A food blog from both sides of the pond
The Royal Wedding is just days away and all over the papers and the 24 hour news channels. Surprisingly an offer of free union jack cupcake cases brought out the patriot in me. (Available from Lakeland who I am not sponsored by. I just wish I was.) So I made the most British cupcake I could think of: a mini victoria sponge cake with jam and buttercream icing. And just for good measure I iced them in red, white and blue (or more accurately dark pink, cream and blue!)
For family holidays, I’m always the one signed up to bring dessert. And by “signed up” I mean I more or less demand the right to make dessert (my mom is more of a cook than a baker, and with me around I don’t feel there’s a need to follow up her wonderful cooking with a store-bought cake/pie). So for this Easter, I decided to make a carrot cake, because I don’t know if I’ve ever made one, and cream cheese frosting sounded tasty.
I wanted to mix it up a bit, though. I don’t really like nuts in baked goods. It’s not the flavor, it’s the abrupt texture change that bugs me: if I’m biting into a soft, warm, gooey brownie, I don’t want to hit nut (that’s what she said). But I do think that walnuts have a very strong place with carrot cake, so I decided to try using walnuts as a flour instead of an add-in. If you want a normal cake, just substitute the ground walnuts with the flour of your choice, probably all-purpose.
