Sugar Free Lemon Drizzle Cake

Celebrating a birthday or simple want a sweet afternoon treat that won't spike your blood sugar? Please keep reading. 

This Lemon Drizzle Cake is sugar free so its the perfect option for diabetics, though this doesn't necessarily mean it's low in calories (it's crazy how many people seem to just make this assumption!). All things in moderation people!

I was hunting around for birthday cake recipe ideas for my Grandad (type 2 diabetes represent yo!) and came across this one on the BBC Good Foods site. It follows the basic formula for most cakes but replaces sugar with the sweetener Xylitol.

For those who don't know, xylitol is a sugar alcohol which is extracted from a range of plants including corn and birch bark. It has about 40% less calories that sugar (when compared teaspoon v teaspoon) but more importantly for the diabetic community it won't raise your blood sugar levels like the usual sweet stuff. If you don't particularly like this type of sweetener you could probably swap it for Natvia or whatever other type you prefer, just check the quantity conversion so you don't overload with sweetness!

I decided to swap the vegetable oil in the original recipe for grape seed oil and topped it with some cream cheese whipped with lemon juice and a little extra xylitol for sweetness. I then topped it all with some chopped pistachios and walnuts, lemon zest and some freeze-dried pomegranate seeds.

Let me know what you think!

 

  

Carrot cake = Good!

Individual sized carrot cupcakes = Amazing!

Individual sized carrot cupcakes topped with cream cheese and candied carrot tuille = SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

 

Carrot and Cream Cheese Cupcakes

Makes ~10 cupcakes

For the Cupcakes

125g Self-Raising Flour

1/2 tsp Bi-Carb Soda

2 tsp Cinnamon, ground

Pinch of Salt

150g Caster Sugar

1 cup Pecans, chopped

2/3 cup Vegetable Oil

2 Eggs

2 large Carrots, grated

For the Cream Cheese Icing

250g Cream Cheese

500g Icing Sugar

100g Butter 

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

To Decorate

2 cups Pecans

Candied Carrot Tuilles (see this recipe for how to make them)

To make the cupcakes, start by combining the first six ingredients in one bowl and the remaining ingredients in a separate bowl, whisking the wet mixture until combined. Add the wet mixture into the dry and stir until totally combined. 

Divide the cupcake mixture between 10 cupcake cases and bake at 180 degrees C for 20-25min until cooked through when tested with a skewer. Set them aside to cool completely. 

To make the icing, beat the butter and cream cheese in an electric mixer until totally combined and light. Beat in the vanilla and then gradually add in the icing sugar and continue beating until the entire mixture is smooth. 

Use a knife to spread a thin layer of icing over the top of the cooled cupcakes. Take half of your decorating pecans and place them in a zip lock bag, then use a rolling pin to crush them finely. Sprinkle the crushed nuts over the top of the cupcakes, making sure they are well covered all the way to the edges. Shake off any excess nuts which didn't stick in the icing. 

Place the rest of your icing in a piping bag fitted with a star-shaped tip and pipe a swirl of icing on top of each nut-covered cupcake. Top each with an extra pecan and a candied carrot curl.

That's it! Enjoy XO

Just Peachy!

So it has been a while between posts... apologies for my laziness!

But what better way to get back into the swing of things than with a peach- coloured feast of tiered cake, macarons and cupcakes!

And flowers. Don't forget the flowers.

The Great Cake Drape

 

Guess what guys?! Today I decided to give you another tutorial-style post! Yay for learning!

Unfortunately... along the way I had a few issues with what you would think would be a relatively simple cake. Boo!

But hey, I'm still learning as I go, so I decided to go ahead with this post anyway and you can take it as a what to and what NOT to do guide. Now that's some silver-lined lemonade!  

So, as you can probably assume from the image above, today I'm going to show you step by step how to make this fancy-pants cake featuring draped fondant, roses and pearls. Snazzy right?! 

Ok, so right off the bat let me give you a helpful hint: make sure your tiers are sized proportionately.

I think the cake looked better in real life than it appears in the photos, but looking at that first photo you can see that the top tier is slightly too small in contrast to the bottom tier so the entire thing just looks a little misshapen. If you don't have a stack of cake tins measuring every other dimension (as I clearly don't) then just use what you have and I'm sure it will still turn out fine. Like I said, in reality the cake looked fine and it's really only been since looking at the photos that it had been nagging at me. So my point is: try to proportion your tiers where possible but where you can't don't stress it too hard. 

My second major issue... that rose on the right making a break for freedom. 

If I had my way again I would have moved the drapery join and the adjourning rose inwards. As it is every time I look at these pictures I can imagine that rose sprouting legs and jumping for freedom off the edge of the cake! Call me paranoid, compulsive or simply observant... but that little detail really bugs me! So, to avoid that gnawing agitation that I am currently experiencing, make sure you know EXACTLY where you want each detail to be! Plan plan plan is all I can say!

Now that my neurotic frustrations are out the way, lets make some cake! 

What You Will Need

• Fondant/Gum paste Flowers (I used 5 but feel free to go nuts! - I will be posting a how to on these at some point too!)
• 2 x baked cakes (I used a 20cm and a 12cm...regrettably! See above griping)
• 2 x Cake boards
• Roughly 2lb of white fondant (will vary depending on the size of your cakes)
• Buttercream (or ganache... explained further below)
• Ribbon of a colour of your choice
• Fondant smoother
• Icing sugar / cornflour 
• Rolling pin 
• Wooden dowel 
• Water
• A butt load of patience! 

Step 1: Optimus (Cake) Prime

The first thing you will need to do is to prime your cakes ready for decorating. Simply split your cakes horizontally and fill them with you preferred flavour of buttercream icing (or ganache or really whatever filling floats your boat). Sandwich them back together, pop them onto individual cake boards and then give each of them a good crumb coating.

Never crumb coated before? Never fear!
It simply means covering the outside of the cake in a very thin coat of icing which will hold down any stray crumbs so that when you give it a final coat you wont have any flecks of cake ruining the look of your pretty icing. Set the cake aside in a cool spot until the icing is firm to touch (refrigerating for about 10min can speed this up if your short of time).

Give the cake a second, thicker coat of icing. Your don't want it too thick or else it might go soft under the fondant and you will end up with lumps and bumps. I aim for between 1-2cm usually. 

 

Now you want to try and get this layer as smooth and even as possible. Here in Western Australia the weather has been crazy hot for the last few months and I found my icing was just not wanting to set and so when I eventually had to put my fondant over the top the soft icing didn't hold its shape as well as I would have liked, resulting in a generally 'softer' looking cake without the sharper edges I was after. If you are in a similarly hot or humid area I would recommend considering using a ganache icing instead of the buttercream. Ganache stands up in the hot weather much better than buttercream, believe it or not, and will increase your chances of getting that crisper, more professional looking final result.

Buttercream or ganache, whichever you use, set the cake aside until the icing has set firm and is not 'tacky' to touch, give your cake board a wipe to get ride of any excess icing and then roll out your fondant. Using a dusting of icing sugar or cornflour will help stop the fondant from sticking to the counter top and rolling pin but be careful not to overuse it as it can dry out your fondant and result in cracks later on! Just use only as much as you need to roll out the fondant without it sticking. 

Additionally, when rolling out your fondant make sure you don't go picking it up, flipping it over etc. Give it a roll, carefully rotate it 45 degrees, roll again and repeat until it is even and at your desired thickness.

You want the fondant to be no thinner than 3mm (otherwise it will become prone to tearing!) and not much thicker than 5 or 6mm. Use your rolling pin to help lift the fondant and drape it over the top of the cake and the use the palms of your hands to carefully press it onto the cake. I always start at the top and work my way down the sides, gently stretching the adjusting the fondant to get rid of any creases which inevitably happen with round cakes! Use a sharp knife (or a pizza cutter...) to trim the excess fondant from the bottom of the cake      

Next up, I grab my fondants smoother (pictured below) and go all over my cake with it to get rid of any imperfections. It also gives the cake a shinier, smoother look and for less than $10 I would say that's worth the money!

Do the same thing for your other cake layer so that you have two, fondant covered tiers just waiting to play the cake equivalent of stacks on!

Yes. We have another mistake on my part.

When I was trimming the excess fondant from my smaller cake I may have cut a little too close to the base so that you can see a little of the icing/cake glaring out. But guess what? We are covering the base of our cakes in ribbons and pearls so no one will ever know! Most convenient I would say.

Grab your wooden dowel and trim it if necessary (you want it to be just shorter than the height of the two cakes when stacked. Find the centre of your bottom tier and insert the dowel, pushing it all the way down to the cake board below. Dab a little extra buttercream on the bottom of your top tier (to act as glue) and press it down onto the dowel so it is is sitting smack-bang in the centre of the bottom tier.  

 Time to pretty up the base of the tiers with some ribbon! Now you can use ribbon made of fondant if you want but I opted to go for the real thing since I had it lying around and just really liked the colour of it.

There are a number of ways you can go about attaching the ribbon to the cakes. Some people pipe a ring of icing around the cake and press the ribbon into it, but I find the fat from the icing has a habit of leaking through the ribbon and staining it. Not the greatest look!

I decided to try out a new technique I had read about for the first time and overall I was fairly impressed by it. You simply take your ribbon, dunk it in clean water, thoroughly wring and use your fingers to squeeze out any excess water so the ribbon is just damp but not overly wet to touch. Then you simply wrap it around the cake and press the ends together to seal them. The dampness will help the ribbon stick to the sugar in the fondant and when it dries it will hold on tight.

Time to make some pearls! Grab some extra white fondant or gumpaste and use it to roll out enough small balls to go around the base of each tier. I tried to get all of mine as close to 1cm high as I could. For a little extra pizazz you can give your pearls a light  dusting with lustre dust or you can simply use them as they are. Attach them to the cake using small dabs of water, getting them as close to the side of the cake as you can without squashing them.  

  

Looks like its all coming together now! Thumbs up for progress.

So you now have your basic cake structure and its time to dress it up and make her  pretty!

To make your fondant drapery grab 3 or 4 dowels (depending on how thick you want the drape to be) and line them up on a bench top, evenly spaced with around a cm between each one. Thinly roll out some fondant large enough to cover the dowels, you want it thin enough to have the look of fine material (slightly thinner than what you did for the cake covering).

Place the fondant over the dowels and carefully press the fondant down so the grooves are well defined. Trim off any excess fondant and then leave the fondant for a few minutes to firm up a little. You don't want to leave it so long that it starts turning hard otherwise you may get cracks and lines when you try to bend it around the cake. A couple of minutes should do the trick. Repeat with a second drape for the second tier.

Using a few dabs of water as glue, pinch the two ends of the drapes and stick them to the cake. I started at the top and worked my way down. When joining the two drapes in the middle of the cake I tucked the bottom drape around the end of the first one to make it look more like one flowing piece.  

 Grab your edible roses and use a little more water or edible glue to attach them at each point that the drapes intersect the cake. You may need to support the roses as the water dries but they should hold their positions when fully dried.


 

 

 

   


And there you have it!

Simply yet fancy-pants cake to serve at birthdays, anniversaries or to simply carry around and give you an air of superiority!

Hit up the comments below with your thoughts and let me know if you give it a go!

  

 

Who's Ready For A Fiesta!

Its been a long time coming I know, but I finally have another tutorial-style post for you! Hooray!

Today boys and girls, we are going to learn how to make our very own Pinata Cake! Perfect for Mexican-themes parties or even Cinco de Mayo!

This cake came about after I was requested to make a cake for an upcoming 21st birthday fitting the following criteria:

• Not too big, something to serve between 30-40 people
• No fondant! 
• Mexican themed 

Besides that I was given a free licence style wise.  Oh yeahhhhhhh!

Its not often I get to decorate a cake sans-fondant and using buttercream icing as a feature, so I was quite pleased with the opportunity. Something I hadn't considered though was just how much the weather would mess with me! Here in Australia we are still struggling through summer and week after week of temperatures in the mid-high 30s... not good for a cake covered in highly melt-able butter! Nevertheless I struggled on and the cake really held its own given the conditions.

And of course, it wouldn't be a pinata cake without being stuffed full of lollies and chocolates!

So, lets get to the good stuff!

You Will Need:

• 2 x square cakes (I used 30cm square chocolate cakes) 
• Assorted lollies of your choice (I used about 2 packets... and ate the rest)
• Buttercream icing (in total I used almost 1kg of butter and almost 2kg of icing sugar)
• Your choice of food colourings
• A solid cake board 
• Piping bags and a large petal piping tip 
• A small amount of brown and white fondant (optional) 

To start off, grab one of your cakes and decide the shape and size of your pinata! After some solid time spent on google images I settled on a classic horse shape (or is it a donkey? No, pretty sure its a horse...).

As you can see above, I cut my cake into three main sections. One large piece for the body, a smaller rectangle for the head and a remaining rectangle from which I would cut the legs and a small triangle for the ear.

Cut them out and put them into formation on your cake board and you should have something resembling this:

Measure the size of each piece and use these measurements to make the exact same cuts in your remaining square cake. Cover these pieces to stop them drying out and leave these set aside for now while you work on the first cake which will form the bottom layer. 

Time to carve out some space in the cake for your lollies.  Using a serrated knife, carefully cut about halfway into the body section of the cake, leaving about a 3cm border from the edge of the cake. Make sure you don't cut all the way through, you only want to carve out about half the depth of the cake layer!

 I found that the easiest way to do this was to make a cut around the outline of the area I was removing with a knife and then using a fork like a chisel to lift it away  

 

Now grab your buttercream icing and apply a thin crumb coating to the entire bottom layer. For those new to the baking game, a crumb coating is simply a very thin coat of icing which helps stick and loose crumbs to the cake and stops them getting into your final icing layers. Don't worry if it looks a little rough, you will be covering it in another layer of icing in the end.

 

Allow the cake to sit in a cool spot until the icing firms, or if the weather is warm or you need it done quickly, stick the cake in the fridge for 10min or so. When the crumb coating no longer feels soft to touch, take the cake and fill the middle cavity with lollies! Take more of your buttercream icing and cover the top of the cake pieces (this will form the middle layer of icing on the finished cake).  

Halfway there! Now it's time to get the top layer on.

Grab the matching body piece of cake that you cut from the second cake and just like you did with the first one, carve out the middle. Again, be careful not to cut all the way through.

Carefully flip the piece and place on top of the lollies and base layer (so you are left with a nice flat surface). Take the other cuts made from the second cake and stick them on top of their corresponding body parts. Give the entire cake a quick crumb coating and set until firm. 

Once the crumb coat is set, give the cake a proper coating of icing (mine was about 1-1 1/2cm thick). Try to get it as smooth and even as you can, though you are covering it in colourful 'ruffles' so it doesn't have to be perfect or hot watered or anything like that.  

Time to get your ruffle on!

Take your remaining icing and divide it into 4 mixing bowls. Add whatever colouring you want to each, the brighter the better! Overall I ended up needing about 3-4 cups of each colour.

If you have four petal piping tips then this next step will be so much easier. If like me you only have one... here's where it gets a little frustrating. Decide what order you want your colours to go in and load up your piping bags with colouring (with only one piping tip I had to do it one bag at a time, emptying an excess from the bag when I finished a row, washing the tip and loading up the next colour...).

Starting at the bottom of the cake, make sure the thicker end of the petal tip is touching the cake and carefully use a back and forward movement with your hand to create a ruffled appearance across the feet and up the body. If you haven't used this piping technique before a quick google search will give you a ton of videos showing you how its done!

As you move up the cake, pipe each new row close enough to the one below so that it slightly overlaps.

 

I changed colours after every three rows but thats simply because I thought it looked the best given the dimensions of my cake.

 

 

If you find you icing getting too soft to pipe cleanly (Australia holla!) you can put it in the fridge for a couple of minutes to firm it up a little, but be careful not to leave it to long or you risk it getting grainy and too stiff (if this happens let it come to room temperature again and mix to try and get it smooth again). 

Once the piping is done you can leave it as is or you can add a few final details to make it look just that bit better! I flattened a piece of brown fondantinto a little nose and cut out a circle of white fondant, painted it with some food colouring gels and stuck it on to give him an eye.  

Here is a views of his cute butt....

And thats it! 


You now have yourself a fun, colourful and delicoious treat to serve at your next Mexican-infused event!

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and if you have any questions or thoughts just hit me up in the comments section below!

XO

Allsorts of Delicious

Licorice.

You either love it or hate.

If you are one of those fabulous people who appreciate this dark and sultry sweet, then this could be the slice for you!

A long time ago (in a dining room far, far away!) I made this slice for a friend to serve when she had some friends over for as coffee. One of her guests fell in love with this treat and has raved about it ever since. So when said Guest's birthday approached my friend asked me to once again whip up the dish as a birthday surprise. How could I possibly refuse?!

So here you go, the apparently famous Licorice Allsort Slice! 

Licorice Allsort Slice

Makes ~20 pieces


125g butter, chopped
2/3 cup sweetened condensed milk
2 tbsp golden syrup
250g plain sweet biscuits
1/2 cup dessicated coconut
375g licorice allsorts, roughly chopped
375g dark cooking chocolate, chopped
30g copha (vegetable shortening)



Place the butter, condensed milk and golden syrup in a small saucepan and cook, stirring over a low heat until the butter in fully melted and the mixture is smooth and combined. Remove from the heat and set aside for 10 minutes to cool.

Using a food processor to crush the biscuits into a breadcrumb consistency and place in a medium sized mixing bowl along with the coconut and licorice. Add the melted butter mixture and stir until combined.

Line a 20x30cm baking dish with non-stick paper and press the mixture into the base of the dish. Refrigerate for 30min to set.

Using either a bain marie or a microwave, melt the chocolate and copha together until totally smooth and combined. Pour the mixture over the chilled biscuit base and either tilt the dish or use a spatula to smooth the chocolate and ensure the base is totally covered. Refrigerate for a further 30min or until the chocolate layer has set firm.


Remove the slice from the baking dish and use a hot, sharp knife to cut it into individual pieces.

Enjoy!