Chocolate Coffee Cake and Love Cake Giveaway

This cake may look like a normal chocolate cake but would you believe me if I told you it was totally allergy free?

I tried out the Love Cake mix for my mum on mothers day and wasn't disappointed.

Before you snub me for using 'packet cake' mix check out the ingredients: gluten free flour (organic rice, organic tapioca, potato starch), organic raw sugar, organic cocoa powder, baking powder (gluten and aluminium free) guar gum, baking soda and sea salt.

None of those crazy ingredients and preservatives you can't pronounce that are made in a science lab. This cake mix is basically just Love Cake doing all the hard work, that is, finding the right balance of ingredients to make it taste amazing.

I know that buying cake mix isn't something most people would be excited about but the fact that just about anyone can eat these cakes makes it totally exciting!

I'm talking wheat free, gluten free, dairy free, soy free, (can be made) egg free. I would say it is perfect for those that have more than one allergy who feel like they have to miss out on baking. This is totally for you!

If you're worried about the taste then don't be, do you think I would even write about a cake that tastes bad on my blog let alone serve it to my gluten intolerant mum?! It's yummy and you wouldn't know it's gluten/everything free! (I tested it on Mr S before giving it to her, he gave it the seal of approval!)



As I've mentioned before my mum has coeliacs disease so she can't usually eat the cakes I make. She was pretty excited to try this one out on mothers day!

I decided to ice mine with coffee buttercream and then pour over a chocolate glaze. Needless to say, it was delicious!

My mum loved the cake and said it lasted a week still tasting great too!


Chocolate Cake with Coffee Buttercream

Coffee Buttercream

Ingredients:
220g Butter, softened
3 t Instant Coffee (dissolved in 1 T water)
3 - 4 C Icing Sugar

• Beat butter until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes.
• Sift Icing sugar into mixture, one cup at a time.
• Gradually add the coffee to the icing one teaspoon at a time until you reach the taste you like. 3 teaspoons may be too strong for some or too weak for others, for me this was just right!
• If the icing is too soft add a little more icing sugar, if it is too stiff add a little milk  or extra coffee.

Chocolate Glaze
Recipe from Baked Explorations

Ingredients:
114g Dark Chocolate (I used 62%)
85g Butter, room temperature, cubed
1/2 T Corn Syrup (or golden syrup)

• Slowly heat all ingredients on a doubler boiler until melted.
• Stir until well incorporated then remove from the heat.
• Leave the glaze to cool for approx. 15 minutes so it doesn't melt the buttercream on the cake.

Chocolate Coffee Cake Assembly

• Prepare two 6" chocolate cakes (I used one packet of Love Cake's organic chocolate cake mix)
• Once cakes are cooled, cut the tops off and place on a baking tray.
• Scoop approx. 1 cup of coffee buttercream on top of one of the cakes facing up and spread to the edges. You'll want this to be nice and thick, about 1cm.
• Place second cake on top so that the bottom is facing up (with the smooth edge).
• Ice the entire cake with coffee buttercream.
• Once the chocolate glaze is room temperature (or slightly warmer) gently pour on top of cake and spread to the edges with a spatula.
• When the entire top of the cake is covered in chocolate glaze go back and pour more chocolate on top, this time gently nudge the glaze to the edges so it trickles down the sides of the cake. It is up to you how much chocolate you add, I say the more the better!
• Place in a fridge for approx. 30 minutes or until glaze is set.
• Enjoy!

Giveaway time!

The lovely team at Love Cake are giving one lucky Lydia Bakes reader the chance to win two packets of their delicious cake mixes.

To be in to win two packets of Love Cake cake mixes, "like" Love Cake on Facebook and leave a comment below telling me what your favourite gluten free/allergy free treat is. Please include your name and email address in the comments below.

Good luck! The winner will be picked at random using the randompicker.com generator and notified on Facebook on the 28th of May 2013. Entries only open to New Zealand residents.

White Chocolate Orange Cookies

The other day I could feel a cold coming on, Mr S and I were discussing being "man sick" and of all people he was accusing me of being over the top when sick and said I don't handle colds very well.

Says Mr I-go-to-the-doctors-for-every-single-thing "man sick" man himself!

So I made a bet with him that I wouldn't complain at all during this cold.

Easier said than done.

So maybe I am a bit of a whinge when it comes to being sick. Surely no one else has ever felt the way I feel now, like there is cotton wool stuffed inside my whole head, my nose has a life of it's own and my headache is ever lasting as if there's a party going on in my head with the bass turned up high. I am the only one who has ever had a cold, ever. Right?

Last night we decided to watch Cast Away in bed, well that put me in my place. Suddenly things didn't seem so bad. I could be stuck on an island with nothing but a volley ball on a stick and a hole in my tooth!

So I'm back to proving that I can last a cold without complaining every two seconds, wish me luck!

Although these cookies wouldn't help me on a desert island (actually yes they really would) and I probably wouldn't be able to taste them right now, I can't help wishing there were some in the pantry right now to go with nice glass of milk.

Cookies make the best comfort food don't you think?

Plus these cookies have orange zest and juice in them, which means vitamin C, which means these cookies are practically medicine right?



White Chocolate Orange Cookies
Adapted from Cookies and Cups
Makes approx 24 large cookies

Ingredients:
225g Butter, room temperature
1/2 C Sugar
1/2 C Brown Sugar
1 Egg
1 1/2 T Orange Juice (juiced from an orange)
2 1/4 C Flour
1 t Baking Soda
1/2 t Salt
2 T Orange Zest
2 C White Chocolate Chips

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line two trays with baking paper.
• Cream the butter and both sugars for approx. 2 minutes until light and fluffy.
• Add the egg and orange juice and mix until incorporated.
• Sift flour, baking soda and salt and add to the mix with the orange zest, mix until dough comes together.
• Add chocolate chips and stir through so they are evenly distributed.
• Scoop large spoonfuls of cookie dough into a ball shape and drop on the baking trays about 2" apart.
• Bake for 8-10 minutes or until they turn light golden.
• Cool on trays for 2 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Am I the only one who gets whiney as soon as I  get sick? Or are you like that too?

What are your tricks to getting better soon?

Happy Mothers Day!

A while ago I was cleaning out my cupboards and storing things in big plastic boxes when I came across my old scrapbook my mum made for my 21st.

By far my favourite pages are the ones about all the cakes mum made me while I was growing up.

Clearly I got my baking skills from her!

My most favourite cake in the world is my third birthday cake. The train cake.

It features chocolate wheaten biscuits for wheels, an Eskimo lolly for the chimney, Rashuns chips for the chains joining the carriages together, popcorn and more Rashuns being carried in the carriages and is neatly decorated with a few Pebbles and perfectly bright icing.

I'm pretty sure this is what made me become a cake decorator!

Other cakes I can remember over the years were a giant crocodile cake complete with an open mouth, a hickory dickory dock cake, a cat cake, an L shaped cake, an alien cake...you name it, I got it! 

My mum made all these cakes without having had any training. What a superstar! 

So I'd like to take this moment to say a giant THANK YOU to my mum, without whom this blog probably wouldn't be here. She has been a fantastic influence on me, not just in the baking area but in life.

Happy Mothers Day mum!

Mini Oreo Cheesecakes

Last weekend I completely overbooked myself but for some reason everything worked out fine.

Originally I was freaking out about food. Yes food. Clearly that's all I think about.

Luckily everything worked out fine. I had a full day of training at work where they provided food (Chinese takeaways for lunch!) then I bought a pre-made quiche for a hens night later that afternoon.

We had friends coming over for dinner on Saturday night, luckily Mr S came to the rescue and made the entire dinner and dessert, including creme brulees, ooh la la.

On Sunday we indulged in the most deliciously fatty fish and chips when we got together with our home group and for dessert I whipped up these cute mini cheesecakes which were deceptively easy to make!

I decided last week that I would start eating healthy again once uni started up (this week), so it makes total sense to eat my body weight in bad food beforehand right?

These cheesecakes truly saved me though. I thought I wasn't going to have enough time to make anything! I looked up how to make a cookies and cream cheesecake but after reading about water baths and jiggly-ness I decided it was too-hard-basket.




These cute little cookies and cream cheesecakes are bite sized and topped with cream which helps to offset that tangyness of the cream cheese. Just perfect.

Mini Oreo Cheesecakes
Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart
Makes 16

22 Oreos (16 whole, 6 chopped coarsely)
450g Cream Cheese, room temperature
1/2 C Sugar
1/2 t Vanilla Extract
2 Eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten
1/2 C Sour Cream
Pinch of salt
1 C Cream
16 Mini Oreos

• Preheat oven to 135 degrees C and line a muffin tin with cupcake cases.
• Place one Oreo in each cupcake case.
• Beat cream cheese until smooth and gradually add sugar.
• Add vanilla and mix until combined.
• Gradually add eggs to mixture and beat until combined, making sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl as you go.
• Add sour cream and salt and mix until combined
• Add chopped Oreoas and stir in by hand.
• Spoon mixture into cupcake cases until almost full.
• Bake for approximately 22 minutes or until filling is set.
• Let cool in tins then refrigerate for at least four hours (it's best left overnight).
• Whip cream until it holds it shape and pipe small swirls in the middle of each cheesecake.
• Top with a mini Oreo and enjoy!

Who knows what this weekend will bring. Probably a whole lot more food, there seems to be a theme there.

As it is Mothers day this weekend it'll have to involve cake. What are your plans for this weekend? Anything food related?

New Look Lydia Bakes

Happy Monday everyone!

I'm sure you have noticed the fantastic new look here at Lydia Bakes. 

This is all thanks to my amazing friend, Danelle, who also happens to be a blogger, graphic designer and wedding photographer (yes I know, some people get all the gifts!)

Danelle has blogged about our adventure of getting the layout of my blog looking like this, check it out for a better insight into what she did. I have to say, she did an amazing job don't you think?

The original idea was to move my entire blog to Wordpress and go self hosted. To those of you who don't know what that means (okay I hardly know what that means myself!)  it's a bit of a big job. Well, now Blogger and Google has stopped me doing that, it's a long and annoying story so I'm staying put and making the changes that I can make right here.

So all you need to know is I'm not going anywhere!

I am, however, going to be working on re-formatting every post (that's 302 posts!)and re-creating recipes to make changes and photographing them to match the rest of the blog. I hate inconsistency!

So things may get quiet until everything is back to normal but I assure you I am working on it!

One thing I would like to ask my amazing and loyal readers is what you would like to see here at Lydia Bakes?

Is it more recipes of a certain type? More tutorials? More photos of Pecan? (please be that option) or more cafe reviews and giveaways? 

I would love to know what you would like to see! So please be as specific as possible and I will try my best to produce an awesome blog for you in return!

From the bottom of my heart I want to thank each and every single person who visits my blog, the 76 followers on Twitter, the 122 followers on Instagram, the 330 followers on Pinterest and the 597 600 followers on Facebook. I really do appreciate your support. I love your comments and it makes my day when you show me photos of your baking!

Thank you!

Nutella Banana Cake and Caker Cookbook Giveaway

It's the uni holidays for me at the moment which means two things, time to catch up on study (sucks, I know!) and lots of time to bake.

One recipe I've been dying to try out ever since I bought the cook book is the Nutella banana cake by The Caker.



I've been a fan of Jordan and her amazing cake creations from The Caker for quite a long time but never managed to find an opportunity to get a slice of her cake!

I was lucky enough to attend the launch for The Caker's book launch and finally got to try some of her delicious baking.



Needless to say, the baking was delicious. I tried a raspberry coconut macaroon, peanut butter and jelly cupcake and a dark chocolate and pistachio cupcake. All tasted amazing, so naturally I bought a copy!

This recipe has been on my radar since before the book launch, I regularly head over to her site to ogle the delicious cakes!



With delicious and different recipes like pinot noir chocolate cake, earl grey tea cookies and chai latte cake with condensed milk icing I can't wait to try them all out!

What I like about this recipe is that it is two cake batters mixed together, banana and Nutella and you can really taste both with each bite. It tastes even better when smothered in Nutella, but lets face it, what doesn't!

Nutella Banana Cake
Recipe recreated from The Caker with permission

Ingredients:

Banana Cake Batter
125g Butter, softened
125g Caster Sugar
1 t Vanilla
2 Eggs
2 Ripe Bananas, mashed
1 t Baking Soda
2 T Milk, boiled
175g Flour
1 t Cinnamon

Nutella Cake Batter
1/2 C Nutella
1 Egg
50g Flour
Dash of Milk

For the icing:
Nutella!

• Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line two 6" tins with baking paper.
• Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about two minutes.
• Add vanilla and eggs, beating well after each addition.
• Add mashed banana and mix until well incorporated.
• Boil milk by placing in a cup and microwaving for approx. 30 seconds.
• Dissolve the baking soda in the milk, it will froth up, add this to the mixture and stir in until incorporated.
• Sift flour and cinnamon into mixture and fold in carefully, taking care not to over mix.
• In a separate bowl, combine Nutella, egg and flour and mix until smooth.
• Add milk to mixture to thin it out a little, I added about a tablespoon in total.
• Pour banana batter into cake tins and pour Nutella batter over top.
• Using a knife, swirl the batters together slightly.
• Bake for approx. 35 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.
• Leave to cool in tins for 5-10 minutes before removing and cooling on a rack.
• Once completely cool, cut the tops off both cakes, sandwich together with a thick layer of Nutella and ice the top with more Nutella.

Recipe Notes:
All up I used a 220g container of Nutella, 1/2 a cup in the batter and the rest on the middle and top of the cake. You could also ice the sides but I liked the rustic look the cake had with the sides showing.
The original recipe is for one 9" cake, you can bake this for approx. 45 minutes then ice the entire cake with Nutella.



With about four assignments on the go at the moment I can definitely keep busy these uni holidays. I've worked out that baking is great for procrastinating, dishes...not so much!

One great thing about my holidays is that Mr S decided to take time off too, so even though I'm keeping busy it has been nice to spend time together each day. Most nights we're watching movies and take turns picking what to watch, tonight is my pick - Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 2! Oh yeah!



Competition Closed!

Congratulations to Shima who has won herself a copy of The Caker's cookbook.

Jordan is giving one lucky Lydia Bakes reader a copy of her fabulous cookbook. All you have to do to get in the draw is head over to The Caker's website and leave a comment below telling me which is your favourite flavour cake. Please include your name and email address in the comments below.

Good luck! The winner will be picked at random using the randompicker.com generator and notified on Facebook on the 2nd of May 2013. Entries only open to New Zealand residents.

Anzac Cookies

Here in New Zealand we are gearing up for Anzac Day this Thursday.

Anzac day is a day of rememberence in Australia and New Zealand to commemorate the troops in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) who fought at Gallipoli in World War I.

The wives of the soldiers sent these cookies over to them and because of the ingredients the cookies kept their shape and didn't spoil easily (they didn't use eggs back then!)



These cookies are incredibly easy to make but still taste amazing, as Anzac cookies should!

I like my cookies nice and fat with no added chocolate but feel free to add a drizzle of your favourite chocolate to make them a little more decadent.



Anzac Cookies
Recipe adapted from Little & Friday
Makes approx. 20 cookies

Ingredients:
1 C Flour
1 C Coconut (thread)
2/3 C Brown Sugar, packed
1 C Whole Rolled Oats
125g Butter
2 T Golden Syrup
1/2 t Baking Soda
2 T Boiling Water
Dark chocolate for drizzling (optional)

• Preheat oven to 160 degrees C and line two trays with baking paper.
• Combine flour, coconut, brown sugar and rolled oats until well incorporated.
• Melt butter and golden syrup in a pan.
• While butter melts, put baking soda in a cup and add the boiling water, it will start to bubble up.
• Quickly add the baking soda water to the butter mixture, it will start bubbling up and double in size, pour over the dry ingredients while bubbling.
• Mix together with a wooden spoon until well incorporated.
• Roll large spoonfuls of cookie dough into large balls and place on the baking trays, approx. 3cm apart.
• Gently flatten cookies with the back of a spoon and bake for approx. 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.
• When cookies come out of the oven they will still be soft, leave on the trays to cool and they will harden up and become delicious and crunchy!
• If desired, melt a few pieces of chocolate and place in a ziplock bag. Snip off the corner and drizzle over cookies.

I decided to have a bit of fun with the chocolate!

However you spend Anzac Day, I hope it is a good one. Lest we forget!