There's been lots of talk about the Hummingbird Bakery around here lately. Alex has declared herself to be a fan after trying their Red Velvet Cupcake yesterday - so what do you do if you're nowhere near one of their London outlets? Luckily for you, The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook is packed with all their secrets and I have to admit, it's been one of my sources of new sweet recipes for the past few months. And it's only £8.99 in the Amazon sale! Hurrah!
I have a few caveats about this beautifully photographed, enticing book. Firstly, do read the notes at the beginning - important stuff about cupcake case sizes etc. You can use your common sense about some of the ingredients they suggest: freshly grated coconut is undoubtedly better for the Coconut Meringue Cake, but that involves the oven and a hammer and trust me, it's not worth it (yes, yes, I did fall for it) as it's the kind of great idea conjured up by someone with a house elf, frankly. Also, many of the cakes are three layers, American style. They look fantastic but really - well, it's a lot of cake. Even for the very sweet-toothed. Consider scaling back the ingredients and making it as a two-tier sandwich cake.
Where Hummingbird really does score highly is with the cupcake recipes, unsurprisingly and yes, it's worth getting the book for those alone even if you never make any of the cakes. I can't recommend the Banana and Chocolate ones enough. They stay remarkably moist for days so they're great to make ahead of time, in a big batch. I used their chocolate frosting recipe (it's relatively runny so perhaps upping the sugar quantity slightly might be advisable) but didn't have enough cocoa and substituted half cocoa, half Horlicks which resulted in a delicious toffee taste. The Ginger cupcakes are tangy and moreish, which mainly comes from the icing made with root-ginger infused milk and there are lots of other unusual flavours, such as green tea and lavender to try.
After acquiring this book I went out and bought a savarin cake mould so that I could make the Coffee Cake. After I attempt the Red Velvet Cupcakes and the Brooklyn Blackout Cake, of course. I'll let you know how they turn out - now, who wants to come around for tea?
Even better, it's only a fiver with the Book People!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thebookpeople.co.uk/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_10001_10051_169004_100_500020__category_
I love this book! Have been battling with the red velvet ones for some time - can never get hold of the 'recommended' food colouring at the time I need it (am too impatient to wait for delivery by post, and if I did order it I know that is when I would least be inclined to ever make one again!) so have been experimenting but as yet they've been too pink, too brown, too chewy... Think maybe it's time to try one of the other recipes instead! PS. Gail, love the picture of your coconut cake on your blog!
ReplyDeleteI was tempted to get it until I read the reviews on Amazon - lots of people saying the measurements aren't right, as if the recipes weren't tested in a domestic kitchen. Clearly other people have been more successful though! And I might still get it just to look at the pictures...
ReplyDeleteHummingbird Bakery have amended some of their recipes - the replacement sheets can be found here http://hummingbirdbakery,com/bakingtips.pdf
ReplyDeleteI have it and have gotten quite a bit of use out of it, but I agree that lots of the recipes need tweaking. The cake (I've forgotten the name) which has a brownie base, a cheesecake middle and a cream-and-raspberry topping had not quite enough of the cheesecake and too much of the cream (can't believe I just typed that). Even the cashier in the shop where I bought it said that if I made the spinach muffins I should reduce the amount of spinach and cut it up much more finely than suggested.
ReplyDeleteSo the recipes are nice, but be prepared to make lots and lots of tweaks.
I also have Martha Stewart Cupcakes. So far, that's more dependable, although life is too short for most of the second half of the book.
Thanks for your comments ladies! The pdf nat has suggested is well worth a read. Hummingbird are right when they say that baking is a science and the recipe should be exact!
ReplyDeleteHappy baking everyone!
I have baked from this book three times and every time has been a disaster. The recipes (which I followed exactly) for Double Chocolate Cookies, Spinach and Cheese Muffins and Traditional Brownies just don't work. I don't want to spend time tweaking and experimenting and looking up errata online, I just want to bake tasty treats!
ReplyDeleteI don't even want to give this book to a charity shop because then others would waste eggs like I have. I might send it back to Ryland Peters & Small and demand a refund.
This is one of my favourite recipe books of all time - my office has been enjoying cupcakes, lemon bars and brownies on a regular basis as a result! The chocolate cheesecake was amazing too. I've probably done more recipes from this book than any other recipe book I own. yum!
ReplyDeleteHugely disappointed with this book. Have to agree with Helen and Rosie - the book looks beautiful - but the recipes just don’t work. I think they have simply scaled down industrial quantities and it doesn’t work for domestic kitchens.
ReplyDeleteThe volume of frosting for the cupcakes is double what you need, the cake mixtures always have buckets left over and the lemon loaf refused to cook all the way through.
The lemon meringue pie recipe doesn’t use all the listed ingredients, the timings are all out of wack, the centre of the refuses to set and the volume of meringue threatened to drown my KitchenAid.
The cupcakes are interesting enough flavours but there are lots of unnecessary steps (for example don't both melting the marshmallows and cutting out a hole in the top for the marshmallow cupcakes, just shove a couple of mini ones into the top of the cakes while they are still warm)
–Get this book at your peril… experienced bakers only.
It is a lovely book, but I agree that the measurement inaccuracies are unforgivable in a cookery book - fortunately I found them on the web before I started cooking. The red velvet cupcakes are worth the price of the book - to get the right colour you need Dr Oetker's red food colouring (not natural red or cochineal as I've learnt from experience). The Brooklyn Blackout cake worked fine with just 2 layers (same amount of mixture), but is very rich and would serve about 16. The custard was tricky - 200g of cornflour set like concrete, not the glue consistency the book talked about, but dissolved again in the custard mix - which then congealed in a lump. The end result was fine, though there was too much custard, but I ascribed that to only using 2 layers. Overall I've enjoyed using the book, but it could be better.
ReplyDeleteHi All. Gosh am I glad to have found these comments. For a while I wondered if I was going mad. I was following the recipes exactly and some of the cakes were just not turning out right. The lemon cake is a success though! The pumpkin pie needs almost an extra 50 minutes cooking. Today I am making spinach and cheese muffins and already it is one big sticky mess even though I have followed the exact recipe!
ReplyDeleteI got the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook for my birthday and I've never had any problems! I have made 90% of the cakes in there, although I used the revised versions for the Lemon & Poppyseed, Lemon Loaf and Red Velvet Cupcakes. It is, by far, my favourite baking bible. All of my cakes have turned out perfectly, but as people have said the quantities are out of whack I may have been helped by inaccurate scales......
ReplyDeleteHullo
ReplyDeleteI'm attempting the Blackout Cake tomorrow and was looking for advice - glad I found this as I thought the measurement thing was just me, what with my similar problems with the cheesecake/brownie crossover heart attack thingies... tasty but thinking on your feet is required.
As all above though the amended red velvet cupcakes are fantabulous and well worth making.
I am pleased to hear that other people have had a problem with the Spinach and Cheese muffins. the mixture was really thick and solid and I had to literally tear it to fill the muffin cases. I also had almost twice as much mixture as I needed and made 18 muffins. They turned out ok but very heavy, I expected them to be more muffin-like and rise a bit. Disappointed.
ReplyDeleteI have also made the Lemon and Poppy Seed cake though and this is lovely.
Just made the Brooklyn Blackout cake. I am an experienced baker of more years than I care to remember but this recipe is hugely disappointing. You do need far more than 120mls of water to mix the 200g of cornflour otherwise you have concrete and when I added the mix to the chocolate syrup in the pan it set so quickly it was almost impossible to whisk as the recipe suggests leaving some small lumps. I haven't put it all together yet as still waiting for the custard to cool but I shall not be making this again. Many other far far better recipes out there. Don't waste your money on the ingredients.
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone's comments about the cheese & spinach muffins. Despite the Bakery's defence of their recipes in the PDF download, I followed their cheese & spinach muffins recipe TO THE LETTER and there simply isn't enough liquid for a proper mix - it was like mixing plasticine. But I persevered and had faith in the recipe but the muffins just weren't nice and were heavy, doughy and undercooked, despite keeping them in the oven for longer than stated. A waste of time and money.
ReplyDeleteI have this cookbook - LOVE IT! Well worth the investment.
ReplyDeleteGlad I'm not the only one who had problems with the Cheese & Spinach muffins - a complete sticky disaster and a waste of a ton of expensive ingredients! The only recipe from this book so far though that has been a washout - but will tread with caution from here on...
ReplyDeleteI looked at the recipe for coconut layered cake, and was astonished at the volume of sugar needed! In ratio to the small amount of butter needed, it just doesn't feel right, and I'm loathe to waste so much. I've never seen a cake recipe that has nearly a pound of sugar and only 4 ounces of butter. I'm going to have to adapt it to the English way of 8 ounces of flour, butter, sugar to 4 eggs, but will have a stab at the coconut flavoured custard as it makes a chage from buttercream.
ReplyDeleteI have just make the coffee cake and had a mountain of explosive molten cake pouring over the edge of the tin they specified using - an utter nightmare. It uses an incredible amount of ingredients which are just incorrect in their volume.
ReplyDeleteI've had nothing but success with this book so far. I've even had friends tell me my cupcakes are better than the one's they've eaten from the actual Hummingbird (and I don't consider myself a fantastic cook, so high praise). So far all of the recipes have been fine bar the lemon cup cakes, which didn't include a couple of the ingredients listed. The stupidity of that... Basic proofreading! So far the only thing I haven't liked were the said lemon cup cakes and the peanut cookies, which were a bit meh. But so far so good!
ReplyDeleteCiara
I tried to make the coffee cake and it was a disaster. After 80 min in the oven it was still not done. I followed the receipe close, but i won't be making it Again.
ReplyDeleteThe book is fine, but i won¨t recommend the marshmellow cupcakes. they are too sweet and gooey.
just made the coffee cake and disregarding my better judgement followed the recipe!! Molten lava flowing out of the cake tin(bought especially). Nearlt 2 hours in the oven. Never heard of 8 Eggs in a cake that size!!! Nice pictures and good for inspiration, the Carrot Cake is to die for and always works, not a book for the feint hearted or new baker. I will be returning to Mary Berry and Delia!!! Relieved to hear its not only me as my daughter loves this book !!!
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