Baking: Banana Nutella Cupcakes

Last week, it was my husband's birthday, so naturally I took the opportunity the night before to do a spot of baking while he was at work. I often whip up a banana bread when we've got leftover bananas that need using up, and he's a huge fan, so as I hadn't made one in quite some time, I decided on this for the basis of the cakes. The recipe I use creates a lovely sticky and luxurious consistency that is just right for cupcakes. I then decided that, to make them that bit more special, I'd pop some Nutella in the middle so that he'd have a nice surprise when he bit into the first cake.

I was going to leave it there, but let's be honest - cupcakes just don't look the same without a swirl of icing on top, do they? In this case, I whipped up a chocolate cream cheese icing that frankly was to die for.

Unfortunately, as some of you may have seen on Instagram, my first attempt was a huge fail, thanks to our oven deciding to die half way through baking. However, we got it fixed on Thursday, and these are the results of the second go.

Ingredients:

For the cupcakes:

4 small ripe bananas

1/3 cup unsalted butter or margarine

3/4 cup demarara sugar

1 1/2 cups of self-raising flour

1 egg, beaten

1  jar of Nutella (you only need a few spoonfuls at this stage).

For the cream cheese icing:

8oz cream cheese (I used Philadelphia Light)

8oz icing sugar

1 cup Nutella (from the same jar)

The cupcakes:

1. Heat your butter/margarine in a pan until melted - be careful not to let it boil though.

2. Mash up the bananas using a fork and then add them to the melted butter, stirring until smoothly combined.

3. Stir in the beaten egg and the sugar (adding it gradually is easier).

4. Sift in the flour and then fold in using a metal spoon (don't stir it around and around - you want to put air into the mixture).

5.  Now your cake mix is ready, pop your cases onto a baking tray and fill each one by about a third with the mixture.

6. Add roughly a heaped teaspoon of Nutella to the centre of each.

7. Now add some more of the cake mixture until the cases are about 2/3 full in total. Be careful not to overfill them.

8. Pop them into the oven and bake on a medium temperature for about 20 -25 mins. Personally, I just tend to play it by ear and keep an eye on them until they have risen and look cooked but not at all brown on top.

9. When they are ready, take your cupcakes out of the oven and place them onto a wire rack to cool while you make the icing.

The icing

1. Cream together the cream cheese and Nutella, then add the sugar, and combine until smooth and fluffy. You can use a hand mixer for this, but as I don't currently have one I just did it with a fork. (NB - it's much easier if the ingredients are at room temperature).

2. When your cupcakes have completely cooled, you can fill a piping bag with the mixture and pipe swirls on the top using a star-shaped nozzle. If you don't have one then you can always use a spatula, although it won't look quite as good.

And that's it! These really are so delicious, and in my eyes they taste just as good without the icing ( I do love it, but with the Nutella middle they are quite decadent enough already!). However, for aesthetic purposes, a good swirl on the top of a cupcake is always a winner.

Do let me know if you decide to give these a go, as I'd love to know what your verdict is. Part of me thinks I might be posting this a bit too soon after Easter, what with many of you having consumed close to your own body-weight in chocolate (if Instagram is anything to go by!). Not that I wouldn't have indulged myself under other circumstances, but as I've mentioned before, since making these delicious treats I've been staying away from sugar to see if it will do my skin any good (in case you hadn't heard, it's started playing up out of nowhere).

Hope everyone is having a great week so far.

xx

August Agenda

I absolutely cannot believe that today is 1st August! It is freaking me out how quickly this year is going, it's almost time to start thinking about Christmas again already! Too early to start compiling my Christmas Wishlist!? No, never! Just as well really, as I actually do have a bit of a mental one going on in my head already! 

Anyway, being the first of the month, it's time to dust off July's Agenda and see how I did with my little tasks, and also to set some new ones for the coming month.

So, here were the things I had hoped to achieve in the month of July:

1. Learn to do a fish-tail plait/braid.

Mission accomplished. I actually did this one on the same day as I put up the post. Check me out, being all organised and one step ahead. You'd think that boded well for the rest of the month, wouldn't you? Yeah.....

2. Bake Macaroons and Slutty Brownies.

Fail. And this one isn't even a chore! To be honest, I think the fact that my husband's family fed us so much cake when we went to stay with them kind of put me off a bit - I literally felt sick by the time we left to come home! And I've also been ill three times this month. Maybe next time!?

3. Save my pennies.

Well. Isn't that ironic. I did indeed save as many pennies as I possibly could this month.....and then, as many of you will already know, my car essentially died and cost me a LOT more than the pittence I had saved. So actually, it was like I took this task...and achieved the complete opposite. Yay. Oh well, not to worry -  apparently I (and most of the other #bbloggers on Twitter) have won a small fortune on the South African lottery without even playing it, so all our financial problems are soon to be a thing of the past! 

(Just in case anyone missed the sarcasm there....yeah, that's what it was).

4. Get away.

I don't think this one needs much of an explanation. It didn't happen!

5. Blog every day.

Huzzah- I'm going to give myself a gold star for this one, as even though I didn't technically blog every single day, the only exceptions were when I was ill and when I was having internet problems, and in spite of this I still finished the month on thirty five posts! Win!

6. Do something crafty.

Well. I cut up an old t-shirt I never wear and made it into something else I will never wear. Does that count?

In my defence, I have ordered some studs from Ebay, so expect to see everything I own, including my dog, covered in those very soon.

So, I scored a grand total of............................2 out of 6. How embarrassing. But do you know what? I'm not really all that bothered, as I feel that I've achieved a lot this month anyway. Blogging as consistently as I have was the most important challenge to me, and I have also managed to get some exercise most days and do some more work on my secret little venture, so I feel quite satisfied in spite of my score for the month!

August's Agenda will be as follows:

1. Plan looooads of extra activities for my classes in advance.

Some of you will know that I teach English as a foreign language, and lessons start again next week. I always try to plan lots of fun activities to keep my pupils' enthusiasm levels up, but often, they only last me until about half way through the term, and then I am desperately looking for more! So this time, I am going to make sure I have more than enough at the ready so that I don't have to stress about it later on.

2. Finish my secret project.

I'm afraid I can't really tell you much about this one until it's ready, but let's just say it is a new little business venture of mine. Hopefully, I will finally be ready to reveal all in next month's recap!

3. Keep up the daily exercise.

Self explanatory, really.

4. Have a nice day out with the hubby!

Again, this one is penny-permitting, but I'm including it anyway as I wish to start the month with optimism!

Just those four for this month I think, as the first two are going to be taking up a lot of my time!

(By the way, the photos in this post are just a couple of my favourite Instagram pics from the past month.)

What tasks and activities have you got planned for yourselves over the coming month? Do you find setting yourselves goals helpful?

xx

Little Catch-up

Hi lovelies, as I think I mentioned in my last post, I'm away at the moment, but I didn't want to leave my little blog unattended, so I thought I would post from my phone for the first time and show you a few photos from my week so far (so if it all looks a bit higgledy piggledy then that is why!) I was planning to save them all up for the end of the week, but I don't see the harm on mixing things up a but and doing it mid-week for a change.
I've been so healthy of late, but we are currently visiting yet more of my other half's family, and all they do is feed me cake! Seriously, they do not stop, and whenever I finish eating my lunch, they insist that I have more, and look really disappointed when I decline! It has been nice to relax a but and not have to cook though!
Anyway, the photos. There is cake, obviously. Then there is the outfit I wore yesterday, and the Benefit goodies I got this week. I'll leave it there for now, proper posting will resume tomorrow!