Meringue Kisses!

Afternoon everyone! 

Got another post for you today, yes I hear what you're saying! "Two in the past couple of days? Is she okay?" I'm pretty well thank you, I just feel the need to tell you all what has been happening in the world of SSM (I sometimes think I should of chosen a better name, more suitable sounding when I shorten it down, but I don't know what I could change it too! All ideas welcome!) 

As you can see with these pictures, they are colourful, cute and very tasty and moreish - In the words of Mr. B. The recipe is from the wonderful Meringue Girls who are a couple of brilliant women who go by the names of Alex Hoffler and Stacey O'Gorman, who have opened their beautiful business in London! 

I've been wanting their cookbook for a while but I'm still waiting haha, it might end up being wrapped up for my 21st or even under the tree later this year. In the meantime, I will persist with this one wonderful recipe and colour and change taste by my own accord. 

The recipe is simple, much more simple than I thought it would be though I did have to shuffle through a few sites to see what other people we're putting the oven temp too, as it doesn't mention it on the recipe page on their site. 

It has taken me quite a few attempts with the Kisses to get them just right, the colour, the taste and the size. The first time wasn't a success and I remember my dad saying that I had done something wrong (A past food chess and patisserie chef too - It's where I have got my foodie life from I have decided) 

But since then, whilst I was practising, I made the recipe smaller so there was no wastage. But now I am slowly mastering it and I can go back to the normal recipe which is ace! I just love making meringue! Whether it be the kisses or a pavlova, there's just something about it that's so soothing. Think on the same par as bread! 

If you wish to make some lovely little meringue kisses yourself, then I will be doing a follow up post with the recipe from The Meringue Girls  and a detailed description my myself on how to get those lovely meringue kisses and how to keep practising! 

More posts to come soon so keep your eyes open! 

Much love as always, keep baking! 

Mother's Day Cake

Ahh! Hey everyone! 

How are we all doing this evening, morning, afternoon, wherever you are in this big wide world! 

I for one am feeling great, this blog is finally starting to pick itself up (by itself, I mean me...of course...or am I?) 

Anyway, all pages are getting updated, and most of them are all up to date, though sadly apart from this one. BUT! We've nearly got you all covered, seeing as we have a few final posts to go then everything will be all in sync!

We currently have some Banoffee cupcakes in the oven, but we will post them at a later date...hopefully tonight or tomorrow. It has only just occrred to me that I should of probably been putting the dates on these posts to when they actually took place, but I haven't. Sorry guys, may do it at some point! 

So the above photo is the second, yes I did just say second, Mother's Day cake. The first was a dummy and it was made for my college course, but this! Oh no, this beauty was a fruit cake and decorated too! 

It's pretty much the same as the one I made for college, except it has pink roses instead of really pale pink roses, it's mint green instead of pale baby blue and it has some different flowers around the outside and different embossing on the cake board.

So basically, the design is the same, the colours are a tad different, only a tad though! 

I loved making this cake and my Mum and Auntie enjoyed it too, sadly my Nan didn't but she was with us in spirit I'm sure! 

I made the lovely roses, but I know they need working on..I'm sorting that out don't worry, still learning in some ways but aren't we all! I was aiming this page to be a website but it's kind of turned into a blog (which it is I suppose, I know!) But I do prefer it as a blog, so hey ho!

I embossed little flowers around the top of the cake, made thin little pink daisies to go around the outside of the cake too! I then piped 'Happy Mother's Day' in graduated line work on top in white then pink. To top it all off, I pipped a snail trail around the base of the cake in pink and embossed the cake board.  

Ta-Da! All piping was done with Royal Icing :) 

Speak soon and much love, 

Sprinkle, Sparkle & Magic 

Paris Themed Birthday Cake

Evening everyone! 

How are we all doing? 

I've just finished going through all the posts, seeing as half of them had photo's missing! Can you believe it, no? Me neither!

Anyway, I don't have many more updates to give you all, well, I do but I will do them all in a batch post. You will all soon see!  For now I will grant you the access to view some of the last cakes that I have recently done, there are three but will all be posted in separate posts (They need their glory! Haha) 

And here we have it! The two tiered, Paris themed birthday cake. I really did enjoy making this cake so much and for once I wasn't really stressful, Hoozah! It was great and so fun!

Now to the specifics: The bottom layer was a Funfetti cake with vanilla buttercream and raspberry jam sandwiched together, the top tier is chocolate cake sandwiched together with chocolate buttercream. 

The bottom layer was then covered in white sugar paste and the top in mint green. Emerald stripes of sugarpaste we're placed around the bottom tier, whilst emerald polka dots we're placed around the top tier. 

Using modelling paste, I created one large pink rose to sit on top, and four little white roses to be placed on top of the bottom tier. I made silhouettes out of black sugarpaste and placed them inbetween the emerald stripes. Making the black stand out more on the white background. 

Last but not least, there's an Eiffel Tower stuck on top, constructed out of Rice cripsies and covered with many layers of white chocolate and then green. We then placed black and white ribbon around the base of each cake to make it look even more pretty, and pinned them in with a pearl coloured bobby bin (Don't worry, it was brand new, not used for anything else and sterilized first) 

I really enjoyed making this cake, especially the silhouettes, I just love them!  I really liked how it looked and everything. It was a surprise for the customer as her partner had bought her tickets to go away to Paris for the weekend and surprised her with her birthday cake! How wicked is that! Very happy to be a part of it. 

Much love, 

Sprinkle, Sparkle & Magic

Going beyond the traditional Battenberg...

This was my first attempt at making Battenberg and I loved it! I've always been a big fan of this sweet cake since I was a little girl, when my Granddad and Nanan used to buy me it as a treat instead of sweets sometimes and I loved it. Or for an afternoon snack with juice when we would all sit together and watch You've Been Framed or Strictly. 

So I decided it was time to make my own and it worked! Probably not the best square shape, but it's homemade and not batch produced by Kipling so what do you expect? ;) 

I made three batches, one for my family, one for Nan and Granddad and one for Sam and his dad. I also decided to rock things up a bit and made a Green and Yellow one, straying away from the traditional pink!

- Em xx