Given my renewed interest in decorating cakes for (and with) my daughters, the timing of the new Eaglemoss magazine collection, Disney Cakes and Sweets couldn't have been sweeter! The first edition of this weekly publication is released on the 4th of September but Lara and I got a sneak preview and got to work on our creations straight away.
Disney Cakes and Sweets isn't really intended as a children's cookery magazine; in fact, most of the recipes are well beyond a preschooler. I would go as far as to say that several of the recipes are something I would want to shut myself away in a room to cook, without the distractions of a child... Sleeping Beauty's Marshmallow Pillows for instance sound unlike anything I've ever attempted to cook before. And the star of the show is a step-by-step guide of how to bake, ice and decorate your own Disney castle showstopping cake (the steps are distributed across several editions).
The first magazine in the Disney Cakes and Sweets collection came with two free products - a pair of Winnie the Pooh stencils and a Mickey Mouse Cookie cutter.
Winnie the Pooh's Honey Cupcakes were a really interesting take on a simple sponge cupcake recipe - using wholemeal flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and honey. I can honestly say that I really really enjoyed the cakes because they were so unusual.
Using my new-found cupcake icing skills, I helped Lara to ice our cupcakes with a gentle yellow coloured butter cream. The Disney Cakes and Sweets magazine had a few simple guides in the back of the magazine of how to colour and ice cakes with different types of icing (although I would say that my recent hands-on tutorship really helped me). After the buttercream had set a little, we used a paintbrush to brush edible glitter over the Disney Winnie the Pooh stencils - Lara LOVED this part!
At the weekend we were invited to a barbecue and Lara wanted to take a present for everyone so we decided to bake gingerbread. Inside the Disney Cakes and Sweets magazine the recipe for Mickey Mouse Cookies was a basic biscuit recipe (but with truely stunning icing skills!) but Lara really fancied gingerbread... so gingerbread it was. We made a really sticky biscuit dough using lots of ginger, cinnamon and golden syrup and then chilled it for half an hour before 'attempting' to roll it out. Our Mickey Cooki Cutter was really very good, Lara maged to get a good shape on nearly every biscuit, and then used the stamp part of the cutter to imprint Mickey's face on each cookie.
The gingerbread Mickey Mouse faces went down a storm at the barbecue.
To me, Disney Cakes and Sweets is a great source of inspiration and I think that the free cookery gadgets and Disney accessories with each edition will be great for children's cookery and for birthday parties. I now just need to find myself an occasion to make a 101 Dalmations cake!
