Raspberry and Coconut Squares – August BakedIn Baking Club Recipe

I’m beginning to feel like the legend that was Bruce Forsyth, when he used to tell every couple on Strictly Come Dancing that they were his favourite… because every month I say the same thing. THIS BakedIn Baking Club recipe is my favourite. Well, at least until September’s arrives anyway!

In case this is your first visit to my blog, let me tell you about this Baking Club. Every month they send you all the dry ingredients you need as well as extra bits and pieces such as baking paper and testing skewers, to make a scrumptious recipe created exclusively for BakedIn with Michel Roux’s approval. There is always a handy tip included on the recipe card which suggests a way to make the recipe extra special. The recipe card tells you exactly what is included in the box, what extra ingredients you will need, and has clear instructions and photographs for each step of the recipe. All of the dry ingredients are weighed out for you so you can get on with the fun part of baking without so much preparation. The card does tell you though how much of each dry ingredient there is so that you can make the recipe again in the future. I love that detail! I used to receive a subscription box that gave you a recipe and the spices needed to make amazing curries. The recipes were fantastic. The only problem was they didn’t tell you how much of all of the included ingredients there were, so it was impossible to make the recipe again without buying the whole kit again! I love that BakedIn aren’t like that. They WANT you to make their recipes time and time again and they want to get everyone baking! These recipes are perfect for baking with children too, so make brilliant quality family time. Plus of course you’ll have a wonderful time eating them.

The Raspberry and Coconut Squares recipe was absolutely scrumptious. It had a delicious almond base which had a gorgeous crispy crust. It reminded me a bit of suet pastry puddings, although much much nicer, and no suet. This base was topped with fresh raspberries, a coconut crumble-type layer, another layer of raspberries, and finally topped with white chocolate curls after it had cooled. It was supposed to be cut into 12 squares, but as I frequently get accused of being a “feeder” I decided to live up to the accusations and cut it into 9 larger squares 😀 We enjoyed it with ice cream one day and custard the next, and each time it was heavenly. Definitely one to make over and over again. It was comfort food at it’s best and we’ll be enjoying this one a lot during the Winter months, warmed up with custard.

If you are interested in joining the Baking Club, just click HERE to go to their website to find out more. It costs just £8 a month including delivery (even less if you pay for a few months in one go). Although at the moment when you first visit the link you will get a chance to sign up to their mailing list and receive your first box for just £3.99! That’s an offer you can’t refuse. Happy Baking!

 

 

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Rocky Road Brownies – July’s BakedIn Baking Club Box

July’s BakedIn Baking Club box was a HUUUUUUUUUUUGE hit in my house! Everyone’s faces lit up when they saw the recipe card. Rocky Road… love. Brownies… love. Put them both together and you get what can only be described as heaven. Beautiful chocolate brownies baked until they are still soft and a bit gooey inside but with a delicious crunchy top, with a rocky road style topping. What’s not to love???

As always, BakedIn sent all the dry ingredients needed to make this scrummilicious treat already weighed out, plus baking paper, a testing skewer, butter guide, and the wonderful recipe card.

The only extra ingredients I needed to use were butter, eggs and double cream. Although I didn’t have to buy them as I always have those in anyway. The dry ingredients which BakedIn provide are top quality ingredients. No cheap or inferior products in their boxes! For example, the flour comes from the Great Taste Award winning flour millers at WESSEX MILL, and they only use the best chocolate and cocoa powder. You can taste the quality!

For the rocky road topping we had to make caramel. I love making caramel. There’s something slightly therapeutic about watching the sugar melt and turn into a lovely amber colour. This recipe made plenty, and BakedIn wrote a tip on the recipe card to use any leftover caramel poured over ice cream. We did that and it was beautiful. I love how these boxes include some more technical steps, such as making caramel, from time to time. It is a great way for anyone to learn some new techniques which they might have previously been daunted about trying.

This brings me on to another wonderful thing about being a BakedIn Baking Club subscriber. A few months ago they set up a Facebook group which is just for subscribers. The support and encouragement that the members give to each other is a joy to see. There are members who have hardly ever baked before, along with ones who have baked lots, but you’d never know. I have been in baking groups on Facebook before and some can get very catty to say the least, with people thinking they are better than anyone else. The BakedIn Baking Club group is a million miles away from those types of groups thankfully. It genuinely is a friendly supportive group and the people are amazing. I feel proud to be in such a lovely group. If you join the Baking Club you’ll see what I mean. As well as the people in the group, it is also good to join because you get access to great deals and discounts on some of BakedIn’s other kits.

Back to the recipe. The brownies came out exactly as I like them. I could very easily have eaten them just as they were with a scoop of ice cream. The smell of chocolate filling the house as they came out of the oven made me drool! I added the caramel, marshmallows and chocolate malt balls (like Maltesers) and was so excited to cut it into pieces to enjoy! The recipe card said to cut into 9 to 12 pieces. As you can see from the main photo though, greedy pig me cut it into 9. The bigger the better. I was contemplating cutting it into less pieces so that they would be even bigger it looked so tempting! (The only reason I didn’t was because of Michel Roux. He works with BakedIn to create these wonderful recipes and I thought just in case he ever happens to look at the pictures of subscribers bakes, I didn’t want him thinking bad of me 🙂 You never know!) Needless to say they didn’t last long in my house! And it is yet another recipe to make again and again. Good job the recipe cards tell you how much of each of the dry ingredients you need!

BakedIn Baking Club costs just £8 a month with free delivery. It costs even less if you sign up to 3 or 6 months at a time. You can also buy gift subscriptions for other people. Perfect for any occasion but I’d say ideal as a house-warming present. You can’t beat the smell of baking to give any house an extra homely feel to it.

If you would like to find out more or to join, just click HERE to go to their website. I’ll look forward to seeing you and your bakes in the Facebook group!

 

 

 

Scrumptious Chocolate Flapjacks

I absolutely love flapjacks. They are so easy to make and so satisfying to eat, and you only need a few ingredients. The oats fill you up and give you energy, and you can make them in so many different flavours. Today we fancied chocolate.

I’ve eaten some before that have been hard and crunchy, more like a biscuit. That’s not how I like mine. They have to be soft and chewy and slightly crumbly for me. The recipe to make them like this is so easy to remember. Whatever weight of oats you use, just add half that amount each of light brown sugar and butter. For example, if you use 400g of oats, you will need 200g of brown sugar and 200g of butter. Add 1 tbsp of golden syrup per 100g of oats and you have a perfect flapjack.

For this chocolate version I decided to add a layer of delicious JimJams Milk Chocolate Spread in the middle. I wasn’t sure if it would work but it was soooooo good. I warmed up a tablespoonful in the microwave for a few seconds to drizzle on top after they were cooled too. Naughty me. Well actually not really! That is why I love JimJams spreads… they have 83% less sugar than another very well-known brand. (I was introduced to JimJams through a subscription box some time ago. Find out more about what I thought of it HERE … the Degustabox discount code has now expired so don’t try using that though). JimJams is now much easier to buy too. It is available in many supermarkets for around £2.60 per jar.

So, here’s the recipe. Use the measurement guide I gave earlier if you want to scale the recipe up or down to suit your pan size. I would recommend using JimJams, as flapjacks do have quite a lot of sugar so you don’t want to add loads more with the other brand 😉

 

CHOCOLATE FLAPJACKS

500g rolled or porridge oats

250g butter, plus extra for greasing

250g light brown sugar

5 tbsps golden syrup

JimJams Milk Chocolate Spread

 

• Preheat your oven to 180C conventional/160C fan/gas mark 4. Grease and line a 13 x 7 inch pan. Don’t worry about the short sides. Make sure the paper hangs over the long sides though so you can lift the flapjack out easily when cool.
• Place the butter, sugar and syrup into a large pan and heat gently on the hob until the butter has melted. Stir regularly to make sure it is all combined. When it is melted, remove from the heat. Add the oats and mix well until completely covered in the syrupy mixture.
• Tip half of the mixture into your prepared pan and press down firmly with the back of a spoon.

• Add a thin layer of JimJams spread. (I didn’t give an amount as you can add as much or as little as you want).

• Tip the remainder of the oaty mixture on top and press down firmly with the back of a spoon again.

• Bake in the centre of the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes until golden brown. Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the pan.
• When it is cool, place 1tbsp JimJams in a small dish or cup and microwave for a few seconds to melt slightly. Drizzle over the top of the flapjack. Cut into desired sized pieces. I cut it into 12 large pieces, but you could cut it into 24 small squares.
• Enjoy!

 

You could add a layer of your favourite jam instead of the chocolate spread if you prefer a fruitier version. JimJams also make amazing low sugar jams!

Let me know what you use to make yours!

Lemon and Poppy Seed Muffins… BakedIn Baking Club May Box

I love the middle of the month. It’s when my BakedIn Baking Club subscription box lands on my doormat! The excitement as I hear the thud as it lands, the sight of the lovely bright green box, the anticipation of what might be inside this month, and then the satisfaction of being able to make something I might not normally bake, and finally the joy of eating it. Yes, I definitely love the middle of the month.

The May box was a perfect Spring box. I always think of lemons as Spring and Summer fruits, even though they’re not. It’s just that this is when I most enjoy them and find them most refreshing in recipes. This lemon and poppy seed muffin recipe called for 3 lemons, so I knew I was going to love it! I already have a go-to recipe for lemon drizzle cakes (THIS ONE) so I was intrigued to see how much the BakedIn recipe would vary. Obviously the fact they were muffins meant they would probably be denser than light cupcakes, but only slightly. I was actually surprised at how light these muffins were! The poppy seeds added a lovely texture and broke up the lemon taste beautifully.

The recipe said to grease a muffin tin well with plenty of butter. I normally make muffins in paper cases so was going to use some for these, but as I like to follow the recipes the way they were intended, I decided against the cases. I’m so glad I did. I have to confess though, the amount of butter that the recipe instructed to use to grease the tin seemed a lot, so stupid old me thought just a fraction of the amount would be fine. I should have known these recipes are tried and tested before being sent out, so if a recipe says you need x amount of butter, you really do!!! Needless to say my first attempt at these muffins tasted delicious but looked… erm… well let’s just say Mary Berry would have called them “informal”. They were how Mary Berry likes her tipples… bottomless 😉

Luckily Tesco is a stone’s throw away from my house so off I popped to get more lemons. After greasing the pan the way the recipe said this time, I made another batch of these muffins and they came out perfectly!  The lemon fragrance as they were baking was so beautiful. There are some baking smells more than others that I wish could be bottled up and sold as air fresheners. The smell from these muffins was one of those. So inviting.

My usual lemon drizzle recipe involves the baked, still warm cakes having a lemon syrup poured over them so it soaks in. This muffin recipe made a lovely crunchy syrup to pour on, and that was so good. The icing to pipe on top was the same as I am used to making. I really loved all the textures in these muffins; the lightness of the actual cake, with the crunchiness of the seeds and the sugary topping. It all resulted in a match made in heaven. And sadly, as with all BakedIn bakes so far, these didn’t last long. Fortunately though BakedIn make sure they give you all the measurements on the recipe card so you can make them again in the future. I’ll definitely be making more of these. I have some oranges begging to be used up too so I might try orange and poppy seed ones.

If you are new to my blog, I’ve just realised you’re probably wondering what the BakedIn Baking Club is! Well it is an amazing subscription box which sends you all the dry ingredients and bits and pieces needed to follow a beautiful recipe created exclusively by the great chef Michel Roux. For example, take a look at the May box:

All the dry ingredients come already weighed out for convenience. If part of the recipe requires a few dry ingredients to be added at the same time, then those ingredients are placed together in one packet. There is always a very clear recipe card with photos of every step so you can see you’re on the right track. Michel Roux adds a Top Tip to either help with a tricky part of the bake or to suggest ways to enhance it even further. As well as the dry ingredients you always get a butter measure, and in this box there was also a skewer to test when the muffins were ready, and a disposable piping bag for the icing to decorate. Obviously they can’t send things like eggs and butter as they would be a logistical nightmare to keep chilled and whole, but they always tell you in advance what you will need to buy yourself.

Sometimes you get a little treat added to the box, as if the bake isn’t enough of a treat! BakedIn do like to make you feel valued, so these treats are such lovely gestures. In past boxes there have been tea temples and gourmet marshmallows. The May box had a tea temple from teapigs included as a treat. Mine was rooibos creme caramel flavoured, which won a Great Taste award in 2014. You could see little chunks of caramel in among the tea leaves! I have to say I loved this tea so much. It was beautiful and sweet and the flavour was just wonderful. I saved it until the house was empty and the dog was having a nap. Tea like this demands your undivided attention!

If you fancy trying the BakedIn Baking Club for yourself, it costs just £7.99 per month which includes delivery! It really is great value. BakedIn also appreciate that it can be frustrating when you sign up to a subscription box as you often have to wait almost a month to receive the first one, depending on when you signed up. To get rid of this annoying factor, when you sign up with BakedIn they send you a fantastic kit straight away to get you baking within 5 days of joining. This first kit is for double chocolate whoopie pies and it is absolutely scrumptious! You then receive the next box at the same time as everyone else, and every month after.

BakedIn recently started a Baking Club group on Facebook too, which you can only join if you are a subscriber. The group is fantastic! You can share photos of your bakes, ask any questions you might have… everyone in the group is so friendly and supportive. Special offers and discounts sometimes pop up in there too so it’s well worth joining!

If you would like to subscribe to the Baking Club, click HERE to go to their website. Happy Baking! 🙂

 

DISCLAIMER: I pay fully for my subscription and BakedIn don’t ask me to write posts for them. I choose to though as it is a subscription I highly recommend and a company I love. All views and opinions are my own. 

BakedIn Baking Club March Box… Chocolate Orange Hot Cross Buns

I really look forward to receiving my BakedIn Baking Club kit each month. My heart skips a beat when I see the long green box on my doormat. The March box was a perfect recipe for Easter… hot cross buns. They sent all the dry ingredients for you to either make traditional or chocolate orange hot cross buns.

As well as the packets of flour, sugars, yeast, spices, sultanas, chocolate chips etc, they also sent a butter measure (as always), a piping bag, baking parchment and the easy to follow recipe card. Last month they sent a tea temple from teapigs which I loved, so I was very happy to find they had sent another one in this box too! This time it was their Everyday Brew and it was so refreshing. Perfect to start the day the right way or as an energiser mid-morning with a hot cross bun 🙂 This tea is extra special for another reason, apart from the fact it tastes so good. Most of their tea comes from Rwanda, a country that unfortunately still has a stigma attached to disability. Teapigs fully funds one house (the teapigs house) which provides specialist care and accommodation for children and young adults with disabilities, and they also send donations to other similar houses and to help with the costs at the UCC Children’s School, a school which has over 500 children (52 of them with severe physical or learning disabilities). Every time you buy a pack of the teapigs Everyday Brew, they donate some of the money to these extremely worthwhile causes. So you get a cuppa that makes you feel good in more ways than one!

The kit also included a little pot of Boddington’s Berries orange marmalade to use as part of the glaze for the buns. The citrus smell as I peeled back the foil top was just beautiful! And it tasted as good as the smell suggested.

I had never made hot cross buns before so was excited but nervous about making these. I knew with BakedIn though every stage of the process would be explained brilliantly, and the end results would be scrumptious. I was right. The hardest part of the whole thing was the waiting while the dough proved. The recipe involved kneading the dough by hand, but I’ve had a bit of a kitchen nightmare which has meant I haven’t had much worktop space, so I used my stand mixer to knead mine. I followed the rest of the recipe exactly. I was so impressed with the resulting buns! We all tried each of the flavours and couldn’t decide which we preferred. They were both delicious. It was really good to have the chance to try a different flavour to the traditional ones too. They were so soft and light yet so so tasty. BakedIn continuously impress me with their recipes and their attention to detail. I have recommended them to so many people as they are such a fantastic club to be part of.

The Baking Club usually costs just £7.99 per month, which INCLUDES delivery! It is amazing value considering everything you receive, and the fact you are baking recipes exclusively created for BakedIn by Michel Roux! Michel Roux!!!!!! I know!!!!!!! How lucky are we?? If you enter the code TRY499 at the checkout you will receive your first box for £4.99! Click HERE to go to the website and begin your baking adventure. Happy baking! 🙂

2…4…6…Ate! Easy Shortbread Hearts, Baked with Love

As many of you will know, my mother sadly passed away when I was still a child. It wasn’t just my mother that died that day, it was also a whole host of experiences that many people take for granted. I’d never get to tell her about my first boyfriend, or go wedding dress shopping with her, or hand a precious grandchild to her to hold for a while. Those things fill me with sadness, but strangely enough the one thing I never got chance to do but really wish I had was to bake something for her. When my son makes or bakes something for me, it fills my heart with so much joy and pride, and I wish I could have done that for her. The look of pure satisfaction and happiness on my son’s face as he watches my face light up… well that’s a look that will stay with me forever.

I always loved baking and loved making things at school in Home Economics, as it was then called. Those lessons taught me so much. How to make shortcrust pastry, how to make a Victoria sponge. The methods and quantities used always stick in my head. One thing I was taught which I remember well was shortbread. The easiest shortbread ever to remember. In those days (the 1980s) we measured ingredients in ounces not grams, and for shortbread my teacher used to write on the board “2-4-6-Ate”. Easiest ingredient quantities ever, right? It stood for 2 ounces of sugar, 4 of butter, 6 of flour, and that would make them good enough to eat. It is such a simple recipe, my 9 year old son knows it by heart too, and he makes scrumptious shortbread!

With Mother’s Day approaching I wanted to write a blog post of a recipe that would be easy enough for children to make, with supervision, to give to their Mums as a gorgeous little gift. Baked with love. A wonderful cookware and bakeware shop called The Little Cook Shop very kindly sent me a beautiful Eddingtons loose-based mini heart pan to try, and I decided this would be perfect for this recipe.

The pan has 12 small heart-shaped cavities, and each has a removable base so you can get your bakes out so much easier. Push up from underneath and your bake just pops out. It is also non-stick for extra easiness. There is a scrumptious looking recipe on the back of the box to make strawberry and chocolate cheesecakes with this pan. I shall definitely be trying those at some point!!! This pan costs £9.99 and is well worth it at that price as the quality is fantastic. However, The Little Cook Shop have given me a code to pass on to you so you can have 10% off any order, making this pan just £8.99! I can’t recommend it highly enough. I will be using mine A LOT! It will be perfect for savoury bakes such as quiches as well as so many sweet bakes. Have a look around their website and enter the code CONFARREO10 at the checkout to redeem the discount offer. You can use it on anything you order, not just this pan.

Back to the recipe. I normally only really use unsalted butter in my baking, but I was taught that shortbread is best when made with salted butter. It also is best made with butter that is slightly softened but still cold. Too warm and it affects the texture. Too cold and it’s hard to mix in properly. This is where a fairly new butter in the shops is just perfect.

The Softer Butter Co. has produced a delicious butter that tastes exactly as you’d expect from a quality 100% natural butter, but it has one big difference. It is, as the name suggests, softer! No need to leave this one out of the fridge for a while to soften up, it is the perfect softness straight from the fridge. If you want to try it yourself, you can find it in Morrisons and in some Tesco stores. It is perfect for this recipe as it is softer but still cold.

EASIEST SHORTBREAD EVER 2-4-6-ATE!

2 ounces of caster sugar

4 ounces of salted butter slightly softened, or the Softer Butter Co straight from the fridge

6 ounces of plain flour, sieved

a knob of butter, melted for greasing

extra caster sugar for sprinkling on after baking (optional)

• Use a pastry brush to grease the heart cavities with melted butter.
• Cream together the sugar and the butter, until pale and fluffy. You can do this with a wooden spoon or an electric hand whisk. Obviously the electric whisk is quicker, but children love mixing with spoons.
• Tip the flour into the butter mixture, and use a wooden spoon to mix well until you have a fairly stiff paste/dough and everything is combined thoroughly.
• Use your hands to gently press the mixture together and then divide into 12 equal sized balls, about the size of walnuts.
• Place one ball into each greased heart cavity, and use your fingers to press them down until they fill the bottom of the cavities and are level. Use a fork to prick them all over, making sure you don’t go all the way through them.
• 
• Place the pan with the uncooked dough into the fridge. While it is chilling, turn your oven on to 170C or 150C if using a fan oven.
• When the oven has reached the temperature, place the pan on to the middle shelf and bake for 20-25 minutes until lightly golden. Remove from the oven and sprinkle the shortbread with caster sugar, if using. Leave in the pan for 5-10 minutes.
• Using a clean tea towel to protect your finger from getting burnt, push up each heart shortbread from underneath, and place them on a wire rack to cool completely. They will pop up so perfectly and cleanly.
• 

You can keep them plain like this, and they will be delicious served with a cup of tea. They are perfectly crumbly and melt in the mouth.

Or you can decorate them by dipping half in melted chocolate or icing, and sprinkling decorations on. I love the different ways you can present them so I decorated 4 with melted white chocolate and dried rose petals, 4 with melted ginger dark chocolate and chopped hazelnuts, and 4 with icing and sprinkles.

Beech’s Fine Chocolates make 60g bars of various flavours of the most delicious chocolate, and I used their bars for the melted chocolate decoration on these hearts. Their chocolate tastes so luxurious and smooth. The white chocolate was so creamy and the ginger dark chocolate had a beautiful gentle warmth. Of course, you can use any chocolate, but these bars make the shortbread so indulgent. Melt the chocolate either in a microwave (being very careful not to burn it) or in a heatproof bowl placed over a pan of barely simmering water, making sure the bowl does not touch the water. Dip each heart into the chocolate and then place back on the wire rack. Sprinkle with whatever decorations you fancy.

If using icing, mix a few drops of water into 2 ounces of icing sugar, until it is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, but runny enough to dip. Dip the shortbread into the icing and return to the wire rack. Decorate with sprinkles. I used the stunning Unicorn Sprinkletti available from Scrumptious Sprinkles. The colours in this are so feminine and magical, and the shapes are so pretty.

My son said you could decorate them to show what you think of your mother. You love her so you make them heart shaped with this beautiful pan. Then if you think she’s pretty, you decorate with sprinkles or flowers. If she’s daft and nutty, you use chopped nuts. I asked him how he would decorate mine and he said with plenty of nuts! Charming!

I hope you enjoy baking these oh so easy treats. And if your children will be making them for Mother’s Day I’m sure there’ll be some very happy mums.

Don’t forget, if you head over to The Little Cook Shop you can buy anything you want and get a 10% discount if you use the code CONFARREO10 at the checkout. You could even pick up some presents for Mother’s Day there! If you particularly want to buy this gorgeous mini heart pan click HERE to go directly to it. Happy shopping and happy baking!

(EDIT 12/09/2018: The hearts pan is no longer available in this shop so I have removed the link for it. You can however use any loose-bottomed pan with 12 cavities for this recipe).

A Gingerbread House from the Festive BakedIn Baking Club

As you all know, I have been a member of the BakedIn Baking Club for a while now and it never fails to impress me with the recipe each month. December’s box really really excited me! Shockingly I had never made a gingerbread house before, so as soon as I opened the box and saw an array of sweets and the recipe card I let out a little happy squeal. I had visions of Hansel and Gretel and an instant Christmassy feeling swept over me. I hadn’t been feeling particularly festive until the arrival of this box, but this really changed that!

The box contained the recipe card, lots of different sweets, all the dry ingredients needed for the gingerbread and the icing, a butter measure, baking paper, and templates for cutting out the shapes needed to construct the house. As you can see, each packet is clearly labelled with a number. This makes following the recipe so much easier and makes it ideal to do with children. My 9 year old son Luke couldn’t wait to help me with this one! After watching some episodes of The Great British Bake Off I was a bit nervous that my gingerbread would collapse, as that seemed to be a common problem with some bakers. I needn’t have worried. Baking Club recipes are created exclusively for BakedIn by Michel Roux, so it goes without saying that they are perfect. No chance of collapse with this recipe!

Making the house with Luke was one of the highlights of the Christmas holiday. He loved decorating it most of all. The only trouble was he loved the end result so much he wouldn’t let us eat it for ages!!! Luckily it still tasted amazing when he finally agreed to breaking it up.

The house had stained glass effect windows which looked stunning when we placed a battery-operated tealight inside the house. We did originally use a little torch but the tealight looked better. Luke said it was as if there was a fire glowing inside. There might not have been a real fire but there was a definite real feeling of warmth and happiness from making this recipe. In fact, we enjoyed it so much we decided that we will make a gingerbread house every Christmas from now on. You really can’t beat the contentment that baking with your family brings.

BakedIn Baking Club is a club suitable for everyone. People who have never baked before or who are just beginning to bake will love how easy the recipes are to follow. The recipe cards have photographs of each step so you know you are on the right track. The ingredients are already weighed out for you so you don’t have to spend ages doing preparation. All the dry ingredients you will need are included so you don’t have to buy a big bag of something you might not need again for a while, meaning less waste. People who are regular bakers will enjoy being able to add the scrumptious recipes to their own repertoire.

It costs just £7.99 a month to be part of this wonderful Baking Club. That price includes postage so it is amazing value for money. If you are interested in joining it too, you can have your first box for just £4.99!

To get your first box for £4.99 click  HERE  to go to the BakedIn website and enter code TRY499 at checkout.  Happy Baking!

DISCLAIMER: I pay for my subscription and receive no compensation for writing reviews for them. All views are my own honest opinions. 

BakedIn Baking Club…. Autumnal Spiced Blackberry Muffins

I really look forward to my BakedIn Baking Club box arriving each month. The chance to bake something delicious using a recipe created exclusively by Michel Roux for BakedIn is just so exciting, and I love the anticipation of what each recipe might be.

The October box was a beautiful Spiced Blackberry Muffin recipe. The eagle-eyed readers amongst you will have noticed I used blueberries instead. Here’s why. I had gone with a friend and my son to pick some blackberries not long before this kit arrived, and had found a perfect place with an abundance of big juicy berries. As we were about to start picking them though, an elderly gentleman approached us and told us we should leave them. We thought he was joking but it quickly became apparent he wasn’t, as he proceeded to go on and on about how they were food for the birds. We did tell him there were more than enough for the birds and for us and if we didn’t pick some they’d just go rotten there were so many, but he just wouldn’t leave us alone, saying “Birds can’t go to Tesco”. He was so rude and his manner was so unfriendly, he was actually making us feel very uncomfortable, so we decided to abandon our berry picking. I went to Tesco to buy some the next day, only to find they weren’t selling them any more! I searched for any bushes locally as the perfect place we had found was miles away on a nice day out, but sadly the berries had all gone. Luckily the helpful BakedIn team told me that this recipe would work with blueberries too, so that is what I had to use. I will be making these again next year though as soon as I spot ripe blackberries around!

The Baking Club kit arrived as always in a box that fits perfectly through the letterbox. It contained all the dry ingredients needed for the recipe, already weighed out and placed in numbered packages to make following the recipe card simple. It also contained a handy butter measure guide, the recipe card, a skewer, and squares of baking paper.

The baking paper squares were to make muffin cases out of, which I thought was wonderful. They ended up looking like the lovely tulip muffin cases you can buy, but were so easy to make! I just needed a glass that was the same width as the cups in my muffin tray, which I had, and then it was a simple task of folding the paper around the bottom of the glass. It didn’t take long at all to get them all made and placed in the trays ready for the mixture.

The instructions were, as always, very clear and easy to follow. You really can’t go wrong with these kits. I would say they are completely foolproof. The kitchen had the most amazing aroma of cinnamon and almond while I was preparing and baking these. It felt very Autumnal and cosy. The recipe made 20 muffins, which was great as they were so delicious they disappeared rapidly!

The addition of cinnamon pearl sugar on the top added a beautiful sweet and spicy crunch. They really were scrumptious!

I don’t believe in giving much away about these recipes as they are exclusive to the Baking Club, but I can say in the months I’ve subscribed there hasn’t been a single recipe I haven’t loved. It is so easy to get stuck in a rut of just baking the same things for convenience, so this Club is a great way to try new bakes you might not otherwise have come across. It is ideal too for those days when you really want to bake but time is short. The fact the ingredients are weighed out for you cuts out so much preparation time, so you can just get on with the fun part. I tend to do mine with my 9 year old son, as the recipe card is so easy to follow. A perfect way to spend quality time with your family, and a great way to bring everyone together to enjoy the end results!

Christmas is fast approaching, and if there’s someone you are struggling to find a gift idea for, why not buy them a Baking Club subscription? It would make  a beautiful gift for any occasion. How about a house warming present? Give someone the smell of home baking to fill their house every month, along with a sense of pride and achievement when they have created something delicious.

The Baking Club subscription costs £7.99 per month, including postage. That is already a fantastic price, but the lovely BakedIn team are so sure you will love their Club, they are letting you have your first box for the crazy price of just £1.99!!! You can cancel at any time should you want to (although I doubt you will).

To get your first box for the ridiculously low price of £1.99, click HERE to join the Club using the discount code they will provide on that page. Happy Baking!

Chocolate and Vanilla Marble Loaf – Bakedin Baking Club September Recipe

Do you love to bake but sometimes just don’t have the time? Work commitments keep eating into your free time? Say hello to Bakedin Baking Club.

I subscribed to the Bakedin Baking Club a while ago and have to say the recipes just keep getting better. Just when you think they’ve peaked with how delicious a recipe can be, they bring out the next one and it’s another “Wow Factor” one!

Every month you receive a wonderful box full of all the dry ingredients you need to bake a recipe created exclusively by Michel Roux. You also receive extras needed such as baking paper, skewers, etc. You just need to provide the eggs and any chilled ingredients.

This might just look like 6 ingredients but it’s not. Different ingredients that go in to the recipe at the same time are packaged together in one bag for convenience, all of them weighed out exactly for you. Only top quality ingredients are used too. You don’t have to spend ages weighing everything out, which is great when you are short of time. All of this costs just £7.99 a month which includes delivery so it is fantastic value for money. The recipe card is clear and easy to follow and all the measurements of the dry ingredients are listed so you can make the recipe again any time you fancy.

I love marble cakes. The different colours and flavours really appeal to me, so I was very excited to get this Marble Loaf in the oven! The recipe said to line the loaf tin with the baking paper provided, but I have a huge supply of loaf tin liners so I decided to use one of those instead. I followed the rest of the recipe to the letter though. The vanilla and chocolate aromas from each bowl made my mouth water. Just look at all the flecks of ground vanilla in there! Yum!

Spooning the 2 mixtures into the loaf tin and gently swirling them together was fun. I tried not to do it too much as I didn’t want a chocolate loaf on it’s own. (Well I wouldn’t have minded really but I wanted to do it right hehe). So this was how it looked before and after baking:

 

The next part was to make the chocolate glaze topping, melt the white chocolate using their brilliant chocolate melting method, and make the feathered design on the top. They had provided skewers to test the loaf was ready, to swirl the mixtures, and to make the effect on top. Perfect!

Every recipe card has a Top Tip from Michel Roux on a way to enhance the recipe even more. The tip with this one was how to make a hot chocolate using any leftover chocolate topping. As you can see in the main picture, I did that, and it was scrumptious! The Marble Loaf went down really well in our house and with some Mums at my son’s school, who I gave some to. I will definitely be making this again and again, and making sure I have extra topping for more hot chocolate!!!

Bakedin Baking Club is perfect for beginners and for more experienced bakers alike. The recipes are exclusive and the numbered packages of ingredients make them super-convenient and easy to follow. They are also ideal to make with children, as the recipe includes clear photographs of each stage. Perfect for quality fun time with the family.

If you are tempted to try a Bakedin Baking Club recipe box for yourself, click HERE and you will receive your first one for just £1.99! That doesn’t even cover their postage to send it! You will receive your first box within a few days of ordering it so you don’t have to wait weeks like you do with some other subscription boxes. You can cancel at any time, although I know you won’t want to once you’ve tried your first one. Happy Baking!

DISCLAIMER: I pay for my subscription and have not been asked to write a review. I just love to promote fantastic products and services and this is definitely in that category! All views and opinions are my own honest thoughts. 

 

Baking with Vimto Mini Jelly Beans

I was recently very lucky to receive a parcel full of Vimto goodies, including their new Mini Jelly Beans. Strawberry, Cherry and Original Vimto flavours all in one packet. They are dairy free and made with real fruit juice, and are suitable for vegetarians. These were absolutely scrumptious. We all love Vimto in my house so this was a wonderful parcel to receive!

With the Great British Bake Off in full swing, the nation has gone in to baking frenzy. One of my favourite things to do is bake with my 9 year old son Luke. I’m a firm believer that baking with children is a vital activity. It gives them skills that will be so beneficial to them later in life and also is an unbelievably fantastic bonding pastime. When I was a child my Mum was too ill to bake, so I missed out on this. I was determined I would bake with Luke and he really enjoys it. I think too of a BBC film I saw that has really stuck in my head since watching it: Toast, which is a biography of the famous chef Nigel Slater. The scene that haunts me is when, as a child Nigel kept asking if he could bake mince pies for Christmas with his Mum but she kept saying no. Then a couple of weeks before she usually made them she took him into the kitchen and made some with him, as she knew she was dying and this would be her only chance. That memory has stayed strong with him, and the scene has stayed strong with me. I don’t mean this post to be sorrowful, I just want to express how something as simple as baking with family can have such a lasting impression on their lives.

One of the first things I ever made with Luke was good old rock cakes. These were the first thing I ever baked at school and were so easy but tasty. If you have never baked with your children before, these are the perfect place to start. Luke now makes them on his own (apart from the oven part) and loves them with either cherries or sultanas in. I decided to see what they would be like with Vimto Mini Jelly Beans in instead of fruit. I have to say I think I actually preferred them! The Jelly Beans went beautifully soft after they were baked and they tasted so good. Here is the recipe…

VIMTO MINI JELLY BEAN ROCK CAKES

225g self raising flour, sifted

110g unsalted butter, chilled and cubed

75g caster sugar

110g Vimto Mini Jelly Beans

1 egg, beaten

2 dessertspoons milk

• Preheat the oven to 200C/180C Fan. Line 2 baking sheets/trays with baking paper.
• Place the flour and butter into a bowl and rub together using your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
• Add the caster sugar and Jelly Beans and stir it together.
• Pour in the egg and milk and mix well together, making sure the Jelly Beans are evenly distributed. The mixture will be very stiff.
• Use a spoon to place 10 heaped mounds on to the baking sheets, 5 on each. Place them well apart as they do spread out! Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown and nicely risen. Cool on a wire rack. Enjoy!

 

As you can see, they really are easy to make and your children will love them. They will also feel so proud that they created something so yummy. Most children love getting a bit messy, so their sticky hands from rubbing the flour and butter together will be so satisfying for them. And believe me, they’ll remember the experience a lot longer than you could imagine!

 

We also used the goodies to decorate a delicious cake. Use your favourite sponge cake recipe to make the cake of your choice (we made a vanilla cake) and mix Vimto cordial into stiff buttercream to taste. The Vimto will make it go lovely and fluffy. Fill your cake with it, smooth some round the side, and pipe a circle on the top edge. Pour some Mini Jelly Beans on to the top to cover. If you want you can mix icing sugar and a small amount of Vimto together until it coats the back of a spoon nicely. Put this into a disposable piping bag and snip off the very tip. Pipe a small blob of icing on to the top edge and let it run down the side. Repeat at regular intervals all around the cake. I have to say, Vimto buttercream is now a favourite in this house! Not too strong but enough to taste it. Perfect.

 

If you want to try Vimto Mini Jelly Beans for yourself (and I strongly recommend that you do as they are moreishly addictive) you can buy them in individual serving packs or in family sized packs,from Nisa, Poundland, Home Bargains, some Tesco stores, among other shops.

TOP TIP… Buy more than you need. It is impossible to not eat a whole packet one or two extra as you make the rock cakes.

Have fun!

 

DISCLAIMER: I received the Jelly Beans and Cordial for free to use in baking. All ideas and views are my own and I am always honest in my opinions.