Bake Off!

Recently we had a 'Bake Off' competition at work. It was a lot of fun and everyone was surprised at the high level of quality in terms of effort and taste. I thought I would share a couple of shots of what we produced.

This was my effort - a neapolitan loaf, with three layers of sponge in the loaf... chocolate with choc chips, strawberry with fresh strawberries and vanilla toped with vanilla icing. The icing was topped with hundreds and thousands, flakes and chopped nuts, and chocolate drizzled ice cream wafers. The cones at the front were filled with the three layers of sponge too, and topped with the icing. I was really pleased with the look, although I thought the cake was a little close, a bit too dense. But overall I was pleased with it.

But there was lots of competition as you can see! I must admit that I felt pretty full (and slightly sick) after trying all the cakes (for reasons of judging - we all got to vote on the best cakes) - I don't know how Mary Berry does it! Great fun though, and the proceeds of the day go to our charity of the year. We voted for the best taste, best look and best effort - it was a tough job to choose.

 ...and whilst we are on the subject of cake, here is a shot of the cake I made for May the 4th (Star Wars day!) this year. It is supposed to be a millenium falcon cake resting on an asteroid of rice-krispie cake. I called it the Muffinellium Falcon. The cake is made using a silicon mold. It is a bit tricky getting the cake out of the mold without breaking off important bits of spaceship! It is best to give the mold a fine layer of rapeseed oil before putting the sponge mix in, as this really helps in the sponge release.