Annie's Cakeville

 

Red Velvet cake is a type of cake that is usually bright-red, dark-red or reddish-brown in colour. It is traditionally prepared as a layer cake and topped with cream cheese or cooked Roux icing (this is also known as boiled milk icing). This icing is prepared by boiling 1 cup of milk and 3 tablespoons of flour until thick. It is then removed from the heat and allowed to cool below room temperature and then 1 cup of white sugar and 1 cup of butter beaten until creamy and pale is added to it and continuously beaten together until very fluffy. For the best result this icing should be beaten for a very long time.  The Red velvet cake gets its colouring either from the cocoa and vinegar reaction in it or the easiest way - from artificial food colouring which I used in this recipe.The Red velvet is one of my favorites as I like to layer it with ice-cream. Here is my recipe below. Enjoy! RED VELVET CAKE RECIPE Prep time: 45mins          ...

Peanuts otherwise called groundnuts are one of the healthiest foods in the world. They contain mono-saturated fats which is encouraged in heart-healthy diets. Studies have proven that peanuts are very heart-friendly, and also contain other nutrients that are heart healthy such as Niacin, Vitamin E, Folate, Manganese and Protein. Other studies have highlighted the numerous health benefits of peanuts and its key role in reducing the risk of coming down with many diseases e.g Stroke.  I LOVE PEANUTS , yes those words are in bold because I truly love peanuts and nuts in general. Never leave me alone with a bottle of peanuts at home or worse still a jar of PEANUT BUTTER. You will never meet them the same when you get back, (my fiancee can attest to this)   LOL. I always tell myself I will have just a scoop and I find out I just keep going back for more and can't tell  myself to stop. Not until the empty jar stares back at me, that I know its time to stop. Luckily am not so ...

   STEPS TO COLOURING  YOUR ICING Icing is used to decorate cakes and other pastries. Icing can be coloured into various colours of your choice e.g red, green, blue etc. Colouring Icing be it Butter-cream, Royal Icing or Fondant, is a very easy-to-do task and does not require any expertise. All you have to do is make sure you put in the right amount of colouring and adjust it if you want a darker shade of the colour but make sure you mix in different bowls if you want different colours in order not get the colours mixed up. There are two types of food colours or Icing colours that can be used, Powdered, Liquid or Gel colours. Powdered colours are very cheap and affordable but personally I don't like to use powdered colours because they easily clump together and extra energy is needed to make sure the powdered colour is well incoporated. When using liquid colours, care must be taken to avoid it from making the plain Icing from becoming watery. So little amount of liqu...

   Piping bags also known as icing bags or pastry bags are used to decorate cakes, cookies and other pastries.  They are readily available in baking stores but if one is not available in a case of emergency, then this easy-to-do step by step process will make your ordinary kitchen plastic bag come in handy. Want to find out how! read on...   HOMEMADE ICING BAG: DIY - ( Do- It- Yourself) Things you'll need:    Any plastic bag/Ziploc bag or any other resealable bag A pair of Scissors Coupler set Piping Tips  Icing (Butter-cream or Royal Icing) (it can be colored to your preference)   Procedure: Hold up your piping bag into a triangular position, cut a little tip off one of the triangular points.Make sure the cut is not too big as you can always trim off extra if it blocks off the opening of your coupler. Insert your coupler from the inside of the bag and if it doesn't fall out then it fits perfectly. You can trim ...

     Carrots are very good sources of  Vitamin B6 and Vitamin K which helps in blood clotting and controls bleeding. Carrots are root vegetables that contain B-carotene, which is partly metabolized into Vitamin A providing more than 100% of the recommended daily value per 100g of carrot.  Carrots are 88% water, 4.7% sugar, 0.2% fat, 2.6% protein and 1% ash. Carrots are used traditionally for cooking various cuisines, but can also be incorporated in baking. This inspired this recipe of mine and I hope you try it out and enjoy it as I did. Check out the recipe below.     CARROT CAKE  RECIPE Prep Time: 30mins  Cook Time: 1hr 30mins    Total Time: 2hrs  Ingredients   1 cup Butter (plus extra for greasing pan ) 1 cup Granulated sugar 2 cups Flour 1 Egg 1/3 cup Full cream Milk 1teaspoon Strawberry flavour (optional) 1 teaspoon Vanilla essence 5 medium-sized Carrots (grated with the largest par...

Chocolates they say are a girl's favorite (second to Diamonds, *winks) . This recipe is my special recipe for those who love to have a sweet indulgence. Hope you try it out! Enjoy reading. CHOCOLATE CAKE (Fudge cake) Prep time: 20mins                     Cook time: 1hr 10mins                       Total Time : 1hr 30mins Ingredients 1 cup Flour 1/2 cup Granulated sugar 1/3 cup Butter 2 tbsp Oil 1/3 cup Full cream milk 1 tbsp Dutch-processed unsweetened  cocoa powder ( see my previous post "the science of baking: concluding part" to learn more about this) 1 tbsp Browning 1/3 cup mashed Peanuts (optional or skip if you are allergic to nuts) 1 tbsp Baking powder 1 Egg   1 teaspoon Vanilla essence     Procedure:  Preheat your oven/pot ( see my post on "how to bake a cake without an oven" for directions) to 180 degrees Cel...

Corn is the other name for Maize especially in English-speaking countries such as mine. In Nigeria, corns are available within the mid-seasons of the year from June -August. They can be eaten roasted or boiled. Some cultures incorporate them into foods such as bean porridge. Chowing down on one yesterday, it hit me to incorporate it in a cake. And so began the quest to create my own corn cake recipe by just being experimental (being a science graduate, I love to experiment. LOL ). Here is the recipe, I hope you try it out and enjoy it as I and my family did! CORN CAKE RECIPE Prep Time: 20mins             Cook Time:1hr            Total Time: 1hr 20mins    Ingredients needed:  5 medium-sized ears soft-Fresh Corn 1 cup Butter (unsalted) 1/2 cup Granulated sugar 1 Tbsp Custard powder 1 cup All-purpose flour 1/3cup Corn flour 1/3 cup Full cream Milk 1 ts...

       As a beginner, here are some basic ingredients you will need to waltz your way through the process of cake baking.      ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS FOR BAKING, includes and is not limited to All -purpose Flour/ Self Raising Flour - APF can be used for a wide range of cake recipes and SRF for recipes that specifically require it. Choosing a good brand and sticking to it will help you achieve great result for your cakes. I personally love to use one of the best Nigerian brands (Golden Penny brand) and sometimes I go for an international brand (Mc Dougalls).  Granulated sugar/Brown sugar : For my granulated sugar I stick to my Nigerian brand (Golden penny) its well refined and gives me the result I want. You can choose whatever brand works for you. Brown sugar is found in many recipes for fudge cakes or chocolate cakes and choosing a good brands is a huge factor. Confectioner's sugar/Icing Sugar. This is one of the most important ing...

If you are new to cake baking, and looking for a guide to achieve your cake baking dream, this post will guide you to a successful start. Here is a list of tools you will need, most of them are quite cheap and affordable, and are readily available at your local or online store  12 ESSENTIAL TOOLS NEEDED 1. Measuring cups and spoon : these come in 1cup =250ml, 1/2cup=125ml, 1/3 cup=83mls,1/4cup= 62ml, 1/8 cup= 31ml. The spoons vary  also as 1Tablespoon, 1/2 Tablespoon, 1 Teaspoon, 1/2 Teaspoon etc. I prefer these to the calibrated measuring cups because with time due to wear and tear, the calibrations wipe off and so measurements can't be read accurately. These on the other hand lasts a lifetime because the measurement values are engraved on them. 2. Baking Pans/Muffin tins - The batter mixture is poured into these in order to bake the cake. Aluminum tins are mostly used because they are oven safe and retain their shape.  These can b...

BAKING SODA/POWDER These are classified as leavening agents. They are also very important ingredients in cake making as these serve as rising agents. Baking soda is pure sodium bicarbonate and it begins to act immediately upon mixing the ingredients, so recipes that call for baking soda needs to be baked immediately as failure to do this will result in a flat cake. Baking powder comprises of sodium bicarbonate, the acidifying agent, and also a drying agent (usually starch e-g corn-starch). It is readily available as single-acting baking powder  and double-acting baking powder.  The single-acting powders are activated by moisture, so recipes which include this product must be baked immediately after mixing. Double-acting powders on the other hand  react in two phases and can stand for a while before baking. In double-acting powders, gases are released at room temperature when the powder is added to the cake mixture, but most of the gas is released after the tempe...

FLOUR (contd): Kelly Stewart a Portland based food writer said in her kitchen chemistry article of 2009, that "the protein in flour, lends structure to baked goods". She went on to ask a baking instructor Peter Reinhart on the basics behind dough construction and he told her that two proteins are present in flour called - glutenin and gliadin. When the water  is added to the flour, the proteins are drawn to each other thereby forming gluten. The flour used in cakes creates a less rigid gluten network and a finer crumb hence the reason for cakes being lighter than bread. In choosing the right flour to use, Kelly contacted a former Vanderbilt University biochemist, Shirley Corriher, an expert in the science of baking. She shared some tricks as to how to determine the right flour. "Measure 2 cups into a bowl and stir it with a scant cup of water. If you have a high protein flour, its going to suck in water like crazy and form a dough" she said. But a lesser prot...

                   Cooking and baking have been the traditional methods of food preparation since time immemorial before modern tools for measurements were invented. Grandmothers, great grand-mothers and the mothers before them have cooked and baked just by using their eyes, tongues and noses to feel for when the dough is well kneaded and the right time to get it out. They know when the dough feels and looks right.                    Which brings us to question whether there is really a need for precision and accuracy in measurements during baking as today we have to follow a recipe just as it is, with the right amount of this and that in order to get a good result.                                 In the home kitchen, there ar...

For people like me who happen to live in a country where power supply is epileptic, one has not to solely rely on electricity for one's daily activities.   This is especially essential for cake makers like me. So in a case where there is no electricity and one cannot afford to use a gas oven, we are made to find a way out - IMPROVISATION.  This baking without an oven technique came in handy many times as a cake maker while studying in the University and still does when I want to be very economical. You can still try it out if you have a cooker that has a non-functional oven or if you find yourself in a situation where  an oven is not readily available Here is how to bake a cake without an oven.  Things you'll need; 1. A kerosene stove or cooker 2. Aluminum Pot - it can vary in size depending on the size of cake. Cupcakes don't require large pots but larger cakes do. 3. Baking Pans ( Aluminum foil pans or cupcake tins or aluminu...

I thought to myself " how will I post one of my best baking experiences and not talk about my worst", that would be like telling the world that there is no worry in life. This is one of the worst cake making experiences I have had.. read on      It is said that in life one must go through good times and bad in other to be well grounded. The beauty of Gold is usually hidden in a thick black mass not until it has gone through fierce fire.   My cake making journey has been fun with disappointments and happy moments to grease it. I have made good cakes, great cakes and not so good cakes that most times whenever I am baking I say a silent prayer inside me. Its funny right, but its true.  The day started out beautiful as the sky was blue and  the day bright and sunny. I remember it so well as i was in a wonderful mood that morning, I was approached by a girl who was planning her birthday celebration later that day, she wanted it t...

       I decided to share this story as a sequel to how my journey to cake making started. I remember vividly like it was yesterday. It was a sunny day, bright and promising, as it was going to be the first day of the beginning of my cake making journey.       My first cake was a chocolate fudge cake( though I found out it was called this later in my baking career, LOL) it was made with crude tools but it was moist, crumbly and delicious to taste, it was PERFECT.         I was  in  my second year in the university at the time when  a friend (now a certified nurse) wanted to mark her birthday and whose love for cake was beyond this world.  She was in dire need of a cake and most of the cake makers in my hostel then had been booked. I can't remember how I got talking to her about her birthday cake, but I think I happened to bump into her on my way to the common room (this is where we bu...

       I believe everyone has got a hidden talent within and it takes a journey of self discovery to be able to  tap into it. As a girl growing up in a house where you are mostly alone, I read a lot and loved to draw, paint or decorate things. At a point I thought I was going to end up as an Architect or a Fashion designer, so it wasn't a huge surprise to me when I fell in love with baking cakes and decorating them.  My cake journey began when I was in my second year in the University about 5years ago,( check out my later post for my first cake making experience ) although I wasn't too serious with it until after graduating because one needed full concentration to one's academic work and much more when you are studying to be a Pharmacologist, you need all the concentration you can muster LOL,  and  I never thought I had it in me until it happened. I started out baking for friends and family and I improvised a lot especially ...

Hi there everyone,   I am happy you have taken the time to visit my blog. I am a self-taught cake baker and decorator, I motivate myself (all glory to GOD) and create my own recipes. I promise a lot of fun and original content to meet your baking and cake decorating needs. Hope you stick around and we'll get to know ourselves better. Feel free to make your comments and ask your questions wherever clarity is needed. Join me on my cake journey as I begin my advancement into a reknowned Cake Artist.  Thanks!