cake of macabre magnificence

On the strength of the fabulous cake we made for Friday's birthday (no apologies for the brag), a good friend asked us to make her a birthday cake this weekend.
She has a taste for the macabre does our Janine, and requested something a little twisted. We were happy to oblige ...

This was our first time making a themed cake for someone outside of our immediate family and I have to admit it was a teeny bit stressful - I don't think I could ever do this for money, or to a strict brief. It's fun to have an idea and then just go with it, never sure quite how it'll work out.

But as with the birthday cakes we've made for our daughters, the best part was thinking fondly of the recipient as we made it, chortling at how much she'd love it. As weird as it may be to imbue a blood-splattered cake with warmth and love, this one was splattered with both.
Happy birthday Janine!

And some notes for those interested ... the 3 tiers were standard Victoria sponge (double mixture), sandwiched in this case with strawberry jam and iced (by my husband the master icer) with white buttercream. The edible blood was a bit of a coup - after researching many recipes online (most of which called for cup of corn syrup - eeeuwww), we made our own by modifying a chocolate glaze recipe which we've used often before, this time using just a little bit of cocoa powder and lots of red and green food colouring.
Artfully applied with a basting brush, the glaze harden beautifully, looked super gory and tasted delicious!

cupcakes and crafts and rainbow sprinkled farts

Okay, okay, I've had my moan ... back to normal programming about how wonderful and idyllic our lives are.

Hanging out with the love of her life - David Attenborough.

Peanut butter and jam muffins. With chocolate chips.

Mongoose encounters at the World of Birds.

Camping on Easter weekend. We love camping.

Making tambourines, as per Friday's instructions.

Screw the end product, hole-punched paper plates and pipe cleaners ftw!

But for the true muzo, it's a serious business.

Pelicans drifting aloft. Reminding us to look up, and remember our blessings.

dinosaur cake

My brother and father both have birthdays this week, and this year their combined age is 100! We begged volunteered to bake them a cake and Friday, completely lacking in irony, declared it would be dinosaur themed.
And then proceeded to art direct the crap out of it.

No cut-out dinosaur shaped cake (as envisioned by me), nope - she very specifically brought home this dinosaur picture from school and declared that we'd use it for the shape 'on top of the cake Mum'. 
And in the bank of buy-by-weight candy in the supermarket she honed in on these chocolate-covered sunflower seeds for being 'just the right dinosaur colours'.

All I was to do was to provide the sheet cake (baked, I must add, almost entirely by Sunday who's become an ace at cracking eggs - although her two year old tactile sensitivity still makes her shriek after every addition 'Clof! Clof Mummy! Egg on haaaaaaand!')

She was even allowed to assist in the decor, while big sister hovered by.

Not bad huh? I shudder with fear that soon I may have to relinquish full control over their own birthday cakes.

With some flaked almond 'spines' and a single candle eye, Dino was ready to face extinction on my Mum's pretty birthday tea table.

Happy hundredth birthday lovely men in my life!

disco kitchen

When the late afternoon spring sunshine pours into your kitchen, illuminating your kitchtastic 70's tiles, what's a girl to do but hang mirror-balls right?

(And rock out with a ginger.)

packing with kids

Apparently the heart is because we love baking.

We love it so much that it's probably not a bad thing all the gear is packed away. Possibly we should archive this box once we get to the other side ...

But who am I kidding right?

baking brags # 2: cake pops

Sunday turns 2 next month. And naturally my thoughts have turned to birthday cake ...

I've long professed this is one of the main reasons I have children: birthday cakes. Friday got these awesome (yeah, it's called baking brags for a reason see) penguin cupcakes for her 2nd birthday. And last year I made cake pops for the little birthday celebration we had for Sunday's 1st.

As soon as I'd made them I knew they could be improved upon. I think this year I'll have to do just that.

You know cake pops right? Crazy, mad, nut-so concept. You bake a cake, smash it up, mix with frosting (you actually have to go with the American terminology on this one) 'til you get a, uh, cake dough consistency, then roll mix into little balls, poke with a stick and dip in melted chocolate.
Who does that?
Turns out, me.

Of course someone's already brought out a Cake Pop Maker, why wouldn't they? But I prefer a more authentic hand-rolled pop myself.

Now to decide on look and feel ... oh, and of course, taste ...

baking brags # 1: penguin cupcakes

I finally caught up with Charly's Cake Angels, the local reality TV show about Charly's Bakery and the family of astoundingly creative ladies who run it.
I have a special place in my heart for Charly's having once dropped one of their magnificent Lemon Meringue Pies in Kirstenbosch long ago (hey we still ate it!) but I digress ...

Talk about cake porn. But weirdly it's not so much the cake I lust after, but all that cake decorating gear! The colours and fondant and edible glitter and icing paraphenalia ... jeez I could have so much fun with all that. Sigh.

I've long maintained that birthday baking projects are one of the best things about having kids, and in my 4 short years of parenting I've taken full advantage ... (and I'm not shy to show them off).

Friday's 2nd birthday: Penguin Cupcakes!

These were so much fun to make. Chocolate cake, black cupcake papers, black food colouring powder (which we had to darken even further with alternating drops of red and green liquid food colouring). The white dots I made with Royal Icing and the orange beaks & feet and the black wings we cut out from carefully peeled layers off Liquorice Allsorts.
Awesome no?

And did I mention fun? So much fun to make and Friday, who was deeply obsessed with penguins at the time, was suitably wowed.

The only thing we hadn't thought of ... 2 year olds + black icing. They all looked like little ghouls by the end of the party!

the (p)rice of peace

I thought the 5 minutes peace was too good to be true.

Turns out I was right.

The upside? Picking it up grain for grain kept her occupied for another 5 minutes at least.

Have a great weekend y'all!

marshmallow lego heads

How cute is this?

Ja okay, she's very sweet but that Lego head?! That's cute.

A friend's son recently turned 7 and had a Lego themed birthday party. Keeping it simple his parents got the talented Kirsty Paxton from Artee Parteez to host a Lego building workshop at their home and my friend made these super cute marshmallow Lego heads!
Find out how she did it here. Her mods included drawing the faces with edible pen (much less fiddly than piped icing) and using the lid of a koki or marker to cut out the knobbly bit for the top - hers are better proportioned I think. In fact, hers are better all round - well done!

I went over one evening before the party to help out. She finished up the heads and I finished up all the marshmallow and chocolate scraps.
I'm such a great friend.

And if you'd like to feel completely mesmerised,overwhelmed, inspired, inadequate, surreal, awed, normal, gobsmacked ... you actually have to decide for yourself ... check out this Lego party.
She made her own Lego-man crayons?! Er ...