Cake Gadget of the Week

Yes that is what it looks like and no I'm not mental, my cake gadget of the week really is an empty egg box.  OK so I'm not sure an empty egg box really counts as a gadget but they're really handy when it comes to making sugar flowers.

Cake Serving Guide

I get so many requests from people who are insure what size of cake they need for events.  There are lots of cake serving guides out there which are all very different but I thought I'd post up the one I use.  The servings calculated here aren't huge afternoon tea size but the kind of size you'd give out as a taster at a wedding or birthday.

CAKE SIZE	FRUIT (ROUND)	FRUIT (SQUARE)	SPONGE (ROUND)	SPONGE (SQUARE)
6 INCH	22	28	11	14
8 INCH	40	54	20	27
9 INCH	54	70	27	35
10 INCH	68	90	34	45
12 INCH	100	134	50	67

How to..........Quilt A Sugarpaste Covered Cake Board

I was asked a couple of weeks ago to make a cake with a quilted effect cake board and so thought I'd share my easy, low cost method of doing it. 

You can buy all sorts of fancy quilting tools such as this and diamond cutters like these and special tools like this which are all fab but if you don't have any of these to hand its still possible to create a quilted effect with kitchen utensils you probably already have in your drawer.  This method is also a lot more versatile and customisable as you can adjust the size of the diamonds exactly to your liking which may be important depending on your design. 

It's Been A While...........

I know, shame on me, it's been a good couple of months since I've written a blog.  But there is a good reason.   My other half Steve has just taken on a pub and so the past few months have been a whirlwind of getting to grips with the new business (and being a part time Landlady.....'get out of my puuuuuuuuuuuuuuuub' etc), renovating the living accomodation and moving in!  Needless to say its been mental with my feet barely touching the floor most of the time.

Saying that its all good, business is going well and I finally have a permanent home for We Bake Cake along with (hopefully) lots of new business.  So this my place:

Bit grand eh?  The pubs called The Tavern at Scale Hall and you can find out a bit more about it at www.scale-hall.co.uk or if you're in the Lancaster and Morecambe area why not pop in for a pint?

I might have been quiet on the blog but I've still been baking away like a demon.  You can see some of my latest creations over on the Facebook page and I promise I'm now back to my regular blogging starting with my new blog on my recent Barcelona trip.

Cake Travels - Barcelona

I turned 29 again *ahem* a few weeks ago and in celebration my Mum and I thought we'd take ourselves off to Barcelona for the weekend.  There was A LOT of this

(those glasses were almost as big as our heads.....serious)

plenty of this

How To......Make Rocky Road

I'm on a bit of a health kick at the moment and so last weekend I decided to remove all temptation and remove the masses of chocolate and biscuits that have been hanging around my house since Christmas.  Yes you read that right I STILL have chocolate left over from Christmas. 

Anyway I couldn't bring myself to bin it all so decided to whip up a batch of Rocky Road with the intention of sending it to work with the boyfriend to feed his cake hungry office and gain me some girlfriend points.  I did send him to work with some but a couple of pieces may have inadvertently fallen into my mouth also, ooooops.  Well if you're going to be naughty you may as well do it properly. 

How to..........Make Sugar Roses

Sugar roses..........the flower every aspiring cake decorator wants to learn.  Yep they can be tricky but master the technique and you can create some really lovely decorations that will always impress.  I did consider posting my own step by step 'how to' but to be honest there's already plenty of tutorials out there online so I won't regurgitate the great stuff that's already out there, but I will let you in on a few of my hints and tips!!

Cake Gadget of the Week

OK so you'd be forgiven for thinking you'd accidently stumbled across a DIY blog for this weeks cake gadget.

Yes that really is a spirit level......on a cake.  But what else would you use to to check that your cake is really level on top?  Makes a lot of sense when you think about it and you can pick up these tiny spirit levels for pennies online.  Genius!

The Death of the Cookbook?

I came across this interesting article on the Guardian website this week about the increasing use of tablet devices in the kitchen and I wondered what you all thought about technology like this moving into the kitchen and whether our trusty cookbooks are going to become a thing of the past?

I for one have to say that I've been converted by the iPad.  I got one as a present for Christmas and it now pretty much lives in my kitchen which is great for me although probably not great for the iPad.  In addition much to my boyfriends dismay everytime he picks it up its covered in buttery fingerprints and/or a thin film of icing sugar, ooooops!  I do love it though, largely using it to access my favourite recipes on the web and via the odd useful app I've found.  With sites like BBC Food and culinary greats such as Delia, Nigella and Jamie all having an online presence the wealth of recipes available is very impressive!

How To...........make (almost!) perfect fondant stripes

Striped cakes seem to be the cake of the moment so thought I'd let you know how I go about getting (almost) perfect stripes on my fondant iced cakes. 

First off, creating the stripes.  You can do this by hand by rolling out some fondant, measuring and then cutting out stripes, however to get a really neat look its worth buying one of these handy little ribbon cutters such as this one by Wilton.  They look overly complicated but once you've got the hang of which spacers go where to get which size of ribbon they're super easy to use.  Just roll over the fondant and voila perfectly sized ribbons.

Now to add them to the cake.  Now you can be all mega technical about this if you like and measure round the cake working out where to place all the ribbons and how many you can fit on.  However if you're like me and prefer a speedier solution I find trial and error and trusting your eye works just as well.  Its easier to place four ribbons on the cake first (two opposite each other) to split the cake into quarters.  Place the four ribbons on the cake (with no water at this point) and have a good luck to see if they look even, if they don't move them around.  Once they look OK dab a bit of water on the back of each ribbon and gently place on the cake and press down.

Once you've got your four quarters sorted you can then fill in the gaps of each quarter.  This ensures you get the same amount of spacing between each ribbon and the same number of ribbons in each quarter.  Again just lay the ribbons on gently to start with to position them and once they look OK then stick onto the cake.

Here's one I made earlier.

How Cute Is This?

Just had to put a post up about this as its so bloody adorable.  Came across it in Accessorize at the weekend, a super cute mini cupcake necklace.  I think if a piece of jewellery epitomised me this would be it.  Well actually anything with a row of pink sparkling diamonds in it would probably do that particular job but its hardly likely so in the meantime I'll just make do with this.

You can buy it here on the Accessorize site for the bargain price of £6.

We Bake Cake Christmas Cake Part 3

Wow its been a long time since I last posted!  I blame the excesses of Christmas.  Why is it even when you're off work and technically not doing very much you still can't find time to do the stuff you need to do?! Anyway thought I better post the final pictures of my fully decorated Christmas cake.  I decided to wrap it up like a present with holly motif wrapping paper and a big red bow.  What do you think?

Needless to say it doesn't look like this anymore!