CHARITY BAKING

A few years ago, the five ladies at my place of work decided that we would like to have a cake stall to contribute to the charity “BBC Children in need”. I don't know why we didn't think of it before. So now every November when the event comes round, we get baking.

The first time we did it was in 2003 and we made £135. Gradually over the years word has got around and lots of the surrounding small businesses and residents look forward to our cakes arriving. We know this because they tell us so !

In 2010 we made over £700 !! The whole premises was a sea of home-baked cakes at 9am and by late afternoon, most of it had gone.

Each year I try to make something I haven’t done before. On one occasion I decided to make RASPBERRY AND BANANA MUFFINS.

The recipe comes from a book called “The Sweet Life” by Antony Worral Thompson.  It’s a book of cakes and puddings – just my kinda book !!  All the recipes us a sugar substitute called Splenda.  You can however, re-substitute sugar for the substitute by making the conversion: 8tblsp Splenda = 100g sugar.  If you get what I mean !!

These muffins were absolutely scrumptious.  The raspberry flavour was quite intense, which according to Antony is due to using frozen rather than fresh ones.  They were also still nice and fresh the next day.

Like all muffins they were quick and easy to make and I have since adapted the recipe for other fruits with great success.  The only thing I haven’t done so far is to make them using Splenda !!  (Sorry, Antony!!)

Here’s the recipe (my version):

Ingredients

200g plain flour

2 tsp. baking powder

100g caster sugar (or 8 tbsp. Splenda)

100g frozen raspberries, briefly thawed

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla extract

50g butter, melted

100 ml semi-skimmed milk

1 ripe banana, mashed

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°C/180°fan and place 9 paper muffin cases in a muffin tin.

Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl and stir in the sugar and raspberries.

In another bowl, beat together the egg, vanilla, milk and melted butter. Then stir this mixture into the dry ingredients along with the mashed banana until just combined, avoiding over-mixing. The mixture should be lumpy but with no traces of dry flour. Divide the mixture evenly between the paper cases.

Bake for 20-25 minutes until risen and golden. Remove from the tin and cool on a wire rack.

Makes 9 muffins.