A Hobbitty Cake

When the kids realised Christmas was over and we had forgotten to make our traditional gingerbread house, Mr J suggested we make a gingerbread hobbit hole for Easter, instead.

His idea morphed into the cake I created yesterday. As you might already know, hobbit holes are curved, comfy dwellings etched into hillsides. Angled, straight-lined gingerbread is not very conducive to curvy comfort, but soft cake most definitely is!

I whipped up the super easy spice cake recipe detailed below and divided it between two containers for baking: an eight-inch round cake tin, and a similarly-sized stainless steel bowl.  When the cakes were cool, I sandwiched them together with an icing glaze, after cutting off a few centimetres at the front to create the indentation for the door.  These extra slices of cake provided a doorstep, and some height above the door of the hobbit hole.  

The door itself was a large round cookie, an adapted healthier version of traditional rolled sugar cookie dough.  I kneaded green colouring into white fondant icing and rolled it out to fit the door, using a toothpick and cocoa powder to create the detail.  The door handle was a tiny piece of white fondant, rolled in cocoa powder.  The two round windows were also bits of white fondant, covered in gold sparkle and detailed with a toothpick. I iced the entire hobbit hole with cinnamon-spiced buttercream, and sprinkled it with green coconut grass.  

Mmmm.... delicious!

SPICE CAKE

• 1 1/2 cups wholemeal spelt flour
• 1/2 cup brown rice flour
• 1 1/2 cups raw caster sugar
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 4 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
• 1 tsp mixed spice [or allspice]
• 1 cup coconut milk, melted with:
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 eggs

Whisk together flours, sugar, baking powder, bicarb, and spices. Separately, beat eggs and vanilla into cooled melted butter/coconut milk mixture.  Whisk two mixtures together well and pour batter into oiled/floured/lined baking tins of your choice: either the bowl and the cake tin if you're making your own hobbit house, or alternatively two dozen cupcake/two eight-inch cake tins.

Bake for about 45-50 minutes in a pre-heated 350F/180C/gas mark 4 oven.

When cool, ice with buttercream of your choice.  Ours was this:

CINNAMON BUTTERCREAM ICING

• 1 cup softened butter
• 1 TBS vanilla extract
• 2 TBS cinnamon
• enough icing sugar to create a creamy consistency: about 2-3 cups

Beat together butter, vanilla, and cinnamon until well mixed.  Add in icing sugar, a cup at a time, until the right consistency is reached.  Cover cakes or cupcakes with icing and top with coconut.

For homemade, greener alternatives follow the link to Beth's blog and find more bloggers' household tips, recipe ideas, and creative stuff!