Florentina-turner

Whilst at the 'Cake and Bake' show in Manchester last month (where I witnessed Mary Berry in the flesh), I picked up this patterned transfer paper that you apply to chocolate. After getting it home and realizing I didn't actually know what to do with it, I recently decided to apply it to chocolate covered florentines that I made as Easter treats for my family... weird stuff!

Duck your ideas up...

It was my bestie's birthday earlier in March but I wasn't in Yorkshire to share it with her, so prepared her a belated Easter weekend, including this 'duck' cake, (loosely) based on a cake found in my Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cakes - Vintage Edition - book.

Yes, those are frozen peas for eyes.

Curd it be any more lemony?

Having made a jar of lemon curd for a cupcake recipe recently, I decided to whip up some more for my three mums (mums just love lemon!)... 

Have-a Jaffa...

My Easter gifts this year: Using this recipe and some mini chocolate molds, I created some mini jaffa cakes (and lemon cakes!). I then recycled my birthday cards that I have hoarded from the past 22 years and created some gift tags for the little bags...

Pick and Mix fix...

The birthday cake I made for Claire, as we both love our trip to Wilkinson's for a bag of pick 'n' mix before a cinema trip...

Over the Hill...

To celebrate my dad's birthday I made him this 'hill scene' cake, due to his fondness for walking/hiking. The phrase 'over the hill' was not considered until after the cake was made.. Oops!

Copy+Paste-ry... (oh dear)

It was my birthday last week, and what better way to celebrate than to make yourself some 'party food'! Pretty much all the ingredients were from Aldi (and why wouldn't they be?). The top ones are goats cheese and caramelised onion, and the others are stilton and caramelised apple twist (a variation of this recipe).

Christmas Crafts

Last week some members of our course held a mini craft stall at university, and these are some of the things I made and sold...

Screen-printed Christmas cards

Christmas cake cupcakes

Tree decorations

I feel like chicken[cake] tonight...

A cake I made for my mother-in-law's birthday.. The 'grass-coloured' icing was (accidentally) achieved by mixing green food colouring with cocoa powder, and the chickens and accompanying 'eglu' (a snazzy, modern chicken coop) were made out of rolled icing...

Whoopie!!!

'Whoopie Pies' are American cakes which are very popular over here now! I couldn't find a 'non-American' recipe (I wasn't sure if one 'cup' was the same as one Hollyoaks mug) so I just guessed and use these amounts:

175g Dark Chocolate, 100g Butter, 225g Sugar, 3 Eggs, 1tsp Vanilla Essence, 150g Plain Flour, 40g Cocoa Powder, 1/2 tsp Baking Powder, 3/4 tsp Salt.

And here are the simple instructions:

Melt chocolate and butter. Whisk sugar, eggs and vanilla together. Sift flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt into a bowl. Mix everything together! Bake for about 10-15 mins. Then just butter icing for the middle.

Turkish and Italian Delights...

In addition to the paper treats, I also made my mum some sweet treats for her birthday. The tiramisu's were made using this recipe (except I used yogurt instead of cream and Ameretto in place of Marsala), and they were enjoyed after the meal I made for the family. I then decided to tackle Turkish Delight.. not a delight to make! Everything went fine until it came to removing it from the container.. a bag full of icing sugar later, and I managed to salvage it. It's slightly on the thin side, but mildy presentable! I used this recipe. (The flowers are there to make the end product seem more delightful..working?) 

Easter Eggs-hibits...

With Easter and spare time, brings cooking and baking! I decided to make a few 'snacks' for me and my family on Easter...

I originally got this idea here for 'cake pops', but due to my lack of American ingredients (fondant, candy melts) I decided to amend the recipe.. however the 'cake balls' wouldn't stay on the lolly pop sticks, so I ended up putting them into mini bun cases! They were very difficult to decorate, but I think you get the general idea of what they are supposed to be!!

I put all our sweet treats onto my favourite cake stand, which included my Easter chicks and bunnies, some home-made Millionaire's shortcake (courtesy of the Hairy Bikers: 'Mums know best'), mini doughnuts (which I made using a mini doughnut tin from a car boot that day! Because they weren't fried, they were more like cakes but they were still yummy!), and some gingerbread biscuits and buns that my sister made.

I was surprised how easy these mini quiches (also courtesy of the Hairy Bikers: '12 Days of Christmas') were to make. For the filling I just made a basic mixture of crème fraiche, eggs and parmesan and added extra ingredients for variations, including Blue cheese & Spring Onion and Ham & Mustard.

Finally, I had some red onion chutney and goats cheese that I wanted to fill some pastry cases with, but as I used all the cases for my mini quiches I had to find an alternative 'base'! I just sliced some tortilla wraps into triangles, spread the chutney on and crumbled goats cheese on top. Then just put in the oven for 5-10 minutes!

One a Penny, Two a Penny..

...Hot Cross Buns! The second year I have attempted baking them, and this year proved to be much better! I think leaving them for longer to rise at each stage proved to be beneficial, as well as giving them a good old glaze at the end to help moisten them. Happy Good Friday!

Twenty One-t another slice?

For my bestest friend Claire's birthday, I decided to write her a song and animate it in a creepy, yet humorous way. (I'd just like to point out that those, sadly, are not my legs...)

..and here was her 'jungle theme' cake; baked by the lovely Jenny Cox and decorated by myself.

Alice in bun-derland...

For my 21st birthday I decided to have a [tea]party based on the theme 'Alice in Wonderland', so with the help of friends, I baked and iced cupcakes and biscuits to place on the tables.. You can't tell in the photos, but the UV lighting made the icing glow!!

This is a photo of me and my [new!] fiancée.  I'm wearing the dress I made for the party,  which I created using a light silk-type fabric for the skirt, sleeves and headband, and made the apron using a white fabric and lace ribbon around the edge. The skirt proved difficult, but I ended up using netting underneath and bunching up certain areas and sewing in place..

'Tis the season to be creative...

This Christmas I decided to give myself the mammoth task of hand-making almost all of my Christmas gifts..and I wouldn't have it any other way :)

I saw chocolate 'slabs' similar to these in Marks and Spencers, but at a ridiculous price! So, I decided that I would make my own for a fraction of the price. I melted a (huge) bar of chocolate into a silicone cake tin, baked some mini gingerbread men and placed them in, used letter moulds to make white chocolate letters and added some marshmallows. 

I knew that my sisters were in need of a sewin box, so I decided to make them one each. I covered a gift box with fabric and sewed on some cut-out felt letters. I made little pins and needles booklets by sewing together sheets of felt and cutting out their initial letters with the same fabric from the box. I then filled the boxes with thread, scissors, tape measures and all the sewing essentials..

This was a dress that I customised for my best friend for her birthday. I bought some cute bird fabric and cut out heart shapes, and sewed them onto a lovely recycled-fabric dress..

This was a birthday 'cake' that I made for my sister's birthay..I decided that I would make something a bit different, so made up the recipe for Millionaire Shortbread and let it set in a circular mould...

Whilst at University, I thought I would take advantage of the Silkscreen Printing facilities. For my future mother-in-law, I drew a chicken design (she owns 3 chickens and loves them!) and printed it around the collar and on the pockets. I incorporated her name (Di) in the design.. 

My boyfriend's favourite computer game is the Half Life series, and hence his favourite character is Gordan Freeman! So I put my fear of the pen tool aside and created a silhouette of the character's face, so that his only his key features (beard and glasses!) were shown..  

Finally, I printed a shirt for my boyfriend's brother, who recently received a personalised number plate for his birthday. I reproduced this number (again using the pen tool) so that he could wear it with pride, even when he wasn't driving!

                 

    

Dreamcast/Dreamcake

For my boyfriend's 21st birthday I decided to make him a cake (cakes), based on the Dreamcast - a games console from his childhood. I used roll-out icing onto chocolate sponge cakes, then used a pearl lustre powder to create a sheen effect! I then used extra icing and icing pens to add the details. I originally bought Skittles for the buttons on the controller, then later discovered that there is no blue skittle!! ("Skittles- Taste the Rainbow. Except Blue.") So I hastily bought some Smarties last minute! (Apologies for the poor photography - I had to take the photos quickly before carefully transporting it to him on a train!)