SWEET PERFECT BLUEBERRY

GLUTEN AND DAIRY FREE BLUEBERRY CAKE

In my dreams we live in such climate that there are fresh berries and fruits all year round. Well we don't. But at least we have few weeks berry season and for example we can go to forest and pick some blueberries. This year there are a lot of them. They are very healthy and the taste is perfect. We want to save a lot of blueberries in freezer to enjoy their taste during  dark winter mornings.

This cake is totally gluten and dairy free. The izing on the cake is made of coconut cream and icing sugar. I wrote recipes for you but if you have read any of my recipes, you know I make things a bit more about than exact. Of course baking is much more precise combared to cooking.


SPONGE CAKE BASE

3 eggs
1 dl sugar (plentiful) 
1 dl potato starch
almost 1 tsp baking powder

Whip the eggs and sugar until the dough is fluffy and light. Add carefully dry ingredients. Bake in oven in 225 C degreees about 12-18 min. You can use baking sheet paper that it is very easy to remove the ready cake base from the baking dish.

MERINGUE

2 egg white
1 dl sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp plain vinegar
1 tsp potato starch

Whip egg whites and sugar until they are stiff and glossy. Mix other ingredients carefully. Spread meringue dough on the baking sheet paper in shape you want. Bake in 120-100 C degrees about 1 hour. Baking time depends on how thick the meringue is. I had very thin so the time was about 1 hour. If you want to leave your meringue soft inside it means less baking time. Why I use potato starch and vinegar is because the meringue will not be too hard and it will split nicely with spoon.

SUGAR IZING

Ingredients are coconut cream and izing sugar. It depends on how much you need it but I begun with 1/2 dl coconut cream and started adding the izing sugar until the mix was nicely firm.

SOYA CREAM

I used almost ready soya cream from the shop. It takes only few minutes to whip the cream. I added some sugar and vanilla extract to achieve nicer taste.

BUILDING A CAKE

I moist the cake base with water. Cake will be too sweet if you use juice etc. But maybe a drop or two of rosewater won't do any harm. 

I used soya cream and fresh blueberries inside the cake. I decorated the cake with coconut izing sugar mix. If you want to have really sweet cake you can use the mix more inside the cake. I put the meringue top on the cake. Finally I decorated the cake with fresh blueberries and lemon balm leaves. I put the cake to fridge expecially because of the sugar izing. Give a bit time to the cake that it will have more balanced taste. 

I already miss the summer and all the fresh fruits, vegetables, berries you can have then. That's why I've been planning to make some preservation in old-fashioned way. I'll get back to it later this autumn.

xoxo

Kreetta

COOLING WATERMELON CAKES

TINY CAKES FOR SUMMER PARTY

We love cakes! Today we celebrate Lab Noon's birthday party with having a link party. Congrats Lab Noon! There might be best cake ever! You can find all the other great celebrating food blogs in the end of this post. There is also a giveaway in Lab Noon's blog.

But now I want to tell you about my cake! I love summer and I love to enjoy summer days as much as possible in the garden. Summer is so short here in Scandinavia that you really have to try enjoy every bit of it. So it is a very good idea to have a nice garden party. Parties are always something that you need to work a little bit. If you have garden party then you really have to decide what works there for example on a very warm summer day. 

And yes, I have the coolest - the coolest ever - cake for you. Cute tiny watermelon cake. It is fresh and delicious and very simple to make. It's almost only a watermelon you need.

TINY WATERMELON CAKES

watermelon

fresh berries

mint or lemon balm

cream (i used coconut cream but you can choose your favorite cream)
 

other things like vanilla extract, rose water, candy, chocolate, fruits you want to use in decorating the tiny cakes.

HOW-TO

Find a glass that has straight edges or other enough sharp cylinder shaped item. You can also use professional cutters, then cutting is really easy. I had a bit decorated glass but it worked just fine. You just have to be a bit careful.

Cut the watermelon. Cut it for the height you want your tiny cake to be. After that you can push the glass to the watermelon. After you have made a circle there, you can also use knife to cut the watermelon. But with glass you get nice round shaped ones that are pretty as they are. You can do it quite slowly that the piece of watermelon doesn't stuck in the glass. I have to admit it was quite fun :) You really should not use design glass like this but you get nice pic though, haha! The glass is by Iittala and the designer is Oiva Toikka. He is now 84 years old. Very famous designer in Finland.

Why I used the glass because it was just right size with my tiny ceramic cake holders. I have made them from paper clay. I've been waiting a chance to use them as a photo prop and now I could. When I was making them in ceramic course people were a bit amused by them. "Where do you use them?" they asked me. They said they liked them but couldn't imagine the purpose. Can you? You can use them with small cakes, pastries like macarones and muffins. You can also have your ring and earrings there on your nightstand ;) As you see very useful.

As we are talking about watermelon we know how wet it is, so when you are cutting the cakes, you can dry them a bit with paper towel. Save them in cool place before serving. 

Don't they look adorable? There are possibilites to take this idea even more further. You can also have a DIY cake garden party. Everybody can decorate their own cakes or maybe even make the whole thing. That would be great fun! 

So let's have a party! This post is one of Lab Noon's virtual birthday party. There are several nice recipes for you to enjoy. So please go through the links below and find your favorite cake!

LAB NOON'S VIRTUAL BIRTHDAY PARTY LINK LOVE

Lab Noon

Twigg Studios 

Hortus Cuisine

Foodistan 

Cocinayletras 

Celeste Cucina 

Foolproof Living 

mykitchenkiosk 

My daily sourdough bread  

Gourmet Project 

La Panificatrice Folle

Rustica Retro  

Vermilion Roots 
Persian Foodie

 

You can also win very nice giveaway by leaving a comment on Lab Noon's post. Shipping is only available in Europe.

What do you think - are you going to make some watermelon cakes? You can always make a one big if you aren't a friend of tiny little things...

xoxo

Kreetta

Flower LOVE

Good Sunday! Lazy morning. Lazy day. This is a bit "dagen efter" for whole Finland because yesterday we had Finland's Independence Day.  That is the day when everybody is watching the Linnanjuhlat from television. It is the Presidential Independence Day reception. It's THE big party in Presidential Palace, approximately 2000 invited guests. Everybody would like to be there even at once...so have to do something that President of the Republic of Finland Sauli Niinistö will invite us there, haha. But being honest it's fun to watch how people have dressed up for the party and of course there are many opinions about the dresses...

We had also planned to travel to visit our friends and celebrate but sad to say I got weird stomach flu so we missed the party. I had also planned that I will make a blog post about the flowers I bought quite cheap price this week but because I got sick I can only show you these pics taken by iPhone for Instagram by VSCO cam.

I think it's unbelievable what you can do with your phone nowadays. Of course you can see the grain but this time of the year we don't have so much light so it means grain. But I don't care about it. I think it makes pics even more real and grain has always been one part of the photography.

I have promised many things lately to make and show you here in blog but I have had quite a lot work - which is very good for starting businesswoman ;) I had planned that I have my web shop open before X-mas but...we'll see. I think I'm going to take a nap now.

Have a great Sunday and enjoy waiting for X-mas!

xo
Kreetta

Flower Garland Workshop

In our daily life it is very fashionable to say that I've been soooo busy. I don't want to say it but this time - I have to say it. So many things have been going on lately and so many wonderful things!

Party Party - Summer Summer

Summer is the best time to celebrate different kind of things. I've been in few parties already and there are more to come and in between them a summer trip and then again party party. Can I complain? No. Do I enjoy myself? Yes. I hope you have also great time where ever you are and when ever you have your holiday. I'll go offline for the rest of the July.

But there might still be some updates in the facebook on my blog page. I like you to go and visit there. Or go to see how I'm doing in Pinterest. If you have time. I also would be so so happy if you can like my Gretchen Gretchen blog page in facebook...but only if you do. 

If you have some ideas or thoughts about my blog what you like the most please tell me...because in autumn I will make some decisions about the content of my blog. Thank you for your precious feedback!  I'm really really happy that you read my blog. I'm making and writing things that are close to my heart but it is always lovely to hear your point of views too. Have a wonderful summer days and see you!

xoxo

Kreetta

Garden party DIY

Hello my reader - how are you? Yesterday I made a post even though it's not my "blogging" day but as I have promised one Photography Concept and Styling in month...I hope you have time to check out the photo essee of my word recollection.

Today I give you a garden hint. In my little garden I have had problems with snails and birds. My 3 strawberry plants has produced some but birds has eaten them all. I have seen people using reflecting cd's above strawberries so as you see I made a little bit more stylish version of it. There's no proof that it works but doesn't it look so cute! It's fun decoration for garden also. Do you have great or fun ideas to decorate the garden? I like to hear if you do!

All you need is

* string

* wooden sticks

* 2 nails and hammer or just pins

* x-mas lametta

I guess you can see how it's done from the picture. You can also make differently this is only a starting point. Have a happy week!

xo

Kreetta