BBC Good Food

11 November 2010

Member

"I made these for a Halloween party, and they were brilliant! They are easy but time-consuming, so mine didn't look quite as tidy as Fiona's but still obvious what they were meant to be. For all those confused people, I think you're making it more complicated than it is. Just make some cupcakes (whatever kind you like), make some buttercream (or the shortening stuff), colour it blue, and chuck it on top in a round-ish shape. Then just get creative with the mouth and eyes! One tip: I first tried to use natural food colouring, but it didn't work at all, only made the buttercream pale blue, so had to throw it away, go and buy some un-natural colouring, and start again, then it worked perfectly. Everyone was very impressed!"

11 November 2010

Tested

"I'm making this for a wedding next week, and I had a slight issue with the trial run; when I turned the oven off (I left the cake in the oven with the door open for ten minutes, as I'd been having trouble with sponges sinking), the cake sank and came away from the sides quite a lot, and ...in a weird 'waisted' shape, which meant I had to use a lot of buttercream on the outside to give it a flat edge for the fondant icing. Any ideas how I can stop this happening? I'd increased the ingredients by 80% to go in a 25cm tin, and used newspaper tied on with string around the edge of the tin to stop the edges cooking too fast. Also, does anyone know when you are meant to take the cake out of the tin? I left it in to cool completely, but not sure if this is correct, as the bottom was stuck to the greaseproof paper when I took it off. The cake tastes amazing though, and it was as white as it looks in the picture (but I used white caster sugar). "

20 August 2009

Tested

"I added sweet potato to the recipe, which made the flavour and texture a bit more interesting. I also missed out the stock, as it was runny enough without it, and I found it a bit bland so added fish sauce and lime juice, and it was lovely. "