The Pinwheel Blog.....
April 2025 - Easter Baking Traditions
Easter baking traditions vary around the world, through different cultures to quirky family traditions.
​
Easter treats for the British often include Hot Cross Buns, Simnel Cakes, Chocolate Eggs and all things cute from bunnies and chicks to lambs and duckling!
Our Easter range this year has proven our most popular yet! We've had Creme Egg muffins, Easter cupcakes and brownies, Bunny biscuits and a delicious take on the Simnel cake with our Simnel treacle tart!
Along with our specials each week being an 'eggcelent' addition to any Easter cake display.
​
A tradition in my family was to have an Easter egg hunt. Sometimes hunting for chocolate eggs, sometimes little vintage tin eggs. This year I brought this family past time to the bakery. Hiding little (wipe clean!) plastic eggs around the bakery for the team to find. There has been lots of laughter which is alwasy needed to get us through extemely busy baking days!
​
It's always wonderful to share traditions with friends and family - our Pinwheel family has a new tradition now too - we like to go to the lambing barn on the farm where the bakery is and look at all the proud new mummies and their babies. Timing it well this year to arrive just in time to feed the pet lambs!
​
Happy Easter to you all - enjoy old and new traditions alike.
​
January 2025 - New Year, New Challenge
Instead of looking back on 2024 (which was a wonderful year, don't get us wrong!), we are looking forward to a new year ahead!
​
This year we are launching our decorating evenings at some of our lovely wholesale customers cafes and shops.
​
Participating in decorating classes brings with it both community, friendships and allows the creative juices to flow.
We will be teaching simple yet effective decorating techniques that you can craft your own beautiful bakes with fibrant designs and unlock a newfound sense of accomplishment.
​
Not only will you be enjoying an evening of fun and skill-building, you will be supporting small, local businesses and help passionate artisans thrive in your community.
It's a change to have a 'date night', make new friends or spend time with old friends, meet like minded people and contribute to the local economy, all while indulging in the sweet satifcation of your edible creations!
Check out our events page to book onto our upcoming classes!
November 2024 - Christmas Baking
The joy of Christmas baking is a celebration of tradition in many households. The smell of cinnamon, cloves and sugar fills the homes and bakeries across the UK. Every recipe from gingerbread biscuits to Christmas cakes and puddings holds a sense of nostalgia for many. Our recipes have been handed down across the years, tinkered with and become part of our award winning patisserie.
​
Christmas baking is also a communal experience that brings people closer together. Baking and decorating biscuits and cakes with friends and family for presents and treats is a true joy.
​
We don't think the joy of coming together and decorating should be just for Christmas though! Watch out for our news in January for some exciting new events coming in 2025!
October 2024 - The rise in popularity of Halloween in the UK
Halloween has really taken off in the UK in recent years.
What used to be a low-key event is now a build up not dissimmilar to Christmas (some might say)
In the bakery year, September is usually a quieter time, where bakeries re-group after a busy summer season and start preparing for Christmas.
However, (along with many others we hope), we find there is very little time to take stock and as soon as the schools are back, we are straight into autumn and Halloween baking madness!
Halloween is becoming a big event as soon as autumn hits! Rolling out our autumn/winter menu and spooky specials ready to get everyone in the spirit for pumpkin picking, trick-or-treating and spooky themed parties and gatherings!
Social media of course has made it even more fun and popular, with people sharing their crafting ideas, costumes and festive setups.
It is safe to say, Halloween is now a must-celebrate event across the UK!
​
So as we busily make pumpkin pie and spiced treacle tarts along with spooky skellington biscuits and 'mummified' brownies - we wish everyone the very best for spooky season!
August 2024 - Gluten Free - lifestyle choice or dietry requirement
We have noticed a large increase in the popularity of our gluten free products over the past 6 months.​​​
Gluten free products are for some, a dietry requirement. Celiac disease (a condition where gluten triggers harmful immune reactions) can be very unpleasant and in some cases very serious.
Others are choosing gluten free products as a life style choice - feeling better physically and mentally from eating less gluten.
​
As the demand for gluten free products grows - so does our menu! We love creating products for every dietry requirement. Quality handmade cakes, pastries and desserts made with carefully sourced ingredients.
The trend for gluten-free living show no signs of slowing down. Therefore we embrace this and continue to innovate, offering new and improved gluten free cakes, desserts, tarts, tray bakes and savouries.
​Our new autumn/winter menu will be launching next month with lots of delicious delicacies for everyone to enjoy - watch this space!
​​​
* Our products are handmade in an environment where allergens are present. Therefore traces of allergens may be present in our products.
July 2024 - Chocolate, we can't live without it!
The last few months has seen increases across the board for cocoa prices. This is due to a few factors ranging from climate change to econmic policies.
Effecting the industry so significantly that where we would normally absorb the price increases ourselves, with increases of 80% (av) this is not an option at present.
It effects chocolate and cocoa prices and it seems we cannot live without chocolate - and why would we want to?
So instead of compromising on the quality, we choose to increase our prices ever so slightly and continue to produce award winning cakes, pastries and desserts for you to enjoy across the region.
​
Check out some of our delicious chocolate products from tarts and cakes to traybakes and desserts!​​​
