Choo Choo!

This week I had to make a first birthday cake for smiley little Lucas. I wanted to design a cake that was suitable for a little boy but still retained my favourite pastel colours and styling. The result was a birthday train in pale blues and greens. The train was inspired by one of my favourite cake blogs http://www.cakejournal.com/. Always amazingly beautiful cakes and so so pretty. Happy birthday Lucas!

How make pretty flower cupcakes

Now I am obviously a big advocate of cupcakes of the eating variety but today I thought I would share with you my lovely cupcake decorations made with flowers and not flour! They are so simple but so effective. Beautiful on a vintage cake stand to brighten up your table or even just your day. Once you get the hang of them they can be made with any flowers you like from bought flowers to flowers from your garden. I would recommend using flowers with quite a strong stem as you don't want them to break when pushed in to the oasis. Small flowers such as spray roses or daisies work best but there is no reason why you couldn't replicate with one or two larger flowers. Obviously you can make as many or as few as you like but in the spirit of baking I will make one dozen.

List of ingredients:

12 tea lights in silver metal cases (the ones you get in big bags from Ikea)

Block of oasis

Bunch of spray roses

12 cupcake cases

Method:

1. Soak the oasis in water until water absorbs through the whole block.

2. Remove the tea lights from the silver outer case. These can be put to one side and kept for another time.

3. Cut a thin strip of oasis, about the same thickness as the depth of the tea light holder.

4. Press the tea light holder in to the oasis so that you end up with the silver case filled with oasis.

5. Cut the spray roses from the bunch so that they have 1-2cm of stem.

6. Push the roses in to the oasis starting around the edge and finishing in the middle.

7. Place in to pretty cupcake cases and voila!

Happy flower baking!