The whole nation is celebrating the queen's 90th Birthday and
for this special occasion award winning master pâtissier and celebrity chef
Eric Lanlard has teamed up with Tesco Finest to create the perfect birthday
cake "Fit for the Queen" to celebrate the queens 90th Birthday.
The cake is a three layered cake, one chocolate and two
pink velvet layers filled with raspberry conserve and covered with Madagascan
white chocolate buttercream and crowned with delicate prosecco flavoured
buttercream roses. The final finishing touches are given by a sprinkle of
edible lustre dust.The limited edition Tesco finest Cake Fit for a Queen is
available in 532 stores nationwide from 3rd to 16th June 2016 at £10.00 and it
serves 14.
My friend Heidi and I were very fortunate to be invited at the first showing and tasting
of this cake at a recent event hosted by Tesco Finest. We were able to sample
this delicious cake and then we were given a lesson in cake decorating by EricLanlard before being set free to let our creative juices run to create our own
cakes to decorate and take home.
Eric shared many useful cake decorating tips with us and it
was a very creative session as Eric showed us two techniques of decoration,
creating a drip effect on the cake followed by piping buttercream roses.You can see my creation below.
All the guests created some stunning cakes in a rainbow of colours.
I would like to thank Tesco Finest for inviting me to this
event. All views and opinions are of my own personal experience of the event.
I am a really big fan of Great British Bake off and watch every episode when it's on. I really love the baking challenges that the participants partake in and secretly always wanted to be able to do something like that.
My wish was granted and I was recently invited to Estimation Nation Baking Challenge with Smart Energy GB at the Open Kitchen in Hoxton.
So what are Smart meters, I can hear that question being asked.Smart meters are new generation gas and electricity meters that are replacing the old generation meters. They send automatic readings to your energy supplier and you can also monitor how much energy your gadgets is using with the help of the smart meters. Smart meters mean that there is no estimated bill, you get an exact reading of your energy usage and you can also budget your usage as it shows when, where and how much energy you are using from day to day on a portable hand held device.
The advantages of the smart meters are that you no longer have to have a meter reading done, you are able to know exactly how much your bill is on a daily basis.The meters also work with prepayment plans and the smart meter will show you how much credit you have left and when you need to top up.
Smart meters are being rolled out in England, Wales and Scotland and by 2020 everyone will have an option to choose to change to this system if they wish. It will not cost anything to you to make the change as your energy provider will provide and fit a smart meter and issue a handheld device as part of your energy plan.
Now that I have told you all about the smart meters I am going to explain what our estimation nation baking challenge was all about. We were set up in pairs and had to bake two recipes, before we could do that we were fitted with Gopro cameras to film the whole baking challenge. It was really hard to keep them on our heads while baking and they did not look very flattering.
The first technical challenge was to make Raspberry cupcakes and the second was to make Cheesy herby savoury scones., You may think that this was an easy challenge but wait for it there was a major twist exactly like Bake off style!!!
We were given the ingredients and a recipe card, but the card had all the quantity measurements, the baking temperature and baking times missing. Our task was to estimate all the ingredients and baking times and we were not given any measuring or weighing tools.
Sarah my partner and I have both baked before so we had a vague idea of quantities.We worked really well together as a team right from the guesstimation of the ingredients to the mixing, baking and finally the styling and presentation. We were extremely pleased with our finished creations, not only did they turn out well, they tasted great too.
The bakes were judged by Ian Cummings who was a runner up of the Great British Bake off last year. The evening ended with some hot canapes and prize givings.
There were prizes for the best bake and the worst, needless to say we won neither. Being competitive I was pretty confident that we did well, I am sure I would not have wanted to win the worst bake prize !!!!It was a fun and exciting participating in the Estimation Nation baking challenge.
I was invited by Smart Energy GB to participate in this challenge. All views and opinions are of my own personal experience. The two group photos and the bottom photo was used with permission from O'connor Photography.
You can watch everyone in action in this video that was shot on the day:
I recently attended the Central school of cookery with some fellow bloggers to attend a Betty Crocker master class.The event was fun and interactive with a hands on baking and decorating class.
After a brief introduction
about the history of Betty Crocker, we set about baking with the
Betty Crocker products.
The prepared Betty Crocker mixes are really easy to use and
you can get guaranteed results each time you use them. The mixes can be used in
innovative ways to create a multitude and variety of cakes that not only look
good but taste awesome. You can check out the full Betty Crocker baking range here.
At the event we used the red velvet mix, the vanilla mix, the brownie mix and the cookie mix.With amazing team work with my friends Akesha Reid and LeBinh we created some delectable cakes.
We made some lovely marbled swirley snowflake red velvet and vanilla loaf cake with frosting, some crunchy christmas brownie houses, chocolate chip cookie brownies and some Christmas themed vanilla cup cakes with vanilla frosting.
For the frosting Betty Crocker have delicious
cream cheese frosting and their new vanilla
Icing and Rainbow Sprinkles which is a two in one solution, you get the
sprinkles with the icing. It is convenient and easy to use, as it comes with the
perfect amount of sprinkles and the creamy vanilla icing to frost any
cookies or cakes. Betty Crocker™ Vanilla
Icing with Rainbow Sprinkles is available in your local supermarket from and retails
at RRP of £2.85.
At the masterclass we had lots of fun creating and decorating the cakes. The emphasis was on christmas and we really enjoyed decorating our bakes with christmassy fondant cut outs.
I had a lovely time baking at the Betty Crocker Masterclass, and would like to thank Betty Crocker for inviting me and giving me a wonderful goody bag so that I could continue baking at home too.
3 of the photos (the loaf cake in 1st picture , the group photo and the breaking egg
one in collage) used in this post were from Preston Perfect Photography, the rest are copyright of citrusspiceuk
As always at simplyfood, when ever I try something new I like to give my readers a chance to try it too. Betty Crocker has been very kind and they have agreed to send 1 simply food reader 5 betty crocker products so that they too can create some lovely christmas bakes to enjoy during the festivities.
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