Banana and Coffee Smoothie

This banana and coffee smoothie is such a great way to start the day - you get both your caffeine and your fruit fix in one go! This smoothie tastes like it has come straight from a coffee shop, but it is so easy to make and you more than likely have all the ingredients at home, so it comes at a fraction of the price and effort. Give it a go! 

Ingredients (makes two small glasses, or one large glass)

1 banana, sliced

1 cup of milk

½ cup of cold black coffee

½ cup of ice

2tsp sugar

Method

Place all of the ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth, pour into a glass or bottle, add a straw and you're good to go! It really is that quick and simple :) enjoy!

Toffee Crisp Cake Bars

I think that Toffee Crisps are so underrated. It's a bold statement to make, but I seriously think that they are the best chocolate bar going, yet I have been to some shops that don't stock them :( No one else agrees with me, which is great because it means theres more for me! To declare my love for the underrated Toffee Crisp I decided to create a cake bar in their honour: a chocolate traybake (courtesy of Mary Berry) with caramel buttercream, caramel drizzle and pieces of Toffee Crisps. I think this traybake makes a perfect cake for a birthday party and you could mix it up depending on your favourite chocolate bar!  

Ingredients 

For the chocolate traybake

50g cocoa powder

6tbsp boiling water

100g soft butter

275g caster sugar

3 large free-range eggs 

125ml milk

175g self-raising flour

1tsp baking powder

For the caramel buttercream

a jar of caramel
   - 220g sugar

   - 105ml water

   - 245ml double cream

   - 1tsp vanilla extract

150g soft butter

350g sifted icing sugar

a splash of milk

2 x toffee crisp chocolate bars

Method

I would advise making your caramel first so that it has had time to cool down and thicken in the fridge. This means you can add it to your buttercream without it melting the butter. To make your caramel just follow these simple steps:

• Add the vanilla extract to the double cream and leave to one side.
• Pour the sugar and water into a medium sized saucepan and give it a quick stir. Place onto a medium heat and keep an eye on it - don't stir it once it has been placed on the heat - you can shuffle the saucepan around, but resist any temptation to stir!
• Once the sugar and water mixture has turned a deep amber colour, remove it from the heat and slowly pour in your vanilla cream, making sure you are stirring at the same time. It can bubble and steam so be careful not to splash yourself as the caramel will be very hot. 
• If there are any lumps in your caramel, don't worry - just place it on a low heat and stir until there are no lumps left.
• If you like you can add a teaspoon of salt to your caramel to make it salted caramel - just give it a good stir to ensure the salt has dissolved. 
• Pour into a jar and leave to one side to cool down. 

Chocolate traybake

1. Preheat your oven to 160ºC and grease and line a traybake tin with butter and baking paper.
2. In a large mixing bowl sift in the cocoa powder, add the boiling water and mix together. Next add in the softened butter and mix until smooth. 
3. Add all of the remaining ingredients and mix until everything has been incorporated.
4. Pour your cake batter into the traybake tin and bake in the oven for 30-35 minutes. 
5. Remove from the oven, leave to cool and then make your buttercream.

Caramel buttercream

1. Beat your butter in a mixer until it has gone smooth and pale. 
2. Add in the icing sugar in two halves, making sure it has mixed in smoothly with the butter. 
3. Once you have added all of the icing sugar, add a splash of milk to loosen the mixture. 
4. Next add about 4 or 5 spoonfuls of your caramel - or just as many as you like depending on how you want your buttercream to taste. 
5. Spread your buttercream over the chocolate sponge and smooth it out. 
6. Chop up a couple of Toffee Crisp chocolate bars and scatter the pieces over the top of the buttercream. 
7. Finish off the traybake with a generous drizzle of your caramel. 
8. Leave to set slightly and cut into bars or squares.

I hope you like this recipe, it is so yummy and really good fun - I think it would be perfect for a chocolate lovers birthday! I would suggest storing the cakes in an airtight container so that the chocolate bars don't go stale.

Coffee and Walnut Cake

Two months into setting up The Little Yellow Book and I've finally posted a recipe to my favourite cake: coffee and walnut cake. I have absolutely no idea why it has taken me so long to make this for the blog, but here it is! This cake is beautifully moist and I personally think the coffee buttercream is the best bit - and I'm not overly mad on buttercream or icing, so that is definitely saying something!

Ingredients 

For the cake 

225g unsalted butter, softened
225g caster sugar
4 free range eggs
225g self-raising flour, sifted
½ tsp baking powder
3tbsp instant coffee granules
5tbsp hot water
a splash of milk

For the buttercream

150g softened butter
400g icing sugar, sifted
a splash of milk
3tbsp instant coffee granules
5tbsp hot water
chopped walnuts

Method 

Coffee cake

1. Preheat your oven to 180ºC and line two sandwich tins with butter and flour. 
2. Make up the coffee using 3 tablespoons of coffee with 5 tablespoons of hot water and leave it to cool down.
3. Cream together the butter and sugar until smooth.
4. Add the egg one by one, with a tablespoon of flour between each egg and mix together. Also add the baking powder at this stage.
5. Add your splash of milk and the cooled coffee. I would suggest adding your coffee bit by bit and checking the consistency of the batter - you don't want it to be too wet. 
6. Once you're happy with your cake mixture, divide it between the two prepared cake tins and bake in the oven for 25 minutes. 
7. After 25 minutes, check that the cakes have baked all the way through by inserting a skewer or a fork and checking that it comes out clean. Take them out of the oven and leave to cool and make your coffee buttercream.

Coffee buttercream

1. Firstly make up your coffee using 3 tablespoons of coffee with 5 tablespoons of hot water and leave it to cool down.
2. It will be easier, and quicker, to make your buttercream in an electric mixer, but you can definitely make it with a wooden spoon. You will need to mix your butter until it goes pale and smooth. 
3. Next you'll need to add your icing sugar in stages so that it doesn't go everywhere when you mix it! Add in the icing sugar bit by bit and mix together. Add a tiny splash of milk to bring it together.
4. Finally add in the cooled coffee, bit by bit so that your icing doesn't get too wet, but if it does, don't worry - add in more sifted icing sugar. In fact, it's probably best to experiment with how much coffee you add in, depending how strong you want the flavour to be.
5. When you're happy with the coffee buttercream, slice the cooled cakes in half so that you can layer up the cake. You can always just keep it as a sandwich cake if you prefer. 
6. Place your first cake layer onto your serving plate and smooth a quarter of the icing over it. I was quite stingy with the buttercream for the first couple of layers (as you can see in the second photo), but don't be - I definitely had enough to have equal amounts of buttercream in between each layer. Layer up the cake with the buttercream and if you like you could add some chopped walnuts in between the layers.
7. Smooth some buttercream on the top of the cake and sprinkle some chopped and halved walnuts on the top and serve! 

Can you tell I was worried about running out of icing at the beginning?!

I hope you like this recipe - it goes perfectly with a cup of tea!

Mushroom and Gorgonzola Twists

Here is my final Sunday challenge recipe (lets ignore the fact that it's actually Monday...) and although it's the last of the challenges it is also a first for me: the first savoury post on the The Little Yellow Book! This blog was meant to be just for baking cakes and all things sweet, but I do really enjoy cooking, despite the fact that I am a broke student! I love the independence of cooking - and planning - my own meals whilst at uni, so I think I will be putting quite a few savoury recipe posts on here in the future. So, for my final Sunday challenge I made the mushroom and gorgonzola twists from The Great British Bake Off's How to Bake.

It is quite hard to make savoury stuff look as pretty as cakes! 

Ingredients

300g filo pastry (or 6 sheets)
4 large portobello mushrooms
2-3tbsp olive oil
small bunch of parsley
a few sprigs of rosemary
1 large garlic clove, peeled
100g gorgonzola (or any blue cheese)
50g unsalted butter, melted
black pepper

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 190ºC. 
2. Remove the stalks from the mushrooms and leave to one side. Heat up your oil in a large frying pan and cook your mushrooms on a medium heat for 5 minutes on each side. 
3. While the mushrooms are on the hob, chop up the mushroom stalks, the garlic and herbs and season with black pepper. Divide your cheese into quarters and roll it into a rough ball shape. 
4. Lay out your filo pastry on a work surface and halve it so you have two lots of 3 layers of pastry. Cut the layers into two so you are left with 4 lots of 3 layers. 
5. Place a mushroom on each square of 3 layers, followed by the garlicky herby mixture and the ball of cheese. 
6. Brush the edges of each square with melted butter and gather the edges and twist the four corners so its held in place.
7. Place the filo parcels on a baking tray and brush with more melted butter. Bake for 20 minutes and until the parcels are a lovely golden brown colour. 
8. Serve them hot with a little salad. Enjoy!

Apologies for the lack of prettiness! 

I think these mushroom and blue cheese twists would make a great starter with a side salad or as a main with baby potatoes and salad. I hope you enjoyed this savoury recipe and let me know if you want to see any more meal ideas on my blog!