Diamond Jubilee Baking

Jubilee Cupcakes

Yesterday, to celebrate the Queen's diamond jubilee, we had a royal feast, consisting of a tea party and buffet. Since it was such a special occasion, I couldn't let it pass by without paying homage to the Queen in cake form. Here are my results...


A royal celebration, wouldn't be a celebration without the Queen's face on a cupcake and I was keen not to disappoint, so here she is in all her glory. The recipe was the usual one and I also used gold edible glitter to decorate. The toppers were from a lovely ebayer and the cases from a local baking shop.


To coincide with the cupcakes, I also decided to make a Victoria Sandwich which I'll post about in a separate entry, where I'll add a detailed recipe.

For anyone who just wants a quick idea of how to make it you do this;
Cream 6oz of margarine and 6oz of sugar in a large bowl. Beat three eggs together in a mug and slowly add to the sugar/margarine mix, completely mixing in the eggs inbetween each addition. Once all of the egg is mixed in, slowly add 6oz of self raising flour. Add a pinch of salt. Mix well. Grease and Line 2 cake tins and divide the mixture between both. Put in the oven at 150-160C for 27 minutes. Remove from oven and leave to cool. Spread Jam/Conserve on one of the cakes and then place the other on top. Dust with icing sugar.


Like I said, that's very basic, so if you want something a little easier to follow then look out for my next post which will be a lot more detailed.(I can confirm that it tastes very nice, even if I do say so myself!)

That's it on the cake front, but if you like buffets, then have a look at the rest of our delicacies...

Strawberries and Cream, Making it a truely British affair!

Pasta Salad

Our fair table!

Until next time,

Happy Baking!

X

The Afternoon Tea Club Goes Live!

As I mentioned in my post a couple of weeks ago, I'm currently in the process of starting up a tearoom review blog with my friend Laura...

Well I'm pleased to announce that The Afternoon Tea Club has now gone live and can be found here!

Check it out and let us know what you think!

Happy Baking!

X

Coming Soon: The Afternoon Tea Club

It's been a while since my last post, but I just wanted to let you all know about an exciting new project, which I'm going to be working on with my friend Laura over the next couple of months (and beyond)!

So what's this intriguing project you speak of?

Well... It's called the Afternoon Tea Club, and the basic principal behind it is that every week we go to a different tea room and review it - simples - essentially it's an excuse for us to eat cake, but please indulge us - we promise to be interesting!

We've not gone live yet, but when we do I'll let you know.

In the meantime, if you know of any nice tearooms in the North-West, then drop us a line!

You can find us at...

theafternoonteaclub@hotmail.co.uk

or just comment below :)

Happy Baking!

X

PS- Look out next week for a post on all of my recent baking disasters!

A Girl Can Dream: The Perfect Birthday Cake - Choccywoccydoodah

Choccywoccydoodah

After writing my last post, I sat down with a cup of tea (okay coffee, but tea sounds so much genteel, don't you think?) and a cupcake (okay a hobnob) to watch the new series of Choccywoccydoodah on the Good Food Channel.

Oh my, how incredible are their cakes?

For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of watching the show yet, it's a fly on the wall documentary, which follows the staff at the marvelous chocolate and cake specialists Choccywoccydoodah in Brighton, as they go about their daily business of creating edible masterpieces! Do watch it if you can - it's addictive viewing.

Anyway, the cake they were making in this particular episode, was probably one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen - it had edible butterflys and everything - and it got me thinking, how AMAZING it would be to have a cake like that for my 21st Birthday!
So I went to their website to have a look at what they do - I am now officially in love with a Cake.
'A Cake?'
'Yes a cake!'
But this isn't just any cake. No. This is a cake and then some. This is a magical cake. This is the stuff of dreams. This is perfection... Have I got my point across?

No words can do this cake justice, so I won't even try.
Just look at this...

It's a Teaparty on a cake - how fabulous is that?
Look at the mini chocolate cupcakes and the teapot with the pouring tea... Ahh I don't think that it could be any cuter if it tried, it's just wonderful!
But alas there's a snag... with prices starting at £400, it seems unlikely that I'll be able to afford anything like this anytime soon - unless I win the Lottery? Or buy it and charge an entrance fee for people to come and have a look!

Anyway that's another one to go on the dream list, alongside winning the Booker Prize and getting into the X Factor Final (okay so that's not one, but it's everyone elses dream, so it may as well be mine too!)


If you're curious to see more, check out the Choccywoccydoodah website at: http://www.choccywoccydoodah.com/index.html

Until next time,

Happy Baking

X

PS- I promise to actually bake something one of these days and as soon as I do, I'll post it on here! :)

Royal Wedding Fun!

I've been waiting to do this post for ages, (1) because it's the first time I've written about something I've actually made myself, (2) because I've been planning these little things for about a month and a half, and (3) because...well... it's the royal wedding - only the most exciting day of the year - well my year anyway! (Oh and (4) coz it just so happened to be my birthday as well! so Yay for me!)

Fresh out of the oven

On the 29th April 2011, Royal Wedding day, we had a Tea Party, with flags and finger sandwiches - very refined and very English, I know - and my contribution was a cupcake celebration, so on Wednesday morning I started with baking the cakes, ready for decoration on Friday.
Now, you probably think it was a little premature to bake the cakes three days in advance, and that they might dry out, but oddly enough I always find that if cakes are left to stand for a few days, then they become a lot denser and nicer to eat!

For the occasion, I bought some special little Union Jack cases and flags from The Works, for 99p, so that my cakes had a 'British' feel!
I must admit that I was a little worried about using coloured cake cases, because last time I did the dye somehow managed to leak into the cake and ruin the entire batch, which wasn't good at all! However this time, I threw caution to the wind and used them again - I'm glad I did, because they added a really great feel to the cakes, that no other cases would have given.

Crowns

My other decorations came from a few places... I got the crowns from John Lewis, for about £3 for five, and the Will and Kate toppers came from a company called Simply Topps on Amazon, who sold me a pack of 24 for the brilliant price of around £2 including P&P! (Not bad eh?)

These decorations were brillaint and, as you can see, hid a multitude of sins on my unpiped icing beneath!

Totes Rah! (as Heat Magazine would say - God I'm so classy with my reading materials aren't I?)

The Wedding itself was beautiful (don't you think?)and the tea party a complete success - So I think that all in all it was one of those days which can be classed as pretty damn perfect!

Congratulations Will & Kate!!!

Happy Baking
X