I’ve always loved to cook – and the challenge of cooking for large numbers of people has always been fun for me.
I never baked. My standard dessert was fruit salad and I prefer cheese myself personally.
My mother and sisters are phenomenal bakers. They have “the touch” – and many of my best friends were dab hands at baking.
I remember watching Chrissie whip up some choux pastry and KNEW I would never be able to do that.
One of the big differences with NZ and Canada/North America is the whole COOKIE thing here.
At Christmas and Thanksgiving, people take to their kitchens and produce insane amounts of baked goods which they give to friends, co-workers, customers and suppliers.
After a couple of years I decided to do “a few Christmas cookies” and that’s when it all began…
My baking obsession.
Then Stacy and I started making cupcakes. It became a ritual when she’d visit.
I loved playing with icing and tips.
Stace is super creative and does great freehand designs and amazing colours.
Craig and Stace asked me to do their wedding cupcakes and I decided I’d better take some darn LESSONS.
I did all 3 Wilton courses, and loved it.
The courses are cheap…$35 for 8 hours of class. The trap is the amount of equipment and supplies you need to complete the courses.
So, once the wedding was over I decided that I’d do some bake sales to at least pay for the bulk of the stuff I’d indulged myself in…
I set up a stall outside our shop on a couple of busy Saturdays and did a local flea market one Sunday but it was lame and stinky.
So last week I did the night market at our local “Party in the Park” which is a summer-long event every Friday night.
I slaved for 2 days straight and made:
36 each of Cookie Monster, Elmo, Oscar and Big Bird
24 each of Red Velvet with cream cheese icing, Chocolate with white chocolate icing and Vanilla with Magnoloa whipped vanilla icing.
I also made brownies, tropical carrot cake and my Louisiana banana cake with pecan praline topping.
Oh Em Gee!
I sold out!
KA CHING!
So I have signed up for the rest of the summer and I’ve been working ahead.
Here’s what I did this weekend.
I made ladybugs for the new ladybug cupcakes for this Friday.
I prototyped it…
I made literally HUNDREDS of different flowers…
I candied lemons for lemon cupcake decoration
Made some bows…
Dozens upon dozens of eyes for Elmo and co.
Kermit eyes..
I haven’t decided when Elmo is going to make his appearance yet. Maybe next week…
Cookie Monster eyes…
And I made 8 carrot cakes. They freeze well thankfully!
So many people took photos – and I took a couple of dozen cards down with me and they all went vooommmm. So I am getting more for this weekend.
I will make sure we take lots of pictures!
