film

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes
| Rhiannon

In continuation of our current movie Vine theme (see also: Revenant bear claws and Star Wars BB8 pizza), this week we decided to create some super-special cupcakes. It’s all about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies this time around, so we had to create something that a zombie would love. What better than a sickly-sweet and sticky cupcake, marbled red to look like a bloody brain?

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes

This was a lot of fun to do, even if we did have one run first time out which wasn’t quite up to scratch (not enough food colouring – turns out you need more than you think!). We made the cupcakes with oat milk instead of actual milk, which is a barely noticeable change but just gives it that little bit of extra texture. Right in the centre of the marbled cake mixture is a black cherry – the perfect way to create that bloody effect without needing to get too messy! 

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes

Other than the oat milk, the recipe was just a basic cupcake mix like this one from Tesco Real Food. They’re very simple to make, so give them a go yourself if you’re planning to watch the film. I’d be excited to see other people giving it a go, so if you do, be sure to post a link in the comments!

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Brain Cupcakes

You can also up the ante with some pink icing on top, swirled to look like the pattern on the brain. We just couldn’t help but eat these little beauties right away, so we gave the icing a miss!

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Vine Post: BB8 Pizza

| Rhiannon

Like pretty much everyone else, J and I have both seen the new Star Wars film and loved it. It’s an exciting time for the franchise, and after seeing some really creative BB8 cakes, we wanted to get in on the action. That’s why we decided to create a BB8 homage that is true to our tastes… a pizza!

Following on from our The Revenant bear claws, we just had to vine the process of making our BB8. We used white cheddar cheese along with red Leicester, and the silver parts just had to be mushrooms. Finally, a dollop of barbecue sauce (our secret ingredient for making any pizza amazing) was BB8’s “eye”. This was a lot of fun to make, as you can no doubt tell from the video! In order to get the head and body effect, we bought one medium pizza and one mini one (unfortunately we couldn’t get a blank pizza base at that size, but this one just had tomato sauce and cheese). Then we sliced the bottom section off the mini pizza in order to make it the right shape! We also “drew” the design based on a reference photo first, using a knife to gently mark out the different areas where we would be laying the cheese.

Unfortunately we got way too excited about eating it and didn’t take any photos. I can verify, however, that it was delicious. Well… full disclosure, we added some more vegetables and Quorn pepperoni before eating it – just to make it a bit more interesting. Still, no matter how much you try to disguise a droid, it’s still the same underneath.

Enough of all that: let’s finally get to the Vine!

So, what do you think? Are we pizza art geniuses or what? We’d love to see your foodie Star Wars efforts too!

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Vine Post: The Revenant Bear Claws

Bear Claw
| Rhiannon

So last night J and I went to see The Revenant. Wow. What a movie. If it doesn’t walk away with about 10 gazillion Oscars, there’s something wrong with the film industry. But besides the huge talents of Leonardo “Give Me Best Actor Already” Di Caprio and Tom Hardy, there’s another big star in the film: the bear.

The bear attack is harrowing, tense, and visceral. Bloody and terrifying, it serves as a reminder that nature is often far stronger and more vicious than simple man. So what better way to pay homage to that than with a cute, sugary bear claw?

Bear Claw
Bear Claw

 

Well, maybe not cute so cute. We added coconut shavings on top of the bear claws so that they would blacken as the pastry cooked, creating the claws and a bit of dark fur (if you squint). We made these bear claws in a super-easy way, using pre-made puff pastry that we cut and rolled into the right shape. As for the filling, we used Scarlett and Mustard’s zesty orange curd for a really zingy interior. We felt that red strawberry jam might have been a little too on the nose…

The Revenant Bear Claw
The Revenant Bear Claw

Once you have your pastry filled with curd, all that is left is to fold it over (coating the edges with egg wash to ensure it all sticks together) and cut the claws out. Then you pull it apart slightly to make that almost-crescent shape, and stick it in the oven for about 20 minutes. Gooey, melty, and delicious bear claws are the result.

Bear Claw
Bear Claw

Don’t worry about the coconut, by the way – it may look horribly burnt, but the taste is barely noticeable over the pastry. You could probably cremate them a lot further than this and still get away with it!

Finally, here’s the Vine to show how we made them:

Just think – if Leo had come up against these in The Revenant, he might have met a sticky end. Ha!

 

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