Chocolate Dipped Whipped Shortbread

I’m back! Finally, a little later than expected, and with – unfortunatly – no baking to share other than my own. Nevermind.

My trip away was great – except for the part where I came down with a nasty case of the chicken pox ): That kind of put a hold on the fun. Anyway, I’m pretty much recovered now – well, to a standard of being able to feel partially normal again. And while I acctually didn’t get to bake anything with my Aunty, I was able to eat up all of her genorosity all the same.  I also got to share photo’s of my baking (the one’s I share on here) with her and some of her elderly friends – so that was nice 🙂

What else is new with me? Well, as of last week I’ve applied for two jobs. One is food preparation early Saturday and Sunday morning’s at the local shop, the other (please please please may I get this one) is at a European bakery. If I get either I’ll be incredibly happy.

School starts again on Wednesday – I guess it had to happen sometime, right?

As for me baking, it’s been practically non existent for the past few weeks. It was mum’s birthday on Friday, which ment we had shop bought cake (read: YUM.) plus apple pie, plus a whole jar of lollies and chocolates from when we went away. There is literally no room in our kitchen for me now. Haha.

With that being said – I still made space for these delicious delights – chocolate dipped whipped shortbread – what a mouthful! The secret is simply, whip, whip, whip! If you whip effectivly, you are guaranteed a delicious light, buttery, melting yet dense mouthful everytime. There is deffinatly room for these in every kitchen – and tummy!

Have a great week everyone – happy baking!

Whipped Shortbread (from A Culinary Education)

(makes about 60 cookies)

1 lb(500 g) of butter, at room temperature
1 cup sifted icing sugar
1/2 cup corn starch
2 tsp vanilla
3 cups all purpose flour

(1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees
(2) Line baking sheet(s) with parchment paper
(3) With an electric mixer on medium speed, cream butter and icing sugar until very fluffy (this is what gives the cookie that light and airy texture…it takes about 5 minutes)
(4) Mix in corn starch and vanilla until combined
(5) Turn electric mixer to low and mix in flour 
(6) Turn electric mixer back to medium speed and continue to mix until dough has that light and fluffy texture (about 3-4 minutes)
(7) (time to get the cookies onto your baking sheets) Drop by teaspoonfuls or use a cookie press or pipe cookies onto the parchment lined baking sheets. 
(9) Bake 20-25 minutes, until edges are a golden brown

Rainbow m&m Cookies

Happy holidays! Christmas has come and gone for another year – it’s sad that it’s finally over after months of preparation – but at least now we can look forward to the new year. I spent my half of my Christmas day flying home from a wonderful holiday on Norfolk Island – but all in all it was a lovely day, and my lead up to Christmas was equally as lovely – it was a well earned rest, but at the same time it’s good to be home.

Now that we’re home, I’m focusing on the new year – which I must say has seemed to sprung up awfully soon since last time. I’m tidying up around the house while I have the free time because of the holidays – and I’ve planned some new years goals I’m determined to work towards, for example, get a job. It’s one thing I love about the new year is – at least mentally – being able to start fresh and hopefully make some positive change. Plus, with a new school year means loads of new opportunities, I’m looking forward to it.

Hopefully 2012 will be a little less shaky, with Christchurch being hit by yet another large earthquake on the 23rd – and another 50 or so aftershocks and still counting. It was a real blow to everyone here, I’m glad we were away when it happened. I’m one of the lucky one’s as our house wasn’t as badly affected as people on the eastern side of town – but an earthquake is an earthquake, and it’s just as challenging no matter what your situation.

On a brighter note – the cookies! These cookies acctually aren’t a recent bake – I made them a few months back and took photo’s but never shared them. With all the sweet food that’s inhabiting our pantry at the moment, both mum and I decided we’d better finish what’s left before we end up with an alladins cave of  fatty goodness, so I’ve been out of the kitchen when it comes to baking.

With that being said, I acctually just finished making some oaty caramel slice because I’m craving it since returning from having it for dessert every night we’ve been away – so watch this space!

I made these cookies for a dancing competition.  There are a lot of little kids at my dance studio, so when requests were sent out for home baking donations, I decided to put some of the m&m’s in the pantry to good use in brightening up chocolate cookies because they would be sure to sell – and they did. They’re not just for the littlies either – big kids like myself were fans too. And they really stood out against all the other plain muffins and slices.

Anyway, I didn’t think I’d have much to write but I’ve come out with quite a bit afterall. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas/holiday and get some rest before the new year hits us full swing! Untill next time – happy baking!

 

 

 

Magnificant Melting Moments

It’s always heartbreaking and frustrating when I recipe dosent turn out just the way you wanted. And although I must admit these melting moments do look scrumptious – they’re not what I wanted.

You see, this recipe is not a first for me. It’s one of the few recipes which I attained from an acctual cookbook. I frequently return to it because it turns out somewhat right everytime, and always tastes good.

Last Weekend, I had a sudden urge for a delicious, gob-stopping, buttery biscuit crammed with icing – I immediatly turned to these cookies. I halved the recipe, and produced five – perfect –  lovely plump creamy biscuits, the combination of custard powder and flower caked my mouth as I munched. Enough to satisfy my craving after I devoured three of them. There was still something missing though. The lemon icing simply wasn’t enough, so I decided to make the cookies again, this time adding lemon zest to both the biscuit dough and the icing. This produced a lovely lemony treat – but my cookies were not what I had in mind.

My mum looked at me like I was mad as I stood infront of the oven telling the cookies how much of a fail they were – rightly so I suppose, because they looked alright, and they tasted fine too. But they werent the replica of what I had made the previous week, and my craving for those lovely plump melting moments went un-satisfied, dispite still eating two of them.

You – like my mum – are probably struggling to see what I mean, but if you had experienced the cookies, you would understand. I think maybe the cookies were slightly too buttery this week, which caused a flatter, more buttery cookie -or maybe it was a result of the lemon zest. I don’t really know, but they werent what I wanted.

However, I will not abandon the recipe. Sooner or later the inkling for a melting moment will return, and I shall keep you posted on the results.

Biscuits: (recipe from the Biscuit and Slice Bible)

190g softened butter, 1/3 cup sugar, 1 cup plain flour, 1 cup custard powder, pinch of salt, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (and I added about 2 tablespoons of lemon zest).

Preheat oven to 180 degrees (celcius). Lightly grease a baking tray.

Cream butter and icing sugar untill light and fluffy. In another bowl, sift flour, custard powder and salt. Add to creamed mixture with vanilla to form a soft dough.

Bake for 15-20minutes, untill lightly golden.

Once cold sandwich biscuits together with lemon flavoured butter icing.

Butter icing (lemon variation)

125g softened butter, 2 cups icing sugar, 1 -2 tablespoons warm lemon juice, 2 teaspoons lemon zest (optional).

Cream the butter in a bowl. Gradually add the icing sugar, alternating with the lemon juice, untill soft and creamy. Beat in the lemon zest if using.

 

Benedict Bar

There is nothing better than waking up early in the morning, fetching some toast and then spending a good half hour pondering around food blogs. The only problem is it always makes me wish I was eating something better than toast.

Hello and welcome to my blog, Sixteen Cupcakes. Finally, after being an avid food blog browser for years, I finally have a place to call my very own on here. A little about me to start off with, my name is Savannah (hello!) and I am 16 years old (hence Sixteen Cupcakes). I live in the south island of New Zealand in the down-under corner of the globe – and I’m a passionate baker and food addict. Nothing gets me going more than food, cooking and baking – so, I have decided to share my baking creations with the rest of the online food community, and hopefully give back a slice of what it has given me.

As my first post, I decided to share these Benedict Bars, which I found here, http://lisaiscooking.blogspot.com/2009/04/benedict-bars.html – Lisa is cooking’s blog . It is, one of the many recipe’s that have made me drool while on one of my morning blog browse sessions – I had to make it. Let me say I’m so glad I did. The shortbread crust melted into the tang of wildberry jam and the sweet crunch of the almond topping –  I think you know where I’m going with this. It was perfect.

Do yourself a favour and do try these, you will be so glad you did. Until next time – happy baking  ! 

 

Benedict Bar

First prepare the shortbread crust:
150 g unsalted butter
225 g plain flour (All purpose flour)
4 T corn flour
1/2 t baking powder
125 caster sugar (granulated sugar) + more for sprinkling into pan
1/4 t sea salt
1 t vanilla extract

-spray a 24 x 20cm (I used an eight inch square pan, but slightly larger would also work) with cooking spray and sprinkle with sugar
-dice the butter straight from the refrigerator into a mixing bowl and leave to soften for 30 minutes; sift the flour, cornflour, and baking powder on top, then add the sugar, salt, and vanilla; rub together between your fingertips until the mixtures begins to cohere (Or, place in the bowl of a stand mixer and mix with the paddle attachment until it resembles breadcrumbs.)
-press into the prepared pan and chill in the refrigerator while making the topping

Bars:
100g unsalted butter
60g caster sugar (granulated sugar)
1 t vanilla extract
200g flaked almonds
3 T milk
raspberry jam (or blackcurrant jelly or whatever jam or jelly you have)

-preheat oven to 180 degrees C or 350 degrees F [Here’s a handy conversion tool: http://www.metric-conversions.org/temperature/celsius-to-fahrenheit.htm]
– put butter, sugar, vanilla, almonds, and milk in a small saucepan over low heat, and warm until the butter melts; remove from heat and allow to cool
-remove shortbread from refrigerator and spread a layer of jam on top; pour cooled, melted butter mixture over top; bake for 25 to 30 minutes and then allow to cool on a rack; chill in the refrigerator for one hour to make cutting easier