Recipe book is icing on the cake as Lancaster cupcake firm ends

A popular baker is bidding farewell to the popular Yummy Cupcake Company, after 10 years of baking sweet treats for the people of Lancaster and the surrounding areas.

But fans of the brand have the chance to keep a memento of the well-known business, as owner Jen Cavanagh has released a book filled with mouth-watering recipes for her cupcakes and traybakes.

Jen sees the book as a final farewell to her loyal customers, who have often asked about the secrets to her scrumptious sweet treats.

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She said: “The last 10 years have been amazing, I’ve met so many lovely people and fellow small businesses through the Yummy Cupcake Company.

“I’m feeling a little sad of course, as it’s the end of an era, but it’s also the start of a whole new adventure and I’m excited about the future – even if I’m not sure what it holds yet!”

Jen started the Yummy Cupcake Company after returning from a stint living in New York – where cupcakes were hugely popular and brands such as Magnolia Bakery had garnered a worldwide following.

Adjusting to life back home, Jen juggled job interviews with experimenting in the kitchen, before signing up for her first market stall where she had her first taste of success when it completely sold out. As word began to spread, Jen set up a shop in the city centre in 2008, while also supplying local shops and cafés. Demand then continued to increase, and Jen moved to a bigger kitchen unit, before making the difficult decision this year to hang up her apron for the last time – but not before giving her customers a parting gift.

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Jen said: “I didn’t have any formal training, and the recipes had always been either in my head or scribbled down on scraps of paper, but friends and family were always asking me for recipes so that gave me the initial idea for the book.”

The Book, A Decade of Cake, is now available to order on the Yummy Cupcake Company’s Facebook page.

It was funded through a Kickstarter campaign and fate took an interesting twist when she found out she had reached her target of £3,000 on the day she went into labour and gave birth to her little boy, Sam.

Jen said: “I wasn’t sure about the level of interest for the book at first. I decided on an initial print run and put together a plan for the recipes and photography, then I launched the Kickstarter campaign. There were options for people to pre-order, buy a bakery workshop experience or they could have recipes dedicated to them.

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“It was quite a nerve-wracking thing to do as I was self-publishing, but we hit our target within a month and it was a lovely coincidence as Sam was born just a day later!”

“We’ve already had orders to ship the book to the USA, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece and France and Abu Dhabi, which is amazing!

“Not knowing what’s around the corner is really quite exciting, and I’m so glad to have been able to release the book – it’s the icing on the cake of a fantastic 10 years.”