This was my first experience decorating with fondant and it was a blast! These fresh cheery cupcakes with fondant icing may look intimidating, but they’re actually quite easy to make. Upon returning to Chicago some of our friends invited us over for afternoon tea. Beyond thrilled at discovering more people who enjoy having tea, I started to plan what to make. It dawned on me that as much as I love tea, I needed (ok, more like wanted) a cookbook purely dedicated to afternoon tea recipes.

I discovered The Perfect Afternoon Tea Recipe Book by Antony Wild and Carol Pastor. It’s a beautiful book with gorgeous photographs and detailed instructions. It’s interesting to note the differences between British and American cooking terminology, such as self-raising flour for self-rising flour, plain flour for all-purpose flour, bicarbonate of soda for baking soda, icing sugar for confectioners’ sugar, cornflour for cornstarch,  wholemeal flour for whole-wheat flour, sugarpaste for fondant, etc. Luckily enough, the book has both the English and American terms. read more