New Domain

To continue the professionalization of this little blog, I've invested in a brand new domain name.

Welcome to...


Okay, so it's not as snazzy as carolinescupcakes.co.uk or .com, but I think it works quite nicely. Don't you agree? :)

So remember...

www.carolinescupcakes.info

Happy Baking!

X

We Have a New Image!

As I'm coming up to my one year anniversary online, I've decided to try and make the site, a little more professional... so without further ado, I present to you the brand new image of Caroline's Cupcakes... You like?


Everything's still in the same place - just a little more refined!

So what to you think? Do you like it or love it? let me know :)

Happy Baking!

X

For those of you who would like to reminisce over the different images I've adopted over the last twelve months, here's a mini montage of the blogs history to date - Enjoy!

Coming Soon: The Afternoon Tea Club

It's been a while since my last post, but I just wanted to let you all know about an exciting new project, which I'm going to be working on with my friend Laura over the next couple of months (and beyond)!

So what's this intriguing project you speak of?

Well... It's called the Afternoon Tea Club, and the basic principal behind it is that every week we go to a different tea room and review it - simples - essentially it's an excuse for us to eat cake, but please indulge us - we promise to be interesting!

We've not gone live yet, but when we do I'll let you know.

In the meantime, if you know of any nice tearooms in the North-West, then drop us a line!

You can find us at...

theafternoonteaclub@hotmail.co.uk

or just comment below :)

Happy Baking!

X

PS- Look out next week for a post on all of my recent baking disasters!

Happy New Year!

My New Year's Resolutions 2012

Okay so it's a few hours off yet, here in the UK, but while it's still early I wanted to take a moment to wish you all a very happy new year and to thank you for reading my blog over the last twelve months - Thank you - I hope I've been vaguely interesting!

I'll be back in January to continue spreading the Cupcake love, but in the meantime have a fabulous night, wherever you are in the world and enjoy 2012 :)

Happy Baking!

X

Christmassy Creations: Cupcakes

Christmas wouldn't be christmas in my house without some festive cupcakes... so here they are (Usual recipe of course)


Above are my Jolly Holly Cupcakes - Yes I made the tops myself - Gosh I am talented aren't I?!
(incase you want to know, they're made out of sugar paste!)

This is my my Gift Cupcake, again with home made topper :)



And finally my Chocolate Stardust Cupcake - Topper not made by me, but supplied by the lovely people at the Baking shop in York!

So yeah that's my Christmas cookery in a nutshell - let me know what you think!

Happy Baking!

X

Christmassy Creations: Mince Pies

I hope you all had very merry Christmas' filled with lots of good food and wine - I certainly did!

Last week, to get into the festive spirit, I started my seasonal baking. So in the first of this two part post, I will show you how to make Mince Pies!


Mince Pies

For short crust pastry, I always like to use the BBC Food recipe, which I find produces the best pastry (Here's the LINK or if you prefer I've printed it below) but if you can't be bothered, then you can always use frozen!

Ingredients

• 125g/4oz plain flour
  

• pinch of salt
  

• 55g/2oz butter, cubed

• 30-45ml/2-3 tbsp cold water

Method

1. Put the flour and salt in a large bowl and add the cubes of butter.

2. Use your fingertips to rub the butter into the flour until you have a mixture that resembles coarse breadcrumbs with no large lumps of butter remaining. Try to work quickly so that it does not become greasy.

3. Using a knife, stir in just enough of the cold water to bind the dough together.

4. Wrap the dough in clingfilm and chill for 10-15 minutes before using.

5. Alternatively using a food processor, put the flour, butter and salt in the food processor and pulse until the fat is rubbed into the flour.

6. With the motor running, gradually add the water through the funnel until the dough comes together. Only add enough water to bind it and then stop.

7. Wrap the dough in clingfilm as before and chill for 10-15 minutes before using.

So that's the Pastry...

- After these stages are complete, take the dough from the fridge and roll on a lightly floured surface until about 5mm thick.

- Cut out rolled dough with a circular cutter (these will form the base of each pie) and place each circle into a section of a pre-greased bun tray.

- For the filling you can either make your own, or if you're like me, you can buy it from the supermarket - For these I used Waitrose's own mincemeat and I can highly reccommend it! So whatever filling you have, take it and fill the little pastry cases.

- Next the tops. Take the left over pastry and re roll it and cut using a holly stencil so that each pie has two holly leaves for topping.

- Place the 'leaves' on top and finish with a pastry berry.

- Brush tops with milk or beaten egg and put in the oven at 180C (FAN) for 20 minutes.

- Leave to cool for 15 minutes and enjoy!


So that's how you make mince pies - If you give the recipe a go, let me know how they turn out, in the meantime look out for my follow up blog post on my Christmas Cupcakes!

Happy Holidays and Happy Baking!

X

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!
Hope you're all have a fabulous day, eating lots of delicious treats and drinking too much wine - Look out next week for my very own festive delights...
But until then - Happy Baking :)

Xxx