Happy birthday to me!!

Happy birthday to me!! I made this cake for my birthday in late September. I have this thing with hippos.... my brother really enjoyed it. There was a hippo on his cake eating cake. Tee hee.

The cake is again Nigella Lawson's "chocolate storecupboard cake" but I used raspberry jam instead of marmelade. It has chocolate buttercream, homemade marshmallow fondant and fondant hippos.



Party on little dude!

Welcome baby boy!

One of my colleagues recently had a baby boy - I made this cake in September 2009 as a gift for their family. I also made a batch of matching cupcakes for the people at work. I knew they'd be upset if they saw me bring in cake and then not let them eat it!!

The cake is Nigella Lawson's "chocolate storecupboard cake", with chocolate buttercream and home-made marshmallow fondant.


The cupcakes are vanilla packet mix with fresh strawberries thrown in. Cream cheese frosting and fondant duckies. Quack!

I gather that the cake went down very with my friend's wife and in-laws. :o)

A first fondant cake

This is my first ever attempt at covering a cake in fondant. I learned a lot doing it, but I didn't think it was too bad for a first effort! The cake is Nigella Lawson's "chocolate storecupboard cake".

My mother-in-law's birthday cake:


Mmm... it tasted pretty good too!

Puppy's first birthday

Our little puppy had her first birthday in August 2009 - so I made this cake... unfortunately for her, it was made of stuff that's bad for dog's so we ate the whole thing for her...

It's a bone-shaped chocolate ripple cake, with Frangelico in it.

Aww, isn't she a cutie??

Pooh cake

A work colleague of mine returned to work in June 2009 after having some extended sick leave. As a welcome back pressie, I made a Winnie-the-Pooh cake.


He's made out of lemon packet cake, and I flavoured the buttercream icing with a little lemon juice. Yum yum! I also added a little icing bumble bee to the middle of the "hunny" pot (which is an enormous chocolate brownie).

Here's to Pooh!

Random cupcakes

During June and July 2009 I made several random batches of cupcakes for a couple of events: a Tupperware party and my sister-in-laws house-warming.

Red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and heart sprinkles:

Vanilla packet cupcakes, with fresh strawberries and cream cheese frosting, decorated with fondant strawberries:

Vanilla packet mix cupcakes, with vanilla butter-cream frosting. Decorated with imprinted fondant and fondant butterflies.

I love cupcakes. Yum yum.

The cake that started it all

This is it. This is the cake that started my cake decorating obsession. Don't get me wrong - I have always loved baking. I just never bothered to decorate anything before devouring it!

This cake came about because it was Easter-time and my husband had been going on and on about his favourite Easter egg - a large 3D chocolate Freddo. So I set off to buy him the Freddo only to discover that Cadbury had stopped making it! Hubby was very disappointed. I decided that I was going to try and get him a 3D Freddo. Thus the cake idea was formed.

I had never done any decorating at all prior to this (well except for putting sprinkles on cupcakes as a child).

The cake was constructed using a simple chocolate packet mix and the Wilton 3D bear tin. I used vanilla buttercream to ice the cake.

The cake a big success. Hubby had a great big grin on his face as he sliced Freddo's head off!!

Inspiration!

I just saw the new movie "Julie and Julia" and came out totally inspired. It's a great movie - highly recommended to anyone who loves to cook.

So anyway - after watching the movie I decided to finally write up my adventures into the world of cake decorating and baking. This blog is mostly just a record of my creations, but is also a way to share some of my ideas with friends and family.

The first few posts relate to cakes I've made in the last six months. Then I plan on updating the blog as I make new things.

So, read on and enjoy!

Ceri