Tag Archives: baking

Banoffee Pie

Banoffee Pie

Banoffee Pie

I swear I’m not being paid by the BBC Good Food group to promote their website but here’s another one of their amazing recipes to get your taste buds going!

Banoffee Pie really couldn’t be any easier. It’s always so much more simple to pull off than you think and always seems to end up looking absolutely scrumptious. It’s got to be one of my ultimate guilty pleasures, I reckon I could eat at least half the entire thing in one sitting.

But like all recipes, this one needs just a little bit of fiddling with!

Instead of using Hob Nobs, I much prefer sticking to the traditional Digestive biscuit because I don’t think the ‘oaty one’ gets as crispy a finish (besides, if you’re using Digestives you can pull a fast one and buy value brand biscuits which taste just the same)!

The only other thing I really want to say is that you shouldn’t be lazy and use store bought caramel! Not only does it get too thick, making your own toffee sauce tastes better, has a much better texture and is easy as pie – pun intended – to make as long as you have the patience and the eye of an eagle.

All you have to do is slowly melt 200g of sugar in a saucepan on a low heat, whisk in 100g of butter and remove from the heat. Once you’ve let it sit for roughly ten seconds, start whisking in 100ml of heavy whipping cream and viola, you’ve got yourself the tastiest toffee sauce ever!

Good luck you Fongtastic bunch of future bakers!

If you tried making a Banoffee Pie using this recipe, tweet your results @FongtasticFood

FONGTASTIC Black Sticky Rice with Mango and Coconut Cream

Mango Rice

Helene Ng mixed things up by making this traditional Thai dessert, black sticky rice with mango and coconut cream.

If you cooked something you’re particularly proud of, please e-mail it to fongtasticfood@gmail.com

Lemon Meringue Pie

Lemon Meringue Pie

Lemon Meringue Pie

As you can probably tell, I’m big into puddings at the moment and the only way I can justify eating this much pudding is by making it myself. There aren’t that many healthy desserts out there but I decided that a Lemon Meringue Pie had to be one of the kindest to the waist. This BBC Good Food recipe turned out a superb looking pie that impressed everyone with it’s perfectly bronzed and spiky meringue topping.

Unfortunately, the taste test ended up being a little bit of a flop. The filling was ruined by an orange that had somehow managed to squeeze its way into the recipe. Instead of tasting like a lemon meringue pie, the orange overpowered the flavour of the lemon and transformed it into an unwanted orange meringue pie. It’s such a shame because this pie could have easily been able to match up to its stellar appearance and scrumptious meringue if only it didn’t include one of its key ingredients; the orange. Although I may have a sad face on this time round, at least I can sleep well tonight knowing exactly how to make my next lemon meringue pie the best it can possibly be.

Chocolate and Salted Caramel Mousse Cake

BBC Good FoodWhen BBC Good Food called this Chocolate and Salted Caramel Mousse Cake ‘decadent’, they really meant it! I don’t think I’ve ever spent so much money on ingredients to make a cake before, but this might just have to be one of my very own proudest bakes.

I’m not going to lie though, this wasn’t one of the easiest cakes to execute so I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who hasn’t got that much experience (especially considering how I’m away from home and had to conjure this beast up without my beloved electronic scales, absolute #nightmare)!!!

Now on to the actual recipe review. This recipe does not, I repeat, does not, need nearly as much light brown soft sugar, cocoa powder or finely chopped dark chocolate (for the ganache) as it suggests. Unless, of course, you’re hoping to live a short but happy life. 500g of sugar is just ridiculous and I’m sure I only put in about half of this and my cake turned out fine, same goes for the cocoa and chocolate.

Chocolate and Caramel Cake

Chocolate and Salted Caramel Mousse Cake

My one disappointment with this cake was that I couldn’t taste the salted caramel. Even though the recipe overindulges in regards to the cake mixture and ganache, it leaves you having to spread across your caramel rather sparingly. More caramel is a definite must if you want to try baking this beauty. Otherwise, you will end up wasting your time patiently standing by the cooker to make sure your sugar doesn’t burn, for absolutely nothing.

Overall though, I have to say this was the ultimate guilty pleasure and it’s so enormous that I still have leftovers four days later (and it hasn’t even gone as dry as a boot yet)! It stays moist, it’s full of chocolate and double cream, and it’s one of the best cakes I’ve ever made. If only I knew, I would’ve saved it for Easter lunch to have with friends and family (and to show off, of course). Oh well, I guess I’ll have to finish it off all on my own!

If you baked something you’re particularly proud of, tweet it @FongtasticFood with the hash-tag ‘#proudbakes‘.

Tate & Lyle Unveil Cake Hotel

Hand-Stitched Meringue Rug

A hand-stitched rug made of meringues.

A team of 14 cake-makers has spent almost 3,000 hours baking and decorating over 100 pieces of edible art to fill a three-storey luxury hotel in Central London.

The edible project has been set up to promote a new line of Tate & Lyle Sugars, inspired by regions from around the world. Over 600 kilograms of this sugar was then used to reflect each different region across eight separate rooms.

A pirate room contains a giant treasure chest filled with pearls and gold coins.

A pirate room contains a giant treasure chest filled with edible pearls and gold coins.

The eight tasting rooms include (from press release):

  • A Mediterranean-inspired bedroom, with edible furnishings, a caramel popcorn-filled bathtub, floating meringues and edible pearlescent popcorn bunting, all created using Light Soft Brown sugar.
  • A Pirates of the Caribbean room, with a giant treasure chest full of edible pearls, ginger spiced doubloons and cutlasses, which visitors can spray gold themselves, and rum and raisin chocolate brownies and tea cakes – all made from Taste Experience Caribbean-inspired Light Muscovado sugar.
  • A British-inspired Golden syrup sugar room, with a giant golden-syrup lion, patriotic treacle tarts in the shape of the British Isles and a giant tower of doughnuts.
  • A Mayan-inspired room hidden in the cellar featuring a Mayan fudge temple, complete with floating meringue ‘clouds’, ‘sacrificial’ salted caramel and chocolate hearts, and Mayan-inspired carved gold cookies all made from Taste Experience Mayan-inspired golden caster sugar.
  • A Mississippi-inspired ‘Mardi Gras’ room featuring a five foot long rainbow cake in the traditional colours of green, yellow & purple, gold baby heads and of course King Cakes.
  • A Barbados-inspired library, with edible shells, and beautiful hand-painted cookies, fruit cakes and florentines showcased as museum features inside vintage glass jars, all made from Barbados inspired Dark Muscovado sugar.
  • A Guyanese-inspired room, complete with a sea turtle cake, and cake ‘turtle eggs’ buried in mounds of Demerara sugar.
  • A South Pacific-inspired room with a huge two metre high Easter Island statue, made entirely from chocolate mud cake baked using Golden Granulated sugar.
Giant edible sculptures include a 2-metre long vanilla sponge turtle cake.

Giant edible sculptures include a 2-metre long vanilla sponge turtle cake.

In the Barbados-inspired library, edible shells line the shelves.

In the Barbados-inspired library, edible shells line the shelves.

James Whiteley, Tate & Lyle Sugars Senior Brand Manager said: “We think the cake hotel perfectly captures the excitement, inspiration and expertise behind the creation of our new range of golden and brown cane sugars. The Taste Experience range is about more than just adding sweetness; it’s about subtle flavour differences, texture and appearance. We hope that through the cake hotel we can showcase the versatility of golden and brown cane sugars and inspire people to get creative in the kitchen.”

The Soho-based hotel is open from now until Wednesday, March 27. For bookings, tweet @welovebaking saying why you want to stay over in the first cake hotel, including the hash-tag ‘#TastingHouse‘.

For more information, please contact Mischief PR at Tate&Lyle@MischiefPR.com

Banana Cashew Cake

All RecipesThe ultimate form of procrastination: baking.

Instead of choosing to get on with my ever-growing workload, I decided to bake a banana cake.

With almost 200 5-star ratings, I thought this step-by-step guide from AllRecipes would surely do the trick.

Banana Cashew Cake

Banana Cashew Cake

I’m going to start this recipe review by calling xuthus1972, in the nicest sense of the word, a liar. From my experience, the banana cake took just over double the suggested cooking time, but boy was it worth the wait!

The cake came out looking absolutely mouthwatering, it was perfectly golden and slipped out of the loaf tin and onto a cooling rack as easy as pie (no pun intended). I’m not even going to get into how good it made my kitchen smell…

Unlike most banana cakes, this one wasn’t too heavy and had a lovely crumbly texture. My decision to also add some chopped cashew nuts really made it something special. With each individual bite, I could taste the creaminess of the banana and the nutty flavour of the cashews. The two flavours just complimented each other beautifully.

But now that I’ve finished my slice, I better get back to work … at least until dinner.