Guilty Pleasure

I call this a guilty pleasure because I bought new sandwich tins in Morrison's as they were on offer. The checkout person only charged me for one - I didn't realise until I got home - honestly!

Anyway, this is a Victoria Sponge cake I made some time ago. It's from the BBC Good Food website and written by Barney Desmazery. There are loads on GF website but I like Barney - if you read the comments at the end of any of his recipes, he often replies. In my book that makes him an all round nice guy. You can follow him on Twitter, @barneydesmazery.

The cream in this looks a bit stingy but it wasn't honestly! Must just be the photo! 

Back to the point .... this is a cake I made ages ago but with the job and the house move etc I didn't get round to blogging about it. I've packed my baking stuff away too so wont be baking again in this house ever! I still have no idea when the move will happen and am very stressed about it. Still, it'll be worth it in the end. Getting used to a new oven will be strange though. I have this one pretty well sussed I think after ten years.

Tea and cake is a pretty perfect combo

Thats it from me now until I am in the new house with my lovely husband and I've got organised enough to bake.

See you soon (ish), Laura x

Cookies for Jennifer

I have been promising my best friend I would make cookies for her for ages and here they are...

Chocolate Chunk Cookies

There was a slight flaw in my plan. I ordered a lovely little gift box with hearts all over to put them in then made the biggest cookies ever. Not even one would fit in.  Resorted to plan B and put them in a tin!

They didn't look too pretty (biscuits aren't my forte it has to be said) but Jennifer didn't seem to mind too much .....

Cookie Monster!

Happy Halloween, and Happy Birthday Derek!

Firstly my apologies. I'm blogging in the wrong order here. I have cookies to add, and a Victoria sponge. For the first time in a while I've baked more than I've blogged.

Still, as it's Halloween I thought I'd blog the Halloween cakes now and catch up with everything else during the week.....

Scary Stuff

These were a birthday present for my mum's husband (65 today!) I had planned to opt for something 'birthdayish' but as he has a birthday on Halloween, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to make these.

The topping is simply Green and Blacks chocolate. 70% Dark (you don't need the 85%) and White.

Jeff very kindly and cleverly made the making of these into a little film. You can blatantly see that I made them in my dressing gown with a towel on my just washed hair but oh well!!!!!

I'm not sure this will upload here. It seems to be taking too long. Enjoy if it works, if not I'll try it again later  ....

Night Vision Anybody?

Carrots are rumoured to help you see in the dark. I don't know about that but they make nice cake.

These are something of an experiment as the recipe was for a whole cake and so I've faffed about with it somewhat to make cupcakes.

Yes, I know... Carrot leaves look NOTHING like that! Artistic License
I think they call it!

Finally, a use for the fabulous orange disco glitter!
That's one way to get kids to eat veg I guess!

A new take on grow your own

My husband assures me that he likes carrot cake, as long as it's "done right!" He's not home yet - I'll let you know! I ate one and it tasted alright to me...

Laura x

P.s They are in gold foil cases btw. Must work on my photography skills!

Use Your Loaf ...Tin

Last week I decided to deviate from buns, muffins and cup cakes and rustle up a nice sticky ginger cake with lemon icing.

It was delicious and was well received at work and so I rustled up a second and took my convalescent dad a slice.

What it lacks in prettiness, it makes up for in taste!

Mmmm

If anybody wants to have a go, let me know and I'll post the recipe.

Laura x

Cakey Birthday to You...

It's my sisters birthday today (36!!!) and I wanted to try something new for her to take to work. I settled on Lemon and Poppy Seed Cupcakes.  I didn't  taste one (unusual - if I'm baking for public consumption I usually eat one un iced to be sure!) but apparently they were well received.

Buns in Transit

Pretty cakes all in a row

To decorate -  I cut what should've been flowers, but look more like fried eggs thanks to the cutter I used, out of white fondant icing, put a circle of edible glue onto the centres and stuck assorted sprinkles on. The cupcakes were iced in lemon butter cream tinted slightly yellow and a flower was glued to each.

Et voila! If you give these a try, the mixture doesn't look promising but they came out fine - or so the taste panel at Christ Church Primary tell me.

Pat a Cake Video as promised...

Jeff just showed me how to do this so here it is ... Birthday buns for Aunty Pat!

Better late than Never

Sorry for the lack of blog action but I have a good excuse. I've been away to get married which was fantastic and then I started my new job so the cakes have been a little thin on the ground. I do have two lots to show though...

The first I made for my Aunties Sixtieth birthday. I wasn't totally happy with them but will blog them anyway.. Jeff made a video of the making of them but as yet I have no idea how to post that on here. If I ever work that out I'll let you see it!

The second were Jeff's wedding present. Unfortunately they got slightly damaged in transit! I do have boxes to carry them safely but they don't keep them fresh so I risked them in a tin and they got slightly squished.

A work in progress...

I'm such a messy cook!

I can ice 'I love you' no problem at all. It turns out though, I can't ice 'Jeff'!  Oops!!!

Here Come the Girls....

So, the second and last of my two hen nights was yesterday (I'm rough today!) and I wanted to share my little girly cakes with you. We met for champagne at a friends house before heading out so it seemed only right that I supplied the cakes.

I opted for three different simple designs. The first I thought would never work! I piped pink hearts in royal icing onto greaseproof paper and left them to go really hard. I thought they'd snap when I peeled them off the paper but my luck was in it seemed!

Fingers crossed they stay in one piece!

The other two designs were much less fiddly but I can still say it will be a while before I make anything with pink buttercream in again!

I heart you

Pretty in Pink

Star Spangled

And here they are en masse! 

Ice Cream Sundae

It's been a busy few weeks (new job, house sold, wedding two weeks on Friday....) and so baking has had to take a back seat. Today has been my last ever FIS team meeting though before I move on to pastures new so had to get my mixing bowl out!

Note the lack of pinny... didn't want to get my new one full of buttercream. I think that defeats the object really! 

I managed to cause havoc in the kitchen with these and there is still icing sugar everywhere. I was rushing and so over filled my piping bag. Serves me right! Buttercream everywhere was the end result! The only hints I can give you are put your bag into a cup or mug, fold the sides over as best you can and only fill a third full.  Otherwise you can guarantee the contents will seep out all over you! Disposable piping bags are useful if you are lazy.

Can you guess what it is yet?!

These are just a plain and simple sponge cup cake underneath but the topping turns them into something special! They were very well received by my friends at work but then they are easily pleased when it comes to cake!

A perfect little 99, raspberry sauce and everything!

Must go now, I am busy planning cakes for my hen do (part two!) on Saturday. I'm thinking girly but that's as far as I've got. Watch this space!

Laura x

My Army of Ladybirds

Ladybirds - don't you just love them? 

I fear my colours might run together by morning! Time will tell!

Birthday Buns!

I got lots of cakey presents for my birthday including this fab new pinny which I love so I thought I'd better get on with the birthday buns.

I have opted for plain and boring muffin cases because I don't think they need anything fancy, not because I'm in short supply....

Just waiting for them to cool (on my lovely new rack!) so I can ice them.

Spot the odd one out! I only had eleven brown cases! 

Will be back soon with the finished article.

SORRY!

Hi all, I'm so sorry there has been no blogging since I came back from my hols. Life has been too busy! (Note to self - must make time for cakes! Cakes are very important!)

I did make a batch of muffins for the team meeting at work but didn't photograph them as they were Beetroot Bonanza which you've already seen and as I was rushing.

It's my birthday on Saturday so am planning some lovely cupcakes to take to work on Friday, I have also promised to make something with bananas and frosting for a friend who is a birthday girl next week so watch this space!

Love Laura x

A Little Note From Me...

Hi All, just to let you know I'm giving up baking - well for a week anyway. I'm off to get myself a sun tan so I can look like a bronzed healthy bride as opposed to a pasty white stressed one.

I will leave you with a picture of the magnificent (if I say so myself) Sausage and Egg Pie that I made probably about this time last year. I keep promising to recreate it for Jeff.

I know it doesn't strictly belong on here but look at it! It's beautiful!

Top Hat and Tails

This is my Blueberry bush. It's a 'Top Hat' Blueberry. It was tiny when I got it and now is huge and produces more berries than I can eat. I've picked 200 grams tonight without even trying. They freeze well though so is no problem.

I'm no gardener so would recommend one of these to anybody. All you need is Ericaceous Compost and some food and hundreds of little blue 'superfoods' will be yours! A cat (tails - see???!!!)  is handy too as blackbirds eat them all given half a chance.

Very Lovely New Blue Muffin Tray! 

Thought I'd better put the bumper crop to good use so these are Blueberry and White Chocolate Muffins from the BBC Goodfood website. They have 55 ratings and overall score four stars so thought they'd be worth a go. I got seven out of the mixture for some strange reason.

They went down very nicely with a cup of tea.

A word of advice.... If you want to make them, you need to double the amount of baking powder and don't over stir! 

And the winner is...

Greenhouse Maggie (who claimed her prize yesterday afternoon) closely followed by Lady Red. I owe you a cake/bake/biscuit Lady Red!

The answer, for those who didn't guess, was Custard Creams....mmmmmm!

Here they are in all their glory.

Thank you for following by the way. If you have no photo on though, please sort it out!

Thanks xxx

Competition Time!

Anybody who can guess what I am going to turn this little selection into gets a prize.... They get to eat one!

Star Struck

In hindsight (which is a wonderful thing incidentally) I would have iced half in a much deeper blue with a white star. Live and learn eh?

Photograph isn't doing my lovely blue and white spotty bun cases justice - sorry!

A Bun in the Oven

Twelve actually, I have so many things I should be doing - ironing, cleaning, job application form etc but figured if I did a nice cupcake job first then I might feel more inspired to tackle the boring stuff. I am on holiday after all!

They're just 'chuck it all in and see what happens' plain vanilla cupcakes but I'm going for a star design which will be great if I can carry it off!

This is my practise run. I think it might be not so easy on an actual cake! Photos to follow (good or not!) when I've iced them!

Little Pots of Happiness ....

Edible Glitter!

The one on the left looks gold but it is really silver!

Shopping for Goodies

It's Saturday afternoon and so far this weekend I've baked absolutely nothing. In fact I've cooked nothing full stop. I will try and rectify that tomorrow.

I have been to Lakeland in search of equipment though and chose a new muffin tin, a mini muffin tin and a cooling rack for my birthday from Jeff. Will be good and save them until it really is my birthday!

I also got a magic carpet liner for my baking trays - nothing at all sticks to them which is helpful when it comes to washing up as I am the messiest baker in the world I think. I get icing sugar and flour everywhere.

Got some bun cases too. Tiny silver ones and big blue and white spotty ones. Have an idea of what's going in the big ones.

As I was on a roll with buying cakey bakey stuff, we walked up to the nice cake shop in Gatley (Martyn Jackson Celebration Cakes) and got some edible glitter. They have loads of colours (which makes me ridiculously excited) and I want to get the full set eventually. I really wanted orange but need to plan an orange cup cake first! Went for silver which will go with most things (am I getting sensible now I'm approaching 32???) and disco blue for the new bun cases.

A word of warning - Edible glitter cannot be digested by the human body!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally chose some brown and white spotty bun cases which I thought would be good for chocolate muffins and some teeny tiny little cases that I don't know what to do with. I'll have a think about that....

Muffin Magic!

A quick one tonight as I'm sleepy.

A very fine big blue muffin tray is on it's way to me so lovely big muffins coming soon. Watch this space!

Beetroot Bonanza

My mum is coming for her tea tomorrow night. She's not a massive cake eater so thought I'd better try something different for her and not too sweet.

I had loads of beetroot ready in my veg plot (I say veg plot, I mean large wooden box with veg growing in it) so thought I would give these a go...

First dig up your chosen beetroot. Wash it, peel it, grate it.

THEN...

Sprinkle in some love (as well as a bit of flour and some eggs and that)

It really is that colour with no added colourings or preservatives honestly!

Spoon into some pink and lovely bun cases (you might need a wonderful boyfriend to buy these for you)

Pop in the oven at 200 degrees Celsius for twenty mins then leave to cool on a wire rack.

Add the magic pink frosting (food colouring is what made that pink!) et voila!

Beetroot bonanza eat your heart out.

Taste a bit like carrot cake, only PINK!

Love Heart Cupcakes

I was invited to a girls only dinner party last Friday night. It was decided we'd each take a course ... I somehow ended up with after dinner mints! What a cop out! I didn't ask for the easy option - honestly! Thought I'd better get creative so, having just bought a gorgeous new cake book (Baking Magic by Kate Shirazi) I made a love heart cupcake for each guest.I was rather pleased with the way they turned out!

I also made one much less girly cupcake for the hosts little boy.

They went down a storm but we had drunk about 15 bottles of Rose by then (apart from Ben who is only 7 that is - he had milk with his!)