Chocolate explosion cakes

I fancy making some cake so I looked at some different recipes and found one that looked really good. It was the recipe I used for my mums birthday cake, I made these before my mum's birthday cake and that is why she asked me to make her cake with this recipe.

For the cupcakes I used:

225g (8oz) unsalted butter

225g (8oz) caster sugar

3 medium eggs

2 tbsp condensed milk

225g (8oz) self raising flour

25g (1oz) cocoa powder

100g (3 1/2 oz) milk chocolate, melted

50g (1 3/4 oz) mini marshmallows

100g (2 1/2oz) chocolate chips

For the icing I used:

Vanilla frosting

Chocolate frosting

Assorted chocolate

1. Preheat the oven to 170c, gas mark 3. Line a 12-hole muffin tin with paper cases. Cream together the butter and sugar in a bowl, add the eggs and condensed milk, then use an electric whisk to mix on a high speed until you have a smooth batter.

2. Add the flour and cocoa powder and mix again until the batter is thick, then add the melted chocolate. Spoon about 1 tbsp of batter into the bottom of each case, then sprinkle over a few marshmallows and chocolate chips.

3. Cover with around 1 tbsp with batter and spread to the edges of the cases using the back of a spoon. Bake in the over for around 15-18 minutes, the makes may still be squidgy when you first take them out because of the melted marshmallows. Leave to cool.

4. Fill the piping bag with vanilla frosting on one side and chocolate frosting on the other side. Pipe a swirl of frosting on top of each cupcake, starting at the outside and swirling around until you reach the middle. Decorate according to your taste with pieces of chopped up chocolate.

A lot of people wanted this recipe so I thought I'd share it with everyone!!

Katie

My Mums birthday cake

I was shown a picture on facebook of a cake and it made me smile so I showed my mum it and she told me she wanted it for her birthday. So of course as the amazing daughter I made her the cake.

This was a rather fun cake to make, not because of what it was but because of the amount of problems I had with it that resulted in patching it up with chocolate!! I made a cupcakes during the week that had marshmallows in the middle of them and my mum liked them so she asked me to make it into a big cake so I did; thinking it was going to plan I made it with a lot of marshmallows in the middle. It came out perfect, until is started to set... it sank in the middle leaving a bit hole. Thinking I would just cover it up with the melted chocolate which was what I was meant to do, I thought it would fix it.

After I had covered the side with chocolate frosting I added the Kit Kat's and let them set into place. I had quite a bit of chocolate frosting left; I told mum I had the problem with the hole and a load of chocolate frosting left, mum being mum and her friends at work she suggested I fill the hole up with chocolate frosting. So I used the rest of the chocolate frosting (over half the tub) and filled in the hole and covered the top of the cake. I then melted the chocolate and covered the chocolate frosting with the melted chocolate. After the chocolate had set a little I added the pigs, the pig in the middle (lying down) started to sink, so I had a lot of hassle trying to save this pig from sinking which was apparently quite funny to watch.

So when I had finished the cake I couldn't really call it a cake because of there not being a lot there; it was really just lots of types of chocolate. Mum was very pleased with it and so where her friends at work, so I think it was job well done!!

Katie

I'm glad I have a kindle

I got a kindle fire HD just after Christmas and because you can buy magazines on there I brought one of the cake magazine and they have some very good recipes and some very good ideas for decorating cupcake. I was bored and decided to make some cakes (as I usually do) and decorate them. I took a few ideas from this magazine on my kindle fire and decided to change them slightly. I also brought some new cutters during that week so I had to try them out as well so this was perfect.

The array of cakes I made

Bumble bee

Rose

Bow

I played for hours on these cakes and I was quite pleased with them, my favourites were the bumble bee and the rose. This was the first rose I had made, I had tried before but they didn't turn out very well. I had looked all over the Internet at how to make a rose and I finally found a way of making them that was easy for me.

I also had played around with some other ideas I had found on the Internet earlier that month and this is what they looked like

I saw the Mario cupcakes and just had to make them! The rose in this picture is not as good as the previous one but with trial and error I found one that worked for me.

Katie

Dirty Birthday Cake

I was asked to make a birthday cake for a friends birthday party, we joked around saying that I should make her a dirty birthday cake and started looking at some cake ideas not thinking anything of it. We then actually decided that she wanted a dirty birthday cake and decided on a cake that we found in a book. And this is what it looked like:

This proved to be a very difficult cake to make (well for me anyway). I made a 10 inch square sponge cake, I cut it in half and then sliced the two pieces of cake in the middle to make four layers. I dirty iced three layers together and then with the fourth layer I cut about 1 inch in and cut the inside out to make a place for the guy to sit in, then I dirty iced all of it.

I then cut out squares to make tiles for the bath and stuck them on the cake. I found the body very difficult to do because I hadn't done a body before and I couldn't get the sizing right and he was too big to sit in the bath. Finally when I got the torso the right size, I put the torso in and then I did the legs and arms. Once they had been done I attached them to the cake and the torso. I then made the bubbles for the bath to cover him up; I rolled out some white fondant in a few pieces and then with a clean pan scourer and pressed it onto the fondant and made a bubble effect. Even though it is not very clear in the picture it was very effective. I then made the extras for the cake, duck, taps, pans, socks and towels. I then added the writing and stars because the cake board was a bit to big and it looked like it needed something else.

This was a very fun cake to make and definitely went down well at the birthday party!!

Katie

Christmas cakes

Every Christmas my family gets together on Christmas eve and have a big family meal. I make a cake every year for us to have. Over the first couple of years of doing this I made a chocolate fudge cake, but the year just gone I decorate my own cake. These were the chocolate fudge cakes:

This Christmas just gone I decided to do my own cake, I looked around on the Internet to see what I could do and decided to use some ideas and make my own cake. I decided to do penguins on my cake because they seemed the easiest to do.

My brother was doing another cake stall around Christmas to raise money for his world challenge trip, so I was asked to make some Christmas themed cupcakes to sell. These went down fairly well because of the characters I made on them.

I enjoy making cakes around Christmas because being stuck inside in the cold it means having to much time on my hands with nothing to do. Meaning I have time to make cakes and share them with my friends and family.

Katie

Cookie Monster Birthday Cake

After seeing the cupcakes with the sesame street characters, I was asked to make a birthday cake with the cookie monster on it. They wanted it plain and simple with a big cookie monster face on it.

I brought some alphabet cutters, they are not brilliant but they do the job. The cookie monster face was a big fluted pastry cutter and then half a round pastry cutter for the mouth and two smaller circles for the eyes. For the cookies I used 2 sizes of circle cutters and cut out brown circles. I used an edible pen and drew dots on it to look like cookies.

They were very pleased with their birthday cake when it was given to her and was more than she expected!!

Katie

Angry Birds and Sesame Street Cupcakes

After playing around with big cakes I decided to try making cupcakes because I find they generally go down better than a big cake. My brother was having a cake stall with his friends to raise money for their world challenge trip to the Himalayas and they wanted me to make some cakes. So I had a look on the Internet for some inspiration as to what to do and then I came across some angry birds cakes and sesame street cakes. I thought these might be good to do as they might sell quicker because kids will want them and parents will buy them. So I had a go at them and this was the finished product:

I did most of the angry birds but they are not pictured, and the sesame street characters pictured where the only ones had made. For the cupcakes I used the same principle as making a big cake, I dirty iced the top of the cakes with butter cream and then cut out a fondant circle with a pastry cutter. For the sesame street characters I used a fluted pastry cutter to make their faces and then cut out the extra bits to make their faces. I did the same for the angry birds but used a normal pastry cutter and then cut out the rest of the pieces.

The lady bird pictured was fairly easy, instead of cutting out a white fondant circle I cut out a black piece and put it on. I then did a red circle and cut out a triangle to form the wings and then I cut out an oval shape to make the head. I then added eyes and black dots.

These went down very well at my brothers cake sale and they were the first to go, together they raised about £150 to go towards their trip between the four of them which was pretty good considering they were outside in the pouring rain!

Katie