SUMMER IS HERE AT LAST.

We have been very busy in recent months. Many customers have requested mini gift boxed rum cakes as corporate gifts. Move over cup cakes, Dee's Luxury rum Cakes are the new must have.

The link between Dee's and fashion continues. Look out for us in a special editorial feature in the August edition of the style bible VOGUE.

Our recipe has been slightly refined to include more rum soaked friut for slightly firmer cake.

Dee

FOODIES FESTIVAL HAMPTON COURT PALACE MAY 5-7 2012

Join us on during the Mayday Bank Holiday weekend at the first major food festival in the South East for 2012. The Foodies Festival is always a delightful venue for all the family. I visited with a friend last year and have fond memories of sipping Bellini's at the Harvey Nichols marquee and eating some fabulous food from a variety of stalls before heading home with a bag of cheeses and cakes.

Dee's Luxury Jamaican Rum Cakes will be there all weekend supplying you with slices of delicious rum cakes , gift boxed mini rum cakes , standard 6 inch gift boxed rum cakes, 4 inch rum cakes and the exclusive Jamaican Rum Cup Cakes.

We are praying for good weather.

The first 5 people to email their name and address to our email before 25 April 2012 will each receive a free all weekend ticket which admits 2 (worth £50) Accompanied children under 16 go free ( visit http://www.foodiesfestival.com/ for additional information about the festival.

I am looking forward to seeing the cookery demonstration from Levi Roots at midday on 5 May 2012.

Gearing up for Taste of Christmas

The last few days have been manic.  We're preparing for our first exhibition at the Taste of Christmas, at Excel, London and there's so much to do!  There's been a constant buzz of deliveries, despatches and phone calls, as we try to get organised.  It's been exhausting, but also exhilarating as we set in motion months of planning and creative energy.   The final touches are coming together nicely.  We can't wait to start meeting our customers, so that they can enjoy what is a truly gourmet product; roll on Friday December 2nd...

Dee's origins

• Only high quality ingredients are used, such as pure unsalted butter. 
• No butter substitutes with transfats come through our door. 
• All the eggs used are free range 
• We are currently working at  sourcing locally produced free range eggs. 
• Wherever possible, we like to keep our food airmiles down by using locally produced ingredients. This is especially important to us in terms of eggs, chicken and meat. 
• The cakes are sweetened with dark muscovado and demerara sugar.
• We are  also in the process of  developing a gluten free version of the Dee's Rum Cake.

The cakes are basted after baking with rum and a little kirsch. My mother always used kirsch on her rum cakes. She told us stories of her first part time job when she arrived in England, which was as the assistant to a German gourmet chef, Mrs Kerscher. This probably explained why we have great childhood memories of my mother producing a wide variety of baked goodies on her days off and for our birthday parties.

She always used white rum on her cakes and would keep dried fruit soaked in fortified wine all year round, in a sealed jar ready for making cakes at any time.

I was also fortunate to have a childminder before I started infant school called Mrs Blackwood, who was a professional baker. She had a massive Kenwood Chef with all the attachments and would bake cakes on the days that I was at her home. I was inspired by her calm attitude to baking.

Our Busy Christmas Calendar

• We were proud to be a part of the Taste of Christmas Festival at the Excel in London on 2, 3 and 4 December 2011. This is the premier exhibition for foodies.It was great to take part.

• Dee's LJRC were honoured to be supporting the 2011 Afridiziak Gift and Occasions Christmas Shopping Boutique on Saturday 3 December 2011 at the Bussey Building CLF Art Cafe, Rye Lane SE15.(http://www.clfartcafe.org/) The £3 entry included a donation to the African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust. The first 50 guests received a free mini Dee's Rum cake slice, or rum cup cake. Children go free.(www.afridiziak.com/xmas2011) 

• We will also be exhibiting at the Duckie Christmas Market at the Barbican in London on 11, 20, 21 and 22 December (http://www.duckie.co.uk/). 
• Dee's will be at the Pop up Christmas Fair at the Living Bar , Coldharbour Lane in Brixton on Saturday 17 December 2011 . 11am to 6pm where you can pick up your christmas cakes or simply buy slices. 

Please keep watching this blog for more places to find us this Christmas.  There is definitely demand for our delicious rum cakes.

Nice of you to drop by...

Welcome to the Dee's Luxury Jamaican Rum Cake blog.


We are the producers of hand crafted luxury rum cakes infused with authentic Jamaican white rum.
I personally bake all of the cakes that we produce. I have been baking since my teenage years. The recipe for the rum cake is an edited version of the recipe that my mother used. My sister and I were both born in London of Jamaican Parentage. We are very proud of our Jamaican heritage, particularly the culinary aspect.


By trade I am a family barrister and my sister is a journalist with a food trade magazine and teacher at a fashion college. We are also both discerning foodies and have munched our way around the world over the past few decades.


At the end of last year we identified the fact that the traditional rum cakes that we consume at times of celebration were difficult to find. I have been making them to order for family and friends for years. At Christmas close friends would leave my home clutching boxes or tins full of the aromatic, rum cakes. I would bake for weddings, birthdays and even funeral wakes. Dee's cakes actually taste of rum - you do not have to go searching for the rum flavour, they greet you with open arms!


We decided to share the cakes with others last Christmas and participated in the Afridiziak Gifts and Occasions Xmas Boutique at the Oval House Theatre in Kennington. The cakes were very well received and we had a fabulous time.


This Summer has been busy for Dee's LJRC. We had a successful stall at the Jamaica Basic School Foundation Party In The Park at Crystal Palace park. This was followed by a terrific day at the Thames Festival outside the Tate Modern, as part of the Crafty Fox Collective. The Crafty Fox crew, Sinead and Stefan were amazing to work with. We unveiled The Dee's Rum Cup Cake, which sold out after a few hours. The night ended with a spectacular firework display on the Thames.

Westbury Hotel, London Fashion Week

Next came our stand at London Fashion Week at the fashion shows held at the Westbury Hotel in Mayfair. We were a bit sceptical because we thought that serious fashionistas don't eat cake. We were proved wrong. They do in fact eat cake, but they eat it as a meal, rather than to polish off the end of a meal as I do. Boxed cakes were also popular for guests to take to "after parties".


Also look out for my posting of recipes that friends share with me and for my "memorable meals" posting in which I recall the delights of meals scoffed and savoured over the years.


Deborah