Blueberry Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Ian wanted a blue themed cake to celebrate coming first in something at work so I decided to go for a Blueberry cake with a cream cheese frosting.

Ingredients

• 175g softened butter
• 175g golden caster sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 225g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 4tbsp soured cream
• 300g  blueberries

For the frosting

• 200g tub Philadelphia cheese
• 115g icing sugar
• 4 tbsp soured cream

Preheat the oven to fan160/gas 4/Conventional 180

Grease a 22cm Cake tin and line the bottom with Baking paper.

Put the butter, sugar eggs, flour, baking powder and vanilla into a bowl and beat for 2  -3 mins until well mixed and light in colour. Add the soured cream and beat again, then gently fold in half of the blueberries.

I found this mix worked very well as often with fruit cakes the fruit can sink to the bottom, a tip to avoid this is to dust the fruit with a little flour before you add it as it helps to prevent it from sinking to the bottom.  But I don't think that would be necessary here.

Gently spoon this mixture into the prepared tin and smooth out the top. Bake for 50 minutes until it is risen and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Rest for a couple of minutes in the tin then turn out, remove lining paper and leave to cool completely on a cooling rack

Whilst it is cooling make the frosting. Simply whisk together all the ingredients. It will seem quite lumpy at first, but will eventually become glossy and smooth.

When the Cake  is completely cooled top with the frosting, smooth out and decorate as you choose with the remaining Blueberries. You can store this cake in the fridge for a couple of days, but remove from fridge an hour or two before you want to eat it

Easiest ever Chocolate Brownies!

This is a very popular recipe in our house and one I don't mind making because it is so easy!

Ingredients
175g Butter
200g Dark Chocolate
325g Caster Sugar
130g Plain Flour
3 Eggs
icing sugar to decorate

Preheat oven to 170C. Line a square or rectangular tin with baking paper, don't worry too much about neatness, I just lay it over then press into the sides of the tin.

Melt Chocolate and butter together in a large bowl set over a pan of simmering water (or if you are lazy like me do it in the microwave!:) ) stir well to combine then add the sugarand stir well - it will look like a lot of sugar for the chocolate but it is the right amount. Add the flour and stir then finally stir in the eggs and mix until the mixture is smooth. Pour into lined tin smooth out and bake for 30-35 minutes. When ready cracks should be appearing across the top and the top should crack if you press it lightly with your finger. Remove from oven and rest in tin for 5 minutes. Remove from tin by holding a chopping board over the tin and turning it over, remove tin and lining paper then place another chopping board on top and turn back over. Leave to cool then cut into squares and dust with Icing sugar.

This pic is to show the kind of cracking you should see when the brownies are ready