As it is international cake day on Wednesday 26th November, I decided to share with you a new recipe I have fallen in love with. My adoration for this classic flavour combination came from my addiction to raspberry and white chocolate cookies as a child. Now baking with and eating the two together takes me back to shopping with my Nan and the innocence of childhood memories. I found a recipe online and tweaked it, as well as adding my own raspberry jam butter cream with a homemade raspberry sauce. Enjoy!
Ingredients:
250g soft butter
250g caster sugar
250g self raising flour
4 eggs
4-5 tbsp milk
100g white chocolate (chips or broken into small pieces)
raspberries (no quantity, I used about 2/3 small punnet)
Method:
Preheat the oven to 180C / 350F / Gas Mark 4
Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (see picture towards the end of the post)
Add and beat in the eggs one at a time, continue beating until some volume has been added
Gradually sift in the flour and fold in, then add the milk to loosen up the mixture slightly
Add the raspberries and white chocolate chips or pieces delicately so you don't knock the air out of the batter or destroy the raspberries. I suggest coating them in flour before adding to the mixture as this stops them sinking to the bottom of the cake during baking
Spoon into cake cases and bake for around 15 minutes or until golden (see pictures)
Decorate how you want, I used raspberry jam butter cream which is a small pack of butter with around 5-6 tablespoons of icing sugar and 2 teaspoons or raspberry jam, more if you want a stronger colour or flavour. The sauce was made with the leftover raspberries, 2 teaspoons of caster or granulated sugar and a splash of water, then strain to take the seeds out.
THIS is soft and fluffy
This is the colour my cakes went when they were done
So as you probably don't know, I'm rather partial to a weird holiday, and this is no exception. Yesterday (15/11/2014) was the 10th annual Guinness World Record day, where around 600,000 hopefuls try to break records and get their name into the infamous book that inspired me as a child (I'm not joking, I thought I could be the youngest person to write a cook book and walk to the North Pole simultaneously at one point).
I didn't get my name in the book, however, I did break a world record when I was younger. I think I was about 9 years old and a lot of schools in England decided to try and break the record for most people singing the same song at the same time (or something along those lines). Joss Stone and Lemar got involved and it was the most amazing thing that had ever happened. I didn't get to meet them but my 9 year old self felt a connection with them, shame neither of them are relevant anymore. Anyway, we all gathered into the school assembly hall and stood in rows, made sure we were singing at the right time, we had some guy in a suit from Guinness World Records there and we all belted out Lean On Me. Safe to say we broke the record, I can't remember any exact stats but I think it was mentioned in the 2005 book. I tried Googling it but nothing, it's been broken, kind of destroyed my dreams on this dreary Sunday morning.
It goes without saying that I know how important yesterday was to some people, because quite frankly, I still want individual recognition in that book. There is no I in team, but there are three in individual excellence.
In America, the largest high heeled shoe was unveiled by the brand Kenneth Cole. It measured 1.95m long and 1.85m tall, the highest shoes I own are around 6.5 inches, something tells me I couldn't walk in those. It was an okay shoe, I wasn't too impressed, it could have looked a lot classier.
I suppose it's in fashion and a big ass shoe isn't exactly going to look like it would if it was actually wearable, but honestly, that little one at the bottom isn't exactly my cup of tea either, I'll leave it at that.
So you get shoes in America and there were a few sports records broken too, and what do we get here in the UK? People dresses as penguins. Yesterday, on Queen's Walk, London, the record for the largest gathering of people dressed as penguins was broken. There were 373 people dressed as penguins and waddling around the capital yesterday. This actually happened:
Is it odd that for me, it was a proud moment to be British? Forget the 2012 Olympics, and the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, this is what I live for. A lot of people who decide to dress as penguins.
My favourite ever thing that has ever happened involving record breaking (apart from my record, of course) is Paramore's video for Ain't It Fun. If you haven't seen this, you need to! The video shows the three-piece band attempting to and breaking various weird and wonderful world records and then eventually breaking the record for setting the most records in a music video. The song is absolutely brilliant too! Watch it here:
I'd love to know if you have any ideas for a record I could try and set this time next year for my individual recognition. The weirder the better!
