When my friend announced her engagement, I was thrilled – woo! Party! I was then shocked – and honoured – to be asked to make her wedding cake. She was already planning the flavour and style and two flavours she definitely wanted was lemon drizzle and chocolate.
The months passed, but every so often I’d receive an image of a cake design she liked (good ol’Pinterest). She’d settled on one design which had candied lemon up the side and finished with a lemon yellow buttercream. The plan was to create a two-tier wedding cake with 48 cupcakes in similar flavours to the cake, plus 12 vegan and 12 gluten-free.
The wedding cake
The top tier of the cake (8-inch cake) consists of four layers of lemon drizzle filled and decorated with a mild lemon-flavoured cream cheese frosting.
The bottom tier (12 inches) has three layers of chocolate sponge, filled and decorated with a white chocolate ganache. The whole cake was then dusted with a fine coat of edible gold lustre and candied lemon slices.
Cupcakes
The cupcakes were slightly different to the cake as they were topped with the associated flavoured buttercream. I decorated the chocolate cupcakes with gold sparkle dust and gold stars, and the lemon cupcakes had jelly lemon slices (I forgot to take a photo of those!)
Vegan cupcakes
It was the first time I had made vegan cupcakes and the recipe I used was sourced from the internet (I used this one). It wasn’t great if I’m honest. When I make them again, I’ll go with my usual recipe and adjust as necessary. The cupcakes were alright – not amazing or particularly moist. I had to add more soy milk and sunflower oil as the consistency wasn’t right from the recipe.
However, my son liked them, and the person who they were for said they were good, but it’s definitely a recipe I’d tweak a little more to gain more confidence in their quality.
It’s good to see the supermarkets have more vegan foods available, and they taste just as good! I was shocked, I don’t mind admitting!