Fathers day has come around again, giving me a great excuse to get in the kitchen and bake a cake for my dad. This year I decided to go for a cherry and almond cake, as this is something I have not made before. Most recipes call for using glace cherries but I wanted to try substituting these for fresh cherries as they are in season right now. This was a bit risky because using fresh fruit in cakes can affect the texture as they release water whilst the cake is baking. I decided to go for it anyway as I like to experiment a little! I halved and stoned my cherries then soaked them overnight in amaretto liqueur and a little sugar. The recipe I used contained both ground almonds and flour, but I also added almond extract to bring out the flavour of the almonds.

Before adding the cherries to the cake mixture, I coated them in a little flour to try and prevent them sinking to the bottom. I also kept a few aside and placed them on top of the cake mixture once it was in the tin, so that some could be seen once the cake was baked.
About 10 minutes before the cake had finished baking, I used the amaretto syrup from which the cherries had been soaked in to brush over the top of the cake in order to keep it nice and moist plus packed with almond flavour. For a bit of decoration, I drizzled glace icing over the cake- quite a nice finishing touch I thought!
The resulting cake turned out really well, and the texture was beautifully moist without being too heavy or pudding like. Most importantly, my dad thought it was delicious, but then again he says that about most things!

I bought some lovely 72% cocoa dark chocolate the other day so I thought I'd make good use of it by using it as a coating for biscuits. I thought dark chocolate would combine beautifully with ginger so I got out Leith's baking bible and found a recipe for ginger nuts- small crunchy biscuits flavoured with the spicyness of ground ginger. These biscuits are made by the melting method ie. the butter sugar and syrup are melted together before adding the flour. I placed small balls of the dough onto a baking sheet because I thought they would easily spread whilst baking-which they did! All in all this was a very easy recipe that gave good results but next time I might try adding chopped crystallised ginger for an extra kick!
The butterflies pictured here are shortbread half coated in luxury white chocolate and very indulgent they were! I stuck to using my normal shortbread recipe from Leith's baking bible which uses both plain flour and ground rice to give a lovely crumbly texture. I always like to finish my shortbread with a sprinkling of caster sugar as the biscuits themselves are not overly sweet and you can't go wrong with a bit of extra sugar!

Unfortunatly around the time of my birthday my laptop died, which meant that I couldn't upload my new baking photos which has lead me not to update my blog regularly :( The good news is I'm still baking and have lots of new things that I can't wait to share with you! My laptop still seems to be in some sort of computer coma, and I've got to wait another month until I receive my new one (my birthday present to myself!) so until then I'm using the home pc and my Dad's laptop! Anyway, I'll get started on what I've been baking over the past month or so-enjoy!