Rustic semi-rustic cake with fresh flowers - June 2016

This week's wedding cake... a 3 tier rustic semi-naked cake with fresh cosmos, roses and lisianthus.  

Heart shaped mini cakes - April 2016

Sweet little heart shaped cakes.  

They not only look good though, they taste great too ;)

Cute huh!

x

A cake for Nina - February 2016

It's been an amazing time for my old friends, the Blaine Brothers.  They wrote, directed and released their first feature film "Nina Forever".  Since then, it's been lauded all over the world, winning awards and being championed by reviewers.  

Now it's available on Amazon on DVD, Blue-ray or via Streaming services.

Go to: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nina-Forever-Abigail-Hardingham/dp/B019J5OK02.

I love this film, it's well worth buying

 The amazing Oliver Russell shot it, it's got an an incredible cast, is beautifully designed and styled and will honestly surprise you with it's humour and nuance.

To celebrate the DVD release the directors, Ben and Chris, did a whirlwind tour of the U.K. at selected cinemas with special showings of the film and a Q&A session afterwards.  I caught up with them at the Ritzy cinema in Brixton and, of course...brought cake.

Each element relates to a scene in the film.  So, starting from the top...

Toppers:

I remember now why I haven't made a tree with sugar for a while.  

It's so time consuming!

  

This was a big tree so I couldn't just cover wire in tape.  I used a wooden dowel core for the trunk, then various thicknesses of wire.  I covered the whole thing with sugarpaste, which is easier said than done.  The paste didn't want to stick to the wire so i had to create a key by heating the wires with a blowtorch, rubbing sugarpaste onto the hot wires so a little melted on and created a crust, then I could stick the paste on.  

Please note: Obviously, the waxed tape is flammable, as is the sugar and the wood plus there's a real danger of burning yourself with the hot wires.  This is an adult only exercise, with the aid of water, safety equipment and a first aid box handy.  

I do not recommend you replicate this!

Nina's grave, complete with daffodils, as per the film.

Top Tier:

First I airbrushed a base of green, blue and a little grey.

Then I hand painted graveyard scenes from the film in loose water colours and extruded  the "Nina Forever" lettering.

Middle Tier:

Since Nina was released it's inspired lots of people to produce artworks which they've been sharing with Ben and Chris.  One of these that I particularly liked, I reproduced on a plaque.  It's not a patch on the original I'm afraid, but still worked very well.

Bottom Tier:

One of the pivotal scenes in the film takes place in a hotel room that has a striking wall with a lake scene on it.  

You might have gathered by now that Nina's naked in the film, save for some long tresses, some streaky make up and the blood from her accident.  In the scene in the hotel room, Nina ends up sitting blooding on the floor against the back wall.

I airbrushed water, shore and sky, then piped foliage.

I modelled Nina's face, then started adding her red and black make up.

I added the blood by colouring piping gel as it gives a less opaque, "fresher" look than just painting.

She had a skewer inside to hold her upright.

The cake ready for transporting the 2 hours+ to London (minus the tree, which I put on when I got there and with a couple of pins still in place while the royal icing was setting).

It's the bane of my life when I have to set up cakes under halogen down-lighters.  

It's such harsh lighting, badly colour balanced, with awful shadows so the cakes either look burned out or really dark in photographs.  

It makes perfect cakes look really pedestrian... 

but there you are, nothing to be done about it now.

...and anyway, it tasted great!

To the Blaine Brothers, Mr Russell, Imogen Loveday, Ryan Chandler, Mrs Blaine, Alex Mayover, Kevin Williamson and all you other wonderfully talented people involved in Nina, it's amazing, you're amazing, and I'm really proud to be your friend! xxxx

Floral cascade cake with 90 and Jack Russell - Dec 2015

A 2 tier buttercream covered cake with lots of different coloured fondant flowers.

This one was a 90th birthday cake for a lovely lady who has a soft spot for Jack Russells so we added some toppers to reflect this.

NOTE:  These and many other toppers are available in my Etsy shop.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/KasserinaHome?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Ducati birthday cake - Feb 2016

6" chocolate cake with a small Ducati 996 modelled on the top.

NOTE:  This and many other toppers are available in my Etsy shop.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/KasserinaHome?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Croquembouche - Jan 16

Nom, Nom, Nom!

...nuff said

Simple Rainbow stacked cake with sprinkles - December 2015

Simple but effective!

Six layers of rainbow vanilla love, stacked high, covered with smoothed buttercream and showered with rainbow sprinkles... perfect.

Now, the only issue with this little lovely is that when you make a cake higher than it is wide, it tends to want a little lie down when you drive it around corners (especially when you've made it to taste this good).  

This cake had quite a way to go, so in order to make sure that the cake was safely transported I gave it a central bubble straw support to make sure that the layers didn't slide around on the buttercream.  

I also screwed a dowel into the cake drum and positioned the bubble straw and cake over it so nothing could shift during delivery.

I hadn't even got back from delivering the cake before the customer sent me this photo. It seems to have gone down well!

Hoo ha! 

Come see Kasserina at the Crawley wedding show on the 25th October.

One of the biggest of the year, I'm really looking forward to it!

The Crawley Wedding Fayre at K2

"The Crawley Wedding Fayre is one of the largest Wedding Fair Shows in the South East attracting exhibitors and brides-to-be from West Sussex, East Sussex, Kent, Surrey and South London.

This Sussex Wedding Fair is held in the large main arena of the K2 Leisure Centre in Crawley and features many wedding specialists, a bridal fashion catwalk show and wedding cars INSIDE the venue itself.

Don’t miss this bridal show for your one-stop wedding planning all under one roof!"

Go to http://crawleyweddingfayre.com for more details and free advance tickets

Giraffe birthday cake - October 2015

Small three layer 6" chocolate fudge birthday cake with a theme... 

think you can tell what that might be!

NOTE:  This and many other toppers are available in my Etsy shop.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/KasserinaHome?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Harvest Flowers Wedding cake - October 2015

White feathers wedding cake - October 2015

Wedding Fair time!

My first foray into wafer paper, but it was easier than expected and I quite like the effect. 

My original design involved neater looking, more deco feathers, but as I steamed them I found that I much preferred them with a looser effect (more natural), so I just kept going with that.