Graphic Design #2

Another foray into graphic design - after the first with my new tablet. My aim is to create one of these a week now. Watch this space....

Regents Canal

It's not everyday Mary Poppins pops up on a walk down Regent's Canal.

Portobello Road

Down where the riches of ages are stowed apparently.

The Most Beautiful Necklace Ever

I swear I have been looking for this necklace my whole life. It is perfect in every sense of the word. Thank you Zara for making such a neck-improving life-altering piece of jewellery.

London Town

  

Flipping Great Flapjacks

They're golden. They're crumbley. They're firey hot. They're my ginger and lemon flapjacks. The best bit? I didn't have to buy a single thing; all the ingredients were in my baking cupboard already. Just what the doctor ordered on a spending free weekend.

Bellini Cuptail

I have been busy imagining and designing and sketching a series of cupcakes inspired by my favourite cocktails. Hence 'cuptail.' I was going to call them 'cockcakes' but this was renownedly met with disapproval. Lord knows why.

The Bellini Cuptail was inspired by my fizz-fuelled jaunt to Venice, well recorded in my blog. I spent the majority of my time in Venice pretty jolly from over-consumption of bellinis. My motto was 'Where there's a bellini, there's a way.'

This is the first in a series of my Cuptails. It has a peach compote middle, light elderflower icing and crackling space dust on the top to create the bubbling prosecco and sweet peach of the magnificent bellini.

cakes...

125g unsalted butter

125g caster sugar

2 medium eggs

125g plain flour

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

2 tablespoons of elderflower cordial

A can of peach slices blended until smooth

icing...

60g unsalted butter

250g icing super

3-4 tablespoons elderflower cordial

Space dust / popping candy crumbled on the top

• Preheat oven to 180°C and pop muffin cases into cupcake tins

• For the cakes : Cream butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Add elderflower cordial, then add the eggs one at a time, being careful not to beat too much or it will curdle. Seive the flour, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder and salt and gently fold into the mixture. Divide into the cupcake cases and bake for 20 minutes, or until golden on the top and a skewer comes out clean. Once cooked, leave to cool completely - stone cold.
• Drain the peaches completely and then blend until smooth. Cut holes into the cakes, quite deeply and remove excess sponge. Fill the holes with peach puree - if you see the peach puree sinking after about 5 minutes, top up.

• To ice : Beat the icing sugar into the butter, then add the elderflower cordial to taste. Should be really thick consistency. Squidge into a piping bag, and pipe however you want onto the top making sure to cover the peach pure middles. Make sure the icing is touch set before crumbling popping candy onto the top as it melts if it gets wet.