I cook a lot. About half the time, we eat food I cook. I like cooking, and cleaning, go figure. I’ve never really studied cooking or baking, though one year I learned how to make Christmas sweets.
Recently my wife and I started watching The Great British Bake Off, and added one of their books to our collection. In doing so, I’ve made a few new things. Learning the technical skills for baking is hard. It’s tricky to get it right and you have to pay attention more than I generally want to do.
However the skills I’m mastering are definitely helping me in other ways, as my ability to debug code has gone up the more I learn how to read and interpret directions to make something I don’t understand.
Mary Berry’s Coffee Cupcakes
This was supposed to be coffee and walnut cakes, but I don’t like nuts. It’s a basic cake, made with the creaming method, and adding in coffee essence.
To make the coffee essence, I brewed a strong cup via my Aeropress and let it come to room temperature.
Failed Merengue
I whipped it by hand for some reason. I got a blister doing it and then burnt it.
Next time I’m using my hand mixer.
Chocolate Macaroons with Caramel
The filling on these were a bit too crunchy, but the caramel was delicious.
It took me three tries to get the caramel right.