Fairy cakes and Flowers
Perhaps you are feeling as I do – just not quite ready to say goodbye to summer. Yes, the gardens are past their best. The flowers giving a last brave encore but their edges are crumpling and their glory quietly fading. Yes, the children are back at school, smart and crisp in slightly too big [...]
Perhaps you are feeling as I do – just not quite ready to say goodbye to summer. Yes, the gardens are past their best. The flowers giving a last brave encore but their edges are crumpling and their glory quietly fading. Yes, the children are back at school, smart and crisp in slightly too big uniforms. And yes, the wind is bringing a distinctive autumnal note. But it’s not over yet! We can still celebrate the lasting colours and brightness, and some fairy cakes are just the thing for that. As a surprise treasure found in a September lunchbox, a little cake always brings a smile!
Fairy Cakes
Turn on the oven and heat to 180 degrees centigrade. Choose 12 pretty fairy cake – or small cupcake – liners and place them in a fairy cake/muffin tin.
150g butter, softened
150g caster sugar
2 eggs
150g self-raising flour
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2-3 tablespoons of milk
Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs. Mix in the vanilla essence. Stir in the flour swiftly and with a light touch. Don’t overmix. Listen to something nice on the radio instead. Add a couple of spoons of milk to keep the mix from being too thick and dense. It should just about drop off a spoon. Working quickly, fill the cake liners. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the cakes are nicely risen and golden. Don’t keep opening the oven but just keep a watch through the oven window (if it has one) after about 15 minutes.
Take the cakes out and let them cool on a rack.
Simple fondant icing
300g icing sugar, sifted
3 tablespoons water (you can replace 1 or 2 spoons with lemon juice if your want lemony icing)
Mix the water into the icing sugar and give it a good stir until it is smooth and glossy. If you wish, you can add a few drops of food colour to tint the icing.
Decorating is especially fun and satisfying. Flowers, glitter, icing sugar, sprinkles, berries…
We still have lots of village teas happening, the last of the cricket teas, and cake sales – fairy cakes always go down well. Or give a little box of them wrapped in tissue and ribbon as a lovely present. Or you could just eat them, with a cup of tea, relaxing in the garden with a good book.
Let me know what you think. Any nice ideas for decorations? I love to hear from you so please drop me a comment if you have a moment! P.
Sally: 7th September 2010
I’m missing England so badly at the moment. Your beautiful pictures helped and hurt simultaneously. I brought silver balls back in my suitcase – children seem to love them on fairy cakes even though they’re fairly tasteless and break your teeth.
pascale: 7th September 2010
Hi Sally. Thanks for the visit and nice comment. I took a quick look at your great blog just now, will go back for a better look later. I know that feeling of missing places, but the other side is craving adventure and travel! We have only been in England about 5 years, and I do get regular wanderlust. How long have you been in the Middle East? Px
Meeta: 7th September 2010
what lovely pictures pascale! yes i do not want to let go of summer quite yet either but looking at the fall produce appearing slowly i am getting slightly excited too!
Margaret: 7th September 2010
Beautifully illustrated summer tea and so very English – lovely.
natalie: 7th September 2010
Such beautiful flowers. A little sad now that autumn is starting to show signs of ariving, but it gives hope for next Spring.
Charlie: 7th September 2010
I love this little escape from Autumn and enjoyed our accidental meeting while out food shopping. What beautiful, atmospheric pictures, as ever x
pascale: 7th September 2010
Thanks Charlie. Was lovely to bump into you yesterday. I’ll email bit later today. Px
Sarah, Maison Cupcake: 7th September 2010
Lovely cakes and pictures – I am having trouble though getting your posts into my feedreader, I’ve got your blogspot and the feedburner feeds installed into google reader but neither are delivering the new posts to me?
pascale: 7th September 2010
Sarah, thanks so much. I know I haven’t got the subscribe/feeds stuff sorted out properly and it’s driving me crazy! I’ll have to gather my strength and try to get it right now. x
catty: 7th September 2010
What gorgeous fairy cakes
You’re right, summer is ending but we need to keep the bright happy food going!!
Choclette: 7th September 2010
Your cakes are lovely and would love to have village teas, but really your flowers are just wonderful – and you say they are looking past their best!
pascale: 7th September 2010
Yes, stylist’s license – I picked out the best ones! Thanks for visiting. Px
Jen: 7th September 2010
Hi Pascale! Thanks for letting us use your recipe – we’ve now put it up on our site with a link back to yours!
http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/638508
pascale: 7th September 2010
Hi Jen, thanks for using it – it looks so nice on your site!