Birthday baking (although no excuse needed)

Yup, of course I have been baking!

We had a lovely few days in and around Bath, but as Andy took the photos I need to wait for him to send them to me before I do a post. So you have to make do with a baking post instead.

It is Andy’s birthday today, and yesterday we went out for a meal with his parents, brothers and their girlfriends. His brothers especially are massive chocoholics, so I decided to make a brownie cake for after. I had seen Lucy make her recipe into a cake before, so I decided to try it out.

Now it was my own fault because I lined the cake pans with foil, but did not grease them. Duh. Anyway, I did manage to get them off, more or less in one piece!

I made some mint filling by creaming a little bit of pure spread, some mint extract and icing sugar.

Then I topped it with the rest of the cheat icing that I bought a few weeks back (I found it in the fridge) and decorated with stars. Those stars are my favourite!

We went to Prezzo, which I love because they do an amazing goats cheese salad with artichokes, roasted peppers, tomatoes, spinach, toasted bread and balsamic. Yum. Although I had to save some space for the cake. It went down very well indeed (although Andy’s Dad thought that the “30” referred to how many slices it should be- to be fair my parents forget how old I am too) but it was sooooooo sweet. I only had a small slice but I could only just manage that. Anyway it satisfied all the chocolate lovers- and there was lots left which we made them keep for another day.

Andy had requested that I make him a fruitcake (his brothers don’t like it and one of the girlfriends hates dried fruits) so I did that today.

I used a recipe for Light fruit cake from an Eric Lanlard book (I was kindly sent the book after writing the blog post about Baking Mad)- this has dried fruit (which I soaked before using as I find otherwise it is too dry) but also lemon zest for a lighter taste. They smell delicious anyway.

The recipe said it would serve 6, and I wanted to use my new mini loaf pans (I think each mini pan would be a good two servings) so as you can see there was a lot more! I think they will freeze well too. I am going to put some marzipan on them in a bit.

I have had a pretty chilled out day today, compared to the last few days. I did manage a lot of walking (more than I have done in months) but I was so exhausted in the evenings. Andy was off at football today so I have been enjoying time to relax.

Including having an Earl Grey tea and a cookie from Tam via the cookie swap.

Also, I did my first ever guest post! Laura from Mommy Run Fast has been doing a series called “Purposeful Running” and mine was posted today. You can check it out here.

I hope everyone had a lovely long weekend- anyone get any Easter Eggs? My Dad got us a rake for our allotment (he said he was going to get us an Easter egg, but then saw that and knew we needed one- he wants to start a new tradition!), and we did not get each other anything, but Andy’s Mum gave us one to share yesterday. Although we need to eat the birthday cake first!

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25 thoughts on “Birthday baking (although no excuse needed)”

  1. I love Bath too – we went there for a romantic getaway a few weeks ago. Such a pretty city!

    We left it too late to get Easter Eggs – when we went on Saturday every place we went to was sold out! So we got blocks of Lindt instead 😛 Tom also got me a book I really wanted so I was more than happy with that!

    Your baking looks delicious as always 🙂

    1. Thanks 🙂 All your cups of Earl Grey tea were making me fancy it- I had some while we were away and carried on once I was home. You are right, Bath is such a pretty place. And I think a block of chocolate is better than an Easter egg anyway!

  2. Happy birthday to Andy! So glad I could share your story. 🙂 And yum on all that baking… we’ve got our share of sweet stuff floating around here, too!

  3. Happy birthday to Andy, I think they were all lucky to sample that cake it looks amazing! Looking forward to hearing about Bath, I’ve seen a few bloggers visits and it looks like a great place. I was very lucky as James got me a Lindt chocolate bunny and then surprised me with a Green and Blacks dark chocolate egg! Hence to say I’m rather chocolated out now 😉

  4. I was rather proud of my baking efforts over the weekend but then I pop on over here and I’m drooling all over the place 🙂

    1. Well that was Lucy’s idea 🙂 (and a fab one too). A green juice will sort you out soon I am sure.x

  5. Happy birthday to Andy! A brownie cake sounds a great idea; that squidgy nutty chocolatiness in cake form, yum 🙂
    Glad you’ve been feeling better enough to walk more and glad you had a good weekend. My mum gave me a Waitrose egg with caramel bits in it – and some Mini Eggs… it’s a hard life!

    1. Thanks Eleanor 🙂 I am getting close to normal now I think.
      Yes I am not sure why brownie cakes have not been invented before- such a good idea!

    1. Yes the mint cream was lovely- I made some vegan mint slices before and his brothers loved the mint filling, so I decided to have it in the cake.

  6. Oh lord, brownie cake?! I know what I’m making for Max’s birthday =D He LOVES brownies!

  7. Happy Birthday to Andy 🙂 Both the cakes look good, although I’d probably go for fruit cake every time. I love chocolate, but somehow chocolate cake doesn’t really do it for me.
    My Mum sent me money for a meal instead of an Easter egg, and Peter and I don’t buy them for each other. I am secretly hoping that Peter’s parents might have got me one though!

    1. I never like chocolate cake as much as other cake, but the brownie cake was much nicer than normal chocolate cake.
      A meal is a nice Easter gift.

  8. I love Bath, such a beautiful place! Love all your baking! I got a dark choc lindt bunny which has been eaten! I melted him in my porridge each day 😛 I also got a green and blacks dark egg, but I’ve put that away in the cupboard for another time.

  9. Glad the brownie cake went down well, your decoration looks so pretty! 🙂 I also made brownies at the weekend and forgot to spray the foil, whoops. They came off fine once completely cool a few days later, but I did have a struggle to get the first few squares off when we wanted to eat them that afternoon!

    We have lots of Easter chocolate to get through! Liam and I “only” got 3 Easter eggs to share between us, but the children got 8 eggs and a bag of mini creme eggs EACH, yikes!! We only bought them one egg each and none for ourselves, but our relatives go a bit chocolate crazy – it quickly adds up!!

    1. Those little stars (from Sainsbury’s) make anything look pretty! Yes it was a great recipe- I think I prefer mine for actual brownies, but for a cake it was perfect as it held together a bit better- so am sure I will be making it again, and hopefully remember to grease the foil!

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