My baking estimation challenge with Smart Energy GB

Sometimes my job throws at me the best of events. As soon as this one from Smart Energy GB popped into my email I was excited.

A bake off challenge with a difference was the brief I was given. Was I interested in taking part…absolutely☺

We met at a cooking school in trendy Hoxton. I walked into a room for coffee and biscuits to meet lots of bloggers. A few of us had been tweeting each other on the way there, so I immediately saw some friendly faces like @mymummyspam and @diaryofthedad. Everyone was very friendly and I did the rounds to see who everyone was, which blogs they ran and what they wrote about. A lot of food bloggers, beauty, mummy, daddy, lifestyle. I was the only personal finance blogger there. Hurrah☺

Great British Bake off

I also made a beeline for Ian Cumming, actual runner up from Great British Bake Off last year. We had a great chat about his world after GBBO…what has been good, what has been not so good. He is a lovely man, just a normal person who is very good at baking and photography (his proper job). My advice was to ride the wave for as long as possible!

The Baking Begins

We were ushered to the kitchen for a very serious health and safety briefing and a bit of guidance on the task. We were to make cup cakes…but ingredients included vegetable oil, baking powder and bicarb…all we had were the ingredients with no measurements. This was the aim of the day, estimate the ingredients #estimationchallenge. Luckily I was paired up with the wonderful Paris from Workingmumblog.  Who helpfully knew how to cook😉. We went for it…had a tiny bit of help from Ian and the cookery school people (more oil!) and made the cakes. We had to guess the oven temperature and time. I think we did amazingly. The cakes tasted and looked great, we were sure we would be the winners.

Smart Energy GB

In the break I spent some time with Robbie from Smart Energy GB and had a demo of the new smart meters coming your way very soon. All 60 million households in UK will have one by 2020. This means no more estimated billing. Hooray I shout. I cannot stand estimated gas/electricity bills, I have had tons of issues with over payment, under payment resulting in a big complaint and a chunk of compensation back in 2013.

Smart meters mean you will see on real time basis how much energy you are using, when you leave the house the monitor will flag up red if too many devices are left on. I cannot wait to get one, the money saving possibilities are endless. I expect to drastically reduce my energy bill.

So back up to the kitchen and the next task was scones, but with pasta flour and herbs and cayenne pepper. I can make scones…but maybe not these ones with no measurements. They tasted okay, maybe a bit doughy. We could see that other people’s efforts looked better.

Baking done, who were the winners?

Baking was all done for the day and we retired to reception for some yummy canapés and wine. The styling in the room was beautiful. Stunning flowers to match the purple from the brand colours. We had the competition announcement. Paris and I were sure we’d won…um no. We didn’t.  Oh well. I am not at all competitive…

We left with all the purples baking goodies from the day and a gorgeous pair of weighing scales to ensure when we next bake we can measure with accuracy. We also left with the recipe cards for the cakes and scones. I will be making the cupcakes as they tasted like heaven. A brilliant day where I had such fun and got to meet some amazing people. And bring it on smart meters to help EVERYONE save money.

And yeah there is a brilliant YouTube clip sharing the fun of the day, check out my entrance at the beginning of the video….LOL. Youtube Video of #Estimationnation

I was not paid for this post, but it’s important to know I did receive baking goodies as freebies!