Every time I roll this post title over my tongue I giggle out loud. I can't help but think of "I've got a lovely bunch of co-co-nuts, de-delee-de-dee".

Perhaps it's time for a tea break?






















I love lemon curd. I would prefer to eat it just like that if I had half a chance (who needs toast, or scones, or cake anyway?). When I bake lemon meringue pie (or order it at a tea shop), I scrape off the meringue bits (yuck) and just eat the lemon curd filling and crust. Yum.

So, when the lovely Elizabeth gave me her recipe for Lemon Curd Cake - it was serendipity.

I like my lemon sour. I like my lemon to reach up and smack my taste buds like there's no tomorrow.
I know, lemon-haters: look away.

















The recipe calls for 2 tablespoons of lemon curd. I completely ignored that instruction and added a generous dollop of lemon curd to the batter. When I checked the jar afterwards, it seemed that my "good dollop" was around half the jar. Oops.

You see those dense bits in the cake in the photo? Those are swirls of curd. Mm.

The recipe handled the extra lemon beautifully. And, if that's not enough to convince you to get your batter on, it also is an all-in-one recipe. That means you put all of the ingredients together and mix and you're done. I know, I couldn't contain my excitement either.


Here's the original recipe from the Lightwater Village website. It originally comes from Ada Polkinghorn's cookbook, so big-ups to Ada for this all-in-one-bowl batter that bakes up beautifully.

I've copied the recipe below.

Elizabeth's Lemon Curd Cake


For the cake:
100g caster sugar (but keep 2 tablespoons aside)
115g soft margarine
2 eggs
150g self-raising flour
2 tablespoons of lemon curd (or a generous dollop)
grated rind of 1 large lemon (keep some back for decoration)

The EEWI ladies did another round of cake-baking last weekend. I baked and baked and baked - and worried that I hadn't quite baked enough, I baked some more.

And then: disaster. My baking powder (horrors upon horrors!) was a no-go. That means that it didn't work. That means that I had a lot of flat cakes and brownies.

So, I baked again.

Before I knew it, we were at the Museum of Childhood on a rainy Sunday morning, stringing bunting up around all of the available spaces and stacking cakes upon cakes on the most beautiful little cake stands.


Here are Elizabeth and Niki on the morning shift. Doesn't it all look festive? I didn't have a proper look around the venue (The Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green) but from what I saw, it looked amazing. Definitely going to have to go back when there are fewer summer festivals and market stalls.






















We were supposed to be outside but the rain had prevented us from setting up shop. To make up for it, Niki brought along some of her potted plants to bring "the outside in".






















My crunchies were delicious, even if I do say so myself! This time I put the chocolate topping on while they were still very hot and it all soaked in to create a layer of chocolate fudgey deliciousness.






















Niki's patriotic fairy cakes were fabulous in their red, white and blue. Even the paper cases had little red soldiers and London buses on them!






















Niki also made these lemon and courgette buns. The sweets on top remind me of the "oranges and lemons" sugar slice sweets we used to get when we were little - they were such a treat, and I haven't seen them in years!

















What would be an EEWI bake sale without Colleen's ever popular flake-topped cupcakes? These sold out very quickly! I love the blue cases on the blue polka dot cake stand.

















These are my "bunny garden" cupcakes. I made them half-sized for small people. I also topped some of them with fudge and with pink and white pearls.

















This is Elizabeth's all-in-one Lemon Curd Cake. It is delicious. It sold out very quickly, so that's definitely one we'll have to bring back at the next bake sale.






















I thought this was a lovely idea - Colleen's small chocolate cupcakes topped with rocky road. Yum.

















I had a really good look through all of the EEWI canvas bags on sale this weekend. Some of them are particularly beautiful! They're the perfect "book bag" size which fits in a good book and a bit of knitting for train journeys.













While we were there we saw another popular local market-seller: Miwary. She hand-sews the most beautiful little things like bunnies, brooches and a line of fabric tea cups. Thanks to Elizabeth for the recommendation!



















Here's one of her pretty fabric tea cups (website here). Aren't they lovely?

I'm all baked out now. We're off to visit family on Friday night so I'm looking forward to a baking-free weekend (who would ever think I'd be saying that?) filled with a lot of catching up on lazy afternoons of reading and as little proper work as possible.

We had a bread-free Easter. Actually, it happens every year. I know - no hot cross buns, the horror! - but every year at this time of year we celebrate Pesach (Passover) which happens to coincide with a bread-ban over Easter time.

Do you remember me telling you all about the late-night baking I did for the W.I. stall at Spitalfields Market for International Women's Day?

Well.


We all met up very early at Liverpool Street's Spitalfield Market in Ye Olde London Town. I drank coffee and oohed and ahhed at the bunting, and Veronika and Colleen did all the hard work setting up. I did make some doily-edged, rather-pretty price tags though.


This is Colleen. She blogs over at rus in ubris and she's also the head honcho over at the East End W.I. Honcho, in a really feminine, elegant and lovely way.






















This is Veronika. Here's she organising the bunting whilst simultaneously demonstrating the benefits of laughter yoga (which you can see on the piece of paper if you look oh-so-closely).

Unfortunately at this time my camera-eating battery ran out of juice - but luckily Colleen was prepared so I've borrowed one or two of her pictures from the Facebook Page (and it would be oh-so nice of you to pop over and like it, while we're on the topic) so here they are.

















Look at all the delicious things! Right there in front are delicious parmesan, chives and feta muffins which were particularly delicious.





















This is a close-up. Yum. At the top there are my baked offerings: spicy carrot muffins with vanilla buttercream icing with a sugarpaste carrot, and chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream icing with honeycomb sprinkles. I completely forgot to photograph them before leaving home in the morning, so this'll have to do!

I worked the morning shift and then had to rush back home to carry on working (it has been a very demanding week so far) but I hear that it went well and we had very few tasty treats left over. Also, before I finish up here, you should definitely check out the recipe for Veronika's Herman the German Sourdough Friendship Cake!

So, Christmas came and went and we had a fabulous time in Ye Olde Faringdon. There was turkey and roast potatoes and vegetables, trifle and Yule Log and Christmas treats aplenty. But, like most people, it seems, I had a severe case of Christmas Treat Withdrawal when we got back home.
















So I made these: Christmas Mince Pies.

We made mince pie filling up in Faringdon, so I came home with a jar of ready-made mince pie deliciousness all ready to bake into pies. I used ready-made shortcrust pastry (oh the horrors, I know!) and figured I was half-way there with the home-madeness and nobody would notice because of the sheer delectable tastiness of the filling.






















The pies turned out rather well, I cut out scalloped circles that were larger than the shallow muffin tin, and filled each one with mince pie filling. I topped it with a sugared pastry cut-out (those are snowflakes, don't you know) and baked for 15 minutes until lightly golden.
















I used my newly-acquired snowflake cutter set which I got in the Lakeland sale, aren't they pretty? The biggest cutter is about 20cm wide - who has cookies that big? I think they'd be rather nice with a cut-out middle, but all the pointy bits could come off so you'd have to be extra careful. I'm sure I'll find a use for it... even if I have to make enormous shortbread snowflakes, or chocolate-dipped wintery cookies.

Here's Granny's Mince Pie Filling Recipe:


4oz suet (beef, or vegetarian)
8 oz raisins
8 oz currants
6 oz sultanas
6 oz apple, peeled and cored
4oz mixed peel
8 oz soft brown sugar
2 oz almonds, blanched
Juice and grated rind of 1 lemon
1/2 teaspoon mixed spice
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
4oz brandy or rum

Using coarse screen on your mincer, mice suet, raisins, currants, sultanas, apple, peel, nuts into bowl. Add other ingredients and mix well on a low speed. Once mixed, pot or use as required.

We've been back in London for just over a week now, and my, how things have changed. The sun is only half up by 8am, and it lazily goes back to bed by 3pm. Temperatures are dropping down to 1'C, and the first snow fell this morning.

But the thing is - I kinda love this time of year in London. It's festively alight with fairy lights and glitter, and the whole world looks like you're viewing it through a bokeh filter on a camera.
















See what I mean? (The pic, above, is by Axel Bührmann and seems very fitting for this time of year!).

And what's more christmassy than gingerbread and egg nog, minus the egg nog (ew)?

Gingerbread cookies!
















As you can see, I'm still very much in the wedding swing of things. I can't resist adding an iced heart to the batch when baking cookies!

These came about when shopping for Christmas gifts for our UK-based family. I needed something suitable for an arty 5-year old that would keep him busy with novelty value. Phew. So, after much deliberation, I chose a gingerbread making kit from Mason and Cash that comes with a lovely gingerbread cutter, a mini mixing bowl and a mini rolling pin and wooden spoon set.


And while I was there, I also noticed these. A family of gingerbread cutters! Those were for me. As it happens, I also got the little 'un a book called 'Dress Your Gingerbread' which looks like heaps of fun, and a selection of Dr Oetker cake decoration goodies.






















I particularly like the back cover which features the Lion with the caption: 'Eat me! I'm Roarsome!' The recipe in the book makes 4 large biscuits which is more than enough for little hands, but I was after something spicy with extra ginger, so I used the recipe on the side of the Gingerbread Kit box (which just so happens to be this recipe, from the BBC). I didn't use a food processor - I used my hands, the old-fashioned way! - and I added in an extra sprinkling of ginger.






















I wanted 'old fashioned' gingerbread decorations, so I gave the big ones stitched lines on their legs and arms, with giant Smarties buttons for the boys. The girls got aprons and dainty pink pearl buttons because they like to bake and look glamorous. The little ones were done much the same way, without the appendage detailing and with silver balls instead of Smarties for the boys.















... and hearts. I was so tempted to make one with a grumpy face, but nothing could dampen my festive baking glee. Okay - and, I was also tempted to add just one with a skeleton painted on instead of the normal cheery grin.

But that's not all. Oh no. If you call now, you also get - gingerbread cake. Egad, gingerbread in cake form? Fantastic.
















It is a rich, sticky, treacle-y cake iced that needs to be nibbled on with a cup of tea or coffee. It reeks of Christmas with a combination of cinnamon and ginger that would make an excellent addition to a Starbucks Brew.

I used Nigella's recipe for Fresh Gingerbread with Lemon Icing, doubled the amount of ginger and cinnamon (I was feeling festive) and grated orange zest into the cake batter. I also replaced the lemon in the icing with orange. I don't own a baking tray big enough for a cake this size so I used a glass Pyrex dish and learnt, through frantic Internet research before baking, that to compensate for the glass you should lower the cooking temperature by 25'C. It worked perfectly.

The gingerbread cake was delicious, although a bit heavy on the treacle which seemed to overpower the other tastes in the cake The (doubled) cinnamon and ginger combination came as an afterthought when tasting the cake but it still had a distinct gingerbread taste (and smell!) about it that rocked my kitchen. Yum.

Here's a link to the Gingerbread Cookie Recipe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/christmas_gingerbread_84244
- very tasty biscuits. Don't overwork the dough, and do add in more spice!

Here's a link to Nigella's Fresh Gingerbread with Lemon Icing: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Fresh-Gingerbread-with-Lemon-Icing-105095
- my version of the recipe, in How to be a Domestic Goddess uses golden syrup instead of corn syrup, so I'd use that.

I've been a bit under the weather this week, with long hours of work and a terrible cold. So, what better way to cheer up a rainy day than with a batch of kisses? Of the baked variety, of course.



Here's another one of those amazing Women's Weekly Books (from Amazon, £3.90) that I seem to be using a bit as a baking bible at the moment. These recipes are really great, I haven't gone wrong with their recipes yet (touch wood, or, as my aunt Karin says, spit three times pah pah pah).
















So, back to the Kisses. They're a sort of sponge-cake-biscuit with a distinctly custardy taste - due, largely, to the custard powder you mix into the batter. The two spongey halves are sandwiched together with vienna cream. They're not as light as I thought they would be - imagine a rich custard sponge with a light sweet and creamy filling. You can easily eat three or four of these with a cup of coffee!
















The recipe is quite easy and comes together quickly, and I'd imagine you could adapt it to give them a citrus zing, or half-dip them in chocolate. I found that I baked them in batches because my baking trays weren't big enough. If you do that, let them cool a bit on the tray before you take them off - they'll hold their shape better. Also, leave the sandwiched kisses for a bit before eating so that the vienna cream sets for a better texture.

The recipe is available in the book, 100 Classic Cakes, and I found it online as well (here at RecipeFinder). I've copied the recipe below.

Kisses

Ingredients 
125g butter
½ cup (110g) caster sugar
1 egg
1/3 cup (50g) plain flour
¼cup (35g) self-raising flour
2/3 cup (100g) cornflour
¼cup (35g) custard powder 

Vienna cream 
60g butter
¾ cup (120g) icing sugar mixture
2 teaspoons milk

Note: this recipe makes about 40 cookies and can be prepared three days ahead. Kisses can be filled several hours before serving.

Method
Preheat oven to moderately hot (200°C). Lightly grease oven trays. Beat butter and sugar in a small bowl with an electric mixer until smooth and creamy. Add the egg and beat only until combined. Stir in sifted dry ingredients in two batches.

Spoon mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 1cm tube. Pipe 3cm-diameter rounds of mixture, about 3cm apart, onto prepared oven trays. Bake in two batches in a moderately hot oven for about 10 minutes or until lightly browned. Loosen biscuits and cool on trays. Sandwich the cold biscuits with Vienna cream and dust with extra sifted icing sugar, if desired.

For the Vienna cream, beat butter until as white as possible. Gradually beat in half the sifted icing sugar, then the milk; gradually beat in the remaining icing sugar.

Unfilled kisses suitable to freeze. Not suitable to microwave.