Gardening Themed Cake

Here is a few snaps of a 70th birthday cake I made recently for a keen gardener.

The brief was spring flowers/colours and needed to include a few birds. I was pleased with the end result and enjoyed making all the little bits and pieces to decorate the cake.

The BEST chocolate celebration cake...

I like chocolate cakes to taste of, well, chocolate. I have a bit of pet hate for chocolate cakes that only contain a measly amount of cocoa. For me, that simply doesn't cut the mustard.

But no longer! The search for the best chocolate cake recipe for celebration cakes is over. *Fan fare please!!!* Look no further than cake aficionado Lindy Smith's delicious chocolate fudge cake recipe. It is gooey, moist and lovely & rich. YES please.

I was first introduced to this recipe by the lovely Barbara Millard and I have made so many in the past few weeks I thought it was high time I shared the joy. It is a really easy recipe, and in terms of process very much resembles a making a brownie.  Although it takes a lot of ingredients (a ton of dark chocolate, sugar and butter), it really is worth it. I am also reliably informed that because of the high sugar content it keeps fresh for well over a week (if it lasts that long!). It can be carved into all manor of shapes and is delicious filled with buttercream, a rich chocolate ganache or even nutella. An all round brilliant recipe! I've tripled it, cut the recipe in half and filled all kinds of tins from round, square to pudding bowls. I've even stacked it. It has worked every time!

You can access the recipe via the original blog post here. Here are a few pictures of the process....

Process for the best chocolate cake

So what are you waiting for.... go and bake!! I promise you won't be disappointed :)

V x

PS - if you're wondering why I've not lined the tin it's because of my latest wonder discovery - Dr Oetker Cake Release Spray. It's magic stuff and available in Morrisons and Sainsburys. It saves loads of time!

Engagement cupcakes....

Over Christmas some very dear friends got engaged. So, what better way to mark the occasion that some pretty cupcakes?

Here are a few pictures of the cakes which were a mixture of raspberry bakewell cake topped with almond cream cheese frosting and chocolate orange topped with white chocolate & orange cream cheese frosting.

A finished them with a mixture of designs including roses, hearts and stencil flowers.

Engagement Cupcakes

V x

Monster Mania...

I LOVED making this cake. It was for a little boys 5th birthday party and the theme was "Monster Mania". Not being familiar with this kids series, a quick google revealed a range of inspiration for my cake design....scary, but definitely cute monsters....

Monster Mania

With this in mind, I decided to base the design roughly on the purple monster (name unknown!) and this was the finished result...

The cake was chocolate and covered in vanilla buttercream spikes (made using a grass tip) and had fondant features.

V x