Mrs Bumble

With the Great British Bake Off blaring from my TV, now seems the perfect time to write up this recipe. This is a recipe from the Cake Queen herself Mary Berry, however I've added a little to it to give it a bit more oomph.

There's nothing more satisfying that ticking an item off your bucket list. I've spent years dreaming of creating my own frangipane, but never got around to it. Mainly because I had some strange idea that it was going to be a lot of work! 

I was wrong, it was actually very similar to the very easy to make Victoria sponge. 

This recipe makes 12 gorgeous 3" tartlets.

Equipment:

3" tart tins. I used the 6 hole tartlet pan from Lakeland

Pastry Ingredients

100g Plain Flour

50g Unsalted Butter

50g Caster Sugar

2 Egg Yolks from Large Eggs

Frangipane Ingredients

50g Unsalted Butter

50g Caster Sugar

1 Large Egg beaten

50g Ground Almonds

15g Plain Flour

1tsp Almond Extract

30g Flaked Almonds

Raspberry or Cherry Jam

Your first job is to make the pastry. Begin by measuring the flour and butter into a bowl and rubbing between your fingertips until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. Stir in the sugar and finally add the egg yolks, mixing until the ingredients form a soft dough.

On a lightly floured surface, knead the dough until smooth. Wrap in cling film and chill for around 30 minutes. 

Lightly butter the silicone tin. I don't know if this is necessary, but I'd rather err on the side of caution than have tarts that are stuck in the tin!

After 30 minutes remove the dough from the fridge. I found it easier to cut and roll out only half of the dough at a time as it is fragile. Cut out 6 circles using a 3" fluted pastry cutter. Gently lay each circle into the tin. Repeat for the other piece of dough.

You don't want to over work the dough, so try to only re use the trimmings once. Having said that my husband was a bit too heavy handed with the dough and I ended up rolling it out a few times, and it still tasted yum!

Once you've got the 12 cases, prick the surface of each with a fork and place in the fridge for another 15 minutes.

Turn your oven onto 190C/165C Fan/Gas Mark 5

Whilst the cases are chilling, you can make a start on the filling. 

Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Gradually add the eggs, making sure to beat well in between to stop the dreaded curdle! 

Turn the mixer to the lowest setting and mix in the ground almonds, followed by the plain flour. And finally the almond extract.

If you want to jazz it up a little spread a small spoon of jam into the pastry cases before filling with the frangipane mixture

Grab the cases from the fridge and divide your mixture between each case. I used a spoon to spread the mixture around the cases to ensure they were evenly filled.

Scatter the flaked almonds over the top, or if you're a bit OCD place them prettily :D

Bake in the oven for around 15 minutes. The frangipane should be golden and springy to the touch. Leave to cool on a wire rack. 

YUM!

Enjoy!

As a thank you for sticking with me and hopefully enjoying my cakes, I've got a lovely reward. I have some great prizes for 3 lucky winners.

You could win. A 6" Rose Pink ceramic Cake stand or one of the 2 Magic Decor lace moulds (2 patterns) with some Magic Lace mix.

So how do you win?!

All you have to do is share, like and comment on the photo I'll be uploading to Facebook of my Cake International entry. 

Terms

1 - Each share, and like will get you 1 entry into the competition. You will get 1 entry for your first comment, and no further entries for any extra comments. So if you do all 3, you get 3 entries. 

2 - Please ensure you set the privacy on your share to public. If I cannot see it, then it won't count..... as I cannot see it lol

3 - Competition closes at Midnight on the 19th of November. (GMT)

4 - Winners will be announced on my Facebook page on the 20th of November.

5 - Winners will have 72 hours to claim their prize, before the prize is offered to another person.

6- Winners will be chosen at random.

This weekend I will have had my very first trip to Cake International at the Birmingham NEC. And my first time (well duh) entering their competitions. 

So I thought it would be nice to take photos of my progress as I go, so I can look back and remember it, hopefully fondly lol. I hope you enjoy this ramble through my design and creation process :)

I'm entering the Wedding Cake category. Meant to be doing 2 entries, but admitted defeat and have scaled down to the one.... darn, must stop thinking I can do more than I can! 

Right, so onto the cake. I had to design one and the first thing that popped into my head was a Hidden Scene cake with a Parisian theme. Me and my hubby are going away for our extremely late honeymoon to Paris this winter, so it's a Wintery Parisian theme!

Some early notes and sketches. (If you can read my handwriting, you get a pat on the back :p)

So I've got the main idea of my cake down. It's just a case of trying to get that vision into icing, which I usually find quite hard as the rules change a lot, what works on paper may not work in 3D.

I'd decided I wanted my cake to have a White, Grey and Purple theme. After mulling it over, I decided to remove the purple from the front of the cake, as I don't think it'll have as much impact. So went with predominately white, with hints of grey in the flowers and grey ribbon.

The first thing I started on was the flowers. Here's one of the bouquets.

I was going to have 2 of the tiers iced in grey as well, but when I went to test the flower positions on the cake, I actually really liked it all in white! So I did a quick photoshop on it, to see what it would look like grey. 

Still prefer the white. Although the grey is growing on me a bit. I thought it'd probably be an idea to check the ribbon, to see if that added enough grey to it.

Here's the flower position check, in which I was happy with the original idea of having the flowers between the top two cakes. Even if they're on opposite sides from the drawing lol

Today I made a mess....I am very good at mess. If I wasn't a cake decorator I would be a mess maker. On the plus side, I have now iced the 4 cakes and the board!

 Not content with just making a mess in the kitchen, where the floor was very sticky >.> whoops. I also made a mess on my desk. I spent an hour cutting out my template for the Eiffel Tower I plan to make tomorrow. Hoping it's not as useful as a chocolate tea pot and carving up my finger in the process wasn't a wasted effort... we shall see!

Do you see all the little triangles?.... they're everywhere >.> Sorry I'm waffling. Here are some photos! :D

Here's one of the Eiffel pieces. I decided to split them, so that I could fit them around the cake. Unfortunately, I had to start rushing, so the finish isn't very good... booo. Also had plans to make it 3D, but then when I put it against the cake there wasn't enough room.... or time!

The Eiffel on the cake! Showing off its leaning tower of Pisa'ness

Hand painted. I've also added in stars using pearl lustre paints, a banner that says "Veux-tu m'epouser?" or "Will you marry me?", added some dark purple skyline and a few flower bunches. 

Here I'm testing out the size and placement of my petites gens (little people.)

I prefer this pose with the man proposing as it's more in keeping with the banner.

Andddd...... here it is finished. 

Here's my cake! It won a bronze. Planning to go back next year and see if I can beat that :D

If you're wondering why I got a Bronze and not say Best in Show (I kid) then the reasoning was the finish. There were a lot of little defects with the finish on this cake. I had a major rush to get it finished. Dropped it and buckled the board, which I managed to get back in place without major disaster, but it did leave a crack. 

Will I learn for next time? I would hope, but unfortunately, even though I had planned for this to be my sole work for an entire month, I either felt guilty and took on orders or just cool stuff I can't tell you about yet happened.... haha. Sorry! Wish I could. 

So I'll be entering next year in London, CI has set me a challenge and I will beat it :D Maybe see you there?

Oh and Congratulations to everyone that entered and to those that won or placed. 

Much love,

I've not written a guide or how to in ages! Sorry. I shall make amends now, with hopefully something that will be pleasing!

I recently went to a professional photographer to take some photos of my work. Before this I was always of the impression that my cake should do the talking, and not be surrounded by props, as who wants to see props?! they want cake... right? That's not to say I didn't admire other peoples work, such as Carina's Cupcakes for her use of tea cups and bits and bobs, which she's been doing for a good few years now to enhance and compliment her cupcakes! And Cotton & Crumbs, who's photos look so darn appealing! I want to get married again lol. 

But the photoshoot totally inspired me to have a go at setting a stage for my cakes, instead of just photographing them on a plain background. 

So I've spent the last week or so, popping into various shops to find the bits and bobs I need for my photos.

Here's my first ever prop based photo shoot. With me behind the camera! I'm in love!

The first bit of advice I can give you, is to learn how to use your camera. That is extremely important. I went to the local college and did a 7 week evening class to learn how to use my DSLR. Without that knowledge I would have to rely on the auto function to take photos, which leaves so much to chance! 

Next is finding the backdrop. I went to the local DIY store and grabbed some samples of wall paper. Mainly to test which ones would look good in a photo. You don't want anything too busy that will distract from your work, and it also has to take the light well. I love this one by Graham & Brown (Damask Ivory), which I purchased from B&Q.

You also want to look at the "floor" for your set. I've been looking at some photography backdrops, but they're pretty expensive. So whilst at B&Q I had a look at their flooring. I picked up a pack of vinyl flooring in bleached wood for under £11. (syrinx flooring).

I've got some foam boards from Hobbycraft, which I had been using previously as the floor and background for my photos. But out with the white and boring! I've stuck the wallpaper to one of them, using tape and then using the self adhesive on the flooring, added 4 planks to the other! So I now have a sturdy floor and backdrop for my photos. 

I use a small coffee table for the base and a slightly taller table, or even the back of a chair to prop up the background.

Right, so we now have the background. Now to put the pretty stuff in it! And for that you need pretty things! Try to find things that compliment your work without overpowering it.

I've spent a fair amount of time visiting small independent gift and house ware shops, charity shops, trawling ebay and the internet, and visiting local fairs. 

For this shoot I'm photographing the Lace and pearls Cupcakes, for next years class. (Details here). I wanted a vintage feel to the photo, so I looked out for glass bottles and pearls from local fairs and charity shops. The cute little cake forks were found on ebid. The wooden boxes were by Sass & Belle. The glass bottles can be found here. The pearls were from various charity shops, well worth a look in your local ones. 

My husband is becoming exasperated with the amount of little bits and pieces I keep bringing home >.> Whoops. 

And now its time to play. Lay out your set and take a photo. I had my camera on a tripod, so that the shot would remain the same even if I was playing around with the things in it. If the photo looks good on the first take, then you're amazing, if like me you think the balance is off. Ie there's too much on one side of the photo, or there's something missing, then carry on playing and snapping away until you've got the composition right.

Next, if you know how to play with the manual setting on your camera, you should start adjusting the settings until the lighting is just right. It was hammering down with rain when I took this, but because I could play with the amount of light the camera was letting in, I could make it look like it wasn't a dull wet Tuesday! So again, well worth spending a few quid and learning how to use your camera! 

From this... wet Tuesday

...to this lovely bright day. And all I had changed was the shutter speed on my camera. There were no lights on, except the sun hidden behind copious clouds and rain! There is also no editing on this photo, this is how it came out of the camera.

Big difference, huh? Here's another photo from today. The first using the cameras "auto" function, where you camera does everything for you.

And here with me controlling the camera....

and the final photo, edited and ready to post online to promote this years Christmas Cupcake Class (details here)

Christmas garland, holly leaves, berries and fat quarters as napkins from Hobbycraft. Milk bottles and straws, The Sweet Hostess. Plates from Homesense. Cute forks from Paisley Cat LTD.

So I think writing this has made me realise 2 things. One I think I need to write a blog on the basics of learning the dreaded manual function on your camera. And 2 maybe a bit of photoshop editing, so you can learn to crop out your sofa and door frame.... haha.

I hope you enjoyed this. If you have any questions please ask!

First up Happy 30th Birthday to my gorgeous husband, Mr B. This cake was for him and he watched me struggle on with it, whilst I pretended it was for a customer :D Pulled it off!

So, I get asked a lot "How do you make your cakes perfect?" or "wow your cakes look so perfect, I wish mine were". I'll let you in on a little secret, that I've touched on before, they're not!

I'm sure you're sitting there scoffing, going "oh yea, another porkie to make us mortals feel better about the lumps and bumps". Well I thought instead of words I would show you. To prove that even cake artists that you may aspire to be (be cool if someone aspired to be me lol) are human too. They make mistakes, they scuff the icing with the smoother and make a big dent, they get tears in the icing, their cakes aren't level or the sides are a bit squiffy.

The art is drawing the eye away from these little bugger ups. I make a lot, I am extremely clumsy, and this darn heat is making my life covering cakes very hard. I've even got to the point where I'm thinking of packing it in until the people that make icing get their behinds in gear and start making good sugarpaste again! We'll save that moan for another day lol.

I sometimes look at a cake and think "what on earth am I going to do to this to make it good? I've totally ruined it" woah is me, and in the words of the Wee Free Men "Waily, waily, waily!!" But somehow I always pull it off, probably because my real skill is in decoration rather than perfect bases.

Right, so the proof. Here is without doubt THE worst cake I've ever iced. If it could go wrong, it would go wrong. And because of that I got upset and made even more mistakes.

The bottom by comparison looks amazing, but look at the dents and dinks. And the bulges >< And the awful cut edge. Oh man this is embarrassing!!

The top? What can I say? Except ARRGGHHH! I iced it, because its so tall and the icing is so soft (again this is for another rant, another day) the icing decided to pool at the bottom, so it got wider as it went down. Me no likey! So I decided to shave it off...... what was I thinking? Err, apparantely I wasn't. Never done that before, and never will again *see the next photo for the omg you did what?*. Call it crazy desperation. Oh and then there's the hole that appeared because the icing had small dry bits of icing stuck in it (i hate this icing!!). It opened up and then started to grow and bulge. I smoothed it back in. Went away and then came back to find it gaping as it made a run for it. So I smoothed it and went away. Came back, and its still trying to escape my wrath (probably). So I stuck my finger in it and squashed the git. Made me feel better at least. It stayed put for a few hours then off it went again. So by this point I was in a right huff. Decided to pull it off and re ice it!

The plan was to re ice the bottom tier with brown paste, so I wasn't that worried about the awful base. And air brush the top cake blue. Has anyone tried icing a cake with blue icing, its a nightmare!! 

So here it is, after I'd started decorating it. In this photo I had stripped the icing from the top cake, patched up the poor crumbcoat with the buttercream from the cake (I had none spare) and double iced the bottom tier with a layer of chocolate paste. And my has that totally ugly cake wreck of a cake started looking better!

And finished. Phew. I think I pulled it off!

Another example of my utterly flawless finish (lol) on cakes.

 This cake was to become the pineapple on the SpongeBob Squarepants cake. Again having problems with stupidly soft icing, that for some reason was not taking the colour. I kept finding blobs of neat colouring in it! Again had to double ice this one to fix the "omg what is that?" from the first covering. 

And here it is when finished.

So I think proof that even a bad start can turn out well :) and that even people you look up to can and do make mistakes. In fact a few lovely ladies I share a group with on Facebook are all bemoaning their icing, all finding it full of air bubbles, ripping when they get it on the cake or tearing. And these are people I look up to! So it really does happen to us all.

If you're wondering, no I don't edit my photos to remove any mistakes. I only fix the lighting and crop them. 

Since I started my business I've missed a lot of orders because the reaction to my price has been "How much?!!!". Lately it has been weighing on me a little (read that as an awful lot), and making me feel a bit down. So I wanted to clarify why my prices are as they are.

This is by no means an attack on anyone that has had a quote from me, I completely understand why people would feel the price is too high. It would be for me too, if I'm honest! There's nothing wrong with buying a supermarket cake, some of them are pretty cool! 

Asda Angry Birds cake. £10. 

Tesco Disney Princess cake. £10.

But I'm not a supermarket, its just me. I have to cover my basic costs and then have a small amount of "profit" to make it worthwhile. Otherwise what is the point?

Yes, I make cakes for the love of it. I really do love the looks on peoples faces when they see their edible work of art. And yes I love designing and creating those cakes too. I love getting lovely feedback on my facebook page, from friends and random strangers who see my cakes. But, and this is a big but, I simply cannot live on love. Love doesn't buy me new shoes or a chocolate bar and until Tesco accept it as a currency, I'm afraid its got to be money.

So to start with I spend a minimum of 1 days work on each cake. And that is for the most simple designs, which still take time to bake, cool, crumbcoat, ice, and finally decorate. Granted I get to sit on my bum and do some me stuff whilst it's baking and cooling.... well except for the fact I would then have a mountain of washing up to clean and dry, and the sides to clean so that no trace of raw cake mix or raw egg will contaminate the cooked cake. 

How much would you charge/pay for this cake? (6" Chocolate Fudge)

For the more complex designs, say Angry Birds or a Gruffalo cake, I spend about a day and a half of solid decoration, so that's on top of the baking, cooling, crumbcoating, icing and clearing up. So we're now up to 2.5 days work, sometimes more. I have spent 3 days on some cakes in the past.

How much would you charge/pay for this cake? 6" and 4".

Now look at the prices I charge and work out if say £80 is really too much money? This is just a general example, but lets say the cake ingredients, box, board, ribbon and icing cost £29.

Butter, Sugar, Flour, Eggs and Vanilla Extract @£9.71

Butter, Icing Sugar, Vanilla Extract, Jam @ £4.33

Box, Board, Ribbon @ £3.30

Icing, Tylo, Colourings @ £4.61

Electricity, Water, Gas @Urrr.. £6   (this is a guesstimation, using water in a dishwasher and a sink of washing up, running 2 ovens for 1.5 hours each, and around the same amount of gas.  I could be totally wrong with this!)

Cleaning Products, dishwasher tabs, washing up liquid, washing machine liquid, Kitchen roll @ £1.05p

That's £51 to cover 2.5 days work I've just done. I tend to work from 10am -5-6pm. So we'll say I do 6 hours a day.

6 x 2.5 = 15 hours

51.51/15 = £3.43 an hour. 

So we get to £3.43 an hour. Do you think that sounds like a lot? It actually makes me even more depressed, that my time is valued at something so tiny.

But we still come back to the problem of £80 being too much for a cake. There are other bakers out there that will do it for less, they obviously value their time even less than I do! Or they work so fast it only takes them 20 mins to decorate. For me I prefer spending more time, so the cake can be as good as I can get it, and not a rushed job. Maybe I'm at fault here, should I drop my standards (or just speed up in general XD), so I can knock out cakes quicker? Or should I stay true to myself and my art and keep doing what I think is right?.

So if you're thinking of choosing me to make a cake, but looking at my prices and your eyes are hanging out on stalks, please please take this into account. Yes I may be way more expensive than you were expecting, but I hope you can see from my cakes that I put so much time and effort in that the price is a little more justified. 

In closing, if I were to pay myself minimum wage, that £80 cake would now be, wait for it.... £121.34! I can dream, and in that dream world people would be happy to pay it, in reality I think I'd just not be getting any orders XD

Ok that wasn't really in closing, I've got something else to say XD

In any business where people make hand crafted gifts or items, they rarely take into account their own time and effort when pricing their wares. A friend made a hand crafted gift, which she charged £15 for. And then spent at least 5 hours making it. Yet would the buyer pay her for such a small token gift, if she actually charged for her time? Probably not. It's a sad state of affairs, and it makes me wish I was back in Victorian England, where the prices were high because there was no cheapie mass produced alternative, making honest hard working people look like they're trying to rip you off. :( But those hand crafted items still exist today. Of course my cake will be eaten and forgotten, but maybe it'll have happy memories that last you a lifetime, after all its a one off special cake just for you!

Yesterday I had another one to one, but this time with two. So a one to two class :D Charlie and Lindsay came to visit to learn how to ice and stack a 2 tier cake.

Here they are, Lindsay on the left and Charlie on the right.

After learning to bake a cake in the morning, they went on to preparing my blue peter "here's one I made earlier" cakes. Filling and then crumbcoating.

Then it was on to a spot of relaxing (haha I kid) Rose making. 

Covering and stacking.

And then we have the puuurty cakes they made. Very elegant me thinks!

Here's Charlie's Cake

And Lindsay's

I hope everyone is having a lovely day. I'm doing housework.... ya boo sucks!

If you'd like to come to one of my one to one classes, or even two to one (you save a bit of money) then get in touch.

It's sunny outside, and guess where I spent my day?... you guessed it in the kitchen. And I'm going to be there for the next 2 days as well. Who wants to bet it'll rain on Tuesday? hah!

Right onto the real reason I'm blogging again. I hope you're not all bored by now :p

I had another visitor to the kitchen today, Adie. Here he is mixing up his cake batter. 

Getting a perfect level cut with no tools except those handy knuckles.

And his crumbcoated cake of yummieness.

After learning to stack his cake, it was time for some decoration. He had no idea this morning we would even be decorating a cake, so this was a bit of an ad hoc design, that I came up with after a bit of googling who on earth Ben and Holly actually were! Here's the work in progress....

And TA-Dah! Awesome cake, for his little girl Kaycee. 

If you'd like to come to one of my one to one classes, where you control the subject email [email protected]

Priced from £80 per student.

One to one classes dates available, please email [email protected]

Another day in the kitchen for me today, and today I had another visitor. I've spent the morning with April, helping her learn to crumbcoat and ice a cake. I seem to only have photos of the start and then the finish, oh and her hands. So they kinda have to go in the blog! Famous hands! Woo

April started the day with 2 cakes, a block of butter, some icing sugar and some icing. And learnt how to make the fluffy buttercream she used to fill and crumbcoat her cake. So here's the cake crumbcoated, it's her first time, as she had never heard of a crumbcoat before... and look at it! 

The magic hands that created the cake. 

(it's a slow news day :p) Also say hi to the lettuce in the window :D

And finally her cake.

Unfortunately lettuce was harmed during the making of this class. We had a nice salad XD

I'm off to spend an afternoon in the garden.

I spent the day with Jude from Jude's Cakes making Sugarcraft Roses, Peonies, Hydrangeas and a Calla Lily. A very busy day, and I'm now baking cakes for this weeks orders and for a one to one tomorrow morning. 

Enough of my waffles, here are Jude's flowers sitting on one of my dummy cakes. I think she did a fabulous job :)

And my second blog in a matter of days! I've been working on an Angry Birds Star Wars cake this weekend. I did my first Angry Birds cake at the beginning of 2012, and it was the first cake where I went a bit crazy with the decorations and used the entire cake to tell a story rather than just sticking a few models on it and calling it done. So it was super awesome when I had a request from Samantha to create a new design for her son.

The cake itself is a 6" and 4" round, I decided that even though my bespoke cakes are around 4-4.5" tall per tier, that just wouldn't be enough. This cake had to have the height to make it grand. So I've ended up with a 5-5.5" tall per tier cake, and it just doesn't look so wee anymore. It's a big cake in it's own right..... well done little cakie!

Here he is,... yes it's a boy cake.

Whilst trying to sleep on Saturday I was mentally planning the steps to creating this cake. Normally I would have iced the board and then started decorating, but this cake involves a lot of painting, so I decided to paint it, dowel, ice the board and then stack. 

Colours..

... yay!

So here's the bottom tier painted. I used Sugarflair Petal Blue and White. Popped them in a small dish, added some revitaliser spirit and then went nuts with the paintbrush. I let the colours mingle to give it the variations you can see.

Ok, so here's a mini guide to doweling your cake. I'll let you into a secret, I don't think any of my cakes have ever been level. It's not my forte sadly. But hey, I make up for it with the pretty things I stick on! :D So if you're sitting there lamenting the fact my cakes are "perfect" and yours aren't, don't! You just don't notice the wonky bits, much the same as I probably wouldn't notice yours. So stop beating yourself up... ahem. Right onto the doweling.

So take your cake, use a cake board/drum that is the same size as the next tier up and place it centrally or towards the back of the tier (I do this if I have a lot of decorations to go on the front of the cake) 

When you're happy with the placement, use a scribe tool or pin to mark the edge of the circle, so you know where to place the cake and where to dowel.... and yes I know that looks off centre in the photo :p

Place your dowels at equal distances apart around the middle of the cake. I usually aim for an inch and a bit inside the edge of the scribed line. For larger cakes, or cakes that have more tiers use more dowels.

Use an edible pen to mark out the height of each dowel just above the surface of the icing. Pull out the dowels and trim them to the length of the longest dowel. I use a pair of scissors to score the dowel and then snap it.

Push the dowels back into the holes you created when testing the length needed.

Next up was icing the board. I often ice the boards after icing the cake as it saves having pre iced boards hanging around awaiting their new masters. To do this I roll out a long thin sausage of paste. Cut one edge nice and straight. Paint water onto the board and then lift the paste and gently feed the straight cut edge around the cake. When you get to the back trim  the excess paste away and smooth the join.

I use packet royal icing sugar to stack cakes. So just add a bit of water to the powdered sugar and you're ready to roll. Smear it over the top of the cake, but make sure you keep it well away from the score line, so that if it does spread it won't pop out the sides and ruin your cake!

Now for the bit I hate. Lifting the second cake and placing it on top, without a, knocking and denting the bottom tier, b, dropping the cake, c, leaving a mess because I've put it in the wrong place, d, buckling the icing as I lift it or put it down e, the list is endless. Always fills me with dread, I'm a butter fingers!

Woo we have a tiered cake!

Next job is the decorations. Now I always start with the background stuff first, then work my way to the important bits. I usually start at the bottom and work my way up to the top. So here's the cake with some of the rocks and ice blocks that are a feature in the game. I decided to add them in, so that the environment isn't flat. The cake is lovely as it is, but it needs stuff to make it pop!

*cough* slightly wonky side on the top tier. See I'm not perfect :p This was caused by trying to ice a cake that was perfectly straight in the crazy heat we had on Saturday. Everything was meeeeelting~ inlcuding me

So that's the background stuff done, now onto the important stuff. The reason I'm making this cake. Again I started with the props they need, so for the Angry Birds its the fort and catapult. Although you'll have to wait for the catapult as it was drying before I glued it on :D

Once I saw the composition of the cake, I knew how many models I needed to balance the design. Think of composition like balancing weights, if all of your detail is on one side the balance is shifted, so try to evenly place your work, so that no areas look bare. Finally I made the 3 birds, 3 piggies and added the ribbon. 

And we have a finished cake! 

Happy birthday Hayden!

Hi friends. 

I thought it would be nice to chronicle my cakes as I make them, so you could see the stages I go through until the cake is finished.

Today's cake was a big challenge for me. My first cake using scaffolding to hold the cake in place. And I've got to thank my mum and dad for their help building it! 

The scaffolding is half a 9" loose bottomed cake tin, with the edges covered in plastic tubing as it was very sharp. Then a standard wooden dowel through the centre. 

So we start off with a yummy 9" Dairy Free Vanilla Sponge. 

Because the cake is going to be standing on its side I couldn't cut the cake in half through the sides for fear of it peeling apart once erected. The other reason was it would be hard for the customer to portion out their cake.

So here's the cake cut

I've covered the stand in cling film to make it food safe. Now it's time to start stacking and filling the slices of cake!

We have a cake standing on its side! YAY! Seriously I was very very nervous about this. Would the stand work and hold the weight? Would the cake flop over? It stayed standing! Whoop! The only flaw in my plan is that the cake tin at the bottom was wider than the cake at the top. So I didn't end up with a perfect circle when iced. But hey, I can learn from that.

So the next job is to crumbcoat and chill it ready for it's coat of icing and decorations! I did have a few problems with this. The dairy free buttercream was very soft. I'm used to working with butter that's really stiff, so holds its shape. I've since learnt you can add Trex to it to stiffen it a bit. 

Now it's time to ice the cake. And oh man did I have issues. Which surprisingly wasn't because the paste was ripping from the height of the cake, but because the buttercream underneath was refusing to stay put. 

You'll also notice the non round shape left from the cake tin support. It's annoying me! But not much I could do by then.

Unfortunately this is where my little photo journal ends as by this point I was waaaaay behind, so just had to crack on with the decorations and get the cake finished, so I could start on another order and prepare for a fully booked double cake class..... can I sleep yet?

So here's the finished cake. I hope you like it and I hope this little journal helps you to understand how this cake was created :)

I reckon it's about time for a competition. I've not done one in a long old time, and since Christmas is coming up, I'm sure you'd like to win some cake goodies!

 Your favourite Christmas cake.

- Hobby bakers. *

- Professional bakers. **

The prizes! (if you'd like to donate a prize please drop me an email [email protected])

The winner of the Hobby baker category will win a Blossom Sugarart Veiner and Cutter, a Rose silicone mould, cupcake cases and a pot of sprinkles.  OR a £30 voucher for a cupcake class at Make Me It Said (www.MakeMeItSaid.co.uk)

The winner of the Professional bakers category will win a Blossom Sugarart Veiner and Cutter, a set of 4" deep round cake dummies (10", 8", 6") OR a 5 tier clear cupcake stand OR a £30 voucher for a cupcake class at Make Me It Said (www.MakeMeItSaid.co.uk)

The rules.

1. All cakes must be made by the entrant. 

2. Please state whether you bake for fun or as a business. (I will check)

3. You may enter a cake, cupcake, cake pop, mini cake.... basically a cake of some description!

4. Please like my page and share with your friends.

5. My decision is final. Please don't try to brow beat me into changing my mind. I also don't want to hear any sob stories. All entries will be judged on merit.

6. The competition is open to anyone in the world, however if you win a prize and do not live in the UK you will be asked to pay for postage.

7. Entries must be sent to [email protected] or posted on my facebook page www.facebook.com/yellowbeecakecompany

8. The competition closes on the 25th of December. Entries must be received before 23.59pm on the 25th. Any entry after this time will be disqualified.

9. Finalists for each category will be posted on the 27th of December on this blog and on my facebook page.

10. Winners will be announced on the 29th of December.

11. Winners will have until the 5th of January to respond to messages requesting their address. If they do not respond another winner will be chosen.

* A hobby baker is someone that bakes for friends and family and does not make money from their cakes. 

So, you've got an order. What now?! What's the best way to keep a track of orders? What do I do if someone is wanting to order something 2 years away and my diary only goes up to Jan 2013?! Arrgggh!

Well thanks to Mr B, who kept bugging me to use google docs, I've got the answer.

The benefits of google docs/drive is that I can write up an order, send my customer the link, and they can have a read and I can make amendments in real time, allowing them to click refresh and see everything as it should be. It also means I've got a copy of everything I need related to that customer in one handy place. Ie not on my desk in a mountain of paper work that never seems to go away! (I'd take a photo, but it's pretty embarrassing lol)

Now I'm not suggesting you all have to switch to using google docs/drive, but it is how I sort out my orders, so the technical stuff in this blog will all be about that side of things. Whereas the non technical bits, ie my order confirmation forms can be used in whatever means you see fit :)

To begin with you need to set up a filing system. If you like to kick it old school you could use one of these... 

It's so cute, I feel the need to have one!

...or a folder etc, to store your paperwork in. If you like to be friendly to the trees, then you can use a computer program to track your orders, word/office or do as I do and use google docs.

I've set my files up, so that it's split into monthly folders. As soon as I get an order through I make a new document and place it into the correct monthly folder. To begin with the order might be a bit vague, as often the customer might just want a Peppa Pig cake, but not sure how big, flavours, writing etc. I add these details as soon as the customer let's me know.

At the end of the month, I check through all orders for the next month and write them into my diary. I'll also check inventory of the boxes, boards, ribbons and icing etc I currently have and place orders, if needed, for supplies for the following month.

So here's a copy of my order confirmation form. 

Business Name Order Confirmation Your Name Address Phone Number Email Address Customer name: email: Phone: Address: Delivery Date: Description: Details: cake size/flavours: design description: As agreed the cost of the cake is £. A deposit of £ by  and the remaining balance of £ to be paid upon delivery/collection. Payment can be made via bank transfer, cheque, paypal or cash on collection. Please note I can only accept cash upon delivery, if you would like to pay via another method please do so a minimum of 3 days before delivery. Paypal Add your details here Bank Details Cheque’s

Each order is filed underneath the customers name (Order Confirmation - Vicky Turner). As soon as they pay the deposit the name of the document changes to reflect this by adding DP (Deposit Paid) or FP (Fully Paid). For instance "Order Confirmation - Vicky Turner FP) Once the order is baked I add on a second page which lists details of the cake, see below.

Ingredients and Accountability. Date Baked Eggs BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date Flour BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date Margarine/Butter BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date Chocolate BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date Cocoa BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date Dairy BBE/Use By                                                      Batch Number Purchased From/date

This is an essential part of baking. If a customer were to get sick your EHO would ask to see records of your ingredients. It is your back up, if the root of the sickness was found to be from the source, ie the eggs were contaminated on the production line, you would be safe guarding your business by having proof the illness was not caused by you.

Once the order is delivered and paid for the file changes to "Order Confirmation - Vicky Turner COMPLETE". 

Crikey, it's been a bit long since my last blog post! Since it's been so long and I've now got a new business name, I thought I would make a new Mrs B. So here I am, *Hi!*

I was just in the kitchen and had a random thought, whilst adding the eggs to the cake mix, about how I started out as a business. I'm sure a lot of you have already read my guides to starting up your own business, so I would hope you have an idea of the steps you need to take, but I never touched upon how to actually get going once all the forms and paperwork are done, where do you go from there?.... so todays blog is about cheese... no ok, it's about how to actually get started, finding yourself a customer or two and how to price your work.

So I've got about 60 minutes to write this whilst my Vanilla cake is doing its merry dance in the oven. I'm sure it won't take me that long, but I do love to waffle, so you never know :p

A free cake isn't good, a good cake isn't free. Although I have to say it's pretty good for a freebie!

Firstly I wanted to talk from personal experience about how I started. My situation will be a little different from a lot of yours as I had only recently moved into a new town, so had no friends to make cakes for as they're all back in Southampton.... *waves, miss you all*. So I offered my cakes for free,.. yes free... (must have been mad!), on the local freecycle group. Within 10 minutes of posting my inbox was flooded with people requesting their free cake! I ended up deleting the post after the 10 minutes as I was in danger of working myself to an early grave and getting in serious debt with Tesco for all the ingredients I would have needed! 

At the time I was convinced that those people getting free cake would tell their friends about the new baker and I would get some orders from it. It didn't work. I guess people who want free cake, want free cake for life? As the only repeat "business" I got was from them asking for another free cake! It wasn't without merit though as it did give me enough orders that I could boost my portfolio and hopefully entice some paying customers to my web of sticky cakes. 

Anyone for free cake?

I remember at one point someone asking for a second free cake and I said I would do it for £13 (8" cake decorated with a theme) and told it was too much... lol. Oh well we live and learn.

Onto my next brainwave.... summer fetes! That'll be a sure-fire way to get my cakes eaten and enjoyed, and then some orders. Wooo! I spent a day baking up a storm of cupcakes. Bought some of those little plastic pods and stuck my business details on them. Delivered them to the cake table as they were a donation. My thought was that yes I would lose money, but I would gain some exposure, so that was worth it..... WRONG! I walked past the tent about 5 times and saw that none of my cakes were being eaten, I was gutted. I ended up walking past a few more times and got so depressed I left. And lo and behold, didn't hear a single peep from anyone wanting to order a cake.

Man, this is hard work! I just want to get some orders. Why won't anyone order from me? I'm sure most of you have either had or currently having that very thought! 

The next thing I tried was a Christmas Market. Another massive fail. I was told the foot fall would be in the thousand region and that last year the stall holders were selling out of things. The doors opened and a trickle of people moseyed in to the hand crafted fair, and most of them spent their entire time around the handbag stall that was selling manufactured bags. I had one of the best stalls there from my perspective. I was right by the front door, so they walked in and saw my stand, but instead they shuffled around the side and ended up on my stall last, AFTER they had been by the tea and cakes offered by the venue. I ended up coming home with over 50 cupcakes. The stall had cost me £30, so massive loss and a very disillusioned Mrs B!

When the whole debacle about my business name came about I was all ready to toss in the towel. What was the point of having a business if the orders were trickling in at a snails pace? So I took a few months off and licked my wounds. 

And then something magic happened, the Angry Birds cake. I think my most popular cake to date and the one that has propelled my business into... well a business! 

The cake that got the cake ball rolling.

From that one cake I ended up getting a lot of people requesting quotes. However I don't believe that is the sole reason I'm for the first time closing my books until the new year. So I thought I would share with you some of the things I've picked up over the last year.

1. If you're doing cakes for friends and family try to do something out of the box. Always try to increase your skills, for instance try a carved cake. This is a really great way to show potential customers you're more than a one trick pony and to gain more knowledge. 

2. Use the local facebay groups to promote your cakes. They're like eBay for facebook.

3. If you think a cake will look good in your portfolio and get you extra trade then offer it at a discount. This ensures you get the order and hopefully will get you noticed in the area. I did this with the Angry Birds cake. 

4. If noone is ordering cakes try making some dummy cakes to entice them to.

5. If you work or your partner does, see if you can use the staff noticeboard.

6. Find out if there are any boutiques or wedding dress shops that will have your work in their window or on their displays. 

7. Send your work into the readers sections of cake magazines. You never know a potential customer might see your cake and want to order from you. All it'll cost you is a CD and the postage.

8. Finally be patient! (so important it's in bold, oh yes!) It's taken a year of being in business to finally get to the stage where people know I exist. If you really want to do this as a job, then you might have to wait for the word to eventually get round your neighbourhood. Banish those negative thoughts about closing down because no-one knows you're here. They will it takes time, and it's worth it :)

Here are some of the things I tried that I don't think worked, but might work for you.

1. Advertising in newsagents windows.

2. Offering free cakes on Freecycle. (Although it didn't get me any trade, it did boost my portfolio, so I'm still happy I did this)

3. Offering free cakes on my page. I don't think I've had a single order from anyone that has had a free cake. 

4. Markets. I know a lot of people that successfully run market stalls, it just never paid off for me. 

5. Giving cakes to charity or events. Again never heard from anyone afterwards. Does my phone work, better ring myself to check!

*ring ring* *hi is that Mrs B?*

Finally I wanted to talk about pricing. It is an extremely hard thing to gauge and will depend entirely on where abouts in the country you are and if you live in a poor of affluent area. 

I started out "selling" my cakes for free. Then within a few orders decided that was just daft, so did them for cost (that magical guesswork of a figure, how on earth do you quantify the water used? O.o). Next I doubled my costs and was selling my 8" round sponges, fully decorated for £30. There was a massive flaw there though, person A could order a sponge with just a ribbon for £30, person B could order a cake with the entire cast of the Simpsons for £30. So I was getting jipped and so was customer A, why should they pay the same and not get as much? 

So back to the drawing board/calculator I went and worked out a new method of pricing. My cakes now have a base value, ie my 8" rounds now cost £50 and that includes moderate decoration and 1 model. Anything extra adds pennies onto the cost. That way I know I'm not creating enough models to start a new colony of sugar people and not getting paid for it. 

Here's my current price structure.

Woah, Mrs B is sharing her prices. I know it's not the done thing by cakers. Mainly because you run the risk of having your local competition undercutting your prices. But hey, I would rather my customers knew where my prices start, so they don't end up wanting a cake for £13 from me (I bet the customer who turned me down at the start of this blog wishes they hadn't lol).

My advice for pricing is to look at what other people of the same skill level as you charge. If your cakes are better than mine, charge more! If they're not then charge less. If you're Peggy Porschen charge a lot! Wouldn't it be funny if she was reading this? lol. Just whatever you do, make sure you're happy with your prices.

If you're handing out quotes and never hearing a peep back, then you might be a bit too high for the market. It depends how busy you want to be. I've come to the decision I would rather do less work and get paid for my time. So my higher prices will put people off, but it's a price I'm willing to pay. There will always be someone cheaper than you. Offering their cakes at bargain prices, and they might actually be good, it might be another new starter trying to find their way in a market that's full to bursting.