RSPCA Cupcake Day 2019 - Red Velvet Cupcakes and Mars Bar Slice

Today is the official RSPCA Cupcake Day in Australia, to raise money for the work of the RSPCA.  Our work RSPCA Cupcake Day was held on Tuesday last week to accommodate when most people in our team could attend.  In all, with sales on the day and donations, together with donation matching from the RSPCA Cupcake Day official sponsor, we raised a total of $901 for the RSPCA.  Given that we are small in number, I was especially thrilled with this result.

For our RSPCA Cupcake Day morning tea, I made Red Velvet Cupcakes and Mars Bar Slice.


I remade Dorie Greenspan's Melody Cookie dough and used it to make some cat cookies as cupcake toppers:

The eyes of the cats are cachous stuck on with a bit of royal icing.

The cats graced the top of some red velvet cupcakes decorated with cream cheese icing:

I used the Queen Red Velvet Cake recipe online here.  I made the proportion of the recipe suggested by Queen for the cupcakes (~ one third of the full cake recipe), but my experience was that this only made very small cupcakes (patty cake size).  If I was to make these again, I would make a half of the cake recipe instead so that I could make muffin tin sized cupcakes.

Here's a close up of a cupcake:

The beauty of the cupcakes is that they were cheap to make, especially as I had bought cream cheese for the icing on sale.

The third item that I made for our RSPCA Cupcake Sale was Mars Bar Slice, recipe here from Taste.com.au:

I bought that Mars Bars when they were on sale and already had a stash of dark chocolate and Rice Bubbles, which kept the cost of a potentially expensive recipe down to an affordable level.

We had a number of other contributions on the day, including freshly made gluten free pancakes with maple syrup and berries from one of my colleagues:

I thought this was particularly impressive as there was an element of live performance involved.  The warm pancakes were my personal favourite.

Here's a happy snap of some of our bakers:

Everyone seemed happy enough with the range on sale.  A carrot cake was a sell-out.  In addition to the aforementioned items, we had banana muffins, apricot ANZACs, chocolate and zucchini slice and date and berry cake for sale.  We had a few items left over, but sales were good.

That's a wrap for another RSPCA Cupcake Day.  I am not sure if I will organise it again next year because there was an unfortunate level of pressuring from a call centre to be involved this year, even though I had already registered.  However, I am happy to have participated this year to support a very good cause in the work that the RSPCA does to fight animal cruelty.

Phillippa's Sausage Rolls

Who doesn't love an Aussie sausage roll?  Spicy mince, flaky pastry and tomato sauce (of course!) merge to make one delicious, popular treat.

I recently made the sausage rolls from Phillippa's Home Baking, which use rough puff pastry and a mixture of beef and pork mince.  For those not from Melbourne, Phillippa's is a bakery institution established by Phillippa Grogan, famed for its breads and other baked goods. 

These sausage rolls did not disappoint - they had flaky pastry, and were just on the right side of spicy and juicy:

Have I tempted you to make some sausage rolls for yourself?  If so, you will need:

Rough puff:

225g plain flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
170g cold butter, cubed
125ml chilled water
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Put the flour and salt into a bowl.  Add the butter, water and lemon juice.  Use your hands to mix the ingredients together into a rough dough, then wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for half an hour.

Take the dough from the fridge and roll into a rectangle about 20cm x 30cm, with the edges being as straight as possible.  Fold one short end of the dough into the middle of the rectangle, then fold the doubled over part of the dough over the top of the remaining third of the dough so that you have a folded piece of pastry measuring 20cm x 10cm.  Wrap in plastic film and chill in the fridge for half an hour.

Repeat the rolling and folding process with the pastry three more times.  You now have ready to use rough puff pastry!

Sausage rolls: 

80g fresh breadcrumbs
1 brown onion, chopped
100ml tomato sauce (ketchup)
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
3/4 teaspoon salt 
3/4 teaspoon black pepper
350g beef mince
350g pork mince
2 tablespoons chopped flat leaf parsley
1 tablespoon chopped thyme or sage
1 x rough puff pastry
1 egg
1 tablespoon milk

Process the breadcrumbs in a food processor to make medium sized breadcrumbs, and place into a large bowl.

Put the onion, tomato sauce, mustard, salt and pepper into the food processor and blitz to a puree, then spoon into the bowl with the breadcrumbs.  Add the mince, parsley and herbs to the bowl and mix with your hands until well combined.  Place into a covered bowl and chill.

Preheat your oven to 220 degrees Celsius.  Line two baking trays with baking paper or silicon mats.

Lightly flour your work bench, then roll out the rough puff pastry into a rectangle measuring 48cm x 30cm.  Cut the pastry into three pieces measuring 30cm x 16cm each.

Take the sausage meat mixture and divide into three even pieces.  Roll each piece into a ball, then roll  each ball into a sausage measuring the length of the long end of the pastry.  Place one sausage on the edge of one long end of a pastry strip, brush the opposite long end of the pastry strip with water, then roll the pastry, starting with the sausage edge, to enclose the sausage in the pastry. Press the edges of the pastry join lightly with a fork to seal.

Repeat for each of the other two pastry strips and the remaining sausage mixture.  Cut each long sausage roll into the desired size using a sharp knife (I cut each into quarters for party sized sausage rolls).

In a small bowl, beat the egg and milk together with a fork, then using a pastry brush, brush this egg wash mixture over the top of the sausage rolls.  

Place the sausage rolls on the lined trays and bake in the oven for 30-35 minutes or until cooked through and golden on top. 

Serve the sausage rolls hot with lashings of tomato sauce.

Chocolate Mini Cupcakes for RSPCA Cupcake Day

On Monday 20 August, we hosted an RSPCA Cupcake Day in my team at work.  I enjoy RSPCA Cupcake Day, because while raising money for a good cause, you get to see the marvellous delights made by the hidden bakers in your team, and sample some terrific home made baked goods.

This year, I made Chocolate Mini Cupcakes from the Nestle website - after all, it's not Cupcake Day without some cupcakes.

Here are the cupcakes, unadorned:

I then gussied them up with some fancy piped frosting, sanding sugar and sugar stars and flowers:

The recipe made 36 mini cupcakes - here they are in all their glory:

The recipe is as follows:

100g dark chocolate melts or chopped dark chocolate
125ml water
65g butter
110g brown sugar
2 eggs
110g self raising flour
35g plain flour
2 tablespoons cocoa
65g choc bits (optional)

Icing:

185g butter
280 icing sugar
1 heaped tablespoon cocoa 

Preheat your oven to 180°C. Line 2 x 12-hole  mini muffin trays with paper cases (in my case, 3 trays!).

Now here comes the counter-intuitive step (because we are told that water spoils chocolate).  Place the chocolate melts or chopped dark chocolate and water in a small saucepan over low heat and cook, stirring constantly, for 5 minutes or until melted and smooth. Trust me, it works - it takes a while, just be patient. Remove from the heat.

In a stand mixer, beat the butter and brown sugar  together until pale and creamy. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Add the flours and cocoa, and beat on low speed until just combined. Add the melted chocolate mixture and stir to combine, then fold in the choc bits.

Spoon the batter into the muffin pans and bake for 15 minutes or until cooked through. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. 

For the icing, beat all of the ingredients together in a stand mixer until light and fluffy.  using a piping bag, pipe the icing onto the cooled cupcakes and decorate as desired.

Here is our laden RSPCA Cupcake Day morning tea table:

It was all devine! We raised over $400 for the RSPCA, which is a pretty good effort.

Coconut Cupcakes for Cupcake Day for the RSPCA

My third and final batch of cupcakes for Cupcake Day for the RSPCA were coconut cupcakes with bunny ears.

The recipe for the coconut cupcakes came from the Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Cookbook.  I used coconut frosting based on The Primrose Bakery buttercream recipe, flavoured with coconut essence rather than vanilla essence.  The bunny ears are marshmallows sliced diagonally in half and the cut side dipped into pink coloured sanding sugar.  I found the idea here.  I coloured my own sugar by placing white sanding sugar in a freezer bag with a couple of drops of rose colouring and shaking the bag vigorously until  all of the sugar was coloured.

The recipe for 24 coconut cupcakes is as follows (I made a half batch):

3/4 cup shredded coconut
2 1/3 cups plain flour
2 teaspoons  baking powder
3 eggs
3 egg whites
200g salted butter, softened
1 3/4 cups  sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 cup coconut milk

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.  Line two 12 hole muffin tins with cupcake papers. 

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl.  Using a food processor, process the coconut until very fine and then add to the sifted ingredients.  Mix to combine.

In another bowl, combine the eggs and egg whites.  In a third bowl, beat the  butter for 1 minute.  Add the sugar to the butter in three batches, combining well between each addition.  When all the sugar is added, beat until the mixture is light and creamy.

Add the eggs in 4 batches, beating well between each addition.  Add the vanilla and beat well.

Add a third of the flour mixture to the batter, and beat on low till just combined.  Add half the coconut milk and beat to just combined.  Repeat until all the flour is added.  

Scoop the batter into the cupcake papers and bake the cakes in the preheated oven for 18 minutes or until cooked through.  Remove the cakes from the tins immediately and cool on wire rack.  Ice the cakes as you please when completely cool.
Here are our three baking organisers for RSPCA Cupcake Day, enjoying the fruits of their labour:

Caramel Mud Cupcakes for Cupcake Day for the RSPCA

My second cupcakes for Cupcake Day for the RSPCA were caramel mud cupcakes.  I made these according to Donna Hay's recipe, which is online here. 

The only tip that I have is to make sure you work fast with the frosting, because it sets quickly.

I topped the frosting with paw prints made of chocolate chips and larger chocolate melts, in keeping with the animal theme.

We had an amazing response to our Cupcake Day, raising over $1,000. 

Here's a pic of our behind the scenes team putting the cupcake display together, ready for sale:

Lemon Cupcakes for Cupcake Day for the RSPCA

Last Monday, 17 August, we held a Cupcake Day for the RSPCA at our work.  We had an overwhelming response from cupcake bakers and buyers alike, and we also received a donation from the business.  In all, we raised over $1,000 for the RSPCA - it surpassed my expectations, and I was so proud of our business for making this fabulous contribution to a very worthy cause.

I made 32 cupcakes all up (knowing that we were likely to have a lot more coming in from the other bakers) in three different flavours and designs.  I learned from last time I participated in the RSPCA Cupcake Day that if I wanted to make animal cupcakes, I should not make them too fussy, because it takes too long when you are doing a large batch.

My first cupcake flavour was lemon.  I chose Martha Stewart's recipe for lemon cupcakes from her cupcake book, which is also published online here.  I made sure that they tasted lemony by rubbing the lemon zest into the sugar before using it in the cake batter - this tends to make the lemon flavour more pronounced than just mixing in the zest.

To decorate my cupcakes, I chose Primrose Bakery's buttercream but flavoured it with lemon juice instead of vanilla and coloured it yellow.  I piped the icing on using a grass tip to resemble feathers.  The eyes are mini M&Ms, and the beak is an orange M&M upended on its side. I got this idea from Johanna's post here.

Stay tuned for more RSPCA Cupcake Day recipes.

RSPCA Cupcake Day August 2012

On Monday, it was the RSPCA Cupcake Day 2012.  I was keen to participate, so I obtained permission from my work to sell cupcakes for the RSPCA in the breakout room at morning tea.

I baked 78 cupcakes all up, using free range eggs:

Suzanne at work also baked some chocolate cupcakes, which was great as we had more to sell.

My cupcakes were Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Cookbook's Very Vanilla and Dinosaur Rock Chocolate cupcake recipes, and Martha Stewart's Red Velvet Cupcake recipe:

I made my vanilla cupcakes into sheep from Martha Stewart Cupcakes, which you can find via video tutorial here: 

I made the chocolate cupcakes into koalas using the technique that I found online here:

And I made the red velvet cakes into dogs using ideas out of my own head - I cut ears out of cola sour straps, a tongue out of strawberry sour straps, the eyes were mini M&Ms and the nose was a regular sized M&M.  I piped on the mouth using black ready made writing icing:

The sheep and koalas were iced with the Crabapple Bakery's vanilla buttercream, as described in the link for the vanilla cupcake recipe, and tinted half of it grey for the koalas with a little black gel colouring.  On the red velvet cakes, I used the cream cheese frosting recipe from The Country Show Cookbook that I used for my recent carrot cake here. 

Suzanne and I raised over $300 for the RSPCA - thanks to my wonderful work colleagues for their support in this fundraising venture.