Bits and Bobs

The good news is, the yorkshire ale fruit cake went down a treat with the couple who are having it as their wedding cake.  I had made one and let it mature for 5 weeks, and another one and let it mature for 1 week.  We sat down and tried them both at the same time so we could directly compare them.  Now, I'm not a fan of fruit cake myself, but I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was :) The one that had matured for longer was slightly darker and held together a lot better overall - you couldn't taste the beer very much, but that was ok.  The "younger" one had a much crumbier texture and I think the flavour was nice for someone not too fond of fruit cake - it wasn't overly rich.  Both were very moist though which was excellent, and I think that was partly due to the amount of beer that was in the cake, as well as leaving the lining paper (the lining paper used to line the tins when they were baked) on until served.

I have also recently been on a course to learn how to stack cakes - i'm fairly happy with my decorating abilities but stacking (despite being an engineer) was always that one step too far for me.  I attended a course with the lovely Lisa Sims of the Melbourne Cake Decorating Company in Derby and I spent a very enjoyable Sunday covering a stacking a two tier cake.  This was the result:

I have also been practicing my mum's birthday cake too which is in just over a week's time - I've been experimenting on my work colleagues this week.  My mum has requested a rainbow cake which is 6 thin layers of different coloured cake.  I was dead chuffed with my practice run at the cake itself but the icing left a lot to be desired!  I had used a recipe for cream cheese frosting but it was horrendous - much too thin and runny, just a big ol' gloopy mess.  So I think when I make it for real, I will stick to what I know best and use butter cream to ice it instead.  Photos and recipe coming soon!

I also need to tell you all about my vintage treadle sewing machine restoration project, and some of my new sewing projects I have got on the go, but I shall save those for another day :)

That's all for now peeps x

p.s. can't believe it has been two months since my last blog post! I blame Rupert - our new addition to the family (coloquically referred to as Pooper as he likes to poop!)  He's such a cutie :)