The Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days: Recipes to Make Every Day Special

Having been impressed by the Hummingbird Bakery produce before, I knew I had to pre-order this book to have a go myself. Having gotten the book a few days ago, I've been examining it lots, and even baking a few recipes, and I must say, this book is seriously yummy! I can't wait to be able to taste more of these delicious recipes!As for the recipes, there are lots of cupcakes (as expected) quite a few cakes and cheesecakes, plenty of loafs, bars and cookies, and several whoopie pies. As a nice surprise, there are also a few savoury muffin recipes. Some of their recipes have really intriguing combinations - how about a Beetroot and Chocolate Cupcake? Or maybe a Chocolate Guinness Cake? Or a Courgette, Walnut and Cinnamon Layer Cake? I'll definately will be trying these, just to try how these combinations work out.The recipes are not overly complicated, and as for levels some are pretty simple, and some increase in difficulty demanding several steps. Almost all of the ingredients are easily found in well-stocked supermarkets and if not, they can be substituted with something very similar (e.g. you can easily make a buttermilk substitute yourself). There are also some baking tips at the back for those with not that much experience.The only annoying thing I found with the book was the lay-out. The book is divided into holiday/special occasion -sections (e.g. Halloween, Mothers Day, Christmas...), and each sections has cupcakes, cakes, whoopie pies, loafs, savoury muffins etc. This makes it more difficult to find what you want to bake, and if you are looking for example different cupcakes you'd have to flip through the whole book to locate all the recipes. To me it would be more logical to have cupcakes in one section, cakes in another, whoopie pies in a third and so on.And if I'm nitpicking, the graphic design was done inconsistently, as some of the pictures have white frames and some don't. But this is a very minor point.Nonetheless, overall this is an inspiring book with yummy recipes!

Tarek Malouf was inspired by The Magnolia Bakery in New York City, 'the spiritual home' of the modern day take on cup cakes. Having visited this revered establishment several times over the last few years, I have become accustomed to joining a fairly long line of anticipatory customers snaking way from the shop doorway down West 11th Street.The author was persuaded by his NYC based sister to open a similar establishment in London in 2004 and now has two shops, the first in Portobello Road, and secondly in South Kensington. In a short time he had built up a fervent following including celebrities such as Elle Macpherson and Claudio Schiffer just to mention two beautiful bodies which, ironically do not seem to have undergone too much 'cup cake' abuse. What is their secret I wonder?This book was purchased for one of our married daughters with 5 children and the original husband still in attendance, who with good initial training from her mother and lots of practice on her family has developed into a first class cake maker, which perhaps accounts for continued presence of the father of her children. She was thrilled with the book and has already tried a number of the recipes and reports that they were easy to follow and produced excellent, attractive results, and she now finds her children going through the book and turning over the pages of cakes they like the look of. Apparently there have been lots and lots of turned down pages.The 5 star rating was the opinion of my daughter. Certainly before we passed the book over to her, we had a good look through and were greatly impressed with the imaginative range of recipes, and the stunning photography.

My daughter and I had great fun with the Hummingbird cup cake book so it was inevitable that we would preorder this one. Were we disappointed? Not at all! We were impressed by the cup cake book because all you need do is follow the simple recipes and you'd be rewarded with incredibly good cup cakes and muffins. Now the guys at Hummingbird show they are not one trick ponies and make a wide range of cakes - including some great new cup cake recipes - available to the rest of us.As before the recipes are detailed but simple to follow and I'd doubt there's a single taste that is not catered for. So many recipe books are a bit like music albums. There's one or two great hits and a whole load of album-filler tracks. Well this book bucks that trend. I'll doubt we'll do every recipe but there's not a duff one amongst them. So five stars? No, not quite. If I could I'd mark it down half a star. Why? It comes down to the book itself. It's produced to very high standards and it's half bound in cloth - the pink bit in the illustration. Looks great but after our first outing in the kitchen it got soiled with flour and butter. A wipe clean version may not be as impressive, but would be more practical.Still the recipes are out of this world!

I love baking (although am far from an expert at it!), and particularly love cookbooks centred around all things nice, and naughty! This book certainly doesn't dissapoint, with easy to follow recipes and great photography this is a fantastic addition to any cooks collection, from the masters of cupcakes!I have so far made the caramel hazelnut cheesecake, to a round of applause from my guests and a claim that it was better than anything they have had in the cheesecake factory! Plus the lemon & poppy seed loaf cake which was also delicious. I am thoroughly looking forward to working my way through the rest of these temtping recipes!The book is perfect for anyone with an interest in baking, the recipes aren't too difficult to follow, and you dont need to be a pastry chef to get results. By simply following the recipe step by step I turned out a cheesecake and a cake that looked pretty much like the ones in the pictures! Plus the vibrant pink book cover looks great on the bookcase!Thoroughly recommended, cant wait for the next edition from the hummingbird bakery!

I have Malouf's other book, and I liked it so much, that had decided to order this one as well. recommended for avid bakers

para las que amamos esta repostería. Las mismas características de buen hacer marca de la casa tanto en edición como en recetas, diferentes a sus otros libros. No hay miedo de comprar creyendo derrochar dinero por encontrar lo mismo.Este ofrece propuestas "más caseras", más cakes y menos filigranas, pero igual de apetitosos, siguiendo las estaciones y las fiestas señaladas del calendario anglosajón, claro, pero tan versátiles que son adaptables a cualquier momento.Añade a cada episodio recetas tradicionales absolutamente norteamericanas muy curiosas.Tiene unos cupcakes de chocolate fondant espectaculares.Hay que tenerlo!!

Another great hummingbird bakery cookbook. The recipes are easy to make and there are various pictures of the different yummy recipes. Only thing that would help is if the measurements were also listed in cup and tablespoon quantities. Can't wait for the next book.

If you only ever buy one cake book this has to be it! I have made cupcakes in the past but theyve never been amazing. I just made the sticky toffee cupcakes and Im absolutely amazed everyone of them is perfect, light and they taste amazing. I have never been moved enough by a book to write a review but this one is certainly it. I bought it on kindle to read on my fire - the pictures are perfect and its easy to read. Next to make are the gingerbread cupcakes although maybe could be chocolate, there are so many beautiful but seriously easy recipes here. I have a kitchenaid so i suppose its just 'point and go' but it really was super easy with delicious results. Thank you Hummingbird Bakery.

Questo libro è stata una piacevole sorpresa, mi era stato consigliato e ha superato le aspettative! È in inglese, ma è abbastanza semplice, quindi nonostante la mia poca dimestichezza con la lingua non ho avuto grandi difficoltà.Ha ricette davvero originali e "fresche" , è diviso per occasioni e non per tipo di dolce come molti dei miei altri libri, ma devo dire che mi sono trovata molto bene lo stesso... il massimo dei punti per la sezione primaverile ed estiva di cupcakes, mi piacciono tutti moltissimo. Non c'è una ricetta che non proverei.