A Little Christmas Shopping

Whilst out and about today, I did pick up some lovely christmas presents, but also managed to get myself some very lovely decorations too, well who can blame me! I found some really gorgeous scandinavian style shabby chic baubles and a lovely felt flowery heart.
Plus a Missoni scarf, but we'll skim over that bit quickly...!

Cake Decoration - Large Open Roses and Snowflakes

This weekend I have been working on decorations for a couple of cakes I will be working on in the next couple of weeks. The first for my Nan's birthday, and the second is a commission for a colleague at work.

To make the large open roses for my Nan's cake, I followed a tutorial in the Cake Masterclass book by Mich Turner (If you don't have it get, it, such a useful book!) using white fondant icing. I had never used a ball tool or a petal pad before, but thinning and shaping the petals turned out to be a lot easier then I had imagined, and they looked almost life-like when they were placed on the crinkled foil. For the centers I used a fairly runny dark grey icing and then dotted the detail on with a thicker white icing.

The second items were snowflakes for a wintry themed cake! (I wont let the cat out of the bag until I've finished it but I will make sure I put up some photos) I bought some cutters last year to use for a christmas cake, but until now I've never got around to using them. The detail is really intricate and when dusted with some edible silver luster and a pearlescent ball in the centre, I think they will look really pretty!

A Weekend of Baking...Mini Victoria Sponges and Triple Chocolate Brownies

Last Tuesday it was my one year work anniversary, so I decided to make some treats to take in for my colleagues. I recently bought an individual loose-bottomed mini cake pan from Lakeland, so I was looking forward to trying it out to see what I could achieve.

The tray came with a victoria sponge recipe, so using this I set about making the cakes. Everything was going very well until I put the trays of batter into the over, went back to check on them a few minutes later, to find that four of the loose bottoms had sprung slight leaks and were dripping down into the tray below!

I was worried that I would have uneaven bakes with some burning and some still raw, but amazingly, they all turned out rather well! By the time I had trimmed some down, neatened them up, iced them and filled them, they were rather tasty!

My second bake was my triple chocolate brownies, a recipe I keep as a very closely guarded secret as they really are that good! (I'll let you into the secret...you need a lot of chocolate!) Delicious, moreish and decadent, they are the perfect thing to have for elevenses with a cup of tea.

A Weekend of Baking...An Excellent Steak and Ale Pie

Last weekend, as a bid to expand my baking repertoire, I decided to try my hand at an old favourite, a double-crusted Steak and Ale pie.
My family, boyfriend and I all love The Lamb in Stoke Goldington,  for its delicious real ales, proper scrumpy cider and amazing pies. Piled up with fresh vegetables and hand-cut chips, there really is no better way to spend an evening. If you fancy visiting, here is their website to take a look at. They were voted CAMRA Pub of the year in 2008, so it's definitely worth a look.

http://www.thelambatstokegoldington.co.uk/about.html

Before...

So, in an homage to them, I decided to have a go and make my own. I decided to make a simple but tasty steak and ale pie using proper butchers meat, a can of dark ale and some thyme. We used a traditional metal pie plate for the recipe, and this helped to create a beautifully crisp and brown bottom, nothing soggy about that! Glazed with beaten egg and with pastry leaves on top, it made the perfect hearty warming meal for a chilly Saturday night.

...and After! Obviously you can see that it was horrible!

Tip: When lining the tine with my handmade shortcrust, I made the mistake of trimming it before putting the meat in. This of course meant that it slipped down a little into the pan, and when I put the top on, there wasn't a lot of pastry to crimp. Next time, I will leave trimming both sections of pastry until last and then crimp them, hopefully this will mean that they will stick together better when baking.