Swirly chocolate and vanilla cupcakes

Here at Adventures in Cake, we love swirly whirly cupcakes, the mix of flavours and the prettiness of the icing makes us all very happy here on the farm- shame these weren't for us to eat, but for some other lucky fellows!

Going global, transatlantic love

I have had my first order from overseas- how exciting, I'm now an international business woman.  The customer lived in America and her husband lived in Devon.  She wanted to send him a valentines gift and this is where I come in.

6 Valentines carrot cake cupcakes later, the husband was genuinely touched and delighted with his surprise, and I got to feel warm and fuzzy in helping bring two loves separated by thousands of miles closer together on Valentines Day.

Ahh, love and cake- life's natural partners.

A minnie mouse birthday cake for a grown up girly

After making the caterpillar cake recently, one of the mums at the party got in touch and asked me to make a cake for her little sisters 21st birthday.  The brief was 'anything chocolate, Spice Girls, or Disney-she loves Disney'.

Off I went and brainstormed.  I couldn't find anything in my imagination that could represent the Spice Girls via the medium of buttercream.  The Disney idea had more possibilities.  As it was a 21st, I wanted to keep it playful, but a bit sophisticated.... or as sophisticated as you can get with giant chocolate ears.

It's always slightly nerve-wracking presenting a cake (will they like the design? will they ike the flavours?  will it get there in one piece?....actually, I'm normally fairly confident about the design and taste- its the logistics of transporting that gives me the willies), but I delivered the cake this morning and it was happily received...phew.  I've never really made anything like this before, but I'm learning all the time.

The ears are giant cake pops made in the form of flat discs moulded onto 2 bamboo skewers, then coated in dark chocolate and then a layer of buttercream and golden chestnut glitter.

Mini cupcakes for the big church bells

Our church bells need re-hanging.  This is super duper mega expensive and funds need to be raised.  Before you can qualify for funding from the big boys, you need to prove you have raised a certain percentage locally.  This is where I come in, in a very small way of course.

Now I’m not a religious person, but I recognise the brilliant space that a church has, both physically as an ancient building, and also emotionally within a community.  All that history, the atmosphere, the acoustics, the dazzling stained glass, the stylish pews (do you think I could sneak one home for my new kitchen in the barn??), but mostly the sense of cohesion and pulling together.

A concert was arranged in the local church to raise money, and we merry bell ringers were to be providing the half time snacks (as the poster promised wine and nibbles)  I had been asked if I could possibly bake some cupcakes, and of course I agreed.

I decided mini ones would be best, more like a cocktail pudding snack, than a full on slice o’ cake which is what mine more usually are.

I kept it classic and went with chocolate and vanilla decorated in shades of cream, blue and purple and only had empty cake stands to take home.  Happy concert goers and happy me.

Sparkly cupcakes for the bride and groom

Here are the wedding cupcakes as promised.  The bride and groom had 85 vanilla cupcakes with plum and scarlet butterflies.  One giant cupcake in vanilla with a chocolate buttercream icing on the base, also decorated with butterflies. The last photo is of the cakes in the evening, all dressed up and ready to party.

Sparkly wedding cupcakes- a sneaky glimpse

Here is a cheeky glimpse of the cupcakes from this weekends wedding.  More to come soon.

A girl's gotta have tuppaware

I'm very excited.  I've just ordered four cupcake couriers from the very lovely Sugar Shack , a brilliant on-line store that sells all things cake.  I've already chosen what I want, but I'm still mooching around their site looking for more!

A cupcake courier is a specially made plastic tuppaware thingy that has 3 stacking trays with deep insets to hold each cupcake safe and secure.  It can hold 36 cupcakes, or one massive cake if you take the trays out. I already have a stock of white corrugated cardboard cake boxes that have cupcake insets that I use for deliveries, but wanted something more sustainable and sturdy.

The magic cupcake couriers are due to arrive by Thursday, which is perfect as I have a cupcake wedding this weekend.  Should a girl get this excited about tuppaware?  Lets face it, and lets not be shy...I think the answer is probably yes.

Wedding cupcakes

 As promised, here are my most recent wedding cupcakes.  The bride and groom had 6 different flavours, each with a different handmade decoration.  The bride was totally delighted, which is always a real pleasure to see.

Chocolate birthday cupcakes

I know I have my most recent wedding cupcakes to show you, but I'm still sorting through the squillions of photos.  In the meantime, take a look at one of my recent birthday orders.  Girly chocolate cupcakes.  Something pinky was requested, and I happily baked and designed something fitting.

I've got such a lovely collection of edible glitters now that I can't help going to town and using a blend of different colours.  These cupcakes had about 5 different variations of pink through to violet purple and a gorgeous iridescent white one, so pretty.  If only everything we ate could be covered in glitter.

 

Wedding cupcakes

Here are the photos from the most recent wedding Adventures in Cake baked for.  The bride's colour theme was red and ivory.  They requested a selection of flavours, so a mix of carrot cake, lemon, vanilla and coconut made up the tower of 80 cupcakes.  Hearts and butterflies and glitter topped off each cake.  The large cake was a double layer juicy lemon cake, also topped with butterflies and a liberal sprinkling of red and gold glitter.

The wedding was held in an old church in deepest Devon and the reception was in the Tithe Barn next door. It looked so romantic and cosy, the red and gold beautifully complemented the old wood in the barn.

Cupcakes for the boys

I took a bespoke order this week for a previous customer (in fact she was my very first bespoke order customer when I started out).  She had seen the giant cupcakes on my blog and wanted one for her son's 30th birthday.  She plumped for chocolate cake, with a vanilla butter cream icing. For the decoration, she wanted it sparkly and fabulous, but not too girly....Happy to oblige I came up with a design of two shades of blue stars, with matching blue glitter.

When I finished the cake last night, it looked so lovely I was tempted to call my client to let her know it looked fab- but it was knocking on 11pm, and so much too late for cupcake conversations.  Though I did get Handsome husband to come into the kitchen to give me his opinion as a man- he said whilst he wasn't sure if a cupcake was essentially a 'girl thing', he thought it looked tasty and could he have some?

Bronze stars and golden hearts

Love is in the air again.  

The week marvellous mum came down to help out, as its much more fun with two- plus marvellous mum is much better at the maths involved in upscaling recipes.  I would always need a pen, paper, calculator plus a cool drink and a lie down to work out the maths sometimes.  I can do it, it just takes a while, whereas marvellous mum can work it out in her head in a jiffy.  

Adventures in Cake had a big wedding order, 70 double chocolate brownies, and 70 carrot cake cupcakes, and banana and walnut cupcakes were the bride and grooms desire for their wedding party.  

Testing out the recipes were a lot of fun and they all turned out mighty pretty and glamorous looking.  They were for a wedding reception in a Lawrence of Arabia style tent and I hope went someway to matching this magical, romantic setting.