We are the music makers and we are the dreamers of dreams...

I have decided to enter a competition in a homes magazine to launch Becky BakesWell as a proper business. I feel like Charlie Bucket when he nervously asks Grandpa Jo if he stands a chance of finding a golden ticket in his birthday Wonka bar. Grandpa Joe replies 'You've got more chance Charlie, because you want it more.'

I don't think that wishing and hoping is going to give me any more of a chance, but Grandpa Joe's sentiment does make me think that somebody has to win the competition and I do stand a chance, however slim.

I've got to fill in an application form with all sorts of Apprentice-style questions - eek! I need to market Becky BakesWell but I don't want to sound like Stuart 'the brand' Baggs from last year's series of the show, haha!

Will update you on my progress soon. This weekend I will be baking something special as a surprise.. more on that on Monday or Tuesday.

Until then I thought I'd leave you with the moment that my baking fate was sealed...

Pure Imagination

Happy Baking!

Becky BakesWell x

Pete's Perfect Flapjacks

Flapjacks were one of the first things that I baked for Dan - this came about as a result of Dan reminiscing about some flapjacks that his Scottish mate had made years back and a random conversation where Dan tried to get the recipe so that we could make them. This is a copy of the recipe that I hastily scribbled down as the ingredients and method were relayed over the phone by Dan's mate Pete.

It is for this reason that I named them Pete's Perfect Flapjacks, and be warned - these are not the sort of dusty, dessicated flapjacks that you'd find in a health food shop. Instead, they are oaty, chewy oblongs blessed with a resiny depth from the golden syrup. Not good if you're on a diet, but bugger it I say! 

As a guide, you set the amount of oats you will use then half the amount of butter and sugar.

I decided to use a small roasting tin as my flapjack tin. I just tipped the dry oats into the tin until they came about half-way up the sides. I used my hand to roughly level the oats in the tin and  then tipped the oats into the bowl of the scales to give me my set amount - 400g oats.

400g rolled oats

200g butter

200g soft brown sugar

3 tablespoons of golden syrup
optional extra - sprinkle of cinnamon

1) Preheat your oven to 180 degrees centigrade/ 350 degrees farenheit or gas mark 4.

2) Grease and line a small but deep, square tin with baking paper.

3) Melt butter and sugar in pan over a gentle heat.

4) Add the oats and mix thoroughly to coat the oats so that they are slick and glossy.

5) Swirl the golden syrup into the pan along with a sprinkle of cinnamon for a subtle earthy flavour.

6) Stir the mixture to combine and then tip into the prepared tin.

7) Smooth the mixture to create an even layer, with the back of a wooden spoon, then transfer to the centre shelf of the oven for 10-15 mins.

Keep a close eye on the flapjacks in the oven as they are prone to catching and become brittle when left without attention. The flapjacks are ready when the edges are a deep golden brown but the centre just has a pale golden glow from the oven. Slice into squares whilst warm but leave to cool completely before taking out of tin, as the mix is still pliable when warm and is prone to breakages. 

Cookie Love

I am rather excited that I will have some time over Easter to experiment with these babies from NY. I went to New York at Christmas for a very special holiday and as Dan and I were striding through the streets on Christmas Eve near Park Avenue,  I squealed with excitement when I saw a Williams Sonoma store - I know,  I know - squealing should be reserved for the shop with the little blue boxes... not a kitchenware shop eh? Sorry to disappoint, but that's the kinda geeky gal I am! Rather than trying to desperately fit clothes or gadgets into my suitcase as mementos of my stay in the Big Apple, I was dreaming up schemes to bring my baking booty back to Blighty!

I had seen these cookie cutters on the WS website about a year before my trip and was crestfallen to find that the site only sent international deliveries out to certain countries and the UK was not on the list. So to find these cutters in the Park Avenue area store made the wait worthwhile. I have been on the WS site recently though and it seems that they have now added UK to their list of global deliveries. Not before time too!

I think I'll need to experiment with a few cookie recipes beforehand to get a good balance between a fine crumb texture to make sure that lettering is clear on the cooked cookies and to make sure that the finished cookies taste good. All too often, cookies are a case of style over substance, resembling mini works of art rather than the tasty treats that they deserve to be.

Easter Cake - Update

 The Easter cake is very nearly finished. All I need to do is add a piece of co-ordinating ribbon to the edge of the cake board and we are done!

 Looking at the cake as a finished piece, I have a soft-spot for the marzipan duck and chicks - they make me cheerful when I see them guarding the fake cake (the cake is a dummy cake for my assessment). There are some imperfections that do niggle me a bit - I can't help it, it's the perfectionist diva in me. However, I know what I would need to do to put these things right to improve the finish for future cakes, which I guess is the important thing.

In more news, we take delivery of our new oven on Saturday! I feel a bit of a traitor to the sisterhood doing a  little kitchen dance at this exciting news especially as it's International Women's Day and I'm cooing over pictures of the oven like a proud parent! However, like a baby, this oven is long over-due and presents a new chapter in my life as Becky BakesWell. Living without an oven for seven months has been torturous - no homemade roasties in all this time (cue sniffling and sob). My family have been kind enough to let me use their ovens to bake cakes for friends, and without them, my mission to start delivering cake happiness would have been impossible indeed!

This weekend, roasties and cake baking are on my agenda - will post more recipes and cake related adventures soon!

Happy Baking,
Becky B x

Easter Cake Project

Hey there!

For readers that don't know me, I travel quite a distance to work from where I live and in Winter, my morning commute to Yorkshire across the Pennines in the fog and murky light can be grim. However, with the light mornings and warmer weather here, it's nice to see the landscape changing along with the seasons. This morning I noticed that the snowdrops are also shooting up in the gardens that I pass - a sure fire sign that Spring is on its way and Easter is around the corner. So, with this in mind, I thought I'd add a post about my Easter cake project. I have been inspired by Peggy Porschen's simple and kitsch duck motif cake below.

I started off with a plain white sugar paste covered dummy cake as the basis of the design, which I have then embossed with butterflies and a flower design which looks a bit like Broderie Anglaise. I also added a crimped border around the top edge of the cake, in the shape of bows. 

The second stage of the design consisted of painting the embossed decorations with powdered pigments. It's best to use vodka as the liquid to mix with the powders as this dries much quicker than water and therefore is less likely to bleed. 

I've also modelled a duck and chicks out of marzipan which I have tinted yellow, adding beaks from orange tinted marzipan. These models will sit on top of the cake, inside the circle of flowers. To unify the different aspects of the design, I've started to make a border for the bottom of the cake out of balls of pink and yellow sugarpaste, in a graduated design, which will pull the colours together. 

Here are the pics of the work in progress:

Can't wait to finish the decoration and post the finished results!

Until then,
Happy Baking x