Brown Sugar & Pecan Caramel Bundt Cake

by giraffescanbake // June 13, 2014 // 61 Comments

Oh my god you guys, Oh. My. God. It’s is Fiesta Friday #20 and I have brought something really special! This brown sugar & pecan caramel pound cake, it is amazing. You NEED to try it. It’s a pound cake but it’s so, so light and moist, and the brown sugar combined with the toffee and caramel is to die for. I will be making this cake again, several times.

Leah’s mum has been asking me to make her this cake for a while now after she saw a photo of one on Facebook and I finally got around to doing it for her. I wish I hadn’t waited so long, so many missed opportunities to enjoy this cake. Luckily for me I made enough batter for two bundt tins so I got to have one too!

There is a lot of sugar in this cake, mostly brown sugar. And it has chopped pecans nestled inside and lots of yummy heath toffee bits! Then it’s topped with a very generous helping of caramel sauce. So much sweet, caramel flavour in this cake it’s like heaven… and definitely not for the health nuts! But everyone deserves a treat every now and then right?

Father’s day is this weekend too, and if this isn’t a perfect father’s day cake I don’t know what is! Who needs hallmark when you have this much caramel to indulge in!

And the best part? It’s so easy to make! You just beat the butter, cream it with the sugar, beat in the eggs and add the dry ingredients and the milk. Stir in your pecans and toffee and bake! Then the caramel sauce is just as easy to make, just heat the condensed milk with sugar, whisk in the butter and vanilla and you’re done. You want to pour on the caramel sauce while it’s still hot as it does harden a little as it cools.

I’m not sure what else I can say about this cake that isn’t just me gushing about how much I love it! So instead I’ll let you guys try it out for yourselves. It is Fiesta Friday after all, this week’s is co-hosted by Fae and Suzanne so make sure you go check them out! And, of course, a big thanks to Angie for bringing us this wonderful party every week!

I recently updated this recipe with new photos and made it gluten free, make sure you check it out here!

[recipe title=”Brown Sugar & Pecan Caramel Pound Cake”]
Ingredients

For the cake:

1 1/2 cups butter, softened
2 cups light brown sugar, packed
1 cup caster sugar
5 large eggs, room temperature
3 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup whole milk
1 bag heath toffee bits (8oz)
1 cup pecans, roughly chopped

For the caramel sauce:

1 can sweetened condensed milk (14oz)
1 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp butter
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Method

Preheat oven to 160C/325F. Grease your bundt pan(s) well.
Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl and set aside
Beat the butter until pale and creamy. Beat in sugars until fluffy.
Beat in the eggs one at a time until combined.
Add the flour mixture and milk alternatively, starting and ending with the flour. Beat until just combined.
Stir in the toffee bits and pecans.
Spoon batter into pans and bake for approximately 1 hour and 20 minutes, until skewer comes out clean. After 50 minutes of baking, lightly cover with foil to stop it browning too much at top. Leave to cool in pan for 10 minutes then transfer to wire rack.
While cake is cooling make the caramel sauce. In a medium saucepan, combined condensed milk and brown sugar and bring to the boil over a medium high heat, whisking often. Reduce heat and simmer for 8 minutes, whisking often. Remove from heat and whisk in butter and vanilla. Leave to cool for 5 minutes
Pour the caramel sauce over the cooled cake, you want to do this while the sauce is still hot as it hardens slightly as it cools.
Garnish with more pecan halves, serve

Notes:

Make sure you grease your pan well as this is a very moist cake and it can be a bit of a pain to coax out without breaking! I use this home made pan release and it’s great.
This cake is great eaten right after you’ve added the sauce, when it’s all warm and gooey (be careful the sauce isn’t too hot, don’t want any burned tongues!)
This recipe will make one 12 cup bundt pan cake, or almost two 6 cup bundt pan cakes (I had one slightly smaller one)
Store in an airtight container for 3-5 days

[/recipe]

Devil’s Food Cake

by giraffescanbake // March 30, 2014 // 12 Comments

Happy Mother’s Day everybody!

Today is Mother’s Day in the UK and to celebrate I made my mum a yummy devil’s food cake, complete with fresh whipped cream, chocolate ganache and chocolate truffles! If you’re gonna do chocolate, you may as well go all out! This recipe will be for the devil’s food cake, you can pair it with whatever you like of course (white cloud frosting is an excellent pairing)!

I got this recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction, and I can tell you right now I didn’t change a thing! I adore her blog and all of her recipes (her cookbook is on my wish list on amazon too!), you should definitely check her out.

This recipe calls for a cup of strong, hot coffee. Coffee is one of those things that brings out the flavours in chocolate, you add it to your chocolate cake recipe and instantly you’ve intensified your chocolate goodness! This is actually the first time I’ve added coffee to chocolate cake, which is terrible I know, but I have this crazy aversion to coffee I violently hate it. And although I knew in theory that I wouldn’t be able to taste the coffee, I was convinced I would be able to! Of course, I couldn’t taste it at all in this cake and I’m now cursing myself for being such a baby and not doing this sooner. This cake is so rich and fudgy and just delightful, everything a devil’s food cake should be!

I said above that I didn’t change anything in this recipe and there’s good reason for that. Every single ingredient is perfectly matched with what you want this cake to come out like. The oil makes it lovely and moist, butter would only distract from the deep chocolate flavour. You want to use natural unsweetened cocoa for this cake, do not use dutch processed or the bicarb won’t react with the cocoa and you won’t get that gorgeous reddish tint and that distinctive flavour. And if you take away the buttermilk you won’t get such a moist crumb (Sally said to trust her on that and I did!). Then of course without the coffee that chocolate certainly won’t hit you so hard. All that’s left are your sugar, flour and eggs – you of course need the eggs to be room temperate as is true with pretty much any baking. If, like me, you always forget to take your eggs out of the fridge you can bring them to room temperature by letting them sit in warm to hot water for about 5 minutes.

This cake has a nice quick bake on it too, you definitely don’t want to over bake it and take away any of that moistness (count how many times I’ve said “moist” in this post!). Share the batter between two 9″ sandwich tins and bake for about 25 minutes or until your cake tester comes out clean. My cake is actually a 6″ as I made cupcakes out of it too! You can then fill and ice it with whatever you love with chocolate, my pairings definitely made it all that much richer but I think this cake would be great with milk chocolate frosting as Sally had it or even vanilla, yum!

This one’s for you mum, thanks for being the best mum ever! (and she enjoyed it very much!)

[recipe title=”Devil’s Food Cake”]

Ingredients

1 and 3/4 cups plain flour
1 and 3/4 cups caster sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (not dutch processed)
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
1 tps salt
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup freshly brewed strong hot coffee

Method

Preheat oven to 350F/170C. Grease and line two 9″ cake pans
Sift together the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, bicarb and salt and set aside
Combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs and vanilla using a stand mixer or hand mixer then gradually add the dry ingredients with the mixer on low. Add the coffee. You will have a very thin, water like batter – don’t worry, it’s supposed to be like that!
Pour the batter evenly between the tins and bake for approx 25 mins or until your cake tester comes out clean.
Leave to cool in pan for 5 minutes, then turn out on wire rack and leave to cool completely before filling and frosting

[/recipe]

Happy Birthday to Me!

by giraffescanbake // March 29, 2014 // 1 Comment

Yep, today is my birthday. I’m a little upset about creeping closer and closer to the big 3-0, but it’s nothing a little cake can’t fix!

That’s right, I did make my own birthday cupcakes, but that’s okay. Really it’s just an extra treat for me! These are some beautiful fudgy devil’s food cake cupcakes, but the recipe I’ll be sharing with you today is the devilishly sweet frosting on top. It’s called white cloud frosting and it tastes like marshmallow in frosting form! I won’t lie to you, I’m definitely more of a buttercream girl but this is still a yummy one! If you like your sweets teeth achingly sweet, this is definitely the one for you!

The sweetness of the frosting is a great compliment on the deeply chocolatey devil’s food cake too. Don’t worry, I will be posting the cake recipe tomorrow. Two posts in one weekend, I’m going wild I know! But tomorrow is Mother’s Day here in the UK and I will be making my mum a special devil’s food cake with fresh whipped cream for the occasion! So you won’t have to wait long if you want to pair these two beauties together like I did!

This frosting doesn’t contain any butter or icing sugar, it’s sweetened with syrup and of course the meringue like texture comes from whipped egg whites. Most recipes you find online will call for corn syrup, that’s not something we have much of in the UK so I used golden syrup. You could also use maple syrup or liquid glucose. I used liquid glucose in my first batch, which failed miserably because I have a really terrible stand mixer (if anybody wants to donate me a kitchenaid or other decent stand mixer, please feel free!!) I used up all my glucose in the first lot, so the second batch I used golden syrup. I was worried I would lose the bright white colour you want with this frosting, but while it was slightly golden at first it went white once it was finished!

It’s nice and quick to whip up too, especially compared to my fave – swiss meringue buttercream. You beat egg whites until foamy and then slowly add a little caster sugar, beating until soft peaks form. Then you boil the syrup and pour into the egg whites and beat until stiff peaks form. The heat of the syrup will cook the egg whites enough so you don’t have to worry about raw eggs in your frosting! Then just stir in vanilla and you’re done! This recipe makes enough to frost about 12 cupcakes, it doesn’t keep very well so you want to use it all up! Don’t be shy with that frosting!

Today I don’t think I’ll do much else but eat cake and drink some wine. I think I’ll cook up some black bean and kale burgers too! I’m getting boring in my old age, I know!

[recipe title=”White Cloud Frosting”]
Ingredients

2 egg whites, at room temperature
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup golden syrup
1 tbsp pure vanilla extract

Method

In a clean, dry bowl beat the egg whites and salt on a high speed until foamy. You’ll want to use a stand mixer if possible, but I used a hand mixer with my second batch and it works just fine (you just might get a bit of arm ache!)
While the mixer is running, slowly add the sugar. Beat until it forms soft peaks.
Put the syrup in a small saucepan and bring to the boil over a medium heat. Once its come to boil, remove from heat. While the mixer is running on high, slowly pour the syrup into the egg mixture (be careful, the last thing you want is boiling syrup on your skin – trust me!). Beat the mixture until stiff peaks form, this will take about 5 minutes.
Add the vanilla and stir to combine.
Use the frosting right away. Add sprinkles asap as a thin layer will form and your sprinkles won’t stick (and what’s a birthday cake without sprinkles?)

[/recipe]
Have a great day, I’ll see you all tomorrow!

Happy Valentine’s Day

by giraffescanbake // February 15, 2014 // 4 Comments

Why have one Valentine’s cake when you can have three!

I bought some super cute Wilton heart pans, they’re only 4″ across but they make for super adorable little heart cakes which are perfect for valentine’s day. Or, if you prefer, “I love me” day! Plus they were only $10 in Target!

I made these for my best friend/other half. I have a terrible track record of messing up cakes I make for her (there’s a certain Mondrian birthday cake we do not talk about) but these turned out really great looking and taste just as good!

All three are the same flavour, I did consider making three different flavours but who has the time for that in one day! They’re chocolate and hazelnut, one of my favourite flavours ever (and also the flavour she chose). Don’t give me access to a jar of nutella and a spoon because the whole thing will be gone in a day! Yum, yum, yummy!

These are my fave chocolate cake recipe with chocolate hazelnut ganache and chocolate hazelnut swiss meringue buttercream. Seeing as I did all three the same flavour, I got creative with the decorating. The first is the Ferrero Rocher cake, the sides are covered with chocolate hazelnut SMBC and chopped hazelnuts and then topped with chocolate hazelnut ganache. There are also a few ferrero rochers hiding inside the cake too!

The second is filled with the SMBC and ganache, then covered in SMBC. Then I surrounded it with Cadbury’s Chocolate Fingers and topped it with V Day themed M&M’s. I know this design has been done by everybody and their mother, but it’s one of my favourite designs and one I’ll never get tired of (There’s a two tier cake I did last month with chocolate fingers that I’ve not shared with y’all yet and it’s one of my favourites!). Besides, cadbury fingers are like crack, how could you ever get bored of them?!

The last is my least favourite. It’s filled with the SMBC and ganache and then decorated with the SMBC in kind of roses. The problem I had here was I was using a large open star nozzle to do the roses (I’m currently in Atlanta so don’t have all my decorating supplies to hand) which is doomed to fail considering the cake is only a 4″! Plus it was snowing and icy outside so the heating was nice and high, giving me a very unworkable buttercream, with the amount of butter there is in SMBC working in warm temperatures is never easy!

I also made some cupcakes to go with them because why not! There’s a lot of cake in this apartment right now (such a horrid problem to have, I know!). I’m gonna do a full post on the cupcakes with the recipe (which I used for all three cakes and the cupcakes) next week. For now here’s a taster:

I hope you all have a lovely Valentine’s Day! If you’re not celebrating it or hate it, then I hope you have a happy Friday with lots of love and happiness! If you’re single today, please don’t be sad about it, go out and buy yourself something nice because you are fab and you deserve it! And whether or not you’re in a relationship, treat somebody you love to something nice, even if it’s just some nice words or some novelty chocolate, while I agree you should love and appreciate those you care about all year round today is a great day to spoil them a little extra 🙂 Have a great day my lovelies, I’ll see you next week!

More chocolately goodness on Giraffes Can Bake that you might like:

Welcome to the World, Thing 1 and Thing 2

by giraffescanbake // January 21, 2014 // 2 Comments

In the early hours of this morning my sister gave birth to twins! So I baked some cupcakes to celebrate (naturally).

And how could I bake anything other than Dr Seuss Thing 1 and Thing 2 cupcakes? I had the idea for these a while ago after seeing something similar on the internet and I’ve just been counting down the days until I could do it!

I had a bit of a struggle with these as I either needed red cake or red cases. And since I couldn’t find red cases for love nor money, it had to be red cake, which naturally means red velvet, my fave! The problem here being that I also didn’t have any red food colouring! For those of you experienced with red velvet you’ll know that the original red colour comes from the reaction between the cocoa powder and acidic ingredient (usually white vinegar of some kind), but to get a garishly bright red that most of us are used to when it comes to red velvet, you also need a ton of red food colouring. I somehow managed to get a nice good red colour from just the cocoa and vinegar plus some ruby sugarflair gel colouring (which is a dark pink) and a very tiny amount blue food colouring (thanks to my colour theory expert of a best friend for that tip!). While organising my cake decorating supplies later today I discovered I did have red food colouring after all, I guess that’s what I get for not organising that stuff sooner!

I’m not gonna give you the red velvet recipe today as I was on a bit of an improvisation with this one, I also made my own buttermilk, this was a strictly “only use what I already have in the house” project!. When I finally write up a red velvet recipe (and I will, it’s my favourite cake) I’ll let you know how to make your own buttermilk too, a quick google will help you out there in the meantime though.

But what is red velvet without cream cheese frosting, right? And that’s the recipe I’m going to give you today. I’m a huge fan of cream cheese frosting, it’s my absolute favourite and I pretty much love it however it comes. But sometimes I find it can be a bit heavy with too much sweetness and not enough tangyness (totally a word), which is why I love this recipe. It’s really light and creamy and the small amount of sugar really lets the cream cheese shine through! Plus it’s still stiff enough to pipe.

So, this one’s for you T1 and T2. This is your Aunty Michelle’s way of welcoming you into this crazy world

[recipe title=”Cream Cheese Frosting” servings=”” time=”15 mins”]

Ingredients

230g full fat cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
60g icing sugar, sifted
160ml cold double cream*

Method

Beat the cream cheese until smooth
Add vanilla and sugar and beat until combined and smooth
Using a whisk attachment, add the cream a little at a time and whip until frosting is thick and ready to pipe
Add more sugar or cream to adjust consistency if necessary

*Note – make sure you use a double cream with at least 35% fat content and one that you know whips well. If you’re not using a good whipping cream then your frosting will not thicken up properly.

[/recipe]