Tea Party, my 30th Birthday

You may have noticed my absence from the blog for the past week or so, this is because I turned 30 last Tuesday. Instead of having a mental breakdown because I'm no longer 21 I decided to have a civilised tea party during the day. I blame Pinterest for putting this idea in my head because of all the pretty girly cakes I see there.

I haven't baked since I was in my early teens, and even then I didn't really do much, I mostly just stood beside my mother and licked the bowl when she was done. But I like setting myself impossible challenges, so I decided to bake all the cakes myself, and to have lots of different types. After some obsessive research on Pinterest and an epic shopping trip I was ready to go. I baked:

Lemon Cheesecake: you can find the recipe here but I tweaked it by adding lemon jelly made with very little hot water( you don't need to add sugar then) and I added an extra tub of philadelphia. I must say I was delighted with the result, it was really fresh and lemony.

70 Plain Buns: I got the recipe from the Odlums website, for kids baking. I decorated them with different icing to vary the taste/display. Here are some links to icing recipes, I made toffee and chocolate ones. I also made butterfly fairy cakes too, you just use a blob of cream and jam, it brought back memories of every kids party I had ever been to.

Marshmallow Rice Krispie Cakes: These Rice Krispie cakes taste like the Rice Krispie Squares you can buy in the shop, I'm not the biggest fan of them but I know other people love them. I got the recipe from Pinterest, but after making all the other millions of cakes I ran out of time and ingredients to make icing for them. They are actually the most frustrating cakes to make as they were so sticky and difficult to handle. At one point I did scream 'I hate you, you ****ing evil devil cakes!', I will obviously never make them again! (I did have some mix leftover so I made a cake version and covered it with icing and strawberries,if nothing else it looked pretty on the table!)

Whoopie Pies: I cheated with these and bought a readymix box. Little did I know it takes pretty much the same amount of effort, next time I'll just make them myself.

Cucumber Sandwiches: It's obligatory to have white bread cucumer sandwiches with no crusts at tea party, I also made some egg sandwiches too.

Savoury Sandwiches: I got some yummy brown bread from the shop around the corner(Bobby Byrnes) and I put chirizzo, olives, rocket, tomatoes, and humous on them.

Vol-Au-Vonts: I bought the frozen pasty in tesco and just added my own filling, I figured I was elbow deep in cakes and that it was too much hassle to make my own pastry. I used various combinations of olives, humous, chilli jam, tomatoes, chirizzo, and mozzerella to fill them. 

Mini Pizza Rolls: I saw the recipe on Pinterest for these bite sized pizza rolls and thought they were perfect for the party. Mine were no way near as tidy but they were super tasty, the key is to make a lovely herb oil to baste them in.

Even though it was a tea party there wasn't much tea consumed, instead I served Pimms. This is a very traditional English garden party drink, closely associated with Wimbledon. It's an alcoholic drink that you soak in fruit overnight and serve on a hot sunny day with ice. Here is my recipe:

1 bottle of Pimms
2 large oranges
1 lemon
2 limes
1/2 cucumber
8/12 strawberries
1 fistful of mint

Leave to soak overnight. Then just before you serve add 2 litres of white lemonade or soda water and 1 litre of ginger ale. Add ice to your glass before serving. I served mine in a selection of mismatched old tea cups.

You may also notice the bunting in the background. I made this from wrapping paper which I got for €1.50 per roll. I then stapled the triangles onto ribbon. It was really quick to make tonnes of it to add some festive cheer to the party.

It was such a lovely day, the party was small enough that I was able to have a good old natter with everyone.  It was perfectly girly, exactly what I wanted! We brought the leftover cake to the pub that night where I met up with the rest of my friends who weren't able to make it to the daytime party. I really can't think of a lovlier way to have spent my day!

Yep that's me crying I'm laughing so much...it may have had something to do with the crazy amount of Pimms that was consumed!

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