It's-a me, Mario!

30 Super Mario themed cakes for Zak's 6th birthday: Star, Toad, and the M logo on vanilla and chocolate cakes, with vanilla, chocolate and strawberry buttercream.
I liked Toad's faces when I drew them, but I think I did them a day or two too early, as they were a bit smudgier on Saturday when I delivered them. A lesson that some things you can't do too far in advance :-(

A pause from Super Mario cakes, to make some Chocolate Parkin Biscuits. It is bonfire night, after all.

I love that Dan Lepard:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/oct/25/baking-foodanddrink-chocolate-parkin-biscuit

Halloween spiced pumpkin cakes

This year I bought 2 small eating pumpkins instead of 1 large 'carving' one. These 2 lovelies became some delicious cakes: The Guardian's Dan Lepard's Pumpkin Ginger Cupcakes. If you have any leftover pumpkin you can make some too:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/oct/24/pumpkin-ginger-cupcakes-baking-dan-lepard (sorry, the insert link doesn't seem to be working)

Happy Halloween everyone!

Hieperdepiep Hoera! Jip & Janneke are here!

Royal icing outlines.
I started by experimenting with royal icing. The easiest way to draw Jip and Janneke accurately seemed to be to trace them with icing.


The outlines were then 'flooded' with runny icing and left to dry.
In theory they should dry to hard shapes that I could have lifted onto the cakes.


...In practice they never really dried (Either I got the recipe wrong, or I think I might need to buy a dehumidifier!) and then they went really strange.
Obviously I didn't use these.


royal icing weirdness.


Luckily, I had a plan B: cutout fondant shapes!


Dag, Jip en Janneke!


Jip


Janneke




and cat.


Marleen also wanted a pile of books on one of the cakes.




The finished box: Hoera!


Marleen asked me to make 6 cakes for her mother, who turned 70 this year. Since her mum is dutch and likes books, she wanted to use some famous characters from dutch literature, while making sure that the cakes still appealed to her 5 year old daughter.

I love Jip and Janneke- the illustrations are so graphic: the children and their pets are always drawn in black silhouette, whereas the background might be really colourful.

These cakes were a lot of work, (especially with the failed royal icing) but well worth it, I think!

Gefeliceteerd, Marleen's mum!

Fashion!

Sarah ordered 6 vanilla cakes for her sister, who is just about to start her final year of a degree in fashion.
I was very inspired to make tape measures, buttons, scissors, etc - the tools of the trade. I even tried to make tiny dress patterns, but they just looked odd (you can see some in the prep work photos).

In the end I did 3 cakes with vanilla icing, buttons, scissors and tape measures, and 3 cakes with raspberry icing with little outfits on (as requested by Sarah). Since I don't know what type of clothes her sister designs, I included a menswear cake too!

What do you give the man who has everything?

What do you give the man who has everything?
Salli knows - she ordered 6 rugby (union) pitches and 6 Cookie Monsters to make up a cheerful, yet sporty present for her friend's 30th birthday.

Vanilla cakes with vanilla buttercream icing, with fondant and glacé icing details.

Smiley

How beautiful do this cake toppers look, laid out with their different colours? I'm definitely feeling inspired to do a 'paintbox' box of cakes... Could even do the cakes with rainbow-coloured batter... anyone want to make an order? ;-)


Am I the only one who wants to write, "acieeeeed"? ...Maybe I'm just showing my age.





6 Smiley cakes for Sam's birthday (Gefeliciteerd, Sam). I was really nervous of attempting such an iconic image, but I think they turned out really nicely.

Vanilla cakes and Vanilla Seed buttercream icing.