Hummingbird Cake with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

Firstly, I'm really sorry about the bad quality photos on this post. This weekend was very hectic and I just didn't find time to photograph this cake in natural daylight and as it was quickly shot on my phone camera they really don't look that great.

But apologies out of the way, because this cake is absolutely delicious and super easy to make, as is the frosting. Really, you just dump everything in a bowl, mix it together and then bake. There's no butter in the batter which did worry me at first, however after tasting you really cannot tell - the banana keeps it so moist and the 4 eggs seem to make up for the lack of any other dairy. As Julie Powell once said "Think it over, any time you taste something that's delicious beyond imagining and you say 'what's in this?' the answer is always going to be butter" - but not this time Julie!

A hummingbird cake isn't usually frosted with chocolate, but as I have started a diet today I wanted to pack in as many possible calories yesteday and went all out, and I think it worked wonderfully. Adding a spoon of chocolate spread is an easy cheat to get a rich chocolatey frosting when you have forgotten to buy some chocolate to melt in... oops. If you would prefer, just omit the cocoa and chocolate spread so you have a vanilla frosting instead.

Hummingbird Cake with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from a recipe by Paula Deen
Serves 12-16 people

Hummingbird Cake Ingredients
375g self-raising flour
200g light muscovado sugar
200g caster sugar
170ml vegetable oil
50g pecan nuts, finely chopped
2 large ripe bananas, mashed
200g crushed pineapple and it's juice (from a tin)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon
4 eggs

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting Ingredients
500g icing sugar, sifted
3 tbsp cocoa powder
200g full fat cream cheese, at room temperature
100g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp milk
1 heaped tbsp chocolate spread

Hummingbird Cake Method
Preheat oven to 170 C / 325 F, then grease and line three 8" baking tins and set aside.

Place all the cake ingredients into a large bowl and mix until well combined.

Divide between the three tins and bake, rotating the tins after 15 minutes, for 25-30 minutes until the tops spring back when you gently pressed with your fingertip.

Remove from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes before removing from their tins and placing on a wire rack to cool completely.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting Method
Make sure your cream cheese and butter are at room temperature or you will have lumpy frosting!

Place all ingredients into a large bowl and mix until smooth and creamy and of a good spreadable consistency.

Cake Construction
Using a serrated knife trim the tops of the cakes so they are all flat.

Place the first layer onto your cake plate and spread on 1/4 of the frosting. Place on the second layer bottom side up and spread with another 1/4. Place the last layer on top, bottom side up again, and use the remaining frosting to cover the cake.

Notes
I reserved some of the frosting for piping on decoration and added a homemade florentine cookie as I had some left from earlier, but the cake looks just as lovely smoothed over and sprinkled with some more chopped pecans.

This cake is best kept refrigerated because of the cream cheese in the frosting - just remove it from the fridge 10-15 minutes before serving to take off a little of the chill.

I used this recipe from Delia for the florentine cookies, which were a present for Pete's Grandad on his birthday, but I added a little chopped stem ginger to them too!

I WANT WEDNESDAY - Naughty Crockery by Trixie Delicious

This is a new little feature I'm starting on the blog where every Wednesday I will publish a post showing some sort of kitchen related item that I have been lusting after this week.

To kick off I will be showing you the work of Trixie Delicious, a New Zealand based company providing the world with some delightfully naughty (and occasionally offensive) crockery!

Below is a lovely little selection of her goodies, I first found her on her Etsy page but you can also purchase through BigCartel or her Felt pages.

Although she is based in New Zealand she does ship internationally, and to the UK it is a very reasonable $10.00 (around £6.25) postage.

Pumpkin Fest Part Six : Pumpkin, Prawn and Pak Choi Curry

Althought it seems my love for this season knows no bounds, I admit there are a few drawbacks. Here in the UK it is awfully rainy and grey, and it seems to have got very cold much earlier than last year which has brought above a wave of colds and flu bugs. But as usual I like to may light of a bad situation, so a blocked up nose to me means that a nice hot bowl of curry and rice is required so the spice can blast away the illness.

I have however mentioned before that I cannot stand too much spice, I tend to choose fragrant and creamy over fiery, so Thai curries are some of my favourites. I know that I have not made my own spice mix here and this seems a bit naughty, but I am lucky enough to live in a town with a large Chinese community so I can buy big tubs of authentic curry paste from one of the four Asian supermarkets within walking distance of my flat (along with anything else that catches my eye, whether I know what it is or not...).

Every supermarket now sells Thai curry pastes too which you could also use, be it red, green or yellow - I went for green as it my favourite and added a little more ginger of the ground variety. I love ginger so much, I would perfume myself with it if I could.

So if you're feeling a little under the weather and need to blast away the cold, or if you are just a curry fan like me, do give this one a go, it's so easy to prepare you would be silly not to. You really don't need to stick to my quantities as this is just how I like it, you can add as much or as little of everything as you'd like.


Pumpkin, Prawn and Pak Choi Curry
Serves 4 as a main meal, along with some basmati or jasmine rice

Ingredients
1 tbsp olive oil
3 red onions, cut into chunks
3-4 tbsp curry paste (depending how spicy you like it)
1/2 tsp ground ginger (optional)
650g roasted pumpkin, cut in largish chunks
1 pack/175g baby sweetcorn
400ml coconut milk (I used canned)
250g king prawns, fresh or defrosted from frozen
200g pak choi, leaves seperated

Method
In a large pan cook the olive oil, red onions, curry paste and ground ginger (if using) over a medium heat until fragrant - 2-3 minutes. Add the pumpkin chunks and baby sweetcorn, cook for a further 5 or so minutes and then add the coconut milk, stir and cook with the lid on for around 10 minutes.

Next add the king prawns, stir them in and put in the pak choi leaves in a layer on top of the curry. Put the lid back on the pot and cook for a further 5 minutes. By now the pak choi will have wilted and you can gently stir them into the curry.

Ladel into bowls and serve with rice and, if you would like, an ice cold beer to combat the heat.

Pumpkin Fest Part Five : Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with Bourbon Cream Cheese Frosting

Pumpkin cupcakes! I know that to my English readers this may seem a little odd as we don't tend to use pumpkin in sweet dishes very often, but to make them easier to imagine, they taste a lot like carrot cake. Moist and deliciously spiced with ginger and cinnamon and more, the cream cheese frosting is to die for and the added splash of bourbon seems to intensify the sweet spicing to perfection.

It's a real shame that pumpkin isn't readily available in the UK other than at Halloween, as these really are one of my favourite cupcakes of all time. Oh well, I shall make do with carrot until I run away to the US to live in my Victorian porched wooden house in the South... one day, I hope...

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with Bourbon Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from a recipe by the genius that is Martha Stewart
Makes 12 standard American sized cupcakes

Cupcake Ingredients
125g plain flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda / baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
pinch of salt
pinch of freshly ground black pepper
pinch of ground nutmeg
pinch of ground allspice
pinch of ground clove
125g unsalted butter, at room temperature
110g light brown sugar
50g dark brown sugar
50g caster sugar
2 eggs
220g pumpkin puree

Frosting Ingredients
125g full fat cream cheese, at room temperature
25g unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 tbsp bourbon whiskey
1 tsp vanilla extract
300-400g icing sugar

Cupcakes Method
Preheat oven to 180 C / 360 F. Line a muffin pan with 12 cupcake cases.

Sift the flour, baking powder and soda and all the spices into a large bowl and stir until evenly combined and then set aside - you don't want any pockets/lumps of spices in the batter.

Beat together the butter and three sugars until fluffy and then mix in the eggs until just combined. Add half the flour mixture and beat again gently, then add the pumpkin puree. Mix until thoroughly combined and then beat in the second half of the flour and spices.

Divide the batter between the cupcake cases and bake in the preheeated oven for between 20-25 minutes. They are ready when they have changed to a dark amber colour and spring back to the touch.

Remove from the oven and let cool for 10 minutes in the tray before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Frosting Method
Gently beat together the cream cheese and the butter with the vanilla extract and bourbon until well combined. Now mix in the icing sugar a little at a time until you reach the right consistency - if you run a fork through it the indentations should stay - you may not need all the sugar.

Pipe or spread the frosting onto your cooled cupcakes and decorate any way you wish - I love the tiny chocolate pumpkins I found at my local supermarket!