Wednesday 7 August 2013

We share our mothers health

My grandmother turned 84 on Monday. 84. I can't imagine where I'll be at 30, never mind living into my 80s. Maybe everything will evolve radically and it'll be normal to live well beyond that, although I am not someone who would want to live forever.

Because she lives at the coast and we live about 14h by car away from her I was not thinking about baking her a cake. But then my aunt decided to fly down, and suddenly we had to fashion some last minute red velvet cupcakes to go along for a trip to the coast. I am not the biggest fan of red velvet, because it's basically a fake chocolate cupcake with cream cheese frosting. Rather give me chocolate on chocolate, not the fake red stuff. I have tried making a red velvet cake using beetroot as colourant, which worked, but still I wouldn't do it again. However, these were requested, so I made them.

Again, the recipe is shamelessly stolen from Nigella Lawson, although I substituted yoghurt for the buttermilk, added 2TB of red food colouring (not the paste, the liquid kind) and made up the frosting as I went along.

Here are the results:









10 comments:

  1. I am jealous! Just made these with liquid colouring and they were a horrid grey/brown. They tasted bland and chemically. Found out its because I used natural red colouring which is a big no no for cakes but fine for icing. Back to the kitchen...

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    1. Damn, I'm sorry to hear that :'(
      You could also try using beetroot as colourant? Here is a link to the recipe I tried, it came out a lot darker than the bright red on the blog's photos but tasted ok : http://www.sophistimom.com/red-velvet-cake-all-natural-no-red-dye/

      Good luck :)

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  2. nice adaptation!
    LardButty

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    1. Thanks, I think my grandmother enjoyed the cupcakes as well :)

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  3. OMG look so delicious! got your website from nigella's website. can't wait to try this recipe.

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    1. Hi Amira,
      Thank you, they were really good :) Let me know how yours turn out :)

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  4. These look amazing! Attempted them last night and used 2 TBS red colouring (liquid) and still didn't achieve that level of redness :( was brown instead... What brand did you use?

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    1. Hi there, I think I used Moir's crimson pink? I am sorry yours didn't turn out so great :( maybe in future add less cocoa and more flour ( instead of 2TB just one of cocoa and one extra TB of flour?)? Although it isn't that much cocoa to begin with. Hope in future they turn a beautiful red :)

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  5. Hi,

    I would like to know if it is necessary to use a mechanical whisk. Will manual whisking do the job?

    Thank you.

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    1. Hi, you can use a normal whisk. Using my mom's Kenwood was just a bit quicker :)

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