Flour, Cake and Pastry

Monday is here which means a brand new tried and tested recipe for you guys to try out. This week, its Madeira Cake. Madeira cake is often flavoured with lemon zest and topped with candied peel and has a firm yet light texture. This week's recipe was one I got from BBC's GoodFood website, and it's so easy! It takes only 20 minutes to prepare and then all you do is pop it in the oven for an hour and voila! And don't forget, a good madeira cake should always have a crack on top! Ingredients: 175g softened butter 175g golden caster sugar 3 large eggs Grated zest of 1 lemon Few drops of vanilla essence 200g self-raising flour 50g ground almonds Method: Heat oven to 170C/150C fan/gas 3.  Butter and line the base of a 900g loaf tin with greaseproof paper. Using an electric whisk, beat together the butter and sugar until light and creamy then beat in the eggs one at a time. Add the lemon zest and vanilla. Now beat in the flour and almonds until you h...

As promised (all be it a little later than I said), here is the scone recipe I mentioned on Twitter on Tuesday!  The recipe comes from one of my favourite recipe books...Be-Ro. It's so simple to make and there's so many different varieties to choose from-fruit, cheese, cherry, blueberry, coffee and walnut. The list goes on! So, here you go! Ingredients: 225g Be-Ro Self Raising Flour 50g Margarine Pinch Salt 25g Caster Sugar (omit this if you're making a savoury scone, such as cheese) 1 Medium Egg To add any extra ingredients, such as cheese or sultanas, just add 50g of your selected filling Method: Heat the oven to 220ºC, 425ºF, Gas Mark 7 and grease a baking tray. Mix flour, and salt, rub in margarine and stir in sugar and fruit. Add egg mixture and milk reserving a little for brushing the tops. Knead lightly on a floured surface and roll out to 1 cm (½ inch) in thickness and cut into 6.5 cm (2½ inch) rounds. Re-roll the trimmings and cut more rounds. B...

Baking has been around for centuries-in fact the first evidence of baking occurred when humans took wild grass grains, soaked them in water, and mixed everything together. It was then mashed into a broth-like paste (it doesn't sound very appetising, I know). In order to cook the paste, it was poured on to a flat hot rock, which resulted in it becoming a bread-like substance. And due to programmes like the Great British Bake Off, Cake Boss and The Hairy Bikers, it's no surprise that baking is becoming more and more popular across the globe. But where do you start? Let me take you on a whirlwind tour of baking basics! 1.Ingredients! This one is pretty simple; no ingredients=no baking! There are some pretty cheap, key ingredients out there that any aspiring baker should keep stocked up on. Flour is the most important ingredient for me, as it will provide a base structure for many baked goods, and also contribute to the texture of the final dish. Next? Sugar,...

It's Monday which means it's a new recipe day! As a baker, I am obviously a big fan of the Great British Bake Off, and I often find that I get a lot of recipes from there. One of my favourites to make is the Chessboard Cake, which was featured as a Showstopper a few years ago. Now, you'd think that as a baker I'd be sick of the sight of sponge, but I'm far from it. There's just so many different things you can do-it's so versatile, you can flavour it however you want, you can cut it into any shape you want, and you can make a lot out of it! When I bought the The Great British Bake Off: How to turn everyday bakes into showstoppers book, this recipe was one of the first to catch my eye. It looks so elegant and impressive, and rather complex, but its actually so easy and mess-free that it's one of my go to cakes when I'm asked to bake something for an event or celebration. Give this a try next time you're in the kitchen, and trust me, you'll...

So, in England at least, autumn is fully on its way. The days are getting shorter and its surely getting colder. But with autumn comes celebrations, and the build up to Christmas. And that means a lot of cake orders! So I'm gonna be quite busy for the next few weeks making fruit cake after fruit cake, but I will still try to post at least every few days and update you guys on exactly how it's all going! And if all goes well I should have some new recipes for you to try in the next few weeks as well! Stay safe and keep on baking...have a fab week! Charley.

This blog is something I've wanted to do for a long time. It took me a while to actually get round to it, but here we are. Better late than never right? So as I said in my first post, I'm a little baking obsessed, but there's lots of other things that I love. So here's a little about me... I live in County Durham in North-East England, in a village of just under 1000 people. Living in the countryside, we get a lot of pretty awesome views especially early in the morning or late at night when the sun goes down. And being a baker, I get to see a lot of pretty sunrises. I'm pretty grateful for that. I'm 19 and still live with my parents and my brother, who always appreciate my baking experiments! Being a baker at work and home, there isn't a lot of time for anything else, but there are a few things I love doing too. I tend to go to a lot of gigs at Newcastle with my friend Gina-we always go and see new and upcoming bands and sometimes go to big gigs at the a...

Working in a bakery and being a home baker means that a good chunk of my life is spent baking. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love it, I couldn't do anything else, but I think sometimes it gets difficult to find that spark-that enjoyment-that I used to have when I was just a normal home-baker. That's when you need to get your attitude right. You need to find the balance. I mean, what's the point of working somewhere or doing something, when you begin to find it boring and start to dislike it? Baking just used to be a hobby of mine that I would do with my mum when I was growing up, and now it is my source of income, so obviously there had to be a step up in skill and stress levels, I mean stress kinda comes with the job. I think when you love doing something so much, you just need to take some time to really sit down and look at your life to get your priorities and views right. That's all it needs. The more you stress about it, the more stressful it will become...

Crumble Crumble Crumble. One of my brother's favourite puddings. Rhubarb, apple, pear...you name it, and it can probably go in a crumble. Yesterday we were given some rhubarb from my neighbours garden and I immediately thought...crumble! Growing up in the English countryside, crumble is a pretty standard dessert-some people might think its pretty boring, but it's a firm favourite in our household-especially on a rainy day. Originating from Ireland, the humble crumble became popular during the second world war when the topping was a cheaper alternative to pies. This was due to the fact that rationing caused shortages of pastry ingredients. In order to reduce the use of rationed flour, fat and sugar, breadcrumbs would be added to the mix. The dish was also popular because it was just so simple! So here's the recipe for a crumble topping: 300g plain flour 175g brown sugar (I sometimes just use white caster sugar-the brown sugar just adds that extra depth ...

When we were little, my friend and I used to love Scooby-Doo (bare with me), so much so that we even collected the magazine series that was published as we were growing up. We were discussing this a while ago, when we remembered that we used to make a shortbread recipe from one of the magazines every single time we would see each other, we loved it that much. For months we've been trying to find the recipe, or one that tasted just as scrummy, just so we can taste it again. However that involved lots of trial and error (and a lot of shortbread)...and we still couldn't find the right recipe. Until one day   I was shopping in Tesco and I picked up the free magazine that you can collect from the checkout. I took it home and flicked through it as I always do, scoping out the recipes inside in case there's any ones I want to keep. And I came across a shortcake recipe. I thought I'd give it a try, not thinking anything of it. BUT. We found it! It tasted exactly the same as...

Finally got my new Instagram page up and running...follow me at @flourcakeandpastry for pictures of all my baking craziness! Don't forget, follow my twitter @readysetbake1 and go and give my facebook page some love... https://www.facebook.com/flourcakeandpastry I'll be posting a new recipe tonight or tomorrow for my favourite shortbread biscuits, which I've been making for over 10 years! Check back later for the details! Charley

Sunday mornings are usually my main chill time in a busy week, and I usually use that time to try out new recipes and do a bit of experimenting. Today I decided to try out a new brownie recipe (mainly because I forgot to buy the ingredients for my usual recipe...), which I found on the MumsNet website. It turned out really well, and I'll probably use the recipe again sometime soon; it's got a much more cakey texture than my usual brownie I make, but served warm with a bit of ice cream, and it was to die for! Here's the recipe, and I'd definitely recommend using the MumsNet website to look for recipes, there's so many simple ones that even a shy baker can get to grips with. Ingredients: 150g butter 150g chocolate 175g caster sugar 2 eggs 1tsp vanilla essence 1/4 tsp salt 100g plain flour 1tbsp drinking chocolate 100g optional fillings/flavouring (or just omit this if you're just after a plain chocolatey brownie!) Method: Set the oven to 180 degree...

So I've just set up my new social media outlets... Twitter: @readysetbake1 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/flourcakeandpastry Instagram will be following in the next couple of days! Charley

Here is my first recipe, and it's one of my favourite things to make! It's just a basic genoise sponge recipe, and you can literally add anything you want to it, to make the flavour unique to how you like it. I find that orange and coconut really compliment each other well, especially with the fresh cream filling I used. The great thing about a genoise sponge is that it's fat-less, meaning its a really light sponge, and you don't need to feel guilty when you help yourself to a slice or two! Ingredients: 6oz Self Raising Flour 6oz Sugar 6 Eggs 600 ml Double Cream 2 Oranges 100g Desiccated Coconut Method: Beat together the Sugar and Eggs until it doubles in size, and it reaches the ribbon stage (when the mix is thick enough that you can draw a number 8 on top with it). This should take about 10 minutes with an electric mix, depending on how strong your electric whisk is. By hand, it can take an awful lot longer, but it's totally worth it (just think of it a...

"Find something you're passionate about and keep tremendously interested in it"-Julia Child. So, first things first, welcome to my new blog; blogging has always been something I've been interested in doing and so I've finally got round to doing it! My name is Charley and I live in a tiny village in Northern England...my life literally revolves around baking! I work in a local bakery, I bake when I get home and I'm always rustling up new recipes and new ideas to try out on my friends and family (I'm sure they love it!). My aim for this blog is to share all my baking experiences; including the good, the bad and the ugly!  From recipes, to bakers and to wacky bakes, hopefully I can inspire you guys out there to get into the wonderful world of baking. Signing off for now... Charley