My favourite & most exciting cake adventure so far!

So this last weekend I headed down to London for my friend Bex's 30th birthday celebrations. There were copious amounts of alcohol, boating, water fights and of course CAKE!

Bex asked me if I would bake her a Care Bear birthday cake to mark the occasion and of course I jumped at the chance! I have to say google was a massive help when it came to thinking of the design for the cake (the internet really is AMAZING!).

My biggest challenge however, was not the design, decorating or baking of the cake but the delivery. This was the first time I was actually going to deliver the cake in person & actually be there to enjoy it too! As I dont have a set of wheels at the moment I had to take the train. Yep! Thats right! I took this monster of a cake all the way to London on the train! Thankfully it made it there without a hitch & Bex was one happy birthday girl!!
I had such a fab weekend, met lots of new lovely people, drank far too much pimms & drove a boat for the first time! The water fights (whilst driving along the river) were hilarious, im suprised nobody ended up overboard!
I would like to say a big THANKS to Bex for iniviting me & letting me be part of the memories!

LM xXx









Red Nose Day 2011

So Friday was Red Nose Day and as usual we did some fundraising in work, sparkly ties, sequin red hats and CUPCAKES! :)

On the menu were Limoncello and The Belguim cupcakes. Then came the really fun bit, making the noses! As Red Nose Day is all about doing something funny for money (and as I have a little obsession with moustaches) I decided half the cupcakes would have red noses with moustaches. Eeeek! :D

They turned out great & they tasted delish! The pics are below and yes they are real! (So many people who didnt actually see the cakes only a picture dont believe that they were real!).

LM xXx

Chocolate & Amaretto Crush - Happy Birthday Kirsten!

My sister requested a Cake for her birthday so I decided I'd make something extremely yummy! I've named the cake 'Chocolate Amaretto Crush'.
A chocolate sponge cake with Amaretto frosting in the middle & on the top of the cake & then covered in crushed up Smarties and Mini Eggs. YUM! I did enjoy smashing up the smarties & mini eggs with a rolling pin! :)

I also made Ice Ice Baby, Limoncello & The Jammie Dodger cupcakes for Kirsten to take back to work with her.

Here's the pics!

LM xXx

White Chocolate & Raspberry Cupcakes

I baked these cupcakes for my colleague Kat's Birthday. The recipe isn't difficult but it takes a while! You could say these cupcakes are 'reasonably' good for you considering the amount of fresh raspberries that go into them. However, I think the white chocolate, double cream and sugar outweigh the fruit a little!

The cake is your standard cake mix with some raspberries blended in, they are then stuffed with a white chocolate & double cream mix and topped with a homemade raspberry jam & buttercream creation. DELISH!

I got my best responses yet from these cupcakes including my branch manager telling me they are 'Orgasmic!' - Thanks Sue!

I have to say, even though they took a while to make I really enjoyed baking them and I just LOVE the look on a persons face when they bite into a scrummy cake. :)

Here's the photos!

Bake Sale for the British Heart Foundation

Firstly, let me apologise for being soooo behind on my blogging! Its been a bit manic over the last few weeks!

So Friday 25th February was our Bake Sale in work in aid of the British Heart Foundation. They are an amazing charity & one very close to my heart. Everyone in the branch got involved and we all wore something red instead of our usual uniforms.

We had a great mix of baked goods from Cupcakes to Meringue and a fabulous Chocolate Cake! I baked some Velvet Underground and Limoncello Cupcakes and in total we raised over £150 just from the cakes!!

Here's a few pics :)

LM xXx

i heart moustaches

So whilst I was lying in bed wide awake at 4am the other night I did a bit of 'internet window shopping' and found these....!! OMG I WANT THEM ALL!! <3 <3 <3

Excessive Tea drinking and Cake talk in Huddersfield!

So this weekend (19th Feb - im a little behind with my blogging!) I went up to Huddersfield to see my friend Danielle. We worked out its been around 2 years since we last saw each other and properly caught up! I was super excited on the train and then she text me to let me know it was SNOWING!! Did a little eek of excitement & then thought practically & realised I was wearing my converse....! Aaaanyway, (Im being typically British and blabbing about the weather again!) the snow didnt last that long.
Danielle has recently started her own cake business called Crumbs Cupcakery and this weekend they had a stall at the local market in Holmfirth. So Saturday was spent baking 50 odd cupcakes, drinking bucket loads of tea and watching a marathon session of four weddings! Danielle was kind enough (or grateful for the extra pair of hands?) to let me bake & ice a few of the cakes which was great practice for me! :D
The market was on Sunday and so we packed up the car & headed over to set up the stall about 8.30am. Crumbs Cupcakery were donating 20% of their takings from the market to the charity Bliss - for babies born too soon, too small, too sick.
Although the market was soo unbelievably cold I really enjoyed hanging out with my friend, talking cake and catching up! She gave me some great advice regarding setting up my own business and basically told me to go for it! :)
I LOVE it when you can sit down with a friend you havent seen or spoken to properly for years and just fall back into the way things were. Once we got all the catching up, the 'OMG your hair is blonde', the 'what have you been doing for the last two years?!' out the way, it was as though we'd only seen each other last week. <3

A FABULOUS WEEKEND ALL ROUND!

Here's a few pics of the cakes & Crumbs Cupcakery's beautiful stall.

LM xXx

CAKING with the BFF - Miss Pauline Whalley

I have had THE most fun this afternoon baking scrummy cupcakes with my favourite person & fellow TEA LOVER Pauline Whalley.

We experimented with a new flavour - Cherry Bakewell as well as making everyone's favourite Benny & the Jets. The Cherry Bakewells turned out A.MAZING! Just your standard cake mix with some Cherry Jam and almond frosting & the traditional Glace cherry on top. SCRUMPTIOUS. 

We kept catching a whiff of the cakes as they were baking in the oven and were struggling to hold in our excitement as we iced them. FINALLY, once they were finished, we tested them. (It wouldn't be fair to give cakes to friends and family that we ourselves had not tested!!). PURE HEAVEN. There was plenty of jumping around & dancing! We also got good feedback from our friends at Dabs Tattoo (the chief testers for this batch). Shell - "I just want to rub my face in it!". Thanks guys!  

Definitely be doing some more team caking in the future! <3

Check out the pics!

LM xXx

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

Happy Valentines Day everyone!

So at my cake decorating course this week we were icing a sponge cake ready for Valentines day. Thankfully I'd had a little practice doing this when I iced Claire's birthday cake so I didnt feel like a complete novice in class!
I kept it nice and simple using white icing and then cut out pink and red hearts. I love making more modern designs on my cakes and spent a while browsing the internet for different design ideas! I had loads of fun decorating this one!

Also made my first sale with this cake!! Leanne from work decided to give it to her boyfriend for Valentines day :)

Hope you like the pics!

LM xXx

Photo Camp – Feb 2011

I had so much I wanted to write about this weekend at Photo Camp that I had to draft this post in Word.

What an amazing weekend! Although I sometimes got a little lost in all the photography talk I definitely learnt A LOT and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

I made a few cupcakes and a surprise Birthday cake for the lovely Claire Penn. I decided to stick with the flavours I made the other week – After Eight Mint & Jammie Dodger and also made some Rum & Ginger ones too! Claire’s cake was a Victoria Sponge and was the first cake I have EVER ICED! I was very happy with the way it turned out!

After baking all night on Thursday evening and then decorating the cakes all night on Friday evening I was pretty shattered by the time I fell into bed on Friday night – but arriving at the Waterside Lodge on Saturday morning I had butterflies in my tummy and I was so excited about what the weekend would bring. 

Once everyone had arrived Jo Rutherford gave a fantastic and inspiring speech that, although it was mainly aimed at all the Photography geeks, (sorry I meant lovely ladies!) I still found that it hit home for me and made me feel really excited about my future!

After this I ran off to go and welcome the models, Kayleigh Jo, Holly Roberts and Gwenaelle Sanchez and Sian Faulkner the make up artist. I wish I could say I worked really hard whilst I was with these guys and it was tough but it was SO MUCH FUN! Watching Sian do all the hair and make up, discussing with everyone how they got into the business & what they did outside of modelling etc. I think I was surprised at how normal everyone was, no divas, and no arrogance just normal lovely people!

Later that evening we all went Bowling, which (and my family and friends will back me up on this) I am so RUBBISH at that I usually refuse to play & I just watch! Plus, I hate wearing the shoes that other people’s feet have been in – bleurgh! However, after all the ladies told me how rubbish they were I decided I’d have a go! I was still rubbish, not sure if I even made it to a score of 50 but I enjoyed myself! Then onto the all you can eat Chinese…YUM! And back to the lodge for yet more alcohol & great conversation (with some ogling of a certain male model from Andrea Ellison!) until the wee hours!

Sunday arrived with a heavy head (from lack of sleep not alcohol!) and we were all ready to do it again! Although the weather was against us (grey skies, hailstones, 50 mph winds) the girls managed to get some amazing shots!

I think my cakes went down pretty well too! After Eight Mint & Jammie Dodger were definite favourites and Claire has informed me that her birthday cake was SCRUMMY too!

Here’s a few pics taken by the fabulous Sara Hazeldine & Claire Penn.

LM xXx

Cake Decorating Week 2

After week one of my cake decorating course - where we watched Karen demonstrate how to ice a Victoria Sponge and listen to a few hints and tips - we moved onto Modelling.
I cannot believe how EASY this was and how much fun I had! We started off pretty easy doing a teddy bear and then moved onto an elephant. I decided that I didnt want to do a brwn teddy so I bought some pink icing (like to keep things girly!).
The great thing about icing is if you mess up, you can just start again! And boy did I have to do that a few times! I seem to find it difficult to get my proportions right and kept making the teddy's arms and legs massive in comparison to his body (did the same with the elephants ears too although they are supposed to be bigger but not GIANT!).

Here's some pics!

LM xXx

1st Baking Session of 2011!

So I finally got my bottom into gear and did some baking this weekend! I've been thinking for a while about whether I can make a cupcake taste like anything I want and today I decided to have a go at making After Eight Mint cupcakes and Jammie Dodger Cupcakes (with reall jammie dodgers!).

The After Eight cupcakes were pretty simple, a yummy chocolate recipe with peppermint flavouring and stuffed with After Eight mints! You'll see from my photo's that there's only two left (they were swiped pretty much as soon as they came out the oven!) so I'd say those were a pretty big hit! I put some peppermint flavouring in the icing too.

The Jammie Dodger cupcakes were me indulging my imagination and seeing if I really could create ANY flavour I wanted, and yes, they worked! Although next time I make them I'll have to put loads more jam in the middle and use Raspberry/Strawberry flavouring rather than the glamorous Chambord suggested by my lovely sister. The flavour wasnt quite intense enough for me!

Im already planning some new flavours to try including Nutella & Peanut butter....(maybe together?! *daydreams*) but for the rest of this week I'll be concentrating on making the Cupcakes for Photo Camp next weekend and also a suprise baked item too!

FYI - Photo Camp is an awesome Photography weekend course created by the lovely Jo Rutherford in order to inspire, encourage and develop budding photographers! Intrigued?  Check out Jo's Blog - jorutherfordphotography.blogspot.com

That's all for now! Hope you enjoy the pics! :)

LM xXx