Elite Event: The Icing On The Cake

I love love this event. First: Cake and Co is such a cute bakery, and their cakes are not just a pretty face they actually taste really good as well. It was a blast to learn a bit of decoration but also to speak with the owner about baking. It was also great to hear the story of how Rose Tinted Flowers came to be, and meet the lady behind the gorgeous flowers. My favorite was the tea from Balanced Energy. As a lover of natural and organic teas, I was delighted to try all the different kinds of tea and to learn more about their health benefits. Thank you Alex and Unilocal Auckland for introducing me to these great local businesses.

Again a very well organised event by the lovely Alex! It’s a challenge to get a big group of people in a small space, but they managed to do it and do it well! Cake & Co. had a fantastic decorating demo, and then stations for us to decorate the most amazing cupcakes! The edible flowers were a fantastic touch (Yay Rose Tinted Flowers), and wrapping up the evening with tea made me feel a bit better about shoving my face with cupcakes.
I am a super tea fanatic (as many of my friends know, and have heard wayyy to much from me about it!), so it was interesting to hear it from a healing and medicinal perspective. Surprisingly, I did learn something new as I had never heard of pre-​steeping the tea in cold water. I might try that at home sometime.
Thank you so much for the beautiful event, and for the gifts Cake & Co., Rose Tinted Flowers, and Balanced Energy! I loved the relaxing tisane blend, and my husband loved the cupcakes. I think I took the most selfies I have ever taken in front of Rose Tinted Flower’s Flower wall! :-)

Another amazing Unilocal elite event event! Alex and Unilocal always come up with the best combinations. This time it was cake, tea and flowers.
I started off the evening tasting and learning about the wonderful teas from Balanced Energy. Catherine took us through a comprehensive tea tasing learning about the correct way to prepare and brew different types of tea ranging from Oolong tea to fruity tisanes. I did not realise I was so misinformed about tea. All of Balanced Energy’s teas are certified organic with no added flavourings or synthetic ingredients and they all tasted amazing. After the tastings I felt refreshed and energised and ready to eat some cake!
Jackie King, the owner of Cake & Co, gave us an amazing lesson on cupcake decorating. We were taught two different piping techniques and were able to try them out on delicious vanilla cupcakes. Cake & Co specailise in making cakes which are gluten free, refined sugar free, dairy free and egg free. They use only natural ingredients, unrefined sugars and free range eggs.
Rosie from Rose Tinted Flowers had created a beautiful flower wall which we able to take photos with our cupcake creations in front of.
Thanks so much to Catherine from Balanced Energy, Jackie from Cake & Co, Rosie from Rose Tinted Flowers and Alex from Unilocal.I had such a wonderful time at this event and will putting my cupcake decorating and tea brewing skills to good use in the future.

I got promoted from the waiting list for this one (thankyou kind and busy stranger!). It was just the midweek lift I needed — fresh flowers by Rose Tinted Flowers, sweet cupcakes by Cake & Co. and organic teas from Balanced Energy. The venue was just big enough for our group of 15, with the tea tasting happening out on the sidewalk. The tea seminar (I’ll call it a seminar, because I don’t know what else to call it) was so interesting that I could mostly ignore the perilous cold breeze. I also learned that I’ve been making tea wrong all my life, though this was no particular surprise. Inside was the cupcake decorating workshop, where we learned two different icing tricks and came away with a duo of free cupcakes. All of which was set against a delightful flower wall (optimal for instagramming). A big thankyou to all involved for a very cool event!

I of course LOVE cake and flowers, but my favorite part was actually the informative tea brewing sesh with Balanced Earth! I was just telling a friend last week that I am embarrassed of my lack of tea etiquette and knowledge, as tea isn’t a big part of American culture. I’m so pleased to now know the difference between tea and tisane, how to use cold water to let the tea breathe and open up, and the origins of some of the different teas.
Thanks so much to our hosts, and to Alex! Another beautiful, delicious, and informative night with great people :)

A beautiful wee intimate gathering of Elites for a mini tutorial in cake icing (always wanted to try) and education in how to brew teas as well as a couple of tastings. Was so looking forward to this event and Alex, once again– delivered the goods.
On the main Ponsonby road sits the cute little Cake & Co shop where this was held– great space with a mouthwatering cabinet of baked delights to admire as we gave decorating a go ourselves as well. Definitely not as easy as it was made to look but a fun time anyway especially with (my fave) edible flowers and other pretty sprinkles. Rose Tinted Flowers did a gorgeous little flower wall and highly informative tea session just outside the front door with Balanced Energy.
What an absolutely wonderful treat of an evening– Thank you Alex, Cake & Co, Rose Tinted Flowers and Balanced Energy!

Had the most amazing night last night at Unilocal’s Icing on the Cake event at Cake and Co in Ponsonby. Really enjoyed the set up of the venue with the beautiful flower wall by Rose Tinted Flowers and the stunningly laid out table of teas provided by balanced energy! Maybe I’m just a tea novice (scratch that, I definitely am) but I can sincerely say that up until last night, I had no clue about the art that is tea making, nor did I know about the extent of the health benefits various teas and tisanes possess. Who knew that tea leaves have to be «awakened».
Being an avid baker, I also really enjoyed learning how to pipe frosting like a domestic goddess from the ladies at Cake and Co. Can’t wait to flex my new found talents over the weekend. Not only were the finished cupcakes beautiful, but they tasted amazing. Can’t wait to come back and buy an actual cake from the place next time I have an event.
All in all, Alex you killed it, thanks for an amazing night. Thanks especially to Cake & Co for hosting, Rose Tinted Flowers for decorating and Balanced Energy for the master class! Loved meeting all of you.

C A K E.
I love you like a fat kid loves cake.
Let them eat cake.
Let’s face it, a nice creamy chocolate cake does a lot for a lot of people; it does for me.
You are the icing on my cake…
These are my all time favourite CAKE quotes, because seriously, who doesn’t love cake?!?
Last night, I attended Unilocal’s Elite Event, titled ‘The Icing On The Cake’ held at Cake & Co on Ponsonby Road. Owner, Jackie King, showed us how to decorate cupcakes with frosting, edible flowers and sprinkles and Catherine of Balanced Energy showed us how to make tea using tea leaves. I was super excited as:
— I love making and eating cakes;
— I love tea, but have never made it properly myself; and
— I have always wanted to learn how to decorate cupcakes and brew the perfect cup of tea!
Cake & Co operate out of a super cute and well decorated café/​shop on Ponsonby Road, where they make a variety of cakes and sweet treats, and cater to dietary needs (gluten free, refined sugar free, dairy free and egg free). You can buy their cakes at their café, plus a range of packaged goodies or you can pre-​order one of their cakes and they can deliver in the Auckland area.
We learnt some of Jackie’s great tips for cupcake decorating:
— you can buy plastic piping bags from Gilmours (just chop one of the corner ends and put the nozzle through)
— make sure you have a firm grip around the bag when piping
— to get a beautiful effect with icing, use a soft gel paste (i.e. red) to paint the sides of the piping bag, then add the frosting inside. Shake the frosting all the way down to the nozzle. When you pipe it, it has a wavy effect of pink and white frosting — lovely!
Then it was our turn! It was super fun and hands on, which I loved. We were able to decorate our cup cakes with edible flowers (very pretty) and colourful sprinkles. And of course, take many photos!!!
Catherine from Balanced Energy also showed us how to brew the perfect cup of tea, along with a tea tasting. Catherine told us a little bit about her background, in that she is a chef by trade, but has always had an interest in herbal medicines. She has now been a health practitioner for 20 years and runs a healing and natural health practice on Waiheke Island. She also has a stall at the La Cigale French Market on Saturdays and Sundays, where you can purchase her certified organic teas and skincare products.
Below is Catherine’s recipe for the perfect cup of tea:
1. place one heaped teaspoon of white tea leaves (or any other kind) into a pot
2. pour cold water onto the tea, which means to «wake up the tea leaves» and leave for 9 minutes
3. after the time is up, strain off the cold water (which has softened the leaves). Catherine said this is when «the leaves are ready to release their goodies!»
4. then pour hot water into the pot (about halfway, for one cup)
5. don’t leave it to sit as it is a waste and it tastes bitter (only leave it to sit for around 30 seconds)
6. pour the tea through the strainer into teacups, and enjoy!
* you can also use the same tea leaves up to 8 times!
We then had a tea tasting with Catherine’s lovely range of teas. On arrival, she made us a cocktail using her ‘Rosehip & Hibiscus’ tisane, along with vodka, lime and edible flowers for decoration. It was a delicious drink and very pretty! We tried a few of her teas, namely the ‘Balm & Roses Tisane’ which was sweet and fragrant. A great tip we received from Catherine is that you can brew a strong pot of this tea and then pour it into the bath! You can also put it on your skin. The next tea we tried was ‘Be Calm Tisane’ consisting of lavender, chamomile and spearmint, which is good for stress and calming the mind. It also helps with digestion. Last but not least, we sampled the ‘Rosehip & Hibiscus Tisane’ which we previously had in our cocktails, but were able to try it on its own. It was my favourite of them all — sweet and perfect for iced teas come summertime!
Cake & Co’s space looked lovely, thanks to Rosie of Rose Tinted Flowers who styled the flowers for the event. The flower wall in particular was beautiful and we were each photographed in front of it! Rosie is based in Grey Lynn and sells her flowers online.
A big thank you to Alex for another fabulous event, full of fun and learning new things. Happy caking!!!

Aw Alex, you’ve done it again! Thanks for organizing yet another well put together event that showcased a little more of our Kiwi talent! Your attention to detail meant everything ran really smoothly in the beautiful but tiny Cake & Co space.
The owner Jackie King was really welcoming. She had two cupcakes packaged in little white boxes for each of us and a nice selection of mini cupcakes and melt-​in-​your mouth sammies for us to sample. I loved the fact that she chose to demonstrate two easy piping techniques so that those who had never used a piping bag could actually succeeded at decorating their cupcakes. The cupcakes were gluten free and made from natural ingredients. The butter cream was not so healthy but delish!
Next up, we had a session with Catherine from Be Spa organic teas. She was super organized too, she even had spare hot water to rinse our cups between each tea tasting session! Catherine is passionate about the healing benefits of teas and herbal tisanes. She talked us through the importance of pouring cold water over organic green tea to wake the leaves up and then pouring hot water — not boiling water (leave boiling water to rest for about 5 minutes) and leaving the tea to breathe for about 30 seconds before pouring it. Catherine was kind enough to give us a little takeaway mystery tea sample too. I got home to discover that I was given a sachet of Spearmint and Rose Petal Tisane which according to the Be Spare Organic Teas & Tisanes website, calms the nerves and uplifts the mood! Oh, and it’s suppose to be wonderful for keeping the skin looking good and aiding digestion — bring it on!
Rosie from Rose Tinted Flowers had done a nice wall display and beautiful little posies that sat prettily on the shelves and cakery counter.
All-​in-​all, it was a fun evening and a BIG sugary thank you to all the lovely ladies who shared their wonderful talents and produce with us.