Vanilla Bean Baked Donuts with Raspberry Icing to Kick off DONUT WEEK 2013!!!

OK so I discovered that Donut Week is the 11th - 18th May this year (maybe every year who knows) a while ago and have been obsessing about donuts ever since. I am so excited to share what I think is the best thing I have ever baked with you - so excited that I am writing this post early and queuing it!

The beauty of this pink sparkly tasty treat is that it looks fabulous but is SO simple to make. This Vanilla Bean Baked Donut is so moist and chewy and everything a donut should be, yet it is baked... and therefore... drum roll please... a healthy donut. (I realise I am quite late jumping on the baked donut band wagon but if you've ever tried to buy a donut pan in the UK that doesn't involve mail ordering from the US you'd understand why) Actually, what makes this recipe healthy is the 50g of Greek yoghurt that goes into it and the amount of butter that has NOT gone into it - there is a mere 15g of butter in this recipe!

Cherry and Almond Super Massive Muffins

I often find myself in Costa eying up the gigantic muffins, so big you could share could eat all to yourself and be good to go for the rest of the afternoon mmmmm. Sadly this is followed by me eying up the price. Except it's not sadly at all. I see it as an opportunity a necessity to go home and create my own super massive muffins to rival those of all the coffee shops with the extra advantage of being able to put whatever flavours and ingredients I like into them. I am currently loving cherry and almond EVERYTHING - stay tuned for a cherry and almond scone post - so the tastiest muffins I could think of were... Cherry and Almond Super Massive Muffins! We are on the cusp of summer but the English spring weather (cough winter cough) sticks its gloomy head in our way a little too often and for those days cherry and almond makes the perfect almost-summer-but-still-a-little-chilly mid-morning, afternoon, whenever-you-fancy treat.

These muffins are DOUBLE almondy

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!