My First Birthday - and a Giveaway

Wow, it seems amazing to think that I hit 'publish' on my first blog post a year ago today!

The year - and the baking that has accompanied it - has been incredible.  

So many things I thought I would never get around to trying, but the blog has helped me to focus.

I started the blog by making my first fruit cake for Christmas, even if it was from one of those festive, Christmas Cake mixes.

Many, many cupcakes, have been made, including these Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes which were my first experiment with fillings.

I've baked my first batch of macarons, and made different kinds since, experimenting with different nuts.

Pistachio Macaron with Dark Chocolate Ganache

I've made a chocolate roulade.

I've made Red Velvet Cupcakes, Blue Velvet Cupcakes and a Red, White and Blue Cake for the Jubilee.

I've made Sourdough Bread, with a little help from Dan Lepard.

I've got my pastry mojo back, and even tried choux.

Chocolate Profiteroles with Raspberry Cream

For Sam, I've been proud to make my first, First Birthday Cake.

I've become much more confident in my baking and have loved developing some of my own recipes.

I've had so much fun and met so many lovely people (yes, that means you!).

It's been a blast.

So to mark the occasion, and to say 'thanks' for your interest and support over the last twelve months, thought I'd run a little competition.

You may recall that I'm a bit of cook book addict (and with that I've probably won the award for understatement of the year).

And I have a really bad habit.

Sometimes I can even buy a book without realising I've already got it.

Or, probably more often, other people buy me a book without realising I've already got it. So in the last twelve months, I've managed to get duplicates of three of my favourite baking related books. I decided the best use for them is to package them up as a giveaway.

First up is Ina Garten's latest, 'Foolproof'. Not strictly a baking book, as it covers many different, yummy things, but I love her baking recipes and this is where the inspiration for Spiced Pumpkin Cupcakes with Maple Frosting came from.

Next up, is the Pink Whisk's, aka Ruth Clemens' 'Busy Girls Guide to Cake Decorating'.

Thirdly, is a great chocolate reference for a chocoholic 'Green and Black's Ultimate Chocolate Recipes'.

Finally, to add to this little haul, the lovely people at Quirk Books also sent me a copy of Marshmallow Madness by Shuana Sever to review, but as I had already bought it, we thought it'd be great to pass on as part of this prize.

To enter you need to do one - or all three - of the following (you get one entry for each one):

(1) Follow the blog in some way, either with Friends Connect or by email for example, and leave a comment below telling me you do and how; or

(2) Like me on Facebook (Fold in the Flour) and leave a comment below telling me you have  and what your username is so I can find you; or

(3) Follow me on Twitter and send me (@FoldintheFlour) a tweet about the competition using #foldintheflourblogiversary, and leave a comment below letting me know that you have done so.

For each entry to count, you need to leave a comment below so that I can pull them all together. I know it's a bit of work, but it should only take a few minutes.

The final thing you should note, and I'm sorry about this but the four books together are pretty heavy, you must have a UK postal address for me to arrange postage to.

The competition will close at midnight on 31 December 2012.

I'll be asking Mike to pick a winner at random from the entries on 1 January, and will contact the winner to arrange postage (hopefully so I can post on 2 January and you can start the New Year in style with some lovely baking ideas!).

I'll update the blog on 1 January with the name of the winner - in case for some reason I can't contact them any other way. They'll have until midnight on 8 January to let me have a postal address. Otherwise, we'll pick another name at random.

Good Luck!

Susie


* Cupcake and candle photo copyright (c) www.123rf.com