Best of 2014 on Kerry Cooks!

Happy New Year and happy 2015! I like the sound of this year – it has a nice solid ring to it, don’t you think?

Today I’m bringing you my annual look back on the past year here on Kerry Cooks, featuring some of my favourite and most popular recipes on my blog! Blog-wise, 2014 was a brilliant year – my traffic continued to grow, I started to bring in sponsored posts here and there, my site got a makeover thanks to the lovely Jo, and I ate a whoooooooole lot of delicious cake and cookies!

Thank YOU so much for heading over here to read my blog, and for baking my recipes too! I love seeing your pictures #kerrycooks on Instagram! Through distance may separate us, a love of cookie dough unites us.

Personally, 2014 was an awesome year too! I turned 30, got married to an incredibly handsome and lovely man and continued to have an amazing family and friends. The only dark spot was the loss of our little kitten Brownie but we still enjoy hanging out with her companion Bella, a little black ball of energy and evil excitement.

Anyhoo, onto cake! First up is the top recipes traffic wise!

1. Rainbow Cake

Taking the lead as ever, with over a quarter of a million views this year alone is my Rainbow Cake! I could never have imagined when I set out to develop the UK’s first easy Rainbow Cake recipe that it would be such a huge hit! I’m so so happy that it’s been such a big success and has brought bright and colourful rainbow fun to your children’s birthday parties and celebrations. Stay tuned for more rainbow baking in 2015!

2. Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

This is a proper red velvet cake, a deliciously dense, tangy, rich chocolate cake slathered in what a reasonable person might call far too much cream cheese frosting. But I am not a reasonable person, and especially not when it comes to cream cheese frosting. While it’s a little more challenging than your average cake, I bet this would win you some serious brownie points if you baked it for your valentine.

3. Millie’s Cookies

If you love Millie’s Cookies, but don’t love the price, or the fact that there isn’t one near you, or the look the teenager behind the counter gives you when you buy ten for yourself, why not bake them at home instead? These cookies are soooo gooey and just perfect for a little winter comfort food.

4. Nutella cupcakes

What do you call a dense, rich chocolate cupcake baked with nutella stuffed inside, then topped with a properly chocolatey nutella frosting (no light brown hues here!) and each topped with a whole Ferrero Rocher? Heaven!

5. Foolproof Thick Cream Cheese Frosting

Cream Cheese frosting used to be my nemesis, but not since I stumbled upon a very strange new, yet foolproof method of making it! You completely melt the butter and it gives you the thickest, most delicious frosting ever with completely NO lumps! Give it a try!

And also some of my favourites from 2014…

(Left to right, up to down, kinda)

Triple Chocolate Brownie Cookies These are for the days (or times of month) when you need a super intense chocolate hit. If you can eat more than one of these, you have my undying admiration.

Cinnamon Rolls with Cream Cheese Glaze 2014 is the year I finally mastered homemade Cinnamon Rolls and these ones make the long years of (delicious) practise worthwhile. Don’t start your new year diet until after you’ve made these, srsly.

How to make your own cake flour Just so useful – bookmark this post or print it out and stick it on your fridge. I’ve already referred to my own post several times. How does a baking blogger run out of baking powder?!

Chewy Chocolate Chip cookies for two The perfect recipe for when you need cookies but you don’t really want twenty of them hanging around – you’ll have just two deliciously chewy chocolate chunk cookies for you and a friend, or you and you again later on! Hooray!

Levain Style Chocolate Cookies These cookies are basically a man vs food challenge except that I’m a woman who can easily take down a cookie the size of my hand and weighing 120g. The most densely chocolatey thing I’ve ever tasted. Make them!

Have you made any resolutions for 2015? Are they sticking?

x Kerry

 

 Let’s be friends! | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram | Google+ | Bloglovin’