One Day Interiors Sale at Craft Central

My very good friends at Craft Central asked me to do a cupcake stall at their Interiors sale. I always love the crowd at Craft Central, because of the nature of the place everyone seems to be really interested in what you do and why you do it. I always get chatting with people and the atmosphere is ridiculously friendly.

More to the point I always sell TONS of cupcakes here which at the end of the day is the aim of the game really.

One guy came in wearing a suit and bought 10 brownies in one go! He had a dinner party that evening and is rubbish at making desserts. I told he would get marked down if he was on 'Come Dine With Me' for not making his own pudding as I happily wrapped the brownies for him - haha!

I ♥ Fortnum & Mason's

I was born and bred in London and I am ashamed to say that I had never visited the food Mecca that is Fortnum and Mason's in Piccadilly. With the lure of free cupcake sampling for National cupcake Week I decided to finally venture in.

Unfortunately there ended up to be no free cupcakes but that wasn't a problem as the actual store is amazing. I felt like Macaulay Culkin in Home alone when he walks into the Toy Store and is totally overwhelmed by everything.

The baking section was phenomenal look at these guys! Definitely going to get some online.

 

 Fortnum and Masons are known for their cream teas, when I saw the little scones topped with thick cream and shiny jam I instantly wanted to make my mini Vicky sponges.

 

I bought some rather posh strawberry jam from Fortnums it's all I managed to get my head round buying...

Here's my recipe for my mini Vicky sponges:

*For the sponge*

200g caster sugar (vanilla sugar if you have it)

200g soft unsalted butter

4 Happy eggs

1tbp vanilla extract
200g self-raising flour, sieved
1tsp baking powder

*For the filling*
100g soft unsalted butter
150g icing sugar, sifted
A drop of vanilla extract
A jar of very posh jam

To make the sponge…
    ◦    Heat oven to 190ºC . Grease and lightly dust with flour a muffin tray.
    ◦    Beat together the unsalted butter and sugar in a large bowl until pale and fluffy.
    ◦    Break the eggs into a jug and add the vanilla extract. Beat the mixture lightly with a fork.
    ◦    Add the egg very gradually to the mixture. Once all the eggs are in, fold in the flour with a large metal spoon
    ◦    Divide the mixture between the tins, smooth the surface. Bake for about 20 mins until golden and the cakes springs back when pressed. Turn onto a cooling rack and leave to cool completely.
To make the butter icing…
    ◦     Beat the unsalted butter until smooth and creamy, then gradually beat in icing sugar and vanilla extract.
    ◦    Split the cakes in half. Spread the butter cream over the bottom half and top it with jam. Sandwich with the top. Dust with a little icing sugar before serving.

National Cupcake Week - It started with a bang and ended with some jam.

My dog Spud reppin' National Cupcake Week!

As some of you may know it's National Cupcake Week from 12-18 September, but to be honest there is National [insert any product here] Week recently, it was even National Egg Week this week! (google it i'm not lying). I thought I would do my bit and join in the National cupcake Week frivolities.

Chloe Sidgwick of 'Chloe Sidgwick's guide to Sewing and Cooking' asked me to guest blog for her about my week as a cupcaker so I scribbled my week down in a diary format for her, so you can check out what I did for National cupcake Week on Chloe's Blog.

Strike a pose...VOGUE!

So it's been about half a year since I tapped my recipes and thoughts into my bloggywogg, no ellaborate excuses just i've been busy is all I have to be honest! But i'm back bitches and what a better way to return than with spot in Vogue!


I was contacted through my website about whether I would like to feature in an advertorial for Vogue magazine, obviously I jumped at the chance. The timing was perfect as I had just had my photoshoot with Manasi and the feature in vogue welcomed one small image. Hoorah!


I thought it was only right to take the guys and gals at Vogue some Chop's Cakes top picks so I visited Vogue HQ armed with a box of brownies and lemon and raspberry cupcakes.

You can probably make out by the awful lighting that I didn't finish baking for Vogue until VERY late, but I think it was worth it as I was placed 6th out of 33 bakers!

 

Outside Vogue HQ bricking it!

This guy was hilarious!

The finished Article, insanely proud of it even though it was rather far back in the magazine and quite small at least I can say to the grandchildren "your gran had her cakes in Vogue!"

The Photoshoot

If you skip to the previous post you will see that a photographer called Manasi Kashyap had taken a photo of my wedding stall at Craft Central. I got in contact with her and enquired about having a proper photoshoot with her - I was wiling to pay but like my good friends at Grab Graphics she wanted to be paid in cake which is fine with me!

It was her friends birthday and she wanted some cupcakes to surprise her with so I dropped some off to her at her local tube station which she later described as 'feeling like a drugs drop-off'.

We arranged to do the shoot on a sunny saturday as natural light is the most important thing when trying to get a perfect picture. So I set to work making all of my favourite cupcakes in my repetoire and Manasi thankfully travelled the length of the Central Line to come to my house to snap the cupcakes.

I'm saving the pictures for my new site that is currently being created by my other half but I will give you a sneak peek...

Chop's Cakes SNAPPED!

These are two photos taken of my cakes at a recent Wedding Fair I did at Craft Central. It was hard work but I thoroughly enjoyed it in the end!

 

Above is taken by Sarah at Craft Central of my Cake Shots.

 

 This is a beautiful picture of my Wedding cake display (yes that's me in the background) taken by Manashi Kashyap

My Top 3 books of 2011...so far

 

1. Eating for England by Nigel Slater - He describes food in a way no other can and eloquently takes you back to the first time you damaged the roof of your mouth with a piece of toblerone or the warm feeling you get when you sink your spoon into a treacle sponge.

This is how he describes cake, I think I want this on my grave...

"British cakes have a certain wobbly charm to them, and what might be missing in terms of finesse is there in lick-your-fingers stickiness...they are something you tuck into with the enthusiasm of a labrador at a water bowl."

 

2. Cakes & Bakes, From my Mother's Kitchen by Linda Collister -  The cakes in this book are both special and comfortingly familiar. I made the pistachio and carrot cake for the other half for his birthday as it's shards of green pistachio make it look celebratory enough to give as a gift.

 

3. Weekend Baking by Sarah Randell - Fabulously easy recipes but massive crowd pleasers. I  recently adapted the chocolate and raspberry bars to sell at a fair and they were gone in under an hour!