Cakes for radio.

I had the pleasure of recording a radio programme last week with Nick Coffer (My Daddy Cooks) and Edd Kimber (The Boy Who Bakes).

Nick's show on Three Counties radio is a cooking show, but the one I am in was specially dedicated to baking.

He normally has a wine expert in also, but this week it was tea expert Damien Cauldwell from Halsey's Deli in Hitchen.

It was a lovely fun show to do and I was very lucky to be able to sample some of Edd's goodies made from recipes in his book, out now!.

I took some flapjack, you can find the recipe here, and a Victoria sponge which I filled with homemade blackberry jam. Nick requested that I paint it, so I came up with a pretty floral design.

You can listen to me on the show here at 12pm today.

I was also very privileged to be included in a fabulous article about alternative wedding cakes in this month's issue of Wedding Magasine.

Kat who wrote the article also writes the fabulous RocknRoll Bride blog.

I shall be back next week with more owly goodness!

Have a smashing weekend.

xxx

How to paint an owl cookie.

Rise up this mornin', Smiled with the risin' sun, Three little birds pitch by my doorstep 

We are having a very special owl and ladybird party soon and preparations are well underway. In the party bags there has to be a cookie, and I thought I'd share with you how to paint a happy (or should that be funny?) owl.

We had a lovely week in Cornwall during the Summer, and one of our trips was to the Screech Owl Sanctuary. It was fabulous, the kidlets got to stroke lots of owls and even have a go at flying them. We took lots of pictures , including this gorgeous chap (sorry I can't remember his name or breed). 

A few of their owls were used as models for the film Legend of the Guardians, so we got to see Movie stars too.

Anyway now we have our model we are ready to begin.

Leave your fondant to dry over night.

I used Sugarflair dark brown and liquorice and Wilton cornflower blue, a dark brown food colouring pen, and size 4 and 1 brushes. I use water to paint with.

The trick is to keep your brush as dry as possible, don't overload it with water and make you strokes as light as you can so they don't etch into the fondant.

If you have a go I'd love to see your creations and do let me know if you have any painting issues.

I still have a few places on my next course 29th September, (e-mail me nevie-pie@hotmail.co.uk) but you'll have to get in soon if you want to come.

xxx

Happy National Cupcake Week!

I received a last minute commission at the weekend for some very special cupcakes.

Daybreak (a TV show in the UK) wanted to present some portrait cupcakes as part of National Cupcake week.

(Unfortunately if you don't live in the UK you will have no idea of who these people are! Sorry.)  

As one of the Daybreak presenters is appearing in Strictly Come Dancing they wanted a sparkly/blingy version of him, and then the two hosts, Brucie and Tess.
(Miss Cakehead had the perfect title; 'Nice to see you, to see you iced!')

The final one was of James Blunt which was harder to do as he has chopped his trade mark curls, so I gave them two versions and let them decide.

I thought you may also like to see some of my favourite cupcakes to help celebrate cupcake week.

Because you can never have too many cupcakes, can you?

What is your favourite cupcake flavour? I like apple of toffee and always chocolate!

xxx