Birthday tea

Earlier this week it was the boyfriend's birthday, and once I had given up complaining about having to get him two sets of presents in quick session, I realised it was an excellent opportunity to try out some of my new baking books.

As K is a bit of a fan of the Chelsea bun, I decided to try out the recipe for these from the new Great British Bake Off book. (I'm such a devote of the show I knew someone was bound to get this for me for Christmas). The buns were good, although I didn't have any ground cinnamon and I think this would probably have improved them. The sultanas are mixed with dried apricots which I love, and the buns are glazed with apricot jam, which allowed me to use up some of the rather 'lightly' set apricot jelly I made last year.

 

There is no better birthday cake than a chocolate one, and as Signe Johansen has a recipe for a chocolate birthday cake in Scandilicious Baking I though this would be a perfect choice. I treated myself to this book at the end of last year, as I just couldn't resist the beautiful layout and delicious sounding recipes when I saw it in the book shop. 

In the introduction to the recipe Signe says that as a child she had tray bake birthday cakes instead of round ones, and she reckoned this was a smart idea by mums, as you tend to eat a smaller amount of cake. I have to say if she had this cake when she was little, she was probably only able to eat a smaller piece, because it is very rich! Don't get me wrong, it is delicious, with chocolate, cocoa and coffee in the cake mix how could it not be, but it is one rich chocolaty cake.