Snowy village Christmas cake

I left deciding what my Christmas cake should look like till the last minute! Not my brightest idea as fruit cakes taste better when they have time to mature but I just couldn't decide what to do. So on the Friday before Christmas I got up at the crack of dawn and made a simple round Christmas cake. Later that afternoon after the cake had cooled I covered it in a layer of marzipan and decided to decorate it with little houses inspired by my vintage house Christmas tree decoration and my Christmas cake from 2009 that had four little houses on. So I started making the little houses out of roll on icing whilst I let the marzipan on my Christmas cake set a little. I also made some fondant white Christmas trees like the ones on my gluten free mint choc chip cupcakes. Unfortunately as I finished decorating my cake in the wee hours of the morning I didn't get to take any photos's along the way. So I have just included a link to my gluten free Christmas cake recipe and the decorations and tools I used.

Snowy village Christmas cake

Ingredients

• Gluten free Christmas cake covered in a layer of marzipan and iced
• Royal Icing
• Ready to roll white icing
• Pink food colouring
• Aqua food colouring
• Pink, mint and white edible glitter
• Mint and pink edible dust
• Sugar snowflakes
• Pink and mint edible balls
• Silver and gold edible sequins

Equipment

• Rolling pin
• Square cutter used to make houses
• Triangle cutter used to make houses
• Holly leaf cutter
• Star cutters used to make Christmas trees
• Snowflake cutter
• Piping bag fitted with small star nozzle

Have a sweet day!

My birdcage shaped, gluten free Christmas Cake

This Christmas I am planning on a making a birdcage-decorated cake to sit on my Winter Wonderland dessert table. To get the shape I need, I have baked two 15cm (6") round cakes and half a 15cm (6") ball cake. Below you will find my recipe for a rich fruit cake that is gluten free.

Fruit cakes are ideally made at least a month before you need to decorate and eat it. They should be fed regularly and left to ripen. I feed mine every week.

Gluten free Christmas cake (makes one 15cm (6") round cake)

Ingredients
225g (8 oz) currants
90g (3.5 oz) sultanas
90g (3.5 oz) raisins
650g (2.5 oz) chopped glace cherries
50g (2 oz) cut mixed peel
3 tbsp cream sherry
50g (2 oz) chopped almonds
175g (6 oz) plain gluten-free flour
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp mixed spice
pinch of salt
150g (5 ounces) unsalted butter, softened
150g (5 ounces) soft brown sugar
3 medium eggs
grated zest of half a lemon
grated zest of half a orange
3 tbsp brandy

Cooking instructions

1. Place all dried fruit and mixed peel in a bowl, pour in sherry and mix well. Cover with a clean cloth. Leave for 12 hours or overnight so fruit can absorb the sherry
2. Preheat oven to 150 deg C (300 deg F)
3. Grease and line tin with baking parchment
4. Wrap newspaper/brown paper around tin and secure with baker's twine
5. Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer on high speed until the mixture turns a pale colour
6. Beat in eggs slowly on medium speed
7. Sieve flour, salt and spices into the mixture and mix slowly on low speed
8. Fold in soaked fruit, almonds, lemon & orange zest until well mixed
9. Pour mixture into tin, level with spatula
10. Place sheet of grease proof paper on top, and make sure to leave a small circle missing from centre
11. Bake for 3 hours and 15 minutes on middle shelf
12. Place cake on a wire rack to cool
13. When cake is completely cool, remove cake from tin
14. Pierce cake several times with skewer
15. Pour 3 tsp of brandy over the top of the cake (feeding)
16. Wrap in baking parchment
17. Wrap in foil or store in an airtight container
18. Feed at regular intervals over the next few weeks

Cake tins are available in my store on page 2.

After at least a few weeks comes the fun part - decorating it!

In case you missed it, here's last year's Winter Woodland Christmas cake with full instructions on how you can create it yourself.




Have a sweet day!

My Winter Woodland dessert table

Felted snowflake table mats

Winter Woodland Christmas Cake

Winter Woodland Gingerbread House

Christmas Cookie Tree

Small candy filled Christmas tree jar

Just a quick post to share with you my Winter Woodland Candy table.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holiday.

Best Wishes

Torie Jayne

Petal paste Reindeer

Ingredients

• Petal paste
• Brush on dust in Ivory Shimmer
• Iced robin

Equipment

• Latex
• Paint brush
• Vaseline
• Christmas deers

Instructions

1. Coat your deer in Vaseline.
2. Paint a thin layer of latex over sides and allow to dry.
3. Repeat step 2 over several days until you have a layer about 5mm thick.
4. Leave to dry for 12 hours.
5. Carefully pull off latex mould from reindeer.
6. Dust the inside with icing sugar.
7. Thoroughly knead sugar paste.
8. Push paste into mould, so head is full of petal paste.
9. Push petal paste into body of reindeer so all sides have at least 20mm of petal paste on them.
10. Leave to dry for about 30 mins.
11. Carefully pull mould away from the icing, starting at the back.
12. When you get to the neck begin to carefully cut mould away.
13. Put petal paste reindeer to one side.
14. Bend wire into antler shape.
15. Mould with your fingers some petal paste around wire antlers, leaving a prong at the end.
16. Push antlers into top of head.
17. Push iced robin into petal paste reindeer's back.
18. Brush ivory shimmer dust on reindeer's hooves and antlers.
19. Leave to set hard.

I love my Christmas Deers from Camel & Yak, so much so that I couldn't think of anything more perfect to go on top of my Christmas cake this year. So, I decided to make a latex mould from the doe and hand craft the antlers from wire and petal paste. I love how he turned out, even if his neck is a little on the wrinkly side! That came from me being clumsy when I cut the latex mould from around the petal paste. I was worried if I didn't get him out from under the latex he would not dry properly and in my haste his head fell off! I re-attached it back on with a wooden cocktail stick and painted over the join with royal icing.

Thank you to the lovely ladies at Blue Ribbons who gave me advice on how to make my hand-made doe mould.

Have a sweet day!