Monday, November 28, 2011

Happy birthday to us!

It's two years since our first post! And to mark the occasion we have a little something for you... a copy of The Australian Women's Weekly Children's Birthday Cake Book.



Weeks before our birthdays we'd start choosing a cake from the book for mum to spend hours making the night before our birthday. Flicking through this copy there are so many familiar cakes but the highlight for me is the train from the cover which Mum made at least twice, even going so far as to make the candy popcorn herself on one of those occasions.


There were only two cakes we were steered away from: the "Candy Castle" probably because of the vast quantities of sugary egg white icing it involved and the "Swimming Pool" possibly because of the practicalities of slicing and serving a cake filled with jelly.


This is the "vintage edition" of the book - printed this year but almost unchanged from the original we grew up with in the 1980s. Four cakes have been swapped for more politically correct masterpieces but the font, layout and copious use of "butter cake mix" remain.


If you'd like to win this copy of the book just leave us a comment telling us about the best birthday cake you've ever had - from the AWW book or not, it doesn't matter.




13 comments:

  1. Well, Happy birthday to your blog!!! Well done! The best birthday cake I had was when I asked my Mum to make me one of my favourites, the crepe gateaux (lots of layer of crepes with chocolate butter cream - usually we make it with citrus butter cream, but that time I wanted something different). I loved it but my friends thought that it was a bit strange! I think that I was about 13...

    ciao
    Alessandra

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  2. My favourite birthday cake was made by my lovely mum two years ago - it was burnt on the outside and slightly undercooked in the middle. Mum let me know which end was the burnt one by putting a big ribbon on it. It was also decorated with After Dinner Mints and strawberries - not a perfect cake, but made with love!!

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  3. Cool!! My mum still has her copy of this exact book (probably the same edition too). It was always the most exciting part of our birthdays - getting to pick our cake. My fav was always the classic princess doll with the marshmallow skirt. I've tried to keep the tradition going and make my partner elaborate character cakes for his birthday. My best so far was a house/garden/animal scene of our dream house. It was amazing, if a may say so myself. I would love a copy of this book for my own children to choose from one day!

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  4. Happy birthday!!!
    My favourite birthday cake was 3 bunnies in bed. 2 rectangular cakes, (one cut in two parts and stuck on end to make the head and foot board) and one for the body of the bed), marshmallow heads and those candied lemon and orange slice thingies that you can buy as ears.

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  5. My favourite and most memorable cake was a spider! He was made from a simple round chocolate cake with thick chocolate icing, orange pipe cleaners for legs, and two big brown buttons for eyes which my best friend Liam tried to pull out- mum quickly rescued the eyes! Pretty cool for my second birthday I thought

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  6. I want to tell you about a cake I made for my grandaughter when she was turning 4. She said she wanted a bunny cake so I went to work and made a rabbit complete with licquorice whiskers etc. Ta Da I went as I presented it to her......her little face clouded over and I asked if she liked it. "Yes grandma, but I wanted a Barney cake". Barney was a purple monster who was on tv at the time, but we didn't have a clue about him! Oh dear!

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  7. Happy Bloggiversary, It's my 3 year blog birthday also this week. I make a lot of cakes for other people's birthday, even run a few classes on how to make novelty cakes but I never make one for myself :o(

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  8. Happy birthday! I think my best ever cake was hmmm, possibly the ever-so-slightly NSFW cake for my triple XXX birthday party, which was covered in fondant lady parts.

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  9. I LOVE this cookbook so much, always flick through it whenever I'm home. I always wanted the swimming pool, but for some reason always ended up with the piano...

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  10. OMG this book is so iconic.... I remember Tina making the dolly cake which was so amazing. When I looked at it again a few years ago I was totally FLOORED at the lack of actual recipes... all just cake mix! Hilarious that people published books like that! Oh the 80s, And Happy Birthday to Daisy too. Love Nicola x

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  11. Well, I don't honestly remember any birthday cakes my Mum made for me. I love making cakes for my kids and grandkids though, in fact tomorrow morning I'm going to make a cake for my oldest grandchild, who's turning eleven. Vanilla cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting, as per her request. Her Mom is almost ready to pop with her fifth! And the best birthday cake I ever made for her was a Strawberry Shortcake (the cartoon character) cake when she was three. She then made it for her daughter when she was three.
    There, are you sick of my stories yet?

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  12. that book is a classic, I was looking at it at the supermarket just the other day !

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  13. I remember this book from when I was a kid! My brother had the train cake from the cover for his 3rd birthday (timewarp!)

    My FAV cake my mum made me was a tiny teddy beach island cake. She hand piped all the swimwear onto each tiny teddy herself.

    I did tell you

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