Kids Cake Making Birthday Party

Jessie is a really keen baker, so for her cake making birthday party she wanted to bake her own cake from scratch! As you can see she did a fantastic job doing every step herself (with a little help from her friends) weighing, creaming, mixing & beating. She basically had her own private baking class. I then taught her how to create a stunning pastel watercolour effect on the finished cake. Whilst the cake was baking I had the opportunity to teach her and her friends and cousins how to pipe gorgeous ruffles and swirls in a kids cake class. They did a fantastic job with their cupcake decorating. Especially considering some of them were only 6yrs old! They loved the taste of the buttercream icing and cream cheese frosting in a variety of gorgeous colours. They were super excited by the huge range of sprinkles we have. The unicorn sprinkles were a big hit! The girls left the class with a good bag of their own cupcake creation to take home and share with their families. They behaved beautifully and Jessie had the best time having learnt cake decorating as well as having had her own private baking class. And she had the wonderful sense of achievement of having made her own birthday cake to take home.

Brides Magazine Live

We were thrilled to be invited by Conde Nast Brides Magazine to do a cake making workshop at their live show as they thought it would inspire their visitors to do it as a fun hen activity. . I went to host the workshop myself and I took along a small film crew who are making a little promo for us. I really wanted to give the group of 16 a taste each of our different cupcake decorating levels. So they had the opportunity to work with cream cheese icing as well as buttercream. The girls applied themselves to the cake making lesson and got some amazing results. After piping a variety of swirls and leaves they did an amazing job on their buttercream ruffles and buttercream flowers during their cake class. Some of them were really keen on booking their hen parties with us. One girl wanted to know if we could come to Oxford for her hen do and I said that as long as it was a large group we would be able to do that. At the end of the cake decorating class they were very happy with their end results and we packed every ones cakes up for them to take home and share with their families. We are really looking forward to seeing ourselves featured in Brides magazine in a couple of months.

Ruffles, Flowers and Sugarpaste Private Lesson

Rosa really wowed me with her cake decorating during her cake workshop. She had just finished her patisserie diploma in Melbourne before she came to study with me. It was a real treat to do a cake class with someone so proficient. She really wanted to focus on advanced cake decorating rather that cake making and also to learn how to make fondant and sugar-paste roses and other decorations. So I created a bespoke cake class for her to cover everything in one go. She was able to get the hang of the buttercream roses, ruffles and petals very quickly and she loved the coffee, peach and pastels colour scheme that we worked with. She was also amazed by the technique we used for piping leaves just by cutting the piping bag into an appropriate shape. She was an absolute natural at piping buttercream flowers and quickly got the hang of the fondant and sugar-paste work. All in all I was totally wowed by what she achieved. As I’m sure you are when you look at these pictures. We had such a lovely time during her private cake lesson.

Buttercream Swirls Private Class

It was hard to believe that Rebecca had never tried piping buttercream swirls when she did cake making before. She was an absolute natural! She really benefited from the focus of a private one to one cake decorating lesson. We covered the swirl piping techniques that we would do in our usual beginners cake class as well as some of the sugarpaste work we do in the full day decorating class. She absolutely loved creating the sugarpaste roses and as you can see from the photos she did a brilliant job with them. She spent time experimenting with the different fondant molds to make a variety of edible adornments including; broaches, bows and flowers. She also decided to use this cake class to experiment with two tone icing colours. I showed her a variety of different ways to get good effects without having to invest in a two channel bag (which I personally don’t think look very good anyway). We had such a great time working together and I’m looking forward to her returning to learn intermediate and advanced piping techniques at her next cupcake workshop.

Private Couples Baking Lesson

Rami Khleif

I had such a lovely morning teaching Rami and Selina the art of cookie baking. As you know there is nothing I love more than giving people baking lessons. It is always fascinating to me the different reasons people come to me to learn how to bake. Sometimes they just want to learn baking skills to treat their friends and families. I also have people come from all over the world because they want to learn to bake cookies and study cake making to set up in business. Rami has a business selling Dutch pancakes in stores in the middle east. He wanted to add cookies and ice cream to the menu and thought that I was the perfect person to teach him how to bake the perfect cookie. We made a classic American style, soft, chewy chocolate chunk style as well as a oat cookies. I showed them my secret method to ensure the chocolate stays melted even when the cookie cools down- I know impressive huh! They had a great baking lesson and were amazed by how delicious there freshly baked cookies were. She is also an instagram expert so gave me some great social media advice, which I really need to put into practice. They are such a fun couple and I really enjoyed spending time with them. I look forward to working with them again in the future. Perhaps they will come and learn cake baking so that they can extend their menu even further....

Hen Day Cake Making

What a brilliant time we had hosting a cupcake making hen party for Bhavini. It was a big group of 20 hens for the hen do, including family and friends from all over the country. They had a great, bonding time learning how to ice and decorate 8 cupcakes each. It was a great cake making ice breaking event and despite the fact that most of the girls were meeting each other for the first time there was soon a great atmosphere with everyone laughing and joking together. Most of them couldn't resist tasting their cupcakes during the class and were thrilled to discover that as they were hand made (by me) they tasted delicious. I even made some vegan versions for those with special dietary requirements. At the end of the cake workshop they were thrilled with there end results and happy to be taking home their cupcakes as well as a fantastic new skill set! All in all they loved there hen activity.

Corporate Summer Party Ideas

We Work wanted to do a fun corporate event that gave the opportunity for staff members from different buildings to get together. Needless to say we were happy to oblige with one of our cupcake decorating team events.  It was during a World Cup game and we took it as a good sign that three of the guys who were in the bar to watch it couldn't help but watch our cake workshop instead. We invited them to get involved and they had a great time- surprising themselves with the professionalism of their end results. At the end of the 1hr workshop we headed out onto the deck to capture the stunning London back drop in a pic. (We were in the London Bridge building) They were a lovely group who really enjoyed the laid back atmosphere of our company event. It was a perfect icebreaker and the group really bonded during the session.They had a fantastic time at the cake making workshop and were excited about the prospect of us returning to do the next level cake class. 

Corporate Fun Days

Rolling up at Amber Lakes we knew we were in for an amazing day of cupcake decorating fun. It is the most stunning location with a beautiful wooden building set on a picturesque lake (obvs). The organisers had created a really special day out with lots of different activities. As well as our fun cake making workshop there was; hula hooping, gin tasting, flower headdress making, glitter face paints, zorbing, beach volleyball, football and a climbing wall. As well as some fantastic food stalls including the delicious pulled beef from 'Bills', well stocked bars a live music stage and some great DJ's. Our cake class was hugely popular. Event after hosting 2two packed classes we had more people wanting to get involved. In the end we set up a 'pop up' cake decorating area whilst we packed up allowing us to teach cake decorating to an extra 20+ people. This really felt like the future of corporate away days. The company employees were clearly having the best time and thrilled to be so appreciated by their employers. 

Kate's Hen Do

What a great time Kate and her Hens had at her cake making hen do. Her mum had come all the way over from Oz with one of her oldest friends (Kate is Australian). The rest of the Hen Party where made up of stage managers from various west end shows. They did a fantastic job with their cupcake decorating creating some beautiful buttercream swirls. As you can see there was a lot of laughter between them all. As they were a small group it was a lovely intimate event and I was able to give them lots of individual attention. At the end of the cake class they couldn't help but admire their cake making achievements and were thrilled to be able to take back their beautiful cupcake creations to share with their friends and family. 

Mermaid Birthday Party

As you probably know by know I love cake decorating and there is nothing I like more than creating a cake table. They are a lot of work though so I only do them twice a year. Once for Teddy's birthday and once for Cosy's. Luckily they are six months apart which gives me plenty of time to recover! For some reason my husband always seems to be away in the lead up to Cosy's birthday which is frustrating as it's when I need him most. This year he was at his brothers stag party and didn't get back till the night before the party. That meant that as well as effectively being a working single parent for the week I had to work cake making night and day to get all the treats prepared for the cake table. When I say had to obviously I mean want to but it does always turn into a big commitment on top of everything else. This year I did a couple of things I haven't got round to before. One is I printed off some mermaid themed 'food cards' from Etsy which my talented adult daughter wrote on in calligraphy. I think this really pulled the whole look of the table together and made it look more finished. The other thing is that I set the table up and photographed it before the guests arrived to make sure I got some good picks before everything got mauled. Also, I got a pic of the mermaid birthday cake in situ before whisking it away to bring out as a surprise for the magical moment when everyone sings 'Happy Birthday'. Unfortunately the mischievous birthday girl snuck a good look at whilst I was taking the pics. Next year I may need to arrange someone to take her to the park whilst I do that. Having done all this in advance did mean that I was able to socialise a bit during the party and have a few drinks rather than my usual rushing around like a mad person. I did indulge in a couple of bottles of Corona beer and relaxed whilst the kids did a great job entertaining themselves. In fact I relaxed so much that it wasn't till everyone had left that I realised that I'd totally forgotten to do the Pinata! Still at least I didn't forget the cake! The funny thing was I had thought I was so organised, wrapping the parcel for pass the parcel (or parcel, parcel, as my kids call it) and prepping the party bags in advance. There's still always something I've overlooked!