Tesco offer a wide range of branded and own brand ingredients for baking cakes and also cake mixes. They have now introduced a range of 'fresh' cake mixes including 'Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough' 'Flapjack Mix' and also 'Gingerbread Dough'. These mixes are pre-prepared so all you need to do is bake them for delicious cakes! This range is known as the 'Easy Home Bake' range.
Vanilla Cupcake Mix
This cupcake mix is presented in a large plastic tub with a resealable plastic lid. The outer cardboard packaging gives the relevant product information. Basically what you have here is a vanilla cupcake mix. It is made from all natural ingredients and one 700g tub is designed to give 12 'light and moist' cupcakes. All you need is a spoon and paper cases on a baking tray.
If you don't wish to use all of the cake mix in one go, the lid can be popped back on and the mix returned to the fridge. It needs to be used up by the best before date. The cupcake mix should be spooned into paper cases (until half full) and baked at 160c for 20-25 minutes.
Ingredients and Nutrition (from the Tesco website
Wheat Flour, Caster Sugar, Milk, Pasteurised Whole Free Range Egg, Vegetable Oil, Unsalted Butter, Raising Agents (Disodium Diphosphate, Sodium Bicarbonate, Natural Vanilla Flavour.
Those with allergies to milk, gluten, egg and wheat should avoid.
100g of cupcake mix contains 290 calories, 29.2g of sugar and 4.1g of saturated fat.
Price
This cupcake mix can be purchased in store or from www.tesco.com. It is priced at £3.50. The other cake mixes in the range are priced around this price too. Frosting and cake decorations are also available.
My Thoughts
You may have realised by now that I am a keen baker and cupcakes are my favourite cakes to bake! I normally bake from scratch but I was feeling a little lazy at the weekend and decided to try out the new Tesco cake mix range. I intended on purchasing the 'Victoria Sponge Mix' which could be used for cupcakes but I settled on the vanilla mix. At £3.50, it isn't cheap but it isn't much more expensive than buying in all the various ingredients. I usually have them all at home but had ran out of everything and this 700g tub was a much lighter option for me to carry home with my shopping so I didn't mind paying a little bit more!
I think Tesco have came up with an excellent idea with these mixes and I plan on trying a few more in the near future. There is no need for mixing so that takes away the pile of dirty dishes (scale bowl, plastic bowl, mixing blades etc) though some may see it as losing the fun element of baking! For me, the fun element is eating the finished product! My tub has a best before date of 22nd of April so a week and a half from purchase. It is a good idea that you can store any extra mix in the fridge for a few days if you want to make just a few cupcakes at a time.
Baking Some Weekend Treats!
Within the tub, the cake mix resembles a proper cupcake mix when all the ingredients have been blended together. It is liquidy, creamy and has a gorgeous sweet vanilla scent.
I pre-heated my oven and arranged my paper cases on the tray. I didn't bother to transfer this cake mix to a bowl as the tub is wide enough to be able to spoon out the mixture with ease. It isn't too messy but I feel a tub with a spout would have been great (showing my lazy attitude lol).
There is more than enough mixture here to fill 12 regular cupcake cases almost to the top. The liquid itself is well blended and you can rest assured that there will be no buttery lumps, no powdery flour bits and no grittiness from the sugar - it is completely smooth. These cupcakes take a little longer to cook than my homemade ones but Tesco recommend 160c and I didn't want to adapt that at all.
As the cupcakes were baking, that familiar 'fresh baked' aroma became apparent in my kitchen and living room. I don't normally add vanilla to my cupcake mix but Tesco have added just the right amount and this allows the cakes to smell a little sweeter than my own. After 20 minutes or so, the cupcakes were ready. They are risen perfectly and filled the cases with ease. The top of the cupcakes were golden brown with a lovely bouncy texture but didn't have the same 'peak' that my homemade cupcakes have.
Decorating Delicious Cupcakes!
Whilst Tesco offer their own frosting, I always choose to use Betty Crocker frosting which comes in a large tub for just short of £2.00. You could also use regular icing as well - there is an endless amount of decorating possibilities when it comes to cupcakes and children can participate too! My son has no interest in helping and simply likes to indulge in the prepared product. Once the cakes were cool, they were easy to decorate. I swirled the frosting on and finished them off with some sprinkles.
The cakes looked delicious - but how did they taste? Whilst I don't feel any mix offers as delicious cupcakes as my own made from scratch, this cupcake mix is much nicer than the dry mixes that shops offer. The cupcakes have a lovely texture and aren't a single bit dry inside or out. They are moist and light as Tesco claim and do have a high quality, homebaked taste. They don't taste cheap at all and are very fresh in flavour. The vanilla addition really is wonderful and adds a delicious sweetness to the cupcake without being sickly or artificial.
Conclusion
I managed to bake 12 cupcakes and frost them for £5.50. This is a little more than buying the individual ingredients but it is worth this cost as the cakes turn out fab and there is very little washing up to do so I can get on with other things. I would recommend this to anyone who isn't a brilliant baker as you could easily whip up a batch of cupcakes in next to no time and pass them off as baked from scratch. Tesco also recommend that you can add ingredients to the actual mix including chocolate chips and fruit.
We kept our cupcakes in a food container and they were lovely and fresh the next day as well.
Overall 4 stars - tasty, easy to bake but a little pricy. I gave my Mum and sister a finished cake and they thoroughly enjoyed it as did my son and fiance so recommended all round!
Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy my pictures - they are put on in a backwards order lol :)
Don't Tell Anyone I Cheated.. 
