs, and stir in the melted butter, making sure all of the mixture is covered. Press the mixture into a well greased and lined tin, using the back of a metal spoon to smooth the surface. Chill for 30 minutes.

2. To make the caramel heat the sugar and butter in a pan over a low heat, gently stirring until melted. Add the condensed milk and bring to a rapid boil, stirring continuously. Cook for a minute or so, until the caramel has thickened. Pour over the base and chill for at least 2 hours, but overnight if possible. 

3. Once the caramel has set, melt the dark chocolate and spread over the caramel. Working quickly before the chocolate sets, add spoonfuls of white chocolate and swirl using a skewer or toothpick to create a marbled effect. Return to the fridge to set for about an hour.

4. Using a hot knife (run under boiling water then dry) cut the shortbread into squares. I actually found the easiest way to do this was with a pizza wheel, but you have to make sure its really hot! 

Store in an airtight container in the fridge and these will last for up to two weeks, well, if you can resist for that long!

Join the baking revolution and share your recipes on twitter with me @millieismagic and the baking week team @bakingweek 

Viennese Whirls

This is the simplest and most beautiful recipe - all it takes is four main ingredients and you've got yourself a light, crumbly, buttery Viennese biscuit. Add in some jam and buttercream and you'll create a teatime classic - simply delicious! 

Ingredients:

Biscuits:

175g margarine
50g caster sugar
175g self raising flour
1tsp vanilla essence

Filling:

25g butter, softened
100g icing sugar
1tsp milk
Jam - whichever flavour you fancy but make sure its a smooth jam, like a seedless raspberry for example. You don't want big pieces of fruit in the middle of your whirls!

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 160 Line a baking tray with baking paper

2. Thoroughly cream together the margarine and sugar. Mix in the flour and vanilla essence until you have a smooth paste 

3. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a large star nozzle (my favourite piping bags to use are these) and pipe rosettes on the baking tray. You could using a template here to get them all the same size, or you can just eyeball it, like I did here:

4. Place in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack

5. While the biscuits are cooling make the buttercream. First off beat the butter until it is really soft, then slowly add the icing sugar, mixing until its all incorporated. If the buttercream is really stiff, add a little of the milk to make it softer - you want a light, fluffy icing, with a spreadable consistency.

6. Take two cooled biscuits, spread a little jam on one and a little buttercream on the other. Push the two halves together - be gentle here as the biscuits have a very soft, crumbly texture. Enjoy one, or two, or three...

Variations:

Chocolate Viennese Whirls

Make as above, substituting a tbsp of flour for a tbsp of cocoa powder in the biscuit mixture, and a tbsp of icing sugar for a tbsp of cocoa powder in the buttercream. Sandwich using nutella in place of jam. Yum!