Valentines cake

For Valentines I was actually on a trip visiting my folks, sister and niece's and nephews up in the great northern tip of Idaho! It was 2 of my niece's birthday's, and my first time back up in Coeur d'Alene in 3 1/2 years! Anyway, it also happened to be Valentines, and while my hubby was back at home with the boys the girls and I were happy to spend it with so much family (both sets of MY grandparents were there too, it was my oldest niece's 8th birthday, which is a big deal for us)
Anyway, I got to make the cake for the family birthday party/Valentines party! I had seen this cake a while ago (martha stewart) and been wanting to try it! I used cream cheese frosting for a better flavor. I started with a thin crumb coat but because it's so runny and thin I kept the frosting refrigerated, and every few columns I had to put the cake back in the fridge too, so it wouldn't all puddle off. It would be much easier with butter cream, but luckily it's a nice and moist cake, so the fridge didn't dry it out too much.

Who you gonna call?

One of the boys in my son's 1st grade class had a birthday party today.  I was lucky enough to get to make his birthday cake!  He requested the Ghost Busters logo.

I stayed up WAY to late working on this one, but it was SOO much fun to make.  First stacked the cakes, then I started carving away, a little at a time.  Piecing together the three different fondant colors was tricky.  Especially since I didn't realize until 2 am that I was almost completely out of white fondant!  I barely had enough to cover the ghost!  But it all worked out.  And I hand painted the lines and details on the cake.  I am really pleased with how this one turned out.  The had hanging out the side reaching forward. I wish I had a better side and top shot.  But when I was taking these pictures at 6 am I wasn't thinking too clearly!  

Lego Cake

So I made a few square cakes and cut these shapes out of it.  I measured them out so they should look the same as the Lego's they are supposed to represent.  But a bit taller, since taller cakes look better.  I prefer covering my cakes with ganache if I'm going to cover them in fondant, since once it dries I can get it so smooth and don't have to worry about it squeezing out the bottom when I put the fondant on.  It doesn't leave much icing, but my chocolate cake is super moist so I think it's okay.  Maybe next time I'll let it dry and do a second ganache layer to try to get it thicker.  Or maybe even try doing a thin buttercream layer before the ganache layer...  But I like the crisp edges with the ganache versus the soft pillowy effect when there is buttercream squished out all over the place. 

Anyway, then I covered it with Fondant.  See how sharp the corners and edges are?  You can't get that with buttercream.  Lovely.  It looks a bit cloudy because of the powdered sugar/cornstarch mixture I use when smoothing the sides.  It won't be there soon.  I wanted to do a blue one too, but couldn't find it this time.  I love the green though.  It's my first time working with it. 

Also for this cake one of the boys attending is allergic to eggs, so I made my first egg-less cake.  After reading about different options online I found this post and decided to try it(using my normal recipe, with the tofu as a substituted for eggs).  Using 1/4 C tofu in place of each egg.  It worked great!  The taste wasn't exactally the same, and certianly not a permanent change but it was surprisinly good, still better than anything in a box!  And the guest with the allergies loved that he was actually able to partake of the party goodies!

And the final cake.  I decided not to put the Lego logo on the top of every dot because it's just so cute this way I didn't want to risk messing it up with my horrid handwriting skills.  I used the same steaming technique I used on this cake to get the shiny look.  I loved it, and luckily so did my son and his friends.  So there you have it, a Lego cake, the only question now is if my other son want's a Lego party too what will I do for his cake???

Lego Birthday party treats

It's my son's birthday party tomorrow and the theme is Lego's.  So for some of the treats I made this cool Lego Mold out of food grade silicone.  I talk about how here on my Craft blog (along with lots of other stuff from the party).  Anyway I made three different candies using the mold.  This one was the least successful, the candy melts.  They broke and cracked when I tried to take them out.  I think if maybe I un-molded them sooner...  I'm not a fan of candy melts, don't like the flavor, so I don't work with them enough to know how to fix the problem.  Anyway, you can see the base plate in the back of the picture, I cover the mold with that to give the bottom of the candies the Lego indent so they are stack-able. 

I only made one batch because they didn't come out well, but they were the biggest hit among the kids so I should have made more anyway!  Maybe a different brand of melts would work better.  I'm not really a fan of Wilton melts, fondant or gumpaste. 

These were the most fun.  Gummies!  I wish the flavor was stronger, but they stack great, don't stick together, and are easy to make.  I used this recipe, but next time I think I'll try using more jello and maybe throw in some citric acid for punch.

Gummies
1 3oz pkg Jell-O any flavor
6 packages unflavored gelatin
3/4 C water
Mix in a sauce pan and heat over medium until the gelatin is dissolved.  Then pour into the mold.  Place it in the freezer for 15 mins then pull out and unmold!

And finally I wanted to make suckers, but the molds were so small that the sticks wouldn't stay in them.  But they were a huge hit.  I just left them as hard candies instead.  Because of the heat of the sugar I couldn't put the base plate on, so they aren't stack-able, and it cooled so fast it was hard to smooth out across the molds, or get the air bubbles out.  So they looked the worst, but they tasted great, and that's really all little boys care about anyway!

Suckers
1 C sugar
1/2 C water
1/3 C corn syrup
1/4 tsp candy flavoring
candy food coloring
Combine sugar, water and corn syrup. Cook to hard crack (300°F.). Check your thermometer first to see if it is accurate with water boiling, as this burns easily after 300°F.
Remove from heat. Add flavoring and food coloring. Stir and pour into greased sucker molds arranged on a greased cookie sheet or a marble slab.

After I un-molded them I sprayed them down with some Pam so they wouldn't stick together.  Everyone loved these too.  They were a huge hit at the party and I think my other son want's a Lego party too so I'll get to use all of this again. 

M-i-c-k-e-y M-o-u-s-e

A good friend of mine asked me to make a birthday cake for her mother.  When talking about what she liked it came out that she LOVES Mickey Mouse.  And that she really loves the hat's you can get when you are there.  SO we came up with this design.  Now I don't like to write on cake's.  It makes me nervous, that and while I can make a great cake, I tend to shake when it comes to the precise details (thanks MOM- I got it from her!), which makes writing NICELY difficult!  BUT I think it turned out great.  The ears were really fun to do.  AND I discovered a GREAT lemon cake recipe while trying out new recipes for this cake.  I'm still not happy with my Strawberry cake recipe though, so anyone that has one they love let me know!

13th birthday

This weekend was the birthday party for last week's birthday girl. It was fun to do. I got to try out a few new techniques! It was great! Although I'm still having troubles with some of my recipes here in the high altitude of UT. My white cake fell, both of them. So I used the bottom half of both cakes to get the right height. I was able to use parchment paper to get more height out of my pan, and I think the layers look better carved out of a 4 inch tall cake instead of a 3 inch tall cake.

Also after the cake was done I used my steamer to make the fondant get all shiny! What do you think? It won't look right with every style of cake, but it worked really well for this cake! I have to say I LOVE this cake. Anyway, Happy Birthday Emily, I hope your sleepover is a blast!

Vampire Cupcakes

My niece turned 13 yesterday.  The nice thing about moving here is that almost all of my husbands family live here.  I love making cakes for family and friends, so I hope that by living here I get to make more for family events!  Back to my niece...  one of her favorite books series is The Vampires Assistant.  So when she found out that the movie was coming out ON her birthday she decided to go to the Saturday matinee with her friends.  My contribution were these Vampire inspired cupcakes!  I haven't read the books myself so I wasn't sure what other characters/themes or direction to go.  So we stuck with simple.    I used my Mixed Berry Coulis for the "blood", it was the perfect texture, although getting it to "drip" right was difficult!  But in the end I enjoyed it.  To make the "teeth" holes without pulling the frosting off I dipped a pointed dowel in cornstarch before poking the holes.  It worked great!

8th birthday cake

One of the fun things about being here in UT again is that I get to see and visit lots of family and friends. Today was my college roommate's oldest daughters 8th birthday! It was fun to not only get to see her and her kids again (our kids are each just months apart!) but I got to make the cake! The design was all from the mind of this sweet little 8 year old, and she knew just what she wanted, mint cake for one layer and chocolate chip for the other.

For carving a Wonky cake it's best to have a nice dense cake, so I picked a peppermint pound cake, with mint ganache to hold it together. The pound cake was surprisingly good, but the mint ganache was a bit too much. The Chocolate chip cake gave me a major headache. I haven't been happy with my normal chocolate chip recipe, just too dry, so I decided to search around for something better. I found a great recipe, but after taking out the first batch it fell and was raw in the middle. But the taste was just great! So I made the same one again, cooking it longer, and it completely imploded in the oven! So I finally switched recipes, and actually forgot to try it. So I hope it was okay, the kids seemed to like it. And it was very similar to the first recipe, but I think a bit dry. I'll have to try a batch just for myself to see if it's truly a keeper or if the search goes on!

8th Birthday

It was my oldest 8th birthday today! She wanted a pool party, and the plates all had hibiscus flowers on them. So this is what we came up with. A strawberry cake, with strawberry icing (and strawberry ice cream). Covered in White fondant with Pink airbrushed on the sides and a flower airbrushed into the top. I would have liked to have done more with the cake, carved it into a hibiscus shape and make it look like a giant flower, but my youngest was up all night throwing up and ruined my early morning plans. Still, the birthday girl was happy and the cake was gone in one day. Yeah!

Sweet 16...

This one was another last min request from someone at church! They've been keeping me busy lately! This cake is a simple design, and should have been really easy, but it was one of THOSE cakes. Everything that could go wrong did, everything that should go right didn't. I had to take it apart and re-fill and frost over 4 times! It was a nightmare from start to finish! And forget about the fondant. It's too humid here for the bow to stay dry and hold its shape for very long, but then the fondant on the cake kept drying out and cracking? How does that work, it was a nightmare. But luckily I was able to pull it all together, albeit much later and longer than I'd planned, and the birthday girl, and her mother, were happy....

Pink Soccer Ball!

On Sunday after church a got a request for a birthday cake today! Not much notice, but I was free and it was easy so I said yes. Her daughter loves pink and soccer and this is how it turned out. I had some trouble with the fondant around the bottom, it just wouldn't press back into itself very well today. I think this fondant wasn't as fresh as my last batch. Although it kneaded together fine. I did use my new pearl airbrush paint, but you can't tell very well in this shot. Just before going to deliver it I thought it needed something and I added the buttercream grass. Presto, it went from nice, to totally cute. I was so glad I thought of it. I'm still not remembering or thinking of these kinds of things these days (concussion) so I am grateful!

Dinosaur egg

My son just turned 6, and he picked a dinosaur party! Since my son doesn't even like cake I wanted to keep it simple! And so he picked a dinosaur egg. He wanted purple with dots. This is what we came up with.
I used purple, blue and burgundy, and mixed it with the fondant. I actually used normal fondant (trying to use up my supply before we move overseas) instead of the marshmallow fondant I've been using. I forgot how much easier it is to work with, although really gross... My baby LOVED it though, she kept eating it. Then I got to use my new pearl airbrush paint. It looked amazing, then I had to add the dots, in gold. I don't care for the dots, but that's what he wanted so... I also splattered gold and silver on the egg. The splatters looked good, I should have just done them, and told him they were spots. In the end it looked good and tasted great and the birthday boy was happy. That's all that matters, huh?

To all the January birthday's out there...

Once a month the women in our church get together for a dessert night! This year they decided to also celebrate all the months birthdays during the evening so I offered to make a birthday cake. Of course something I've noticed at these things, women seemed scared to eat treats! I don't get it. Of course I live off a diet of chocolate with a side of chocolate and wash it down with hot chocolate! So very little of the cake was actually eaten! I brought plenty home for my sweet (and slightly chubby) husband.
You can't see very well, but I used my new pearl airbrush paint for the letters and small flowers. We have terrible lights at our new place and I can't seem to get a good picture of anything these days! I only had a few hours, so it was a quicky. It's not the most detailed, extraordinary or amazing cake ever, but I figured it's been so slow these days here on the blog I'd post it anyway.

Pirate cake

So I've done a few cakes lately, but nothing really out of the ordinary until now, my 3 year old's birthday cake. It was SO much fun to do, there was so much detail that went into the cake, I had a blast making it. I actually started the extra stuff 5 days before. The ladder, sides, ropes, barrel, wheel and cannon balls... I also made poles, a flag, sails and a crows nest out of fondant, but here in the Humid south they never dried all the way (too thick) and broke when I tried to use them.

You can't really see very well, but there is wooden plank detail work on the ship and the cake base (you can click on the picture for a larger image). And I also wrote D.A. on the side of the cake (it stands for Destroying Angel, a nickname) and wrote "Cap'n ____" on the water. And I added 3 black candles sticking out of the side for cannon's and that is what he blew out. I experimented and created chocolate marshmallow fondant for the ship. It worked out well, and tasted nice too! It was a huge hit, everyone loved it and I was pleased!

Itty Bitty Birthday

A friend of mine turned 27 today. She's been going through some interesting challenges lately and her husband really wanted to make her birthday special, and was trying to plan some fun stuff she'd really like. Since she'd mentioned she liked my cakes he called and asked me to do something small in fondant for their family (this little cake feeds 12-14). After talking over ideas he decided to use their wedding flowers/colors. Bright Yellow, Orange and Pink Gerber Daisies. And he really liked the idea of a crazy silly wonky cake. It was a white coconut cake with cream cheese frosting (although not much, it was so warm today- and my air conditioner is broken, that it all squeezed right out the bottom...) and almond marshmallow frosting. It was a new recipe, and I was really pleased with it. A nice texture, firm, holds the shape well. A subtle flavor, the coconut is great, but not too strong or over powering. Something to make again.

Dragonology...

So one of my friend here asked me if I could do a dragon cookie cake. Her daughter had recently gotten a "dragonolgy" book and was determined to have a dragon themed birthday! And adamant about having a cookie cake. So I said sure... She brought over the book and showed me the picture of a baby dragon coming out of an egg that her daughter wanted, but in Orange. So here it is... I decided to use royal icing and the color flow method to get the smooth details that would be missed if I used the basic buttercream star tip method of cake decorating. I was pleased with how it turned out, and liked the effect that painting the dragon with a luster dust/alcohol "paint" created on the royal icing. A shiny textured, grainy feel...

1st Birthday Cake

This was for my babies first birthday! I can't believe she's one already, and for her birthday the theme was dark pink, light pink and green flowers. I found a scrapbooking set I liked, then plates and went with that. Here is the place setting (with the favors around it, edible playdough with cookie cutters, homemade coloring book featuring the birthday girl and crayons, and bubbles.)

When your guests are adults and one year old's there isn't much to do other than eat cake! And that's what we did. The birthday girl got the top, and the rest of us shared the bottom layers. Here is a shot of the layers before I assembled them, you can see how they are shaped a bit better in this photo. This is the first time I covered the cake board with fondant. It was a nice touch and I plan on doing it again.

Beehive cake

Tonight we celebrated a birthday party for the Women's Organization in our church. It's one of the oldest and largest women's organization in the world. It's over 165 years old! Anyway, a month or so ago they called and asked me to make a themed "birthday" cake as the main dessert. Of course in the end we had WAY too much food and desserts, we always do. So there is a lot of cake left over. But it was really fun to make it and I got a new pan out of it. You can't see it very well, but I marbelized the fondant and it created a really cool effect. I wish it came across better. Oh well. I need a better camera and flash, maybe a few lenses, Oh, and photography classes...

I got the wondermold pan (those barbie cake with the doll sticking out the top and the cake being the skirt) and put it on top of an 8 inch by 3 inch round pan to give it the height and sides. I covered it with my new marshmallow fondant and added these fondant bee's. When I got there to set up I noticed a few bee's were missing... My children... Luckily I made plenty. The cake was a hit, and it tasted great too. Chocolate, chocolate and chocolate! MMMMMmmmmm. I changed my chocolate buttercream recipe a bit, I've just discovered Dutch cocoa (thanks Malina) and it is just INCREDIBLE!!!! Anyway, I have 3 more cakes on the book this month. So look for a weekly post!

Horton Hears a Who...

So today I made 2 dozen cookies for a Horton hears a Who birthday party! These are supposed to be the puffy flower that the speck (see the speck!) lands on. But if I have to tell you that then I guess I didn't accomplish it.. ANYWAY, It was tons of fun planning and decorating the cookies.

And THEN I got to wrap them, make a presentation out of it... I love that part! Can you see the candles in the Number 7 Cookie? I didn't get a good shot of the final cookie sandwich with the 7 candles in it. Then I put the ribbons on it with my new stickers and my new Business cards!

My month "off"

Okay, it's been almost a full months since I last posted. It's not that I haven't been baking, trust me I've been baking, just none of it has been different or post worthy. My husband and son share a birthday, but they both don't like cake! So we did Ice cream sundae's, not really all that great for posting. I did make all the ice cream and toppings from scratch... But you get the idea. I am getting ready to make the monthly Chocolate Therapy challenge, tomorrow. So look for that. And I'm doing another wedding cake in a few weeks. So never fear, I'll be back and posting now. My family blog has gotten most of the attention the last few weeks, with double birthday's and family visiting. Life is now back to normal and now so should this blog.