Cake pics and dinner at Gambaro's

My blog has sadly been neglected the last few months. I'd like to say it's because I've been busy, but in all honesty, I haven't been that busy at all. I've been baking but nothing too exciting. Just a few treats (bribes?) for my parents and their employees in exchange for work on my car. I did make a pretty cute cake for my husband as a Valentines Day treat, but I intended to take photos step by step and completely forgot about it.

Chocolate cake with a cute
 little pink heart hidden inside

But now we're in March and this weekend saw the birthday of my gorgeous, sweet sister in law. Our family did it's usual thing and went out to dinner, this time to Gambaro's in Brisbane. It's a bit of a favourite restaurant, every one seems to enjoy the menu.

Balloon bouquet for the birthday girl,
 inside one was a gift card!

Well, all except me, sadly I'm the only one in the family who isn't a seafood lover. I just wish there were a few more non-seafood options! I know it's a seafood restaurant  but there's only so much seafood I can handle. Two courses of it is too much for me, but the only non seafood choice for main is a steak. And well, I can get a steak at the pub, if you know what I mean.  A steak just doesn't seem fancy when every one else is ordering lovely, well thought out meals. I'm hoping their menu changes before we go back there again. Their old menu, which is the one on their website, had a delicious lamb dish. I know they had a smaller menu while they were renovating and now that the renovations have finished I'm crossing my fingers they go back to the larger menu. And bring back the cocktail menu too! Oh! And bring back the crepes on the dessert menu too!

After dinner we went back to my brother and sister in laws house. We are always too full after dinner to have cake, but I planned for that. I made a cake for her, and with the extra batter had whipped up a few cupcakes for mum and dad to take home. I wanted her and my brother to have enough cake to take to work or share with friends. I think her sister and two nephews were visiting today so I'm hoping she got to play the favourite auntie and spoil the nephews with lots of birthday cake!

Chocolate cake with a cherry tree with one sweet little owl.

The cake itself was chocolate and it was covered in a dark chocolate ganache. The filling was caramel, made the old fashioned way of boiling a can of condensed milk and then when cool mixing in some whipped cream. (Oh boy did I baby sit that can of condensed milk, I think I topped up the stock pot every 15mins, I was not going to have that can explode and cover my kitchen with hot sticky caramel!)

The decorations are all fondant, my local spotlight was out of white fondant so I bought a different brand from Woolworths. Which I really regret. It was super soft, sticky and a pain to work with. It sweated so much! The decorations you see are the second attempt. I had the cake all ready on Friday night, but when I woke up Saturday morning they had melted. I nearly cried! But this tree looks so much nicer than the first one so it was worth it. The owl looks nicer too, the first one looked a bit plumper and more like a cat, whereas this one is definitely owl shaped. 

Closer look at Mrs Owl

But the minute I put a lid on the cake carrier it would start to sweat again. I'm sad to say that when I gave the cake to my sister in law it had started to get a bit sticky again. The luster dust that I'd used on the flowers was no longer sparkly and it looked just a bit wet. Ugh. Not using that brand of fondant ever again. 

Luckily everyone said they couldn't tell that the fondant was sticky, but I could. Oh well, lesson learnt!

Next up is my birthday, but because it's just a few days before Easter we're going to celebrate in April instead. Just to space it all out a bit. I'll still make a cake for my husband and I to have on my birthday, but I'll make a larger one for when I family come to visit too. Plus there's Easter baking as well! I still don't know what I'll do for Easter, maybe some cake pops and a cheesecake.

Birthday Pavlova!

I'm a supply teacher so I pick up a few coughs and colds each year. A few weeks ago I was teaching a darling little prep class when one sweet child coughed in my face, it wasn't on purpose, it just happened. Unfortunately that's the risk you take when working with little kids, snot and coughs happen. But I knew right at that moment that I'd be sick within days.

Fast forward a few days and one very long week on a year five class (older classes aren't my speciality!) and it was nearing my husbands birthday. Unfortunately a few days before his birthday he woke up feeling under the weather, he'd picked up my cold. The poor thing spent his birthday home sick and feeling miserable.

Usually I'm prepared for birthdays. I love lists and generally have presents bought and wrapped weeks in advance. This time round I sort of dropped the ball. We agreed to upgrade our computers for our respective birthdays this year, but Tony still needed something to open on his birthday. So the day before I ran around to pick up a few little gifts and supplies to make his birthday dinner. 

Birthday presents (and choccies!) all wrapped and ready to go, with birthday balloons. (Photos were taken very late at night after I'd finished wrapping them, hence the dark and dodgy lighting!)

Roast pork with roasted potatoes, honey carrots and steamed greens was for dinner. To be followed by birthday pavlova instead of cake. There's a bit of a theme when it comes to Tony's birthday meals. The main meal usually includes pork of some kind (last year was brinner - breakfast for dinner, with the year before being glazed pork chops) and a birthday pie. Last year I made black forest cake from scratch, I spent a whole day on that cake! And the year before was cheesecake, but I cheated and bought that from the local cheesecake shop.

Because there's just the two of us, I halved the recipe. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of pavlova, give me cake any day. I didn't want leftovers hanging around for days in the fridge so a halved recipe was the perfect amount. We got three large slices each out of it. 

Pavlova 

Ingredients

3 egg whites

3/4 cup caster sugar

1 tsp white vingar

1/4 tab cornflour

Whipped cream and fruit to decorate. (I used 250ml cream that I whipped until soft peaks. With kiwi, strawberries and bananas to decorate)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 120 and line a baking tray with baking paper.

2. Beat egg whites until soft peaks form.

3. Gradually add sugar, one spoonful at a time. Allow mixture to beat until thick, glossy and sugar is completely dissolved. (Rub the mix between your thumb and forefinger to check for sugar granules)

4. Fold cornflour and vinegar into the sugar and egg mix. 

5. Spoon mix onto the baking paper and shape into a disc shape. Bake for 45 - 50 mins until dry to the touch. Allow to cool completely in the oven.

No matter how I make a pav, it cracks. I've tried so many different recipes. I've tried a hotter oven, a cooler oven. Starting out with a higher temp and lowering the temp. But I just can't make a pretty pavlova, but that's why you smother it in cream and fruit. Cream will hide a multitude of sins! It was also the first time I'd made pavlova using my kitchen aid. So much easier than using the little hand mixer! 

Decorated birthday pav just before the candles were lit! 

Next weekend my family is coming down for Tony's belated birthday lunch. I've got to make a second birthday cake (a traditional cake, I think there'd be an uproar if I tried to serve up cheesecake or pavlova with coffee!) I'm not sure what kind of cake I'll make. Something that will give us enough leftovers so my family can take some home! 

Tux the Penguin Cake

We're in the middle of birthday season for my family. My mother's birthday was last month and my husbands is next month. But this month it was my brother's 28th birthday. He doesn't like a lot of fuss so we usually just celebrate with a low key barbecue, but this year he suggested going out for lunch and chose a Ribs and Burger place close to where I live. After lunch my family came back to my place for cake, coffee and presents!

I'd bought my brother some Bucky Balls and a gift card. I also made him a cake. I make most of the cakes for family get togethers and birthdays. I usually stick with cupcakes, but to be honest, I'm getting sick of making cupcakes. I also couldn't find a way to decorate the cupcakes that would suit my brother. Everything thing seemed to cutesy and I didn't just want to stick with chocolate ganache as that's my usual icing.

I searched through my recipe books for a cake and saw the penguin cake in one of my Australian Women's Weekly party cake books (I think it's the Party Animals? book) They call it the Penguin Prince cake and in the book they also put a red bow on the cake. I was a bit reluctant to do this cake, it involved cutting out the penguin shape from a pattern in the book and it just seemed like a lot of bother. I haven't made a carved cake since year ten home ec! But nothing else seemed to fit, so I bit the bullet and made the penguin cake.

My brother has always liked Tux, the linux mascot. He used to have a tiny little Tux keyring. He's been a linux user since high school so a Tux Penguin cake seemed appropriate.

This cake was a challenge. I didn't have the right sized cake pan, it was just a smidge too small, but I knew that once I carved the cake I'd have tonnes of scraps left over. So I used one of the larger off cuts to build up the sides Tux's feet.

I'd also never worked with black icing before, or iced a cake like this where you have multiple colours of icing. I bought black americolour icing which didn't actually go black, but more of a deep grey. I think instead of starting with a white buttercream, I should've started with a chocolate to get a deeper colour. I also got black icing everywhere! Thank goodness my bench top is black granite so doesn't show stains!

I put the cake in the freezer for 20mins before carving it, then crumb coated the cut edges before putting it back in the freezer. I transferred it onto the cake board and started icing! Starting with the white, then the yellow and finally the black. I piped the icing on before smoothing it down with a heated spatula. The eyes were the trickiest part! I messed them up twice! The second time I got them right, then went to pat down a small peak in the icing with my finger only to transfer food dye onto the white icing.

It took me hours to ice this cake. Luckily I had a few tv shows I wanted to catch up on, so played those in the background while working on it. This was also the first time I'd made buttercream since I got my Kitchen Aid for my 30th birthday in March. Holy cow is it easy to make buttercream now! I loved my pink mixer before, but after making buttercream in it, I love it even more!

The cake turned out pretty good, I see a few flaws in it. I'm still not happy with the eyes and I couldn't get the icing as smooth as I would've liked. But it's not bad!

Next to book. And before I'd smoothed down the icing and messed with the eyes.

My brother was really impressed! He didn't want to cut into it for ages, and in the end would up taking the head and feet home. (I held my breath when he cut it, as he decapitated Tux!) 

The only thing is, is how do I top this for his birthday next year? Or the year after for his 30th? I think I've set the bar a little high now!