Tag Archives: kid-friendly

Blueberry cupcakes with blueberry cream cheese frosting

10 Nov

Blueberry cupcake  with blueberry cream-cheese frosting

Look at the pretty blueberries in these cupcakes. They really are nature’s work of art. I have found a frozen brand of Australian-grown blueberries that I am happy with and always ensure I have a bag in the freezer. I bake with them, the Hungry Dad makes Bircher muesli with them, Miss-now-8 adds them to Greek yogurt and Miss9 is happy to eat a bowl of them for a snack #winning

At the moment in Sydney fresh blueberries are plentiful so you can take your pick when making them delectable blueberry cupcakes with blueberry cream cheese frosting (or cream cheese icing, for my fellow Aussies).

Fresh or frozen works fine and if you opt for frozen there is no need to defrost first.

These blueberry cupcakes are really moist and the Greek yoghurt adds a lovely tang. Try not to eat all the frosting / icing before you ice the cakes – a real danger #OrIsThatJustMe

Blueberry cupcake  w blueberry cream cheese frosting

GATHER:

120g unsalted butter, softened

½ cup caster sugar

1 2/3 cups self-raising flour

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup Greek yogurt cream

1 cup blueberries (frozen is fine)

Icing:

180g unsalted butter, softened

250g cream cheese, softened

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups pure icing sugar, sifted

¼ cup blueberries, extra

Blueberry cupcake  with blueberry  cream cheese frosting

LET’S GET TO IT:

Preheat oven to 190°C and line a cupcake pan with wrappers.

In bowl of electric mixer beat butter, sugar and vanilla on medium speed until fluffy and pale – about three minutes.

Scrape down bowl with a spatula then add eggs, one at a time, beating until combined.

Beat in half the flour, then half the yogurt, then rest of flour then rest of yogurt. Using a silver spoon gently stir in the blueberries.

Fill the wrappers two-thirds full and bake for 15-ish minutes or until a skewer inserted into a cake has only a few crumbs clinging to it.

Remove to wire rack too cool completely.

Meanwhile, make icing: In bowl of electric mixer beat cream cheese, vanilla and butter together until pale and creamy – about two minutes. With beater on low beat in icing sugar then increase speed to medium and beat until thoroughly combined. Use a silver spoon to stir through and break up most of the berries, leaving enough for decoration. Scrape icing into ziplock bag, snip off the corner and pipe icing onto cake, then top each one with a single blueberry.

Blueberry cupcake  with cream cheese frosting

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Brown butter rice crispy treats / salted caramel rice crispy squares

2 Jul

Salted caramel rice krispie treat - The Hungry Mum

Omgosh – treat is the correct word here! This recipe for brown butter rice crispy squares is super dooper easy and super dooper delicious. In case you’re still not sold, you need just four ingredients, one pan, and no baking required. Continue reading

Funfetti white chocolate blondies

1 May

Funfetti white chocolate blondies

I cannot tell a lie – I did not make the vision of loveliness you see before you. That was Miss9, who created these funfetti white chocolate blondies by herself from woah to go.

That child is a way better cook than me, and unlike me, her repertoire includes non-sweet items. I am happy making cakes, I am unhappy making dinner #groundHogDay

Miss9 is passionate about white chocolate and when she saw this recipe in a recent issue of Super Food Ideas’ magazine she raided the pantry and whipped these up in no time. Continue reading

Sydney school holiday idea for kids: Australian National Maritime Museum

7 Apr

maritime1 School holidays in my opinion are a delicate line between ‘yay, a chance to spend some time with the kids without stress’ to ‘what on earth are we going to do all day every day?’ Continue reading

How to make yogurt and berry fruit pops

8 Jan

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This weather is driving me crazy! Last year was officially the hottest on record for Australia and one can only assume it is going to get hotter. For a creature the colour of milk, such as myself, this is not good. My skin says I should be living in Scandinavia but here I am, Sydney born and bred.

We have had a reprieve for the past few days but it will soon be hot again. This is cold comfort for my friends in the northern hemisphere currently experiencing snow, storms and freezing temperatures. Stay safe everyone.

In the meantime, here is a super easy treat, perfect for long hot summer days. Misses 6 & 8 made these pops themselves and couldn’t wait to try them. Two thumbs up 🙂 Continue reading

Easy banana muffin recipe

23 May

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How great are muffins? They take no time to make, are versatile and can even survive being made by Misses 4 and 6 and still taste great. I had a couple of over-ripe bananas sitting in the fruit bowl so turning them into muffins was the order of the day. I tweaked several different muffin recipes from various sources but reduced the amount of sugar as I find most recipes far too sweet.

I decorated these with a few peanut butter chips but they are very yummy without. Continue reading

Fast and simple one bowl chocolate chip bar recipe

20 May

Image I do love a choc chip. Often the introduction of choc chips to a recipe takes it from blah to wow, can I have more? As much as I love choc chip biscuits I find it tedious to be rolling/flattening/baking tray after tray. So when I stumbled across a recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars by the wonderful Two Peas and Their Pod I knew at once I’d be baking it. It all the boxes I was after. Choc chips. Vanilla. Crunchy. Kid-makeable. Continue reading

Easy chocolate cake recipe

24 Apr

 

simple chocolate cake

This is a one bowl, super easy, kid-friendly chocolate cake. It isn’t glam and won’t impress baking experts but for morning tea or a fast dessert you can’t beat it. If you can turn on an oven you can make this chocolate cake, which is great served with ice cream, cream or even just a sprinkling of icing sugar on top.

Making it in a ring baking tin makes it look a little bit more fancy than using a round tin. You could fill the berries to serve if you want to up the glam factor.

It is from a book called Quick Mix Cakes by AWW.

GATHER:

125g melted butter

2 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cocoa powder [Dutch for preference]

1 cup self-raising flour

3/4 cup caster sugar

dash best vanilla

Easy chocolate cake - The Hungry Mum

LET’S GET TO IT

Preheat oven to 170C, and grease a ring pan with non-stick cooking spray.

Place everything in bowl of electric mixer and beat until smooth and mixture has changed colour.

Pour into pan, bake 35-ish minutes/until a skewer comes out clean.

Leave in tin 5 minutes then remove to wire rack to cool.

Easy chocolate cake recipe  -The Hungry Mum

 

Easy home-baked strawberry muffins

14 Apr

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The Hungry Mum family is meeting some friends in the morning for a beachside breakfast BBQ. We thought this mild autumn weather in Sydney would be a perfect time to catchup out of doors. Knowing how ravenous kids can be I baked some strawberry muffins for them to munch on while our breakfast poper is cooking. This recipe, from bestrecipes.com.au, was originally titled ‘Kim’s Moist Muffins.’ It is super easy and failsafe and versatile – everything you want in a muffin receipe [or any recipe, really]. If I knew how to link the site I would but I’m not that talented…

I had three punnets of strawberries in the fridge so I added some of those plus a handful of blueberries that were hanging around. I rounded that out with a pinch of allspice, which is my go to ingredient for all things baked. Kim herself suggested white choc & raspberry but almost anything can be used: mashed banana/sultanas/grated apple…

GATHER:

220g sifted self raising flour

1/2 cup caster sugar

1 egg, lightly beaten

3/4 cup of milk [or buttermik if you have it]

1/4 cup vegetable oil [not olive oil as it is too strong-tasting]

150g added flavours [eg strawberries]

LET’S GET TO IT:

Preheat oven to 170C and line a muffin tin with wrappers.

Place flour and sugar in a large bowl, stir with a wooden spoon.

In a jug place egg, oil and milk, whisk. Add to flour mix and stir until just mixed [do not over mix]

Add in flavours then pour into muffin pans.

Bake 15-20 mins / until golden.

These are fab warm but also can be frozen in a ziplock bag when completely cool.

Easy peasy egg-free coconut and lime mini loaves [perfect for kids to cook]

17 Mar

This recipe is, as Miss 4 would say, easy peasy lemon squeezy. The original recipe, which I’ve tweaked, is from my primary school’s fundraising cookbook, along with taste sensations such as fish finger kebabs and prunes & bacon [subtitled, and I kid you not, ‘a delicious combination] from *many* moons ago. Fear not, this cake is super yum and so super easy that kids can make it without much help. The original makes a very small loaf but I decided to use my mini pan this time & the results were great. It made 4 mini loaves which is ideal if you don’t want to be a guts and eat all the cake  are just having one friend over for a cuppa.

This is such a versatile recipe: it can de doubled and if you don’t like lime use orange or lemon zest. Or omit the zest and just add mixed spice or vanilla.

And what about these amazing photos by Anna Warr? Don’t they make you want to lick the screen? Or is that just me? Check out more of her amazing work at annawarr.com.

GATHER:

1 cup self-raising flour

1 cup coconut [dessicated]

1/4 cup caster sugar

slightly more than 1/2 cup milk

zest from 2 small or one large lime

LET’S DO IT:

Preheat oven to 170C and grease 4 holes from a mini loaf tin.

Place everything in bowl and stir until combined. It will be a stiff batter.

Pour into 4 holes, bake 20-25ish minutes/until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Allow to cool five minutes before removing to a wire rack.

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