Chocolate Cherry Ripe Mud Cake

I recently tried out a new recipe. It was delicious thick mud cake with chunks of cherry ripe throughout. Slathered in dark chocolate ganache, wrapped with chocolate panels and topped with fresh strawberries. Yumm....

Brydie's 1st Birthday Cake & Cupcakes

This was an order for a very old friend of mine for her gorgeous little girls 1st Birthday. I made 10 cupcakes for the kids to match.

Garden Party Cupcakes

These were a last minute order for a 50th Birthday. Fave colours were yellow and green (I added the pink to balance it all out).

24 cupcakes all chocolate mudcake with white chocolate buttercream.

I was so happy with this colour combo! The birthday girl loved them too <3

In the Night Garden Cake

My little man turned 2 recently, and I struggled as to what cake to make for him. Then one day he was watching tv and this show came on. He got so excited, so that made my mind up for me.

It ended up being such a rush job, I started decorating the cake at 6.30pm the night before his party. It was also the same weekend as the previous posts Wedding, I won't do that again.

Everyone loved the cake, all Harrison wanted was to lick the icing off the character's feet, lol.

6" + 9" Chocolate mud cakes, covered in vanilla buttercream. Plastic figurines & fondant details.

Naomi & Craig's Wedding

Woohoo, my quote was accepted, and they chose the cupcake with the monogram and the little flower.

I even went to the venue and set the display up, so I got to see the beautiful venue, it was divine.

6" cutting cake was chocolate mud cake.

100 cupcakes were half white and half dark chocolate mud.

All topped with white chocolate buttercream.

Monogram topper was made of acrylic and made by Bride's father.

NRL Cake

Archie's Mum & Dad work with my Husband, and are Newcastle Knights fanatics, so when it came to his 1st Birthday cake thats what they chose as the theme.

I hadn't used an edible image before, and I didn't want it to look like it had come from the local bakery / cheesecake shop. I was quite happy with the end result, as were Archie's parents.

Ladybug Garden Cake

This cake has been in the works for quite awhile, it has changed directions numerous times, but this is what I ended up with.

I just had to do a close up of the ladybug. She is Sooooo cute!

Cake is chocolate mud cake w/ vanilla buttercream. Fondant and modelling paste details.

Calling all Star Wars fans.

You may remember earlier this year in February, I made a R2-D2 cake for a little boy called Bailey. Well this month it was his cousin Dylan's Birthday, and he has asked for a Yoda cake. I was pretty stressed about making Yoda, as I had no idea as to how I would make him, but in the end I was quite happy with the result. The best part, is that Dylan loved him :o)



























Yoda was chocolate mud cake, with vanilla & chocolate buttercream.

More Chocolatey Goodness!

Strawberry Malteaser Chocolate Cake

This was 2 layers of rich chocolate cake sandwiched with a chocolate malteaser mousse, covered in whipped milk chocolate ganache and panels, and filled with chocolate coated strawberries and more malteasers. YUMMO!

This was my first time making chocolate panels, and chocolate covered strawberries.






































Made for my good friend Jillian's Mum for her 60th Birthday.

Adam's 30th Birthday Cake.

I had been thinking of what sort of cake to make for Adam for quite a few months. I knew it had to be a white chocolate cake, but other than that, I had no idea. I saw a cake on someone elses blog a while ago, for a single tiered cake covered in kit-kats and m&m's, and thought it looked fun, and yummy. So I altered it to a 2 tiered, and added some stars etc to the top.

It is white chocolate mud cake, layered and covered with dark chocolate ganache, surrounded with kit-kat's, and covered in m&m's.

In total there is 3.15kg's of chocolate on and in this cake.

I am so happy with how it turned out, and that I managed to keep it a secret from him. he loved it.

This is what I ended up with.

Lightning McQueen

Oh, what a cake!

This was an order for my friend Annika's "Cars" obsessed little boy Cameron.

This was a job and a half for me, as I wasn't feeling the best, hadn't made a car cake before, and hadn't tackled red icing before. but, even with all of those things against me, I think it turned out ok. I'm sure Cameron thought it was a toy, as he kept taking the wheels on and off, and wasn't keen on anyone cutting it.

I added the wording on the board as a last minute thing, and painted the letters to match the lightning strike on the car.

Chocolate mud cake, with vanilla frosting. I used vita weet for the back wing, RTR icing details.

Chocolate Pig

The other day, I got home and there was a message on our answering machine from my hair dresser. She was requesting a cake in the shape of a pig for her boyfriend.

I started on the idea of doing a wild boar, (as her BF goes pigging), but we quickly decided it would make for an ugly cake. So after a quick phone call we decided on just a normal pig, done in chocolate.

So this is what I came up with.

Chocolate mud cake, w/ chocolate frosting. I made the eyes out of a mix of mud cake and frosting, rolled into balls, and covered in RTR icing.

Kayden's Christening Cake

This is the cake I made for our friend's Son's Christening last Sunday.

It is a chocolate mud cake with vanilla buttercream icing. All edible except the wire holding the stars.

Last time I made the spikes for a cake, they all fell over, so this time I wired them all together, then inserted them into a flower holder. They stayed upright perfectly!

I think I finally perfected the FMM alpha cutters as well. I have had nothing but trouble with these in the past, and spent over 6 hours making these letters too, but I finally have them sorted : )

Tommy the Turtle Cake

About a month ago, I answered a request on a parenting forum for a cake decorator in my area. I showed the lady some of my cake photos, and she liked them, and some other lovely girls recommended me to her too :)

Anyway she wanted a cake for her Son's 1st birthday, and it had to have a turtle theme. She also liked my Dora cake, so I went from there.

I decided it needed something 3d on top, so went about finding a tutorial online, and Thanks to Cake Journal, I found one. I adapted it a bit, as I wanted a more rounded back, but the principal is the same. I am so happy with how he turned out :)


I made the cake the same way as the Dora cake, its an 8" chocolate mud cake with vanilla butter cream icing. This time I just changed the colours to a blue / green theme, and changed the flowers to stars.

This is what I came up with.

Thanks for looking : )

Happy 1st Birthday Harrison!

I can't believe my little man is 1 already! how fast has this past year gone.

Harrison just after he attacked the cake

The lion cake, Choc mudcake, w/ vienna buttercream icing & RTR icing face.

The colours in this photo are better. More true to life.

Adam, Harrison & I cutting the cake

The kids at the party

Elijah, Kaileb, Harrison, Keenan, Reaghan, Isabel & Aidan

The big stack of presents. he was one spoilt boy!

Chocolate Cupcakes w/ Chocolate Vienna Buttercream Frosting

These cupcakes were delicious, light yet moist. They were so quick and easy too. I had them made and in the oven in less that 10 minutes. I halved the recipe, and made 6 standard size and 12 mini size cupcakes. You may need 2 quantities of frosting if you make the 2 dozen standard size cupcakes. It depends on if you pipe, or spread the frosting on.

Easy Chocolate Cupcakes
Original recipe from Baking Bites Blog

Makes 24 standard size cupcakes, or 60 mini size cupcakes

Ingredients

3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 1/2 cups caster sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons bi-carb soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup water
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (170 degrees Celsius fan-forced). Line trays with cupcake papers
2. In a large bowl whisk cocoa, flour, sugar, soda, baking powder and salt thoroughly.
3. In a medium bowl whisk together eggs, water, buttermilk, oil and vanilla.
4. Whisk wet mix, into dry mix until all of the ingredients are combined with no flour streaks.
5. Fill cupcake papers 3/4 full with mixture.
6. Bake for 11 minutes (mini), 15 minutes (standard), or until a skewer comes out clean.
7. Remove cupcakes from pan, and cool on a wire rack. Once cool they are ready to ice.

Chocolate Vienna Butter Cream
Recipe from the Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake Book

Ingredients

125 grams margarine
1 1/2 cups sifted icing sugar
2 Tablespoons milk

Method

Beat margarine until light & creamy, add in half of the icing sugar, continue to mix until fully incorporated. Add half the milk, followed by the remaining icing sugar, beat until mixed. (sometimes you need the rest of the milk, sometimes you don't). Mixture should be smooth and easy to spread with a spatula.

My Chocolate Fix

I was having a bad day, wondering what I was going to do with myself this week, knowing I was house bound with Harrison being contagious. And I thought, I need chocolate. I actually would of been quite happy with a hot chocolate drink, but, I had no milk. So I thought, Mmmm cookies.

I have made every type of cookie, in my recipe file, and nothing jumped out as chocolaty enough.

So I googled Chocolate Cookie, and this one jumped out.

Outrageous Chocolate Cookies

Adapted by me.

Ingredients

225 grams dark chocolate (roughly chopped)

80 grams margarine

2/3 cup plain flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 large eggs

3/4 cup brown sugar (firmly packed)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

340 grams dark chocolate chips

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (160 degrees Celsius fan - forced)

2. Place chocolate (225 gram amount) and margarine, into a microwave save bowl, and heat on high in 20 second increments, stirring in between, until almost melted, do not overheat, (mine took 80 seconds all up).

3. In another bowl, sift flour & baking powder.

4. In a mixing bowl, beat eggs, sugar & vanilla on high speed until light and fluffy.

5. Add melted chocolate and beat on low speed until combined.

6. Add in flour mixture, and stir with a spatula until just combined, stir in chocolate chips.

7. Drop tablespoons of dough 2-3 inches apart onto lined baking sheets.

8. Bake for 12 minutes, rotating sheets half way through, until cookies are shiny and crackly, yet soft in the centre.

9. Cool on sheets for 10 minutes, then transfer to racks to cool completely.

The finished product.

Notes:

- Chocolate chips (I didn't have any, so I used a combination of block chocolate, and couveture) chopped up.

- The original recipe had salt, which I used in mine, but it left a salty aftertaste, not what I wanted in a cookie.

- You will need a spatula to lift cookies off sheets.

- I was a little disappointed with the shape of the cooked cookie, I prefer a smaller higher cookie, which is chewy in the centre. But even though this cookie was large and flat, it somehow remained chewy, Yay!

So at the moment, this is my Absolute Favourite Cookie.

Adam came home and ate 3, so they must be good, as he usually thinks most of my recipes are way too chocolaty.

Kim's Hens Day

Last Saturday, I went to a friends hens day, she had an Under Cover Wear party at her house, so I made her a cake. Now this cake, wasn't for the faint hearted. I asked Kim what sort of cake she would like, and she wanted "Chocolate", which was great, because its my favourite too. The result was so yummy. Kim's fiance and their son (age 2) ate nearly half of the cake for dinner after we had all left.

This is the Chocolate birthday cake recipe, it has chocolate mousse w/ Malteasers filling, and is covered in chocolate ganache.

from The Crabapple Bakery Cupcake Cookbook