Sunflowers and summer blooms…

 

Matt and Jemimah – Photograph kindly supplied by Ben Photography, Truro

When Matt and Jemimah asked me earlier in the year to make their wedding cake I was over the moon to be given the colour scheme of powder blue and sunflowers especially for an August wedding when the sun should be shining high in the sky. There was something distinctly seasonal about their wedding with the bride choosing to have her bouquet made of only the flowers that would be blooming at this beautiful time of year.  This is perfect for a wedding in Cornwall where we are all proud of the produce and seasonal beauty available here.

Summer Blooms – Image kindly supplied by Ben Photography, Truro

It is particularly lovely when a bride and groom have a few simple asks and then they allow you to create a cake that is unique to their special day and Matt and Jemimah were very much the perfect customers!

Flavour wise a rich, indulgent fruit cake would fill the first two tiers of the cake – matured over several months and happily soaked in delicious spiced rum.  The final tier of the wedding cake; a simple vanilla sponge with vanilla buttercream to please those with more simple tastes in life.

The cake was then decorated with summer blooms and wildflowers in mind – the sunflowers being the centre stage of the design that cascaded around the cake as though a gently breeze had guided the flowers in their path.

I wish the beautiful bride Jemimah and her new husband Matt all the very best for the future!

The cutting of the cake! Image kindly supplied by Ben Photography, Truro

I can sing a rainbow…sing a rainbow….sing along with me!

Its been a while (yet again) since I have blogged and I have been constantly on the go with different styles and types of cake, however when deciding to do a blog post today the one that has stayed in my mind as my favourite of late is the rainbow cake I created for one of my best friends birthdays.

Rainbow cake is one of those surprises that can’t help but make people smile when they cut into the cake and discover the multitude of colour inside! For this blog post instead of just posting pics of the finished cake I decided to take step by step photographs to give you a true idea of the work that goes into a cake like this – soooo much fun though!

I choose Americolor for creating my rainbow colours, you need so little to create a really vibrant hue, the cake itself is a simple vanilla layer cake recipe.  This cake comes out very tall so ensure you have plenty of people about when serving it up!

Step 1 – Create your cake mix using a tried and trusted recipe for vanilla layer cake, once this is done share it out equally between 6 bowls.  Using your americolor (or whatever colourings you prefer) add a couple of drops to each bowl and mix to desired shade.

Step 2 – Pour your cake mix into fully lined 8″ cake tins and bake according to the recipe you are using.

Step 3 – Once they are cooked leave to cool in the tins for about 5 mins and then turn out onto racks and leave to cool completely.

Step 4 – Layer the cakes (make sure you are stacking in the right order, if it helps you can always sing to yourself – but do this while no-one watches!) between each layer add a generous amount of vanilla buttercream – keep this a simple white/ivory colour as it will help set off the rainbow of colours in the cake already.

Step 5 – add a crumb coat of buttercream to the cake layers and leave to set – then add a final thicker layer of buttercream to the cake, I like to take a palette knife and spin the cake on the turntable while the tip of the palette knife touches the buttercream creating a ridged effect.

Step 6 – Now its up to you to decorate the cake how you would like! On this particular occasion the cake was for a keen seamstress so I chose to create lots and lots of sugar buttons in rainbow colours and cascade them down the cake to match the layers inside that when the cake was cut would look oh so pretty….

 

Summer Fete Themed Wedding Cupcakes

Well it’s been an age since I’ve had chance to do a blog post….not that it means I haven’t been busy spreading the Rosy Cheeks Bakery Love!

It being a lovely sunny bank holiday today this particular Wedding Cake seemed ideal to blog about.  The lovely Lorraine of Eclipse Body Art in Newquay went and got herself hitched this year…please see glamorous picture below of the beautiful bride!

Lorraine decided to hold her wedding reception in her very own backyard, and despite the weather trying to put a dampener on this Summer Fete Style Wedding nothing stopped this being an amazing evening in which guests were treated to the likes of hay bales, home-cooked food, camping, and traditional British Fete games – there was even a coconut shy!

With this in mind we decided upon keeping to this theme and creating a mixture of different cupcakes that all worked beautifully together…toadstools, flowers and tiny caterpillars adorned the Wedding Cupcake tower each one secretly filled with delicious caramel that would only be discovered as it was curiously bitten into…anyway enough from me see for yourselves…

Lorraine is an amazing artist and you can check out her work here and while on the subject it would be a perfect time to reveal my cupcake themed tattoo! I gave Lorraine an illustration by one of my favourite artists Kate Wilson.  The illustrations are all based on the idea that birds have secret lives and this is the end result – Lorraine I can’t thank you enough! x

Turtle Power

I thought I would share these adorable little sugar paste turtles that I spent yesterday afternoon making ready for a 12th birthday cake I will be making in a couple of weeks! (full cake post then)  They just have that ‘awww’ factor that perfectly suits a cold winters afternoon snuggled up in doors!

Claire x

Vintage + Cupcakes = Love!

There are two things in this world I love  – 1. Anything Vintage 2. Cupcakes.  So I was super excited to combine these two things together and create this collection of Vintage inspired Cupcakes.  I was given a button mould for Christmas (lucky me!) and couldn’t wait to use it, there is something so satisfying about pushing a tiny piece of sugar paste into the mould and being given in return the cutest little perfectly formed buttons.

I decided to use a colour scheme of blue, pink and yellow adding a touch of Caramel/Ivory Sugarflair to each ball of sugar paste as I mixed the base colour as this adds a beautiful vintage hue.

As I would be using the button mould to create some of my decorations I decided to also include a simple yet delicate quilt like stitching on some of the cupcakes helping bring the theme perfectly together.  Finally each and every single detail on each cupcake was lavishly covered in a shimmering edible pearl dust so that they sparkle elegantly as soon as the light catches them.

I think these cupcakes would suit many a different occasion; Wedding, Baby Shower, Birthday, or even just because you think you deserve a treat…am I right?

All that Glitters is Gold…

This weekend it was the wedding of my favourite Uncle…Stuart or ‘Stu’ as I prefer to call him!  His daughter and one of my best friends (and cousins) gave me a shout to ask if I would make the wedding cake for this happy event and I couldn’t have been more honoured.  The only restrictions I was given were that the wedding ‘theme’ colours would be glittering gold and a deep chocolate brown (both of which I love!).  I decided to create a 3 Tiered Brooklyn Blackout Chocolate Cake covered in fondant icing and then finished with beautiful golden cascading flowers, ribbons and elegant piping detail.  I hope you like this as much as I do and it offers you inspiration…

Claire x

P.S I have taken pics in both natural and artificial light and have decided to showcase a few of each as the cake really takes on a different ‘persona’ as it were dependent on the light, see what you think!

It seems appropriate during this post that I also introduce to you my new God-Daughter Lacey-Rose, who was born on Saturday 14th of December to the aforementioned Best Friend and cousin Kelly and her husband Mikey. I am already dreaming up Christening Cake plans and only the best will do for my God Daughter!

Making Whoopie…Pies!

With January in full swing, I figured it was about time I put some of the beautiful cookery books to use that I was kindly bought for Christmas! I also received a Whoopie Pie baking tray…and combining that with The Hummingbird Bakery’s recipe for Milk Chocolate Chip Whoopie Pies away I went…

Having done a little research the first Whoopie Pie was made in the 1920’s and it seems a bit of a toss up between whether the Amish were responsible or the lovely residents of Pensylvania…either way I am grateful for this sweet little invention!

The Whoopie Pie is almost like a mixture between a cookie and a cake, and when making the batter this is also clear in its consistency then think Ben and Jerry’s Cookie Dough Ice-cream in taste (whilst raw) and you are there!

I chose to go for a chocolate and vanilla buttercream instead of the marshmellow fluff suggested in the recipe and here are the results…

 

 

Christmas Specialities – Frangipane Topped Mince Pies

As you can probably tell by now I love Christmas! Part of the reason for this (and its a large part!) is all of the festive baking and cooking that I get to do. 

Obviously Christmas wouldn’t be the same without the traditional favourite – mince pies.  However with the amount of food everyone is indulging in some times the poor old mince pie can be left to one side due to the fact it can be quite a ‘heavy’ treat.  That is why I decided to add Almond Frangipane to my mince pie recipe this year, keeping the sweet pastry base, and a generous dollop of freshly prepared mincemeat, the Frangipane spreads and swells over the top creating a sweet and light cake like topping that is a refreshing change to the traditional pastry, pastry, and more pastry! 

It is important when making these that the sweet pastry cases are rolled out as thin as possible so that a really lovely crunchy texture is achieved that blends well with the sweetness of the mincemeat and the soft light almost gooeyness of the frangipane. 

Only 2 more days until the official countdown to Christmas can begin – have you got your advent calendars ready?

Claire x

Who needs riches when you can eat millionnaires shortbread?

The weekend was a little wet and miserable and the winter blues were setting in so I decided to cheer up the troops with a moreish batch of Millionnaires Shortbread.  For anybody who hasn’t tried this before its a combination of rich butter shortbread, gooey caramel and a final layer of chunky milk chocolate, I think its the combination of textures that makes these so popular.  I decided to top them with some tinsy tiny golden edible stars to stay in the spirit of the upcoming Christmas events! Next post will be Almond Frangipane topped Mince Pies – for those of you who like traditional with a modern twist!

It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas…(well nearly!)

Have I gone mad you say?  Its only the 13th of November…

It is only 42 sleeps until Christmas Day is upon us…and the truth be known I LOVE Christmas!

The festive season seems incomplete without traditional Christmas Cake so this is something I have been working on for a few months now so that the cakes have time to be ‘fed’ properly.  I like to make a very rich Christmas Cake with lots of fruit – raisins, sultanas, cranberries, apricots and cherries combined with a divine splash (when I say splash I mean pour!) of a good oak whisky and freshly squeezed orange juice…all in all it creates a beautifully moist, sweet cake – perfect for the most important day of the year!

I  wanted to achieve a more vintage elegance with the finish of the Christmas cakes so decided to opt for beautiful pure white snow flakes (something we all wish for at Christmas!) that shimmer and shine when the light catches the sparkling irridescent powder the cake is lavishly covered in.  To finish I added a vintage lace ribbon.