What Have I Done to Deserve This? // Pet Shop Boys

I have a new job! It's all very exciting. I've been there three weeks now, and it's exhausting but great. Much much better than my old job, which I'd grown really fed up of.
I was very sad to leave when it came to it, but I know that I'll still see the people who made it such a great place to work.

Cakes always went down a storm there, so I made some to take in for my last day. I wanted to do some cupcakes (as they're always easy), one load fruity and one load that are a bit different.

For the fruity ones I found a Hummingbird recipe for Strawberry Cheesecake Cupcakes. I don't know what it is about that book, I trust it too much. It was completely against my instincts to shovel a load of chopped up strawberries into a cake case, top with batter and bake. I knew they would turn to some kind of horrible mush and the cases wouldn't stand it, but for some reason I trusted the book and did it anyway. They were rank. I left them to dry out over night and took in half of them for work uniced.. I don't know if anyone thought 'bleearrrgh what on Earth is she feeding us?' as they revealed the mess of strawberries at the bottom of the cake. If I make them again I will do it as follows; Bake cupcake as usual. Hollow out some cake, fill with chopped strawberries. Ice. Much better.

For the other batch I did Hummingbird's Marshmallow Cupcakes, as pictured. My thoughts behind this were that they were the girliest cake I'd ever seen, and it seemed entirely appropriate to make a batch for 12 male engineers.


I liked these a lot, a much more logical recipe, and much much tastier.
The only thing I would change would be to make my own marshmallows and fill the cupcakes with the unset goo, rather than melting shop-bought ones.

Colourblind // Darius

Aahh you can't beat a bit of Darius.





These were done ages ago, marshmallows with the remaining American gummy bears. I wanted to do something with them that would show off the amazing colours.



I think I need a new sugar thermometer, as all of my recent marshmallows haven't been that good, a bit too squishy and sticky, I don't think all of these got eaten.



Sorry for the lack of posts between now and Christmas, things went a bit wonky. I have a few posts to catch up on and should be back on track for Easter.

Trees // Pulp

Libby left me with the worst of the cake trio to sample at my leisure yesterday afternoon. If you hadn't guessed already I got the one with green on top:


The cake is made of: Factory consistency, boring cupcake sponge; pink butter style icing, white chocolate chips, Green confectionary chrismas tree (1cm in thickness). This would be a fairly bog standard novelty cake, seasonal to boot, unortunately it has one serious downfall, one component is amiss, you guessed it, it's the green bit.

I hesitate to call it marshmallow but that's how the tree would be advertised if you brought it on its own. There's a sliding scale for the quality of marshmallowy confection and it's a steep one:

1. The cream of the crop: Homemade Marshmallow. James Martin said of this delicious stuff that you'll never go back to normal marshmallows again, he's almost right.
2. Packet marshmallows: the ones in supermarkets that are advertised as being "seductively soft" however they are primarily toasted around bonfires, or have their chewy monotonousness smothered by a dubious chocolate fountain, all seduction lost.
   
3. Flumps: machine uniform, 13 year old sugar rush fodder. Still palateable comfort food, often found at the seaside in cones bigger than most stomachs, good thing they compact.
   
4. Sugar coated Jelly Pop's: Do not compact, these were certainly popular last year filling many supermarket xmas shelves but I've not seen so many this year, possibly because after eating three you realise they're disgusting. Their texture is first grainy because of the sugar coating (coarse granulated sugar) which swiftly dissolves and you discover that the jelly pop is not a smooth jelly but slightly textured, almost mealy, it takes more than a glass of water before your mouth feels clean again. Then there's the taste, sweet of course but mainly: rank. They taste like nothing natural and you know you should be able to place the flavour, they're trying for flavour, unfortunately the thick coloring carries more aroma, like a cheap plastic panhandle that got too hot. If you eat too many you may get the sensation that there are chemical sores on your tongue.
   

This tree sweet was somewhere between 3. and 4. unfortunately for Candy Cakes the difference between the two is enormous. That is that Flumps are still paletable whereas the Jelly pops were a Christmas '08 phenomenon, they seemed like a good idea at the time, like investment banking, only this year everyone wants investment back!


I felt ill at the first nibble, soldiering on I finished the whole thing. I felt nauseous. It was so green, it tasted of green, it had the squashiness of mallow and the mealiness of a jelly pop. It had the same coarse sugar coating and was simply revolting. The sugar icing baubles were reminicient of gristle.

Unfortunately the problem goes deeper than this piece of evil confection, the cake structure shows the business model of this product, as Lib mentioned below there is no investment into the quality of the muffins and cakes. They are are not lovingly hand-crafted parcels of deliciousness, they're cheap, on trend, rubbish. The cake was acceptably moist but boring, the pink butter icing and so-so-so awful white choc was flavorless, the flavor of the disgusting one cm thick green thing had leeched into the pink icing which made it also revolting.

An otherwise boring cake has been made nauseating by this mistake of sugar and science. The second main function of food is to taste good, CandyCakes have skipped this stage and made cakes that LOOK good only. This sets a precident that I'm sure most of the other cakes live up to, made on the cheap to turn a profit. Unfortunately even the most fashionable cake eater couldnt stop themselves from turning green after eating this, but not as green as the tree, leave that shade to the scientists.