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Clandestine Cake-a-long 2: Toffee Shock Cake

  By Helen | February 28, 2013 - 7:16 am |
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Toffee Shock Cake before the fudge topping set

I’m finally able to upload my picture of this magnificent cake. Our bake for the next fortnight is the Toffee Shock Cake by Julia England from Derby’s CCC. My version is once again not as picturesque as I’d like it to be but absolutely delicious. Definitely not a cake for the dieters but thoroughly enjoyable to make – I found the sponges came together really quickly, even though there were 4 different flavours. For me, though, the real star was the fudge topping – I could have eaten it with a spoon (oh alright then, I’ll admit I did!) That fudge will definitely be featuring in some ice-cream dishes this summer.

Julia is one of the contributors that I have actually met. We went on a foodie conference a couple of years ago and she is one of those people that you feel like you’ve known forever. We may even have drunk a spot of wine later that night! Julia is one of the bakers that went down to appear on The One Show when the CCC were featured last year – I’m trying to get her to pay a visit to the North West very soon – If any other CCC bakers are around, you would be welcome to join us.

So, here goes – let’s find out a bit more about Julia…

1. How did you get into baking?
I really got into baking after appearing on a BBC 2 TV show called Economy Gastronomy in 2009 … I found a new love for food and baking , and discovered I was actually quite good at the whole cooking lark ! Baking just came naturally !! So I started writing a blog of my adventures and disasters in the kitchen .. you can read this at http://awannabefoodie.wordpress.com

2. What is your favourite cake?
My favourite cake has got to be a simple Victoria Sponge .. I fill mine with a sweet strawberry jam and freshly whipped cream … then I drench it in icing sugar !! You just can’t beat it !!

3. What is the last cake that you made?
The last cake I made was a vanilla madeira decorated in the style of the kids gaming craze Minecraft for an 11 year old little girl !! I have recently started my own cake business Daisychain Cakery offering cakes for all occasions!! I love making cakes and seeing the smiles .. you can’t beat it !!! Turning a passion into a job has been hard but I enjoy it …

The last cake I made for my own enjoyment was Jo Christy’s Trick or Treat Tuck Shop Cake from the CCC cookbook … YUM !!!! The sherbert buttercream was immense !!!

4. You have friends coming round for the evening, which cake would you bake them?
If I had friends coming over for dinner .. I would probably bake a lemon meringue cake .. serving it with cream as a perfect pud !! Two birds with one stone …

5. What famous person (past or present) would you like to bake a cake for?
Oooh there are so many people I would love to bake for .. dead and alive !! My youngest son was named after Frank Sinatra as he is one of my great idols … I’d have loved to have baked for him !! and the rest of the guys !!! I must admit most of the people I want to bake for are the fella’s I have a soft spot for .. Sean Bean , Kevin bacon .. and the gorgeous Gary Barlow !! I truly am that shallow !!!

However, I would like to bake for Delia Smith … I’m sure I could show her a thing or two !! hahahaha !!! ‘Ark at me ….. ! I wouldn’t dare bake for St Mary of Berry .. I’d be emotionally exhausted waiting for a verdict !!!

6. How many CCC events have you attended?
I have been running the Derby branch of CCC since October 2011 and have atteneded numerous clubs .. my own, Loughborough and Leeds .. sometimes two in a weekend ! You can never get enough of cake .. and the people you meet !!!

7. What recipe out of the CCC book do you fancy baking the most?
There are so many amazing recipes in the book .. I can’t wait to make Andrew Kites Boozy Vic Sponge … and attempt the raspberry yogurt Bundt recipe from Rachel McGrath … so so many to choose from I simply can’t !!!!!

I also asked Julia for any tips on making a successful Toffee Shock Cake

Any advice I would offer on making my Toffee Shock Cake is … don’t stress it ! It truly is a simple cake to make … anything goes , there are no rights or wrongs .. just bake , assemble and enjoy !!! Your friends and family will love it … I was recently told by a lady that it tasted better than her son’s wedding cake .. and that was made by the Famous Choccywoccydoodah !!! So you guys can also make this amazing confection and spread the word …… ! It’s certainly a showstopper !!!!

I have to agree, it is rather a spectularly tasty cake. I was a bit too impatient when I made my fudge topping and didn’t simmer for long enough so it was still quite runny. I left it overnight and it was so much better by morning. Apparently, the stirring also helps to make it thicken – think I was a bit too keen on the tasting!

Can’t wait to see everyone else’s interpretations – you may have noticed that I used Ferrero Rocher chocs for my decoration – I knew the girls wouldn’t eat fudge pieces and surprisingly we had some FR’s left over!

We’ve had 2 rich cakes so far in our quest to bake our way through the book so our next cake will be the Feather Light Cake courtesy of Helen Jones with the added ingredient of air!

Dates to remember:
Linky closes – Monday 11th March – I will do a round up that night of anyone who has linked up a pic.
Cake-a-long 3 starts – Tuesday 12th March

 

 

20th February – Double Celebration

  By Helen | February 20, 2013 - 10:58 pm |
3 Comments

Its a bit crazy in our house today – the 20th February is a double birthday celebration in our house. Dermot is 35 today and baby T is a big 2! Where did those 2 years go?

I’m not going to do a long post as I’m going back to the celebrations (drinking wine and building a wooden kitchen – so rock ‘n’ roll) but I thought I’d share some pics of how the girls have changed in the past 2 years. They’ve flown!

Happy birthday if its your birthday too today – it seems a popular day. We know 9 people who have a birthday on the 20th Feb – I’ve been writing cards for weeks!

Where have I been? Warning: Overly proud parental post

  By Helen | December 17, 2012 - 7:43 am | , ,
2 Comments

Regular readers (yep, I think I’ve got a couple!) may have noticed that blog posts have become a little bit sparse over the past few weeks. I know I’ve tended to have gaps between posting from time to time when life gets a little bit more crazy than usual but on this occasion there’s been some even more crazy than usual weeks.

At the beginning of December, we trotted off to Gloucester with Millie for her first ever National Age Groups Synchronised Swimming competition. We had been warned that this was a big comp and to expect a whole different atmosphere than previous comps – even so, we were taken aback by how professional the set up was. Not surprisingly, Millie was really nervous – competing at a national level when you are only 10 and been doing the sport for only 10 months is rather daunting.

We realised (as did Millie) that this was a great chance to see some amazing swimmers and tried not to put pressure on what her results might be. But she did brilliantly! She came second in her age group for individual figures (imagine loads of girls doing slow, silent shapes in the water in front of 4 sets of 4 judges – simply terrifying!), got a silver medal with her 12 and under team routine and gained an invitation to try out for the England Talent Squad.

So last weekend, I found myself driving down to Crystal Palace with Millie, her friend, who had also been invited down for the trials, and her Mum. We dropped the girls off on the Friday morning and had no contact until we were to collect them late on the Saturday when their fate would have been sealed. We had 2 days to ourselves which should have been bliss and we made the most of our shopping/chatting/eating time but we were so on edge wondering how our girls were getting on. Definitely one of the most stressful parenting experiences so far knowing how rigorous the tests were that our girls were being put through.

Saturday came and we counted down the hours until we could collect them – best scenario would be both girls to get onto the squad (Jessie is 2 years older than Mil so looking to get onto a higher level so they weren’t even competing for a place against each other). It may be a miserable journey home Up North if only one got through….

4PM and we arrive, just wanting to get our hands on our babies. By this point, we weren’t even bothered about the outcome – just wanting to know they had survived. But it was fantastic news, they both got in!
2 happy girls and 2 very relieved mums and one enormous journey home.

And so our next stage begins… we carry on with training in Trafford with added training in London knowing that MIllie is delighted to have been chosen to be potentially a future star of the England Team. Well done Millie, (and Jessie) your hard work has paid off and we are VERY proud of you! xxx

White Rose Wedding Cake with Ivy Side Design – Cake of the Week

  By Helen | July 15, 2012 - 9:22 pm |
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Another terrible picture. Another cake drop off in torrential rain. Another happy couple – thank goodness!

I had never even met the bride and groom before they came to look at their cake on Friday – in fact, I had only spoken to the bride twice. I was understandably a bit nervous then whether I had actually done the exact cake that they had in mind. It turned out that they were completely lovely and were really chuffed with their cake. Phew …again!

I wasn’t sure how just one rose on each tier would look – especially as they weren’t having any filler flowers and I was taking a chance including any leaves. I’m glad I did as it made the arrangement look ‘proper’.

This will be the last Cake of the Week link up for a while as I take a summer break. I will schedule a few Cakes of the Week but won’t be able to do a linky so hold on to those creations until the end of August (or post them this week!)

A crazily busy week at Casa Costello – wedding cakes galore, leaving parties, and a tenth birthday – how did I become the mum of a child in double figures?

The Day I turned into Pamela Anderson – The Big Beach Clean Up

  By Helen | May 30, 2012 - 6:31 am |
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The title of this post may be a teeny bit misleading. No’ I’ve not been saving lives or squeezing myself into red swimming costumes but I was on a beach … on one of the coldest, windiest May days I can remember.

So, why was I there? I was part of a group participating in The M&S Big Beach Clean Up – One of a number of days arranged in conjunction with the Marine Conservation Society to encourage to help clean up our beaches.

We went to West Kirby Beach on The Wirral. We were told that actually the beach was quite a ‘clean’ beach anyway and it was a lovely spot when we arrived. Even in howling winds! I’m ashamed to say I didn’t even know West Kirby Beach existed even though it is less than an hour away from here. I was invited to take my children but as it was a school/nursery day, I gathered together the troops and got some friends to bring their little ones (I bet they were secretly cursing me when they saw the state of the weather!)

Helpers were armed with bin bags and some grabbers and instructions not to pick up anything remotely dog-poo-like and off we went. There was soon team work involved as the wind meant you couldn’t pick up and hold a bag open at the same time and it was surprising how much we collected. There was due to be a grand weigh in but it didn’t happen (we were too busy munching on our free BBQ supplied by M&S by then) but it was amazing how many bags could be collected off a short patch of seemingly spotless beach. NOTE: If you are thinking of having a late night beach BBQ – take plastic bottles with you and take them home at the end! There was so much glass.

For more information you can go to the Marine Conservation Society’s page Forever Fish – where they have the following information on how much litter has been collected so far…

A huge thank you from MCS and M&S
Thanks to the 6,000 volunteers who took part in our Big Beach Clean-up in May – for helping us to collect a whopping 11,500kg* of litter!

The sun didn’t shine at every beach but this didn’t stop you from filling over 3,200 bin bags of rubbish, including 12,800 wrappers and 2,850 tin cans. Lucky litter pickers even found a set of false teeth and half a sofa in Edinburgh, a carpet in Clacton and a pink thong on Shoreham beach!

Sadly, we didn’t find anything as exciting as a pink thong (thank God!).

To get the kids involved there are plenty of facts, activities and games on the School of Fish resource page.

Hope to see you at next year’s Big Beach Clean Up – I’m so proud that we did it!

Bakers Pantry – 15 chances to win a month’s worth of biscuits

  By Helen | February 5, 2012 - 10:52 pm | ,
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We love biscuits in this house – truly we do. Its sad how long we can spend discussing our favourite of the moment. My essential item in my hospital bag when I had both Violet and Tara was a pack of digestives!

I have been asked to tell you about a new competition run by Bakers Pantry who supply biscuits to your home. There are 15 chances over the course of this week to win a month’s subscription of biscuits. All you have to do is click here

Of course, I couldn’t tell you about this fabulous competition without having sampled a selection of the biscuits on offer so Bakers Pantry kindly sent over a box for us to try – that was a surprise when I answered the door to the postman – better than a bill any day!

We received seven different types of biscuit which honestly all looked delicious – the types you tend to eat when you are on holiday in a posh hotel. We’ve not eaten them all yet but so far the favourite has been the Chocolate Chip and Cherry Cookies which come in a lovely tin – perfect for a coffee morning with the ladies!

So don’t forget pop on over to Bakers Pantry and grab yourself the chance of a month’s supply of biscuits – I’m off to indulge with a cup of tea (and yes, they dunk brilliantly!)

What inspires my blog? The British Parenting Calendar 2011

  By Helen | December 12, 2011 - 2:04 am |
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Let me tell you a little story. There once was a cake. Yes a pretty cake but apart from that you wouldn’t know anything about who the cake was for. So I started a cake blog. I knew nothing about blogs, didn’t even realise the world of parenting blogs existed but I had the urge to write more about cakes. Sometimes there are stories about why a particular cake is chosen. Sometimes I’m particularly proud of a certain bit of a cake and sometimes I’m just plain made up that I can even do the cake. And so my cake blog was born and happily it ticked along with me not realising how many people were reading it.


And then there were these 3. The most important things in my life (Yep, even more than cake) and that urge came again. I wanted to capture important parts of our life for us to remember. The funny bits, the unusual bits, the plain weird bits.


And then we bought this and found that the five of us have massive adventures that we really don’t want to forget.

And there you have it. How Casa Costello came to be – who knows how it will change in the next few years but I love my little spot of the internet. I love that people read about us and the cakes and even feel inspired to leave messages. How fab!

So why am I telling all of this? In June of this year, I went to Cybermummy and took part in the Parent Blogging Calendar photoshoot under the Foodies section. Organised by Tara Cain and Jay Mountford, there are 100 calendars available supplied by Snapfish in exchange for our blog CV. I’m game for a go so here’s my history!