A place to show off the things I have baked
It’s my niece’s birthday on the 4th January and she sent me a video in December asking me to please make a “Unicorn Cake with all the colours” because “I love unicorns”.
I hadn’t been asked to make a unicorn in well over a year, but it seems 5 year olds still like them.
The inside was 5 coloured layers to make it rainbow-esque and these turned out a bit brighter than I thought they would be.
My brother and I were never sporty when we were children. As a teen I started to do more cardio at the gym, and when I was 25 I discovered Roller Derby which I played for 6 years. It was great to feel a part of a team and it really helped build my confidence. As a child I was fatter and never did well at sport. As an adult, I was actually good at roller derby and it was a great feeling.
I imagine my brother was in a similar situation, and he discovered all-inclsuive rugby in recent years. He’s really blossomed in the sport and he’s doing amazing – I am very proud of him!
I like an excuse to bake, and as this month is Pride celebrations all over the place i decided to try make something to celebrate Pride and send them to him (secretly) in the post. I just really hope they have shipped OK…
I used this recipe from All Recipes to make the blondies, and then topped them with a white chocolate ganache. I used a 3:1 chocolate to cream ratio and coloured some of this with gel colouring.
To begin with I covered the full tray of blondies with white chocolate ganache, then I added rainbow stripes which I then feathered:
I posted these to his work without him knowing, so hoping they get there in one piece. Time will tell!
I love cinnamon. I love cinnamon rolls. When we go to America, I love the smell of Cinnabon when we go shopping in malls (though I have to restrict how often I eat it as I know they are so full of calories). With this in mind, I wanted to try making some cinnamon rolls at home for the first time.
The dough was made with flour, salt, milk, yeast, and sugar and had to prove for 90 minutes. After this, I rolled it out to try make a rectangle:
You have to coat the dough with butter, and then sprinkle a LOT of sugar and cinnamon over it
I followed a recipe that allegedly made 12-14 buns. Instead of cutting it into thinner buns, I cut it into 8 instead.
A second prove is then needed to allow the buns to puff up before baking:
I believe that I over-baked them a little, but it was nothing that a little cream cheese frosting wouldn’t fix:
And finally, the inside of the bun as I was eating it. Yum yum yum yum
Another family birthday means another cake. This time around the spec was “Peppa Pig” and “Normal cake” (I always assume people just mean vanilla and strawberry jam when they ask for “normal”.
As I don’t like making fondant covered cakes anymore, the below is what I came up with…
I took the above photo then remembered I’d bought some candles too.
I cheated on the cake making as I couldn’t be bothered to make my own pigs. Instead I spent £3.99 on the set from eBay.
Finally, the obligatory cake insides shot. The cake rounds were 7″ each, so that’s quite a chunk of icing for the outsides!
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:
Some friends got married this week and were having a simple service with “no fuss”. I wanted to make a fuss so I made them this small wedding cake. It’s a basic vanilla / strawberry jam on the inside with vanilla buttercream too.
I used Wilton Whitest White to get the icing colour right, and sprayed a pearl spray on at the end to give it the shiny finish.
The flowers were just artificial ones to finish it off.
For my birthday last year, I was given a photo box thing to take photos in, but I’m lazy and so had rarely used it. I decided to use it for some shots of this cake.
I feel really into Halloween this year. I’ve got plans to carve two bulldog pumpkins (One for work and one for home) and I’ve just spent today decorating mini pumpkin cakes made from mini bundt cakes.
Yesterday, we went to our friends’ house for a Halloween gathering.
Although we went Day of the Dead style (thanks to some half price outfits purchased last year), they had a “mad science” theme so I decided to have a go at making a brain cake.
I started earlier in the week by baking some vanilla cake layers and dyed them with red food dye. I had ran out of gel colour though and had to resort to liquid – this resulted in pink cakes and not red. I covered in a buttercream coating, and shaped it as best as I could work out freehand…
I used fondant (dyed ivory and pink) to make the “brain tissue”. I then just attached it in swirly patterns to make my brain.
After completing the first half of the cake, I continued the “twizzling” with the other side of the cake until it was fully covered.
To finish the cake, I covered it in a seedless strawberry jam which gave it a shiny, bloody glaze:
Everyone told me that it turned out well – I was really impressed with it as it was quite a low effort cake!
This post was originally on my old website, but figured it was another good one to share on here….
In November, my parents’ friends were let down by their cake maker and I got asked around a week before if I’d be able to make something for them. I could do anything – their theme was poppies as they were getting married on Remembrance Day. This was the results of my labour:
I spent most of the evenings in the run up to their wedding making things for the cake. Due to the last minute request, I had no time left to book any leave from work. I ended up making over 100 cupcakes (red were vanilla and white were lemon). I made the poppy toppers by hand cutting out and shaping fondant, and topping with glitter.
The top of the cake tower was a three layer vanilla sponge with jam and buttercream. It was not quite as neat as I would have liked, but the fondant tore three times when I was trying to decorate it, and this was the best I could manage at 10pm the night before their wedding!
It didn’t turn out too bad though – and the bride and groom were very happy with the result:
We have a big garden and last year my husband started to grow our own vegetables. This year it seems that the courgettes are taking over & growing into giants so I have been trying to find recipes to use them all up.
Last year, I used a recipe from Shugary Sweets for a Chocolate Courgette Cake. I decided to do this again this year to use up one of the behemoth vegetables!
As I was making the cake, I realised I didn’t have the full amount of cocoa powder in my store cupboards (I ALWAYS have this in so no idea how that escaped me). I tried to make do with some ginger chocolate morsels from Hotel Chocolat, but it wasn’t quite right so was slightly less chocolaty than the last time I made this.
Also, I should have let it cool in the pan a bit more. Due to the moistness of the cake, it didn’t hold shape when I turned it out.
I had spare batter too, so I made some cupcake sized cakes too
So far, all that I’ve shared are some drip cakes. I do make other things too, as the below cupcake examples will show.
I find cupcakes to be “easy” in regards to making the cakes – they are a lot quicker as naturally less cake = less cooking time. They still look good though if you put the effort in.
Eid Cupcakes
I made these for our neighbours to wish them Eid Mubarek.
Rose Swirl Cupcakes
I don’t recall why I made these, but they weren’t the best rose – swirls I’ve done. I think the icing was a little wet on these ones.
Oreo Cupcakes
I made these after we moved house two years ago. I was desperate to get baking to feel “normal” and these were a quick and easy bake. Funfetti cakes with pink icing & funfetti Oreos, and then red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese icing and red velvet Oreos
Thank You
I made these to thank some neighbours for their help when bad winds blew our fencing down. The style was inspired by an amazing Instagram baker – Cakes n Sprinkles
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes
These were for my friend’s birthday. Chocolate cupcakes, peanut butter icing, and various Reeses sweets on top!