Elderflower and white chocolate cake: Free Cakes for Kids

Think back to when you were a child and celebrated your birthday. I’ll bet there was cake, and you can probably remember some of your favourite cakes as a child, right? I was obsessed with Sarah Lee Double Chocolate Gateaux and often had one of those for my birthday but I also remember very clearly when my mum baked several loaf cakes to make the shape of the number 14, decorated with chocolate icing. I have a feeling I remember a hedgehog cake with chocolate buttons when I was younger as well!
Some children aren’t lucky enough to get a birthday cake, for all sorts of reasons - money is tight, they are living in temporary accommodation without the facilities to easily bake a cake, their families have got a lot on their plate due to illness or disability or maybe the child is a young carer themselves and deserves a treat. Free Cakes for Kids is an organisation that links up local amateur cake makers to provide birthday cakes for underprivileged children and makes sure they get a homemade treat on their birthday, which makes them feel special.

I’ve written about Free Cakes for Kids before as I’ve been involved with the group for a little while. To find out if there is a local group in your town check out the website.
For a little while now my local group has been baking a cake once a week for an Age UK tea party at a residential care home. I was just about to go back to work after maternity leave (yes, there’s been a bit of a delay in posting this!) and knew I wouldn’t have much time to bake any more so signed up to do one of these as it fell nicely into my last week off when my daughter was doing half days at nursery, so I could bake the cake and deliver it while she was there.

I wasn’t doing any grocery shopping for the next few days and rather than make a special trip out (which is not as quick as it used to be before I had a one year old in tow) so decided if at all possible to use ingredients I already had at home. I knew I had an unopened bottle of elderflower cordial in the cupboard and that I had seen recipes for elderflower cake somewhere.

I made Lynn Hill’s elderflower cordial cake with white chocolate ganache from the original Clandestine Cake Club book - you can find part of the recipe online here though to see the whole thing you will have to buy the book!

I found it interesting that the cake itself doesn’t use butter; it seemed to give a light texture to the finished cake but of course I didn’t get to eat any as it was for Age UK!

The white chocolate ganache was a little tricky as first it was too thick to spread (I left it too long in the fridge) then it was too runny. I wasn’t happy with the finish and decided I needed to decorate it but not in a way that would be too time consuming.

 

I loved the idea of piping ‘hello’ on the cake, since this was for a tea party and wasn’t a birthday cake, so I used some melted milk chocolate and a tiny piping bag. I then got out my special flower piping nozzles that make beautiful shaped petals of different kinds - you don’t have to have any special piping skills as the nozzles do all the work! The purple flowers were a bit darker than I would have liked as I used a bit too much food colouring but overall I was happy with the effects and hope the residents of the care home enjoyed their cake!

 

Humpty Dumpty Creme Egg Cake

 

This is a great cake for Easter - it has Cadburys Creme Eggs baked in the middle!

I made it for a meeting of my local Clandestine Cake Club which had a triple theme. First it was "Once upon a time", plus Easter, plus a hidden ingredient. That was quite a lot to get into one cake and everyone else made Easter cakes decorated with chicks and mini eggs, and a few people also had a hidden ingredient. I was more interested by the "once upon a time" theme and was thinking about nursery rhymes and fairy tales and realised that there was one that would also fit the Easter theme - humpty dumpty! I then remembered that I had seen recipes online for chocolate brownies with Cadburys creme eggs baked in the middle and wondered if I could do the same with cake. Strangely, I couldn't find any recipes or blog posts on the internet for Cadburys creme egg cakes- I found plenty of brownie recipes and also cupcakes but I couldn't find an example where someone had tried it in a cake. So I wasn't sure if it would work or not... but look how it turned out!

 I did wonder about freezing the creme eggs before I baked them in the cake to see if they would hold their shape better; if you want to have a go at making this cake and trying that I would be interested to hear how it turns out. The eggs did remain relatively intact anyway the way that I did it.

Humpty Dumpty Cadburys Creme Egg Cake - an original recipe by Caroline Makes

For the loaf cake:

175g softened butter or margarine

175g caster sugar

3 eggs

125g self-raising flour

50g cocoa powder

50ml milk

6 Cadburys creme eggs

For the humpty dumpty cake:

120g softened butter or margarine

120g caster sugar

2 eggs

80g self-raising flour

30g cocoa powder

20ml milk

For the buttercream

200g softened butter or margarine

400g icing sugar

50g cocoa powder

Roll-out fondant to decorate: I used two 250g packs of Renshaw ready-to-roll icing in teddy bear brown (though I didn't use it all), plus about 500g of white ready-to-roll icing, half of which I coloured blue with Sugarflair baby blue gel paste, and some Dr. Oetker wafer daisies. I also used a tiny amount of black sugarpaste though you can also use an edible pen or mark on the mouth with a curved modelling tool or a spoon and I bought some edible eyes by Suck UK, though you could make eyes from white and black sugarpaste. I also had a brickwork embosser from the Sugarcraft Patchwork Cutters range though you could use a knife if you don't have this. You'll see pictures and explanations of all these below.

To make the cake, preheat the oven to 175C. Grease and line a loaf tin or spray with Cake Release and do the same with either a small round cake tin or line a muffin tin with cupcake cases.

For the loaf cake, cream the butter and the sugar with an electric beater then add the eggs one at a time. Fold in the flour and the cocoa powder and finally the milk.

I bought a pack of six Cadbury's creme eggs in the supermarket for £2 which I thought was pretty good.

Pour the cake mixture into the prepared loaf tin and gently press in each of the creme eggs once you have taken them out of their wrappers of course. I pushed them down like the ones you can see in the back row, then spread the cake mixture so it covered the tops of the creme eggs, as I thought they would melt too quickly in the oven otherwise. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes.

 Do the same process with the ingredients for the humpty dumpty cake, without the creme eggs. Bake this in either a small round cake tin or as cupcakes; it doesn't matter because you are going to crumble this cake up like when you make cake pops.

 Here is the loaf cake - leave it to cool in the tin for a while then turn out onto a wire rack.

You can see that the creme eggs have melted and actually left holes in the bottom of the cake. This didn't seem to be a problem for me but if you have any ideas on how to stop this happening I'd like to hear them!

 When you have baked the other cake or the cupcakes, leave them to cool and then crumble up the cake into a large bowl. Make the buttercream by creaming the butter and icing sugar with the cocoa powder and add a little at a time to the cake crumbs and mix well, kneading with your hands, until you have a dough consistency. Have a look at this post on cake pops for some pictures and a step-by-step description.

When you have your ball of cake roll it between your hands to make it a little more egg-shaped. Then roll out some white fondant and cover the cake ball - it doesn't matter if the bottom is a bit uneven (I find it quite hard to cover a ball without ragged seams on the bottom) as you won't see the bottom of the cake.

Then colour some fondant in another colour - I used baby blue - or roll out some coloured fondant and cover the bottom half of the egg. Again the underneath won't be seen.

I wanted to make it look as if Humpty Dumpty was wearing a shirt so I cut out a triangle of white fondant and made some buttons in blue. I stuck this on the front.

I found these edible eyes in a gift shop; they weren't cheap at £4.99 but I thought they would be fun to try out.

I also made a hat out of fondant and a mouth - though I didn't get the smile right, but I couldn't move it as the black fondant would have left a mark. Roll out some sausage shapes in blue fondant to make the arms and the legs which you will fix on later.

When the loaf cake is cold, roll out some brown or reddish-brown coloured fondant - I used teddy bear brown - and cover the cake. Spread a thin layer of buttercream over the cake first then cover with the fondant. Place it on a cake board.

I bought this patchwork brickwork cutter/embosser a while ago after making this dog basket cake 
and decided it would be perfect to make the wall.

Simply press into the fondant so you can see the brick pattern.

And finally assemble the cake - sit humpty dumpty on the wall, and fix on his arms and legs with either a little buttercream or edible glue. I added some Dr. Oetker wafer daisies on one end of the wall.

 I had no idea what the inside would look like until I cut into the cake at the Clandestine Cake Club meeting.... I was really pleased to see the Cadbury's creme eggs had kept their shape and melted a little, but when you eat the cake you definitely know you are eating a piece of the creme egg at the same time. This was quite a fudgy cake and really delicious.

A wonderful experiment for Easter!

 

The Clandestine Cake Club meeting was very enjoyable; it took place in Waterstone's cafe so we drank tea and ate cake while surrounded by cookery books.

Here are some of the other delicious cakes that CCC members made, around the Easter theme, some of which also had a hidden ingredient, but nobody else used the "once upon a time" theme.

I am sending this to We Should Cocoa, created by Choclette at Chocolate Log Blog and hosted this month by Rachel Cotterill as the theme this month is Easter.

The theme for Love Cake, hosted by Jibber Jabber UK, is "springing into Easter".

The theme for Calendar Cakes, hosted by Rachel at Dollybakes, is also Easter.

Crepe Cake or Thousand Layer Cake

If you are wondering how to jazz up your pancakes for Shrove Tuesday how about making a pancake cake? This kind of cake is also known as a crepe cake, or a thousand layer cake - it's not literally a thousand layers but the picture above shows why it has that name! This is essentially a stack of pancakes sandwiched together with creme patissiere between each layer, and you slice it as you would a normal cake.

I made this for my local Clandestine Cake Club meeting in February. The organisers, Hayley and Maureen, chose an unusual theme: the Tudor period. The title was "queen of hearts" but rather than relating to Valentine's day, it actually meant King Henry VIII and his many queens. We were asked to make a cake using ingredients that would have been available in the Tudor era, such as fruit, nuts, spices etc. We had fruit cake, ginger cake, apple cake - and a passionfruit cake which I think slightly missed the point but was still very nice!

I had an idea right away which I decided to go with - pancakes! Pancakes were popular in Tudor times particularly on Shrove Tuesday when people would use up richer foods such as eggs, sugar and milk before Lent. I also thought that the origin of the pancake race dated back to Tudor times, but it turns out (according to Wikipedia anyway) that it was just a couple of decades before that. The story goes that a housewive was making pancakes when the bells started ringing for the church service; she didn't want to be late so she ran to church with her frying pan, tossing her pancake as she went! However what I also discovered was that it was on Shrove Tuesday that Henry VIII publicly declared his love for Anne Bolyn, at a joust in 1526. So I think a pancake cake does fit the Tudor theme!

 For the pancakes, you need: (Makes about 12-15 pancakes depending on size and thickness)
6 cups milk
12 eggs
3 cups plain flour
2/3 cup caster sugar
large pinch of salt
oil or Fry Light for frying

For the creme patissiere:
1 egg
1 tbsp plain flour
2 tbsp caster sugar
1 tbsp cornflour
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla flavouring
2 tbsp double cream, whipped

For the filling:
2 cups double cream
2 tbsp caster sugar

It's best to make the creme patissiere the day before; you can also make the pancake batter in advance but return to room temperature before using.

To make the creme patissiere, beat the egg, flour, sugar and cornflour until smooth.

In a saucepan bring the milk to the boil then immediately remove from the heat and slowly whisk in the egg mixture.

Return to the heat, stirring continually for about five minutes until thickened then remove from the heat. Add the vanilla and set aside to cool until firm. When the creme has cooled, fold in the whipped cream and refrigerate overnight.

To make the pancakes, beat the eggs, flour and milk and add the sugar and salt.

Heat a little oil or Fry Light in a frying pan, pour in enough of the pancake mixture so you have a thin layer and cook on both sides until browned.

 The pancakes need to cool, so I laid them all out on a long strip of greaseproof paper along my kitchen worktop. 

When the pancakes are cooled, beat the creme patissiere into the whipped cream with the caster sugar.

Spread a thin layer of the filling on each pancake and layer them up. It's best to do this on a cake board or whatever you want to serve the cake on as it isn't very easy to move afterwards!
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

Here you can see the cake starting to take shape

And here's the whole cake. I had a sort of half-pancake made from the last bit of mixture which I used on top and then sprinkled it with icing sugar.

I love seeing all the layers!

When you slice the cake, you get a normal cake-slice shape but you can see all the layers and the cream in the middle.

To an extent, yes this is a pile of pancakes... but it does actually taste like cake and is an unusual alternative either to a sponge cake or if you want to make something different on Shrove Tuesday!

Toffee Apple Bonfire Night Cake

Today I'm combining baking with a public service announcement - please check there are no hedgehogs in your bonfire before you set it alight!

Actually, the reason I made this is because a hedgehog is a lot easier to make than a figure of Guy Fawkes!

I decided to go to my second Clandestine Cake Club and was pleased to see that this time my local Sutton group had joined forces with nearby Epsom for a bonfire night extravaganza - the theme was "gunpowder, treason and plot". Last year I made these ginger bonfire cupcakes using Cadbury flakes which I topped with popping candy. I was really pleased with them but didn't want to make the same thing again. The food I associate mainly with bonfire night - other than sausages, which wouldn't really work in a cake (or would it....?!) - is toffee apple. Which is funny as I've never actually eaten a toffee apple! I also wanted to find a way to decorate the cake so it would stand out - with 25 people expected at the Cake Club I knew I needed a showstopper! (Competitive, moi?). I thought about making a figurine of Guy Fawkes sat on a bonfire made of Matchmakers chocolate sticks, but realised I probably didn't have the time to make a person and it would be a lot easier and quicker to make a hedgehog. I also have a leaf-shaped plunger cutter which I thought I could put to good use by making autumn leaves to cover the cake. What do you think?

I based the cake partly on this one from All Recipes but added my own spin.

You need:

3 eggs

200g caster sugar

200ml vegetable oil

2 tsp vanilla flavouring

375g plain flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp bicarb of soda

500g apples, peeled and chopped

100g pecans, chopped

For the toffee buttercream:

110g butter

220g brown sugar

250g icing sugar

pinch of salt

dash of milk (optional)





Preheat the oven to 180C. Cream the eggs and sugar then mix in the vegetable oil and vanilla.

Fold in the flour, salt and bicarb of soda.

Chop the pecans and add to the cake mix.

Peel and chop about 500g or so of apples.

Fold in the mixture, which will be quite stiff by this point.

Grease a large round cake tin and spoon in the mixture. Bake for about an hour, keeping an eye on the cake so the top doesn't start to burn.

The cake rose a lot in the middle which was perfect for the bonfire effect I wanted. Turn out of the tin and leave to cool.

Cut the cake in half - you can see the apple and pecan pieces clearly.

I decided to make toffee buttercream to go with the apple flavour in the cake. I melted the butter in a small pan and added the brown sugar, stirring until I had a fudge-like consistency.

Remove from the heat and allow to cool, then mix in the icing sugar. If the mixture is too stiff add a splash of milk.

When cool, spread over the bottom half of the cake.

Sandwich the cake together. This is a pretty big cake!

I have a set of three  leaf-shape plunger cutters in varying sizes. I used the middle size to make a pile of leaves out of fondant, which I had coloured green, brown and orange with gel icing colours.

I also made a hedgehog from fondant which I had coloured with two shades of brown. It was very easy to make. Make a large ball for the body and a small ball for the head, and pinch the head slightly so it is pointed. Roll sausage shapes for the arms and feet. I also rolled a circle of the paler brown colour to stick on as the face and also the stomach, and used tiny amounts of black fondant for the nose and eyes. I made him an orange scarf as well, from a sausage shape which I rolled and then pressed flat. To make the spikes, simply take a pair of scissors and make very small v-shaped snips all over the hedgehog's head and body - it looks like spikes!

To decorate the cake, I covered the top with plain buttercream as the toffee buttercream would have been too stiff. I then placed the leaves haphazardly all over the cake so it would look as if they had fallen from trees.

I sat Mr. Hedgehod in the middle of the cake, and took a box of orange Matchmakers and propped the sticks up around him to look like a bonfire. I placed some broken Matchmakers in front of him to look like logs.

Here you can see the hedgehog sitting in the bonfire, surrounded by leaves.

And here's the whole cake!

I am sharing this with Elizabeth of Elizabeth's Kitchen Diary for her Shop Local challenge as the apples I used in the cake came from my boyfriend's mum's garden - which means the food miles of that particular ingredient were less than three!

This might be slightly tenuous but as the Matchmakers are chocolate orange flavour, I am entering this into Alphabakes, the blog challenge that I co-host with Ros of the More Than Occasional Baker, as the letter we have chosen this month is O.

I took this cake to my local Clandestine Cake Club as the theme was "gunpowder, treason and plot". I had a lovely time chatting to new faces and people I had met before and tasting all the cakes. I took a few photos which I wanted to share with you; this is Maureen's cake with 'flames' on top that are hard caramel shards she says were very easy to make:



The organiser Hayley decorated the tables with Halloween and bonfire night themed decorations. I can't remember the names of all the cakes here but there is a bonfire at the back, and a very neat fondant-covered cake with flames on the right.

This spiced toffee apple cake was made by my almost-sister-in-law Ellie and was delicious

This creation was from Gemma, organiser of the Croydon CCC, who made a toffee apple complete with giant lolly stick and wrapped it in cellophane. It was very original!