SMS: Toasted Almond Lemon Bars

I'm afraid I'll be leaving you a fleeting post today, dear readers.  I'm awaiting my ride to the Newcastle Quayside Market along with several hundred cupcakes, brownies and cookies.  Fingers crossed for a good one.

These toasted almond lemon bars were one of the very first recipes that caught my eye in the Sweet Melissa Baking Book.  Since that day I've been waiting for someone to notice how special they sounded.  At last, my prayers were answered by Rebecca from Indecisive Baker.

Despite how delicious these bars are, I found the recipe a little too much of a faff to ever try again.  The dough was a nightmare to work with, so soft even after allowing it to chill in the fridge.  Trying to sculpt the sticky mess up the sides of my baking tin almost drove me to insanity, I must have washed my hands about twenty times. 

So, my search for the perfect lemon bar continues.  Do you have a reliable recipe?  I'd love to give it a try.

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Sweet Melissa Sundays: Gingersnaps

Have I told you that I love ginger?  Well I do.  I love it in curry, I love it in crumbles and most of all I love it in biscuits!   Open my cupboard and you'll notice, among all of the random tins and jars ginger is the most stocked item. Stem, chopped, crystallized, ground, then open my fridge and there's a little knobbly finger of the stuff.  You see what I mean...

After my deceleration you'll be very surprised to hear that gingersnaps are my very favorite biscuit.  After seeing it on the SMS list I've been itching to get them baked and right in my cookie jar, but these biscuits just weren't gingery enough for my palate.  They needed something, they needed more!  I added chopped stem ginger and a teaspoon of ginger syrup.  Perfect.  The stem ginger added that extra bite and made a good biscuit into an excellent one!

Check out Gloria's aptly named blog The Gingersnap Girl for the recipe and don't forget to check out the rest of the SMS bakers for their yummy treats.

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Peanut Butter Truffles, Gee Whiz!

I'm afraid I'm going to have to keep this brief.  Yesterday was the 27th anniversary of my birth, yep, I'm getting on in years!  Anyway, as I'm sure most of you can understand, I'm feeling a little fuzzy in the headular area.  The only thing to fix the fuzzy is for me to be taken for lunch by my lovely mother and spend the rest of the day being pandered to by my little brothers.  Bliss.

Right, on to the truffles.  This weeks pick was the choice of Mara from the lovely blog Love Your Mother Earth.  Well, I love peanut butter and I love making truffles so for me,  this week was a massive bag of win.  The only problem I had with the recipe was the quantity of peanut butter.  I decided to make half of the truffles in honor of my attempt to drop a stone before my holiday, but left the amount of peanut butter the same.  Still, the flavour wasn't half as strong as I would have hoped. So if you're thinking of making these, and you love peanut butter as much as I do, up the quantity to around 1/2 a cup.

As usual don't forget to check the other ladies for their opinions.

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SMS, late again!

Hi guys, I'm late, again! But this time it's not my fault, well at least not totally. Stupidly I decided to upload my SMS pics to my work laptop and since I haven't been in work since last Tuesday I've been unable to get them back. Silly me. But, better late than never, eh?!

For this weeks choice I decided to revert back to my tried and tested method of turning a layer cake into cupcakes. I've made these babies quite a few times now and they always go down as a roaring success at every Pet Lamb event. Everybody loves a Malteaser. It's the lighter way to enjoy chocolate, don't you know.



As usual check out the SMS girlies for more Malteaser treats!

Now, I better get back to work before I revert to lazy mode and spend the rest of the day surfing for new blogs :D

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Sweet Melissa and her Carrot Cake

Good morning campers, and to all you yummy mummies out there, Happy Mothers Day! If any of you are like me then this cake will be making the perfect addition to an already lovely Mothering Sunday gift. I mean, every mam deserves a cake! This weeks pick was the choice of Julie from a Little Bit of Everything, Carrot Cake with Orange Cream Cheese Frosting.


I was quite excited to make this one as for as long as I can remember I've turned the SMS layer cakes into cupcakes. So this week I decided to stick to the recipe, for once. Sadly, my excitement was short lived as I found this cake rather disappointing. As it baked the cake developed quite a crispy top, not dissimilar to the texture of a meringue. Oddly enough, while the top was quite dry, the inside was awfully moist, a little too moist, despite passing the toothpick test. Personally, I blame my oven! This was the last thing I baked before getting my oven door replaced as for the last year the inner glass has been loose and the seal has been broken (thanks mister landlord). Fingers crossed that from now on my cakes will be disaster free ;)


Don't forget to have a mosey over to the SMS bakers to see everyone else's mothers day treats!

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Sugarlove

Two Sweet Melissa's in a row? I must be getting my wee bot back on track ;)

First of all, I'd like to say one thing. For the first time since I was 17 I am no longer employed by the protective and cushy bubble that is the local authority. Yup, on Friday I bid Gateshead Council and Housing Company a final farewell, thus closing that chapter of my life forever. I've met some wonderful people and had some super fun times and I hope whoever may be reading this knows I'll miss that little corner of my office deeply. However, in the same breath I am overjoyed to state that I am now the newest member of the Bigface Studio family. Yeah sure, there might just be Kris and myself at the moment, but that's not the point ;) Now, onwards and upwards!

Right, now I've got that out of the way let me get to the main attraction. I've never been a big fan of sugar cookies, I've just never found a recipe that has worked for me. They're either too tough, to crumbly, too bland or just too damn difficult to work with. Sweet Melissas version was one of the better cookies I've came across. The dough came together quickly and easily and was very pliable. Now, I'm certainly not a fan of delicate flavours, I like to taste my food and taste it big, so with this in mind I upped the amount of vanilla and lemon zest by half a tsb each. After reading my fellow SMS bakers comments I'm certainly glad I did, the main theme running through the posts were 'lack of flavour' and 'bland'. Glad I dodged that bullet.



I've always been a little bit obsessed with sugar skulls and after having a rake through my assortment of cookie cutters I decided to use my halloween skull and spend an afternoon colouring in bright and beautiful Day of the Dead style biccies. I sold the biscuits at a friends gig and boy were they the hit of the show. Everyone that wandered past out little stall commented on their decoration before digging deep in their wallets to become a proud owner ;) Thanks Melissa and thanks Nina for your awesome pick this week, you've rekindled my faith in sugar cookies!

I do apologise for my early post, but I have a very busy day ahead of me tomorrow and I just wouldn't get the time to get this up. I hope you forgive me!

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Double Melissa

I've been naughty, very naughty indeed! I've neglected my poor Sweet Melissa cook book and more importantly, I've neglected my dear Sweet Melissa Sunday ladies. *Hangs head in shame* I do apologise my sweets, how can I ever make it up to you? I know, how about a double header, will that make you smile? I thought so ;)

Now that's out of the way let me tell you why I've been such a lazy bones. Firstly, and most importantly, I've been a poorly Katiecakes. Sore throat developed into a cold, cold developed into a chesty cough, chesty cough developed into a chest infection, you know how it goes. So I've been holed up in my teeny little house going stir crazy. My passion for all things kitchen went out of the window and I sat on the sofa eating nothing but take away's for a week and a half. Poor me! But, I'm all better now thanks to a fist full of antibiotics every day and I'm itching to get back into the kitchen.

Firstly, I'd like to say sorry specifically to Rosy of Rosy Lips and Lavender. I feel dreadful for missing your pick last week. I did bake along, I just never got round to posting those delicious red velvet morsels of nomminess! Well, I say delicious, I never actually got to eat one. I baked last weeks choice for an Alice in Wonderland themed event for Pet Lamb and decorated them like wee toadstools. Boy were they a hit! So thumbs up to Rosy, the punters couldn't get enough :D



Now, for this weeks choice Spike of Spike Bakes picked the perfect desert to follow absolutely any Valentines feast, easy chocolate mousse. I mean, who doesn't like chocolate mousse? And talk about easy, I was overjoyed with how simply the recipe came together, especially as I'm currently in the process of making a beef wellington and didn't really have the time for an overly complex desert. Hurrah for ten minute mousse!



Don't forget to have a peek at my fellow SMS girls! Now, I'm back off to see to my wellington. Happy Valentines my lovelies!

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And we're off

Oh Sweet Melissa, how I've missed your presence in my kitchen during these cold and snowy weeks. It feels like forever since we last danced, don't ever leave me again. Deal? Deal!

Our first recipe of 2010 is an exciting one, a creative opportunity even. Donna of L'Amour de Tarte chose the chocolate pie crust but the filling was to be left up to us. Decisions decisions. Dozens of combination's flooded my mind, peanut butter, lemon curd, toffee, even a chocolate version of the English classic bakewell tart. The possibilities were endless. Eventually I settled upon one filling, something that marries perfectly with chocolate and one of my very favorite combination's, chocolate, cherry and cream tart.


Like most other Melissa bakers I found the crust quite a disappointment. It was difficult to work with, cracking at every given opportunity and had quite a bland taste despite me subbing the shortening for an all butter version. Oh well, the search for a delicious chocolate crust continues and for now I'll stick to crushed oreos :)

Check out the other SMS girls to see how they decided to fill their pies.

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