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Gluten Free Yeast-Raised Donuts with Margarita Cheesecake Filling

Gluten Free Yeast-Raised Donuts that are crazy delicious! That’s right, these donuts are yeast-raised, fluffy and just as delicious as their gluten-filled sisters – and I will talk you through all the easy steps to get perfect gluten free yeast-raised donuts every time, with only a 30 minutes rising time! If that wasn’t good enough already, they have a margarita cheesecake filling and are rolled in lime sugar. Totally yummy, easy and perfect for Cinco de Mayo.

Plus a FREE printable cheat sheet to help you in the kitchen!

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Gluten Free Yeast-Raised Margarita Cheesecake Donuts - fluffy, delicious and so easy! This amazing recipe also includes all my tips on how to make perfect gluten free yeast-raised donuts every time. Plus a FREE cheat sheet printable! - a donut with a bite taken out of it, showing the fluffy inside

Y’all, I love donuts. Is there anybody who doesn’t love donuts. And look, I love cutting down on some calories with baked donuts as much as the next guy but if I’m having a serious donut craving it’s gotta be deep fried or it just won’t cut it. Since developing a gluten intolerance, real fried donuts have felt pretty much off limits. I mean, how often do you see gluten free donuts in a bakery? And adding the gluten free challenge to the yeast beast? Gah, scary, right?! Well, that’s what I thought.  But I’m happy to admit I was very wrong!

Gluten Free Yeast-Raised Margarita Cheesecake Donuts - fluffy, delicious and so easy! This amazing recipe also includes all my tips on how to make perfect gluten free yeast-raised donuts every time. Plus a FREE cheat sheet printable! - close up of a donut

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Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Covered Strawberry Easter Chicks

These adorable Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Covered Strawberry Easter Chicks are the most fun treat you’ll make this Easter! They’re quick and easy to make, and kids will love helping too! Oh, and they’re totally yummy and naturally Gluten Free of course.

These adorable Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Covered Strawberry Easter Chicks are the most fun treat you’ll make this Easter! They’re quick and easy to make, and kids will love helping too! Oh, and they’re totally yummy and naturally Gluten Free of course.

I’m really not a fan of holidays that change date each year, y’know why? Because I am a disorganised mess and I forget it about. So yup, I have left my Easter recipe until the last minute! I know, I know, I can’t really blame the change of date since it’s not exactly a secret. I mean, in theory we can know every Easter until the end of time – for example, did you know that Easter Sunday in the year 2100 will be on March 28th ? – mark your calendars now! Yet, I am using the changing date of Easter each year as an excuse for why I am posting my Easter treat recipe with less than two weeks to go – and I’m sticking to it!

These adorable Nutella Stuffed Chocolate Covered Strawberry Easter Chicks are the most fun treat you’ll make this Easter! They’re quick and easy to make, and kids will love helping too! Oh, and they’re totally yummy and naturally Gluten Free of course.

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Chocolate and Hazelnut Macarons

Amazing Chocolate and Hazelnut French Macarons that are made with ground hazelnuts and filled with a Nutella ganache. With my step by step photo guide, you’ll be able to make these delicious, chewy meringue cookies too!

Chocolate and Hazelnut Macarons with Step By Step Photo Guide by Giraffes Can Bake - French Macarons made with ground hazelnuts and filled with a nutella ganache

After my many, many struggles with making macarons, I now really enjoy making them! With all the rules you’re supposed to follow and all the scary stories lots of people will tell you about the horror of macaronage, they can seem very daunting. But once you’ve learned all the tips and tricks and, most importantly, figured out what works for you – you’ll be able to impress everybody with your awesome macarons! In this post I not only have a delicious Chocolate and Hazelnut Macaron recipe for you, but I’m sharing all the tricks I’ve picked up along my journey of learning to make these misunderstood cookies with you – including photos for those of you who are more visual like me! As you might imagine, this is gonna be a long one – but once we’re done, I’m hoping you’ll feel much more confident in macaron making – no matter your baking experience! So hold on to your butts, let’s get started!

Chocolate and Hazelnut Macarons with Step By Step Photo Guide by Giraffes Can Bake - French Macarons made with ground hazelnuts and filled with a nutella ganache

 

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Spider-Man Toffee Apples

spider-man toffee apples

Okay, I have a confession to make – I hate halloween! There, I said it! Don’t throw rocks at me, please! I actually love all the festivities surrounding Halloween, the dressing up, the parties and of course, the baking, but I have this one extreme phobia that ruins the whole holiday for me! That doesn’t mean I can’t take part in the baking fun though, so enter these toffee apples!

spider-man toffee apples

Halloween isn’t all that big in the UK anyway, kids do trick or treat and there’s the odd party, but it’s definitely no where near the scale you find in the US! It’s crazy how much those guys get into the spirit of Halloween, I love it. Or, I would, if I could celebrate Halloween in any way other than hiding in my house until it’s all over! Toffee apples aren’t just a halloween treat, here in the UK we serve them up on Bonfire Night too. 

spider-man toffee apples

 

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Piñata Cake

Yummy cake with a hidden surprise!

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It’s been a while since my last blog post, I’d love to tell you it’s because I’ve been super busy but really I’m just lazy. I’m currently in Atlanta celebrating the holiday season. I celebrated my first Thanskgiving this year, it was a lot of fun, you can’t beat a holiday where all you do is eat! I made my Sweet Potato & Cider Cupcakes with Marshmallow Frosting for the occasion. Anyway, back to the task at hand.

My nephew’s 6th birthday was coming up so naturally I planned to make him a cake. He loves Mario so I went with a Mario world themed base and a coin block on top. As it’s a coin block there has to be coins inside, and so I made my first piñata cake! It’s a simple thing to do but looks really impressive when you cut into the cake. Kids will love it too of course. In this blog post I’ll show the method I used, so there are no recipes in this post. I plan to share my Chocolate Mojito Swiss Roll recipe soon (I just need to go through it again as I didn’t write it down the first time, oops) so look out for that, it’s a good one!

This method will work with most cakes. This one is a cube of course, but it’ll work with a standard round cake too (or any shape if you’re committed enough!). The first thing to do is bake your cake layers, you want the cake to be tall enough to be able to have a good sized centre for the sweets/chocolates, my cake had three layers so I’ll be basing this tutorial off of that. Once your layers are baked and cooled, cut a circle out of the centre of one layer and then circles out of half the other two layers. Feel free to eat the cut offs, you deserve it!

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For the centre layer, you want the hole to go all the way through

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For the top and bottom layer, you don’t want the hole to go all the way through

Now it’s time to fill and build it. Frost the bottom layer, being careful to avoid the hole cut out, then place the centre layer on top

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Fill the whole with your chosen sweets. Mine was filled with chocolate coins and smarties.

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Frost/fill that top layer, again avoiding the hole and top up with more sweets

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Add the top layer and you have your base for your fancy piñata cake.

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It looks like just a normal cake, but you know the secret inside!

Now crumb coat and frost/cover your cake as you would normally. Present your cake and accept all the praise you get for how impressive and clever you are!

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The finished cake! As you can see, my cake decorating skills still need some work but I’m getting better!

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The birthday boy and his cake!

Of course with a piñata you’re supposed to whack it with a stick to get the sweets inside. I wouldn’t recommend that with a cake, unless you cover the room with plastic first haha!