A strawberry butterfly cake

My little girl is no longer so little. She celebrated her 3rd birthday last week, but she is the size of a 4 or 5 year old and speaks like one too. I often forget that she is still so little and sometimes expect so much from her. I can't believe it's been 3 years since I laboured in the hospital and had my all-natural unmedicated birth experience (which I was told was not possible after my firstborn was delivered via emergency ceasarean years ago). She was an easy baby who loved to sleep (she still loves her sleep), and she's clever in a different way to my boy's brainy smartness. She's turning out to be a very girly girl, and her request for her birthday cake was simple and girly: a pink and purple butterfly strawberry cake. This Betty Crocker butterfly cake recipe seemed simple enough to execute, and I made a strawberry cake using two recipes. I followed this food.com recipe, and used Chocolate Moosey's idea of reducing the strawberry to produce a more intense flavour and colour (but I reduced it much further than she did). Fresh strawberries were not available at the supermarket, and I could not find the frozen variety, but thankfully one of the cake supplies store I went to sold tubs of frozen pureed strawberries. The strawberry buttercream frosting was a lovely pink colour, and fortified the strawberry flavour of the cake. I was pleased with how well the cake turned out, and I was complimented on the cake at my girl's party. Homemade cakes are a rarity in Hong Kong (kitchens here are tiny and tabletop ovens are a bit of a luxury), and in fact I've never been to a birthday party where the cake was homemade. One dad at the party told me that he wasn't going to have any cake until his wife told him that I made it. I made the strawberry cake again for my girl's class when they celebrated her birthday in kindy, and the principal declared that she had two servings!

I really enjoyed making and decorating this butterfly cake, which was as easy to make as the other pink cake I made last year. I wonder if my third baby will be requesting pink cakes for her birthday like her sister! The recipe below is for a round two-layer strawberry cake. For cutting and decorating into a butterfly cake, please refer to This Betty Crocker butterfly cake recipe.

The cake shortly after I finished decorating it:

Strawberry Cake

Ingredients

CAKE
2 1/4 cups (225g) sifted cake flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup (115g) butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup (200g) sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup (240g) pureed strawberries
1/2 cup (115mL) milk

FROSTING
1 cup (225g) butter
3.5 cups icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup (60mL) reduced pureed strawberries

Method

FOR CAKE:
1. In a large saucepan, bring pureed strawberries to a boil, stirring occasionally. Simmer for 15 to 20 minutes or until the strawberries cook down to about two-thirds of the volume. Remove from the heat and allow to cool to room temperature. Use 1/2 cup of the reduced puree for the cake and reserve the remaining 1/4 cup for the frosting.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
3. In a large bowl, sift together flour and baking powder.
4. In a separate bowl, cream the butter and sugar with a mixer on medium speed for a few minutes until light and fluffy.
5. Add the eggs to the creamed butter, one at a time, mixing well each time. Add vanilla.
6. Add the flour in three additions, alternating with the milk and strawberry puree (in two additions), beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Beat only until the ingredients are incorporated, and do not overmix.
7. Divide the batter between the two round greased and lined cake pans and bake 25-30 minutes or until the tops are brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes then invert cakes onto cooling racks to cool completely.

FOR FROSTING:
1. Using a hand mixer, mix together sugar and butter on low speed until well blended and then increase speed to medium and beat for another 3 minutes until light and fluffy.
2. Add vanilla and 3 tablespoons of strawberry puree and continue to beat on medium speed for 1 minute more, adding more puree if needed for spreading consistency.

A Pokeball cake for an 8th

The boy turned 8 recently, and a few months ago he had requested a Pokemon-themed cake. He had lofty ideas but since I was the one who had to make it, I presented a simpler and less time-consuming cake. It still took me almost a week to make it, as I could only work on it for an hour at a time. It was also my first time using fondant. I started making themed birthday cakes since my son turned 3, and all these years I'd deliberately avoided fondant because I want my cakes to taste good, favouring buttercream instead. The style of cake I wanted to make was best decorated with fondant, so I decided that now was as good as any time to try fondant. It was also my first time using an enhanced cake formula, which I only considered because my trial run using the new ball-shaped cake pan with a made-from-scratch recipe yielded a less than satisfactory result. The doctored cake mix recipe takes advantage of the reliable results of a cake box mix, while offering a more homemade flavour. It was in fact my first time using a box mix ever, and I honestly still prefer the taste of made-from-scratch cakes (though hubby insisted there was not much difference except for the time saved). However I do see great advantages in yielding reliable results, especially now that three kids means I'm time-poor and cannot afford too many cakes flopping on me. Hubby and the kids love either cakes the same, and the differences are only noticeable when compared side-by-side.

While searching the internet for ideas, I came across a design of a central Poke ball cake surrounded by cupcakes with faces of several Pokemons. I toyed with the idea of using making a layered cake using a normal circular cake pan and carving a ball shape out of that, but in the end I ordered a Wilton soccer ball cake pan from Amazon to make my life easier. If I had to do it all again, I probably would choose to bake individual layers to shape rather than a large half-ball, because the cake took a long time to bake, and I had to try and counteract the drying effects of a long baking period. For inspiration and tips on decorating, I watched How to Cake It's Poke Ball Cake video tutorial and Cupcake Jemma's fondant masterclass. I also enjoyed watching this video on making a Pokeball cake. I made a chocolate cake with plain buttercream for one half-sphere, and a white cake with chocolate buttercream for the other half-sphere. I used ganache to crumb coat the cakes before laying the fondant - a white chocolate ganache for the chocolate cake and dark chocolate ganache for the white cake. For the cupcakes, I bought edible printed icing with images of various Pokemons, because I didn't have the time nor talent to decorate each individual cupcake. The only problem was that no one could remove the printed icing from the backing paper (and I followed every instruction and tips!), so as a last resort, I cut out each circle of image, and instructed the parents and kids not to eat the topping.

I used the following tips from this Super-enhanced Cake Formula to keep the cake moist:
- made a simple syrup of equal parts water and sugar, to brush onto the cake after it came out of the oven while still in the pan.
- laid plastic wrap on the cooling rack, and after cake has been out of the oven for 10 minutes, turned the cake pan onto plastic wrap, then brushed the sides and bottom with more simple syrup. Then wrap cake completely in plastic wrap.
- allowed to cool completely (took a couple of hours).
- when it came time to torte the cake, I brushed on more simple syrup before adding the filling

Other tips I found useful were:
- buy a lot of fondant! I had 2lbs each of the red and white fondant, and only a miniscule amount for the black. I had to make more black fondant using the white fondant and the black Americolor food gel from the boy's 6th birthday
- crumb coat with chocolate ganache, then let it set before frosting the second layer. The cakes were frozen (as I had to make them several days beforehand) and the cool temperature helped the ganache to set quickly
- use cornflour to dust while handling the fondant
- roll out the fondant to approximately 5mm thickness

At the end of the day, I decided that I don't like fondant. Working with fondant and eating it. For me, taste always trumps aesthetics, and I felt like I'd compromised on my principle with this cake. I'll stick with delicious buttercream for cake decorations.

Chocolate Buttermilk Cupcakes

I had a lot of buttermilk to use up from the first made-from-scratch cake recipe I attempted with the ball pan; hubby could only find organic buttermilk in 1L cartons, and I didn't have the heart to throw most of it out. I used it in the cakes and cupcakes, and they all turned out quite nicely. For the cupcakes, I modified this Taste of Home recipe for chocolate buttermilk cupcakes. I used 1/2 cup less sugar, substituted decaf coffee for the water, and used cake flour to yield a more tender crumb. It was a hit! The texture was extremely tender, the decaf coffee added a subtle dimension to the chocolate flavour (without the caffeine!). The boy wanted to help make the cupcakes, and it was easy enough for him to help measure out the ingredients and mix them.

Makes two dozen (24) cupcakes.

Ingredients
1/2 cup (115g) butter, softened
1 cup (200g) sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups (190g) cake flour
1/2 cup (60g) baking cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (125ml) buttermilk
1/2 cup (125ml) decaffeinated coffee (can use water instead)

Method
1. Preheat oven to 180°C.
2. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in vanilla.
3. Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt.
4. Combine buttermilk and water.
5. Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture alternately with buttermilk and water, beating well after each addition.
6. Fill paper-lined muffin cups two-thirds full. Bake 15-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks to cool completely.
7. Frost with buttercream frosting.

Cupcakes were the first to go as soon as the candle was blown:

Super Enhanced Cake Formula

Copied from Cake Central

Ingredients
1 Cake Mix Box (Duncan Heines®, Betty Crocker®, Pillsbury® etc.)
1 cup self-raising flour
1/2 cup (100g) sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup (250ml) buttermilk
1 cup (225g) melted salted butter
1 tablespoon of Vanilla
3 mounded tablespoons of cocoa powder for the chocolate mix

Instructions for Extending Cake Mix
For this recipe you are only going to use the actual cake mix powder, do NOT also add the ingredients from directions on the cake mix box. Just ignore any other ingredients or directions listed on the cake mix packaging.
Preheat Oven to 160°C
Mix flour, sugar, cake mix, baking powder, salt and **cocoa powder together with fork, set aside.
Add eggs, water, sour cream, butter, vanilla, and cream to Mixer bowl
Add dry ingredients and mix well on (about 2 minutes on lowest speed).
Bake for 65 minutes for 9 in. cake pan.

Peppa Pig birthday cake for a 2-year-old

We've been celebrating a few birthdays in this household lately. First celebration was big boy's 7th birthday, then mine less than three weeks later, and finally baby girl's birthday two weeks later. We were actually not going to do anything more than just a simple celebration amongst the four of us like last year, and besides, how much can a 2-year-old appreciate a birthday do? I should know by now to never underestimate the power of a mother's guilt - yes the guilt got to me once again. Baby girl has two good friends a few months younger than her who also live in the same complex as us, and the three of them play with each other almost everyday at the playground. We invited these two girls over to our tiny apartment to celebrate baby girl turning 2, and I am glad we made the effort because baby girl loved everything - her friends coming over to play, the presents, the cake. She was still singing the "Happy Birthday" song a week after her birthday. It was easy to choose the cake theme, as Peppa Pig is one of my girl's favourite - and easily recognisable - characters. Due to time constraints, I kept the cake decorating simple. Since I wanted a durable cake for carving, I used the same cake recipe that I used for my son's birthday cake. I also used the same easy frosting recipe, and added a little bit of pink colouring. The basics of decorating with frosting - such as freezing the cake before carving, 'glueing' the cake to the cake board with a dab of frosting, and applying a crumb coat first - made the frosting process relatively painless. This was the easiest and simplest themed birthday cake I've made so far, but the other two mums were still gobsmacked that I baked and decorated it myself. The things we do for our kids :)

The cake:

Birthday girl blowing out the candles:

A Minecraft-themed cake for a 7th birthday

My son will celebrate his 7th birthday this week and we had a party on Saturday to celebrate with some of his friends. The party almost did not happen, as his birthday falls so close to our trip to Australia, and I don't exactly have much free time to organise a party (my almost-2 daughter is at a highly demanding age, and most days it seems I barely have it together to keep this household running smoothly, much less plan a party!). So when the boy brought up the topic of his birthday party a couple of months ago (with the request for a Minecraft-themed cake), I asked my son to choose between a birthday trip to Disneyland (which we have done annually on his birthday since he turned 3) or a party - he chose Disneyland. But about a month ago, mother's guilt got to me - after all, my son has had both a party and a trip to Disneyland to celebrate his birthday every year since he was 3 (it is kinda ironic that this birthday tradition started out because of mother's guilt for not being able to do anything for the boy's 2nd birthday). Hubby suggested that we could make the Disneyland trip on our girl's birthday next month instead, so that our boy could still have his party, and of course, our boy loved that idea! Choosing the party venue was easy, as our boy had previously been invited to 6th and 7th birthday parties at Funzone, and I found it to be much better suited for this age group than the BBQ-and-bouncy-castle format I'd organised for previous birthdays. Ordering the food was also easy from one of Funzone's preferred caterer Checkmate Pizza, but we were unhappy when the food arrived 40 minutes late and did not include the disposable plates, napkins and cutlery that was promised (we only had the party room for two hours, and I did not appreciate having to rush off to buy the paper plates and cutlery).

For the cake, hubby and son gave several suggestions, but they all seemed fiddly to make (neither of them have background in cake-making). I scoured the internet for ideas, and there were many beautiful creations of Minecraft-themed cakes, but looked very time-consuming and used fondant (which I think is great for decorating only, just not for eating). I came across a youtube tutorial on How to make a Minecraft cake - with yoyomax12, and I liked how she used three different components to make the whole thing with pretty good visual impact, and all without the use of fondant! The three parts were each easy to make, and assembling was a cinch. The trickiest part (which was not that tricky at all) was figuring out the quantity without making too much or too little, but that was done easily using a paper, pencil and ruler to draw out a rough design to scale, and working from that. Once I had all the components ready, assembling the pieces and adding the icing were pretty quick and easy. The finished product drew a lot of attention from parents (which was embarassing for me), and a couple of the mums were very surprised that I made the cake (in HK, most (sane) parents opt the easy route and either buy a readymade cake or order one to design). The kids loved having the choice of eating cake, rice krispies treat, jelly, or all three!

The cake just after it was assembled and iced, just waiting for the finishing touches (paper cutouts of Minecraft characters):

For the 'water' blocks, I used two large 170g packets of Berry Blue flavoured Jell-o, and used only half the amount of water suggested on the package directions (each packet called for 2 cups boiling water and 2 cups cold water, but I used that amount for two packets). For the 'sand' blocks, I made rice krispies treats for the first time in my life! I used the basic rice krispies treats recipe provided in the youtube description by yoyomax12 in her youtube tutorial, and it turned out well - not too sweet and sticky. For the 'grass' blocks, instead of the durable cake recipe used in the youtube (which uses a bought cake mix), I wanted to do a from-scratch recipe. I found Veena's Art of Cakes: Dense Chocolate cake perfect for Carving recipe, which I modified a little by omitting the coffee - the hyperactive kids don't need sugar AND caffeine. I made two batches, and for the first batch I followed the method very closely (using my hand-mixer with standard beaters rather than the paddle attachment used by the baker), but I found that beating the butter, sugar and eggs at once without first creaming the butter and sugar meant that the butter floated in clumps in the wet mixture (though the end result turned out fine). For the second batch I felt much more comfortable creaming the butter and sugar first and then adding the eggs, but this yielded a more tender cake that crumbled a bit more than the first cake I baked. However after freezing both cakes, they were easy to cut and carve and survived the manhandling while putting the cake together. I thought this cake recipe was great for sculpting - it was dense yet not too heavy to eat. I loved that it was moist and not too sweet with loads of chocolate taste. The grass frosting on top of the 'grass' blocks were easy to do with the grass decorating tip (Wilton No. 233) and buttercream frosting that had a few drops of Americolour Leaf Green soft gel paste added to it. I assembled the cake in the morning before the party, and my son was fascinated with the process (in previous years, the decorating happened late at night after he was already in bed, so he never got to see me toiling over his birthday cakes). It helps to use the same size cake pan for making the cakes, rice krispies treats and jell-o, as it will help make uniform blocks of the same size.

The whole thing mostly survived the trip to the party venue:

Basic Rice Krispies Treats

Ingredients
6 cups Rice Krispies cereal
40 large marshmallows (about a 280g packet)
3 tablespoons of butter

Method
Melt butter and marshmallows in a large pot on low heat. Once melted, add the cereal and stir until coated. Press mixture into a greased pan.


Dense Chocolate Cake perfect for Carving

(adapted from Veena's Art of Cakes)

This recipe will make a two layer 8 inch cake or a 7″ x 10″ rectangular pan, and recipe can be doubled or tripled.

Ingredients

150 ml whole milk
2 tsp lemon Juice
225 grams (1 cup) butter, softened but not melted
200 grams (1 cup) dark brown sugar
4 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
200 grams (2 cup + 2 tbsp) plain flour
60 grams (1/2 cup) cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder

Method

1. Preheat oven to 170C/340F. Grease pan for baking.
2. Add the lemon juice to the milk and set aside.
3. In a mixing bowl, add the soft butter, sugar, eggs, and turn the mixer on medium and mix for about 5 minutes until the mixture is light and fluffy.
4. Sift the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder.
5. Add the flour mixture (in three additions) alternately with the milk (in two additions), beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Beat only until the ingredients are incorporated.
6. Pour into cake pan and bake for about 30 to 40 minutes until a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean. If using two pans the cake will bake faster so check at 30 minutes.
7. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then remove from the pan. Allow to cool completely on a cooling rack.
8. Once cooled wrap in two cling wraps, followed by aluminum foil, and place in the freezer for at least one hour before you carve into it.


Quick Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

(recipe from Food Network

Ingredients
1 cup (225g) butter
3 cups icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2-3 tablespoons whipping cream or milk

Method
1. Using a hand mixer, mix together sugar and butter on low speed until well blended and then increase speed to medium and beat for another 3 minutes.
2. Add vanilla and cream and continue to beat on medium speed for 1 minute more, adding more cream if needed for spreading consistency.

The boy loved it, and that makes the effort all worthwhile:

Apple & Carrot (First Birthday) Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Baby girl has officially bid farewell to her infancy as she celebrates turning one year old this week. We had a low-key celebration with just the four of us and a healthy birthday cake. I feel a little guilty not doing anything bigger, but then I am reminded that we already had an early celebration with our family when we were in Sydney last month. I wanted to make a small cake for baby girl to dig into, and when I tried looking for the recipe I did for my son's first birthday (quite a few years ago, though it seemed only like yesterday), I found that I failed to post it up on my blog. So I had to search once again on the internet, looked at four or five recipes, and picked out the one that used the least amount of sugar. I then cut down the sugar even more (80%!), and used a little bit of honey to celebrate the fact that baby girl can now safely consume honey (a known source of bacteria spores that causes botulism, hence not recommended for babies under 12 months old). Though I reduced the amount of sugar, the 6-year-old loves it and hubby said it was fine. Baby girl and I prefer the cake without the cream cheese frosting but hubby and son like it with. My recipe below is a modification of this carrot & apple cake recipe, and there was enough batter for a small heart-shaped cake pan and a dozen muffin cups (or two 20cm round cake pans). The resulting cake and muffins were moist and dense, perfect as a healthful treat - or a baby's first birthday cake. If I were to make it again, I would stick to my usual muffin-making method of mixing the wet and dry ingredients separately before combining the two mixes, which ought to reduce the amount of mixing and hopefully yield a more tender crumb.

Apple & Carrot (First Birthday) Cake

Ingredients

Cake batter
300g self-raising flour
100g carrots, peeled and roughly grated
25g brown sugar
25ml raw honey
125ml light olive oil (any oil with mild flavour is suitable)
3 small apples, peeled, cored and roughly grated
2 large eggs
1 large egg white
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Cream cheese frosting
150g cream cheese, taken out of refrigerator to soften slightly
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon yogurt
(optional - 2 tablespoons icing sugar)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160degC (180degC for conventional oven). Grease two 20cm round cake pans (or one small cake pan and a 12-cup muffin tray).
2. Put all the cake ingredients into a large bowl and mix everything together until well combined (I used my hand mixer on low speed).
3. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until cake feels springy to the touch or until toothpick comes out clean when inserted (if making muffins, check after 20 minutes).
4. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for ten minutes in the cake pans. Carefully remove cakes from the cake pans and cool on a cooling rack.
5. To make frosting: mix the cream cheese, vanilla extract, yogurt and icing sugar (if using) until smooth and well combined.
6. Frost the cake as you wish (or not), and enjoy like my daughter did!

The dense, moist texture of the cake:

6 Years Old!

My boy turns six very soon, and we held a celebration on Saturday with some of his friends. Last year's celebration - just a month before my girl's birth - was supposed to be the final one for a couple of years, as I wasn't sure how capable I would be to do one while caring for an infant. But mother's guilt got to me. Especially after my son - who has been counting down the days to his birthday for the past two months - said that he was looking forward to playing with his friends on the bouncy castle and the ride-on cars. I did tell him that I might not be able to do it this year, as we will be hopping on the plane the day after his birthday, and he accepted this with astounding maturity. I decided to put myself to the test anyway, and organised a somewhat last minute birthday party for my son (invites were sent out only two weeks prior). As with previous years, I hired a bouncy castle and a couple of ride-on cars (but I have a feeling that this will be my last time doing a party in this format as my boy will outgrow the rental toys by next birthday). The weather was perfect (the weather forecast for early showers did not eventuate), there was plenty of food for everyone (phew!), and the kids had loads of fun.

Hired out our residence's barbecue court, and some rental bouncy castle and ride-on cars:

As for the boy's cake, it was a no-brainer decision to do a Star Wars themed cake as that is his current obsession (thanks to hubby). In the week before the party, I found out that one of his little friends has allergies to eggs, dairy and gluten, and along with my boy's nut allergy, I had the gargantuan task of making a cake that would suit them. Hubby said from the beginning that I should to stick to my plan to bake the usual cake and make some gluten-free cupcakes for the little friend, but I hate excluding anyone with special requirements (having dealt with it myself for almost six years), at least not without giving it a go first. So I tried making a gluten-free, egg-free, dairy-free and nut-free cake, but unfortunately the cake mix I used wasn't suitable for a large cake - it was fudgy and moist in the centre even after two hours of baking (hence the standard toothpick test indicated the cake was not cooked) but the edges had baked rock hard. With so little time, I ditched the idea of making a gluten-free Darth Vader cake, and made gluten-free cupcakes instead. Instead of building the cake from scratch, I ordered a Darth Vader cake pan from the US to help make my life a bit easier. The decorating instructions that came with the cake pan proved too fiddly, so I decorated it the way I felt comfortable with. For the cake, I used the tried-and-true Chocolate Butter Cake recipe from joyofbaking that I've successfully used for previous birthday cakes, and it baked beautifully in the cake pan (much to my relief, as the party was on the next day!). For the frosting, I started off with a chocolate buttercream (using 1 cup butter, 3 cups icing sugar, 3/4 cup cocoa powder and 4-5 tablespoons milk) and tinted it with about eight drops of black Americolor food colouring. This gave a dark enough colour without affecting the flavour nor give people coloured teeth. Then I frosted the cake with a frosting spatula and piped the details on with a piping bag and tips. For a rushed job, it didn't turn out too badly. The boy was pleased with the cake, and there wasn't much leftover - success!

Darth Vader cake, decorated my way:

The gluten-free cupcakes were a hit with the little boy who is allergic to gluten, eggs and dairy! His mum said she had never seen him polish off anything so quickly before:

5 Years Old!

Where did the time go? It's a little hard to believe that it has already been five years since our lives were completely changed. Back then, I had no idea that the little baby we held would grow up to have such a strong personality, a goofy nature and a sweet compassionate soul. We know he'll be a good big brother to his little sibling to be born next month. Despite being 8 months pregnant (with work commitments), I decided to go ahead with the plans to celebrate our boy's birthday, because I am not sure if I'd be able to do it for him next year or the one after. To make our lives easier, we used the same format as previously, and kept the gathering small. Putting on a barbecue party for an additional six kids and their parents was quite manageable, and the kids were entertained for hours with the ride-on toys and a bouncy castle that I'd hired from a toy rental company. The weather couldn't have been more perfect (October is one of two months when it's good to be outdoors in Hong Kong), and our boy had a great time.

Cozy gathering in our residence's barbecue court:

The kids having a ball:

Some of the barbecued food we enjoyed:

A space shuttle cake, which was perfect for our son who has a strong interest in all things astronomy. I did a similar cake for his 3rd birthday, but he is able to appreciate it more now. And making and decorating the cake is easier and quicker the second time round:

The family tradition for our boy's birthday is to go to Disneyland! He'd been looking forward to going to Disneyland for most of this year, and he could barely contain his excitement when his birthday finally arrived! I didn't take much photos as this was our fourth visit in the past three years, but if you're interested to look at more photos of Hong Kong Disneyland, click here, here and here. The boy's birthday fell on a weekday during his school's term break, so we didn't have to battle the weekend or holiday crowds, nor did he have to miss out on school (and hubby was more than happy to take a day off work to celebrate his son's birthday). Seeing my son so happy more than makes up for the sad fact that I was not allowed on all the fun rides (and honestly I was glad for the chance to rest while the boys enjoyed the rides).

A Mickey Mouse-shaped waffle for morning tea while we waited for the park to open:

With his favourite character - he even brought along his Buzz Lightyear toy which was a gift from last Christmas. (We'd told him it was too large and heavy to bring along, but he insisted that he would carry it himself - and he did!):

We caught part of the parade:

We stayed late to watch the fireworks, and saw the spooky Halloween-themed decorations come to life:

I was utterly exhausted by the time we got home after 9pm, but we had a successful birthday outing at Disneyland!

4 Years Old!

My boy is officially 4 years of age. It was exactly four years ago today when our lives were completely changed, and I wouldn't want it anything different. Being a mother has its challenges, and I am being totally honest when I say it is the toughest and most exhausting job I have ever done (and I've done quite a few challenging ones). However motherhood is also the most rewarding, and I am very proud of my little boy. We had an early celebration on Saturday with five of his friends, and it looked like the kids had a lot of fun! With good weather and a couple of great barbecue cooks, even the adults looked like they were enjoying themselves.

We hired out our residence's BBQ Court and rented a small bouncy castle and some ride-on toys from a toy rental shop, which was just right for a small party:

The pre-lunch snacks as arranged by my younger sister (who visited Hong Kong for a few days to also celebrate the boy's birthday):

The BBQ was in capable hands - thanks to my sister's boyfriend who is great at the BBQ (as most Aussie blokes are!):

The table, arranged in an efficient manner by my younger sister who has far more experience at hosting parties and barbecues than me:

The cake, modelled after my son's Playskool's Deci-Bot toy that teaches numbers and counting with fingers that light up. The candles are supposed to represent four of Deci's fingers:

There was a lot of fuss over the cake by both adults and kids alike, which was unexpected and slightly embarrassing for me:

For the cake, I'd baked a Chocolate Butter Cake following this joyofbaking.com recipe using the same baking pan as last year's birthday (which is actually a lasagne pan, but it worked just fine for cakes for the second year in a row). I then froze the sheet cake to make it easier to frost. I drew out a template of the Deci-Bot toy, enlarged the image using our printer/photocopier to a desired size, made some orange-flavoured buttercream frosting, then sat down to carving the cake and decorating it. It took about four hours to assemble and decorate the cake, but I did it with more confidence than last year. I actually wasn't terribly pleased with how it was turning out, but hubby and sister said it looked good, which encouraged me enough to finish it.

A closer look at the cake, shortly after it received its finishing touches of multi-coloured jelly beans, soft jujubes and 'cigar' biscuits:

I baked another Chocolate Butter Cake to bring to my son's school so he could also celebrate with his classmates. I'd actually intended to bake the same marble cake as last year, but the boy was quite clear he wanted the chocolate butter cake. I used the same recipe as above but poured all the batter into one round pan instead of splitting into two. That meant the cake took almost twice as long to cook, but it didn't turn out too badly.

Blowing out more candles at school:

A Marble Cake and a Space Shuttle Cake for the birthday boy

My son turned 3 on Saturday, and I did more cake baking last week than in the past year! The boy's kindy had asked me to kindly bring a cake so that his class could celebrate his birthday, and I baked a Choc-Vanilla Marble Cake using this joyofbaking recipe. There was another kid in class who shared the same birthday as my son, and my homebaked cake looked rustic and not as pretty as the store-bought ones that the other mum had brought. Most mums in HK are too busy to bake, and to be honest - given how busy I was last week - I would probably have been happy to buy a cake from the store, but the boy has so many food allergies that it just wasn't an option. It was my first time baking a marble cake, and I was so glad to see it did indeed have a marbled effect when the cake was cut in class. The teacher and helpers appreciated the homebaked effort, and they were happy that Zak could finally eat a birthday cake in class!

The whole marble cake on the cooling rack:

My little piece in a yellow plastic bowl in my son's classroom:

We also had a party to celebrate the boy's birthday, and I baked and decorated a space shuttle-themed cake for the party. I used the same basic butter cake recipe as the marble cake to bake a chocolate cake, made some orange-flavoured buttercream using orange oil, and used the template from this Betty Crocker recipe to cut and decorate the sheet cake into a space shuttle shape. I'd chosen this theme because my son has a special interest in space (recently I overheard him correctly name all the planets in the solar system, by memory and in perfect order - I still get the planets in the wrong order myself!), and I must admit it was no small feat, especially when I already had plenty on my plate preparing for my parents arrival and organising the party. It was my first time dabbling in cake decoration (beyond simple icing), and it really was rewarding to see all the pieces come together. I don't think I've ever used so much butter for a cake before!

The chocolate sheet cake baking in the oven, the largest piece I've ever baked. It's also the largest size that can fit in this table-top oven:

The finished product, from the top. I used glacé cherries, jelly beans and gummy lollies for the final touches:

View from the side (note the strategically placed candles, a suggestion that hubby and I thought were brilliant):

Now that the cake baking projects are done, I can say that it was a fun experience. I've certainly learnt a lot about frostings, and am no longer apprehensive about decorating cakes.