This weekend sees the opening of a dream of mine... my own (mini) bakery!!!

Every 3rd Sunday of the month I will be selling home baked cakes from my kitchen. The baking starts this weekend and I can't wait!

I've got a full Christmas themed menu (check out #bakemenu on Twitter) from iced Christmas cake to Brownie Santa Hats, so if you're in the Bristol area this weekend, be sure to stop by! The first 25 customers will receive a gift, and of course, there will be tasters!

280 Bakes
280 Broadlands Drive
Bristol
BS11 0PW

Join me 4-5pm every third Sunday (opens 20th December) and find what you want for tea!

280 Bakes is on Facebook and Twitter, so get in touch!

Lou x

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We've worked hard to make our house Christmas-y, El Husbandio and I. He is missing home (Costa Rica) and I'm missing home too (Swindon). Equally fun Christmases! Here's what we've created, hung and decorated this year.

I'm especially proud of the wreath (a gift for a friend) and the Rudolph cake. My very own show stopper for my fancy baker sister

Enjoy!

​Lou x

Ugly sunsets - there are no such things. 

And I've Googled it.

​There's a photo saying 'I give up finding an ugly sunset'.

There's a song.

And there's an Adobe colour scheme. 

There's no actual sunsets which are ugly. 

And that's pretty un-ugly in itself. 

Lou x

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My Christmas bake for this year was inspired by Pinterest. I am totally addicted to cake-browsing on that amazing website, and this one was a real challenge for me. This was definitely the cake I've baked which required the most skills. 

Pretty damn chuffed with that, I have to say! I baked it for my showstopper cake baking sister, who's missing Christmas with the family this year. She was impressed, so I think that qualifies: I'm officially a showstopping baker!

The secrets to my Rudolph bake

The cake itself is a simple vanilla sponge - one big cake, although it probably should have been deeper.

To get the curly fur effect in the chocolate frosting I piped into dots (blobs with a push-and-pull-to-a-peak). It took about an hour to do and I needed another batch of frosting!

The red nose is simply a roll of icing, dyed red, and the eyes are made the same way. They're held in place with cocktail sticks. 

Finally, the best bit: the antlers. I drew a template of antlers on paper and put a sheet of grease proof paper over the top. This made it easy to remove the antlers from the paper when they had set. Melting candy melts (cooking chocolate might work?), I filled in the template with thick layer, sinking a lolly stick into the 'trunk' of the antlers. Be sure to leave about half the stick poking out the bottom so you have a good hold on the cake when you stick them in. Chilled in the fridge, they don't take long to solidify, but make sure the area around them is clear. A dropped carrot can cause havoc to poor Rudolph's antler shape. 

What can I try next? Feeling confident now!

Lou x

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My sister's a cleaver old stick. She's the showstopping baker in our family. Mum is technical (having trained in food) and I'm firmly in the signature bake, a bit more experimental. We threw my dad a surprise retirement party earlier this year and my sister baked this bang on theme treasure. Dad was a pilot. 

The cake was a tripe sponge layered delight covered in chocolate icing and shortbread plane cookies. Well done sis!

Before you ask, the marzipan man was a throwback to my wedding party in February. It's a model of dad, helping to give me away. I still have to post a picture of that cake - it was epic!

Into bakes? Feeling hungry? Check out my less show stopping but equally tasty contribution to the party's cake display, inspired by the Great British Bake Off. 

Lou x

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No, there's no elephant seal meat inside these, you'll be glad to hear. I think they're hideous animals, violent, selfish creatures, and ugly at that - just like this pie! 

I had some shortcrust pastry to use up from my sweet potato pie baked for Halloween, so I lined four muffin tins with the leftovers. Then I finely sliced ham, dropped it into the bottom of the pie case, and covered it with scrambled egg mixture. They took about 30 minutes to bake at 180 degrees, and created some fantastically uneven (ugly!) elephant seal like pies. They tasted amazing, but they're not something I'd make for company!

Have you ever created something new and ugly, yet tasty?

Lou x

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I don't have any kids (yet), so I can't really trick or treat, but I'm a big fan of Halloween all the same. Here's how you Halloween with no one under 20 years old...

​After all the lead up, here's how my Halloween went down. Like a bat out of hell, if raced past, even with a bed time of 1.30am! We had soooo many trick or treaters - love it - the food was a success, and everyone got in the spirit/booze. Check it out!

Feeding Frenzy

I made 'dragon's blood' cocktail (sangria, essentially) and non-alcoholic bat's piss (a jug of lemonade) for the t-totals. 'Wink Murder' made an appearance once the food had been devoured. Halloween themed tunes were playing all night - just google 'devil' songs!

That's how you Halloween like an adult. 

Lou x

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Think of a Halloween colour. Orange? Black? I'm going to get you to think green this Halloween. 

How you make your Halloween more environmentally friendly, in other words. 

1. Don't use disposable cups. These are cute, but they're creating unnecessary waste. Try the same idea with cermaic reusable ones, if you're really keen on googley eyes. 

2. When lighting up creepy decorations, try using candles or LED lights - much more energy efficient than normal bulbs. Solar lights are even better, if you're decorating your garden. 

3. Don't make too much food if you're throwing a party. Go with the mantra 'eating is cheating' if you're on the booze! Be creative about the kind of food you can make to make a little go a long way and to reduce food waste. Check out my top foodie picks for Halloween!

4. If your sweet food doesn't get eaten, give them away as 'trick or treat' candy. 

5. Use up old scraps of material for costumes, or raid the local charity shop for ideas or outfits you can 'bloody-up'. 

6. Don't waste pumpkin! Use the soft flesh and seeds you've scooped out of your decorated pumpkin in a soup or pie, and roast the seeds in paprika and salt. Yum!

7. Try to use recycled paper while making decorations. Spooky spider webs and paper chains are perfect for this. 

8. Give your kids reusable containers for their trick or treat loot. 

9. Decorate your house with things you can use again next year. For example, hanging bats made of material, jam jar lanterns, window stickers... Come and have a look at some of my ideas for making your house a horror!

10. Use old tea towels or curtains to make beanbags for 'toss the pumpkin'. 

11. Dig out your old jam jars to use as lanterns or as 'witches brew' glasses for spooky themed drinks. 

12. Recycle your waste into a costume - just wait until you see what I've got planned! 

13. Host a costume swap party. We've all got a costume from the past we could give a new home. 

Statistic images borrowed from Edie.

Are you planning to reduce your environmental impact this Halloween? Let me know if you have any tips by commenting in the box below.
​
Lou x

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Here's my top 11 picks from the internet for ways to decorate your home this Halloween. Are you going to try any of them?

Two days to go!!!

Stay tuned - I'll be posting something showing you what ended up in my Halloween House this weekend - food, costumes and decor!

​Lou x

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​We're half way through my Halloween series of blogs here on Miss Write and today is all about food! Hope you're hungry... Here's my top five Halloween finger food picks. 

From the top left, we have...

Werewolf cupcakes 
Monster eye cookies
A pumpkin shaped cheeseball
Doughnut bugs
Devil's Eggs 
Olive creepy crawlies
Mummy croissants

As you know, I love trying new things in the kitchen, but I won't be making any of these this Halloween. I have a few top secret tricks up my sleeve. 

I won't be making Werewolf cupcakes as there will be plenty of cake at my house. Standard. 
Monster Eye cookies - doesn't really work with my aversion to eyes!
The cheeseball looks like it has disaster written all over it, however great it may be as a centre piece. 
Doughnuts are not really in my favourite foods, so I'll give those giant bugs a miss. 
Devil's Eggs - see Monster Eye cookies - ick!
The olive creepy crawlies were a possibility but El Husbandio doesn't like olives, so I can find something we both like. 
Croissants - don't go there. Mine are shortcrust pastry. Deal with it! 

There's nothing to stop you making these though - go for it! They all look awesome and very tasty. Good luck and send me some photos on my Twitter!

Lou x

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