Yuppiechef The Art of Baking: Lesson 1

I hate Yuppiechef. I hate them because I want to buy everything on their website and I'm totally addicted to growing my ever increasing wish list. Anyway, I found that they have a baking course called the Art of Baking on their website. And if you finished the course by mid December you could win a Kitchen Aid mixer. Who could say no to that? I'm no pastry chef I bake a few times a year, mostly my tried and tested recipes. Since we're moving and getting a brand new kitchen I want to get the most use out of it.

About the course

They say that cooking is an art and baking is a science. And the course gently explains the science of baking and how the ingredients work together, the ratios, techniques and some handy tips and tricks. The course is presented by the the popular foodie blogger Sarah Graham, from a foodie lives here. I enjoyed doing the course. I liked the layout. Each lesson had a video, which is great to just reading, as well as notes, recipes and an easy enough test.

Easy espresso cake with mocha buttercream

This is the recipe from lesson 1. I tried it in my new kitchen with my brand new oven. Now here is my own little lesson on that. If you get a brand new oven, bake something that you have baked before, use an oven thermometer, and read the oven instructions. Now the recipe called for two cake tins. I only have one so my first half of the cake did not turn out that great. The temp was too low so the middle sunk :(. This is what a sunk cake looks like:

I got the setting right on the second half and it came out fine. The cake (without the buttercream) tasted better the next day and was very yummy with the buttercream. I wouldn't make this cake without the buttercream frosting.

Another tip:

The recipe requires instant coffee. I only have ground, the filter coffee I made was a little too weak, so the flavour didn't really come through. Next time I will try and make a really strong expresso.

The next lesson is about cookies and biscuits. You can read about it here.