I have the pleasure to occasionally dog-sit for Betty the Bulldog. This is a picture of Betty a few years back on her birthday when I made her pupcakes…
Anyway, Betty’s owner asked me if I could make a cake for her grandson’s first birthday. I was given a picture as inspiration, but she lets me go with my own design.
This was what I made:
It is 5 layers of vanilla cake sandwiched with vanilla buttercream and strawberry jam.
Because the weather was warmer last week, I decided to coat the cake with a white chocolate coating instead of buttercream as I figured it would be more stable during the warmer weather.
I made the topper from fondant, following this guide online
and I kept the cake in my fridge until collected to ensure it was as fresh as possible (I made it the day before collection). Here it is sharing a shelf with my cold brew:
The balls were only decorative and bought online – I don’t have the skill to make my own!
The youngest niece asked for a bunny cake for her birthday…
She is always quite indecisive when it comes to what she wants, though my husband had a conversation with her on video the other week that went something like:
“What cake do you want?”
“A Bunny Cake”
“What Colour?”
“Orange”
“What Flavour”
“Erm, Chocolate”
So I at least had the guidelines of what to aim for with this one (though the end product was more of a browny-orange than actual orange).
I started by baking 5 layers of chocolate cake, and making a chocolate buttercream:
After that wa stacked, I wrapped it in cling film until I needed it and put it in the freezer. In the mean time, I made fondant cut-outs for the bunny’s face / ears:
I had decided to pipe the fur on (vanilla buttercream) using a nozzle that frustrated me loads as it keps pushing through the piping bags due to its shape. Thankfully I got through it though after 6 piping bags.
The top of the cake had a “crown” of various colours (again, asked for by the birthday girl” and I put the cake in the fridge overnight until her party. The ears had to wait until the party itself as they were too tall for any of my fridge shelves, and I couldn’t be bothered to re-jig the shelving.
I usually write “Happy Birthday” using fondant on the cake board, but I’ve been using a silicon mold with chocolate recently for brownie slabs. I did the same for this cake, though they nearly didn’t fit on the board due to them being bigger than my fondant cutters.
I added sprinkes first (Easter-themed ones) then melted chocolate and allowed them to set
The party was yesterday, and the cake was cut – and it was decadent!! Very rich chocolate cake and buttercream. The funny thing is, although I LOVE cake, I don’t really like chocolate cake that much and so I didn’t bother having any myself:
We cut the slices to half height because people were VERY full of sugar and food already!
It was our niece’s 6th birthday celebration on Sunday, and add to that it was the Brother in Law’s 40th that weekend too, so we decided to surprise him at her 6th Birthday “party” at our house. That was 2 cakes.
I had also kindly agreed to make a cake for a friend’s mum’s birthday, so that meant 3 cakes to sort on Saturday. I’ve never felt more like a baker, and it took the full day to decorate them all.
I’d pre-baked the layers (5″ rounds of vanilly cake for the niece, and chocolate cake for the other two) and kept them in the freezer. They always turn out amazing & it makes it so much easier to decorate from frozen.
This was the fridge throughout the Saturday:
It was just as well we have a big fridge & that what little food was in there condensed to the bottom shelf & drawers at the bottom.
These are the finished cakes that I ended up making that day:
My Niece, Amber, Wanted a ballerina cake for her sixth birthday. I got it in my head that pink ruffles would be the way to do this… how much did I regret trying these when the icing kept dropping off the cake?
I suppose the plus side is that when I am not a professional and I am not getting paid, I don’t have to worry too much when things go wrong.
Another birthday treat was some chocolate cupcakes made for my sister in law’s birthday:
Nothing overly exciting for these – chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream. I chucked some Cadbury Miniature Heroes on top and some blue sprinkles to bring some colour.
I got started on Christmas stuff earlier this year, and ended up with all my “home made treats” completed at the end of last week. As such I took a load around to friends’ houses to share the sugary goodness.
Some of the treats as photo’d by a friend!
The offerings were:
Chocolate Coated Oreos
These were Oreos, coating in various chocolate, and decorated to look Christmassy. Sadly I made the error of putting them in the fridge, and by the time they got delivered the milk and dark chocolate ones had bloomed.
Gingerbread Fudge
Made with white chocolate, condensed milk, ginger spice, and gingerbread cookies all broken up. Topped with some Christmas sprinkles! I used this recipe from Janes Patisserie.
Eggnog Truffles
The eggnog truffles are AMAZING if I am allowed to say so. Made with white chocolate, cream cheese, rum flavouring and nutmeg. They are very easy to make, but taste delicious. Recipe from Six Sisters Stuff.
Reindeer Brownies
Made chocolate fudge brownies, cut into squares, then topped with some edible eyes, a red m&m, and pretzels for antlers.
Peanut butter dog treats (for those with dogs!)
The dogs don’t get forgotten at Christmas – these were Peanut Butter dog biscuits made with all natural Peanut Butter. I stamped the bigger ones with dog names, but they didn’t quite show up once they had baked, hence trying to use icing pens to show the names
I can’t believe that it’s the end of April already. I was looking back through Google Photos and saw a number of things that I’d baked this month but not posted about, so here goes:
First off, the mountain of cookies I made after learning to bake soft, gooey cookies. I had some “pumpkin spice baking chips” from our USA trip last year, and used these for the cookies.
Next up, was the cupcakes I made for James’ birthday that I left on his doorstep. Chocolate cake with PB icing, PB drizzle, and chopped up nuts
Whilst sorting out my kitchen cupboards, I also found out that I had 2 bags of vegetarian marshmallows left. They were a few months past their best before dates, so I decided to make these into a combination of Rice Krispie treats, and White chocolate Rocky Road:
And the final bake to post about, was a chocolate banana & rum bread that I made when I had a couple of ripe bananas that I’d not got around to eating yet
Worryingly, we’ve eaten all of these bakes between the two of us this month (well, except for the cupcakes). Maybe I should avoid baking anything for myself in May!
Another idea I had when making cakes for Halloween was to try making some “stabbed” cupcakes. I’d seen the idea on Instagram and thought it would be a good one to try. I had obviously made cupcakes before, but never tried anything with sugar work.
I had to begin by making the sugar mixture for my “Glass” – 2 cups of granulated sugar, some water, and a tube of liquid glucose. I had to heat this to 300 degrees F, whilst constantly stirring. It took nearly an hour!
Once the mixture was heated to the necessary temperature, I poured it out onto baking parchment and allowed it to cool down and set for a few hours
After setting, I hit it with a knife to get it to break up into the “shards”
I already had some cupcakes baked, and some leftover buttercreams. I used chocolate buttercream first, then added a vanilla swirl to the top mwhich i “stabbed” with the sugar shards
Finally, I added some red coloured icing drizzles to make the “blood”:
It’s been a year since I got some software in work that I never thought I’d get, so I used this as an excuse to bake a load of cakes and share them with my work colleagues…
The Blue theme was literally because I bought a Dr. Oetker sprinkle-mix that I liked the colour of. Some more details on each item follow:
Cakesicles. These had a chocolate cake and salted caramel  centre with dark chocolate coatingChocolate cupcakes: Chocolate cake with a chocolate buttercream swirlVanilla cake with strawberry compote and vanilla buttercreamLemon Cupcakes: Lemon cake with lemon curd filling, topped with lemon flavour buttercreamVanilla Cupcake: Vanilla Cake with vanilla buttercreamCakesicles: Blueberry muffin filling mixed with jam and buttercream, coated in white chocolateNot on theme, but I made a gin bundt cake too!
My mum had an early celebration for her 60th Birthday so of course I used this excuse to make her a cake. The plan started with a Balloon Cake (as I had been wanted to make one of these for a while) and quickly escalated from there.
Posing with the cake table
In the end I made a cake table with multiple types of cake.
Lemon Cupcakes – lemon buttercream rose + sprinkles to garnishChocolate Bundt Cakes – coated with white chocolate ganache, buttercream garnish, and sprinkles.White chocolate covered cakesicles with vanilla & strawberry cake insideBirthday cake – vanilla cake, strawberry jam, vanilla buttercream, sprinkles, gold writing & a cake balloon!
