Beetroot, carrot and apple red velvet muffins

We're in the middle of a heatwave at the moment, and loving getting to eat outdoors. For supper this evening, Lu barbecued a couple of small seabass for each of us, and I made a coleslaw with grated carrot, apple and beetroot. Just a couple of each makes a surprising amount when grated, far more than we needed for just the two of us. My solution, of course - is there ever a better solution, to any dilemma? - was cake.

I decided to make some muffins as I never get tired of how amazingly simple and quick they are to make - no electric mixers required, and hardly even any stirring! I added some red food dye to enhance the amazing beetroot colour, and a spoonful or two of cocoa, to make a cross between red velvet cake and carrot cake muffins - with extra punch from ground almonds and almond essence, and a hint of allspice.

Beetroot redcurrant and white chocolate muffins with elderflower mascarpone icing

Tomorrow our friends Cath and Gregg are getting married. I'm helping decorate and it's a red a white colour theme (Gregg is a big Liverpool football fan). Tonight, Cath is having a few of her close girl friends round to her mum's house to celebrate her last night of freedom! I've made these red and white muffins - coloured with beetroot powder (and a little red food dye to make them more red than pink) and full of white chocolate chunks and redcurrants. The icing is flavoured with elderflower cordial.

Redcurrant, white chocolate and hazelnut beetroot friands

I've made friands before but always as mini-muffins, but this time I used my heart-shaped muffin tin.  Instead of ground almonds, I toasted and ground hazelnuts and added a little beetroot powder for colouring (I could've used another spoonful or so to get the cakes a really rich pinky red).  The tops of the cakes are sprinkled with redcurrants and white chocolate, but these hazelnut friands could be made with lots of different fruit combinations.

Cranberry beetroot heart-shaped scones

My lovely wife Lu is very sad at the moment after her nan died this week.  I've been making lots of comfort food like stews and casseroles, and for my Saturday morning baking session today I made her some heart-shaped scones for breakfast in bed.  These are coloured pink with beetroot powder - I bought some in the farmer's market a while ago and haven't known quite what to do with it, but discovered using it in these scones that it's a brilliant natural food colourant.  The beetroot powder has very little taste, just a slightly sweet earthiness to the overall flavour which goes beautifully with the traditional nature of scones.  I also added dried cranberries which have a lovely sweet tartness and bright red colour.  Finally, I added a little of the beetroot powder to whipped double cream, which gave it a lovely pale pink colour and a slight sweetness.

Beetroot chocolate brownies

This is my adaptation of a cross between a Harry Eastwood and a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe, with added decadence through the inclusion of chunks of chocolate, a mix of demerara and caster sugar, lots of cocoa.  If you want them even more chocolatey, increase the amount of melted chocolate - but I think this is a nice amount to maintain the earthiness of the beetroot, which makes them lovely and moist.  The trick with this one is not to use grated raw beetroot but to dice and microwave the veg and blitz it into a purple puree.  I've also separated the eggs so you get lots of air into the mix at the end by adding the beaten egg whites at the last minute.  Altogether, this recipe takes quite a long time to make and you need to be prepared for the amount of washing up required afterwards - but the end results are amazingly well worth it!

For a party to welcome home our friends James, Kate and their new baby Nia, I chopped them into inch squares and piped on a blob of cream whipped with cocoa powder and icing sugar, and added a raspberry to the top of each one.  Pretty!