Arum Lilies and Pearls

Thought I would finish off the year with a classic - the brief was Arum Lilies and Pearls (the couple have a daughter named Pearl!) - Based loosely on a M&S cake that seems to be very popular. All sponge tiers to be eaten on the night.
the pearsl were dusted with lustre dust and looked lovely and shimmery - if only every cake was so simple!

Happy New Year to everyone ...coming soon...Peppa Pig!

NaBloPoMo Post 5 Lazytown Birthday Cake

Anyone with a child under the age of 8 will know and 'love' Lazytown characters well - This was one of last week's challenges - Sportacus (the fella in blue!) is the superhero who is sports mad and has bad reactions to sugar (what a terrible life that would be!) - His mate is the very cute Stephanie who all little girls spend a time wanting to be - and here they are in sugar form!

It's normally boys that want a Lazytown cake so it made a change to make it girly - Hopefully little Emma loved it - I got a lovely message from her Mum saying she did anyway!

Abel & Cole Product Review NaBloPoMo Post 4

Once again I believe I have the best job in the world - I was lucky to receive my box of fruit and veg a while ago from the lovely people at Abel & Cole but a last month I received another! This box had a selection of 'basics' in which were so handy.

What did I get?...
Billingtons Golden Granulated Sugar...This reminds me of home as my Mum always used to buy this (apparently it is healthier for you than refined white sugar!) - This is real luxury sugar - probably a bit too posh for the amount of cakes I produce but lovely for a homemade treat!

Pistachio Nuts - Yum! Thats all!

Real butter - sooo luxurious! Not a long date on it (only a few days but lovely to use)

Children's Organic Pizzas - Pictured here - I thought the boxes were great and the names brilliant - Oink Oink and Maggie & Rita (work them out!)...and even better they were really delicious...and definately not just for children!

Self Raising Flour - In a really clever biodegradable 'plastic' bag - These people think of everything!

For the complete range of Abel & Cole products go here...www.abelandcole.co.uk

NaBloPoMo - Post 3

Today's post/cake is dedicated to our lovely friend and godfather to Millie, Paul. This is one of 2 cakes that I made to celebrate his birthday this weekend - This is the version that went out with his friends around Liverpool on Friday - god knows what the restaurant thought! The idea was to copy the invitation that he sent to his friends which contained a male torso (little bit freaky making that for your friend!), flowers and plenty of yellow. The scariest part was dropping it off at his work on the Friday.

Happy Birthday Paul - We had a fantastic day on Sunday - Did you know you are the same as a Sesame Street and Big Bird?

Operation NaBloPoMo - Day 2 -

Ha! Do you see what I did there? Operation? Doctor cake? Ok... Well I'm still going 2 days in - This cake was for a surgeon who is celebrating a significant birthday - unusually he didn't want his name on the cake (no idea why!) I had such fun with this one - there was a heart covered in blook by him and at the back of the cake a dish containing 'kidneys' with edible blood too! his other interests were reflected on the board - he loves football and walking so there were boots too. I hope he enjoyed it!

NaBloPoMo - A Challenge!

No the heading is not a typing error - it really does say NaBloPoMo - This stands for National Blog Posting Month where bloggers from all over the world try to post a Blog update every day for a month. Considering it is the 3rd of November already and I have only just found out about it I'm not doing too well - but I will give it a go! Finding things to talk about every day for a month shouldn't be too much of a problem - never short of something to say and sooo behind on cake posts.

The cake pictured is a recent christening cake - the family asked me to copy a picture of a cake they found on the internet - I have seen the picture before but for the life of me couldn't find whose it was to ask their permission to copy it and give them credit for the design - apologies if it is you!

Until tomorrow...Argh getting stressed already!

Happy 100th Birthday to the Guides

The Girl Guides Association are celebrating 100 years of 'service'(?) during 2009/2010. To mark the start of their year of celebrations an event was held bringing together the North West Division - and of course where there is a celebration there is a cake!

This cake was enormous - it needed to serve 100+ - the board was 36" x 24" and those stars took forever!


The other cake pictured was for the 50th birthday of the Brownies and Guildes pack that I used to be a member of - a LONG time ago! There is a guide dressed in the new uniform and a brownie dressed in the traditional dress - she has got 2 arms by the way - she is supposed to look like she is making her brownie promise!

Happy birthday everyone - Lets hope they all get a birthday badge!

Hello Sailor!

Apologies for the really camp title - Couldn't resist! Tiny bit scared of doing this large union jack - they look so naff when they are 'not neat'! I loved the tiny details on the sailors uniform - Its what I do best.

Blog updates have been scarce at best for the past few months - I hearby swear to do better .. and do my duty to god and serve the queen - in the words of the good old brownie promise! And to prove this...coming soon! Guides Centenary Celebration Cake!

I am finally over my fear of car cakes!

My heart always sinks when someone rings and asks for a car or bike on a cake - I am such a girl with vehicles!

The customer that ordered this cake was very easy going about what type of car was on the cake but just that it had to appeal to a small child. I loved the finished product so much I made a teeny tiny one for on the board too! My sister must have liked it too - she bought a Fiat 500 the next week which looks just like this car but black!

Personalised Cake Toppers

I love doing a cake that is really personal to the recipient. This wedding cake I made a couple of weeks ago had a groom cake topper dressed in his army uniform. They were having full militiary guard of honour at the wedding - I would have loved to go and watch but the wedding was the same time as my youngest daughter's birthday party - Now, I'm mad about cakes but I wasn't missing that for anything!

Here's Violet's cake - A very rush job again I'm afraid - The peril's of having a Mum that makes cakes for a living - It had a jungle theme as we had the party in the Jungle Play area.

Not a cake!...Oh go on then!

This post is so overdue! Not had access to blog for a couple of weeks - oh how I have missed thee - ish!

The pictures shown are a bit of a departure from my normal ones. The lovely people at Abel & Cole seems to be approaching a lot UK food bloggers asking us to trial their goody boxes - Not a problem! I have been meaning to order a box for a while - yes, I really do eat other things than just cake from time to time!

So, the box itself...contained LOADS more than I expected - a really good range of 'normal' fruit and veg that we would eat - This might have been luck or might have been down to the fact that I asked for 'normal' food - 6 and 3 year olds dont tend to be that adventurous when eating! Included were...Potatoes, Carrots, Spring Onions, Tomatoes, Spring Greens, Onions, Apples, Oranges and plenty more.

What did I make? Well it was Sunday, so it would have been rude not to do a roast dinner! Yum - I always thought people were having me on when they said you can tell food is organic - but there was something special about those 'spuds'!

The next day?...Salad - well it was a warm day (at least by UK standard!)

Overall opinion? Fab! It was also just lovely to have an Abel & Cole box sitting in my utility room - I honestly kept going over to it looking in - how sad!

Am I being honest? Yes, I truly wouldnt give a product a positive review if I didnt mean it.

Tigger Christening Cake

For my lovely friend, Wendy who I believe is an avid reader of my blog - get me! Wendy - get commenting!

I cannot believe I haven't met Samuel yet - something I intend on fixing very soon! Sadly, we couldn't even attend his special day but hopefully the cake was enjoyed by all.

Tigger was made out of sugarpaste - I had to cheat and use sticks to hold his arms up.

TWD Cinnamon Squares and More Chocolate!

Whoops! Didn't realise it was 5 past 12 - I am 5 minutes late for posting this week's Tuesday With Dorie post - The group with members all from all over the world where we all bake the same thing and post our results on a Tuesday/Wednesday-just! This week it was the turn of Cinnamon Squares chosen by Tracey of Tracey's Culinary Adventures

My results as you can tell from again a rubbish pic are just average - I have to say I wasn't disappointed as I didn't really expect much from this recipe but I don't think I'd make again - It was just like a mocha cake which really don't excite me that much. My choc/coffee layer sank to the bottom (which has never happened to me before - I feel like I have joined a gang!) The choc frosting layer did make it better and it will probably all get eaten. There are far better pics from other bakers though so dont take my word for it, hop on over to the rest of the gang

I haven't posted for over a week so I have a massive backlog of cake posts - I thought I would drop one in here just to try and improve the look of this post! This is a Wedding cake made from vanilla sponge with choc buttercream and choc fudge topping and edible blossoms - For a lovely couple, Joanne and Andrew - Good Luck to them both!

Friends

I now I am always harping on about the talents of My lovely friend, Cara but I just wanted to point you over to her blog. Cara has been kind enough to photograph some cupcakes and cookies that I made for Mother's Day and has featured them on her blog. Thank you dear!

Cara and Peter had a little boy 2 weeks ago who I had the pleasure of meeting and cuddling last week - Welcome to the world Hugo Freddie - You are GORGEOUS!

Hop on over to Cara's blog to have a look at her work - She actually specialises in children's photography but makes my cakes look pretty cool!

Guiness Gingerbread and Information Technology

So there I am all pleased with myself for getting the gingerbread done early and having blog post written - I thought it was going too well - I set it up to publish yesterdays morning and guess what...? It didn't! So now I have done it myself and it is under the Wizard of Oz cake - I will never understand IT...ever!

Happy 14th Month Anniversary - My Best Friend Vicky!

Whoops! Just realised I have passed my 1 year bloggaversary! Lets celebrate with a cake! For a wizard of Oz fan who loves the Wicked Witch - There is a belting advert here at the mo for Orange Wednesdays featuring a girl and her bes friend Vicky who happens to be the Wicked Witch. Sorry about the dreadful pic!

Sweet Melissa Sundays - Guiness Gingerbread

Yes, another baking group but how could I resist? I already have the book The Sweet Melissa Baking Book which is full of gorgeous recipes. This weeks selection which we will all post on Sunday (The clue is in the name of the group!) is Guiness Gingerbread. This was chosen by Katie of Katiescakes - read her blog for the recipe! A fellow Uk baker whose cakes are amazing and likes pink gin!

This was gorgeous! At first I thought - yep, its a nice cake with possibly a little too much treacle (I used instead of molasses) - We were all told that it is better left til the next day and Melissa wasn't wrong - 3 days later it is amazing! There's not much left tho! Easy and quick to make - Make it now!

Next week Sour Cherry Pie with Pistachio crumble chosen by Michelle of Flourchild

Black and White Wedding Cake

I always love a Black and White cake and one that features feathers is even better!
This cake was completely designed by the couple and matched perfectly all the other extras in their wedding. The couple were great fun - they have discovered their creative side when planning this wedding even doing their own invitations.

3 tiers of rich fruit cake which is quite unusual as people normally go for a combination of flavours. The sparkly bits are edible - but sadly not the feathers - I haven't invented edible feathers yet!

TWD Chocolate Bread and Butter Pudding

I bet this is the worst picture you will see this week of a bread and butter pudding! To be really honest, once I had made it I wasn't really in the mood to be faffing about with the camera taking pics of a pudding! We don't get that many hot sunny days here in the UK and Sunday was glorious - I wasn't about to miss out on being in the garden with my hubby and my girls!

Having said all that - I am glad I made it - I am not a fan of bread or custard so was heavily tempted not to bother but on I ploughed - I was pleasantly surprised it tasted fine. i didn't get chunks of brioche without custard but that was ok - It tasted even better with loads of raspberry ripple ice-cream! After reading the blurb on the Tuesdayswithdorie site, I reduced the amount of custard by 1/4 and it worked out great.

This weeks recipe was chosen by Lauren of Upper East Side Chronicle

Until next week...which is something else chocolatey! Byeee!

Chocolate Amaretti Torte and the return of Iggle Piggle

Well I did bake the Torte as the proof shows above - I just haven't had time to post about it. I am still without a Food Processor but used the old fashioned way of sticking the biscuits in a bag and bashing them to death with a rolling pin! Very therapeutic! My cooking time was slightly more than the 15 minutes promised at 17 mins but never mind!

The results? Erm ok...Dorie is right it does get better the next day but I really didn't like the almond cream and threw that away. I bought ready chopped almonds (due to lack of food processor and being a lazy/busy cow!) and as a result may have put too many in - I found myself getting annoyed at how nutty it was. The glaze was nice and I will try again as an Ice-cream topping. I probably wouldnt make the whole thing again - there are just too many recipes out there!

On the other hand the other picture is something I do time and time again! In the night garden is a massive programme here the UK and this is one of my most popular requests for cake designs. It makes me laugh when people ask me do i know the Night garden? Know them? I'm practically related to Makka Pakka, Iggle Piggle and Upsy Daisy!

Until Tuesday...I know I will be on time with this week's TWD AS I HAVE ALREADY BAKED IT!!!...AND EATEN IT!

TWD Coming Soon and Twitter News

You may have come here looking for 15 minute Chocolate Amaretti Torte - It is this week's instalment from the fabulous Tuesdays with Dorie baking group - I only arrived back from my hols last night though and found that my food processor is broken! Poo! That is the essential item that turns this recipe into 15 minutes instead of 15 hours! I will be posting the recipe as soon as poss but in the meantime...

Follow me on Twitter - For updates on all things cake, family and fun Helen at Aardvark can now be found here

The photo (because I cannot post without at least a picture of a cake) is of a recent wedding cake featuring the bride, groom (who sings in a Oasis tribute band) and their lovely baby.

Look at me - Aren't I clever?

This was an order from last week - St Helens Chamber which have been really helpful to me in setting up my business ordered 100 cupcakes with their new logo for the official re-launch of the Chamber.

I love doing cupcakes with logos and photos as the images turn out really well and clear!

Next week...wedding cake season starts with a bang!

TWD Coconut Butter Thins

Wow! These were amazing! Notice I said 'were' - They didnt last very long even though the recipe made loads. I wouldn't ever think of putting coconut, macadamia nuts and ground coriander and lime together but it works.

For the recipe see The Barefoot Kitchen Witch - Good choice Jayne! This was of course this week's choice for the Tuesdays With Dorie baking group.

A definite make-again and it didn't seem to take too long to put together. Dorie says enjoy with a cuppa so I did!

Next week Banana Creme Pie - Ugh! Can't imagine anything worse - am going to have to find a substitute for Bananas ... any ideas?

TWD Blueberry Crumb Cake The Sequel

There's not much to say about these really - They dont look pretty, They taste quite nice and I've eaten 2 pieces. I can't say they blew me away - I put too much lemon zest in so this might be why but again they were ok!

We even tried them for breakfast and it was exactly like I expected..I felt like I was eating cake for breakfast - sadly, this isnt the first time I've done this!

Next week will be Coconut Butter Thins chosen by The Barefoot Kitchen Witch.

TWD - Blueberry Crumb Cake

After a break of about 6 months from the baking group, Tuesdays with Dorie, I am back with spatula in hand and kitchen aid at the ready. This group bake every week from the book Baking From My Home To Yours by Dorie Greenspan. If you haven't come across this book yet, rush out and buy it - its fantastic. The aim of this group is to get us baking something that we might not normally try and most of the recipes I have done so far have been a great success (We don't really mention the homemade marshmallows very often in our house!) This weeks recipe was chosen by Sihan from Befuddlement The recipe can be found on Sihan's site (or in the book obviously!)I don't think I am officially due to start back yet but decided to go with the recipe anyway!

The good news is that the recipe was easy to follow and smells delicious - The bad news is that it is still in the oven - Not sure how you would be able to get this recipe done, cooked and eaten for breakfast but so far I'd say it would be worth it - I can't wait for it to come out!

In the meantime, I will leave you with a picture of a recent wedding cake which consisted of a 7" fruit tier with 50 cupcakes all with sparkly hearts.

A new one for me! I know nothing about Star Wars but will give anything a go! This is supposed to be R2D2 (?) with Star Wars type writing. For a little boy who is gorgeous and sooo chirpy!

Cupcake Gift Boxes

I have wanted to offer gift boxes of special cupcakes for ages and haven't been able to get the right boxes - well, now I have got them! AND I LOVE THEM!

I can't believe how popular they have become already which is lovely!

This picture shows a ladie's box of pink vanilla birthday cupcakes but any combination and any decoration is possible! I can't wait to get on with all the ones I have in mind!

Valentine's Trade Fair

What a busy week that was! Instead of doing one trade fair, Aardvark Cakes tried 2 in a week! Thanks to Shop Direct in Speke where we have been going since October 2008, Aardvark Cakes had the opportunity to visit the Aintree location of the Littlewoods Group. Another bunch of really friendly people who make our job so enjoyable!

Just a small selection of the cupcakes that we had on offer are here: Chocolate Fudge, Valentine Vanilla and Cupid's Carrot!

A Cake for the great Outdoors - Not to be confused with a Great Cake for Outdoors!

Quite a brief accompanied this cake order...An 18 year old that loves trecking and all things outdoors. He was getting a North Face Black Jacket for his birthday which had to be featured aswell as his IPod (A must for all 18th cakes it seems!) Gareth's Mum requested a few of his past interests and present hobbies be included on the cake...the lettering is in the style of Warhammer covering gareth's love of military history, Lego Pieces, Life Saving float and rubber ring and books. Gareth is also a lover of Wheetos and carries them on every exhibition often eating them out of the box -That took ages to paint!! His face is not supposed to look dirty - its stubble!

I have to admit this is not of one my favourite designs but I do love that it is so individual to its recipient.