Ladybird and bumblebee cupcakes

I was able to decorate these cupcakes at work today as part of our demo day. I used Mich Turner's Cake Masterclass book to create the cute ladybirds and bumblebees and added them to the grass buttercream cupcakes.

Fishing cake

This is my most recent request for a man's 80th birthday. He enjoys fishing and so his daughter asked for this design on the cake...
I thought the icing would look good with the marble effect to represent the water. I used pearl dust to make the fish sparkle and added reeds/weeds to make it look more like a lake river.

School Fayre Cupcakes

My little sister and I made these for her school fayre... simple vanilla cupcakes that spell out the name of her school!

Yoga Cake

I made this cake for my step mum's birthday celebrations. I was a bit nervous about creating her in icing as I haven't had much practice making figures but I think it turned out ok.
The cake is the usual vanilla sponge with edible decoration...

Jubilee cupcakes

Obviously I couldn't let the jubilee pass without making some sort of cake to celebrate it! I decided to go with cupcakes rather than a big celebration cake and this is what happened...
Lemon cupcakes with lemon curd centre and sugarpaste decoration.

Suitcase cake

I made this cake for a friend who is away from home working in America this summer. Her favourite colour is green and she loves knitting, she has also been to a number of places around the world so I used all of this information to create her suitcase.
The cake is a simple vanilla sponge with jam and buttercream (as usual) and the decoration is all edible, yes even the luggage label!

Trombone Cake

The most recent cake request I have had was to make a 11th birthday cake for a boy who plays the trombone. I wasn't sure what to do at first, as this wasn't going to be an easy cake whatever I chose to do. Having looked online at other music themed cakes I still wasn't overly inspired as they all seemed a bit boring, mostly white cakes with black musical notes.
That's when I came up with the idea of a dark blue 2 tiered cake, white wrap, golden trombone and silver stars to add some sparkle. This is the finished result...

Sadly on it's journey to my mum's house the trombone decided to fall apart! I had really struggled to make the trombone as it was too heavy to support itself. However disaster was averted before the cake was picked up as I had chance to remake the trombone, which I am pleased to report survived it's journey and then another journey to the seaside!!

Flowers and Stripes cake

Last week it was my mums birthday and after having looked at a few cakes online together I knew what sort of style and colours I wanted to go for. I used mostly pastel colours that compliment each other and added a few brighter tones. The cake is vanilla sponge with jam and buttercream and the flower decorations are all edible although slightly on the crunchy side as I made them using florist paste.
I was pleased with the final result and my mum loved the cake too!

Dress and Shoe Biscuits

I got two great new cutters for my birthday, a dress and a shoe, and I have only just had chance to try them out. Also at work we have some new products in from a company called Beau. They sell flavoured sugarpaste and all the different flavours in liquid form. I bought the elderflower flavour to have a go with and added it to my favourite biscuit recipe. I used royal icing to decorate the dresses and shoes and added a little extra lemon to the icing to compliment the elderflower.

Trampoline Cupcakes

My little sister actually made these cute cupcakes (with a little help from her big sis) to raise money for her trampolining club. I think it is a really clever idea and beats the usual swirly buttercream type of cupcakes as these have a strawberry jam surprise inside!

Come Dine With Me Table Cake

The brief for my latest cake was 'Come Dine With Me' and it had to serve 6 people. I thought about a few ideas including making a cake with a tray of icing money on top but settled on the idea of a table cake that is set for 6 people. It was a little tricky working with such tiny objects for the first time but I am pleased with the result.The cake is vanilla sponge sandwiched with buttercream and raspberry jam, decorated with edible decorations (not the candle!).

Orange Tiny Terror Amp Cake

The second cake of the week was for my Dad and I decided to make him a replica of his Orange Tiny Terror Amp.

I didn't have a lot of time to do this cake and next time I would make it bigger so I could get all the detail of the amp on there however the end result wasn't too bad...



Teapot and Teacup Cake

This week I made a birthday cake for my friend Faye inspired by the teapot cake in Fiona Cairns' Birthday Cake Book.

I followed the great instructions but as I didn't have a sphere mould I improvised with two pudding bowls. I changed the white flowers to a cream and also added a matching teacup. I am so proud of this cake....



And Faye liked it too!

Stack of books cake

It was my sisters 21st birthdy this week and so I wanted to make her an amazing cake to celebrate. I had three ideas to start with; a teapot, a bird with bird house and a stack of books. I decided to go with the stack of books because she studies English Literature at university, loves to read and is currently writing a novel.
I asked her for the titles of her top 3 favourite books and the title of her own book and then set to work planning the cake.
To make the cakes looked good but also one cake wasn't one giant block I planned it so that it was one block of cake disguised as two books on top of another block of cakes, also two books.
I painted the covered board with colour paste to get a wood grain effect and then added the yellow post it note and stickers.
I was pleased with the end result (as was my sister) as I had never attempted a tiered cake before this one but I am a perfectionist so there will always be bits I could have improved.

Battenberg Cake

My very first attempt at battenberg cake....

I got a little help by using the silverwood battenberg tin...

Anniversary Chocolate Rose Cake

For my Dad and Step Mum's 10th wedding anniversary I decided to bake them a chocolate cake and took inspiration from the Fiona Cairns birthday cake book for the decoration; piped chocolate ganache roses. I tried a new recipe with this one too, a chocolate buttermilk cake from the book Tea with Bea.

I did run out of ganache and the roses aren't as equal in size as they should be but the overall effect is good I think....

Smoke Alarm Cake

Yes you have read that right, a smoke alarm! My Grandad used to be a fireman, he then went on to be a community safety officer and he wanted a cake he could take into work for his colleagues as he was retiring. As a novelty he asked me to do a smoke alarm cake based on the smoke alarms they have to fit.
This is the smoke alarm I based it on:

And this is the cake:
A 10" round Madeira sponge cake with jam and buttercream filling

Buttons and Birdies Biscuits

I had some new cutters and a mould from the International Cake Show in November and again haven't had chance to use them so when I decided to make some biscuits yesterday I used my new things to decorate them....

These great cutters are from Cakes By Bien and I love them!!

And this is the Wilton button and ribbon mould...

I made lemon biscuits and this is how I decorated them...

I think I would do some piping next time to tie the colours together, some brown dots on the bird ones and white dots on the bird house . Also I need to find a better way of using the Wilton mould as I found it really difficult to get the buttons out in one piece and then fiddly to cut around them. Any suggestions on how to use them properly please let me know :-)

Vanilla Cherry Blossom Cupcakes

I got a few new books for Christmas...

They all have some really great ideas to try and I'm sure when I have the time or occasion I will try as many as I can. Until then I have only tried one idea from the Lola cupcake book.

The recipe for the Vanilla Cherry Blossom cupcakes caught my eye as I love cherry flavoured things and I loved the way they had decorated the cute cupcakes.
Unfortunately the recipe calls for Morello cherry jam which I couldn't find in the local supermarket so I did improvise with some black cherry jam. The resulting flavour wasn't that cherry-ish so next time I'm going to make sure I find the right jam.

Christmas Cakes!

This year I made 6 cakes (in October!) which I fed with brandy about once a week to be ready in time for Christmas. I had 4 different designs to decorate the cakes and this is how they turned out...