Pineapple-shaped pineapple upside-down cake

Listen, I'm not going to lie: I have jumped on the pineapple bandwagon pretty solidly, and have no intention of getting off it. Pineapples have kinda seemed like the theme for this year so it seemed appropriate that for my birthday I make myself a pineapple cake. But not just any pineapple cake: a pineapple-shaped pineapple upside-down cake! ^___^

 

I gathered around (most) of my pineapple things to have a little cake photo shoot because, as I think you've all learnt by now, I can not bake something without wanting to take a million photos of it. Especially if it comes out well, which I think this did! ^___^

A used a recipe from Taste for the pineapple-upside down cake except the only rectangle baking pan I could find was pretty big ... so I ended up tripling the recipe 0___o Also, instead of placing the pineapple rings whole on the bottom of the pan, I cut them into segments (had I thought of this earlier I could have just *brought* segments!) and placed them in a pattern which I thought was vaguely reminiscent of a pineapple skin.

I also made a small round cake to make into the top of the pineapple; for this recipe I used my basic cake recipe (see below) but added a cup of pineapple juice instead of the water.

Basic cake

1 1/2 cups of self-raising flour

1 cup sugar

1 cup water

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1/2 cup vegetable oil

I cut it into a spiky shape and iced it with green butter icing. I had a bit of trouble with the icing though, because it *really* didn't want to stick to the parts of the cake that I had cut, which is possibly because those parts didn't have a crust on them.

Anyway, the most important part about a cake is taste, right? The verdict on this one: delicious. The pineapple upside-down cake was wonderfully moist (ugh, moist) and the pineapple on top was glazed and oh so tasty! The only change to this cake I would make is to perhaps put some crushed pineapple into the batter so it was extra flavoursome all the way through. As I am a fan of delicious flavour. 

The top cake was also really good; not as sweet as the upside-down cake, but a great accompaniment. However this cake is probably best served at a larger party to since it is pretty big! I ended up taking some to work to get rid of it ... but luckily my co-workers didn't mind! ~___^

Since these photos were taken, I have obtained even more pineapple stuff. This bandwagon ride is far from over folks. Although ... I did also get myself some watermelon duct tape (a highly necessary purchase, I'm sure) so perhaps I'll be taking a side ride on bandwagons of other tropical fruits? I guess we'll see. In the photo below, you can see my pineapple string art, pineapple tea cosy, and pineapple perler bead brooch, as well as the incredible pineapple sunglasses Tanya gifted me for the Giant Pineapple KAL and an awesome poster that I printed out from here.

 

And, my new pineapple jar! Pip gave this to me as an early birthday present without even knowing my pineapple filled birthday plans! What a champ ^____^

 

Since next week is Christmas (uhhh, what???!!) I probably won't post, but I will definitely be back directly afterwards to show you all the gifts I've been crafting. The race is on: will I finish them all in time? (Spoiler: probably not.)

- Lisa xx

Pineapple and AT-AT string art

Hello! Today I really felt like I needed a break from my crochet project (so. many. trebles!) so I had a look through my idea notebook and found one that said, in shaking just-woke-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night handwriting, "geometric string art AT-AT". There was also a drawing of what I assume to be the aforementioned AT-AT but it looked more like a cow. Good attempt nonetheless, sleeping-Lisa. A for effort.

So anyway I gathered my supplies, and got to crafting! It turned out well, but my desire for hitting things with a hammer wasn't yet sated, so I made another string art; this one a pineapple. I'm still not over the pineapple trend, and it works with the 70s-esque medium of string art oh so well! And I even made a little tutorial and a template for you to make your own ^___^

 

1. You'll need a hammer, upholstery tacks (or some other kind of small nail), string (I used cotton thread), a piece of wood (mine is a chopping board from IKEA), scissors, and a scalpel.

 

2. You'll also need a silhouette. For my AT-AT I used this one, and for my pineapple I made my own. If you'd like to use my pineapple silhouette, you can download it by clicking on the image above ^___^

 

3. Add your tacks around the edges of the silhouette. My pine board was soft enough that I could push in the tacks a little before hammering them in; this adds a little bit of stability and reduces the chance you'll hammer your thumb ~___^

4. Once you've got all your tacks in, you can remove the paper template. Just rip it off! ^___^

 

5. Some of your tacks might have a little bit of paper stuck underneath them. I used a scalpel to cut these little scraps off.

 

 

6. To start off the string wrapping, I did an adjustable slip knot which I tightened around the first tack. I wrapped the string around each tack around the outside of the shape and then started criss-crossing through the middle.

 

7. To finish off, I also used an adjustable slip knot. It can be a bit tricky to get the knot in the right place so that your string is kept tight enough, but it does look very neat once you get it done. ^___^

8. Cut off the tails of your strings, and you're finished! Huzzah!

 

It's still quite cloudy and rainy here, being winter, but I feel like these little bits of art cheer up the place quite nicely ^___^

I'm back at uni again next week which means that craft will, once again, be relegated to the back burner but until then I shall be working on my crochet project. I hope I can finish it in time to show you soon! 

- Lisa xx