Di-licious

I had a lot of fun planning my daughter's 3rd birthday cake.  However even the best laid plans can go awry. Initially I'd planned to make a two-tiered white chocolate mud cake, covered in fondant and decorated with fondant strawberries, leaves and flowers in a homage to Cath Kidston .  I wanted my first fondant covered cake to be stunning. Sometimes though, you have to let the cakes (or lack of cake) decide what your design will be. The 9inch cake worked out perfectly - it was tall and even and cooked through. At the time I thought I was on fire!  Then I cooked the 6inch cake. The worst thing a baker can do is start to feel cocky before the cake is finished.  I must have invoked a curse because my 6inch cake had a big crack on the surface.  I tested it with the skewer (in multiple spots) and came out clean.  Fantastic!  I let it rest on the bench and got busy with cleaning up. Fifteen min...

In case you missed the news, Nigella was in town last week. That’s right, the domestic goddess herself. I just adore her attitude to food and those gorgeous cashmere cardigans.... they’re the kitchen accessory I covet the most in this world after a Kitchen Aid mixer. It got me thinking: if Nigella were to pop round for arvo tea at my place, what would I make? I delved into How to be a Domestic Goddess for inspiration and then it came to me – macarons! Macarons are the most elegant biscuits in the world – a divine concoction of almond meal, icing sugar and egg whites, sandwiched with ganache or buttercream. They shouldn’t be confused with macaroons which are more like little cakes and are made traditionally with coconut. Macarons are quintessentially French and are about to take over from cupcakes as the next big thing in baking. If you were a fan of Masterchef Australia you would have seen Adriano Zumbo’s killer Macaron Tower challenge . There are hundreds of blogs c...

I finally got a kick in the pants this week to just get on with it. A timely admission of being less than perfect from Glorious Treats made me realise that there’s never going to be a perfect time to bake, create and write. Not everything will bake properly. Not everything will look pretty and I have the kitchen I have so stop wishing and hoping for something better. I have a framed “Keep calm and carry on” tea towel in my family room/kitchen. It’s my daily mantra for when my daughter acts like a preschooler and the house is looking worse for wear. I mutter it under my breath when inevitable baking disasters occur. I force myself to remember it when the dog has dug up my lavender bush to make a nest for herself in the sun. I still swear and throw things at the bench but I take that deep breath sooner and think about how to solve the problem or resolve to start again. When all else fails, a cup of coffee or a glass of wine (depending on the time of day) and a li...

I just love spring.  Days begin to feel warmer, new growth appears in the garden (where my one year old pup hasn't already demolished the plants) and if you're in Melbourne, it has rained, and rained, and rained. My daughter Olive has loved it - lots of muddy puddles to jump in.  Clearly its time to whip up a bunch of mudcakes! Mud cakes are the modern wedding cake decorator's salvation.  They can be baked a couple of days in advance, allowing plenty of time for elaborate decoration.  Mud cakes tolerate fridge and freezer storage and being particularly dense, can be reliably stacked on top of one another or carved into fun shapes like teapots. Mudcakes are also ridiculously easy to make - melt and mix. Gently heat your chocolate, butter and milk together and allow to cool.  Whisk up your eggs and combine with the cooled chocolate mix and then pour into sifted dry ingredients. Mix thoroughly, pour into cupcake papers and...

One of the joys of cake making and motherhood are impromptu tea parties. My almost three year old daughter Olive is well versed in the custom and loves it when I test recipes or decoration techniques. This time around I was experimenting with cake chemistry, a la Cake Journal .  The lovely Miss Louise from Cake Journal has a theory of how to make the perfect domed cupcake - perfect for dipping in poured fondant.  She changes the traditional method of creaming butter and sugar together and instead whisks the  eggs and sugar together and melts the butter with the milk.  I used my favourite vanilla cupcake recipe to see how different (and puffed) my cupcakes could be.  Method-wise, I would go so far as to say Cake Journal's method was simpler and faster.  It was supposed to yield a runny batter which would benefit from using a jug to pour the batter into the cups but mine was still thick.  I ended up using my trusty ice cream scoo...

Isn't this one of the prettiest things you ever laid eyes on? I made these beautiful (di-licious) hydrangea cupcakes for my friend's daughter's baptism. The vanilla cupcakes with vanilla and raspberry buttercream were all the more special thanks to Neilsen-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Extract. I splurged on a bottle at Simon Johnson a few weeks ago after talking for half an hour with one of their sales team about how important a great tasting cake was. She assured me that my cakes would reach another dimension with this amazing vanilla. Well, she was right. These were by far the most amazing vanilla cupcakes I have ever made. The perfume, the taste - just di-licious! I hope I can continue to produce cakes to this standard when I one day put up my own shingle. I have been consistently underwhelmed by the offerings of cupcake shops and wonder if the so-so cake is a product of the production process that making bulk cakes requires. Its something I'll need...

Last night I was feeling playful. I'm in the midst of creating Golden Snitch cupcakes for my niece's party this weekend and I wanted to take a break from wings and gold paint. I showed you my first fondant roses recently and pledged to turn them into something pretty - and so here it is. Very simple, but very pretty! I also got myself a new cake decorating toy - an embossing plate. In truth, its actually an embossing plate for making impressions on cards, but its also perfect for creating pretty cupcake size designs on fondant. To see some really pretty cupcakes, take a look at Small Things Iced - a gorgeous bespoke cake maker and decorator in the UK. One of these days I'll catalogue some of my favourite sites and blogs.....another project AFTER the Golden Snitches!