Vanilla, Rose and Basil

It's been a while since cake vs cookie and I'm hoping to get back to it at least once a week. I'm going to stop linking all the previous episodes but if you go to my profile and hit the 'feast' tab, then you'll find that the 'cake vs cookie' series will be named by its flavour profile instead of what it actually is.

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I have to admit I was quite off about this one because I hate the taste of rose, I think it tastes like badly made perfume. There's a certain strange thing about rose that if you add too much then it tastes horrid but if you add to little then you can't taste it at all. So, I tried to standardise it to the point that I had to ask the internet what I was doing here. I also used fresh basil from a plant because it is far, far more potent than the dried stuff (my hands still smell like basil right now). As for the vanilla, I am more than happy with my regular vanilla essence liquid bottle.

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Cake vs Cookie

1: Cookie

Vanilla, Rose and Basil Shortbread

Ingredients:

• 55g Brown Sugar
• 130g Vegan Butter
• 2x Tsp Vanilla Essence
• 4g Fresh Basil
• 2x Tsp Rose Syrup
• 220g Plain Flour

How To:

1. Preheat your oven to 200/C and line a baking tray with greaseproof paper
2. Cream together your butter, sugar, vanilla, basil and rose until fully combined. You do not need to chop up the basil leaves, whilst mixing they will break on their own - this will keep a lot of the scent and flavour within the leaves - nice and fresh
3. Add the flour and form a dough
4. Chill for 10 minutes
5. Roll and chop the dough into your desired shapes, again the dough should be about half the thickness of your iPhone
6. Bake the cookies for 15-17 minutes until browned
7. Leave to cool for five minutes before transferring to the fridge. Let them sit there for about 10-15 minutes and then you may enjoy them!

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2: Cake

Rose and Basil Cupcake with a Vanilla and Basil Buttercream

Part 1: The Cupcakes

Ingredients:

• 2x Tsp Rose Syrup
• 4g Fresh Basil
• 100g Vegan Butter
• 100g Brown Sugar
• 2x Tbsp Apple Sauce
• 110g Self Raising Flour
• 1x Tsp Baking Powder

How To:

1. Line a cupcake tray with 12 cases and preheat the oven to 200/C
2. Cream together your butter, sugar, rose and basil (again, don't chop the basil!) until fully combined
3. Add the apple sauce and combine once more
4. Add the flour and baking powder and combine again to form a cake batter
5. Spoon them into cupcake cases and bake for 15-18 minutes
6. Leave to cool for five minutes after baking and then transfer the cupcakes to the fridge
7. Leave them there whilst you make the buttercream!

Part 2: Buttercream

Ingredients:

• 100g Vegan Butter
• 200g Powdered Sugar
• 50g Vegan Cream Cheese
• 10g Fresh Basil
• 2x Tbsp Vanilla Essence
• 2x Tsp Your Choice of Gel Food Colouring

How To:

1. Whisk up the butter, basil and vanilla for 5 minutes
2. Add the powdered sugar, cream cheese and food colouring and continue whisking for another five minutes
3. When finished, take the cupcakes out of the fridge and pipe them
4. Place them back in the fridge to harden up a bit
5. After about 10-15 minutes, you may enjoy your cupcakes!

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You can probably see that I've added some icing shapes to the top to make them a bit more colourful. The fact that I had to dye my own icing means that I have currently given myself pink fingers. Be that as it may, it was clear that both of these baked goods were winning today. The flavour combination is a winning light taste which seems to be perfect for the springtime. I am still deciding on which flavour combination to do next but there are plenty to choose from.

I am also drinking my famed 5-Minute Lemonade which was posted to my Facebook with recipe some weeks back. My variation of it today contains blackberries and mint which honestly, as someone who isn't fond of fruit - is actually really tasty.

Thanks for reading!