Moonlight Market – 30th Sep 2011

Oct2

It was a very windy evening on Friday so it was brilliant that there were so many visitors to the Moonlight Market at Weltevreden Farm.  Once again I was invited to have my cupcakes on display and for sale and I decided on different flavour combinations to delight my customers this time.

Strawberries and Cream Cupcakes

Strawberries and Cream Cupcakes

With strawberries being in season and so sweet now I was inspired to make a vanilla cupcake with a cream and strawberry swirl icing. With a fresh strawberry for decoration these cupcakes not only looked delicious but tasted delicious with their gorgeous strawberry aroma.  A perfect summer cupcake.

Nutella Cupcakes

Nutella Cupcakes

I have  a passion for anything with a hazelnut flavour whether it is chocolate, ice-cream or cake.  I added the Nutella spread to my icing for these chocolate cupcakes and then decorated them with an Italian hazelnut wafer biscuit.  How could these not be delectable and yes they were fighting for the last of these at the market – note to self, make more of these Nutella Cupcakes next time!

Arabica Chocolate Cupcakes

Arabica Chocolate Cupcakes

These cupcakes were also chocolate.  I experimented with the Madagascan chocolate I bought at the Good Food and Wine Show.  I melted half of the Arabica coffee flavoured dark chocolate into the icing which gave the icing a beautiful rich caramel colour.  I added a piece of chocolate to each cupcake and these too were a hit at the market.

Orange Aero Cupcakes

Orange Aero Cupcakes

Staying with different flavour chocolate, these cupcakes I decorated with a piece of Orange Aero chocolate.  This chocolate is imported and I bought it from the SuperSpar in Olivedale.   A big thank you to the manager for going out of his way to get me some when he had sold out.

Top Deck Cupcakes

Top Deck Cupcakes

These cupcakes work really well with their name as they are chocolate cupcakes with a vanilla cream icing and have a piece of top deck chocolate for decoration.  They look delightful in the black and white dotted cupcake holders.

Cappucino Chuckle Cupcakes

Cappucino Chuckle Cupcakes

Cappucino cupcakes are not new to my cupcake repertoire as they are a popular flavour.  I have found the best way to get the coffee taste and aroma to the cupcake is to add espresso powder to the icing as it flavours it and it gives the icing a natural rich coffee colour.  I added a chuckle to these for added flavour.

Summer Loving

Sep27

On Saturday we celebrated Heritage Day here in South Africa with hundreds of South Africans dusting off their braai tongs after a long winter to do the traditional South African thing and braai!  After a few weeks of gorgeous warm spring weather it turned nippy on Saturday but can’t imagine that it put a damper on any Heritage Day celebrations.  What better way to bring the South African summer sun to the party on Saturday then with these Summer Loving Cupcakes.

Cupcakes with suns, bikinis, towels & beach balls

Here Comes The Sun!

All the decorations were made from coloured sugarpaste.  I embossed the bikinis with an embossing sheet and added a small flower for detail.  The pink towels I cut out rectangular pieces from sugarpaste and then embossed them with a heart cutter.  The yellow and orange towel is my favourite and that I made using an orange rectangular piece of sugarpaste to which I added yellow flowers.  I rolled the flowers into the orange piece and the result was a really colourful beach towel.  The suns I made using 2 star shapes underneath a flattened round piece of sugarpaste.  Below they don’t have the finished eye detail but I added that with my Nicoletta pens for the finished cupcakes.   With these gorgeous colours who wouldn’t want to celebrate our gorgeous sunny South African heritage.

Summer Loving Sugarpaste Decorations

Summer Loving in Sugarpaste

 

Rose Petal Syrup Cupcakes

Sep26

Friday morning was a brilliant morning for me at the Good Food and Wine show at the Dome.  It was brilliant to visit each of the stands and see, smell and taste the beautiful food and drink on display at the show.  I sampled everything from olives to champagne and have to admit it was great fun.  As usual I was more excited to taste the sweeter samples including fudge,  chocolate and toffee but it was while sampling camembert cheese that I found this delicious Rose Petal Syrup.  La Petite France Rose Petal Syrup comes in a beautiful little jar but what a delight to sample something so fragrantly delicious.

Rose Petal Syrup (La Petite France)

Rose Petal Syrup (La Petite France)

This syrup was devine on the camembert but for me the challenge was to try the syrup on my cupcakes.  I made vanilla cupcakes  and then a cream and cream cheese icing to which I added a little of the syrup.  After I iced the cupcake with this icing I then drizzled a little of the syrup over the cupcakes.  The result as you will see is a beautiful looking cupcake with a gorgeous aroma of rose petals and they tasted as brilliant as they looked.  The petals in the syrup have a wonderful soft texture and are a real surprise to the taste buds when you bite into the icing.  

Rose Petal Syrup Cupcakes)

Rose Petal Syrup Cupcakes

Cupcakes for a Teacher

Sep26
Teacher's Cupcakes

Teacher's Cupcakes

These cupcakes were an order for a teacher who was celebrating her 70th birthday on Sunday.  I made red and green apples, books, rulers & notepaper sugarpaste decorations for these cupcakes to suit the theme.  Shaunagh surprised me with 4 different Nicoletta food colouring markers she had bought at the Good Food and Wine Show on Friday so I used these to mark the lines and to do the writing on the notepapers.  These markers make it so much easier to write on sugarpaste.  I had been painting my writing using edible colouring and a paint brush – so thanks Shaunagh these are a breeze to use.  I hope the cupcakes went down well for your friend’s birthday!

Little Boy Blue

Sep22
Baby Shower Lime & Blue

Baby Shower Lime & Blue

These are cupcakes I made a few weeks ago for a baby shower.  The colour theme was blue and lime green for a baby boy.  The stork decoration I bought from Jodees. The baby feet, bottles and baby grows  I molded from sugarpaste and the baby prams I made using circles of plastic icing cut to shape.  Wishing this client the best of luck when she has her new baby.                                                                              

Baby Shower Lime & Blue

Baby Shower Lime & Blue

 

 

 

 

 

Pistachio & Rosewater Cupcakes

Sep21
Pistachio & Rosewater Cupcakes

Pistachio & Rosewater Cupcakes

It was brilliant to have a a day off from cupcake orders yesterday and at last be able to try out a recipe from a cupcake book that Wendy gave me for my birthday – how did you guess I would be delighted with such a brilliant birthday gift Wendy?  I opted for the pistachio and rosewater cupcakes as they sounded delicious and slightly exotic.  The recipe in the book was for a flatter – more of a tart – type cake so I did adapt it to make these cupcakes.  Really easy if you want to try these at home you could just add 5ml of rosewater and 50grams crushed pistachios to your vanilla cupcake mix and then do the same to either buttercream or cream cheese icing.  They looked really pretty sprinkled with crushed pistachios.  I promised myself I would taste only one of the batch yesterday but that plan went out the window as they were too delicious to have only one so I had 2 (2nd one was just to confirm that they were as tasty as I had initailly thought).  

Half the batch went to Wendy to cheer her up after a couple of weeks of her feeling a bit ”green around the gills’.  We sat together yesterday and thanks to her blogging expertise I now have a new really fancy looking blog.  Please don’t be shy to comment on my blog or to subscribe or email me with comments or ideas.   

Thanks Wendy for all your enthusiasm and help with my blog and thanks to all my followers – I am so chuffed to have reached the 4000 hits mark!