White Chocolate and Cranberry Cookies

 My essays have been handed in, a brand new pad of paper opened and the locations of my lectures have been ascertained.  On the wave of these triumphs I indulged in my first baking project of 2012.

I recently discovered something about myself which I had missed for years.  Occasionally the suggestion would spring to mind, but I would ignore it, not daring to believe it could be true.  However, I cannot lie to myself any longer: I love cranberries.  I love them with brie and bacon; I love them in those ‘Eat Natural’ bars with the light blue wrappers; I love them with chocolate.  What I do not like them in is juice, and it was this which put me off of trying them for so long.

 While I was perusing my recipe books over Christmas, dreaming of one day having time to put down a book and pick up a mixing bowl, one recipe kept catching my attention.  It was in The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days and was accompanied by a glossy picture of large, American-style white chocolate and cranberry cookies wrapped in ribbon.  The combination of chewy cookie, sweet white chocolate and strong, fruity cranberry suck in my mind and now, finally free from the clutches of deadlines, I decided to provoke some Christmas memories and try them out.

I do not have a very good record with cookies.  While I will happily play salmonella roulette and risk eating the mixture from the bowl (not something I would recommend, by the way), I am paranoid about exposing anyone else to this by giving them something which has been undercooked.  As such, my cookies are generally overdone and crunchy rather than golden and chewy.  However, I was determined that I would break this curse.

The dough turned out to be very thick; it resembled the cookie dough that is sold in tubes in America, which I decided was probably the right idea.  Following the recipe, I rolled it into large balls containing about two tablespoons of mixture each and put six on a tray with enough space to allow them to spread out.  Peering through the oven door ten minutes later, I saw that a miraculous change had occurred: they had all sunk into, well, cookie-shaped cookies!  The timer went and I took out the first batch.  Cue a dilemma: did they really need to go back in, or was I being paranoid?  I put them back in and waited, tensely. 

Despite an agonising few moments while they were cooling, in which they seemed to be flopping around in an undercooked mess, they hardened up and – a Christmas miracle – were chewy and gooey in all the right places.  The cranberries and chocolate were delicious, particularly caked in cookie goodness, and my housemates, who become endearingly childlike in the face of free cookies, were delighted.

With the cookie curse broken, the Christmas muse offering a final helping hand before December and the cranberry having claimed its rightful place in my affections, it seems that this is the start of a beautiful friendship and, hopefully, a bright baking year.

Christmas Cupcakes

While the majority of my Christmas holidays were taken up with present-buying, Articulate and essays, I found some time to make some cupcakes for Christmas Day.  I wanted to use flavours which taste essentially of Christmas, so I chose the Gingerbread flavoured ones I made for the course Christmas dinner and some original Chocolate Log cupcakes.

Gingerbread Cupcakes

I used the same recipe from The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days but for some reason the mixture did not smell quite as ‘Deck the Halls’ as before.  Fortunately, the Christmas muse managed to get me before I dyed the icing bright red; equally as fortunate, Tom’s mum gave me some Christmas-shaped sprinkles to decorate the cakes with, and my grandma gave me the toppers.  I have never used toppers on cupcakes; I think I am naturally drawn to decorations which are edible and preferably made almost entirely of sugar.  However, these looked sweet and were kind of a souvenir which allowed people to have a small reminder of their cake while eating it too.

Chocolate Log Cupcakes

While I doubt the wisdom of adding mint to chocolate and carrot to cake, I have a strong and unwavering belief that chocolate added to more chocolate can only lead to good things.  As such, chocolate logs rank very highly with me.  Originally I intended to make a full-sized and traditional chocolate log (the size of a full-sized standard cake, not a full-sized log) but it seemed somehow more inventive to try and reproduce that distinctive taste in a miniature form.  It was time to see if chocolate logs and cupcakes were a winning team.

For the actual cake I used the chocolate cupcake recipe from The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days, as the vanilla cupcake recipe had worked so well in the mini birthday cakes.  While the cakes cooled off after baking, I mixed up the chocolate butter cream for the filling and the icing from the recipe in Love Food: The Cupcake.  I chose this particular book because the vanilla butter cream recipe produced beautiful, light icing and adding chocolate to this seemed like an exceptionally good idea.

Once the cakes were completely cool, I used a small, sharp knife to cut out a little well in the top of each cake.  Each hole had to be deep enough to contain a reasonable amount of filling, but not so deep that it went through the cake and made it split.  Once each had been filled, I replaced the part I had cut out and iced the cakes with a pallet knife.

I used the snowflake-shaped sprinkles to cover the cakes, as I thought the white looked nice on the brown.  I cut a chocolate Flake into sections about a centimetre long, dusted these with icing sugar and put them on the cake.  You may possibly be wondering why I did not dust the whole cake with icing sugar: I had already put the snowflakes on when the Christmas muse (here embodied by my mum) suggested this.  However, I still think they turned out rather nicely and tasted quite similar to the real thing, although next time I might try a solid chocolate topping.

The curse of the dessert struck again, and everyone was so full of potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, turkey and various other birds that no one could manage much dessert.  My granddad, dad and boyfriend managed a gingerbread one each, and my brother had a chocolate log.  Fortunately, Christmas is the best time of year to drag out celebrations, and over the next few days they were forced on various people in the spirit of good will.

Merry Christmas Gingerbread Cupcakes

As the Uni term drew to a rather early close, my course mates and I found ourselves so overwhelmed by festive cheer and goodwill that some kind of course Christmas fest seemed inevitable.  Sure enough, in stepped domestic goddess Sarah and the elf to her Mrs Santa, Olivia, and suggested a Christmas dinner.  Knowing that my cooking skills are limited, I thought the best I could offer would be a dessert.  For Christmas inspiration I turned to The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days, my new birthday book, and found Gingerbread cupcakes.  Although they sounded a bit strange, the prospect of two desserts in one was an offer I could not refuse and seemed in-keeping with Christmas generosity.  It is, after all, the thought that counts.

It turned out that these cupcakes require a lot of ingredients, including three types of spice, golden syrup and black treacle.  The kitchen smelt like a gingerbread house, which was delicious.  Once they had cooled, I mixed some cream cheese icing and waited for the Christmas muse to drop by and explain to me how to use the load of red, gold and silver edible glitter I had at my disposal.  I tried a few experiments, but the glitter was hard to control and I had no clear idea of what I was trying to do.  In the end, I mixed half of the gold into the icing and added a lot of red food dye.  Just as I set down the bottle of food dye and surveyed the 'happy red' icing, the Christmas muse suggested making snowy white snowman faces.  Sigh.  I carried on regardless, icing them with the red icing and my shiny new pallet knife (such an unappreciated tool unless one is without it), before melting some white chocolate and carefully spelling out ‘Merry Christmas’.  On closer inspection, the glitter had disappeared into the icing, suggesting that further work on the use of edible glitter may be a future project.  I put them on a tray and braved the cold and embarrassment of carrying a tray of cupcakes round the chilly streets.

Like fairies in a pantomime, Sarah and Olivia produced a delicious Christmas dinner, including four kinds of meat, homemade Yorkshire puddings (unheard of where I’m from), potato in three different forms and enough vegetables to supply a family of rabbits throughout the festive season.  With everyone full to bursting, it seemed that just as at my family birthday party the desserts would go unloved.  However, students are hungrier people than proper grown-ups, and gradually the cakes began to dwindle in numbers.  They did taste like gingerbread and the cream cheese and chocolate added a bit of sweetness.  Although the food colouring meant the icing was not as tasty as that which the Hummingbird recipe usually produces, it was not particularly noticeable.  I even managed to convince people to take them home, suggesting that the unusual combination of biscuit and cake was a success.

If you are looking for an original idea for a Christmas dessert, these work really well.  Just make sure you consult the Christmas muse about your decoration well in advance of adding any red food dye.

Flavour of the Month - December 2011

As the sound of advent calendars being opened for the first time could be heard across the country, everyone braced themselves for the official start of Christmas.  Although seasonal offerings have been sneakily popping into shops, radios and cinemas since about mid-October, we could now start enjoying the build up to the most wonderful time of the year.  Tree up, presents wrapped and cards written, the next job is what to make for dessert.  To help you with this important process, here are some of my favourite festive accessories to help you create your Christmas masterpieces.

Festive Cupcake Cases

Cheerful Christmas-themed cases are a necessity for any seasonal cupcake.  While cheerful snowmen may not be the most traditional aspect of Christmas, the light blue background and tumbling snowflakes go well with snowy white icing and add a touch of brightness to the red, green and gold of Christmas.

Buy the snowmen cases here.

Edible glitter

Vital in the creation of any mini Winter Wonderland, this edible glitter will add a touch of sparkle to your cupcakes and give the impression of snow.  It is also widely available in other colours, including red, gold and silver.

Buy the Snow White Magic Sparkles here and search the site for other colours.

Christmas cupcake toppers

Aside from all the fun, mince pies and general merriment, Christmas is one of the busiest times of year.  If you are just too busy searching for that perfect Christmas jumper for grandad and the ideal bubble bath for mum, invest in some ready-made cupcake toppers to polish off your Christmas treats.  These adorable penguins would go well with the snowman cases and snowy icing, but there are lots of different choices to go with.

Buy the penguins and search for others here.

Kenwood mixer

As much as I love snow, it is not a white Christmas I will be dreaming of this year.  If you have been a very good baker in 2011, you might be hoping Santa will slip one of these into your socking.  Looking hot in raspberry red, it even co-ordinates with the festive season.  Say goodbye to arm ache and showers of icing sugar and hello to elegantly waiting for your gorgeous gadget to do the hard work for you.

Check out this and other colours here.

Cupcake t shirt

If you want to share your love of cupcakes with the wider world you can be a proud ambassador in this colourful t shirt.  A must-have on any baker’s Christmas list, it won’t make your cakes taste better but you will look cool.

Buy it here.

Amazing Christmas cupcakes

Finally, for a real treat have a look at these beautiful Christmas-themed cupcakes.  Although I don’t think I could bear to eat the little cat or the slightly gormless but adorable penguin, let alone make them, they definitely inject some festive joy and provide some truly seasonal inspiration.  

View them in all their glory here.

Have a very Merry cake-filled Christmas!