Grasshopper Pie


This dessert takes me back to my days as a waitress, maybe one of the best jobs I've ever had though I didn't realise it at the time.

I worked as a waitress after I finished uni. I had no desires to stay a waitress but I can really appreciate that job now; no stress, work didn't come home with me, everyone pitched in and we had a good laugh. I suppose it helped that I had no mortgage and no responsibilities too :)




Anyway, Grasshopper pie was my favourite dessert and I always hoped to find a damaged slice in the box. We couldn't serve it to customers if it wasn't presentable and we'd have to "dispose" of it ;) At least that's what I was told and I had no reason to question it.

Grasshopper pie has a sweet biscuit base (this one was made with double chocolate chip cookies) and a minty mousse filling. I'm not sure why it's called grasshopper pie, I think it's named after a cocktail or maybe it's just because the filling is coloured green. Mine may be a little too green. It should be mint green but I only had electric green to hand.

This is actually half the size of the one I used to serve and its topped with cream instead of chocolate. It's a very naughty dessert but very easy to make as it only needs chilling, no baking.

 Despite all its naughty ingredients it's a light, refreshing pie and you know it's good when it gets the Conster's approval!

Chocolate Truffle Cookies

Those of you that know me know I have no self control when it comes to biscuits. The only way I can manage my addiction is to simply not buy them, however some days biscuits are a necessity. The good thing about our kitchen is it's always well stocked with baking ingredients to make my own.

 So flicking through my recipe books looking for a quick fix, these Chocolate Truffle Cookies were the obvious choice, a. they're chocolate, b. they have a splash of Amaretto in them (also always well stocked in our house).

I had to be patient while the dough chilled but while I was waiting I could run up and down the stairs a few times to make me feel better about my imminent biscuit binge. 

 I said could... I didn't, but I did snap a picture of Mr Prickles who couldn't wait until nightfall for his fix of meal worms.

 My patience ran out as soon as they were baked and I could smell them. I ate them while they were still warm and they were gone in record time, Chris was lucky to get a couple! I have no regrets.

 I've made a few more batches since then, to accompany a cuppa with friends and as a small birthday treat for my Nan who shares my sweet tooth.

 I think they make a nice gift in a pretty jar with a little ribbon tied round.

A Vintage Christening

Most of my cakes are for friends and family but when a friend volunteered my services I decided to have more confidence in my skills and say yes. I get super nervous making cakes for people outside of friends and family but I figure it's good to step outside your comfort zone every once in a while.

The request was for cupcakes to fit in with a vintage tea party theme for a little girls Christening day. The theme was right up my alley and perfect for all my stencils and lace mats... and an excuse to buy more :)

To accompany the cupcakes was an understated but beautiful cake. 
With all of the cupcakes, the cake only needed a little decoration but I still wanted it to stand out. I decided to keep it plain and add one extravagant sugar flower to the top.

 As luck would have it, a tutorial to create an open peony from  'Happy Cakes by Renee' popped up on my facebook feed that week. A brilliant tutorial; I was expecting to need a few attempts at it but I was so happy with how my first one turned out, that is the one you see on the cake.


It's always tricky fitting cakes in around work but nevertheless, I really enjoyed making these and I was so glad they were pleased with them. 

Thank you Melissa for your kind words and thank you to my friends and family also. Your compliments and support encourage me to take on new baking challenges and give me that little confidence boost I need.

3D Basketball Cake

Mr Chris is very much in to NBA Basketball at the moment and requested a basketball cake for his birthday. What he actually asked for was half a basketball because in his words, "he didn't want a cake that falls apart" - he was referring to the great cake disaster of 2012.

I have to restore his faith in my cakes so I took another sneaky day off work, (you would think he'd have caught on to this by now) and with my lessons learnt tackled another ball cake.

This time I did not ignore advice from the experts and read all of the information for ball cakes on Lindy's blog.

 Instead of a soft sponge cake, I baked a madeira cake following Jane's "Baking the Perfect Madeira" post, again on Lindy's blog. I also allowed plenty of time for it to cool, baking the cake the evening before and leaving it overnight. 

 When the cake came out of the oven, I knew it was going to be more successful then last time.
Covering a ball cake with fondant is a little tricky. The idea is to lay the fondant over the cake and form the excess in to two or more pleats around it. The pleats are then cut away and the joins are closed and smoothed out. 

 On this cake it was much harder because I'd created an impression in the fondant (using one of Chris' Lego mats :) ) and I didn't want to loose it. I worked slowly and carefully and for the most part the impression stayed, there were a few spots where it rubbed out but they were near to the bottom so not overly noticeable. 

 I had hoped to add some more finishing touches but ran out of time as Mr Chris finished work a little earlier then usual.

He was suitability impressed and he approved of the filling too. I added almond extract and ground almonds to the madeira recipe and used chocolate amaretto buttercream for the filling - I think this could be my new favourite.

The lesson this time... "If at first you don't succeed, try try again".

Home-made Battenberg Cake

I should have taken some progress pictures but I didn't expect this to turn out so well on my first attempt.

This was created following a Mary Berry recipe from her book "Mary Berry's Baking Bible". It was surprisingly straight forward so if you like battenberg and you have the book I urge you to give it a go. I will definitely make it again so I'll get more pictures next time.

Lissie's First Cake

The very first cake for my little niece Lissie and it was no where near as perfect as she is. 


 I know she can't appreciate it yet but I loved every minute making this and I look forward to creating so many more cakes for her. I also look forward to lots and lots of cuddles!!!

Effie's Cake

A cake to congratulate our friends Ad and Iona on the birth of their beautiful daughter Effie Ksenija.

The elephant's little balloon and the bunting are my favourite parts of this cake. Mr Chris said my little bows were so good he thought I'd bought them or used a mould to make them.
















I had planned to make a more realistic elephant but I thought this little fella was so simple and cute he was perfect for a baby cake.

Zingy Lemon Cake

Using my sister's birthday as an opportunity to experiment with flavours.

 I know my sister likes lemon curd so I baked a lemon sponge, filled it with lemon curd, and covered it with lemon flavoured buttercream.


The flavour was good but I'm still trying to perfect a flawless finish with my buttercream icing. Also, I would avoiding using these silver dragees as they were far too hard to eat.

40th Birthday Bass Guitar

"They call me Cheryl, I'm the baaaws!"

After gaining some confidence carving cakes and watching far too much 'Cake Boss', I was feeling ambitious as Steve's 40th birthday approached and decided to make him a bass guitar cake as he would be playing bass at his birthday gig.

This cake was constructed from five sheet cakes and was so big I had to buy a custom cake board for it! 

 To create the shape I used a template made by Mr Chris. He printed a picture of the bass guitar I wanted to copy and drew a grid over the top. He then drew a larger grid on to paper the size of my sheet cakes, and copied each square across to draw a bigger picture of the guitar. 

 I carved the cake before filling it to avoid the layers sliding as I cut them.








The downside with a cake this large is that it doesn't fit in my freezer. Although I could chill the sheet cakes individually before carving, when it came to my crumb coat the cake was at room temperature and the head of the guitar was really tricky to cover. It crumbled a lot as I tried to ice it and as a result lost some of its shape.



There's definitely room for improvement - the strings could be better, the cake board should be covered and I need to invest in a steamer to add a nice shine to the fondant but it's not bad for a first. I was especially happy with how the wood effect turned out. This is just brown food colouring diluted with some vodka and brushed on to the fondant. The vodka evaporates so it doesn't add any flavour to the cake.

 Hopefully, if I've done a good enough job, any Primus, Les Claypool or Carl Thompson fans will recognise this bass ;)

Peanut Butter Cupcakes

If I pop to the supermarket for lunch I can't resist picking up a pack of peanut butter cups. This didn't go unnoticed by my colleague who also shares a love of all things peanut buttery. 

 As peanut butter cupcakes has been on my "to bake" list for a while, I promised I'd bring some in to work whenever I eventually got round to making them. Then Mr Dutton handed in his notice and brought that day forward.

These have peanut butter in the sponge, peanut butter in the buttercream icing and are topped off with a little slice of a peanut butter cup. I felt they could have had more peanut butter but I probably love peanut butter more then the average person.

Dutton, if there's any chance you're reading this, I hope all is going well in your new job. You haven't been replaced yet and by that I mean there is no one to lower the tone quite like you did. Thorn :)

Halloween Baking


A little spot of Halloween baking with my friend Pilar. We decided to bake zombie cookies as we both love a good zombie film.

I can be a bit of a perfectionist and I'm very meticulous when I'm baking but it turns out Pilar is much like me on that front and we operated a very efficient conveyor line. She also operates in the same time zone as me as we started baking fairly late on a Saturday evening and didn't stop until the wee hours of Sunday morning. 

Anyway,these are sugar cookies with all of the decorations made from fondant. To complete the look we brushed on patches of brown and green food colouring making them look extra rotten - suggested by Pilar, she has an eye for the finishing touches!

 Moving on from the cookies, Pilar also had a strong desire to bake a rotten zombie brain cake and we managed to knock this one out pretty quickly. Again, finishing touches... Pilar's idea to add the maggots :)

This brain was a tasty madeira cake but I struggled to share it with anyone as they were all put off by the exterior... oh well, more for me!

S'More Cupcakes

A s'more inspired cupcake - this is another Hummingbird Bakery recipe.

I haven't had much time for baking recently as I've been seconded to a project at work for the last year and it's managed to take over my life. However, when I paid a visit to my old team I couldn't go empty handed! They always like a bit of cake so they're a good bunch to try new recipes on.

These are chocolate cupcakes, sprinkled with chocolate shavings and crumbled digestives before going in to the oven, then topped with a soft meringue and a little square of dark chocolate.


I didn't think to save one for myself so I'll just have to take their word that they were good - although a little messy to eat.

Iggle Piggle First Birthday Cake

I think children's cakes are my forte - also I enjoy making them as their flaws can be easily disguised :)
















This cake was for Carole's grandson. A couple of firsts for me on this one (no pun intended)... this was the first number cake I've made and my first standing figure! The latter is quite an achievement for me as I've attempted this before and failed miserably.

I don't own any number tins so I carved the one from a sheet cake using a template. I froze the cake for about 30 minutes before cutting to stop it crumbling and to keep the edges sharp, it also helps if the cake is firm when icing it.

A few wooden skews help to keep Iggle Piggle upright and sturdy. More guidance from Krazy Kool Cakes helped me here as their pictures show how they position skews to add support to their figures.

 Makka Pakka didn't require any supports because he only has stumpy little legs like me. Sadly, what I've only just noticed in the picture below, is he's lost his nose. Hopefully that sort of thing goes unnoticed by a 1 year old :)












Sugarveil Cupcakes

When I started baking I owned an 8 inch round cake tin and a spatula. Two years later and I have two kitchen cupboards overflowing with various cake bits - cutters, piping tips, impression mats, stencils, modelling tools, petal dusts - and my collection is still growing.

My latest find was Sugarveil - a flexible icing used to create edible lace - and an opportunity to try it soon presented itself when my friend Steph asked if I could make some cupcakes for her Mums 50th birthday.

 I was sceptical at first as they make it look really easy in the video but actually, it was. It creates a long strip of lace which I cut out and placed on to my cupcakes. I bought a fairly basic patten but there are lots to choose from. 

 I created the "Mum" and "50" plagues a couple of days before the cupcakes so they had time to harden and stand up in the icing.

 Whilst I was in a sugarveil moment, I also created a little batch of cupcakes for Chris' sister and brother-in-law as we still owed them a wedding gift. 

We'd been creating a wedding hamper of treats and these were hidden in the bottom to complete it.
My thanks to Steph whose baby hampers gave me the idea for the wedding hamper :)

Raising money for Macmillan and Cancer Research UK

Let me start this post by saying a huge well done to Zoe Drury and her fellow "blister sisters". What these ladies have achieved is incredible. After Zoe's mum was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2011, Zoe went on a mission to raise money for the charities that helped and supported her back to good health. Organising numerous fundraising events, from packing bags at the local supermarket, to climbing Ben Nevis, Zoe and her friends have raised over £10,000 for Macmillan and Cancer Research UK! Amazing! And that's where I come in....

One of their fund raising events was to host a charity ball and they asked if I could make a cake that could be added to their auction. I'm not a confident baker so I get nervous making cakes for people I don't know but as it was for charity, charities very close to my heart as my Mum and Nan both suffered with breast cancer, I really wanted to help.

The winning bid was from a lady needing a 60th birthday cake for her friend Paul. Sadly Paul had passed away weeks before his 60th but he had already begun organising his party, and his wife was continuing with it as he would have wished.

They sent me a picture of Paul wearing a tam o' shanter hat, the sort with the fake ginger hair, and asked if I could create a cake with a 60 on it and a figure of him wearing the hat. I created a two tier cake, with a 60th spray in the top and hopefully they were pleased with my figure of Paul. 


It was very nice to learn a little bit about Paul when I delivered the cake. He sounded like quite a character and apparently this was just one of many hats he chose to wear. I didn't deliver the cake to the party but I hope his wife and family were pleased with it, and I hope they had a lovely day celebrating his life and remembering good times.
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