How to: icing

I made a whole bunch of mini cupcakes for my friend's wedding afternoon tea.
Thank you Rachel for asking me to bake for your special day! What a privilege.

I've learnt some icing tips and techniques from YouTube- the best school in the world. That's where I learn how to cook, bake, decorate cakes, put on makeup, what fashion is trending etc.

I have this Wilton icing tip set from my auntie. In the middle is the nozzle which you attach to the outside of the piping bag so you can use the same icing bag and change nozzles easily. Brilliant, cause I used one type of icing and five different nozzles.

Here are the ones I used

 Tip numbers from left to right: 7, 97, 106, 101 and 76

And this is the pattern each nozzle makes! Which one is your favorite?
Mine is the rose petals 2nd from right, using tip #101. It takes the longest to do, but you can agree that the result looks intricately beautiful. I think next time I will use two different color icing and give it an ombre effect.

To make the spiral on the leftmost, use a circular tip and pipe from the center outwards, making sure you hold the piping bag vertically.

You can achieve two different effects with the squiggly #97 tip, as seen in the photo. You can start from the centre and use one circular motion to cover the entire cupcake OR you can start from the centre and make a circle one by one going outwards each time.

To make the roses, hold the piping bag so that the fatter end of tip #101 is touching the cupcake. Make a single petal by sweeping in a half circle motion, going around the cupcake starting from the centre.

Finally, the cupcake on the most right is achieved by starting from the centre and going outwards in a circular motion.

The recipe for the buttercream (thanks Reenu) and the cupcakes is in this past blogpost

Buttercream Icing

100g butter (room temp)
1 1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 Tbsp milk

1. Beat butter until pale and fluffy.
2. Add icing sugar and vanilla essence and mix again.
3. Add milk according to the consistency you require.
4. Beat for another 2-3 minutes

Note: The more you beat the paler the icing gets. Mine was still quite yellow, you can beat it for longer or even add coloring.

Add some embellishments like silver cachous and these premade flowers for extra cuteness.




And to conclude,

Worry is imagining life without God.

If you believe in a God that controls everything, a God that is faithful, a God that loves you unconditionally and has the best plan for you... Why are you worried?

Signed,

Elisa

A little bit about nutella cupcakes with nutella icing!

Last year for Charles' birthday I made him oreo cheesecake cupcakes...

Look how happy he was.
For the Oreo Cheesecake Cupcakes recipe click here. It's super easy to make and requires NO BAKING


He turned 21 this year and I made him nutella cupcakes from this video I watched by one the Chiappa sisters

I added Nutella icing on top because... the cupcakes shrunk on the top and it looked quite ugly bare :/

That was just one of the things that went wrong during baking... Keep reading for Lessons Learned.

The star of the show... Nutella. Do you love these black and white striped cases?
Only after did I realise I had birthday-print cases, I'll use those next year

It's super easy to make. Just spoon a large dollop of Nutella into normal cupcake batter.
When it's cooked, the Nutella will remain a hot gooey mess inside.

Beautiful.

They came out wrinkly and sunken... So I decided to cover them in NUTELLA ICING

Nutella, butter and a touch of milk

I used wilton tip 30 to decorate these. The cupcake on the left was iced starting from the outside in and the one on the right was iced from the centre outwards.
Which one do you like better?

I needed to drive over to the white house to give them to him so I used this cake container that Lauren got me for my birthday!! It is awesome because I never have a container to put my baking in but now I do! THANK YOU

To add the finishing touch... Sprinkles

Nutella Cupcakes

4 eggs

1 cup white sugar

3/4 cup self raising flour

180 gr butter, melted

Nutella

1. Beat eggs and sugar until light

2. Sift through the flour and mix by hand

3. Beat in butter (make sure butter is slightly cooled ie. not hot off the pan, so the eggs don't cook)

4. Fill half the cases with batter

5. Spoon a large tablespoon of Nutella into each case

6. Top with remaining batter, leaving one centimetre for the cupcakes to rise

7. Bake at 200 Celcius for 12 minutes * test with a skewer

*A few things didn't go as planned during baking, this is the temperature suggested on the original recipe but...
I found after about 5 minutes in the 200 Celcius oven, the tops started to go brown while the insides were still runny. So I covered the top with aluminium foil. This however hindered the cakes from rising. So I would suggest baking at a lower temperature, maybe 190 or 180 and use cupcake cases that aren't so deep.
Also a good idea to rotate in the middle of baking, as some ovens have 'cold spots'.

For chocolate cupcakes, add 1/2 cup cocoa with the flour

Nutella Icing

2/3 cup melted butter

2/3 cup Nutella

1 cup icing sugar

1 Tbsp milk

1. Beat together butter and Nutella

2. Gradually add icing sugar, checking for consistency

3. Add milk if required

Icing too buttery? Add more Nutella.

Too crumbly? Add milk.

Too sweet? Pinch of salt.

And to conclude,

Still haven't found Lewis Road Creamery chocolate milk.

Signed,

Elisa

A little bit about a bridal shower

Michelle is the first of my friends to get married, and we threw her a bridal shower!

I follow her blog... I love all things pretty and that includes weddings; she writes extensively on her job as a bridal consultant and to-be-bride journey, this is her latest blog post:

http://vintage-affections.tumblr.com/post/51957655887/i-dont-know-about-you-but-im-feeling-22-everything

Eleven girls of us in the kitchen produced a lot of food together!

We made brownies...

with an alarming amount of sugar and butter in it :p

they were so fudgy; I loved them!

Ham and egg sandwiches and scones...

Cupcakes...

and cake pops!

Cake pops are so fancy looking...

This is the woman's blog who first made them, I've been following her inspiring blog for ages. I always check them for new ideas, although I've never really made much from her site; they look too over the top, with ingredients that aren't usually found in nz

http://www.bakerella.com/pops-bites/cake-pops/

Also perplexes me; how does she have that much patience to decorate baking so neatly??

Making cake pops: 

I started with making a vanilla cake, they were from a betty crocker's packet mix, which came with a packet of frosting! So handy cause we needed the frosting to make the cake pops.

Then we crumbled the cake when it was fairly cool, putting it in the fridge to chill and dry up faster, cause it was still moist.

Ydnim then mixed the packet of frosting with the cake crumbs and rolled them into firmly packed balls to be placed in the freezer for roughly half an hour. This is so they firm up.

When they were firm, we melted dark chocolate and placed it in a deep V shaped bowl for easy dipping.

We had two different pop sticks, regular ones and lollipop ones for making mini cake pops.

Now the trickier part...

Dip the end of the stick into the chocolate, covering about a centimetre and insert halfway into a cake ball.

Dip the cake pop vertically and gently tilt to cover the base of the cake balls.

Careful not to move it while dipping, otherwise the stick will detach and you'll be left with a cake ball inside a bowl of chocolate :p

Holding the cake pop with your left hand, gently tap your left wrist so excess chocolate will drip off and you'll be left with a clean even surface.

Add your sprinkles before the chocolate dries and stick on a styrofoam block to set.

We set up a picnic rug outside and had a nice photoshoot with professional photographers

The photographers are from Cue Photography.
They were so great, they captured great moments and are really friendly.
Especially patient when taking a jump photo of 12 girls :p I totally recommend them!

You can view the album of the bridal shower photoshoot by Cue Photography here https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.502670243132865.1073741832.435734303159793&type=1

But this is my favorite photo I took :D

A massive congratulations to Michelle and Richard who got married last Saturday.
The ceremony was beautiful...
Ydnim and leeynaffit performed the most romantic song, A Thousand Years [they have informed me they take bookings. Even advanced ones.] and the bride and groom walked down the aisle at the end to Taylor Swift's Love Story <3

One of many weddings to come!
God bless you two always.




And to conclude,

I got to be part of the engineering revue again this year as a dancer!
To those of you who missed it... You missed out on a great show. We sold out 3 out of 4 shows!!
I had such a great time, became friends with some... interesting people ;) and got to ride a segway for the first time...

Karl Stol (engineers would know him from first year, 121 mechanics paper) was in the revue and he brought along his segway.
Oh my so scary, I screamed so loud when I first got on hahaha... was not prepared for that.

Signed,
Elisa

A little bit about birthdays

So much food on my birthday!

It started the day before my birthday, when Calci took me to The Chocolate Boutique Cafe, read about our time here

The morning of, before uni, I went to The Verve in Parnell and had french toast with bacon and bananas with way too much maple syrup.

I had a test the next day, so I actually spent my birthday studying :/

Then I met Pen and she prodded me all over "because it's my birthday" and got me a taro bub tub tea with chocolate pudding.

Thanks Pen!

Before that, I met up with Lauren and she gave me amazing presents! One of them was a chocolate chip cupcake that she made.

We had a bit of an impromptu party at the top of the rec centre. Me and Pen met Lauren, and Charles Jefferson was there! And he brought his friends! And then the good looking couple came- Mint&Fred!
And Fred was carrying her bag as well as his own and I thought it was really cute, then they left to have lunch with Minty's mum.

Highlight of the day: impromptu party.

My friends have started a cupcake business, Chubby Cupcakes, I asked one of them what flavor she would recommend.
Vanilla with lemon icing and lemon rum curd custard filling... Chocolate mint...

In the end I chose vanilla cupcakes with strawberry icing and custard filling.

Six of these for my Student Life TAC group (teaching, accountability and care)

At TAC we had another party! We danced and I came as a duck...

(I think Fayola was pretending to lick a window?)

Tessa got me a book which induced this reaction...

My reaction was not like that when I unwrapped it... It was more like :O

Anyway.
They got me a cake too!

Red velvet with vanilla icing and white chocolate curls 

We ate so much cake.

Dinner was at Archie's in Newmarket.

Herb pizza bread

Margherita pizza

Mushroom tortelloni.


And I came home

To another cake!
Caramel Macchiato from Gateau House in Newmarket.
It was delicious; blackforest and tiramisu combined.

It doesn't end there.
On Sunday, Wally and Lauren are taking me to Industry Zen at the Viaduct for dinner.
I have such amazing friends. Thank you for all your birthday wishes, and no, I did not have to bake my own cake! Hehe

And to conclude,
I am now twenty. And today I wanted to buy a duvet cover with robots, dinosaurs or trains on it. Mum didn't let me.

Signed,
Elisa.

A little bit about The Chocolate Boutique Cafe

Have you been to the Chocolate Boutique in Parnell?

They serve coffees, hot chocolates, waffles, sundaes, cakes, desserts and little chocolate treats.

Wally took me there for my first time a couple of weeks ago. I asked around for my friends' opinions on this cafe. I think everyone I asked had been there before and tried the Italian Denso (thick and rich hot chocolate drink, which Hiro said is almost like a mousse texture).

It took a good 10 minutes to look through the extensive menu. I couldn't decide between hazelnut cappuccino, peanut butter mocha, creme de menthe chocolate, chilli denso, praline hot chocolate, white chocolate submarino (a submarino is a mug of hot milk served with chocolate, as you stir the chocolate in it melts to create a hot chocolate drink) or affogato ($4 - $5.50)

And those were just the drinks. They served chocolate, maple, caramel waffles ($7.90), raspberry tarts, kahlua cheesecake, chocolate mud cake, eclairs.

I settled on chocolate waffle and a mochaccino

Wally told me how she got a Death by Chocolate last time; chocolate ice cream, chocolate mousse, chocolate sauce. Never again :P

So she got a chocolate mud cake.
I took this photo really quickly because it was melting in the rare September sun

I like how the drinks came with a chocolate mint. Nice touch.

And then Calci took me there for my birthday! I have lovely friends.

Praline hot chocolate ($5.50)

with hazelnut chocolate melted in the bottom of the mug. Yum

Waffles with hokey pokey ice cream and butterscotch sauce.
Delicious

Calci got chocolate waffles and a cappuccino. She said the coffee was good

And she also ordered a cupcake (they have gluten free ones!)

And then pulled out a candle!

I got so excited.

Make a wish, Elisa!

Overall, very satisfied.

Good food, extremely well priced, especially for a boutique.

Although there are only a couple of tables, so I can imagine how busy it would get in there in the evenings.

Next time: sundaes and submarino. Maybe an Italian Denso to share!

The Chocolate Boutique Cafe
323 Parnell Rd, Parnell
11am to 10pm daily

And to conclude,

I passed a store in Parnell and saw an art print.

The Angelus 35 x 25cm print

The original oil painting was done in 1857 by the French realist, Jean-François Millet.

I had been eyeing a larger print seen in a second-hand store in Onehunga. But found this one for $5 :D

What got me captivated by this painting was Salvador Dali's take on it. Read here :)

Signed,

Elisa.