Monday, 4 April 2011

DIY Cakes, cake or cupcake parties or "I can do that!"

Strangely enough (with the exception of cupcakes which are my passion!) the bit I love best about cake decorating, is the bit before the icing comes out.! I love to bake, level and fill cakes and I have finally got to the stage where I can actually admit out loud that I make a really good cake . When a lovely lady recently asked me if I could provide her with 3 tiers of red velvet as base cakes that she could decorate them herself, I was more than happy :) 
This one's gluten free .....

Saturday, 2 April 2011

Wedding Cakes and Special Anniversaries

This is the link to the front page of my blog; click here to have a look at the kind of cakes, cupcakes and cookies that I may have forgotten to add to this page.......
Cupcake Towers can be so pretty.......
Just a few from a couple of displays I have done......
Cupcake boards for special occasions............
Biscuits and cookies.....
These were for Valentines but they can be adapted........
Pink and pretties could be done in any colour.......
I did a wedding for a lovely couple at the beginning of December but due to poor light, I didn't get a great picture.  Andy and Joy were kind enough to send me these though.  Lovely couple in a lovely venue.
**Sue, your cup cakes and fruit cake tasted as amazing as they looked. Your help bringing them to our venue, and loan of your stand, took a great deal of hassle away from both of us, and helped us be worry free. You took our ideas for colour and design and created the most beautiful cakes, which we were 1000% happy with! Our guests were talking about them the next day, which is always a great compliment. Thank you for being so lovely and having an amazing talent. Andy and Joy xx**
Five cakes for this bride; 1 x 12 inch and 1 x 6 inch fruit cakes, 2 x 8 inch round Madeiras and 1 x 10 inch square Madeira.  Gerbera's are my new favourite thing.  I loved making this cake
Small cutting cake and loads of cupcakes for a London themed wedding.  The bride and groom collected the cakes themselves, to set up at a venue the following day.  Rather than put the cake topper into the cake and risk it falling out in transit, I packaged it separately so they could assemble it when they got on site.  There were a mixture of carrot and philly, chocolate and white choc butter icing and vanilla and vanilla butter cream cupcakes along with a maderia sponge cake, filled with vanilla butter icing and seedless raspberry preserves.  I loaned them my 7 tier stand and I have my fingers crossed for a photo sometime later in the month :) One of the requests from the bride and groom was rather than have red, white and blue, the colours I should use would be burgundy, navy and a very pale gold.
Mulberry and sage were the colours for this wedding.  The tiered cake consisted of a vanilla madeira with vanilla butter cream and seedless raspberry preserves on the bottom and a lemon drizzle, with lemon curd and lemon butter cream on the top.  The cupcakes included half a dozen gluten free but all of them were the same flavour - lemon.
Ivory and champage gold cupcakes
*******
Art Deco themed cake
*******
This is my nieces wedding cake.  It was a 12" carrot and walnut with orange butter cream, a 10" chocolate with choc butter cream and an 8" rich fruit cake.  In hindsight, it was a little heavy for the stand so another time I would do a 10/8/6 combo and make the top tier sponge.  If  fruit were a preferred option, I would probably do a separate cutting cake.  My niece chose different colour pink roses (you can't really see them all in this photo), silver leaves, silver butterflies, silver ribbon and a picture of her cocatiels (smiley face here).

Knebworth House - 150 cupcakes with a rich fruit cake to go on my 7 tier stand.  Half of the cakes were chocolate sponge with white choc butter cream and the other half were vanilla sponge with vanilla butter cream.  I also iced half with fondant and half with piped butter cream and added half a dozen gluten free cupcakes for one of the guests.
Gluten Free cupcakes
Comments for the Golden Wedding cupcakes "Thanks again for your amazing cakes.  All of our guests were in awe when they saw them and all commented on how stunning they looked as well as how delicious they tasted.  I've bought cup cakes before but none were in anyway close to how wonderful your cakes were.
 Your stand showed them off to there full beauty, and really suited the venue for the party.
 Thank you for making the order and pick up so easy and straight forward".
Wedding at Hitchin Priory 
Vanilla bean cupcakes with vanilla icing.  Hunter green and ivory blossoms
And the loan of my 7 tier stand
Wedding at the Sun Hotel, Hitchin
The cakes are vanilla and have been baked in gold cupcake cases and the hearts have been hand painted to match.  There was also a 6" iced round fruit cake for the top of a stand but I didn't get a picture of that (it's the same as the cake below but without the flowers).
Wedding at the Sun Hotel, Hitchin
Silver Wedding cakes but these could be adapted for any occasion
Brightly coloured cupcakes can also be adapted using any colours
 Ruby Wedding Cake
Diamond Wedding Cake
1st Anniversary cakes show other designs that can be adapted.
 Beach themed wedding for a couple who got married abroad but had a party at home.
Below - 3 tier Wedding cake. The tops are left plain because the lady was having fresh flowers between each layer, which she was organising herself. 
( I did a Wedding Fayre at the Sun Hotel (27th March 2011) and I sat next to the loveliest lady.  She owns her own shop called Stephanie Rose Flowers and Tiaras and she had the most beautiful things on display.  Her website is http://www.stephanierose.co.uk/ or she has her own shop at
3-4 The Arcade, Hitchin SG5 1ED.  
The ones below were for a Golden Wedding Anniversary and were sprayed with both a golden and a pearl lustre. 
The Golden cupcakes are so popular and I have to say, absolutely beautiful.   They look good in a photo but it really doesn't do them justice because they are so much better in real life.  These ones were a combination of rolled fondant and butter cream toppings, in pearl, ivory and gold.