Grapefruit and Thyme Wholewheat Spelt Loaf Cake {Happy New Year} {Vegan}

Happy new year to the extraordinarily fab people reading this!! Long time no see, eh? Since my last blog post all those many months ago I have visited seven countries, moved in to the house of fun with my favourite gal pals (minus you, Ellen), made new friends and lost one and embarked upon my most intense academic year yet. It's been a wild five months. I don't usually go in for all the stuff that comes with the start of our next rotation around the sun like resolutions yada yada but the latter half of 2014 has been... I'm going do it, feel free to shoot me for what I am about to type... a ROLLER COASTER (hahahaha my sincerest apologies) to say the least so I figured a little reflection wouldn't go amiss. I'm not gonna share my resolutions with you cos they are super duper lame for the most part BUT one of them is to BLOG MORE. In addition to scrawling what I want out of this year in my notebook, and in order to avoid beating myself up come the end of 2015 I also decorated a jar in which I will put bits and pieces, photographs, journal entry type things etc that represent achievements and all the good, exciting, lovely things that happen that quite often get overlooked because lets face it most of us are prone to dwelling on the negative things! This way I can feel warm and fuzzy when I empty the contents of the jar a year from now even if I can't check all the things off my list of resolutions! I can't take credit for the idea though, ta v much BuzzFeed!

Anywhoooo on the foodie blog front I figured what better time to get my blog back up on its feet than the start of the first month of the year? I had forgotten how much I loved trailing the internet, putting a recipe together piece by piece. Once my recipe began to take shape I got all excited the way I used to, rather than feeling exhausted thinking about the blog posts I should be writing. 

I decided for my first post of 2015 I wanted something fruity, maybe even zesty, rather than chocolatey or spicy. I wanted to move away from flavours associated with the holidays. I also wanted to try something I had never done before; like pairing fruit and herbs in a baked good which I know is doable cos ya know Top With Cinnamon's BEST EVER chocolate chip cookies have basil in em and Local Milk sticks herbs in her baked goods left right and centre! (each of those four words takes you to a different sweet recipe with a herb cameo)

Summer Berry and Cinnamon Buttermilk Cake

So it's finally getting sunny in Liverpool (today I even considered bare legs), we have unwillingly given up one hour of perfectly good sleeping time and winter seems to be on its way out (touch wood) so I thought I'd combine warming wintery cinnamon with summer berries to create spring. Turns out Averie Cooks had already made a cake where she combines buttermilk pancakes and blueberry muffins so I adapted the recipe slightly (and I really do mean slightly) to suit my needs. I replaced some of the sugar with soft brown sugar because I love the way it adds a slight caramel-y flavour to baked goods.

Sometimes you just want cake. Not icing, not filling, not cream, none of that fancy extra stuff. Just cake. This pretty fabulous mix of berries and cinnamon adds just enough excitement whilst still allowing this to be just cake. I say just when I mean tummy cuddlin' taste bud caressing cake. This is a soft, fluffy heaven in ya mouth kinda cake.

My blog has fallen by the way side somewhat in recent times, it's exam season you see so I am up to my neck in bacteriophage replication, apoptosis and immunoreceptor tyrosine-based activation motifs so this is just a quick post before my break ends and I have to go back to my life of coloured pens and yellow legal pads (there is something about colours and yellow paper that enforces knowledge better than black pens and white paper..).

The first two paragraphs of this post were written over a month a go so they make little sense now as the weather has got a little warmer and I have indeed by this point got the ol' pins out however I can still imagine myself eating this cake pretty damn clearly which is obviously a great sign and tbf the incessant wind (that may or may not be unique to Merseyside) warrants the use of cinnamon. Make the cake. You know you want to.

Blood Orange Chocolate Loaf Cake

 

January has gone so. very. very. very. slowly. I couldn't be more glad that it's over. February isn't much better what with its dreary drab miserable weather perpetually teetering on the edge of snow (come on if it hasn't snowed by now it should just try again next year please don't make me walk through a sludgy brown mess to get to uni).

Winter-hating aside I finally located some blood oranges! Like a top plonker I've been searching for them since the summer... (for fellow plonkers winter is blood orange season, duh :P ). Anyway I don't go in for the whole 'new year new me' stuff and if I did my self control definitely doesn't stretch to new year healthy eating, so I cracked out a tin of cocoa and made a delicious, dark, moreish, and dare I say it, moist blood orange chocolate cake with a zesty glaze.

In the interest of long term health and well being for those of you possessing the self control to eat all healthily this cake does have some naturally good-for-ya ingredients so it can be enjoyed by everyone, and those adverse to 'healthy' sweet treats won't suspect a thing. Win win sitch right there.

Pistachio Baklava Birthday Cake

 

Baklava is one of Hannah's favourite sweet treats and so what would be more fitting than to turn it into a cake for her nineteenth birthday? (Eeeesh it's been all go on the birthday front recently and soon it will be Christmas gaaaah so many occasions so little time so little dollar) This cake/baklava extravaganza is made up of two layers of spiced cake laced with honey syrup and coated in a mix of chopped pistachios, almonds and pumpkin seeds (OK so technically it's a mixed nut + seed baklava birthday cake, feel free to omit the latter pistachios are expensive but I wanted green!!) and two layers of sweet sweet spiced, honey-syrup-drowned, pistachio covered baklava.

Spiced Butternut Squash Mini Bundt Cakes

Chocolate Malt Cake {Birthday Cake}

Pumpkin Chocolate Marble Bundt Cake {New post - about blummin' time}

Blackberry Crumble Coffee Cake

Celebratory Hippo Cupcakes {Blog Rename/ FINALLY got a domain Celebration Post!!}

Triple-Lemon Drizzle Birthday Cake

Super Rich Chocolate Cake with Dark Fudge Frosting

Well I feel like I should probably re-introduce myself it's been so long... I'm Kate, it's nice to meet ya etc etc yada yada. I do apologize but I have my reasons, I promise! Hannah and I have been busy moving stuff out of our current place and back to the 'rents homes for the next six weeks, before once again returning to Liverpool, only this time we will have our own cosy little apartment - counting the days down already, the kitchen has little yellow tiles and everything.

Marbled Cupcakes

 

Vanilla Bean Cakes with Cherry Swiss Meringue Buttercream

I talked a lot in the last post about the lovely fresh produce summer brings. Here is another example of that produce - these lovely, flavoursome, juicy cherries. I must admit most of these were eaten before I decided to use them to make cherry Swiss Meringue buttercream to top these lovely moist, light and fluffy vanilla bean cakes.

Almond Roulade with Lemon Curd and Fresh Strawberries

Much to my delight the lovely warm sunshine (when I say warm I mean 16 degrees C HA!) has been out consistently for the past few days now (touch wood touch wood touch wood - with every limb because I HAVE to). I cannot express how much I love the sun and how much difference I think it makes with regards to one's mood.Sun = happiness, ergo I must move to a warmer country or I am going to be one miserable munchkin by the time winter rolls back round. Gaaah. Never mind I should be quiet and make the most of it while it graces dreary England with its presence! That (make the most of it I mean!) is exactly what I did yesterday when I made this very summery almond roulade with lemon curd and fresh strawberries, took it off half completed to the bus station to meet Hannah and then on to the park for a well deserved picnic after the last few weeks of solid hard work!

In our picnic hamper were two cans of the delightfully refreshing cloudy lemonade (not as good as blood orange San Pellegrino but mmm thinking about it makes me want to run to the fridge and crack open my last can of cloudy lemonade which I have been saving for later), an onion bagel each - oh my goodness those things get tastier with age - cream cheese and a little jar of strawberries. I LOVE how much fruit this season brings to the markets in town. The copious amounts of fresh produce available (at a much lower price) is definitely one of my favourite things about summer.

Fondant Fancies

With sunshine comes the good mood that sees me buying dungarees, pastel coloured socks, not grunting at the crowds of people in Liverpool on a bank holiday weekend and having the urge to make fondant fancies! I came home one day last week to find someone had 'taken' my piping bag (there is a lot of 'taking' going on here at the moment, I cannot wait to move out into our own apartment where I can keep my stand mixer out and still come home to it!) so the chocolate drizzle on top isn't fab but I tried two different ways did the best job I could without my tools!

Vanilla Orange Upside Down Cake

Hannah has been banging on and on and on and on and on and on and on and ON at me for a very long time to make her an upside down cake. OK she asked pretty nicely all ten thousand times but as someone who cannot understand why anyone would want to make a cake as ugly as an upside down cake it felt a lot like someone banging on. Anyway, she was at college and I wasn't at uni so with lots of work nothing to do I wanted to make something yummy for her coming home and I couldn't think of much she'd appreciate more than me giving in and making an upside down cake. I didn't fancy the more traditional toppings (bottoms? who knows) of apple or pineapple and was feeling a little adventurous so I bought some perfect looking oranges from my favourite fruit and vegetable stall in town. I know I keep harping on about the sun but it seriously does influence my baking choices! I was a little skeptical about not taking the skin off the oranges but to my delight and sheer amazement the cake was super scrummy! I still stand by it being pretty ugly and it was a nightmare to photograph but ya know the things you do for love and all that!

This cake is perfect for summery days and goes brilliantly with custard

Summer Lovin' Cake

I know it's not summer but there have been a few hints that it is on its way - "Really?" I hear my fellow Brits say, "was it not snowing in April this year?!" - and the tiny ray of sun I saw peeking out of the clouds the other day made me feel all summery, not to mention this cake is yummy yummy yummy and so in an attempt to coax the reluctant sun from its hide out behind the clouds and raise everyone's rather wintry spirits I want to share my Summer Lovin' Cake with you all!

This cake looks so much more difficult to make than it is so it is perfect for impressing friends and family at picnics and BBQs. It is made using two different flavoured (and coloured) sponges and provided you have a heart cutter and a loaf tin you are good to go!

Simnel Cupcakes

I had been wanting to making a mini version of the traditional simnel cake since Easter eggs went on sale in Tesco. However, before I went about doing it myself I discovered Emma from baketheneat.com (check out her fantastic blog!) had created the most perfect simnel cupcakes that were exactly what I had in mind. I left out the booze but they were still fantastic and went down a treat with both mine and Hannah's families.