A box of roses

 For Mischa's wedding in March next year, she wants to give each of her guests a beautiful cupcake packaged in a pretty box.  The boxes are ready and waiting... all we need are the cupcakes!  Last week i made a few samples for Mischa so that she could use them to set up a demo table to check that all the thoughtful details work together beautifully once the table is all set.  Here are some pics of the beautiful hand-made rose topped vanilla cupcakes

Bright colours to celebrate a happy occasion!

Some pretty pics to get you going for the week...


The colour scheme for this delightful couple's wedding was turquoise and purple - so bright and happy for a Winter wedding!

Each of the cupcakes was individually decorated and not one cupcake looked the same as another.

A bunch of beautiful roses on top of the cake

African Relish Inspiration

Being so inspired and energised by the course with Roxanne Floquet last weekend, i now see piping and cake designs in almost everything i look at!  The first 'design' that i 'saw' was from a table runner at the table where we sat and had all of our delicious meals at African Relish.  

Yesterday, we celebrated my brother-in-law's 30th  birthday, i thought that this would be the ideal occasion for me to test out my new 'design'!  I baked a carrot cake, one of my favourites, and iced it with cream cheese frosting.  The sugar paste was coloured with Americolour Bright Orange and a teeny weensy bit of Super Black just to take the neon-ness out of the orange.  For the royal icing, i mixed Bright Orange and a bit of Tulip Red to make the colour a little darker so that it contrasted nicely with the backdrop of the sugar paste.

This design could obviously be done in many different colours, i just choose the orange, because it is such a cheerful, happy colour and contrasts so beautifully with the green of the Desert Roses. Wedding cakes, especially, are usually fairly monochromatic, so it is not often that i am able to play with colours like this.  I did enjoy it very much!!  A nice palette for a wedding cake could be a very soft grey sugar paste with the design piped in the grey-green of the Desert Rose - très élégant! 

PS - On Saturday a lovely couple came to see me about their wedding cake - their colour scheme: purple and turquoise. I am very excited about that - watch this space!!!

  

Weekend at African Relish with Roxy Floquet

Gosh, where do i begin...
I suppose that i should begin with the town of Prince Albert, where this wonderful weekend took place.  Quaint, quiet, characterful.  A peaceful village at the foot of the Swartberg Pass, population approximately 10 000, but when you drive or walk around, it feels closer to 1000!  There are plenty of gorgeous little antique shops, coffee shops and restaurants that i wish that i had had the time to explore and try out.

African Relish is a recreational cooking school, which offers set courses and culinary tours lead by a medley of renowned chefs from SA and abroad.  If you have even the slightest hankering to learn more about spices, meat, sauces or bread-baking; i can strongly recommend that you spoil yourself with a weekend in Prince Albert.  African Relish also boasts an enchanting restaurant where you can enjoy meals made with love, creativity and bags of fun.  


Upon our arrival, we were greeted by our hosts, the lovely Virna and gracious Jeremy.  African Relish have a few little cottages that they use to accommodate their guests attending the culinary weekends.  What a pleasant surprise we had when Virna showed us to our cottage, Akkedis!!  Tanya and i wandered around our spacious quarters for a lengthy time oohing and aahing at the luxurious furnishings and precious details before we unpacked our bags.  


To recharge our batteries after the 4 hour journey, we enjoyed a pot of tea out on the stoep, allowing the tranquility of the Little Karoo to take the place of the stress and strain of everyday life.

Now, to get to the reason why 10 ladies from various reaches of the country drove all the way to Prince Albert.  For this weekend, African Relish was hosting the very talented Roxanne Floquet and her sister Debbie to teach us about cake baking and decorating.  And WOW, did they teach us.  I gleaned so much knowledge and inspiration from this weekend!  

This is one of the nine different cakes that Roxy made to show us all the different  techniques that one can use to decorate cakes. We each got to take a gorgeous little cake home to share with our loved ones!

The beautiful petits fours (fondant fancies) that Roxy showed us how to make.  They are as yummy as they look!

Day 1: how to bake sugar biscuits and decorate them.

Day 2: Two comprehensive sessions on sugar craft (we learnt how to make roses, hydrangeas and various other beautiful blooms using sugar paste), and creatively decorating cakes using different piping techniques and the hand-made sugar flowers.

Day 3:  How to make neat-as-a-pin petits fours (or fondant fancies) and decorate them.

I not only gained an exciting array of new skills and techniques, i was inspired by Roxanne's creativity and perfectionism.  After a long, sometimes hard, wedding season, i feel rejuvenated and full of enthusiasm to get creatively cracking in my kitchen!!

The Royal Wedding Cakes

I couldn't resist...  'royal wedding fever' got to me too!  How can such a fairy tale not get to someone as idealistic and romantic as i am.  Here are some pics of the two wedding cakes at the luncheon celebration of Prince William and Catherine's nuptials!

Seventeen individual fruit cakes make up this phenomenal 8-tiered wedding cake.    It took Fiona Cairns and her team five weeks to create this masterpiece. They also spent two days prior to the wedding at Buckingham Palace setting up the cake.

One can only but admire all the intricate piping, scroll work and hand crafted sugar flowers that make up this awe-inspiring wedding cake designed by Fiona Cairns.  (With a lot of input from Catherine of course!)  The English rose, Scottish thistle, Welsh daffodil and Irish shamrock, as well as thirteen other types of flowers and leaves, each traditionally symbolising a special wish, were amongst the many decorations of the royal wedding cake.  

The 'Groom's' cake:  A McVities tea biscuit and chocolate cake requested by Prince William.  This rather modern looking cake comprises 40 pounds of chocolate and a whopping 1700 biscuits!

My Wedding Cake!

An age-old tradition: Cutting the Cake!!

As, a maker of wedding cakes, the obvious decision would be to make my own wedding cake!  The difficult decision came when i had to decide WHICH wedding cake to make for our special day.  Neither of us like fruit cake, so that was out.  But, then you are still left with chocolate mousse cake, vanilla, carrot, red velvet...the list goes on.  

A White Wedding

I had so much fun and pleasure in creating this wedding cake.  Something quite traditional and very romantic! 
I had to deliver this wedding cake to the Lord Charles Hotel.  This is the second time that i have had to deliver a cake there and it was just as much of a pleasure this time as the previous occasion.  The staff are so friendly and assisting and the venue  is perfectly set up early in the morning already.  It is such a treat to walk into a beautifully decorated venue with a table ready and waiting for me to do my thing!  It happens so often that i arrive at the venue an hour before proceedings are to start (on request of the bride) and tables haven't even been laid yet.  My nerves wouldn't be able to handle it - i don't know how theirs do!


Here are the pics...

Wedding Season is in Full Swing

'Tis most certainly the season, the season to be wed!  I always knew that December was a popular month for weddings in the Cape, but until now, i had no idea how much so.  I have been soooo busy with wedding cakes, it's fantastic!!  Here are some more pics of what has kept me away from my blog, and the gym and Christmas preparations!


Liani and Ruhan's Tower of Purple Velvet Petits Fours

Look at the lovely cake topper
that Liani got -
something special!

In keeping with the purple theme, Liani chose purple velvet petits fours: purple velvet (spin off of the ever popular red velvet) sponge with cream cheese frosting.  These were covered in fondant in various shades of purple and decorated with patterns and pretty blossoms.

For the two uppermost tiers, the traditional brandy-soaked fruit cake covered in marzipan was chosen.  To tie in with the petits fours, i iced a 'ribbon' of pattern along the bottom of the cakes and adorned the rest with the lovely little blossoms!

Jody & Mark


I met Jody at my stand at the Somerset Mall Bridal Fair in the beginning of the year.  She really liked this cake that i had on display:

She really wanted a chocolate cake though and her theme was gold and burnt orange.  So this is what i did:  A deliciously moist carrot cake, layered with lemon buttercream frosting & covered with a white chocolate collar.  For a touch of gold, i sprayed the chocolate collar with a little edible gold spray paint.

Chocolate Cake Three Ways


This is a pure chocolate cake: chocolate sponge, chocolate ganache and coated with a chocolate plastique!


I had a leeetle bit of spare time when finishing off this one and a whole lot of ideas.  So i quickly popped down to the ribbon shop to get a few different types of ribbon to release my creative urge! Before finishing this cake off as requested (images with red roses), i tried two other ways.  Unfortunately, the blue ribbon wasn't exactly what i was looking for. Because the pink-look cake was kinda vintagey i wanted to go with something super modern with the blue. Alas alack!  Here are the pics anyway - let me know which one is your favourite...

Coming up roses!

This week's wedding cakes were simple and elegant, leaving their wow factor up to beautiful fresh roses.  There is just really nothing like beautiful fresh flowers! 

 

Summery Wedding Cakes

Here are some pics of this weekend's wedding cakes...

On Friday, Dala and Nico celebrated their marriage at the beautiful Kleine Valleij in Wellington.  Their theme, French Chic, was beautifully interpreted in the table decor and suited the atmosphere of the venue perfectly.  Everything was light and fresh and very elegant.

I made them carrot cake and cream cheese frosting cupcakes.  Decorated with a light grey ribbon to tie in (excuse the pun ;) ) with the rest of the decor.  The great thing about carrot cake cupcakes is that they keep their moisture for much longer than do vanilla or chocolate.  Perfect for a hot Summer's day in Wellington!

Cake no.2 was for Mika - mini cheesecakes with fresh berries. Also a perfect choice for a Summery wedding.  The zesty berries are so refreshing and a cheesecake is a cool and light alternative to other baked cakes.  Yum yum yummm.  I love cheesecake and i LOVE berries - it took a lot of self-control not to eat her cakes before delivering them!