'Wedding Party'

Friday 29th, 11:00 AM - our front room, with great friends and a few snacks - oh, and there was a wedding on the telly!!  My friend and I had decided on a few nice treats to have, here's a peek at the few I got to photograph - the rest were simply devoured too quickly!

Smoked salmon canapes and prosciutto & mango canapes!

Pink Champagne & Strawberry cupcakes to 'toast' the happy couple!




An 'English Rose' inspired cake, as my friends' birthday was only a few days away!







Fabulous day, fabulous friends and fabulous food!

Happy partying,
K xx

Pink Champagne Jellies. . . . .

As seen, over on the Facebook page, I made some 'Pink Champagne and Raspberry Jellies' as part of our little Royal Wedding get-together with some friends!
These look amazing, are super easy to make and rather easy to eat! So I thought I'd share the recipe as they're just the perfect desert for those summer evenings with friends!

(Just bare in mind that this recipe uses nothing but the champers, so maybe make a few from sparkling grape juice for those non-drinkers or kiddies!)

So get your shopping list pad to the ready - just 4 ingredients - here we go!

• 4 leaves gelatine
• 350ml Pink Champers (Prosecco, Cava)
• 2 tbsp caster sugar
• 12 raspberries

Here's the 'work' bit *yawn* - well, someone's gotta do it!

1.  Place the gelatine leaves in a bowl of cold water for 5 minutes or until soft. Squeeze the leaves and discard the water. 
2. Put 100ml Pink Champagne into a bowl that fits snugly over a pan of boiling water, add the gelatine and sugar and heat gently until the gelatine has dissolved. Remove from the heat, add the remaining Champagne and pour into a jug. 
3. Place 3 raspberries in the bottom of each glass. Pour over a little jelly (just enough to cover the raspberries) and refrigerate until set. Very carefully and slowly, pour over the rest of the jelly into the glasses until each glass is almost full. Refrigerate until set. 

These jellies will keep for up to 2 days in the fridge - yeah right! You'll be stood by the fridge waiting for them to set and then devouring them pronto!!

Happy jelly making!

K xx 

Sorry . . . . Its been a while!

WOW! Can't believe it's been bout 2 weeks since I blogged, last - YES, things have been THAT busy in my wee kitchen!  It's seen lots of bunting (hurrah), lots and LOTS of flowers (or to be more correct, floral decorated cupcakes), boyish polka dots and a 'Street Party' - well a cake made to look like a street party!

So, I had the honour of making a surprise birthday cake for a friends' sister, so I went with a yummy chocolate sponge, a generous smothering of pink buttercream icing and cutesy handmade Cath Kidston bunting. . . .cute, right?

Next on the agenda was Mother's Day!  I had made up just a few cupcake 'bouquets' before and thought they would be a real novel idea for Mother's Day gifts!  Cupcakes decorated to look like flowers. . . arranged in a metal pail to look like a bunch of flowers!  Here's a peak at what they looked like. . . .

One of my oldest friends was having her son christened last weekend, so I offered to make him his Christening cake as his gift.  The original design involved a LOT of polka dots, but I decided (rather last minute) to make it slightly more stylized. . . what do you think?

Then, there was 'the BIGGIE' - a cake themed around the Royal Wedding - specially commissioned by my son's school!  They were hosting a morning of fun 'Royal Wedding' festivities and wanted a 'cake' to mark the occasion, so they thought I'd like to make a 'wedding' cake.  After giving it a weekend of thought, I came to the conclusion that an 'actual' wedding cake (whilst looking lovely) just wouldn't be 'fun' enough for a bunch of primary school kids - so I came up with the idea of a 'street party' cake - complete with tables of scrumptious street party food - so here it is, taking about 12 hours in total to make it all came together and looked good!

Some of the finer details. . . .

So, for now that's what I've got to share!  I've got nests, bouquets, glasses and a gadgety themed cake coming up. . . .so keep tuned for sneaky peaks!

Happy baking
K xx

Caterpillars and flowers. . . . .

Wow! So it's been a while since I was here and showing y'all what I've been up to!!  Looking after a poorly son and then kinda being poorly myself has meant no blogging for a day or two (ok, so it's been longer than that, but I'm here now, right!)

So, last week I was asked to create two very special cakes, one for a lovely little lad who was turning one and the other for a wonderful woman who was turning 40!  Gotta love the variety in my line of work :)

The first birthday cake was so much fun! So bright and engaging (and apparently too good to cut, but I'm sure it was scoffed in no time!)  I was totally delighted with how the cake turned out and the cupcakes were just adorable!!  Here's how it all looked. . . . . . .

The 40th birthday cake was one of my, almost 'signature', Giant Cupcake with buttercream 'rosette' frosting surrounded by a combination of piped and marshmallow 'chrysanthemums' :)  This cake was just soooo pretty and apparently was demolished in the record time of 30 minutes. . . . .anyone think they can beat that time? It's a LOOOOOOOT of cake!

So, that was last week's offerings - a little late, but we made it here at last!!

This weekend is full of flowers - CUPCAKE FLOWERS - arranged in beautiful bouquets - all ready to gift to some lucky ladies for Mother's Day!

Happy Caking
K xx

This is what I'd like to be doing in 5 yrs time. . . . .

I was having a 'planning' conversation with a friend a few weeks ago.  I was talking her through a design for her son's Christening when out popped the question 'Do you want your invitations to co-ordinate with your cake?' - then it hit me (WOW) - "complete party packages"!   From invites, thank yous, bunting and sweet treats galore, all co-ordinating in whatever theme we come up with!  Only problem being I'm not sure about the printing of invites (I'm pretty ok with the graphic design side of things) and all the cute little labels I would need!  So I shelved the idea and forgot all about it. . . . . until today!!

THIS is what I want to be doing. . . . . THIS is what I want to be designing. . . . It's just so much more than baking cupcakes, it's about creating an amazing, fun, quirky party table for YOUR party - no matter what the occasion!  I'm determined to solve my 'printing issues' and really want to start investigating how to bring this all together!  I'm just in love with it! Still not sure how I came across it, but I found these images and my wee heart just leapt inside me! As I'm new to blogging I'm sure I need to credit the origianl source, I found these on the blog hello naomi and they are awesome!

Simply gorgeous! Check out those details and the cake!! AMAZING!!

My dream starts here. .  . . .
K xx

Coming up . . . . .

Happy Tuesday morning, you wonderful 'bloggites'! 

Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend and that the start of a new working week is full of wonderful and exciting opportunities that we're all gonna grab with both hands! (Yeah, I should listen to my own advice, as I've had a poorly 6 yr old for 2 days and today am needing matchsticks to keep my eyes open!)

This week I'm very honoured to have 2 orders for 2 people who are celebrating very special birthdays - a lovely little man who's celebrating his 1st birthday and a lovely lady who will be celebrating her 40th!  I also have a lovely order for my floral inspired cupcakes, a gift from a Mum to her daughter who's coming home to visit for a wee while (what a fantastic gift!).  So, there should be lots of photos to post by Friday evening of all the orders from the week!

NEXT week, however, things will be in floral overdrive as the Mother's Day 'Cupcake Bouquets' will be being created and making a lot of Mummies very, very happy (I hope!)  They're something I've been wanting to try for a wee while and this seems the perfect opportunity to launch them! 

What do you think? Cute, aren't they?

Till laters,
Kxx

Change of Scenery. . . . .

Woo Hoo. . . . . . !

Made it out of the kitchen today and had a nice change of scenery watching my wee sister partake in a bit of equine fun!  So me and my trusty Canon headed off into the countryside, to a nice big indoor arena to 'shoot' some photos for her. 

Now, I LOVE my camera and I have a growing passion for photography, but so far, most of my subjects (i.e. my cakes!) are relatively stationery. . . . so it was nice to be stretched and figure out how to snap something that moves - and moves FAST! 
So, here's some of the shots that developed in the 'darkroom' (AKA Photoshop) this evening. . . .

Had a fab day! Thanks to J for asking me to come along and well done to Brody for clearing (most of) his rounds!!  Looking forward to many more opportunities to photograph you both, you're a cracking wee team xx
K xx