Gravity defying cake

This is the cake I made for my mum and dad for their anniversary. It is a Victoria sponge filled with butter icing and strawberry jam, and the decoration is made out of roll out icing. I was really proud that this cake turned out like this, and I was so happy with how it looked once it had been finished!

Maple apple puffs

These were made following a recipe from The Great British Bake Off recipe book. I was a bit disappointed because the pastry didn't puff up in the oven like they were supposed to. However, the filling was really sweet; the combination of apple, maple sauce and cinnamon worked really well together, and although the pastry didn't have that flaky texture like it should have done, it was still really sweet and tasted good.

Chocolate cupcakes

These are chocolate cupcakes which I made for my friend's 18th birthday. They are decorated with chocolate ganache and chocolate sprinkles. Everyone loved them! The cake was soft and moist with the occasional chocolate chunk, whereas the ganache was silky, smooth and creamy. I love this recipe (from Cakes, Bakes and Cupcakes recipe book), and I will definitely be making them again.



Giant cupcake cake

This is the cake I made for my Granny's birthday. I used a Victoria sponge recipe to make the cake, and baked it in a giant cupcake tin I had brought a while ago. For the filling I used butter icing and lemon curd. I then piped the remaining butter icing on top of the cake, and I also piped lemon curd in a swirl on top of the icing. Finally, I sprinkled sprinkles on the icing and stuck white chocolate fingers around the base of the cake with butter icing. Everyone said they enjoyed it, but I thought that there wasn't enough icing in the middle of the cake. But overall I was happy with how it looked and tasted, and I'm happy my Gran liked her birthday cake.

Custard Tarts

I attempted making Egg Custard tarts again, and this time they turned out better than before. I used a round cutter that I had recently brought, which made it easier to get the tarts out of the tin, so this time none of them crumbled. The pastry was sweet and short, and the filling was sweet and creamy. I really enjoyed these, and thought they were a real improvement on last time! 

Strawberry tart

This is a strawberry tart I made yesterday afternoon. I found the recipe on the Good Housekeeping website. The shortcrust pastry was sweet and short, the creme patissiere was really nice, and the strawberries were sweet and worked well with the rest of the tart. However, the sides of the pastry fell down during blind baking, meaning the tart wasn't as tall as it should have been. Also, the edges of the tart wasn't very neat, so next time I will make sure I trim the pastry neater. Finally, I would slice the strawberries and arrange them that way, as they would have covered the whole top of the tart and looked more appealing. But everyone enjoyed it and it was all eaten the same day I had made it, which is always a good sign!

Happy birthday Chris!

I made this for my brother's birthday. It is a chocolate fudge cake cut in half and filled and covered with chocolate orange ganache. I had made this ganache before, but I made it to be chocolate orange flavour by substituting half of the milk chocolate for chocolate orange segments. Also, Chris loves Smarties, so I adapted this cake to turn it into a piñata cake. This was done by cutting a circle into the middle of both cake halves, and scooping out the cake. I then filled this with Smarties and placed the cakes together. After covering the cake with ganache I arranged some chocolate orange segments on the top of the cake, grated another segment and sprinkled this on top. I then scraped a fork around the edge of the cake to create the pattern you can see on it. Although I'm not a fan of chocolate cake, I did enjoy this, and I really liked the ganache. Luckily, everyone else did too, especially Chris - he said it was the best birthday cake he had ever had, and I have my work cut out trying to make a better one for next year ehe!

Mother's Day cake

For Mother's day I made my mum a carrot cake decorated to look like a butterfly. The cake and cream cheese frosting recipe I had used to make this was the same recipe I had used to make the cake that I have previously written about on my blog. I decorated this by cutting the cake in half, then into 1/3 and 2/3, and then arranged the slices to look a butterfly. I then outlined shaped using different coloured icing, and filled in these with jelly tots. The middle butterfly is a strawberry lace. I really like this cake recipe, and I think it looked good, and most importantly, my mum liked it! I got this idea from Pinterest, and I'm glad I tried it.



Hot cross buns

Yes, I know its not Easter yet but I was bored one afternoon and I fancied making some hot cross buns. I found this recipe online on the BBC good food website. I didn't let these prove for long enough so they didn't rise as much as they were supposed to. However, they still tasted really nice, especially when sliced open and spread with butter.

Apple pecan ring

My friend recently had a Pampered Chef party and made this apple pecan ring. I kept the recipe and made this a few days later. It is croissant dough, (which was brought from the shop like the recipe said to), wrapped around sliced apple, crushed pecans and cream cheese mixed with icing sugar. I'm not a huge fan of pecans and cooked apple, but I really enjoyed this. It was really sweet, and the combination of crispy and soft textures made the pudding taste evening better.

Custard and Raspberry pies

These are custard and raspberry pies made with rough puff pastry. The pastry squares were cooked first, and then filled a coating of raspberry jam, custard and raspberries, then cooked again until the custard had just set. These were really nice and the custard, jam and raspberries complemented each other really well. I will definitely be making these again, I loved them!

Olaf cake

This is the birthday cake which I made for my friend's 18th birthday. She loves Disney and the film "Frozen", so when I found the youtuber "cakesbychoppa" and his video of how to decorate a cake to look like Olaf, I thought it was perfect! This is a chocolate cake filled and crumb-coated with milk chocolate ganache. I then shaped the cake following a template, then covered it with fondant icing. I moulded the carrot, eyebrows, eyes and tooth and coloured them with food colouring. I also coloured the mouth with watered down food colouring. Once I had placed everything together, I stuck liquorice straps into the top of the cake to make his hair. My friend really liked this cake which I was so happy about, and I was really pleased with it too! And because I had to shape this cake, I got to taste the remaining bits of cake and ganache, and I was really pleased with it!

Dad's birthday cake

Happy birthday Dad! This is the birthday cake I made for him which is a fruit cake as its his favourite type of cake, (which I made 4 days ago because fruit cake gets better the longer it is left for). I then crumb coated and decorated it with butter icing. I placed chocolate fingers around the side of it, wrote the message in a chocolate pen, and placed fruit on top of it! We all really enjoyed it - even my brother Chris who doesn't like fruit cake at all - and I reckon it will be finished very quickly!

Lemon and Poppyseed cake

I had really wanted to try this cake, and luckily, there was a recipe for it in my British Bake Off book - its becoming very handy. I wasn't that impressed with this cake, I didn't think it was very lemony which I was disappointed with considering the amount of lemon zest which went in it - ah well.

Chocolate marbled cupcakes

These are chocolate cupcakes topped with marbled chocolate and vanilla icing, and chocolate hearts which I made the previous day. I had made the chocolates because I had brought a confectionary magazine which came with the mould. I chose to make chocolate cupcakes because I  had some left over buttermilk from making the scones, and because I had made these before I knew that people liked them. However, there was a bit too much icing so next time I won't pipe so much on top.

Fresh berry scones

These are fresh berry scones I made one Sunday afternoon  when I was a bit bored. They were made with raspberries and blueberries, and me and my family really enjoyed them! This recipe came from my British Bake Off book, and I will be making these again.