Gluten free Black Forest cupcakes

I hadn't made cupcakes in ages and wanted to try something new for Christmas so I decided to use Black Forest Gateaux as my inspiration. Instead of the traditional layers of chocolate cake, cherry liqueur sauce and whipped cream I made chocolate cakes with a cherry liqueur sauce filling topped with whipped cream.

Gluten free Black Forest cupcakes (makes 24 cupcake size cakes)

Ingredients

• 125g butter, softened
• 100g Hotel Chocolat dark chocolate buttons
• 160 ml (2/3 cup) semi-skimmed milk
• 2 eggs
• 175g caster sugar
• 200g gluten free self-raising flour, sieved
• 2 tablespoons Hotel Chocolat organic cocoa powder, sieved
• 125g/4½oz butter, softened
• 1 tsp vanilla essence

Cooking instructions

1. Preheat oven to 160-180 deg C (325-350 deg F)
2. Line muffin tray with paper cases
3. Place chocolate and milk in a small saucepan and stir over low heat until smooth
4. Beat butter, eggs, and sugar with an electric mixer until the mixture turns a pale colour
5. Stir in flour, cocoa, and warm chocolate mix until mixed thoroughly
6. Divide mixture among cases
7. Bake for 25-30 minutes
8. Place cakes on a wire rack to cool

To Fill & Decorate (24 cupcake size cakes)

What you will need

• 200g black cherries, pitted and pureed
• 60 caster sugar
• ½ tsp cornflour mixed with a little water to make a smooth paste
• 2 tbsp cherry liqueur
• 300ml/10fl oz double cream
• Pink food colouring
• Fondant snowflakes

Instructions

1. Place cherries, sugar, cherry liqueur and cornflour mixture in a small saucepan and, over a medium heat, stir until just boiling
2. Remove from heat and stir until mixture thickens, leave to cool
3. Using a cupcake corer, remove centre of cooled cakes
4. Spoon cooled cherry mixture into the hollow of the cakes
5. Whisk cream and pink food colouring until you have soft peaks in an even colour
6. Fill piping bag fitted with a star nozzle full of pink whipped cream
7. On top of the cakes, starting at outside edge, pipe a swirl of pink whipped cream
8. I decorated the top of mine with sprinkled sugar snowflakes and some with a fondant snowflake

Here they are on my Winter Wonderland dessert table:



Have a sweet day!

Lavender & Mint

Source 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

I am so looking forward to Spring, as I hopefully will have finished all the organizing of my house. Then we can start to decorate the last room that we have not yet put our stamp on! I am currently radiating towards the Scandinavian influenced lavender and mint green colour palette as I love how fresh and pretty it looks.
From the pretty patterned bed linen to the shabby chic mint green cupboard and quirky polka dot wrapped gifts this is a look I could easily live with...

I also have to share with you the gorgeous mint cupboard and drawer in this pic from Danish stylist, Katrine Martensen-Larsen.



Have a sweet day!

Yvestown's pretty kitchen

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you Yvestown's gorgeous kitchen with lots of pretty pops of colour, from the pink spot oven glove to the pale blue Smeg fridge and flower filled jug.

Some beautiful shots from my Flickr favourites:

• The gorgeous pastel kitchen accessories in My Kitchen
• The pretty pale blue in The Kitchen The Cupboard and The Smeg
• The cute floral print and delightful Kitchen Flowers
• The green enamel pendant light in in-zinc

Have a sweet day!

Featured in Magie des Zuckers magazine

Still catching up...

On Christmas Eve last year I got a lovely gift through my post box. The November edition of Magie des Zuckers, a German cake decorating magazine. To my delight, my Winter Woodland Christmas dessert table was on pages 4,5,6 & 7 and another double spread at the back of the magazine included some of my recipes from the aforementioned dessert table. My proud Mum kindly got one of her German friends to translate it for me and I blushed at the beautiful write up of my "magical", "doesn't leave anything to be desired", "dreamy" Winter Wonderland table. What an honour! Thank you Magie des Zuckers magazine for the fabulous feature!

Have a sweet day!

Mini gluten free dessert tower

I loved how my mini gluten free dessert tower turned out this Christmas and it was so much more convenient than making five large desserts. For starters, they were much easier to store in the fridge and I never had any leftovers - just more pretty desserts!

On the top tier of my cake stand from Williams Sonoma were key lime pies. On the second tier were raspberry trifles, and on the inner bottom tier I put strawberry panna cotta. On the outer bottom tier, I alternated Summer fruit mousse with cherry cheese cake.

I can't wait to make another dessert tower for Easter!

Apollo spice jars from Higgins Hardware

Divine bakers twine in aqua, cotton candy and green apple from Sew Sweet

Have a sweet day!

Hotel Chocolat Review & Giveaway

I was recently sent a Sealed with a Kiss box of chocolates to review from the lovely folks at Hotel Chocolat. I received a glamourous heart-shaped box full of 35 chocolates, from irresistible liquid caramels and melting pralines to ravishing truffles in beautiful hearts and smoochy chocolate truffle filled lips. My favourites were the new orange and purple striped hearts filled with a light strawberry truffle and a pinch of black pepper and the mellow vanilla filled swirl topped hearts.

Hotel Chocolat have got a great selection of Valentine's Day gifts this season from caramel sweet chocolate hearts to the prettiest pink champagne truffles. There is something to suit all tastes and budgets.

I am pleased to announce a giveaway of a Sealed with a Kiss box of chocolates from Hotel Chocolat - worth £45!

To enter, please visit Hotel Chocolat and then leave a comment below this post letting me know what delicious chocolates you would like to give or receive this Valentine's Day. The giveaway ends on Thursday, February 9th 2012 at 10pm (GMT) and I will randomly select and announce a winner on Friday, February 10th.

To increase your chances of winning this fabulous prize, you can gain one additional entry for doing each of the following:

• tweeting about this giveaway
• blogging about it
• following the Torie Jayne blog
• following Torie Jayne on Twitter

For the first two, please leave a comment below with the link to your tweet or blog post.

This giveaway is open to UK readers.

Good luck and have a sweet day!

Bombay Duck @Top Drawer Spring 2012

Today on label love I wanted to show you the pretty tea and cakes collection from Bombay Duck. They are all so gorgeous that I can't decide which is my favourite collection. How about you?

Here's how the gorgeous collection looked at the Top Drawer Spring/Summer 2012 interior show.

The cake stand would be perfect piled high with pretty macarons

Love the little bird hiding inside...

Loving the dove grey French country-inspired mugs

Tweet! Tweet!

Have a sweet day!

Mini gluten free raspberry trifles

I love trifle but, being gluten intolerant I can only have it if I or my Mum makes it. This past Christmas I made some mini raspberry trifles which I served on my mini dessert stand.

Raspberry Trifle (makes 7 mini jars)

Ingredients

7 amaretti biscuits (make sure they are gluten free)
3 1/2 tbsp Amaretto liqueur
21 raspberries
1 packet of raspberry jelly made up as instructions
1 pint of fresh custard
150 ml double cream
1 tbsp toasted flaked almonds


Cooking instructions

• Place an ameretti biscuit in the bottom of each jar and crush with the end of a wooden spoon until you have a flat surface
• Pour 1/2 a tbsp of Ameretto into each jar
• Place three raspberries on top of each crushed ameretti biscuit
• Divide freshly made jelly between the jars, place in fridge until set
• When jelly is set, pour cooled fresh custard over the jelly and leave to cool
• Whip double cream with a pinch of sugar until you get stiff peaks
• Fill piping bag fitted with a star nozzle with whipped double cream and pipe a star on top of each trifle
• Sprinkle top of each trifle with toasted almonds
• Keep in fridge until serving

Have a sweet day!

Spring Pastels

Source 1,2,3,4

Last week I went to the Top Drawer interior show at Earl's Court in London. It was full of great stands full of all the new Spring products hitting the stores soon. I especially loved the abundance of soft, chalky pastel colours for every room in the house!

So this week on Inspirational Pins I wanted to share with you my current fave pastel interior shots from my Pinterest boards. From the gorgeous striped feature wall and pretty floral cushions in the living room to the stack of candy striped tins adorned with birds and fauna. A pastel pink Smeg fridge and lavender oven set against duck egg blue units and, last but not least, the candy coloured crockery set hanging on the wall.

Have a sweet day!

Printers Tray

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you a selection of white printers trays full of pretty treasures.

Some beautiful shots from my Flickr favourites:

• The pretty aqua and birds in Project - Printers Tray (HYBRID PROJECT) by Vinnie Pearce
• The printed background in Configuration Tray: Going for a Splodge - bead detail by Julie Kirk
• The trinkets in Cabinet of Curiosities by Ranjini Malhotra and
• The pretty Artist Printer's Tray - Wedding Themed by Ranjini by 7 gypsies

I love the one my Dad gave me which I painted white and filled with all my white, aqua and silver beads. I think I might need to get another one after seeing these gorgeous picks. Best place to find one? Ebay.



Have a sweet day!

Decorating my bird cage cake

Several weeks ago I shared with you my Christmas cake, shaped like a bird cage and then how to marzipan bird cage shaped cake. Last week I shared how I iced my cake, so finally this week I show you how I decorated it!

How to decorate bird cage shaped cake
Ingredients

• Gluten free birdcage shaped Christmas cake covered in a layer of marzipan and iced
• Royal Icing
• Ready to roll white icing
• Petal paste roses (instructions coming soon...)
• Petal paste bird (instructions coming soon...)
• Fondant snowflakes (instructions coming soon...)
• Pink edible beads
• Fondant holly leaves (instructions coming soon...)
• Iced ring
• Pink, green and white edible glitter
• Aqua edible dust

Equipment

• Rolling pin
• Bakers twine
• Pins
• Piping bag fitted with small circular nozzle
• Wooden cocktail sticks
• FMM textured lace set

Method

• To get your bird cage even, start by placing a length of bakers twine over the top of your cake and pin in place, so that you have divided the cake in half
• Continue pinning bakers twine to your cake until you have segmented the cake into 12 pieces
• Lightly push the string into the cake so you are left with small indentations and remove string entirely
• Lightly sieve icing sugar on to your work top and knead white icing until soft and pliable. Then, using a rolling pin, roll into a long shape about 5mm thick, i.e. at least the width of the lace imprint and long enough to go round the cake

• Push lace imprint into rolled out icing strip, continue until strip has imprint from end to end. Using a sharp knife, trim sides of strip, lightly brush cooled boiled water onto back of strip and adhere to bottom of cake. Trim off excess at ends
• Make up royal icing as package instructions
• Spoon into piping bag fitted with circular nozzle

• Starting at the top of the cake, carefully pipe a strip of royal icing down one of the indentations in the cake
• Continue until you have all of the cage spindles piped
• Roll out fondant icing as before and cut a small circle out using a round cookie cutter, lightly brush the back of your fondant circle with water and place at top of the cake in the centre
• Then roll a small ball out of white fondant icing and attach to the top of the cake using a wooden tooth pick

• Lightly sieve icing sugar on to your work top and knead white icing until soft and pliable. Then, using a rolling pin, roll into a long shape about 5mm thick, that is at least the width of the lace imprint and long enough to go round the cake
• Push lace imprint into rolled out icing strip, continue until strip has imprint from end to end
• Using a sharp knife, trim sides of strip, lightly brush cooled boiled water onto back of strip and adhere to the top straight part of the cake. Trim off excess at ends

• Brush edible white glitter on to spindles of cage
• Continue brushing white edible glitter on to cage
• Brush aqua cake shimmer onto blue icing
• Work out the position of your petal paste bird and push bird foot into cake

• Pipe a small dab of white royal icing onto the front of your fondant bird, line bird up with its foot and push into the side of the cake
• Pipe a small dab of royal icing onto the back of the fondant roses and place them at the top and bottom of the cake
• Pipe a small dab of royal icing onto the back of the holly leaves and place them at the top and bottom of the cake

• Pipe a small dab of white royal icing onto the edible pink beads and place next to the holly leaves on the cake
• Using edible glitters, dust roses with pink glitter and leaves with green glitter
• Pipe a small dab of white royal icing onto the back of the snowflakes and place on cake
• Attach iced ring to ball on top of cake and lightly dust entire cake with sieved icing sugar

Here it is on my Winter Wonderland table



Have a sweet day!

Miss Etoile @ Top Drawer Spring/Summer 2012

Last week I showed you the gorgeous new treasures from one of my favourite interior brands, Miss Etoile. It was great to see their collection at the Top Drawer interior show in all its sugary, sparkly glory! I so need to get some of the gorgeous paper blooms and striped straws for my Summer soiree's.

Have a sweet day!

Ferm Living Spring 2012

Today on label love I wanted to show you the gorgeous new treasures from another of my favourite interior brands, Ferm Living. I am loving the pretty chic colour palette of rose pink and shades of mint and teal. The signature geometric print looks great on trays, cushions and ceramics. The whimsical wallpapers look fresh and new, and the display boxes in an array of colours look great on the dove grey wall. I am coveting said display boxes and the stackable jars.

Cloudberry Living in the UK stocks a a large choice of Ferm Living, from wallpapers and cushions to the cute house wall shelves and knitted vases.

Here's how the gorgeous collection looked at the Top Drawer interior show this week.






Have a sweet day!

Gluten free mini key lime pies

This past Christmas I served an array of mini desserts on my cupcake stand. For a touch of green I made key lime pies.

Gluten free mini key lime pies (makes 8 mini pies)

Ingredients

• 200g gluten free chocolate digestive biscuits
• 50g butter
• 325g sweetened condensed milk
• 60g sour cream
• 4 limes (zest of 3, juice of 4)
• 1 lemon (juice)

What you will need

• Small glass jars

Cooking instructions

1. Preheat oven to 160 deg C, fan assisted (370 deg F)
2. Place digestives in a bag and crush by rolling a rolling pin back and forth over the bag until you are left with crumbs
3. In a small saucepan, melt the butter, remove from heat and stir in digestive crumbs
4. Divide crumb mixture between the jars and press down firmly with the end of a wooden spoon or teaspoon
5. In a bowl, whisk until combined the condensed milk, sour cream, lemon and lime juice and zest of 2 limes
6. Pour mixture over the biscuit bases in jars
7. Scatter the tops with remaining lime zest
8. Bake in preheated oven for 5 mins or until tiny pin hole bubbles appear
9. Leave to cool before placing in the fridge

Have a sweet day!