Dance Koko Dance Disco Balls

Hello everyone, I made it back alive from Cochella in once piece and only a mild case of sun stroke, but it was totally worth it.

I only landed from sunny Los Angeles yesterday but I'm straight back into the baking. Tonight I have an order for 12 personalised cupcakes for my boyfriends club night Dance Koko Dance which is going to be mental. Him and his partner have asked me to do a cupcake for each of the artists/dj's. I just stuck with the basic vanilla cake and icing. One tiny problem is my butter has been in the cupboard while I was away and since we seem to be having a heatwave in London at the moment and anyway they sank a little as the butter was too warm.. oops!

The line up for tonight...

If your in London tonight you should come along.. tickets are on the door and I'll be on the dance floor!!

Happy Dancing and Baking x

Aussie Pal's Party Times ... cupcakes included!

This post is definitely well overdue as I made these when I went back home to Brisbane in December, I'm getting there with my back blog's.. get it? Sorry bad pun!

My brother and his housemates hosted an amazing cocktail party on their back deck and invited all the pals along. Was the perfect gathering in my few weeks of being back at home and a great way to catch up with so many of them at once. My friend Simon and I stayed on strong until the end, partying hard with a few beer and a game of Pictionary at 5am, well we thought we were party animals drawing simple pictures in the early hours of the morning.

At some point in the night my lovely ladywife Monica helped me serve these up, they were simple vanilla with cream cheese icing. I forget how hot Brisbane is and so they started to lose their icing shape fairly quickly, but didn't last long at all once they got out to all my pals.

Miss Monica!

I think we make a great team here.. I think she should
move back to London.. hey Mon???

Happy Baking x

Just in time for Spring... Low-Fat Berry Tart

I love Friday nights for many reasons; besides it being the longest point of the weekend before having to go back to work on Monday, but it's also my 'cheat night' as I am allowed to have any dessert I want, as long as I've been good all week that is ;)

Last Friday we also had some guests from Australia so I thought a good excuse make something exciting for dessert. I had wanted to make this several weeks back, but it serves 10 so wasn't sure what to do with left overs at that point.

The recipe is from one of the Cook Yourself Thin recipe books which are great books as they really know their stuff ie making low fat food but with tons of flavour. This tart was so simple, starting with some crushed digestive biscuits and butter for the base which was then squished into a pie dish as I don't have a tart dish just yet. For the filling I used low fat cream cheese, honey and a vanilla pod whipped together  and then covered in fresh strawberries and blackberries. The whole thing was devoured and most of us felt guilt free, except maybe for LK who probably overdosed on it, but that was highly amusing to watch.

Happy Baking x

The Love Bakery

I have been meant to put this blog review up for a few weeks now and have just been busy/lazy. My lovely friend Anja was my lucky cupcake adventurer for the day and since my sense of direction seemed to be off for the day we ended up walking around south-west London for about 40 minutes before actually locating the shop, but it was well worth the trip.

The shop is simple but super cute and stands out with its pink paint job.

The shop itself it quite small and there isn't really anywhere to sit, however I just love the whole look of the place, with the cute little hand written signs and amazing front window display. It was Valentines Day (or close too) so they had a number of Valentines day specials which were cute and far from tacky which can sometimes be the case with shops exploding with red love hearts and the over use of pink fluffy things.. yuk!

They had a few different flavours, but mainly just the usual, red velvet, vanilla, Oreo and a chocolate with brownie on top. We opted for a few different flavours, including a raspberry one which I recall had fresh raspberries in the icing. I remember enjoying it a lot.

so simple... and delish!

I love this pic of their front window

Oreo Valentines Cupcake

a simple heart... which I think says "I love you'

This was one of my favourite designs with the edible cherub on top

We carried these all the way back to Anja's flat in Old Street and most they survived the trip except for the heart above, but still looked so cute. I love that all these cakes have edible decorations as I feel a little ripped off when you have to pull half the decorations off (taking the icing with it) as you can't eat it.. I want to eat it all!!!

I don't think I got to try this chocolate brownie one till the next day and by then the brownie was a little dry, but the icing was still creamy and not to sweet.

Chocolate Brownie

Raspberry

It was a long trek over there and back, maybe would have helped it I didn't get lost. I can only dream to have a cute little store like this one day.... however I would like to serve tea and coffee and have people enjoy the surrounding as it was the kind of place I'd love to sit and watch people walk by while savouring every last bit of my cake. 

www.lovebakery.co.uk

Happy Baking x

Black Bottomed Cakes

I've got so many blogs backing up so I'll try keep it short and get them all up before I go on holidays to LA next week!! Yey... Cochella here I come!

My house guest asked me to bake her some cupcakes for her last day of work before shipping off to Scotland. She said I could choose whatever I wished but this time i wanted a challenge of making something that someone has requested. I made her go through my baking books and alas the Hummingbird Cookbook was the winner and she choose a recipe I've wanted to try but never had - Black Bottomed Cupcakes. It's quite a rich cake with a brownie bottom and a cheesecake top and cream cheese icing. I have always halved the amount of cream cheese Hummingbird use in their icing as I've always wanted to pipe it, however this time I didn't want to pipe so I used he normal recipe. Not sure what is do different about their cream cheese but even after adding about any additional 150g of icing sugar it was still running down the side of the cake.

naked cupcakes... nom nom nom

Reports back from her work was they were a cupcake mess by the time she got work, however they were all still blown away by them. She managed to save me one which by the time I got it at home again it was properly squished but it was still delish.

Happy Baking x