Cake seventeen - 2013

Xmas Fruit Cake 

I’m definitely a Xmas lover, I love the days before Xmas when you make all the preparations - Xmas tree, Nativity, house decorations and last but not least cakes and cookies. I also like cooking for Xmas Eve and day but cakes are my favourite! I start mid-November baking the Xmas Fruitcake as it tastes better if yoy store it for some weeks. I like the smell of candied fruit and raisins which fills the house and makes me dream of small and cosy Tea Rooms in Devon or Cornwall. Yes! One of my dreams is to have a small Tea Room and bake a few cakes a day. 

I’m able to leave all the rest behind when it’s Xmas time. My kids say I get obsessed by Xmas baking which could be true, I must admit.. but they all love it in the end... and have their favourite recipes to be prepared. When you love something, you simply do it, without considering how tired you get and how long it takes!

song: Because 

There's no real reason for love

Cake nineteen - 2013 edition

Santa's House 

This is the house I've made with some help from my children for this Christmas. It takes about three days and we need a lot of patience and care in the details. But it's now part of our Christmas tradition. 

Every year we like to change it a little bit: this year we've experimented a new material for the house logs, different shutters, a bigger wreath on the facade and we've closed the front door. Don't forget to give a look at the sleigh and the reindeers... They're my favourite! There are the reins too...

Song: Happy Christmas 

A Merry Christmas to all of us

Cake thirty - one

The Duchess Cake

Like many girls of my generation, when I was a child, I loved to listen to stories set in a fairy tale world full of happy kings and princesses living in white castles surrounded by huge parks, or built on top of high mountain peaks. If I close my eyes I can still recall their life at court: the king was busy with his ministers; the queen and her daughters, there was always more than one, spent their time brushing their hair, choosing the best dress for the next ball and in some cases singing or doing some embroidery work; the prince was riding a white horse or crossing his future 

kingdom on a horse drawn coach. Life was timeless, a stroll in the park or a ball could last for days in my imagination. My mum’s voice sounded kind of remote and I got lost in the book pictures illustrating the ball room or the ride on a coach until a pitch of her voice announced an impeding tragedy. I startled and, holding my breath, I waited for the fairies to appear and magically restore serenity. Those were the years of the first Disney films on Tv and there were no monsters or robots in the stories! I had my happy imaginary hideaway far from the adults’ world... a secret place in my mind. 

Song: Do you want to know a secret

We all have a secret to tell, don't we?

see recipe: 

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/12/thirty-one-duchess-cake.html

Cake thirty

Choco Dream

What colour are your dreams? Do you dream in full colour or in black and white? The answer's not easy, in fact we don’t always remember our dreams. Sometimes they seem to vanish when we open up our eyes, other times we feel like trapped in for hours, we might only remember a single scene, a sensation or a detail. It does happen to me to keep on living my dream for a few hours and of course nightmares are quite difficult to get rid of, they haunt me down and ruin my day. Sweet dreams don’t last long, unfortunately. 

I’ve never tried to investigate the deeper meaning of my dreams, maybe I simply don’t want to, but I often try and find out the link they have with my real life. At night my mind is set free and gives shape to the fears and anxiety I have to disguise during the day.. So in the morning I’m rather busy to kind of lock up 

all my ‘night memories’ in a drawer and colour my day with positive feelings. After all I’m a dreamer and do believe in happy endings!

Wouldn’t it be better to wake up from dreams which take place in a chocolate world? I’d love it! The memory of the smell of chocolate would be enough to vanish all my night ghosts!

Song: I'm only sleeping

Wouldn't it be nice to wake up in a chocolate world?

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/10/cake-thirty-choco-dream.html

Cake twenty-nine

Symphony in red, black and white

An important day for my family: my daughter’s graduation ceremony. We’d all be there with some of her friends and close relatives. I was trying to disguise I was rather tense as I, like all mothers, wanted the best for her. I didn’t mean the best mark, I only wanted her to be fully satisfied: After all I don’t think that the final mark is what really matters, yes of course it does, but it’s more the atmosphere, the empathy, sympathy and interest in your work the professors show that really makes the difference for you. What you need is some kind of encouragement you’re afraid of the future. You know it’ll be tough then, but now it’s time to get some kind of reward for all the work done! I know pretty well what’s it like when nobody seems to care about you, 

in fact my graduation ceremony ended with these words: you’re now doctor in .... for what it’s worth. And this is all I remember of that day! 

I pretended I didn't care since, in a way, those studies were not what I really liked, but then when I got a job the following year, I must say, I'd have liked to call him, but what for? He wouldn't even have remembered my name... 

Luckily her story was different, she was very good and what most matters she was fully satisfied at the end. 

Song: Across the universe

Let's forget all our worries and enjoy this song.

see recipe:

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/08/cake-twenty-nine-symphony-in-red-black.html

Cake twenty-eight

Lilac Chic

I share my passion for baking with my daughters and when it’s time to make a birthday cake for one of us we don’t miss out on the chance to make something special which for us means a three or four tier cake. This doesn’t imply that the rest of the family is happy about it! In fact they’re perfectly aware of the consequences of the three of us working together for a few days and the chance or maybe the certainty that there won’t be anything but cake ingredients in the kitchen until the cake’s ready! We, especially me I must say, kind of forget there’s an outer world and sound like tuned in to a one music station, so, in a way, I do understand their point of view... 

First we decide on decoration  and then choose the cake, usually a different type of cake for each tier. It’s not easy to find something we all like, I do have my favourite cake which I always propose.. I must admit.... but very often when it’s not my birthday cake I have to give in... and accept their ideas. The atmosphere gets tense from time to time especially when it comes to assembling and decorating the cake! 

This cake here's the one for my younger daughter’s 18th birthday and it was only me and her to make it since my older daughter had no time to help. It was a big job but in the end we made it and it was good! 

Song: Birthday

It doesn't matter whose birthday it is, let's celebrate together!

see recipe:

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/08/cake-twenty-eight-lilac-chic.html

Cake twenty-seven alias Bread one

Multigrain Dove

If you’re a cake-baking fan I’m sure you’ll also like baking bread. There’s not the same variety of course but there are more types of bread than you expect: if you simply consider the different breads you have in your country you’ll realize how amazing it s that just mixing some flour and some water you can have some breads which look and taste differently. Besides bread dough can be easily given any shape you like and some bread is no doubt a work of art or some type of sculpture.. I’m not a ‘bread’ artist but I love making bread on special occasions and using bread dough for decoration. I love the smell of freshly baked bread in my kitchen, it really makes me feel positive. Among all shapes I’m fond of pleated bread.. don't know the reason why, maybe it's something which goes back to my childhood and my short curly hair....

Song: Don't pass me by

Follow the rhythm.. I'm sure it'll cheer you up! 

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/07/cake-twenty-seven-alias-bread-one.html

Cake twenty-six

Sicilian Cassata

I’d call it the Queen of Cakes, regal and sumptuous in the decoration, a feast of colours and flavours! The perfect portrait of the island. I'm of Sicilian origins but don't often go back to Sicily as it's quite far away from whee I live. Anyway I love it! Everybody loves it, you can't help it! What I love most is the colour of the sea, a deep blue which is in sharp contrast with the bright yellow of the sun, the white of the houses and the intense colours of the flowers. Every time I leave the island, I close my eyes and try to store this magical symphony of colours hoping it'll help me to brighten up my Winter's gray routine. 

Once I was on a short holiday on the Adriatic Sea and my kids were all very young. I usually took them to Sicily but that time we were there with other friends. We got the beach and all the kids started to play, after some time my son came to me saying: "Mum, when are we going to the seaside?" I said we were in the right place and he went on "No, Mum I mean the blue sea, this can't be the sea it's brown". So I realized he was another unaware victim of the magic of the blue sea, just exactly like me. The spell was cast again and I can even give a name and a place to this spell: it's the deep blue of the water near Scopello or near the Tonnara del Secco in San Vito Lo Capo, two places which are now a must-see but were solitary paradises when I was a child. As you understand it’s a cake which is particularly dear to me, as it belongs to my family tradition. It's  always been on our table on special occasions: it was my aunt Lucia who made it or my mum’s brother, Stefano, who sent us one directly from the best pastry shop in Alcamo.

Then when I was old enough to make cakes I made it myself. It wasn’t easy to get to the same high standard both for quality and look, but after some time I made it! Every time it's a new experience when you get to the decoration, a different look but always rich and colourful: green for the marzipan, white for the icing and red and orange for the candied fruits.

Song: All together now!

Let the colours brighten up your day!

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/07/cake-twenty-six-sicilian-cassata.html

Cake twenty-five

Chocolate Lollipops 

My youngest daughter was still a toddler and I was in England with my students on an exchange programme. I was in a small town not far from Coventry and Birmingham and I remember I was trying to find some little present to take back home. It was the first time I had left my children at home and was abroad without them. I happened to pass by a chocolate shop and saw some chocolate lollipops in the shape of a teddy bear: the right gift for my little baby!  It was so cute! She was already a chocoholic although so young.... and I bought one for her...The problem of a chocolate lollipop is that it’s so nice to look at that you feel sorry to eat it.... It was the same for her... 

After ten years or more I was again in England with my school students, and this time I was in Devon in Plymouth. It was a couple of weeks before Easter and all the shops were full of chocolate delicacies. It was in a shop full of baking equipment that I saw a lollipop mould and it was mine! 

Song: Good Night

Close your eyes and follow me into a chocolate dream world!

Cake twenty-four

Bunnies, Bunnies, Bunnies...

Bunnies aren’t part of my Easter traditions. I only had eggs when I was a kid, bigger or smaller eggs but only eggs. I still have quite a distinct memory of a giant-like chocolate egg which was more or less my size; I remember it was standing in a shopwindow of a bar in the main street and it was destined to the lucky winner of a lottery. It was of a shining red with a big ribbon and some flowers on top. 

Eggs were in all shopwindows, but no bunnies. Bunnies are not wild animals here, we don’t see them run happily in parks and gardens like in England and are only recently become home pets. They are quite popular anyway, but they are bred like chickens and eaten as a delicacy. 

I first saw a chocolate bunny, the Lindt bunny when I was a teenager and it looked rather exotic to my eyes: it could never substitute the Easter Egg on our Easter tables though. Some years ago while wondering in the street of a German town I saw a bunny mould: I bought it and I’ve had my Easter bunny since then. I’ve tried to make it in chocolate but with no good results until I made it my way: the Cake and the Rice Krispies Bunny.

Song: Octopus's Garden
What about walking in a Bunny's Garden?

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/05/cake-twenty-four-bunnies-bunnies-bunnies.html

Cake twenty-three

Easter Eggs 

I first made a chocolate egg ten years ago or more. It all started when I found an Easter chocolate mould in a shop it was love at first sight! But it’s been kind of an unrequited love for years, I must say, until I made my first egg which was acceptable to look at. It was more like a challenge between me and the chocolate egg than a real love... I had to overcome a lot of difficulties, I didn’t know how to join the two parts without making holes in the junction for instance. The thing is that you make chocolate eggs only once a year, so you don’t have many chances to try... But in a way I was lucky: I have four children which means at least four eggs plus one or two more for their friends. After a few attempts which could hardly be called chocolate eggs I had the idea to add some Rice Krispies to the melted chocolate and there it stood, as if my magic, my first chocolate egg without holes and bumps! 

song: I'm fixing a hole
It really doesn't matter if you're wrong, stick to your idea and carry on...

see recipe:

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/04/cake-twenty-three-easter-eggs.html

Easter baking

Easter’s another of my favourite periods of time for baking. Every year I complain I never have enough time to give form to my ideas: I wish I could forget the rest of the world and dedicate myself only to it! I’d love to  shut myself in the kitchen and ignore the natural rhythm of the day, but of course I can’t.... There are days, anyway, when I lose track of time and space and really put my family’s patience to the test; it goes without saying the good smell of chocolate and cakes play their role and partly make up for all the things I leave behind...

What I like to make is what’s not strictly necessary for the Easter lunch but it’s what, in my opinion, makes it special.  

It’s a golden time for baking: from chocolate bunnies to small and big eggs, from basket or flower shaped cakes to the traditional Sicilian Cassata, from cheese Panettone to dove shaped bread and why not a Spring House.

Song: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

We never feel lonely when sharing Easter specialties...

Cake twenty-two

Cheesecake Delice

The first time I had a slice of cheesecake was back in the 70’s in Britain, when I was there as a young student in some families in the suburbs of London as a paying guest, as we used to say. Then I tasted it again in Germany in the early 80's. It was a completely new taste to me. We didn’t use cheese for cakes, the nearest thing we had was our ricotta cheese which was a common ingredient in South Italian recipes. But the taste was totally different. Those were the years when the first cream cheeses like Philapdelphia or Dover were marketed in Italy and I remember I once made a cheesecake for my birthday soon after my return from Germany: I loved it but my friends found it a bit ‘unusual’.  

For some years I thought there was only one type of cheesecake, the classical recipe I’d say, with a base of biscuits and the chilled filling, but then I found out there was a complete hidden universe....  from the chilled to the baked ones, and I didn’t lose time to try each recipe, although my family didn’t sound so fond of them. My mum used to say: ‘Good’ but her voice couldn’t betray it was just to please me... So I couldn’t make cheesecakes very often until I had my own house. Now after many years my mum still doesn’t like them much but my children love them and I feel free to experiment them all! 

This is a a baked cheesecake with some Mars bars inside and rasberries on top, a real delicacy!

Song: ‘Don’t let me down’

Try this cake, it’ll never let you down!

see recipe: 
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/04/cake-twenty-two-cheesecake-delice.html

Cake twenty one

Spring Swirl

It’s almost spingtime and I really feel the need of some sunshine:  warmer weather, longer days, I mean longer time of sunlight, and the juicy spring fruits which prelude to the rich variety of summer. I love all kinds of cakes with fruit but my favourite ones are with strawberries. It’s only a matter of a few weeks’ time. I must admit that I associate strawberries with the good season and spring flowers. I like to give my house a ‘new look’, with flowers on all balconies and windowsills: it’s my way to express my joy for life. 

A few days ago I was undecided about the cake to make, I was looking for a breakfast cake but with a fresher flavour, I didn’t want anything with chocolate or jam, but something which would mirror, in a way, my love for spring. So I opted for this apple cake, which is good with a cup of coffee or tea and has a simple but one-of-a-kind aftertaste.

Song: Act Naturally

A not very popular song but good to cheer us up!

see recipe: 
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-twenty-one-spring-swirl.html

Cake twenty

The king of cheesecakes

I’ve just come back from Belgium which I consider, no doubt, the kingdom of chocolate! I knew Belgian chocolate was world famous but I didn’t expect so many shops and such a variety of chocolates. It was like walking in streets of chocolate with shopwindows full of pralines, chocolate fountains and chocolate statues. Once you went into a shop, you were practically lost! You could hardly resist tasting a small chocolate and you found yourself dreaming to eat them all.. In a few days you felt like addicted to chocolate! 

This is not a Belgian cake but the combination of the delicious chocolate bottom and the yummy soft cheese mixture makes it in my opinion the best of cheesecakes.. 

So I’d love to dedicate this cheesecake ‘the king of cheesecakes’ to Belgium, the kingdom of chocolate. A bit like giving a king his kingdom!

Song: Lucy in the sky with diamonds

Picture yourself in a chocolate street with chocolate trees and marmalade skies...

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-twenty-king-of-cheesecakes.html

Cake nineteen

Father Christmas's House

I first made it a few years ago although it's in a recipe book I bought in Germany in the early 80's. It was my youngest daughter Sara who prompted me to try when she was about 12. I thought it was too difficult to make and had always looked at the photo in the book as a work of art, something impossible for me. I must admit: I  feared to fail. There's nothing worse in cooking than comparing your cake to the one in the recipe book and.... see the difference!!! But she sounded so enthusiastic -we were going to make a house for Father Christmas! That was going to be something special. So I said yes to make her happy and we ventured into an enterprise which sounded to me rather impossible to achieve.

The first time the result wasn't that good, but we insisted and year after year we've learnt some tricks and now we're proud of our wooden cottage in the snow with a small garden around. 

It's become a must in our family!

Last year my son decided it was high time to give Father Christmas a more comfortable and modern looking home and made a plan for a bigger house with a pond and a private boat dock. It was a rather complicated project, Sara was in America for a year and I didn't feel like 'building' it on my own. 

So he and a friend of his helped me. It was really fun and the best assistance I could have! Two students of architecture for a gingerbread house.... What else could I ask for?

Song: Good night 
Close your eyes and.... follow me into Father Xmas's House

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house.html

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house-making.html

http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/03/cake-nineteen-father-xmass-house_10.html

Cake eighteen

Gingerbread  Decorations

Does it ever happen to you to do something the others consider useless? Something you like which isn’t of great importance, of course,  you think it can really make the difference and what's more it’s fun for you? It does to me... and this is one example!

  I do love all Christmas decorations including the ones for the table, I think they help you feel the magic of Christmas. I like my table to look special and not only for the food we eat. This year I've made some gingerbread cookies and decorated the lamp over the table - a kind of Christmas Night scene with trees, snow flakes, reindeers, stars and, of course, Santa Claus and his sleigh - the Xmas tree and the front door wreath. It took me some time but, in the end, I was well satisfied. 

Song: Happy Christmas 
No better tune for Christmas time...

see recipe:
http://time-for-cake-making.blogspot.it/2013/01/cake-eighteen-gingerbread-decorations.html