American Classics - Ham & Jam, Preston - South Lancashire Clandestine Cake Club

Carla's - Amazing Banana maple syrup and pecan bundt

In celebration of Thanksgiving the theme for our cake club was American Classics and what a fun afternoon we had.

We had the following cakes, Banana, maple syrup pecan bundt, Reeces Pieces Cake, New York Cheesecake, Peanut butter and Jelly bundt, Sweet Potato bundt, Boston Cream Pie, All American Carrot Cake, Baked New York Cheesecake, Strawberry shortcake,Apple and Apricot Cake, hummingbird Cake, Ginger Chocolate Brownie Cake and some American Buttermilk biscuits (not strictly to CCC rules but brought along as a kind gesture by a bakers guest).

Hosted by a fab new coffee shop in Preston City Centre - Ham and Jam we enjoyed a massive selection of wonderful baking, great coffee and a warm and friendly atmosphere.

Lucky us, we were also joined by Dorrett Conway -  one of this years Great British Bake Off contestants who lives locally.

Cake clubbers old and new joined us to much our way through cake mountain (Mount Sugar Rushmore !). Everything on Ham and Jam's menu is locally sourced where possible so we were happy to see Atkinson's Coffee being served.

We loved Ham and Jam, a great addition to Preston City Centre as we love to support local independent venues as its what we are all about. Check out their website here

Coffee, cardamon and walnut cake - gluten free

For the latest meeting of South Lancashire Clandestine Cake Club I once again was inspired to bake from a Fiona Cairns recipe book, this bake is from her latest "Seasonal Baking" which is a stunning book and contains some wonderful looking cakes and bakes.

Feeling distinctly autumnal I plumped for a Coffee, cardamon and walnut cake which is a beautiful twist on the classic combination of coffee and walnut, as the recipe contains ground almonds and a relatively low amount of flour, it converted beautifully to gluten free using a standard gluten free flour.

Fiona's recipe is available on the Waitrose website here 

What you need

• 175g softened butter
• 50g walnuts, roughly chopped
• 15 cardamon pods
• 175g golden caster sugar
• 1tbsp of instant coffee powder dissolved in 1tbsp of hot water
• 3 eggs free range - lightly beaten
• 50g ground almonds
• 125g self raising flour (gluten free works fine)

For the caramelised walnuts

• 50g walnut halves
• 100g caster sugar

For the buttercream

• 5 cardamon pods
• 150g softened butter
• 250g icing sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla paste
• 1 tbsp of instant coffee powder dissolved in 1 tbsp of hot water
• 1 tsp milk

You also need 2 sandwich tins - about 22cm diameter oil sprayed and base lined

What you do 

• Preheat the oven to 160c
• Firstly we are going to roast the walnut pieces and halves for about 6 minutes until lightly toasted, don't let them burn. Allow to cool
• Now lets make the caramelised walnut halves, place the walnut halves on a baking tray lined with a silicone sheet or baking parchment.
• In a saucepan bring 100g of caster sugar and 100ml water to the boil, swirl the pan to ensure all the sugar has dissolved, then bring to a vigour rolling boil. The caramel will eventually turn a lovely golden brown and be reduced. 
• Remove from the heat and drizzle over the walnut halves to create a sheet of nutty caramel, leave to one side to set. Be careful as the caramel with be very hot.
• Next we will make the cake
• De seed the cardamon pods, placing the seeds in a pestle and mortar and grind to a fine ground, sieve into a small bowl, take a 1/4 for the buttercream. The rest is for your cake mixture.
• In a mixer (I used my trusty kitchenaid) cream the butter,sugar and coffee until light and fluffy
• Add the eggs, almonds and cardamon, fold in the flour and the chopped walnuts
• Once fully mixed divide the mixture into the prepared sandwich tins.
• Bake in the oven for 20 - 25 minutes, tested with a cocktail stick to check baked through.
• Remove and cool on a wire rack.
• Whilst the cake is cooling, mix up the buttercream using the remaining cardamon and the above listed ingredients, ensure you beat it for a least 6 or so minutes to ensure a light fluffy buttercream.
• To assemble the cake - spread the base layer with buttercream and then top with the other cake. Then spread the rest of the buttercream on the top and sides.
• Crush the walnut caramel and arrange decoratively on top.

Anything Goes at Caffe Manna Eccleston - South Lancashire Clandestine Cake Club

For our 24th meeting of South Lancashire Clandestine Cake club, we paid a return visit to Caffe Manna in Eccleston near Chorley. This is our first visit to Caffe Manna but not to the lovely hosts as the same team used to run Coffee at the Carrington, which has since been demolished and a lovely new larger coffee shop built on the same location.

Caffe Manna is a great coffee shop that serves the finest coffee's and other refreshments to locals and visitors to the village (Eccleston is home to Sir Bradley Wiggans no less !), with ample parking outside the door its well worth a visit if you are passing.

On a warm sultry September afternoon members arrived bearing a fabulous selection of cakes for our anything goes theme, including several gluten free cakes. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and it was great to catch up with members old and new and indulge in cakey gossip ranging from GBBO to vegetable growing.

Coffee walnut cake

Gin, tonic and lemon cake

Licorice allsort cake

Courgette and orange cake

Coffee cardamon and walnut cake - gluten free

Coffee Cake - gluten free

Apricot and Almond cake

Victoria Sponge

Zeeuwe Knop caramel Cake

Cappucino Cake - gluten and diary free

Unfortunately not photographed (sorry Kate,Margaret and Harvey) we also had a delicious Strawberry cake, sticky toffee pudding cake and victoria sponge to enjoy.

Thanks to Caffe Manna for hosting our event, you can find the coffee shop at the Carrington Centre, The Green, Eccleston. They are open every day except Sunday.

The Chocolate Rooms by Choc Amor

This week a beautiful new chocolate shop opened in a the quaint West Lancashire of Tarleton, but what it signifies to me is the amazing foodie journey that Paul and Jacqui the owners has been on. Paul decided just over 12 months ago to become a chocolatier and took the life changing gamble to become an artisan producer of amazing chocolate confections. The first time I met Paul was on a cold snowy day in Chorley at their small farmers market, his passion for great chocolate immediately shone through as we chomped on his fantastic wares.

Now an award winning chocolatier (Great Taste 2013), Paul and  the team at Choc Amor has opened The Chocolate Rooms, a venue where all can enjoy great chocolate, coffee and cake ! you can actually experience much more as the team are keen also to showcase other great local artisan food producers on their coffee shop menu too and for you to purchase and take away.

Choc Amor already have an outlet at Botany Bay in Chorley and you can find out more about this on an earlier post here, but the Chocolate Rooms are something else.

The Chocolate Rooms are in a sensitively converted old agricultural building, here you'll find easy parking and a warm chocolately welcome, their is also a viewing facility so you can watch Lancashire's own "Willy Wonka" at work, creating the delectable creations which you can purchase in the shop. You can also book parties for both adults and children, which of course feature chocolate and hands on chocolate classes are also planned too (might have to try one of those).

The cakes are all handmade on the premises and will hopefully feature the chocolate scones that I experienced on our visit (amazing when filled with black forest jam and cream !) plus other chocolately cakes alongside traditional favourites. Great teas and coffees and of course hot chocolate and a savouries menu to offset all that sweetness.

You can find The Chocolate Rooms just of the A59 in Tarleton village, just pop PR4 6UP in your sat nav. Its well worth a visit (or more in my case) to sample and purchase this handmade, small batch artisan chocolate.

The Rooms will be open Tuesday to Friday 9-5ish, Saturday 10-5 and Sunday 10-4. Closed Mondays. Tarleton is on the A59 between Southport and Preston. 

You can also find Choc Amor on Facebook and twitter too.

Baking fairtrade - Coffee and Raisin Cake

THE BIG FAIR BAKE - Buy it, Bake it, Share it

I am getting involved in the Big Fair Bake - Fairtrade Baking Challenge, I think it great when you bake something that in a small way makes a difference to the world we live in. Baking with fairtrade ingredients is something that I do where every possible in my recipes, because supporting fairtrade means that you offer growers and workers all over the world a fair price for their produce or product and a better life long term.

Foodies100 is running a challenge to create a baking  recipe using ingredients which are fairtrade which you cake bake and share with friends and collegues to raise awareness of Fairtrade.

As part of the Take a step campaign , you have a chance of winning a lovely Kitchenaid blender, all you need to do is visit the Fairtrade website and tell them who you are baking for ! Easy or what.

You can buy lots of baking ingredients that are fairtrade such as

• Coffee
• Sugar
• Raisins
• Cinnamon
• Honey
• Chocolate / Cocoa powder
• Bananas
• Apricots
• Ginger
• Brazil nuts
• Tea
• Vanilla

To name just a few, so next time you are out shopping if you have the choice buy fairtrade. Because this little tiny action makes a big life changing different to producer.

This is an easy recipe and is well liked in the Lancashire Food household , perfect for serving with a mug of fairtrade tea.

Ingredients

• 450ml strong freshly brewed coffee (fairtrade)
• 300g granulated sugar (fairtrade)
• 110g butter (vegetable margarine if you wish to make vegan version)
• 150g raisins (fairtrade)
• 1 tsp allspice
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon (fairtrade )
• 375g plain flour
• 2 tsp bicarb of soda
• 1 tsp baking powder

Method

• Pre heat the oven to 180c/ 170c fan / Gas 4
• Line a deep square cake tin approx 20 cm by 20cm
• Sieve the flour, bicarb and baking powder into a bowl
• In a large pan bring the coffee, sugar,butter, raisins and spices to the boil, allow to cool slighty
• Mix the coffee mixture into the flour, stir until well mixed
• Pour into your prepared tin
• Bake for 45 -60 minutes, until tested cooked with a skewer
• Cool in the tin
• Decorate if you wish with melted chocolate or flavoured buttercream

The cake smells wonderful whilst cooking , a little like a cinnamon latte . As the recipe does not contain eggs it can easily be made vegan by substituting vegetable margarine for the butter. Pretty sure it would work well as gluten free too. 

Bean Drinking Coffee tasting experience

Today has been a busy day, so a caffeine kick has been welcome,  A great local coffee bar has been running a tasting experience so we dropped by to check out the action.


Bean Drinking is run by the lovely Tom and his wife Zoe and is a great venue for a snack or coffee, they are great at supporting the local community and are often the venue for a variety of events such as cake clubs or knit and knatter groups.



If you are ever in the area please pay them a call, support your local barista !