A Belated Birthday Cake Post - Happy Birthday Mum.

Forgive the rubbish photo. Everything was a bit of a rush.

My life has been chaos for the last two or three months due to the volume of pre-Christmas orders and enquiries. I've been working more hours than I can add up and there has been little time for play or blogging.

However, I did make this cake for my mum for her birthday last week with the new silicone bakeware "Say It With Cake" words and numbers moulds. All the letters and numbers are now available singly. I've yet to add them to the website as there are hundreds upon hundreds of boxes of silicone baking molds to sort out. However, I'm hoping to get them added next week - ready to ship at the start of January.

I know many of you have been waiting anxiously for these to be available to buy. They arrived with us two weeks ago, but it has been impossible to sort the massive volume of stock that has arrived in AND get pre-Christmas orders out in time. That's why it's been taking so long to get them on the website. Still - you'll be able to order as of next week for delivery in the New Year

This cake was made from my favourite fruit cake recipe and then "fed" with homemade apple brandy.

I specifically chose to make a birthday cake out of fruit cake so it would keep for a while. The couriers are all really slow at the moment and have massive backlogs from the last lot of severe weather and snow we had earlier in the month. As a result, this took exactly 1 week instead of one day to reach mum.

Still - it should taste as fresh as the day it left and easily keep (if required) for several weeks.

Mary Cadogan's Simmer and Stir Christmas Cake recipe can be found here

I lightly greased and floured the moulds before use. Instead of 2 hours cooking time, in the letter moulds this only took about 22mins until perfectly done. On removing from the oven, my tip is to cover with foil and a tea towel when hot to lock in as much moisture as possible.