Friday 27 March 2015

Easter Cakes and Dressing Up

It's been quite a hectic few days.  The primary school my youngest two go to are holding a bake off and an ambitions day today, and so my kitchen has been taken over by them making and decorating cakes.

L was desperate to make a chocolate brownie cake and R couldn't decide, first off he wanted to make a chocolate cake, then a marble cake, in the end he settled for a green and yellow marble cake covered in green icing, with chicks and a bunny on, and L decided to stick with the chocolate brownie cake but ice with green buttercream icing for grass, and stick her chicks and bunny on.

R went first and made a gluten free Victoria sponge using this recipe:

Ingredients:

                  225g soft butter

                  225g sugar

                  4 eggs

                 225g gluten free self raising flour

                 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum

                 A few drops of green food colouring               

Method:

              Cream your butter and sugar together, beat well.

              Add your eggs one at a time, beating well in between.

              Add your self raising flour and xanthan gum and beat well.

              Divide your mix between two bowls.

              Add the green food colouring to one bowl and mix in.

             Grease and line a round tin, and put in your mixes in blobs, then use a fork to swirl the two together, but don't let them blend to one colour.

             Bake for approximately 40 minutes on gas mark 4.


Once the cake was cooled R had a bit of help rolling out the green fondant icing, he then put a bit of jam on his cake so that the icing would stick, and we placed the fondant on top, unfortunately during cooking the cake had sunk in the middle, but as this was going to be an Easter cake, it actually worked to his advantage as he made a nest for his chicks using some mint Matchmakers and he put a Cadbury Mini Egg in the nest too.  I think it looked amazing and think it would have done well in the competition, but he got upset when he found out that the school were selling the cakes after judging them and has refused to take it in!  He ate the nest, egg and bunny last night so I'm just left with a green cake in the kitchen lol.



L went next with our tried and tested chocolate brownie recipe:

http://ow.ly/KRYxc

However things did not go to plan! 

We really didn't have time to make and decorate cakes as the only evening we have free is a Friday, but they had to be in this morning and so we had to make the cakes Wednesday straight after school, and decorate them Thursday straight after school, before the clubs.  R's cake took longer to make and cook than I had thought it would, and therefore I was only just able to put L's cake in the oven as we had to leave for her club, so I left my hubby in charge of taking it out when the oven beeped.  When we got home the cake was indeed out of the oven, however for some reason it hadn't cooked properly, when the oven beeped it wasn't cooked in the middle and so it went back in, but when the middle was just about cooked half of the outside was burnt.  We tried cutting the cake in half but L wasn't happy, so Thursday morning before school we were making another chocolate brownie cake, luckily this cake cooked properly and is the one that she has decorated and taken to school to be judged! I'm keeping my fingers crossed for her x



So sat in my kitchen along with the green cake is half an edible chocolate brownie cake and half a burnt chocolate brownie cake, I think I might feed that bit to the birds lol

On top of this they also had to decide what to wear, they had to go dressed as what they want to be when they're grown up!  Neither of them really know, L wants to be an actress, but how do you go dressed as an actress?  I suggested going as a character that an actress had played, but that's a bit too similar to dress up as a book character day, and so she has gone in her dance gear and is saying she wants to be a dancer.  R was going as a pilot, but I'm not sure what happened this morning, as he was sulking and changed into army gear by the time I was up, he was upset that they couldn't take guns into school!  I suggested going in his football gear, but he didn't want to and has gone dressed in army trousers and jacket with boots on and a belt with pouches on in which he has his water bottle and drink bottle, so I think he was happy in the end!

I'm so glad it's the Easter holidays after today (today for my eldest daughter who has a teacher training day and is off, looking forward to popping into town with her later for a coffee!)

Lupin Girl x


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