Flower pot cakes

I'm really sorry I didn't get to greet you mums out there on Mother's day.  I hope you all had a wonderful day and that you were truly spoiled by your loved ones! 

What extraordinary thing did your kids do for you? It's usually the girl(s) in the family who's the thoughful one, isn't it?  With boys, what can you really expect? My sons greeted me as soon as they woke up in the morning then off they went about their own business for the rest of the day.  My daughter, on the other hand, really went all out to make the day special for me.  She bought me flowers and sour lollies (which I love).  And she cooked for the family from breakfast till dinner!  She couldn't get the older boys to do anything but managed to "coerce" her (not so) little brother to somehow help her.

As for me, I made some flower pot cakes for a few of my mum friends.

I've been thinking about buying those silicone flower pots I've been seeing online lately but they seem to only come from the UK or US and are very, very expensive.  So instead, I went to our local home improvement store and bought real terracotta flower pots!  I bought twelve 9cm pots for only 74 cents each!

After cleaning with soap and hot water, I seasoned the pots by greasing each inside and out with oil, and then I put them in a 190 deg C oven for 30 minutes.  When they cooled, I repeated the process one more time. I read that seasoning seals the pores in the pot, prevents future cracking and somehow creates a non-stick surface for the pots as well.

Before baking, I greased and floured the pots first.  Then I filled them about 3/4 full with my chocolate cake batter. I baked the cakes at 180 deg C for about 40 minutes.  One cake was about 2 1/2 times bigger than a standard cupcake.

After they had cooled, I tapped the cakes out of the pots.  They cooked beautifully and came out really easily.  I trimmed the tops so I would have a level surface to put my frosting on, after which I placed them back in their pot.

I covered each cake top with chocolate frosting just enough to have a flat surface to pipe my flowers on.  I whipped up a batch of  Swiss meringue buttercream, made small portions of different colours, and then I was ready for the fun part!

First flower: chrysanthemum.  Used tip #81 for the petals, tip #3 for the center and tip #352 for the leaves.

Second flower: sunflower. Used tip#352 for both petals and leaves, tip#4 for the center.

Third flower: hydrangeas.  Used tip#103 for the petals, tip#3 for the dots, tip#352 for the leaves.

And lastly, roses. Used tip#104 for the petals, tip#352 for the leaves.

Here they are all together. Gorgeous, aren't they?

Sadly, I gave them all away!  I didn't leave even one for myself.

But that's ok.  I had a lot of fun and I know I made some friends pretty happy :).



PS.  I have a new recipe to share! It is for a really unique kind of cake. I'm just super busy till the end of this week but will do my best to do so really soon. Watch this space!