Adorable Owl Cupcakes

THEY ARE SO CUTE.
I can't deal with it.
I got this idea from 6bittersweets, who got it from a book that I can't remember the name of.

I happen to be the biggest owl fan ever because I have no life so this was a really great find for me.

I decided to make these this Saturday when some friends came over, although when some turned into around 50 the poor little guys got a little overshadowed.
By which i mean people stubbed out cigarettes on them. I was very close to calling the RSPCA. Joking, I'm not crazy...what...

Saturday was good fun though and probably one of the last of it's kind I'll throw before university. *sob*

It comprised mostly of boys and vodka and I started to get the impression that a good handful of them showed up to see my mum instead of me.

 Even my friend Richard managed to traumatise my sister knocking on the glass of the room she was sitting in demanding to find out when my mum would be arriving home.

I feel like Stacey, sitting in the swimming pool all alone in a tankini while my mum poledances on the kitchen table. Although my mum would never poledance on the kitchen table, it might scuff the surface.

Even my own boyfriend apparently prefers to hang out with my mum:

*thats them playing Wii tennis, I wasn't allowed to play...

More embarrassing still was my night tonight. My friend Toni and I decided against all better judgement to pick up off a gentleman named 'Sleazy' who previously sold me a generous amount of grass from the garden for £40.

We considered backing out after a while, but then he gallantly texted me

 'I'm in da cab' 

I couldn't possible refuse his charming rhetoric.

So inevitably the guy turns up in a car that looks like a battered coke can and exchanges me an empty plastic bag in exchange for my money. You have to hand it to him though, he promised not to sell me grass again and he stuck to it. That's growth.

In the end Toni and I had our asian movie night £40 poorer and more retarded than ever. It's ok though. because we wore our hair in high buns and drank wine while failing at racist impressions. All good.

The Cupcakes

1. Make basic chocolate cupcakes. Recipes can be found anywhere, I went for the hummingbirds one.

2. Ice with chocolate butter cream, made with cocoa powder, icing sugar, vanilla and butter. 

3. Split several oreos so that the white filling is a full circle, and stick these on next to eachother for the eyes. You then put minstrels in for the pupils, at whatever angle creates a nice facial expression.
4. Pick out the yellow and orange skittles from a pack and place them thin onto the cupcake to create a beak. 

5. You can use the excess icing to pipe the furry top of their head/eyebrows.
Enjoy!

Boob Cake

I've been told in the past that my style of baking and blogging is somewhat 'innapropriate'.

I decided they were wrong, and that it was time to prove them right.

Enter boob cake.

I decided to make this cake for my lovely friend Martha's leaving party, as she, like the rest of the world is fucking off to Israel. When I told her I was making a cake she suggested this as a joke, but should've known better that I'd DEFINITELY go through with it. Who knows, maybe this will open up a whole world of pornographic baking and I'll re-define the 'spotted dick'.

I've made boob once before, for my friend Richard's birthday. If you read my last post, he's the one involved with 'titty-aura', much to Pedram's protesting that it's 'his thing'. I need to stop using quotations, it makes me feel like Joey when he kept using them at the wrong times...

So yes, as a co-creator of 'titty-aura', Richard is a big fan of boobs. He always tells me how mine are looking if I'm having a rough day, because that's what friendship is all about. I always tell him when his shirts are too tight and make him look like a sailor, because I'm an asshole.

So although making boob cake was very fun, the presentation of it was much to be desired. I brought it with me to a testosterone clad pub and had to stand around pretending to be amused all of the hundred times another guy cleverly said 'nice rack' and then laughed at his own joke.

I then finally found Martha and put my tits on the table, only to discover that her Dad and Stepmum would be joining us. Who I've never met. I didn't think my biggest problem meeting someone's parents would be avoiding them looking at my nipples. It was awkward to say the least. Martha's Dad tried to talk to me about 'The Iliad' while averting his gaze, which would've been fine except for that I haven't read the Iliad, and so gave some unfounded opinions on the tone of the book...based on Troy the movie. (I should've used quotations there but I felt awkward.)

The first time I made boob cake, I made lots of errors so this is an opportunity for me to teach what I've learnt about handling sugarpaste.

So here's some tips on how to construct a boob cake:

1. Using any cake mix, fill two small identical saucepans and cook in the oven for as long as you normally would until a toothpick comes out clean.

2. Leave to cool and sit the two cakes next to eachother, then coat in buttercream.

3. For the boobs, you should get fleshcolour sugarpaste, and a colour for the bra you want your boobs to be wearing. Mine got a corset because they're fancy. You need to roll out the fleshcolour and lay it over the two cakes and smooth down the edges, cutting off the excess. Then layer the bra colour on top and decorate.

Sugarpaste tips:

* knead the sugarpaste for 5min before you roll it, this prevents it cracking

* when rolling out the sugarpaste, use only a little icing sugar on the surface, and don't allow any icing sugar to come into contact with the sugarpaste that will be on show. 

* Make sure to spread the buttercream thin, otherwise it will clump underneath the sugarpaste

Guy Pollack is inferior

Salted Caramel 'Mo Cake

This cake is seriously sexy.
And I'll tell you what isn't - me when I was making it.
I'm not gonna lie, it is a pretty challenging cake. But more so if you're a spacially unaware retard.
I actually got assaulted by a whisk at one point, it literally fell out of nowhere onto my face covered in cream making me look like something off of youporn.
I was very hesitant to make this cake, because last time I tried to make caramel from scratch, this happened:

It actually looks less painful than it was.

I made this cake last night for my cousins who came over for dinner.

I decided to serve it with a side of 'it's ok to be gay' pep talk for the middle child. This backfired massively.

Me: Listen, if you're a homo, that's fine.
12 year old: I'm not a homo

Me: Yes but you don't know that yet, you're young, you are a 'mo

12 year old: Right...
Me: And it's ok that you're gay. It's ok to want buttsex.
12 year old: The only buttsex I'm going to be having is if my cock is in a woman's ass.

Me:

Back to cake:

Here's your recipe for some salted caramel 'mo cake:

Sponge:

300g butter

140g brown sugar

3 eggs

100g cocoa powder

160ml buttermilk

1 tsp vanilla

330g flour

2 tsp baking powder

1tsp bicarb

1 tsp salt

Salty Caramel:

200g caster sugar

2 tbsp golden syrup

180ml double cream

1 tsp sea salt

Frosting:

200g caster sugar

2 tbsp golden syrup

360ml double cream

450g dark chocolate

450g unsalted butter

1. Make the salty caramel first by boiling the sugar and syrup for 10 mins, then in a seperate pan dissolove salt into double cream. Pour this into the caramel mix and whisk. Set aside.

2. Make frosting following the same steps, but follow by stirring in the dark chocolate and then the butter. Set aside.

3. Sponge. Preheat oven to 170C. Cream butter and both sugars, then add eggs.

4. In a jug stir cocoa buttermilk and vanilla, and sift all dry ingreds. In 3 batches mix in the wet and dry, ending with the dry. 

5. Divide into 2 pans and cook for 25mins.

6. Once cool, sandwich the layers with caramel and frosting, swirling the remaining caramel on top. 

Hummingbird's Malted Chocolate Cupcakes

Hello my loyal and obsessive fans. (I am of course addressing myself and my boyfriend who occassionally checks for a genuine mention on here)

My grandma looked once too for my cheesecake recipe, jammy slut.

So since I got back from Tel Aviv I've done relatively fuck all. But it's been a nice fuck all. I've basically sat around watching The Runaway Bride over and over again crying and smoking. 
In fact it got to the point where Toni left my house while we were halfway through the movie, and the next day when she asked what I was doing I had to tell her I was still watching it.

She does look like a bell when she moves :')

So I've utilized my free house well.

Also had my self a little partA last night, which is basically what comprises of a large group of people spending the evening with me staring at them whispering 'eat my cake'. Good times.

It was a very nice night though, I was reunited with Tally and it felt so good. I also learnt about Titty-aura from Richard and Pedram.

I learnt that it is the effect of being surrounded by great pairs of boobs that creates a calming and happy atmosphere. I suspect it derives from memories of breastfeeding. Poor messed up boys.
Either way, with Tash Biber in the room, the titty-aura was apparently on form.

 Phwoar. Feeling calm yet?

My childhood stalker Alex came and brought his two friends that happened to be all kinds of weird.
They kind of tanked when we invited them to play 'I've Never.'
I thought it would be nice to get them involved, until they opened with 'Er, I've never fucked a girl, realised she's bleeding and carried on.'
...no neither mate.

Maura, Ilana, Jess and Tash all requested a mention.
Tash has already had hers.
Here's the deal on them:
Maura is a slut and her boyfriend has run off with mine out of despair.
Ilana likes feet.
Jess is an ugly ginger.
There, mentioned.

So the night slowed down a little, Alex stayed for a while and I made his friends help tidy up in exchange for me waxing Alex's chest.

 You thought I was joking...

I then got into bed with a cup of tea and went on chatroulette telling people to sort their lives out.

So how does all of this relate to cupcakes?
It doesn't.
Except these cupcakes were eaten last night and I just enjoy talking about myself.
So the cupcakes.
There's this place in St. Albans called The Waffle House. It makes the most amazing malted chocolate milkshake that I've been craving ever since I first had it at age 10. When I discovered this recipe I had to do it, because that malty taste is just the yummiest thing in the world.
Here goes:

Ingredients

Sponge:

150ml sunflower oil

75ml milk

75ml buttermilk

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

240g flour 

25g cocoa powder

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt 

330g caster sugar

150ml boiling water

Frosting:

200g dark chocolate

240ml double cream

115ml malt powder

50g cream cheese

35g caster sugar

Malteasers to decorate

1. Preheat oven to 190C. Whisk the blue ingredients and sift the red in a seperate bowl.
2. Alternate the dry ingredients with the boiling water in 3 shifts mixing into the initial mixture.
3. Divide into paper cases and cook for 18-20mins.
4. Meanwhile melt the dark chocolate in a pan slowly and set aside to cool. Whisk the double cream with the malt powder to create stiff peaks.
5. In a seperate bowl, whisk the cream cheese and sugar, then mix in the melted chocolate and add this to the double cream malt.
6. Use a palette knife to swirl onto cooled cupcakes.

Churrrrrrrrrrros

So I haven't posted for a while because I have been in Tel Aviv this week.
Definitely can't be fucked to actually bake out here because realistically its a treck and other people's kitchens make me uncomfortable.
Like my boyfriend Tyson's house, his mum is a serious pro and makes loads of bread and stuff and all her ingredients are intimidating. Not that it really stops me.
My favourite place to bake is Tally's house.
This is Tally:

The general routine at Tally's is that she phones me up telling me she wants to bake, and then we either both fuck it up or she watches and laughs and gets distracted. She also likes to do things 'the scouse way' where you put a cake in a saucepan. Special one she is.

Anyway, Tel Aviv is standardly gorgeous and this is the longest I've ever gone out here without losing my bikini top on the beach. It's probably because Rob Lawee hasn't arrived yet.
The first time I got assaulted in this way it resulted in me freaking out and getting salt water in my eyes. At which point of course I got a leg cramp and started sinking titanic style as an elderly Israeli man touched himself nearby.

I've been with Shier in her amazing place out here and we've spent the majority of the time trying to retaliate all the 30 year old suitors pursuing her. The problem is that she is too nice. Today as a creepy guy texted her she was nice enough to give a simple response. When I got texted by a creep, I immediately told him to suck my dick. We balance eachother out well.

I just got back from La Mer, and for those who don't know Tel Aviv it's a place where 14 year olds go to get drunk. It is pretty nice there though, minus the minors.
I just came back feeling all sandy and it hit me how much i crave my Soap & Glory. Anyone who doesn't know what that is is mad. It's brilliant, not just because of the puns.
Here's what every girl should own and use on the daily:

1.  Clean on Me

God send if you fancy the softest skin in the entire world. Smells so good, so creamy.

2. The Breakfast Scrub

They say on the side of the tin 'do not eat'. You would think they're joking but it takes a serious amount of restraint not to eat this. It smells like granola and honey and happiness. My sister tried to eat it because she was that kid at nursery who ate the play dough and hasn't grown out of it yet.

3. No Clogs Allowed

Anyone that knows me knows I don't really have spot prone skin BECAUSE I'M A FUCKING GODDESS. Jokes. But spotty or not this stuff feels so good. It's self heating and exfoliating and you don't have the worry of drowning while washing your face because it has a cute little sponge thing to sort your life out.

It's probably about time I stop bullshitting and actually talk about food because realistically that's what you're here for. To stare at food. And not read what I'm saying.
So let's talk CHURROS.

Churros are fantastic, and this kind are little bite sized ones. They're surprisingly really easy to make and a massive crowd pleaser. Whenever my boyfriend and his friends come over for a bun up it's the ideal snack, mostly because they get so excited by the dipping.
See here they are:

N'aww.

So here's how you make churros:

Vegetable oil for frying

1 cup water

1 stick (4 ounces) butter

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted

3 eggs & 2 egg whites

For dusting:

3 tablespoons of cinnamon and sugar, mixed

Prepare to fry the churros by heating about 1 1/2 inches of oil in a deep pan.  The oil should be about 360 degrees F.

To make the dough, bring the water, butter, cinnamon and salt to a rolling boil in a 3-quart saucepan.  Stir in the flour all at once.  Reduce the heat to low and stir vigorously until the mixture forms a ball, about 1 minute.  Remove the pan from the heat.

Let the batter sit for 5 minutes to cool.

When it’s warm (not hot) to the touch, add one egg at a time. Keep stirring until the mixture comes together and is smooth.  (You can do this in a mixer with a paddle attachment if you’ve already had your daily workout.) Note: Since it was way too dry for me, I added 2 egg whites. It was then perfect.

Spoon the mixture into a piping bag fitted with a large star tip.  Have sterilized scissors on hand.  Hold the bag over the hot oil, squeeze a strip of dough about 1 inches long, snip it with the scissors and let it drop into the oil.  Fry 10 to 12 balls at a time, turning once, until golden brown, about 2 minutes on a side.  Drain on paper towels.  Roll the churro tots in the sugar/cinnamon and serve immediately.  These are really best minutes after they’ve been fried.

Serve with whipped cream and/or melted chocolate.

Red Velvet & Cream Cheese Brownies

This week has been very hectic, and so I actually haven't been able to bake at all.
When I say at all, I mean I only managed to make brownies.

Monday was my standard routine of going to Tiger Tiger, quite possibly the perviest club in London. Except this time we celebrated Ariella's belated birthday/leaving to Israel, which was important because it meant free shots from her hot parents.

It was as pervy as ever, so when Nicole Scherzinger's foul song 'Right There' came on and the slag sung 'come on baby put your hands on my body' this creep that looked like one of the Desperate Housewives murderers started feeling me up. I explained to him that the song wasn't to be taken literally. He moved on to the girl next to me. Classy lad.

The rest of the week was filled up by seeing my boyfriend, Tyson Beckford, before he goes off to Thailand or wherever he said he was going. I assume Thailand because that's where all my sister's boyfriends go when they inevitably leave/turn gay.

This seems to be a pattern in our family as I spent the other night listening to my ex talk about his break up with Jesse. (Don't be optimistic and think 'Jessie the Cowgirl'...not quite...more Jesse the guy dressed up like a red indian for the Village People party they attended recently)

You thought I was joking. Either way we hate Jesse. He's a liar.

So since then we've had results day, which has been stressful as shit. I magically got all A's in English and Classics which I keep having to double check, while art literally fucked me.
To be fair I have my teacher Valerie to thank, even though she laughs at me every single lesson when I say something retarded she is a pretty great teacher.
Unlike our other teacher who doesn't need to be named who spent an entire lesson with us gossiping about plastic surgery while eating a sandwich...
The day was emotional but made me really proud of lots of my friends, especially Essie Buckman, Shier Ziser, Ariella Wagerman, , Matt Kuber, Nechama Harris, Toni Enright, and Natalie Barber - all fucking geniuses.
Probably a lot more too, my favourite is because they're way too down to earth for anyone to know they're so clever. Matt not so much.

It was a very nice day, and my parents got out the gin and tonic to celebrate. Although I'm pretty sure it wasn't in honour of me...because it was 6pm and therefore officially happy hour anyway.

SO BACK TO TODAY.
I'm going to Tel Aviv tomorrow FINALLY.
I've been in London so long that they tried to set it on fire to make me leave.
Its all very exciting because I'm going to stay with Shier and her two brothers Lamar and Simba.
I've also been super duper cool enough to download the BA app to track my boarding pass. Ultimate neb.

I need to pack and I totally can't be fucked. If it wasn't for going away tomorrow I would probably be high and baking a cake while listening to Otis Redding. Basically an ideal morning.
Instead, I'm sitting around waiting for my ridiculously excessive Boots order to arrive with all my holiday non-essentials.
In the mean time, I'll share with you the brownies I made mid-week. They're amazing.



Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 2-oz dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 tsp red food coloring
• 2/3 cup all purpose flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 8-oz cream cheese, room temperature
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Butter the bottom and sides of a 8 inch metal baking pan. Put a long piece of parchment paper in the bottom of the pan, letting the parchment extend up two sides of the pan and overhang slightly on both ends. (This will make it easy to remove the bars from the pan after they have baked.) Butter the parchment.

In a small, heatproof bowl, melt butter and chocolate together. Stir until combined and very smooth. Set aside to cool for a few minutes.

In a large bowl, whisk together sugar, eggs, vanilla extract and red food coloring. Add chocolate mixture and stir until smooth. Add flour and salt and stir until just combined and no streaks of dry ingredients remain. 

 

Pour into prepared pan and spread into an even layer. To prepare cheesecake mixture, beat cream cheese, sugar, egg and vanilla extract in a medium bowl until smooth. Distribute the cheesecake mixture in 8 dollops over batter in the pan.

Swirl in with a knife or spatula.Bake for 35-40 minutes, until brownies and cheesecake are set. A knife inserted into the cheesecake mixture should come out clean and the edges will be lightly browned.

Let cool completely in pan on a cooling rack before lifting out the parchment paper to remove the brownies.

The Ugly-Sexy Cheesecake

My sister AND THEO'S 'ugly-sexy' principle is vital to life.
 You probably haven't realised it yet, but there will always be a handful of people out there who fulfil all your ugly-sexy needs.

I'll explain myself.

Say you're out at a club, and you see this guy from across the room.
First of all you think 'shit, he is ugly' but then it becomes blindingly apparent that he is so sexy that you want to live inside his skin like an ugly-sexy onesie.

The point is, these are the guys (and girls) that have a certain sex appeal about them totally untarnished by their looks.
 You're totally drawn to their personality, or voice, or just want to make a bagjob out of them.

For those of you who are still lost (or have closed the page because you wanted cake and you're getting the rantings of an insane person), here are some examples of ugly-sexy people:

1. Professor Snape

...Yeah you would.

2. Lady Gaga

Let's be honest, her face is a bit weird. But you would probably let her take a ride on your disco stick or what have you..

3. Scar

Enough said.

So I think you get my point.

Now this cheesecake is the epitome of ugly-sexy.

It looks like shit. Like genuinely it's so ugly. But...it's sexy.

You know you want to taste it, and when you do it's AMAZING.

It has fucking oreos in it man. OREOS. Oreo's only make life better. Fact.

There is only one thing better in life than oreos. And that is oreos and milk.

This cheesecake however is even better.

Here's how it's done:

1. Put a packet of oreos in a ziplock and mash the shit out of it

2. Stir them into 2 spoonfuls of melted butter in a bowl and then press into a springform pan.

3. Pick your favourite cheesecake recipe (you're not allowed mine, remember)

4. Roughly chop half of another packet of oreos and stir them into the cheesecake mix. Bake as usual.

5. Await ugly-sexy godliness.

P.S. Don't literally go all American Pie and have sex with the cheesecake. It's disrespectful. You should honour and accept a cake's boundaries and religious beliefs. Except for bundt cake...that just seems called for.  

White Chocolate Carrot Cake

For those of you that follow me on facebook, you'll know how I feel about this whole 'riot' situation.
I think it's very important to articulate both sides of an argument in a calm and detailed, nonbiased fashion when dealing with these sorts of affairs.
I feel that I conveyed this powerfully over the weekend:

Honestly though, the fact that people can have such little respect for the place they live in and the people they live amongst really says a lot about how far society has regressed.
The whole thing was just a little too Lord of the Flies for me, except with a little less of a homosexual undertone...

I feel like it's safe to say it's over so I can FINALLY go out tonight again, even if it is with Toni Enright.
We've been so bored staying in all this time, we ended up sending eachothers pictures to a TV dating line. 
And unfortunately have been recieving things to this effect all day...

Awkward..
CARROT CAKE
I have once again decided to dedicate a cake to one of my hair faux pas. 
You can only imagine the damage I'm about to show you from the title. 

Shit got crazy. It was the first time I understood what it was to be told you have no soul. (actually that's not true, but we're talking hair wise here)

Anyhow, carrot cake seems fitting for this one. Because I looked like a big fat carrot cake.

RECIPE

Ingredients:

300 soft light brown sugar

3 eggs

300ml sunflower oil

300g plain flour

2tsp baking powder

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp vanilla extract

300g carrots, grated

Cream cheese frosting

100g white chocolate, melted

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Mix the sugar eggs and oil, then slowly add the flour baking powder and spices.

2. Stir in the grated carrots, pour into prepared caked tins.  Cook for 20/25mins.

3. Mix up icing sugar, butter, cream cheese and milk, varying quantities until smooth and thick. Add the melted chocolate as well as some cinnamon and nutmeg.
4. Using a palette knife, sandwich the two cooled cake layers together and frost with the cream cheese frosting.

 Decorate as desired!