Time For Tea | Bea's of Bloomsbury

I know, it's been a while and I apologise for that. I moved back to London in October and since then life has just been incredibly busy. But I'm back with a post about CAKE...

 Last weekend I visited a cute little cafe 'Bea's of Bloomsbury' for a catch up over a delicious Afternoon Tea with my friend Martha. This time last year we went to South Kensington for a Detox Afternoon tea which I wrote about here. This year we decided to ditch the carrot sticks and indulge ourselves. It was such a lovely experience, I thought it needed to be shared! 

The pièce de résistance...a variety of sandwiches made with focaccia bread, home made scones, beautiful cupcakes, chocolate AND blondie brownies, raspberry marshmallows, all topped off with some very cute little meringues. I definitely wouldn't call this a 'traditional' Afternoon Tea. They also have a great selection of teas, we both decided on 'Vanilla' which was surprisingly yummy as it wasn't too overpowering.

If you'd like to just pop in for a snack Bea's also have a delicious looking collection of cakes. We even came across a 'Duffin'...I was very tempted to buy one and take it home for later. But I didn't need to because we still had cakes left from our tower of treats, which were kindly boxed up for us. 

I would recommend booking a table if you are planning on visiting Bea's at the weekend for an Afternoon Tea. The cafe was completely full and even when you do book the slot is for a limited amount of time.

The Afternoon Tea is £19 per person which I think is pretty reasonable for London. The friendly atmosphere and delicious food make it even more worth while. As you can tell, I only have good things to say about this place! 

Let Them Eat Cake. Chocolate Cupcakes To Be Precise.

I feel like it's been too long since I posted on here. To be honest, I think this has actually been the longest amount of time between posts, so i'm sorry for that. Life seems to have taken over recently and this afternoon is the first time that i've been able to just...sit down.

My relatives from America were still here last weekend so we had a barbecue. Luckily the sun decided to come out and it turned into one of the best days weather wise in a while. My mum made her famous trifle and asked me to make a pudding. So, I went with chocolate cupcakes because apart from brownies they seem to be the only type of cake that usually turns out pretty decent. It's a strange and rather complicated recipe but if you follow it properly then you should end up with some lovely light and chocolatey cupcakes. Yummmm.

You will need:

115g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)

85g unsalted butter, room temp

175g soft brown sugar

2 large eggs

185g plain flour; sifted

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

Pinch of salt

250ml semi-skimmed milk, room temp

1 teaspoon good-quality vanilla extract

That's a lot of ingredients! 

Step 1- Preheat the oven to 170ºC (fan)/190ºC/375ºF/gas mark 5 and line a muffin tray. You should be able to make about 12-16 regular cakes or if you want to make mini ones the mixture should make around 48.

Step 2- Break the chocolate into pieces and melt. I melted mine in the microwave and heated it for 30 seconds at a time. Then leave to cool slightly. 

Step 3- In a large bowl cream the butter and sugar. This should take about 3-5 minutes with an electric hand mixer. 

Step 4- Separate the eggs. In another bowl beat the egg yolks for several minutes.

Step 5- Slowly add the egg yolks to the creamed mixture and beat this well. Then, add the melted chocolate and beat well.

Step 6- Now combine the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt in a separate bowl. 
(Sorry there's no photo of this oops. It wasn't a very interesting step anyway.)

Step 7- Put the milk in a jug and add the vanilla extract.

Step 8- Add one third of the flour to the chocolate mixture and beat well. Then, pour a third of the milk in and beat again. Repeat this until all of the flour and milk have been added. (Sorry again that there's no photo. I think I was concentration too hard on adding the ingredients.)

Step 9- In a new bowl, whisk the egg whites until soft peaks start to form like this...

Step 10- Then carefully fold the egg whites into the batter with a metal spoon. Do not beat, I repeat...do not beat! As this will take all of the air out of the mixture.

Step 11- Again, I don't have a photo but you will end up with quite a liquid batter that looks almost like chocolate mousse. Spoon this mixture into the cases, filling them two thirds full and bake in the oven for 20-25 mins (regular size) or 15 mins for the smaller ones.

I decorated mine with chocolate butter icing, chocolate pretzels and broken up mint matchmakers but you can put whatever you like on top! I always find this the most exciting part of the process and love experimenting with new ways to decorate my cupcakes. 

I know that this recipe seems fairly complex and would take a bit more time than a standard recipe but it's totally worth it because the cakes turn out that bit more fluffy and lighter and will rise without fail, which is probably the most important thing.

Let me know if you end up making your own or if you have any recipes to share!