Decorating saviours

 

The abundance of good quality decorations is not very easy to find in Londontown, in Canada you can go to several bulk food places and find tonnes of cake decorating items at bargain prices but in the UK you have a SMALL selection and it is super expensive. I will never understand how these things work sometimes? 

Anyhow, the good old supermarket and cash and carry where I buy my supplies for Le Dolci does carry my favourite decorations made by Silver Spoon.  The brand carries the best decorations at a reasonable price and the lovely people at Silver Spoon also contact me every once in a while to see if I would like to trial their products, yes please! 

So, I received a little package in the post and used their decorations for a batch of cupcakes to go to some sweet little 5 year olds! The best part of this job is seeing cute kiddies enjoying cakes. And also the adults too! I did have 4 cupcakes for breakfast the other day (all for quality control purposes, of course!) but do think that this job could get dangerous as my metabolism starts to decrease. I will have to go to D's personal trainer soon to get me some abs of steel like he is getting - wow - a personal trainer does work and I have witnessed real abs on a non-gay man! 

Keep the cake addictions going people of England, just make sure you work it off by dancing or walking or doing the London Marathon (a fabulous event that happened yesterday!) Next year I should make cupcakes with little medals on them and hand them out to runners - they deserve it! 

Thanks again to the Silver Spoon peeps for sending me sweets - my customers have given it the thumbs up as have I.

xx

Feedback from this week's cake club deliveries

"Your brownies are very rich and moist - some of the best brownies I've had.

The biscotti are just right. Everyone at work was envious."

Phew! Looking forward to this week's boxes going out. 

The Metro loves Le Dolci

Here is the piece that was in the UK edition of The Metro on 14 Dec. written by Chloe Scott. The girls at the Metro were very pleased with their box of goodies, which was good news for us, phew!

A bit of Christmas cheer

Back in warm-ish Canada, well it is warmer than freezing London. So for people without kids, beware as when you do have them your day can go something like this. Wake up at 7am, make and eat french toast, play and make rainbow cupcakes by 9am, wonder what the hell to do for the rest of the day for about 30 seconds in between more playing of Hungry Hippo, kids Monopoly and tag.

Hmm....it was only 11am and I was already exhausted. So at 1pm it was bowling time, then more playtime and more cupcake eating.

Cousins of the children's age came over after bowling so that eased the play requirements, snuck in a bit of Oprah watching, Le Dolci emails and a bit of pub action tonight with the Adopted Lebanese sister and the real Italian fiery one.  I have done very little walking as this is the land of the vehicle so Momma Dolce's home made pasta and veal have gone down a treat and it keeps on coming. 

Today's cupcake making had a 'rainbow' theme and each cupcake was a color of the rainbow (well we tried as best as we could!) It's great to be home for xmas, more food adventures to come. Bring on the Christmas feast.

 

Interesting Job Application

 

Although I am not hiring, I do everything from packing boxes to licking the bowl myself :), this pic came via email with the note, 'Hire me! I think I would make a pretty good employee.......'

I do like the direct approach and love the pic and the decoration, although I suspect the frosting may not be all natural but this is a good starting point. Unfortunately the applicant is in Canada so they will have to wait 'til a Le Dolci Toronto branch opens. Then they are hired! And her two little angel-looking children can do the taste testing. Little Andrew would be good at that am sure!

Photo shoot fun!

My wonderful friend Jake at Jake Green.co.uk was kind enough to host a photo shoot at his cool studio this past week. He usually does celebs and other fun stuff but he has a sweet tooth so the very cooperative subjects for the afternoon were cakes! Resulting phtoographs from the day are AMAZING.

If you ever need a photographer please call him and tell him I sent you (you may get a discount or a clever East End comment!) Jake has a creative eye and managed to make the cupcakes, cannoli and brownies look fantastic. More pics to be uploaded soon but for now enjoy these two and also read today's review of Le Dolci on Londonist.com written by the lovely Food & Drink editor Chris.

The greatest thing about starting a new biz is all of the interesting and kind people you meet, a lot of people are willing to help newbies and I am sure karma and time will allow me to help them one day too.  A big thanks to all of you who have pointed me in interesting directions and have offered me your time and advice!

x

Check out Springwise.com!

Le Dolci had a piece on the new biz on the world famous newsletter, which I read religiously. Along with George the Greek (in Toronto!), who spotted it on there before I did. It is a great weekly read and everyone should sign up! Thanks Springwise! Check out the piece here!

Le DolciAt dinner with my two favourite Milanese brothers....Le Dolci.
At Wagamama's they ordered the chicken katsu curry - no.101 on the menu - they ALWAYS order that!

One of them was a chef once upon a time with two restaurants in Italy, can you guess which one? The other is in fashion - perhaps the bow tie gives you a big hint. (But don't they look like babies? It must be the Italian genes!)

I may not be posting much this week as have a hand injury and if I can't type I can't work! So am resting the hands for the week to make them better so I can type away more food stories for you!

Sunday am in Richmond for some home cooking so will take some pics of the fashion Dolci's delicacies. Not riso bollito (boiled rice) Mr. Watercolour!