Alphabakes Challenge: April 2016

We've almost come to the end of our second run through the alphabet with only two letters remaining. Ros at The More Than Occasional Baker chose a very topical letter last month - we had C, and given it was Easter there were lots of chocolate entries! This month I wonder if some of you will be entering savoury bakes or trying to find lighter options... the letter that we are baking with this month is..... T. The deadline is the 25th of the month...

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Breakfast Burritos

This is more of an idea than a recipe as you can include almost anything you want - but until recently it hadn't even occurred to me to make one of these before. They make a nice change for a breakfast/ brunch/ even lunch - a different way of serving a full English that means you need to cook less food (one sausage per person is enough for instance) so a little goes a long way - good perhaps if you are cooking for crowds. I cooked some hash browns...

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How to use a Garrett Frill Cutter to make Ruffles on Cakes

If you want a frill or ruffle on your cake the most consistent and professional way to do that is with a Garrett frill cutter. It’s a plastic circle with a ruffled edge, that comes with three interchangeable centres – each one gives a different width to your frill. You just pop one out and the other in.   I’d used a Garrett frill cutter before on this Princess doll cake, but didn’t quite know how to do it properly – you can see from the picture...

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Restaurant review: Tayyabs, Whitechapel

This review is rather overdue as I ate at Tayyabs around Christmas time for a team meal – as some time has elapsed I will keep this brief but essentially wanted to recommend it to anyone who hasn’t been there!   An award-winning restaurant, it’s near but not on Brick Lane – I’ve found in the past that some Brick Lane restaurants are more geared up for tourists but it is a short walk away in Whitechapel where you find the really good, authentic...

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Meal Planning Monday Week 14

I was so tied up with making Easter treats and planning for a busy weekend while my parents were visiting that I completely forgot to plan a menu for this week! In a way that's a good thing as I need to get back on my diet so I'm going to do some pretty simple meals this week. Monday - bank holiday Lunch: crumpet pizzas (lots of crumpets left from weekend) Dinner: sweet and sour chicken for me, chicken wrapped in bacon for him Tuesday: Lunch:...

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Floating Anti-Gravity Mini Egg White Chocolate and Lemon Cake

I was really pleased with this Easter cake apart from one thing - I ran out of Mini Eggs! I had this cake in mind for a long time after I got Lakeland's pouring cake kit for Christmas. I made a white chocolate and lemon cake, filled it with buttercream and lemon curd, and stuck Cadbury's white chocolate fingers around the outside. I used the Lakeland kit to make it look as if a packet of Cadbury Mini Eggs was pouring onto the cake, and I filled...

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Homemade hand-decorated Easter Eggs

I made my own Easter eggs for the first time this year! They did take a bit longer than I thought and I didn't exactly plan elaborate designs for decorating them but I was still quite pleased with them. I made some small Easter eggs last year using a silicon mould, which I filled with soft fondant. For a long time now I've wanted to make full-size Easter eggs so recently bought myself a mould from Hobbycraft, as it was only £1. I was a bit worried...

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