Greysquale

I.e. a swatch round-up of all my Suqqu grey shades, very belated considering that my introduction to the brand (now one of my makeup staples) was and remains my favourite grey eyeshadow palette: Blend Eyeshadow Quad in 09 Koju, released for the Spring 2009 Sakurakage collection and discontinued c. 2010.

picture taken with flash to capture some of the nuances

I've swatched the top right (warm light grey satin) and bottom left (warm sooty matte base with very sparse tonal microshimmer) shades from Koju today, along with *ahem* several of the other Suqqu grey shadows I seem to have acquired since then....


Which now live cosily in a large Z-palette (no-fire depotting process here). Core quads 01-05 and 06-08 run across the top half, and along the bottom are EX-05 Usumomokurumi quad (limited edition Christmas 2011), EX-02 Mizumomo blush duo (LE autumn 2012), the darker side of 01 Momozoe blush duo, and EX-22 Nibidama (a long-discontinued relic from before 2010 when Suqqu used to make single eyeshadows and blushes).
Numbered shades are swatched.

natural light, one swipe with sponge applicators

1. neutral sage grey from 02 Kokedama

2. silver from 04 Keshizumi

3. taupe from 04 Keshizumi [looks much warmer in contrast to the others here]

4. cool grey from 06 Ginbudou

5. EX-22 Nibidama, a cooler silver-mauve taupe

6. iridescent gunmetal from EX-05 Usumomokurumi

7. light grey from 09 Koju

8. charcoal from 09 Koju

with flash, to pick up more textural nuance

fuzzy flash

Sunday Sundries: Signe Johansen's Tropisk Aroma

Key elements of the best chocolate cake ever: the most fragrant cinnamon you can lay your hands on [mine is from The Spice House, a gift from a beautiful friend], nutmeg, vanilla extract, good cocoa powder and espresso powder [if you substitute coffee, go for the strongest you can find and I'd up the quantities even so].

You can find the recipe on Signe Johansen's blog, though I made it from her beautiful book, Scandilicious (see also amazeballs cinnamon buns of yore). My lazy / random idiosyncratic tweaks:
No marbling. Because marbling, srsly? Aint nobody got time etc. And just think of the extra washing up.
Instead, I threw 5 tablespoons of cocoa powder into the whole mix and took out a little of the flour. This creates a seriously tempting (bowl-cleaning-not-a-chore) caramel-tinged batter, with darker flecks of cinnamon and espresso visible throughout:

Baked. Yes, I did tap my tin before shoving it in the oven, but a few air bubbles on the shiny shiny surface are somewhat inevitable because this cake is a miraculous balancing act: simultaneously light and moist.

SJ hid her bubbles in icing; as a home baker who actively prefers her cakes on the fug side, I converted the icing (buttercream infused with the same key flavours of chocolate, coffee and spice) into a filling instead -- far less messy and as a bonus enabling cunning disguise of the fact that you're eating twice the amount of cake per slice....