So we’re all probably aware now of my fascination with the traditions of cooking at home and it is this that has lead me on my next little cooking adventure. I’ve had an interest for sometime in the world of the CWA, good honest salt of the earth women who descend en mass at times of turbulence to make endless sandwiches, knit winter woolies and if you’re really lucky bake a sponge, don’t think I make light of their efforts though, the CWA has also dispensed more than 2 million dollars worth of aid to drought affected families in rural areas over the last couple of years.
There’s been a resurgence of the CWA in the last few years as we modern gals hanker for someone to teach us the things that our grandmothers knew but never got to pass on. They’ve also produced a very concise cookbook which I know a number of modern fella’s to follow on leaving home in a bid to fend of starvation and occasionally woo women and or men lets not be biased.
One particular area of expertise for these ladies, and a source of hot competition, is sponge baking. They can tell just by looking whether a sponge has been over beaten – resulting in large air holes in the sponge, whether the sugar hasn’t been mixed in properly as evidenced by a sticky or crusty surface to the sponge and are on the look out for drag marks where the cake might have been loosened from the tin with a knife, an indication that the tin wasn’t greased properly. Good lord you have to respect that kind of skill.
Now I don’t particularly go with the theory that there is a right way to do everything, there are certainly successful recipes but in my eyes a successful recipe is down to a few elements that you can, essentially through experimentation, isolate and then play with any way you want and its that which ultimately draws me to these kinds of things.
The recipes the ladies use and pass on are tried and true and they are a combination of tradition and thorough experimentation.
Every year at the Royal Melbourne Show an arts and crafts competition is held, where sponge battles sponge and jams, preserves, and fruitcakes are tested against the best and damnit I’ve thrown my hat in the ring. I haven’t thrown caution to the wind and entered the sponge competition, I’m saving that til next year, I figure I need to learn to paddle a little better before I jump into the tank with the sharks. But I am now a competitor in CLASS 223 PATTY CAKES (5). Iced with or without edible decoration eg: Sprinkles, etc. Baked in paper cases. I chose this one because it’s enough of a challenge to keep me occupied but not so much that I can’t have a snoop around on the day and see what everyone else is doing and possibly get some sponge making tips.
The cupcake seems to have been on the rise lately too which may have initially started with the appearance of the magnolia bakery’s cupcakes in an episode of sex in the city, certainly in Melbourne though the opening of bakeries like the Crabapple Bakery in Prahran has lead interested cooks towards all things cupcakey.
There is a joy in a perfect pretty cupcake, just enough for one and decorated so that you feel like you’re at some kind of fairytale picnic or one of the privileged children in a Charles Dickens novel. So now begins the experimentation, I’m working on finding the right flavour and decoration. I started practicing with my niece and nephew Jack and Olivia at the weekend though it wasn’t so much experimentation. I realised this when my sister in law Jenny said to me “John and I have just been saying you’re brave for cooking with both of them, we usually only try that with one at a time”
Now I know how my Uncle Bill might have felt baking scones for the boys on the beaches of Normandy during the war.
That’s kind of the point of cooking with kids though, if you’re really worried about the result or the mess, wait til they’re in bed, the fun of it is in them trying things out and pouring and stirring and both the kids are expert egg crackers.
Though they did get to see what coconut milk tastes like straight and I think we can safely say that the icing was a hit.
So dear readers, any lingering fantasies for cupcake flavours? Submit them and I’ll try them out for you and if you are within cake distance furnish you with the results.
The recipe I used with the kids is a kind of variation on one from the Crabapple Bakery, because I’ve only just started trying things out though it’s not all that different from theirs. It’s a bloody good recipe I must say. I first made these the Thursday night I got the book at about 8:30 at night when young Rusty decided he wanted dessert so they’re fairly foolproof.
Coconut Vanilla Cupcakes
Makes 24.
Preheat your oven to about 170 C or 160 if you have a fan forced oven.
Cream 200g of soft butter with 1 ¾ cups of caster sugar for a couple of minutes either in a mixer or with a hand held electric mixer. Add the sugar in batches so that it combines evenly. Add 4 eggs one at a time beating between each addition. Add a tablespoon of vanilla extract and beat in.
Sift together 2 ¾ cups of self raising flour or the same amount of plain flour and 2 teaspoons of baking powder, add this to the mixture and either beat at a low speed in your mixer or do what I prefer to do and fold it in with a spatula, at the flour in batches of three or four adding in a cup of coconut milk in between until combined.
Spoon the mix to 2/3 fill your cupcake cases and bake for about 20 mins or until the cupcakes are golden and a skewer inserts cleanly.
Mercifully these cool down pretty quickly so you can ice them in about half an hour or so.
Butter cream Icing.
Beat about 200g of butter which has either been left out of the fridge to get to room temperature or if room temperature is pretty cold like it is now zap it in the microwave for a bout 5 seconds til its soft start to add your icing sugar in batches of about three or four, you’ll end up using about 1kg of icing sugar and that will ice about 24 cupcakes if you’re generous with the icing. Have about half a cup of milk at the ready and add it in between the additions of icing sugar to keep the mixture soft and then you can flavour it or colour it in any way you like. We used lime essence in the pale green cupcakes and orange essence in the pale orange ones. The pink ones were just because that’s Livvy’s favourite colour. Interestingly in the morning even though it was freezing cold out there in Gisbourne we woke to find that ants had come to devour the cupcakes, the ants voted for Jacks cupcakes which were the orange and lime ones and left Livvy’s pink ones entirely untouched. So Jack got the ants vote.
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