Tag: cake

Gluten Free American-style jam donuts

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I finally made the leap and purchased an NZD$29 Kmart Pie Maker. They are quite the internet phenomenon in part because they can be used for so many things other than pies. We decided to celebrate the purchase with family by making coealiac friendly american style donuts! They are delicious!

Allergy friendly jam donuts

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cup Healtheries Gluten Free Bread Mix
  • 1/2 cup rice flour
  • 3 tsp Baking Powder
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • (Pinch salt)
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 cup rice milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 2 eggs (beaten)
  • 30g Nuttelex or 1/4 to 1/2 cup rice bran oil
  • Squeeze of lemon (or 1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar).
  • Filling: jam, or maple syrup, or honey.

Allergies: gluten free, dairy free, soy free, nut free

Note: Although I made 12 in the pie maker (3 rounds) you could bake them in the oven in muffin trays instead. You’d probably want 375’F / 180’C for 20-25 mins.

Directions

  1. Mix the dry ingredients.
  2. Make a well in the middle. Add milk, vanilla, eggs, rice bran oil, lemon juice. Mix well.
  3. Allow mix to stand for a few minutes (the gluten free flours will thicken)
  4. 3/4 fill each space in the pie maker. Put a teaspoon of jam in the middle. Put a little more mix over the top.
  5. Cook for 8 minutes. Remove and place on cooling rack. Put the next batch on to cook. (Makes 12 donuts) .
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Easy Carrot Cake

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Best Ever Carrot Cake

Chelsea Sugar’s Best Ever Carrot Cake

Carrot cake is a delicious winter cake. It’s a great way to use up those extra carrots (while they’re cheap and plentiful) and get some warmly sweet spiced cake into lunchboxes or afternoon tea. My inspiration for the recipe is this Best Ever Carrot Cake which I’ve amended to add in some different micro-nutrients; also, swapping from nuts to seeds makes it suitable for childcare and schools with no-nut policies.

Carrot cake with seeds and ancient grains

Delicious carrot cake with seeds and ancient grains.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 cup plain flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp ground ginger
  • pinch Allspice
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar or raw coconut sugar
  • 200g grated carrot
  • ½ cup sultanas or raisins
  • 2 tsp ground chia seeds
  • 3 – 4 Tbsp Hubbards Seeds and Ancient Grains Toppers
    • or, a mix (as desired) of coconut thread, linseed, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, buckwheat, puffed quinoa.
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1 cup rice bran oil or canola oil
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence

Allergies: dairy free, soy free, nut free.

Directions

  1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C bake (160°C fan-forced). Grease a 23cm cake tin (6cm deep) and line with baking paper.
  2. Sift all of the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl.
  3. Add carrot, sultanas, ground chia seeds, and coconut + seed mix and stir until combined.
  4. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, oil and vanilla.
  5. Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour liquid ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined.
  6. Pour the cake mixture into the prepared tin and smooth the surface. Bake for 40-50 minutes or until cooked (when a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean). Remove from oven, cool for 10 minutes then remove from the cake tin and peel away the paper.
  7. Optional: make cream cheese icing to decorate.

 

Cream Cheese Icing

  • 50g butter, softened
  • 125g cream cheese, chopped
  • 1½ cups Icing Sugar

Cream Cheese Icing
Beat butter and cream cheese together until combined. Stir in Chelsea Icing Sugar, then beat mixture on high speed until light and fluffy.

Wild berry chocolate cake (Gluten Free)

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Wild berry chocolate cake (Gluten Free)

Wild berry chocolate cake (Gluten Free)

I love chocolate. I’ve posted a few chocolate recipes like the Crazy One Dish Chocolate Cake and the Chocolate Irish Potato Cake, and I’ve posted some make-from-scratch gluten free recipes like the Vanilla Cupcakes and the all natural pink berry flavoured icing. I wanted to play around in the kitchen with some different gluten free ingredients and make a wonderfully chocolatey and moist cake that also wouldn’t be packed with sugar – I prefer to balance my cakes so there’s more chocolate flavour in the cake and then extra sweetness in the (optional) icing. I liked my recipe for the gluten free Chocolate Cupcakes and used it as the basis for this cake!

Ingredients

Group 1

Group 2

  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 3/4 cup Dutch cocoa powder
  • 1/2 cup superfine white rice flour
  • 1/2 cup garbanzo flour (also called chickpea flour)
  • 1T sweet (glutinous) rice flour
  • 1/4 cup cornstarch (cornflour)
  • 1/2 tsp guar gum
  • 1/4 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1/2 Tbsp Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup fresh or frozen mixed berries (i.e, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, strawberries).
    • I like this paired with raspberries best!

Allergies: dairy free, soy free, gluten free, nut free.

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 180’C.
  2. Whisk together the ingredients in Group 1. This helps to aerate the mix. You can use a stick blender or I used the food processor (with a plastic mixing attachment, not a metal cutting blade!).
  3. Sift together the ingredients in Group 2.
  4. Mix the combined dry ingredients into the whisked liquid.
  5. Divide the mix between two cake tins (or similar). Bake at 180’c for approx. 25-30 mins or until cooked.
  6. Allow to cool before icing. Place one cake layer on serving dish. Cover with jam (i.e. you could have raspberries in the cake mix and then use raspberry jam), place the second cake layer on top, dust with icing sugar. Serve with cream or coconut ice-cream.

Tips

As an alternative you might want to bake this as a bundt cake and use a chocolate buttercream frosting.

Chocolate Buttercream Icing (allergy friendly)

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Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

This is a great frosting to use with Gluten Free Chocolate Cupcakes, the Crazy One Dish Chocolate Cake, or the Chocolate Irish Potato Cake (vegan). I made a vegan version of this frosting for my daughter’s 3rd Birthday (using Nuttelex + coconut milk) and it tasted divine!

Ingredients

  • 115g softened butter, or allergy friendly spread like Nuttelex
  • 2 cups icing sugar
  • 1/2 cup Dutch Cocoa Powder
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
  • 1 – 3 Tbsp milk (dairy, rice, or coconut)
  • Optional: 1/2 tsp espresso powder

Allergies: gluten free, dairy free*, soy free, egg free, nut free. Vegan*.

Directions

  1. Whip the butter.
  2. Sift in 1 cup icing sugar, cocoa powder, and espresso powder. Add the vanilla and milk.
  3. Beat until smooth.
  4. Slowly beat in the rest of the icing sugar to give a good consistency for frosting.

Blood Orange Icing (a.k.a. how to make pretty pink icing without using artificial colours)

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Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

My daughter is sensitive to red food colouring – as are many kids! For some reason New Zealand still allows artificial food colouring agents to be sold here that are banned in many parts of Europe. I’ve been doing more research (as you might have noticed from the post on why to be cautious about annatto as a colouring agent) and am experimenting with natural food colours.

One way to make pink icing is to use beetroot juice but I’m not a big fan of beetroot so instead decided to make a Blood Orange icing that has a beautifully delicate berry flavour and uses fruit tea!

The secret ingredient to this icing mix is Blood Orange fruit tea which uses a mix of

  • Hibiscus
  • Apple
  • Rosehips
  • Natural Flavouring
  • Stevia
  • Orange Peel

Not only do you get to make icing but you can also make yourself a cuppa in the process. Incidentally, this tea is also lovely cold, with sparkling water, or in fruit punch. You could also experiment with other fruit teas (like Blueberry & Blackcurrant) to make other colours.

Ingredients

  • 50g Butter or allergy free spread (i.e. Nuttelex)
  • 1c icing sugar
  • Blood Orange tea bag
  • Hot water

Allergies: gluten free, dairy free*, egg free, soy free, nut free.

Directions

  1. In a mug steep the Blood Orange tea bag in a small amount of boiling water (i.e. about 50 ml). Allow it to cool and it should have a concentrated deep red colour.
  2. Cream the butter and icing sugar.
  3. Slowly add the (cooled) blood-orange-water to the mix until you have the colour and consistency that you desire. (Add more icing sugar if needed).
  4. Ice your cupcakes (like these Gluten Free cupcakes!)

Note: You can also make this with just icing sugar and the Blood Orange mix to make a darker colour.

 

Gluten Free Cupcakes

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Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

I love experimenting with gluten free baking! As well as this vanilla cupcake recipe, I also have different recipes for chocolate cupcakes and berry muffins.

Ingredients

Cupcakes

  • 1c superfine white rice flour
  • 1T glutinous rice flour (also marketed as ‘sweet rice flour’)
  • 1/2 fine cornmeal (polenta) – use finely milled.
  • 1/2c sugar
  • 1 tsp guar gum
  • 2 tsp Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
  • Pinch salt
  • 1/3c neutral oil (i.e. Rice Bran Oil)
  • 1 egg (or egg replacer)
  • Vanilla
  • 2/3c water

Allergies: gluten free, dairy free, egg free*, soy free, nut free.

Makes 8-10 cupcakes.

Directions

  1. Mix all the dry ingredients together.
  2. Whisk the egg (or egg replacer) until fluffy and pour in.
  3. Add the oil and vanilla. Mix.
  4. Slowly pour the water in while mixing.
  5. Spoon into cupcake cases and bake at 180’C for approx. 25 mins until golden.
  6. Allow to cool and ice. I used a Blood Orange icing with no artificial colours!

 

Tip: My current preferred method for cooking cupcakes is to fill a large cake tin with silicon cupcake cases (so that they are touching). This helps them to keep their shape and is super easy to get in and out of the oven.

 

Icing 

The icings that I use don’t have any artificial colours, glycerin, additives etc.

Feijoa Cake

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wp-1486711053232.jpg

Feijoa Cake

Ingredients

  • 125g butter
  • 3/4c sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 1/2 – 2c feijoa pulp (scoop it out and squeeze out the excess liquid).
  • 1 tsp Baking Soda
  • 2T warm milk
  • 2c plain flour
  • 1 tsp Baking Powder

Allergy: soy free, peanut free, tree nut free.

For other yummy things to do with feijoas check out the Feijoa Cheesecake!

Directions

  1. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.
  2. Add in eggs and feijoas. Mix.
  3. Stir baking soda into warm milk; add to mixture.
  4. Add flour and baking powder.
  5. Bake at 180’C for 50 mins or until cake is cooked through.
  6. Serve dusted with icing sugar or with whipped cream.

 

Feijoa Cheesecake

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Feijoa cheesecake

Malt biscuit base for the feijoa cheesecake
Feijoa Cheesecake

Ingredients

Base

  • 250g biscuits
    • Gingernuts pair well with feijoa but aren’t necessarily allergy friendly. I used malt biscuits that were soy free so feel free to sub in something that works for you; i.e. you could use gluten free cookies.
  • 100g melted butter
    • Do melt it; I put butter in straight from the fridge and the crumbs stayed too dry so I had to dash in some rice bran oil.
  • Optional: generous pinches of cinnamon and ginger.

Filling

  • 400g scooped feijoas (after squeezing out excess liquid)
  • 1 – 2T lemon juice
  • 250g cream cheese (at room temperature)
  • 1c greek yoghurt
  • 2T mild liquid honey
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 3tsp powdered gelatin
  • 2T boiling water

Allergies: Soy free, gluten free*, egg free, peanut free, tree nut free.

Directions

  1. Lightly butter the sides and base of a 20cm springform cake pan. Line the base with baking paper.
  2. Crush the biscuits very finely. Combine with the butter.
    • (I used a food processor.)
  3. Press biscuit mix onto the base of the pan. Chill.
  4. Blend the feijoa flesh and lemon juice in a food processor, until smooth. Add the cream cheese, yoghurt, honey, vanilla essence and blend until smooth. Dissolve the gelatine in the boiling water and add to the filling. Mix well.
  5. Pour onto the biscuit base. Cover and chill for 3 hours or overnight.

 

Chocolate Irish Potato Cake (Vegan & Allergy Friendly)

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CHOCOLATE IRISH POTATO CAKE (VEGAN & ALLERGY FRIENDLY)
CHOCOLATE IRISH POTATO CAKE (VEGAN & ALLERGY FRIENDLY)

 

Ingredients

  • 4T ground linseed/flaxseed + 6T hot water
    • OR use 4 eggs.
  • 1c hot unseasoned mashed potato (instant is fine)
    • 1c of potato flakes + approx. 3/4c boiling water makes 1c mashed potato.
  • 1c hot water
  • 3/4c rice bran oil
    • OR 3/4c softened butter
  • 1 1/2c sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 2c flour (or gluten free baking mix)
  • 2 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 1/4c cocoa
  • Optional: 1 tsp cinnamon

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, egg free, peanut free, tree nut free, gluten free*.

Note: I’ve included ingredient options so that you can choose whether to use butter & eggs; I made mine without. It’s worth having a recipe like this even if you don’t have allergies. It’s great if you’ve run out of other ingredients (or would rather use the eggs for breakfast!), it’s cost effective, it’s allergy friendly to share with others, and you’re getting extra nutrients + fibre from the linseed. The other fabulous thing about linseed as an egg replacement is that it makes cakes and breads beautifully moist.

My inspiration for this recipe came from finding potato flakes in a bulk foods store and wondering what I could do with them. I gather from the internet that in some countries (like the USA) it’s reasonably common to find potato flakes or instant mashed potato at the supermarket; elsewhere, have a hunt in bulk food and health food stores.

Directions

Note: This is a thick batter and you’ll get the smoothest batter by using a food processor. You can also use a big mixing bowl and electric hand mixer but in that case you’ll want to go a bit slower (i.e. egg, beat, egg, beat, etc. and alternate the potato & dry ingredients) to blend & aerate it.

  1. Pre-heat oven to 180’C.
  2. Prepare your egg replacement. Use a bowl or mug, put in 4T ground linseed and 6T hot water. Mix and then leave it, for 5-10 mins, until needed (this gives the seeds time to absorb the water) it turns into a stretchy liquid that’s a bit thicker than egg.
  3. Mix up your mashed potato. You can use a bowl, put in 1c of potato flakes, and then slowly add 3/4 – 1 cup of boiling water while stirring until smooth. It turns into mashed potato very quickly.
  4. Slowly add 1c of hot water to the mashed potato stirring carefully to create a smooth liquid.
  5. In the food processor, blend the oil, sugar, and vanilla until smooth.
  6. Add the linseed (egg-replacement) and blend.
  7. Add the liquidy potato.
  8. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cocoa, cinnamon and blend till smooth.
  9. Pour into a silicon cake tin.
  10. Cook for 25 min and check (a knife is likely to come out sticky); cook for another 15 mins and check (a knife is now likely to come out clean). Turn the oven off and leave the cake inside for another 10 minutes. Pull cake out and place on bench to cool.
  11. Dust with icing sugar.

This comes out as a beautifully moist, rich, chocolatey cake.

Alternatives:

  • If anyone successfully plays around with coconut flour/sugar, let me know. I wonder if it would turn out like a gluten-free Bounty Bar cake.
  • If you like coffee consider adding 2T dark roasted instant coffee when adding the dry ingredients.
  • For birthdays or special occasions, try splitting the batter between two cake tins. Layer the cakes with cherry, plum, or raspberry jam in between and a thick chocolate frosting on top.
  • For another allergy friendly chocolate cake, check out this Depression-Era Chocolate cake.

Mum’s Spiced Fruit Loaf

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This is a fabulous recipe and a firm family favourite. It’s also very versatile and can be used to make child sized cakes (in silicon cupcake cases) or miniature christmas cakes (in muffin trays). It also freezes well.

Ingredients

Group 1

  • 1/2c sugar
  • 50g butter or 60ml rice bran oil
  • 1c sultanas
  • 1c chopped dates
  • 1T golden syrup or maple syrup
  • 1 1/4c water

Group 2

  • 1 1/2 tsp  ground ginger
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • pinch nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp ground coriander
  • 1/2c chopped walnuts (optional)
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Group 3

  • 2c flour (or gluten free baking mix)
  • 1 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1 tsp Baking Powder

Allergies: dairy free, soy free, egg free, gluten free*, nut free*.

Directions

  1. Place Group 1 in pot. Boil; then simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
  2. Stir in Group 2.
  3. Ideally allow to cool to room temperature (this takes several hours) as this allows the dried fruit time to soak.
  4. Grease and line loaf tin. Preheat oven to 180’C.
  5. Stir in Group 3.
  6. Bake for 1 hour or until skewer comes out smooth.
  7. Cool in tin for 15 minutes before turning out onto wire rack.

Notes

I use a greased silicon loaf tin and often cook a smaller portion in silicon cupcake cases at the same time (for my toddler); the cupcake-sized cakes only take about 15 mins to cook.

This is a versatile recipe. Sometimes I have my toddler help me assemble all of Group 1 and 2 in the pot before I put it on to heat; sometimes I only give the fruit mix 5-10 mins to cool before adding the dry ingredients and cooking it. Sometimes I’ll do the fruit mix after my toddler’s midday nap, let it cool all afternoon, and then put it in to cook after dinner (when the oven is already warm); I’ve also allowed the fruit to soak all night and then cooked it in the morning.

I’ve made this a number of times and varied ingredients (while essentially keeping to the base recipe); i.e. using 1/2c sultanas and 1/2c cranberries; having no walnuts; using coconut thread instead of walnuts; using 1c mixed nuts (smashed) + coconut + melted chocolate + extra water (this is the one pictured).

Walnuts are a soft nut that are easy to smash and chew. I’ve made this using a nut mix (predominantly walnuts & almonds with some hazelnuts and brazil nuts) because it was on special – the other nuts just take a bit more effort to smash. If you have a young baby or toddler then you may want to leave the nuts out until they’ve grown all their molars and are comfortable chewing nuts.  I’ve found the ideal way for us to smash nuts is to put them in a plastic bag and have my toddler enthusiastically whack them with her toy hammer!

Allergies: Soy free, peanut free, egg free, dairy free (replace butter with oil).