Mexican Farewell Cake for Polly & Michael

Last Saturday Melissa and I were back up in London for another party, this time to celebrate my good friend Polly and her boyfriend's new adventure, which will see them travelling across Asia for six months before settling down in Australia for a couple of years.  So it naturally followed that the theme for the food was, er, Mexican!  Polly had cooked up the biggest pot of chilli I had ever seen (which was delicious by the way) and she had also asked me to make a cake for the occasion.  So carrying on with the Mexican theme, and also taking into account Polly's wheat intolerance, I made a gluten free lemon and lime cake for 50 people. 

The recipe I use is based upon one in Harry Eastwood's Red Velvet And Chocolate Heartache, which uses finely grated courgettes and carrots as key ingredients in the cake batter.  As well as being gluten free, it has the added bonus of only having about a third of the usual amount of sugar and also being dairy free, the only fat in the cake coming from the egg and ground almonds, which are much better for you than butter.  When you describe the cake on paper you'd never believe how delicious it actually is, plus it has the huge advantage of being a cake that is actually good for you!

The only trouble with this cake, is that it can be slightly temperamental as the water content in the vegetables can vary hugely, depending on the season, their size and how fresh they are.  This batch turned out to be extra moist and the cake took double the amount of time to cook than it should have done.  Polly had given Brighton Bakery a mention in her party invitation and lots of my friends were going to be there too so there was really nowhere to hide if the cake turned out badly.  I was worried.

The problem is, you can't cut a slice out of the cake to try it until it's too late.  I had to have faith in my judgement and carry on with decorating the cake and at least this could redeem me if the inside turned out dry.  Polly didn't want a cliched Mexican design with 3D cacti and sombreros so I had to think a little more abstract.  My first thought was to try and replicate a Mexican cut paper design that my friend Laura used on a stunning cushion she made:

(c) Laura Tovey

But alas I think this would be too intricate to do justice to the design in freehand, and I'm really trying hard not to keep buying new cake tools and cutters (honest Melissa!).  I did like the idea of including birds, as it was a nice symbol for Polly and Michael flying away on their adventure.  So I did a search on Google Images and came across the most fantastic Mexican bird design:

(NB If this is your image please let me know so that I can credit you!)

I knew I couldn't recreate the exact intricacies of the design but I used it as my inspiration and this is what I came up with:

The two birds have slightly different designs, all cut free hand from sugarpaste (and with the help of two piping nozzles to cut the circles).

I finished off the design by adding some colourful flowers round the outside and some added details in the same colours used on the birds.  As always, it took me longer than I thought it would as all the individual cut out pieces are quite fiddley but I was really pleased with the result:

Melissa and I dropped the cake off at lunchtime and Polly and Michael really seemed to love it.  Polly said that she's the smaller bird - I'm still trying to figure out which one that is, considering they were cut from the same template... 

We left for a few hours to take advantage of an afternoon in the capital.  We took a walk round Borough Market then along the South Bank to the National Theatre to look at the landscape photography exhibition and a quick look into the Tate Modern.  There's few things I miss about London, but those are probably my top 3 favourite places that I used to enjoy going to.  All the while we were enjoying our afternoon of culture, I had a niggle in my mind and a worry in my belly that the cake was going to be dry which meant I could never fully relax.  Melissa and I went back to the party at about 6pm and two thirds of the cake was already gone.  That had to be a good sign but I was still worried.  I had to try a slice for quality control.... luckily it was still lovely and moist and really tasty.  If I was really nitpicking the very edges were just a little too browned but it didn't seem like anybody else noticed, and by the time we went there were only 3 slices left.  Hurrah!

So Polly and Michael - it was a great party, we loved catching up with everyone and will really miss you.  Stay in touch and roll on 2014 for when you return :o) xx

The Cake That Groaned

Usually January is a pretty miserable month - everyone's dieting, cutting down on the booze and the party season has been long forgotten as we all try and figure out how to make it through to the end of the month after overspending at Christmas.

Well last Thursday night defied convention with a cracking launch party for the new graphic novel, The House That Groaned by the super talented Karrie Fransman.  The party was held at the Gallery in Foyle's, the iconic independent bookshop on Charing Cross Road in London and the room was full to bursting.  That Miss Fransman sure does know how to throw a party.  There was a magician, animations, characters from the book were working the room with big papermache cartoon heads, delicious canapes handmade by Karrie's mum and lovingly carried down from Edinburgh in her suitcase, and a room buzzing with fascinating people.  I was thrilled to have been asked to contribute to the festivities by baking a cake in the shape of the house itself.

Here's how it turned out:

Photo (c) Sabrina Dallot-Seguro

I was really excited that while Karrie was busy signing books, for once I actually got to cut the cake!

Photo (c) Susan Yan Mach

Although it could never compete with the multilayered, twisted adult fairytale that is The House That Groaned, I would like to share with you the story of The Cake That Groaned.

One windy afternoon, two days before the party, a couple of chubby packs of butter made friends with some golden caster sugar, a few eggs, some real vanilla and a cloud of flour.  Once they had thouroughly gotten to know each other in the bowl of a shiny red Kitchenaid, through the magic of bakery these ingredients gently rose in the warm oven of a basement kitchen in Brighton and a delicious 10" vanilla madeira cake was born.

As with all my cakes, I left it well wrapped overnight to settle, and the next day I split it into 3 even layers ready for filling.  The book itself uses different tones of blue throughout, so I thought the perfect choice would be a wild blueberry jam for the filling, which complemented very nicely with the real vanilla cake and Italian meringue buttercream.

I cut a two inch section from the side of the cake and fixed it to the top of the cake with a smear of buttercream, trimming at an angle to create the shape of the roof.  I then gave the whole cake a thin covering of buttercream and covered it with blue sugarpaste:

I then had some fun with my new brick texturing tool to create the brickwork pattern over the top and sides:

 

Next up I created the texture of the roof slates using the end of a piping nozzle.  I also added the chimneys, secured in place with a short length of dried spaghetti and some edible glue:

For the windows I had cut out rectangles of yellow modelling paste and left them to dry out before drawing on the room scenes with edible pen.  Once the ink was dry, I fixed them to the cake using some edible glue.

Karrie - if you're reading, don't look too closely at the drawings, I am definitely not an artist!  As with all my cakes, it's about capturing the essence of the object I am recreating, not an exact depiction...

I finished off the cake by adding the window frames and doors and it was ready to travel 50 odd miles up to London to the party.

Here it is, next to the book itself:

And I'm pleased to say that I had some great feedback on the cake.  Most of it had gone within about 20 minutes so that's got to be a good sign.

If you've not bought the book yet I can highly recommend it.  It's a cracking read, exploring the themes of body image and desire through the larger than life characters that live in a crumbling down house.  Take a look at the book's website www.thehousethatgroaned.com to meet the characters and order your copy. 

Enjoy xx

Happy New Year everyone

A very Happy New Year to everybody from the chilly South Coast!  It's been a few weeks since I've had a chance to post on the blog, and all those things I had planned to write about like my luxury mince pie recipe and how well the Christmas cake turned out just seem so last year. 

I even feel a little bit late in talking about the new year.  A couple of days ago we were all excited about new beginnings and plans for the coming year, new projects, getting fit, drinking less, cutting out the cake... it's now January 4th and I wonder how many of us have already slipped on our resolutions?  Well that last one seems to have been crossed off a few people's lists as we're almost fully booked for cake orders well into February.  So we're looking forward to a great start to the year at Brighton Bakery and hope it's a good sign for things to come.

Our big plan this year is to focus on making more wedding cakes.  We'll be attending our very first Wedding Fayre in Burgess Hill on 29 January which is really exciting but quite daunting too.  If anyone has attended a wedding fayre as a supplier before and has any tips please leave a comment below - they will be much appreciated!  

But before any of that I'm back in the kitchen this morning to decorate a cake for a very special event tomorrow night launching the spanking new debut graphic novel The House That Groaned by Karrie Fransman.  You might just have time to buy and read the book before I post the pictures of the cake.

So before I go, I'd like to wish you our very best wishes for 2012 - may your year be filled with homemade jam and italian meringue buttercream.

Love Emily & Melissa, the Brighton Bakers x

Woodland Animal Cake

For my latest commission I was asked to make a birthday cake for a one year old boy called Albert.  His bedroom is decorated with woodland animals so his mum asked me to create something along the same theme as the centrepiece for his first birthday party.
 
I had so much fun designing this one and creating the cute creatures to go round the outside. Here's how it turned out:

I started with a classic vanilla madeira cake, filled with raspberry conserve and italian meringue buttercream which is just the lightest, super smooth and utterly butterly creamy buttercream you can make.  I started making it a couple of months ago - it's a bit fiddly but I will never go back to regular buttercream, it pales in comparison.
 
Once I had covered the cake with a thin layer of buttercream and cream coloured sugarpaste I had a blank canvas for my design.  As I was decorating this cake freehand, without any moulds or cutters, the first element I had to get in place was the tree.  I rolled a layer of chocolate brown sugarpaste and used a funky new impression mat I bought which gives a tree grain texture when pressed into the sugarpaste.  I then cut out the tree shape freehand.  I deliberately made the tree longer at the top and bottom so that I could get it in the right place and then trim to size.
 
Next I added the grass trim round the bottom of the cake using the same technique as in the footballer cake I made a couple of months ago.  It's good to have a pattern, ribbon or trim of some sort to go round a cake as it really finishes it off and also hides any little imperfections that you may have from trimming the sugarpaste that covers the cake.
  
Then I had lots of fun creating all the woodland creatures that went round the side of the cake.  I wanted them to be bold and graphic but not too cartoony. I chose a few complementary colours and made everything freehand as I went along, starting with a cunning fox:
 

 
You can just about see the wee hedgehogs on the right.  There was also a bluebird flying, a few red toadstools and a badger:
 

 
And finished off with another bluebird and an owl on the top of the tree:
 

I created the texture on the owl's belly using the top of a piping nozzle at an angle.  I also used a different piping nozzle to cut the circles for his eyes - I find them so handy and probably use them more for cutting out sugarpaste than for piping!

I then finished off the cake with a big number one and Albert's name.  I had planned to write Happy Birthday, but I think it would have looked too crowded and decided it was better to keep it simple:

When I came home the other day the answerphone was flashing with a lovely message from Albert's mum saying how much she had liked the cake and that it really made a great centrepiece for Albert's first birthday party.  It's so nice when people take the time to say thank you, I put a lot of love into the cakes I make and it makes it all worth it when you know your creations have made somebody happy.

The art of a great food photograph

A couple of weeks ago I was contacted by Suzanne Goldenberg, a freelance photographer and journalist who offered to take some photographs to try and pitch a Brighton Bakery showcase article to local foodie magazine, Edible.  Naturally, I jumped at the chance for a bit of free publicity and we discussed a few different angles for the piece.  One of the key things that sets us apart from other cake makers is that we offer a range of vegetable based cakes, so that seemed like a good option and I set my mind to work thinking of the best veggie cakes to bake for the photoshoot.
 
Suzanne pitched the idea to her editor and while the article was given the go ahead, it couldn't be seen as promoting just one company due to advertising regulations.  So instead Suzanne planned to write a general article, with a reference to Brighton Bakery and some local cafes that also offer vegetable cakes.  What a shame.  Still, all publicity is good publicity, as they say, and I had a nice chat on the phone to Suzanne about the benefits of using different vegetables in cakes.  I also offered to make a cake for her to photograph for the article as I was really keen to pick up some tips about taking a good food photo as I really have no idea what I'm doing.  I was sure that a certain father in law of mine would be very happy to help out with any cake leftovers...
 
So last Friday I baked a firm favourite from our market stalls, Courgette and Cinnamon cake.  I thought it was a good option as it has a lovely texture where you can see flecks of courgette and lemon zest and it's set off by a pretty zigzag lemon icing on top which I hoped would add interest to the photo. 
 
Suzanne arrived a couple of hours later with a few props in tow - a white board to reflect the light, a small tablecloth, two chopping boards, some pretty plates and a cake knife and fork to dress the scene.  I was surprised that she was happy to take the pictures in our basement kitchen as I didn't think there was enough light, but by angling the white board it lifted the shadows and the photos came out well.
 
We did a few different set ups, one with the cake in its tin, un-iced on a rustic wooden board, then I quickly iced it and Suzanne took a few more shots of the whole cake on the board.  We both new that the best photos would probably be once the cake was cut, so I cut two generous slices which gave us lots of options for the set up.  Different angles, a slice of cake on a plate with a fork, slices stacked up in front of the rest of the loaf, Suzanne busily snapped away dozens of pictures, all very slightly different.  I asked loads of questions along the way and picked up some good tips.  A key thing is that she used a 50mm prime lens, which we might have to invest in - our zoom lens just can't get close enough to pick up the detail that hers can.  The 50mm lens also allows you to open the aperture very wide and take lovely pictures in lower lighting conditions, which would be a real benefit in our house! 
 
Like most photographers, Suzanne is very particular when scrutinising her pictures, and is happy if she gets just 3 or 4 good ones from a shoot (and I'm sure she took well over a hundred photos).  Here's her final selection:

photos © suzannegoldenberg.net

And here's the link to Suzanne's article on the Edible Magazine website: Courgette Muffin Anyone? 

I love how our battered old wooden chopping board has come out in the pictures, and the rustic water icing really sets off the cake with a lovely contrast.

We only got a brief mention in the article, but it was great to see how Suzanne worked, and we already have a cake photography project planned for next year, so it was well worth the price of a couple of courgettes and a little bit of time.  Thanks Suzanne x

Last Minute Christmas Cake!

Yes I should really know better, being a *proper* baker now and all, but my family Christmas cake is still, as yet, unbaked.  My dad is a big fan of Christmas cake and I'm also hoping to convert certain non-believers in my family with this one so I have a big challenge ahead.
 
Usually Christmas cakes, like most rich fruit cakes are matured for at least two months before eating.  There are a few reasons for this - one, it develops and deepens the rich flavour; two, you can give your cake regular "feeds" with brandy (or other spirits of your choice) to add even more flavour, moistness and festivity; and three, it makes the cake cut better without crumbling, which is particularly important for a wedding cake, where the cake must be cut into lots of small portions.
 
So how do you cheat it?  According to Jane Asher, the secret is to boil the fruit mixture with whisky, stout, orange juice and treacle for ten minutes and leave overnight before adding the rest of the ingredients.  She claims it will give the same "matured" flavour, and can be made as close to Christmas as you like.
 
So I'm putting her to the test, although I am making a few alterations to her recipe, mainly in the addition of ground almonds, lemon and swapping the whisky for Drambuie.  I would normally lean towards using brandy, but I inherited the bottle of Drambuie along with several slightly leftfield spirits in the drinks cabinet when my grandpa died and I've been waiting for a reason to use this one.  Plus it means there will be a memory of him in our Christmas celebrations, which makes me happy.

I've just boiled up the fruit and I have to say it has already put me in the Christmas spirit, as the house is filled with delicious festive aromas.  And as it's the season of giving, I thought I would share with you my version of Jane's recipe.  I will report back in the New Year with the family's verdict!
 
Last Minute Christmas Cake Recipe
(makes 1 x deep 8 inch round cake)
200g currants
200g raisins
100g sultanas
100g dates, chopped
75g dried prunes, chopped
75g dried figs, chopped
150g glace cherries, halved
100ml Drambuie
225ml Guinness (a little nod to my lovely wife's Irish heritage)
Zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon
Juice of 1 orange and 1/2 lemon (to make 75ml)
2 tablespoons black treacle
200g butter, softened
200g muscovado or dark brown sugar
200g plain flour
50g ground almonds
5 medium eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/2 teaspoons mixed spice
75g blanched almonds, chopped
 
1. Take a large saucepan and fill the pan with the dried fruit, Guinness, Drambuie, orange and lemon juice and zest and treacle. Bring the mix to the boil and simmer gently for ten minutes, stirring every so often.  I like to add a bit of Irish Christmas spirit by singing out loud very badly to The Pogues' Fairytale of New York as I'm stirring, but that's optional.
2. Take the pan off the heat and leave to cool.  Once it's cold, tip the mix into a bowl, cover and chill in the fridge overnight.
3. The next day, preheat your oven to 140C and double line an 8" round cake tin with parchment.  Make sure your parchment is a good 4 inches tall as the cake is quite deep and can rise higher than your tin.
4. Seive the flour, baking powder and spices into the bowl of your mixer, then add all the remaining cake ingredients except the chopped nuts and beat thoroughly until smooth. 
5. Fold in the fruit mixture and chopped nuts.  At this stage you can add good luck by asking everyone in the house to give the mix a stir**.
6. Pour the mix into your prepared tin and smooth the top, making a dip in the middle so that it rises up evenly.
7. Bake the cake for 3 hours and check with a skewer to see if it's done.  It may need 30-60 minutes more so keep checking every so often and cover the top with foil if it's browning too much on top.
8. Cool the cake in its tin for 10 minutes before turning out to cool completely.
9. Once cool, wrap the cake in baking parchment, then foil and keep somewhere cool until ready to ice.  Feed the cake by skewering a few holes and drizzling over 1-2 tablespoons of Drambuie every few days.

**I remember the tradition of stirring the cake mix when my mum made our Christmas cake every year and I loved the chance to be involved from a really young age, when I had to stand on a chair to reach the bowl.  We also did this at our primary school, and all 100 pupils plus all the teachers would line up in the Dining Hall at lunchtime to stir the giant mix in the bowl.  I wonder if any schools still do that?  I hope so.

UPDATE 8th December: I baked my cake today - it took nearly 4 hours in total and it's a lovely deep cake and smells beautiful, just like my mum's Christmas Cake.  It's still cooling now, and I can't wait to eat it!

Converse Boots Cake - my favourite yet

It was Melissa's birthday way back on 19 October, but the week of her birthday we had so much leftover cake from the Indulge Sussex stall we held that at the time it seemed crazy for me to add another to the cake mountain.  So finally, six weeks later I was able to make Melissa's birthday cake, and I wanted it to be extra special as she had waited so long.  It was also an opportunity for me to really push myself to try something new and I had the perfect challenge in mind.
 
Anyone who knows us will probably have noticed that Melissa and I live in Converse boots.  I'm a little embarrassed to say that between us we have at least 8 different pairs of Converse in the house.  Well I decided that 8 wasn't quite enough and for Melissa's birthday cake I would make her a pair of edible Converse made out of carved cake.
 
Here's how they turned out:
 

 
I was so pleased with this cake and think it's probably the best one I've done yet.  Here's how I made it:
 
I started off with an 8" square lemon madeira cake which I filled with lemon curd buttercream (I didn't bother to level the top as it was going to be carved anyway).  I put the cake in the freezer for about an hour to firm up for carving.
 
Meanwhile I found a picture on the internet of a Converse sole and adjusted it in Photoshop to the right size.  I then cut out a template from baking paper and used it to cut around for the left boot:
 

Using the same template I flipped it over for the right boot:
 

 
I created bases from a cereal box covered in foil using the same template.  I used buttercream to secure the cake to the bases:
 

 
Then using pieces of the leftover cake I added the top of the boots and secured with buttercream:
 

 
I pushed a couple of dowels down into each of the heels to secure the back of the cake while I was carving it.  Then using a sharp paring knife I started to sculpt the shape.  It's best to go little by little as it's easy to take away but much harder to add back on if you take too much. Here it is about half way through:
 

 
The toe section is still too high so I need to be a bit braver .  Must try not to eat all the cake trimmings while I'm doing this....
 

 
Done.  Now I'm happy with the shape they are ready for a layer of buttercream:
 

 
Getting the buttercream smooth was really time consuming as all the surfaces are curved.  I used a small pallette knife dipped in a glass of hot water and lots of patience!  At this stage they look more like wellies than converse but I have faith.  The cakes then went into the fridge to firm up the buttercream before decorating.
 
In hindsight, I wish I had left the cakes in the fridge a bit longer as I decided to make the sugarpaste sections freehand as I went along, using baking parchment held up against the cake to create templates.  The parchment kept sticking as the buttercream was still a bit soft.  I had to be really careful when placing the sugarpaste on as if I got it wrong it meant resmoothing the buttercream before trying again.
 
Using a real Converse boot as a guide (as you know we have many kicking round the house), I figured out the order for which layers had to go on first, and started off with a piece to cover the top of each boot:
 

 
Next came the tongues.  I made a template with parchment first and cut out the shapes with a cutting tool - this looks like a mini pizza wheel and helps to cut the sugarpaste evenly without pulling out of shape (which can happen when you use a regular knife):
 

You can't really see it in the picture, but I used a teatowel to make an imprint to give a fabric texture but rolling over the towel onto the paste with a rolling pin.  I also added some detail using a knife making small indentations round the edge to look like overlocked stitching:

 
Then I added the tongues to the cakes and trimmed the sides at the front once they were in place:
 

 
Next I made another parchment template for the sides, using the same template I flipped it over for the other side of the boot.  Once I had cut the shape I used my new quilting tool to make the stitching:
 

 
I then used a piping nozzle to cut out the eyelets:
 

 
I used some silver lustre dust mixed with a little vodka to make a silver paint and painted the inside of the holes before securing to the sides of the cakes:
 

 
It's now starting to come to life and look like a Converse trainer.  Next up I added the toes and the trim round the edge, which I did in two pieces to make life easier.
 

 
Time for some colour now and the red trim makes all the difference.  I also texturised the piece round the toe by making a criss cross pattern with a small knife:

Another bit of colour was added with the blue trim and the All Star logo on the heel.  I didn't have any deep blue royal icing so I made the lettering with a very thin sausage of sugarpaste fixed on with edible glue:
 

By this point the end was in sight but I had been on my feet for hours and needed a break.  So I sat on the sofa with a tray in my lap and made the laces in front of the TV.  I rolled a rectangle of thin sugarpaste and texturised it with a criss cross pattern made using the side of my small pallette knife.  I then cut thin strips of this to make the laces.  Back at the work top I attached the strips using edible glue starting from the bottom, placing one end in the eyelet hole and then trimming to the edge to make it look as if it went underneath the side piece:
 

 
Then the final detail was to add the round Converse logo to the sides of the boots.  This called for the tiniest piping work I've done to date.  Strictly the logo should have gone on the inside but I used a little artistic licence and placed them on the outside so they would read better:

 
Converse boots cake - done!
 
All in all I think this cake took about 9 hours to make, carve and decorate, but I was so pleased with the finished cake.  There's plenty of detail and I think they look pretty close to the real thing.  Melissa was really pleased with them too - I hope they were worth the wait :o)