Tag: 2017

Posted on

Coffee Cake Recipe

This is a really tasty cake for a Sunday afternoon!

Ingredients:

  • 150g caster sugar
  • 150g butter or margarine
  • 3 eggs
  • 150g self raising flour
  • 1  and a half tsp of baking powder
  • 1 tbsp instant coffee
  • 1 tbsp hot water

Decoration:

  • 225g icing sugar
  • 100g butter or margarine
  • 1 and a half tbsp of instant coffee
  • 1 tbsp hot water

Method:

  • Preheat the oven at 160C. Grease two identical baking tins.
  • Mix the sugar and the butter together until fluffy and a light yellow.
  • Whisk the eggs with a fork.
  • Gradually add the eggs and the flour to the butter and the sugar while mixing.
  • Add 1 and a half tbsp of baking powder.
  • Dissolve the coffee in the hot water and add it to the mixture.
  • Split the mixture evenly into two identical baking tins and cook for 20-30 minutes.

Decoration:

  • While the cake is baking, cream the butter and the icing sugar together until light and fluffy.
  • Dissolve some more coffee in boiling water, making sure you don’t add too much water otherwise the icing will go runny mix it into the butter and icing sugar.
  • Leave it in the fridge until the cake has baked.
  • Once the cakes are done and have been put onto plates spread the icing on the bottom of one of the cakes (leaving around half of the icing for the top)
  • Cover the top and sides in icing an leave to set for 10 minutes or so and then… Enjoy!

Thanks for reading,

Sparkle Girl x

 

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Ideas for a Cosy Christmas Eve

These are some great ideas for a fun Christmas Eve!

Movie Night:

You can always cuddle up and have a cosy movie marathon… If you need some film ideas, try some of these:

sparkle-girl.uk/24-days-of-sparkle-girl-top-10-family-christmas-films

Game Night:

Some great classic games such as Monopoly, Cards, Battleships and Ingenious are always fun!

Just a Good Old Talk:

A nice long chat is never not fun and interesting!

There are lots of other things you could do such as a meal out, takeaway, hide and seek for presents!

Back again tomorrow,

Sparkle Girl xx

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Present Ideas for Grandmas!

These are some great present ideas to buy your grandma for Christmas!

Image result for baked homemade

1- ANYTHING you make yourself!

2- Tea

Whether this is a cup of tea of some tea bags, she will love it!

3- Everybody drinks, so you can never go wrong with mugs.

Image result for personalized teatowel for grandma

4- Personalized gifts, especially tea towels!

Image result for diarys for grandmas

5- Diaries and notebooks

6- Tins, you can never go wrong…

7- Necklaces and Pendants are always a cute little gift

I hope these ideas help you…

Thank you for reading!

Sparkle Girl xx

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Marshmallow Mug

This is a cute little present for someone who loves cups and sweets!

You will need:

  • A nice mug/cup
  • Mini Marshmallows
  • Big Marshmallows
  • Chocolates

Method:

  • Make sure the mug/cup is clean
  • Fill it up with big marshmallows and chocolates
  • Using the mini marshmallows, fill in the gaps
  • If you want to keep it safe or save it, cover the top with clingfilm!

Thank you for reading,

Sparkle Girl xxx

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Mini Pastries

These are some tasty little treats for you to enjoy over Christmas!

Fruit Pastry Cups:

Ingredients:

  • Blueberries
  • Raspberries
  • Shortcrust Pastry
  • Honey

Method:

  • Roll out the pastry and using a large round pastry cutter, cut the pastry into circles (I only did 6 but you can always make more)
  • Sprinkle flour into a cake tray and then put the pastry circles into the cake tray
  • Cook these at 160C until they are almost fully cooked
  • Put the fruit into the pastry and then return to the oven for 2 minutes maximum
  • Cool them on a cooling rack for 5-10 minutes
  • Drizzle honey on the top of them and enjoy

 

Chocolate Leaves:

Ingredients:

  • Shortcrust Pastry
  • Milk Chocolate

Method:

  • Roll out some pastry and cut leaf-like shapes into the pastry
  • Put the leaves into the oven for 5-10 minutes
  • While the pastry is baking, melt the chocolate in the microwave until it is liquid
  • Dip the leaves into the melted chocolate and then place them on a cooling rack to dry
  • Now eat them!

Hope you enjoyed reading,

Sparkle Girl xx

 

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Present Wrapping Hacks

These are some great tips to help you wrap a mountain of presents, quickly and efficiently!

1- ALWAYS get a tape dispenser!

These are the easiest ways to wrap presents because you can quickly get some sellotape without spending 5 minutes trying to find the end of the sellotape!

2- Always put the scruffy edge underneath the neat one!

Usually when you wrap a present there is a scruffy edge and a neat edge, to make the present as neat as possible, always put the scruffy edge underneath the neat one!

3- Fold the side for a neater wrap!

When you are wrapping the sides of the present, to make it neater, fold the flap in so you are left with a straight side rather than a messy one …

These were some simple and easy tips for present wrapping!

Another post tomorrow,

Sparkle Girl x

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Snowman Cake

This is a cute cake for the whole family!

Ingredients:

  • 125g Unsalted Butter
  • 125g Caster Sugar
  • 125g Self-Raising Flour
  • 2 Medium Eggs
  • Vanilla Essence
  • White Fondant Icing
  • Orange Fondant Icing
  • Blue Fondant Icing
  • Black Fondant Icing
  • 1tsp Baking Powder

Method:

  • Heat the oven to 180C and line the baking tin with baking parchment and butter
  • Beat the sugar and the eggs together until they look a bit like buttercream
  • Whisk the eggs together until they have lots of bubbles
  • Sieve the flour – optional
  • Gradually – while mixing the butter and sugar a bit more – add in the flour and the eggs
  • While doing this add in 1tsp of Baking Powder and a few drops of Vanilla Essence
  • Bake in  the oven for 20-30 mins – or until a knife comes out of the mixture/cake clean

Decoration:

  • Roll out the white fondant icing until it is roughly a 1cm thick, cover the entire cake in this (you may need to cut excess icing off)
  • Roll out the blue fondant icing, and cut a long strip of it out
  • Cut a triangle out of the blue icing for the hat, put this on the top of the cake – using the picture below to copy from:
  •  
  • On the strip of blue icing leftover, put small marks vertically across it copy the picture above if you need to
  • Roll out some orange icing into a sausage-like shape, press the top of the icing gently to create a nose and this time put small line marks horizontally across it
  • Roll out a little bit of the black icing into little flat balls and place them where they are in the picture above

Now enjoy the cake! 🙂

Thanks for reading,

Sparkle Girl xx

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Ideas for Present Wrapping!

These are some ideas to make presents for children even better, instead of just plain and boring!

Tinsel Wrap:

All you need for this is tinsel, you just wrap it round the present either side (as if you were putting ribbon on it) and stick it to the bottom of the present. This is just an alternative to ribbon which isn’t as sparkly!

Pop a Joke Inside:

While you are writing the tag, you just write a  Christmas joke on the tag as well! Put the answer upside down somewhere.

Heart of Bows:

Using any colour of stick on bows, stick them in a nice heart shape. You could even use this to cover up a mistake!

Back again tomorrow,

Sparkle Girl xx

 

Posted on

24 Days of Sparkle Girl – Christmas Cutlery Holder!

You will need:

  • Green and Red Paper
  • Scissors
  • Sellotape
  • Extra Decoration (Bows, ribbons)

Method:

  • Cut the green paper into a small square and then fold it in half like this: 
  • Sellotape the green paper together like this:
  •  
  • Cut out a long strip of the red paper and stick it to the green paper like this:
  • If you want add some decorations like I have in the first picture!

Back with another post tomorrow,

Sparkle Girl xx