Orange Cake

Made this yummy little cake for a special father's day afternoon tea. It was yummy and moist..denser than I excepted, but it was good. Iced with orange icing. All real oranges of course :)

• 3 oz butter
• 1 tsp orange rhind
• 3 eggs
• 3 tbsp orange juice
• 1/2 cup water
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 1/4 cups Self rising flour

1. Put butter, orange rhind, juice and water in a pot, stir until melted. Beat eggs and sugar until thick. Fold sifted flour into egg mixture, then add hot liquid, fold in lightly. Pour into a prepared 8" round tin. Bake in a mod oven for 35mins. Ice with icing made with knob of butter, 2tbsp orange juice and icing sugar to mix. Sprinkle orange rind over the top.
2. Recipe found here

Retro Baking - Ginger Loaf

I remember my grandmother occasionally making ginger loaf, and I've always been keen to give it a try myself. I found it to be really soft and cakey, yet not too crumbly. I doubled the recipe and split it between my two tins, but if I was repeating the recipe (which I will). I would double the recipe and only put it in one tin because they looked a little flat because my tins are quite large.

I used this recipe from the Chelsea Sugar website:

Ingredients

50g butter
1 Tbsp Chelsea Golden Syrup
1 egg
1/2 cup Chelsea Soft Brown Sugar
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ginger spice
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup milk

Method

In a large microwave-proof bowl or saucepan, melt the butter and Chelsea golden syrup together.
Add egg and sugar, mix well, then add all other dry ingredients except the soda.
Mix the soda with the milk and stir in. Pour into a baking paper-lined loaf tin and cook at 190°C for 30 - 40 minutes.
Cool on a wire rack, slice and butter when cool.

Sesame Street Cake

And for my second project this past week I decorated this cake for my precious godson, Andrew who turned 1 last week.

The top tier is actually a dummy tier. And the bottom tier made from a layer of strawberry cake (made by Andrew's Mum), and a chocolate layer (made by Andrew's Dad). So all I needed to do on this one was construct it, ice it, and make the little figures. Hope you can tell what they are all supposed to be! (I think it you click on the photo it should enlarge if you want a closer look!)

And this is the cake once cut... it reminds me of that Neapolitan ice cream that you can buy.

Happy birthday little Andrew... you're an awesome wee guy!

Hot rod Cake

This was the first project of the weekend... my task was to create a hot rod cake. I was given the following two photos to work from.

And this is what I came up with:

For this car I decided to try out a brand of fondant called Satin Ice. Basically everything on the car that is black is Satin Ice. I liked that it came in a little plastic tub. I liked that it seems a but more robust than other fondants I have used. It had a slight vanilla taste to it which was quite nice. It is a bit more expensive I think than other brands I have used, but I think it's a good product for extra special projects.

I also brought a little pot of silver paint which looked really effective on the "metal" parts of the cake.

The recipient of the cake seemed really pleased with it and was already taking photos for facebook before I had left from dropping it off.

White Cake Mix

Well I must first apologise for not blogging for a while. I have been busy putting on a special party for my wee man who turned 1. He had an under the sea party. I think he enjoyed himself!

On that note I present... the cake!

The top tier was my normal rich chocolate cake that I have used for most of the birthday cakes I have made so far. The bottom tier is made with a white cake mix I purchased from kiwicakes. It's a special cake mix that contains no butter or egg yolks, so it is much whiter than the usual vanilla cake you see. For a cake mix I was quite pleased with it. It was moist and soft, and had quite a subtle taste to it. I think it would be nice in a wedding cake or other formal cakes that have white icing on them.

I made the piece of cake in the picture into a little turtle "smash" cake... which eventually ended up like this:

Baby Shoes!

Did I mention that my baby is turning 1 this week?

So in honour of babies, here are some little shoes that I made. I think they would look cute on the top of a baby shower cake, or a Christening cake :)

4 Racing Cars

4 little fondant cars... I can just imagine these sitting on top of a little boys birthday cake :)

Big Red Car

Apparently Wiggles gear can be hard to source these days, so I was asked if I could make a big red car figure for a 2 year old birthday boy.

I had to have a giggle yesterday... when the big red car (which was made from solid fondant) was out on display, one of the guests decided to try and take a bite out of the blue wiggles head. This is as far as he got: Can you see the wee teeth marks on his head? :)

And then there were 4 monkeys!

A few posts back I showed you a monkey. One of my net buddies saw it and asked me to make her a few more for her to decorate her sons birthday cake with.

Here they are:

Marking Sheets

In case you're interested, these are the judges marking sheets. You might have to click on them to make them larger and readable.

Some of my favourite cakes from the show

Below are a few of the cakes that I particularily liked from the cake show this weekend:

This was Greg's favourite:

How cute are these wee mini wedding cakes?

and... wow!

I won a pretty yellow ribbon!!

So excited! I came third place in the Non Guild Seniors category. When I dropped the cake off yesterday I became very intimidated by the quality of the other cakes in my class and thought that I definately wouldn't win a placing. But the judges must have seen something in my cake.

So here it is...

Front View

And Rear view

This is the first place winner

This is the second place winner

And a picture of the table for the non guild cakes (if you bring it up full size you might be able to spot mine in there somewhere!)

Off we go!

Well, it's cake exhibition today. I have NEARLY finished my cake. This morning when Emmy came out she said "I love your cake Mummy". So I feel like a winner already :)

Ok so I know my cake isn't the same kind of thing that I predict the other competitors will come up with, but I stayed true to myself and put all the things that I know Emmy likes on it. I have enjoyed the experience so far and learnt lots (I know what cake cleats are now!). And I am looking forward to seeing all the other cakes in the show.

Sneak Peek - My Exhibition Entry

Thought i would give you a sneak peek at what I have been working on tonight for my entry in the sugarcraft competition this weekend. Can you guess the theme of my cake yet?

Ladybird 1st Birthday Cakes :)

I made these cakes for a little girl who was turning one. The large ladybird is a banana cake. It was a bit of a challenge cooking such a large cake in a stainless steel bowl (it was a triple mixture), but I got there in the end!

And I made a little "smash cake" so the birthday girl could go nuts with it. That one was a plain vanilla cake inside.

And I wasn't 100% sure the main cake would be big enough for all the guests, so I made a chocolate cake that they could cut up if they needed more.

Fondant Monkey Figure

I've had a few queries recently about fondant monkeys to put on children's birthday cakes. I had an open pack of fondant that I wanted to use up, so thought it was a good opportunity to have a go.

Here's what I came up with:

Retro Baking - Jam Drop Biscuits

I haven't seen this recipe for years, but I was glad to be reminded of it when I saw Tamara Jane make them on GoodMorning a few days ago.

I couldn't resist making a batch. I used strawberry jam in the center of mine. Strawberry jam reminds me of my Nana. She used to make heaps of strawberry jam. So much nicer than the stuff you buy in the shops. I feel a jam making post coming up!

You can find the recipe here.

And...Sent!

Ok for the past few weeks I have been agonising over whether or not I should enter a cake decorating competition. I'm a newbie and have sooo much to learn about it. And the idea of competing with experts who have been doing it for 20+ years is rather off-putting.

But, I decided to enter. Just for fun. I don't expect to win or even come close to winning, but I figure it's all good for experience (and will give me something to obsessively blog about!). So my application went in the post today.

Click here to see the types of cakes that placed in the competition last year (I'm entering the NG Senior category)

Ladybird - Version 2

For Emmy's first birthday I made her these ladybird cakes:

They were my first decorated cakes and I was very proud of them lol.

Last night I decided to revisit this idea... for no particular reason. Here is what I came up with:

Tigerstix

I have often seen these in the shops, but didn't really know what to do with them. I finally brought some yesterday. Aren't they cute?

I whipped up a chocolate cake, covered it in chocolate buttercream, and stuck some of my wafer straws on. I topped the cake with just plain sugar cookies. Super simple!

Now, I have to figure out what to do with the rest of my wafer sticks before they all get eaten!

Subaru Cake

Just thought I would post a couple of piccys of my latest cake:

Must-have Monday - Star Wars Flexible Spatula Set

Ok... I don't know if this is a must-have item for me, but I know my husband would love it. It's a spatula set that features Darth Vader and an Imperial Stormtrooper.

If you feel the need to buy one, you can order them from here

Penguin Waffles

Our family doesn't have breakfast together very often, so I decided to make a treat for Sunday morning breakfast - Penguin Waffles. A couple of years ago we got given this cute little waffle maker.

And below is the finished product... cute little penguins with golden syrup on their tummies :)

Low Cost - Herbed Wedges

Last night a couple of friends and I went to a low cost cooking evening held by one of the local churches. We got given a neat wee cook book with hints and tips, as well as some scrummy ideas for low cost meals. We were just having an easy tea tonight (grilled sausages), and I thought I might take some of last nights inspiration and jazz it up with some herb wedges.

Here's the instructions:

Cut potatoes into wedges - leave the skin on

Parboil for 5-10 mins

Dry them off and put them in a roasting dish

Sprinkle with a bit of oil and some herbs and/or spices

Bake for 20 mins at 200 degrees

For our wedges I used all dried herbs - marjoram, basil, red bell pepper, rosemary, oregano, parsley and thyme. They turned out better than I expected, and were devoured quickly by the whole family.

Retro Baking - Tan/Caramel Slice

How yummy does this look?

Often I have half a can of condensed left over and it goes off in the fridge because I don't know what to do with it. Well, how about using it to make one of these yummy slices? I remember my Mum making this one often, and now I know why - It's really simple.

I used this recipe. My problem now is that I have half a can of condensed milk... should I make another tan slice? oh yes :)

Wednesday Website - Butter Converter

Found this handy little butter converter. Often I find recipes that sound a bit like "6 tablespoons of butter" or "half a stick of butter". In the past I've hated packing butter into measuring cups or measuring spoons and I would much prefer to just have a metric butter weight to use.

Click here to use the butter converter.

Retro Baking - Hedgehog Biscuits

This is the first biscuit in my "Retro Baking" series. What I mean by this is I'm going to from time to time bake one of those classic home baking recipes which in many cases have sadly been replaced by fancier recipes. This is the type of baking I can imagine my Nana serving from one of her royal coronation souvenir tins :)

If you remember any recipes from your past, please remind me of them so I can try and find a recipe for it, or if you have the recipe - great - email it to me and I'll give it a try!

Hedgehog Biscuits

115g butter (4 oz back in the day!)

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

Vanilla

1 cup self raising flour

1 cup sultanas

Cornflakes

Cream together butter and sugar.

Add Vanilla and egg, beat again.

Add flour and sultanas. Mix.

Roll teaspoonfuls of mixture in cornflakes and place on baking tray.

Bake for about 10 mins at 180 degrees.

Mine aren't the prettiest... I probably put them a bit close to each other on the tray, but I kind of like the way they turned out anyway. Here is the end result:

Random Cutter - Part Two!

In my previous post I had you all guessing what the cutter was. I'm still not really sure what it is, but I decided that for today I will make it a hermit crab. A hermit crab looks a little bit like this:

So here is my random cookie cutter version of a hermit crab:

Random Cutter - Help!

I was having a look through my cookie cutters yesterday and I came across this:

I am curious about it because I can't for the life of me figure out what it is supposed to be! Any suggestions would be gratefully received (because the closest I can come up with is that it's Alf's profile - but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be an 80's alien cutter!)

Ok I have flipped it around the other way. Does this help?

I'm starting to think... hermit crab?