Cookies can be eaten any time of the year, at least in my opinion. And for that reason I am presenting today birthday sprinkles cookies, just because. They are so colorful and happy, just the way I like them, with sprinkles. For some reason I never seem to need my sprinkles other than for Christmas, so these are perfect to finally us some of the sprinkles.
Where is the champagne? Where are the streamers and glitter? You are invited to a nice helping of this strawberry and elderflower cake! Why, you ask? I am celebrating my third year of blogging. The first recipe that went online on my blog was this lemon tart, which I still love to make. I honestly never thought I would be blogging for three years. I have always been a person who just learns things by doing them. Instead of figuring everything out beforehand, I just give it a go and see what happens. The reason I started this blog was because I got tired of having to pass on recipes I was asked to provide to my friends and family. I also wanted to have some kind of organization so I thought a blog may come in handy. I would have never believed that I would enjoy taking pictures as much as baking. Mind you, I once was a professional pianist, I always thought my visual ability was not as good. However, I am still enjoying my blog immensely, be it baking, food photography or anything else, and for that reason I hope there are many more blog years to come. How about a slice of this delicious strawberry elderberry cake for this special occasion?
Do you also bake your own birthday cake? I definitely did this year. When I saw this delicious blueberry lemon cake on the blog Knusperstübchen (in German) I knew this was going to be my birthday cake. Especially since I hadn’t eaten any sweets in week. I wanted to indulge in this beauty. Obviously I had to tweak the recipe a bit. But when I finally digged into the first piece, there was silence. Silence for a full piece of cake, this is how good the cake was. This is a super moist blueberry lemon cake as it contains a lot of fresh blueberries. I also like the fact that so much lemon zest and lemon juice is used in both, the cake and also the cream.
Update 2019: New photos and improved recipes
Happy Easter everybody! I feel it is time for a decadent strawberry chocolate cake, don’t you think? And this one is so good. It has a chocolate cake as base, with a generous cream cheese and whipping cream filling with chunks of chocolate mixed in, lots of fresh strawberries and some more cocoa thrown in, just for good measure. If you are into chocolate (who isn’t?) and if you like fresh strawberries the same way I do, this one is for you. I already published the recipe two years ago and have baked it several times since then. After some additional tweaks I felt I had to republish the recipe since it always, always receives raving reviews and was in desperate need of some fresh photos.
I can’t believe that 2018 is almost over, so many things happened! I distinctly remember my bike accident I had in April. It included hemorrhage, hospitalization and a long road to recovery. I am extremely grateful that I have fully recovered and don’t have any permanent damage. For this really is a miracle. For that reason we had to celebrate here on the blog, we made a gigantic cookie with a cookie monster on top, you will find the recipe here. Or the fact that we are actually moving back to Munich from Hamburg. I am not from Munich originally, but happened to live there for three years some time ago. I am excited to be moving back and see what 2019 will have in store.
Guys, I don’t know if I will ever be able to eat regular tiramisu, seriously tiramisu sponge roll is the best! I have to admit, I have not been a big fan of ladyfingers. At least the store-bought ones. They are so dry! For tiramisu to taste great, you have to wait for the ladyfingers to moisten properly. And I am too lazy to actually make the ladyfingers myself.
But then I finally knew it. You need to know that I am a big fan of sponge rolls. For that reason you will find a share of sponge rolls on my blog. Try this pumpkin roll with apple cream, this roll with blueberries or this strawberry roll. Sponge cake is so light and fluffy, I really love its texture. And one day while I was checking out Pinterest, it suddenly hit me. Of course this is the solution! Why not make tiramisu in a roll instead? Why not omit the dry ladyfingers and instead replace them with my favorite sponge cake? Yes, I had to try this out immediately.
There hasn’t been enough chocolate on this blog yet. So Sachertorte it is! Ever heard of this delicious chocolate cake? It was invented in Austria and it has all the good stuff, lots of butter, lots of eggs (10 in total!), and chocolate, of course. Don’t bore me with cocoa, no, let’s go straight to chocolate. And with these delicious ingredients you make light and fluffy chocolate sponge cake. And to keep it all together, you use apricot jam as the glue. I just love it.
I actually had the chance to eat it in Austria. Originally the cake comes from Vienna, I did have the chance to eat it in Vienna, but, gasp, didn’t like it that much. The one I really enjoyed a lot was in Salzburg, the town Mozart is from. Below picture was one of the first pictures I took with my current camera, the Sony Nex7. If you would like to learn more about food photography, please check these blog posts. I looks great, doesn’t it? Austria is busy exporting its Sachertorte. I can’t blame them for doing that. Because yes, you want to dig into this super rich cake, believe me! What I like best about this rich chocolate cake is that you can actually export it because it gets better over time. The apricot jam seals everything and just to be sure, you pour a thick layer of chocolate ganache on everything, because more chocolate is even better, isn’t it?
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August is one of my favorite months, not only because it is my birthday, but also because it is warm, yet not too hot (okay, this year is an exception) and it is so relaxed, I feel August is the month when people finally get into real holiday mood. When they were finally able to let go of things and focus on the present. So I decided to make an easy cake with my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe. This is a chocolate chip cookie cake. Or a chocolate chip cookie in cake form. 
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Guys, I feel like celebrating with this cookie monster cake! Some of you may have seen it on Facebook that I had a bike accident a while ago. Not to bore you with the details, but I was in the hospital for almost a week and on sick-leave for four more weeks afterwards. So I had to stay in bed a lot and I felt like comfort food. As a proclaimed cookie monster it was quickly decided that it was going to be a skillet cookie. I mean, if you don’t make the cookie monster on top, you don’t even have to form the cookie, you just pat everything into a skillet.
You don’t HAVE to make the cookie monster, but isn’t it just so adorable? Continue Reading…
Ok, so this elderflower and lemon wedding cake is completely spur-of-the moment and unlike me. I am usually not that girly type of girl, sorry, you know, like pink, sprinkles, princess, etc. But somehow when I watched Meghan and Harry getting married, I was touched. And I felt like making their weddding cake, a very small version of course. Especially since elderflowers are finally blossoming here in the north of Germany. We seem to always be lagging behind, whereas in London apparently they are in full blossom, they are only starting here. So I decided to make my own elderflower syrup and give this wedding cake a go.
Mind you, this is my very first three-tier cake and no, it is not the original recipe, I deviate in many aspects. It is simply a wedding cake inspired by Meghan’s and Harry’s wedding cake and since the top tier actually was baked in a muffin tin, you can probably imagine it to only feed about 12 people or so. The bottom cake is a 24cm (9inch) cake tin, the top is only a cupcake. A mini version, yet a celebration of these flavors nonetheless. Elderflower and lemon, sweet versus tart, white and yellow happily married in this symphony of spring.
