Kitchenalia from the Spotty Dog Cakery

It has always been my aim to launch a range of kitchenware products that all of my customers will love. So, I'm very excited that, in time for Christmas, we're launching the first of these new products! Our Retro Cake and Biscuit tins filled with Spotty Dog goodies are now available to buy at both www.loveyourlarder.com and www.notonthehighstreet.com. Each cream and red tin is made in the most gorgeous fifties style and they've both got pride of place on my kitchen table already. These tins will make fantastic Christmas presents or just a treat for you to keep for yourself!

Sugar Plum Fairy Christmas Puddings Launch

It must be nearly Christmas because yesterday I launched our award winning Sugar Plum Fairy Christmas Puddings online! So, you can all buy a gorgeous fruity pud and have it delivered straight to your door. I've been making the puddings since the beginning of October so they will all have time to mature and taste fantastic by the end of December. As always, the puddings are made with our own free range eggs and the majority of the other ingredients used are from a whole food co-operative committed to ethical sourcing.

You can buy the puddings online at both www.notonthehighstreet.com and www.loveyourlarder.com-go on and treat yourself!

Steamed Puddings

Very shortly, I'm going to be launching my Gold Great Taste Award winning Sugar Plum Fairy Christmas Pudding. As we are very aware of our impact on the environment here at the Spotty Dog Cakery, we try to ensure all of our packaging is recycled/recyclable/from a sustainable source. So, all of our Plum Puds are packaged in re-usable plastic pudding basins so you can keep on using them to make some gorgeous puds over the rest of winter or even just use them for storage like any other tupperware box.

As promised, here is a Steamed Pudding recipe which is absolutely delicious.

Steamed Apricot and Autumn Spices Pudding

200g butter

200g brown sugar

3 eggs, beaten

250g plain flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp ginger

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

3 tbsp milk

125 ml apricot jam

100g raisins

2 pint pudding basin (half the quantities for a 1 pint basin)

1. Lightly butter the pudding basin.

2. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Gradually add the eggs beating well as you go.

3. Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and ginger and mix into the batter. Stir in the raisins and then add the milk to make a dropping consistency.

4. Pour the jam into the basin and then spoon over the batter.

5. Cover the basin top with greaseproof paper, crease in the middle to allow for the pudding to expand and tie the paper securely to the basin with string. 

6. Place the pudding in a saucepan not much larger than the basin and pour hot water to around 3/4 of the way up the basin. Cover and simmer for 1 hour remembering to keep the water around the basin topped up. 

7. Turn the basin out onto a warm plate and serve with thick double cream. 

Make Time for Tea

Here at the Scarlett and the Spotty Dog Cakery, we love Tea! And when I say Tea, I don't just mean the drink, I mean the little baked treat of some description to go with it-you know, the piece of battenberg cake, the ginger biscuit or the slice of toast and jam. There's something about the 'something to keep me going' in the middle of the afternoon that feels like such a treat, but not so much of a treat that I won't have it every day. As my Mum would say, I need it to keep my energies up! 


But, I've noticed that here at Spotty Dog HQ, we may be in a bit of a minority. Lots of people, for different reasons (lack of time, guilt over 'snacking' are the most often quoted) don't have some kind of drink and a baked pick -me -up mid afternoon.  And I think this is a real shame. If you're at work or not, it shouldn't be impossible to spare 2 minutes to grab a drink and something cakey or biscuity to eat. Try it and (without wanting to sound corny) I promise you'll feel that life is just a bit better than it was before!

New Recruits

Here in the Cakery, we have some new recruits! Don't worry, we haven't grown so much that we've got a huge new workforce, just 2 new (furry!) product tasters called Hamish and Hettie.

They are both unbelievably cute (if a little naughty) and are providing hours of entertainment for us all. Very importantly, they both LOVE cake so they're pretty happy in their new home.

Christmas is Coming

I know it's only September and I know some of you may not want to think about Christmas yet but I learnt last year (my first Christmas in business) that Christmas prep' starts early in this game! Very early! So, this week I started making first batches of my Sugar Plum Fairy Pudding (which won a Gold Great Taste Award, remember!) 


I've already had pre-orders through for my puds, some from customers who loved them last year and some are for new customers, which is great. I am absolutely loving making the puds again-they have the most gorgeous smell as they cook away in the bottom of the Aga and they're relatively simple to make-all I need is my huge mixing bowl my Gran gave me and a spoon-very retro!


In other news, I've just been on a fabulous trip to York and enjoyed an amazing Afternoon Tea at the wonderful Bettys (see pictures of their lovely shop window below).

Fenwick of Newcastle

I'm very excited to announce that you can now buy a range of our products in the Food Hall at Fenwick of Newcastle! I'll be doing a tasting session to officially launch the products on Saturday 3 September and I'm  really looking forward to it as I absolutely love the Food Hall -it's full of some gorgeous things, including some really great products from other small, local producers. Come along and say hi if you're out and about in Newcastle tomorrow!