Having only just moved to the area I have been really inspired by the community spirit. The way that everyone has pulled together to fight the councils plans to close our library has been nothing short of heroic. There has been a 24 hr vigil with volunteers needing flasks and snacks to keep them going. I thought that the least I could do was donate some cupcakes to give them energy in their endeavors!

Had this pic taken for Easy Living mag as they are doing a feature on me. I got the desk from my favourite antique shop on Goldbourne rd (I have been buying beautiful pieces from David for years now). I love how worn and mellow the wood is and it has lots of drawers and cupboards for all my ribbon, tissue paper and bits and pieces for making things. It never fails to inspire me looking out over my walled garden filled with splashes of red geraniums and delicate heads of lavender. This is the place I find inspiration for my recipes and fairy tales.

Jenny D is a very dear family friend. I have grown up alongside her children and she is very close to both my mum and mother in law, but despite the age gap we have always been great friends.
We have been waning to get her to visit for ages but she is at that difficult age. The one where you have elderly parents in constant need of support, grandchildren to baby sit, kids to bail out (although generally not from prison) and you still have to work for a living.
It seems fundamentally wrong that Jenny still has to work as hard as she does. She is glorious and generous and looks like she should be sipping champagne in some far flung exotic Island not looking after the elderly and infirm in both her work and her down time. She some how manages to rise above it all and look fabulous in uniform or out.
Anyway there was a window of opportunity and we grabbed it, spiriting her away from the bad influence of her children, who would have taken her to a 90s Garage night, which she would have hated. It is such a wonderful thing to be able to offer a spare room to a friend. Oh the joys of living in a house!
Cosy Mae woke bright and early and Jenny treated us to tender flaky croissants and cafe au lait chez Minkies. We then mooched around Queens Park farmers market, trying to strike up that balancing act between being friendly and not getting too involved, not when the roast has yet to go on. Then mum picked up a joint of pork for lunch.
After a long leisurely lunch marked by the popping of corks (it may only have been proseco but too be honest I prefer it to champagne anyway) I presented my cake for afternoon tea. Perhaps it was the thought of Jenny in the sun drenched tropics that inspired me to make a sticky and fruity pineapple upside down cake.

I couldn’t have been more thrilled to be asked to make my best friend Ellie’s little boy Achie’s 1st birthday cake. As I was crazy busy that weekend and I don’t like to bake vanilla sponge to far in advance I had to come up with a simple way of doing a train cake.

I decided to do one base on a nursery toy train meaning I could keep the colours pastel and not have to put in much detail. The thing that brought it to life for me was having the idea to use different kinds of sprinkles as the cargo, I think that this visually lifted the whole thing.

So having finished my last class on Saturday afternoon I made up a large quantity of victoria sponge before going to the theater. You know the drill but here it is anyway:

Cake

24 oz softened butter

24 0z granulated sugar

12 large free range eggs

4 tsps vanilla bean paste

24 oz self raising flour

Icing:

4lb icing sugar

1 lb butter

1 lb cream cheese

4 tsp vanilla essence

Packet of Party Rings

Selection of Sprinkles

I used my Kitchen Aid to do this:

Cream butter and sugar, before beating in the eggs (I did 4 at a time). Add the vanilla bean paste, followed by the self raising flour. I didn’t bother sieving as I was in a hurry! I used an old square tin I have which is 11″ by 11″ and 4″ deep. I buttered it and lightly floured it.I baked the cake in the centre of the oven at 180 degrees. It took just under an hour.

Icing:

Beat half of the icing sugar in to the softened butter, add the cream cheese followed by the remaining sugar and vanilla essence. Beat for 4-5 mins so it is light and fluffy. Divide it into four bowls and colour each one with a small amount of colour paste.

After the theater once the cake was well and truly cooled I took the plunger and cut the huge spongey square into chunks. I quickly realized that I wouldn’t need all the cake for this recipe but tis always better to have too much cake than too little. (The leftovers ended up being slathered with cream and strawberry jam for a makeshift Victoria Sponge cream tea.) I ended up with 6 carriages and one engine which I cut into shape. I left the rest for the next morning as by then it was 2am!

In the morning I got stuck in slathering delicious cream cheese icing onto each of the shapes, luckily I had some left from class so didn’t need to make anymore up. I used a variety of pastel colours and didn’t worry too much about marks from the palette knife, home made cakes should look home made and not shop bought and unless you work in fondant (which I hate) you will never get a perfectly smooth finish.

Once all the sponge was covered I arranged to pieces on some baking parchment on a large tray. I added party rings for wheels and tipped a ludicrous quantity of sprinkles on top of each carriage. I made the chimney from one of the pieces I had cut off to shape the engine. I used a wooden skewer to secure it to the engine. I bought lots of sweets to add as decorations but decided that I really liked the simplicity of it and thought the sweets would detract from it looking like a toy. I was going to make green coconut cake but decided against it. If this was a toy train then it worked better being on a brown floor board like surface.

Having had a bad night with the baby I had to do this all in double quick time to have it ready for the party at 2pm. Then I got a message from my super efficient friend to say her hubby was coming to pick me up at 1.15! Eeek!!! Just did it in time and then managed to get myself and Cosy Mae ready in about five mins flat. Was worth all the effort when both mum and dad welled up on seeing it, Archie seemed happy enough although probably a bit young to fully appreciate my efforts. Have to say I was quite pleased with the result considering the time restrictions and that I hadn’t done a train before.