Birthday cake for kids – our 2nd Birthday

For the birthday of our little man recently we had a big celebration with family & friends. I tried to do a “healthy” cake so I made a Choco-Biscuit with fruity Raspberry-Banana-Filling.


 

Here are the ingredients for the cake:

Mix 6 egg yolks with
4 Spoons of Cocoa powder
100g sugar and
1 spoon Lemon juice
until the sugar has dissolved and the cream has a quite foamy consistency.

 

Whisk 6 egg white until they are very stiff and add them to the egg yolk-mix.

Stir veeeery careful

Sieve 150g flour on top of it and stir very, very carefully.

The egg white should still stay stiff although it is stirred with the other ingredients. So you can guarantee a nice and fluffy Biscuit dough.

Add the dough onto a backing tray and flatten it with a spoon.

Closeup Choco Biscuit...yummy

My Tip:   

ALWAYS use baking paper when you bake biscuit. Never grease the form you put the dough into. So the dough stays nice light and airy and is “rising” to its best performance :)

Bake the cake in a fan assisted oven for about 20-30 Minutes at 160°C. Then let it cool out.

Went quite well....

... and I didn't even use a draft for it

Once the dough is cooled, cut the cake in to any shape you wish: 

that ranges from digits to animals, hobby related objects (football, tennis rack etc) or you can try to make your own Hello Kitty head. 

Let your creativity free range.

 

Then I prepared the filling. For that I used:

2 Bananas

250g Raspberries
500g greek Yogurt
1 packet ground Gelatine
3 spoons Vanillasugar

Mix all ingredients (except Gelatine) with a blender. Prepare the Gelatine according to the info on the package, let it cool down a little bit and blend it into the fruity mix. Then put it in the fridge, so the fruit mix is getting hard – best overnight.

 

Cut the 2 into half and add the fruity-yogurt-mix onto the cake. 

Then decorate the cake as you wish. I added icing-sugar and a few blue sprinkles.

 

Happy Birthday little Man :)

Pat's spiced Wintercake

Yesterday I stumbled across some dried Plums and as my sweet tooth was kicking in, I decided to make a cake. I changed an old family recipe of my Mum which was initially a Cherry-Cake.

Again it’s a fast and easy recipe, quick to do and just good soul food for those cold winter days out there.

The ingredients I used were:

125g Butter
200g Sugar
3 Eggs
100g Flour
1/2 Packet Baking Powder
100g ground Almonds
1Spoon Vanilla sugar
a few dried Plums (about 10)
1 Apple
1teaspoon Cinnamon
1teaspoon ground cloves
3Spoons real Cacao

Totally easy if you have a kitchen machine: simply add all the ingredients into the bowl and stir until everything is soft and dissolved. Cut the dried plums into little bits and add them to the dough.

Peel the apple, cut into little cubes and also add to the dough.

Grease a round cake form, cover with breadcrumbs (or flour) and simple fill in the dough.

Bake for about 50 Minutes at 180°C – ready!

Its so easy and so goooood!

 Have a slice with a hot chocolate (and whipped cream on top) or with your coffee, put your feet up and watch the snowflakes – or the rain, depending on where in the world you are ;)

Bailey’s Cheesecake

For my birthday I took a great risk in converting my earlier featured recipe of the Irish Strawberry Cheesecake into a Bailey’s Cheesecake – hoping it would turn out well because I didn’t had any other desserts.

For this recipe I used:

About 250g Cookies (I used very light Tea Biscuits)
80g Butter
3 Spoons of Nutella
500g Greek yoghurt
150g Cream
3 shot glasses of Bailey’s
100g Sugar
1 Pack of the grounded Gelatine

Crush the cookies in a plastic bag. This is best done with a Rolling pin.

Meanwhile melt the butter with the Nutella in a little pan until everything has melted together.

Mix the cookie crumbs and the liquefied butter/Nutella thoroughly stomp the mix into a spring pan. Make sure the base is nice and tight squashed together.

Put the base into the fridge.


Mix the Yoghurt, Sugar, Baileys and Cream until the Sugar has dissolved.

Pour a little bit of hot water into a bowl, add the grounded Gelatine and whisk sturdy until the Gelatine has dissolved fully. It is important to stir until the Gelatine has cooled down or you will have lumps.

Get the spring pan out of the fridge and pour the topping onto the base. Put it all back into the fridge and wait until hardened.

My Tip: Don’t use too much Gelatine! I wanted to make super sure that the Cheese part is not too runny and used 2 packs of grounded Gelatine – the topping was way too rubbery and reminded me of a massive Bailey’s Gummibear… (not that I ever had one…..)

You can then decorate the cheesecake as you wish – with chocolate or anything else you can think of. Enjoy....

Bananacake / Bananabread

Today I had to get rid of my Bananas. I don’t know how you feel about this but if they are too yellow or already have brown spots I simply cannot eat them.

I like them when they are a bright yellow with maybe a hint of green, then they taste the fruitiest I think.
Not too green of course or you get that weird furry sensation on your tongue.

So today it was time again for the - in my opinion - easiest cake recipe in the world:

Simply throw it all into your kitchen machine, into a cake form – bake- ready.

Ingredients:
150g Butter
3 Eggs
200g Sugar
2 spoons Vanillasugar
125 ground Hazelnuts (if you don’t have any handy you can also use chopped Walnuts or any other nuts. If you have a nut allergy, maybe you can use coconut or simply leave them out)
250g flour
2 spoons Baking powder
3 Bananas

My Tip: if you wish you can add little chocolate-bits to the dough. Dark Chocolate works best.

Mash the bananas slightly with a fork and add all the other ingredients into a bowl while mixing with a mixer. How handy is a proper kitchenmachine:
it is doing the job for you and you simply have to measure & add the ingredients and can in the meantime also entertain your Toddler. Fantastic!

Grease a loaf tin form and cover with breadcrumbs or flour.

Add the dough and bake for ca. 50 minutes at 180°C in a fan oven.
Finished – it can’t get any easier!

If you wish you can melt white chocolate and cover the cake with it – once cooled and put on a plate. It looks just lovely when the chocolate even runs down at the sides a little bit.

I personally love my Banana cake just plain and simple with eventually Chocó inside but not on the outside.

Only since I am here in Ireland I know that my Banana cake is here called Bananabread.

I tasted this kind of “bread” at an office occasion once and was a bit sceptical. I simply thought it is the typical Irish Soda Bread with some Banana in it or so….. different countries have different tastes....

How relieved was I when I figured out it is simply just what I know as MY banana cake :)

Cake with Apples & Almonds

Our little Apple tree had surprisingly lots of apples this autumn. Aside of many jars of apple puree for our Toddler we had enough apples left for some cakes. See what I did the other Sunday.

Ingredients:

For the base:
300g flour
200g butter
100g sugar

For the topping:
2 eggs
100g sugar
2 EL Vanilla sugar
3 big + 2 medium sized apples
100g grounded almonds
150g flaked almonds
2 spoons of butter

Mix the flour, butter and sugar with a dough hook to a base. Mix until the dough looks like you can form it with your hands and put it into the fridge for about 30 Minutes.

Grease a baking form and sprinkle breadcrumbs into it. I used a Ø24cm baking form however think 26cm are better otherwise your base is a bit too thick. Use the dough to pull sides up inside the form, so the topping cannot run out.

Separate the eggs and whisk the egg yolks with a bit of water and the sugar until everything is foamy. Add the vanilla sugar and keep stirring until dissolved.

My Tip: I don’t like the vanilla sugar that much you can buy (tastes quite artificial for my taste buds) so I make vanilla sugar myself:

Simply add 2 Vanilla pods into a plasti container (Tupperware) and add sugar on top. It stays fresh for quite a long time. From time to time add sugar or replace the Vanilla pods if you have the feeling they don’t give away any flavour anymore or fill into a different container if you have to wash the one us use once in a while :) easy, peasy and tastes much better!

 

Grate the 3 big apples roughly and stir with the ground and flaked Almonds into the egg-yolk-mass.

Whisk the egg whites until stiff and lift them carefully under the topping mass. Be very carefully and don’t mix too briskly or the egg white will dissolve and the topping will not be as fluffy.

 

As decoration I peeled 2 smaller apples, removed the core and cut the apples then into thin slices. Put them on top of the cake. Heat the butter just a little bit in the microwave to have it all liquid and paste over the cake topping. 

Then put the cake into the oven and bake for about 40-50 Minutes at 160°C (320°F). 

If you see that the apples on top are getting a bit too dark, simply cover them with a sheet of baking paper.

This cake is perfect for a little afternoon break. You can eat it also with custard or whipped cream… delicious.

Pat’s Christmas-Cheesecake

The other day my little family and I have been to IKEA Dublin and we as usual couldn’t resist their lovely cuisine. 

As we have quite a sweet tooth we never miss out on their dessert section where they had a "Christmas-Style Cheesecake" displayed. 

Well, unfortunately their recipe was based on Christmas-Pudding, means there were Raisins in the cake and I simply detest raisins! I love food in all shapes, forms and flavours but raisins are one of the few things one can see me run.

I had however a bright idea to make this IKEA dessert my own. I changed and tweaked my recipe of the traditional Cheesecake and simply named it 

"Pat's Christmas-Cheesecake"

Ingredients:

ca 200g Cookies

1/2 teaspoon Cinnamon

75 Butter

500g Natural yogurt

50g Cream

2 1/2 German Gingerbreads with Chocolate coating

50g Sugar

1 packet of ground Gelatine

German "Lebkuchen" I got in LIDL Ireland

Smash the Cookies with a roller pin in a plastic bag. Be careful and don’t smash too hard – if the bag bursts…. It’s quite a mess lets say. Once the cookies are not recognizable as such anymore, add the crumbs into a bowl and mix it through with the Cinnamon.

German "Lebkuchen" - nothing beats this flavour :)

Melt the Butter in the Microwave and mix thoroughly with the cookie-cinnamon-crumbs. Stomp the crumbs into a spring form you have placed on a nice little plate.

Mix the Chocó-Gingerbreads with your mixer until you have only crumbs left. 

Add Yogurt, Cream and Sugar into a different bowl and mix it through with a blender until you have a fine, soft consistency. Add the Gingerbread crumbs and give it another blend.

Gingerbread Crumbs

To dissolve the Gelatine I boil water in a kettle, put a little bit in a coffee-cup and add the ground Gelatine on top. Stir briskly with a little fork so you don’t have any lumpy Gelatine-Bits left. Add a few Spoons of the Yogurt-Mix to cool the Gelatine down and keep stirring to cool it down a bit more.

Add the Gelatine to the Yogurt-Gingerbread-Mix and mix again with the blender.

The Cheesecake-Topping

Leave the Mix sitting in the Bowl for a little while – not too long, just long enough so the Mix can settle and is not too liquid anymore. This prevents the Cheesecake-Topping to eventually “run away” under the spring-form.

Carry the whole setting (plate + spring form + cheesecake) into your fridge and leave it there for minimum 4 hours – best is overnight.

Serve it with a scoop of Vanilla- or Chocolate-Ice-cream or with whipped cream, as per your liking.

Enjoy and have a very happy Christmas

 

Irish Strawberry Cheesecake – the VERY easy recipe

To make this yummy cheesecake you will need the following ingredients:

About 200g Cookies
(they have to be easy to crumble i.e. shortbread or oatmeal-cookies or anything else you like)
80g Butter
500g Soft Cheese
(You can use any Soft Cheese, plain and without herbs of course. I preferably use Greek yoghurt because I think it tastes more like SummerJ)
150g Cream
80g Sugar
3 leaves of white Gelatine (you can also use 1 Pack of the grounded Gelatine)
1 little bucket of fresh Strawberries (approx 500g)

At first put all the cookies into a little plastic bag and smash them with the Rolling pin. To make them very fine roll the last few bits so you have a nice crumbly consistency.


Put them into a bowl and add the Butter you have melted beforehand. This can be done in a pot on the cooker but it’s faster to melt it on a little and short setting in your microwave. Mush everything thoroughly or the base will be very crumbly and you can barely get the cake on a plate when serving.

Put a springform tin on a plate and stomp the cookie-mash in. Put into the fridge while you start making the most important part: the topping.

Wash the Strawberries thoroughly, cut into half and put into a high jug. Then comes my favourite kitchen tool into place: the blender!

Mix the strawberries until you have a smooth fruit purée.

Put the fruit purée aside and start with the cheese mix: Mix Soft Cheese (or Yoghurt), Sugar and Cream until the Sugar has dissolved. Then add the fruit purée.

My Tip: If you wish you can put a bit of purée directly on the cookie base which I did (see picture).

Boil the kettle and put a little bit of hot water into a jug or little bowl.


Then add the Gelatine and whisk sturdy in order to avoid any lumpy bits. Keep stirring the mix until it cools down a bit.

Add some of the cheese-fruit-mix in order to cool it down further. This will avoid any gelatine bits in your cheesecake… not nice to chew on, believe me.

Then add the gelatine mix into the cheesecake-topping and keep mixing it again with the blender.

My Tip: Wait until the gelatine has hardened the topping a bit so you avoid any “leaking” when you add the topping on the base.






Put into the fridge until the topping has hardened. This should last minimum 4 hours, best is overnight.


 

I hope you like the recipe and find it as easy to do as I promised. 

Soon I will do a Bailey’s Cheesecake so stay tuned dear Readers ;)

Baked Berry Cheesecake (without flour / with semolina)

This year I was faster than the birds (hahaaaa) and managed to get at least a handful of sour-cherries from our tree. I just love the sourly-sweet contrast in a cake. We planted the tree when moving into our house and by now he is big enough and produces enough fruit for a cake – hooray!

So I was experimenting again and see what recipe I came up with:

Its again easy and quick again – I love those recipes: it looks like a big effort when in fact it isn’t and you have enough time left for your Toddler / husband or anything else.

The ingredients I used were as follows:

Breadcrumbs
4 eggs
80g Butter
750g Greek Yoghurt
5 Spoons (Soupspoons) of semolina
75g sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
300g berries – whatever you have, cherry’s / raspberries / redcurrant or mixed berries

As most ovens are very quick these days I don’t preheat the oven! It saves you energy and cuts down your electricity bill. Always think environmental friendly :)

My little antique helper :)

If you have fresh cherry’s make sure to get the stones out first before you start making the batter. There are quite handy devices out there – I inherited a quite antique one from my Granny which is handy if you only have a little amount of fruits.

Then we get straight into getting greasy: grease a medium sized spring-form with a little bit of butter and sprinkle the breadcrumbs generously into the greased cake pan.
Separate the eggs: egg white in one – egg yolk in another bowl.

Add butter to the bowl with the egg yolks and beat until everything is soft. Add yoghurt, semolina, sugar and baking powder and keep mixing until you have a smooth consistency.

Then whisk the egg whites until they are stiff and carefully fold them into the batter (picture 2)). Make sure not to stir, but slightly cover the stiff egg white with the batter once everything is mixed well throughout.

Pour everything into the greased spring form (picture 3)) and sprinkle the berries on top of it (picture 4)).

Bake it in the oven for about 50 Minutes to 1 hour at 200°C (that’s 400°F if I am not mistaken). If the cake is getting too brown just cover it with a bit of parchment paper. Check after approximately 50 Min with a wooden toothpick if the dough is cooked. If anything is sticking to the pick – leave it in for another little bit (picture 5)).

Remove the cake from the oven and leave to cool. Once cooled, turn the cake pan over onto a cake plate and dust the cake with icing sugar (picture 6)). Ready!

If you wish you can decorate the slices with fresh fruit and serve whipped cream with it.

Guten Appetit :D