Wedding Cake

I don't know how you feel about wedding cake, but personally I think they are overrated. I love cake as much as the next girl but seriously it's just a pretty cake, can you really justify the cost when weddings cost so much already?

So as I've mentioned before I'm taking the plunge and making it myself. I've done the cake decorating classes got all the kit, and now to pick a recipe.

We are both lovers of the traditional fruit cake so it makes sense to stick with that, it also means I can make it weeks in advance as they just get better with time. Preventing last minute cake related stress, see perfect. So far we have done dummy runs with The Fabulous Baker Boys and Nigella.

I think this was the Baker Boys recipe, and maybe Nigella's didn't last long enough for a picture. But ultimately Nigella won out, if only because she gives the quantities to cover 3 different sized cakes. Anything that makes the process as simple as possible is a winner for me. It was also a more suitable cake than the Baker Boys. As lovely as their cake was it was too cakey for us, what we were really after was a heavy, fruit laden, brandy soaked cake, which is what Nigella delivered.

So there we are, now I just have to find the time to bake the 3 different sizes (not eat them) and feed with bandy until it's time to decorate.

Practice Cupcakes

Not too shabby if I do say so myself. Just threw together some basic vanilla cupcakes they weren't really the important part. I just needed something to practise my newly learnt skills, and ideas on.

The flowers are maybe a little big for cupcakes, but I wasn't going to buy 2 different sized cutters just for practising.

It also gave me a chance to have a play with the colouring, surprising how little you need, I might have a bit more fun with it next time though and make the flowers a bit darker in the middle.

The top 2 cakes on the right were done utilising a lattice stamp that gives a quilted effect, you are meant to rock it around the side of a big cake, but it gives a rough idea of what it should look like.

Overall I'm pleased with how they came out and feel pretty confident that I'll be able to decorate the final wedding cake without it looking too, ''homemade''. Think a little more practise is in order, but at least I can make some tasty mistakes.

Do you think I'm mad trying to make and decorate my own wedding cake?

Sugar Roses

I don't know if I've mentioned but I am planning to make my own wedding cake. They just seem so expensive and putting the word wedding in front of anything seems to bump up the price ten fold, so I though I would give it a bash. 

We had decided on a traditional fruit cake as this is on of our favourites, it can also be baked months in advance so that would take some of the pressure off. But I still wanted it to look a bit fancy so on Saturday I attended a cake decorating class with my mum and aunt to learn how to make sugar roses.

We started with a tear drop of icing and just started adding petals.

They shape up quite quick,

It can be fiddly and you have to remember to do things in the right order,

I was super pleased with how they came out, a little direction goes a long way.

Also had a quick bash at buttercream roses, they are crazy easy when you know how and have the right tools.

What do you think? Not bad for a first attempt.

We took the class at Dee's Creative Cakes she does do scheduled classed, but you can also book in for a private class if there is something specific you want to do, like we did.

Easy Yoghurt Cake

I wanted cake, so I made one. A yoghurt cake. I've never made one before so this was a little bit of an experiment. A French friend of mine used to make this cake when we worked together, she always said it was really easy so I thought I would give it a go. Turns out it is. 

You use 1 normal sized yoghurt, I used a Ski smooth in strawberry. I think you are meant to use Greek yoghurt, but I didn't have any, so I improvised. You then use this same pot to measure out some of the other ingredients. 3x plain flour, 2x sugar and 1x oil. 1tbsp baking powder, 1tsp vanilla essence, 10ml milk and 3x eggs. You can also add in a handful of nuts or whatever else if you want, I used some leftover almond flakes. That's it, mix it in a bowl, and bake in a tin at about 170 for 40 mins. Easy. 

You end up with a super quick, moist cake, with hardly any washing up. What more could you want? Give it a go. 

Rainy Day = Cake

The weather today was grim. Heavy rain, hail, thunder and lightning, so we ventured out in the morning to get some breakfast and do some shopping at the fishmongers and butchers (hark at us). Then it just got too much so we decided to be shut in's for the afternoon, indulged in a tasty bacon sandwich made with butcher meat, then I got down to some cake baking. 

Go to sponge cake recipe, courtesy of Rachel Allen "it's so fluffy" mmm, strawberry jam and whipped cream. Think I put too much cream in though, because it all squidged out when I tried to cut it, oh well didn't stop it being scrummy.