Faking It

I am yet to use silicone moulds in my baking, but my mum swears by them. And mums know best. So I have decided to have a look at what the silicone world has to offer. There is some fab stuff out there.

Take these TeaCupCakes from StrawberryFool.

The set contains 4 reusable baking cups and saucers so you can impress your friends, with the presentation of their cupcake, when having tea parties...if you have tea parties. If not, then here is a perfect excuse to start having them.



A perfect recipe to bake in these would be Earl Grey Tea Cakes.

This recipe is taken from Nigella.com


Ingredients:

Butter for greasing
2 Earl Grey tea bags
60ml (1/4 cup) boiling water
80ml (1/3 cup) milk
100g unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 eggs
160g (2/3 cup) caster sugar
190g (1 1/4 cups) self-raising flour
230g (1 1/2 cups) pure icing sugar
1.5 tbsp breakfast marmalade
1.5 tbsp fresh orange juice (approx)

Let's get making:
1. Preheat oven to 180C
2. Brush 12 medium muffin pans with melted butter to lightly grease.
3. Empty the tea leaves from the tea bags into a cup and add the boiling water.
4. Set aside for 3 minutes
5. Stir in the milk and then transfer to a large bowl. Add the butter, eggs, sugar and flour to the tea mixture
6. Use electric beaters on low speed to beat until just combined. Increase speed to medium and beat until the mixture is pale and creamy (the mixture may look slightly curdled)
7. Spoon the mixture evenly into the greased pans. (Or TeaCupCakes, if you have them.)
8. Bake in a preheated oven for 20-22 minutes or until golden and a skewer inserted in the cakes comes out clean.
9. Remove from the oven and set aside for 2-3 minutes before turning onto a wire rack to cool.

To make the marmalade icing...

1. Combine the icing sugar and marmalade in a small bowl.
2.  Add enough juice to make a very thick past
3.  Use a teaspoon dipped in hot water to spread the icing over the tops of the cooled cakes
4. Set aside for 15-20 minutes to allow the icing to set

And now you can enjoy with a cup of tea.