On the first Friday evening back after the holidays my school held their postponed summer barbecue.   Usually if it’s needed I bring along some cupcakes or cookies as part of the pudding.  I was looking forward to going along to the BBQ, even though I had been feeling very tired and had lots going on at home.  So, on that Friday morning I shot off into Harrogate to get some jobs done and then whizzed back home to bake and catch up on the chores.  I went into Lakeland to get a couple of things and fell in love with their cupcake carrier. I already have a couple of cupcake carriers from The Works but they are very poorly made and the base which the cupcakes sit in isn’t level.  So my eyes lit up when I saw the cupcake carrier which worked like a carousel and two dozen cupcakes sit neatly on top of one another inside a pretty cupcake shaped dome! I thought this would be perfect to transport my cakes in without resorting to my giant plastic boxes which take up so much room.

I must admit I get a bit carried away when I get to the baking aisle in any supermarket.  It doesn’t matter what supermarket it is or whether I actually NEED those decorations but I feel as if I just HAVE to have them.  The other week I was in Tesco and spotted Dr Oetker had brought out a new range of sprinkles called their Premium Range.  I liked the look of these as they were a bit different to the old silver balls and hundreds and thousands you see everywhere.  I chose three different pots: the Banoffee Sprinkles, some Rainbow Popping Candy and some Lemon Meringue sprinkles.  All of these I knew would end up on top of some cupcakes or a traybake that I would take along to school or a coffee morning somewhere along the way.  So our school’s BBQ was the perfect occasion to give them a try out.

I matched or complimented the flavours of the sprinkles to the flavours of the cupcakes and used my regular recipes which I use all the time for cupcake baking.  So once I was home from Harrogate out came the mixer and all my ingredients.  I put on all the programmes I hadn’t seen on BBC Iplayer and immersed myself with my favourite hobby.

Here’s what I came up with:

However, my day didn’t quite go to plan.  My daughter goes to dance class on a Friday evening and my hubby had offered to pick her up on the way home from work.  Anyway, he rang to say he was stuck in a massive traffic jam on the M1 and couldn’t get to my daughter in time.  So I had to pick her up.  This was about the same time as the BBQ was starting.  I had to get my daughter home and put the dinner on instead of hubby so in the end we went via school and dropped off the cupcakes but I couldn’t stay for the BBQ.  It was a lovely sunny evening too and I would have liked to have gone.  At least 3 dozen cupcakes got to where they were meant to be going!

The cupcakes were very well received at the BBQ.  I never tasted any but people told me they were lovely and the children went mad for the popping candy ones.  Definitely a big hit then, will be buying those sprinkles again in the future.

Happy Baking!

Love Sam xx