Recipe-time!
4
Sophie Bakes a Cake
No, not the sequel to Sophie's Choice - One of our scriptwriters - Sophie - also has another talent. She bakes the best cakes in the whole of Bolton (a mighty accolade indeed)! Each month she'll be providing you with some recipes that you can try at home.
Over to Soph!
This is a quick and easy recipe for Banoffee cupcakes that I made when we did the Video Studio Bake-Off earlier this year. They were the winning cakes too, so they can’t be all that bad!
All you’ll need to make 12 cakes is…
Cake:
2 ripe bananas (make sure you buy these a few days in advance, so they’re soft and ripe)
125g sifted self-raising flour
100g softened butter
100g caster sugar
2 medium eggs
1 tsp. baking powder
Icing:
100g Carnation Caramel
300g icing sugar
85g softened butter
Slices of banana/sprinkles etc.
1. Pre-heat your oven to 160° (fan), gas mark 4 & pop the bun cases in the tray.
2. Mash the bananas in a bowl, set them aside, you’ll need these later!
3. In a large mixing bowl, add the flour, butter, caster sugar, eggs and baking powder. Beat together until light and creamy then fold in the mashed bananas.
4. Spoon the mix into the cases, to make sure they’re all perfectly even – try using an ice-cream scoop!
*If you want your cupcakes to have a gooey centre, fill the cases half way and, using some of the remaining carnation caramel, add a blob and then fill the rest of the case with the cake batter.
5. Bake for approx. 20 min, or until they’re spongy and springy to touch.
Once they’ve cooled, you’re free to get decorating.
To make the icing:
1. Beat the butter, caramel and icing sugar together to create a thick paste. Add less/extra icing sugar to make the icing as thick as you like.
2. Spoon the mix into a piping bag with a nozzle, and pipe onto the cakes.
3. Top them off with a slice of banana and chocolate sprinkles (a broken flake works just as well) and some chocolate sauce, if you fancy. I even added little white chocolate stars!
Send Sophie your favourite recipes and maybe she’ll make them in time for the next newsletter! [email protected]