Luncheon

I was asked by the ward I live in to make two cakes for a luncheon with the stake.  (ever ward donated 2 cakes each).  They were used as the center pieces for the luncheon and then eaten at the end.  While the cakes didn't need to be fancy I figured any time I get to make a cake with no set design I might as well try something I haven't done before.  For the first cake I went with this swirl design.  It seemed simple enough in theory.  But it's just so DRY here in UT.  I had to try it 4 times before I got the swirls to actually stay stuck to the fondant wrap.  I think next time I'll use a humidifier in the room with me and see if that goes better. 

For the second one I wanted to try this fondant ruffle cake I'd seen.  Of course when I went to go find a picture of the cake I was thinking of I couldn't find it anywhere.  I guess I need to figure out some new search words, and save pictures I like better for inspiration.  I'm not pleased in how this one turned out. 

It was missing something, a big flower topper or something, so I decided to try my new stencil with royal icing technique again.  I used a different stencil this time.  I LOVED the way this turned out, and wished I had just done this around the whole cake instead.  Oh well.  I think I figured out how to make the ruffles work better next time.  I need a larger ball tool, and larger foam pad.  I still think it could be really pretty, so I'll try it again sometime.

In the end of course they were way fancier than they needed to be.  But I got rave review for how they tasted, and in the end that's really the most important part.  What's the point of a nice looking cake if it's not completely delicious?  I decorate for myself, I enjoy it and find it fun.  So while I'm glad people like the cakes I decorate, I'm more pleased when they like how it tastes.   I used my Favorite chocolate cake and my pistacho Mousse recipe for filling.  With Ganache frosting.  My favorite combination!

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!  

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!

Cupcake class

For a Church activity this week for the women I was asked to demonstrate and teach different way's to frost cupcakes. I pre-made 40 cupcakes and decorated each of them a bit differently showing different options you could have.

The only one I ran out of time for (and wouldn't have had time to teach anyway) was dipping the cupcake in poured fondant. But overall I was pleased. Then during the class I showed them how to used 4 different tips, 2 ways each, to create different looks, like this closed star tip:

Versus this one made with the same tip! I was trying to teach easy things to recreate, so I didn't teach making a rose, but this rosette is an easy to make great looking alternative! It was my husbands favorite.

I also showed them how to cover a cake with frosting and fondant. And I got to use my new toys, my impression mats! I made all of these in one night, and while I'm happy with most of them, there are some that I would have redone if I hadn't just been demonstrating and teaching. Doing 40 different cupcakes in 40 different ways was very time consuming!

Luckily I had a bunch of my extra royal icing flowers left that I was able to use! They really add a nice touch to cakes and cupcakes sometimes! I was just relieved not to also have to make 40 different toppers for the cupcakes! If I had more time to teach there are some other things I would have liked to demonstrate, like creating your own fondant topper, but keeping things simple and down to 45 mins with a Q&A was hard. I was really pleased with how well the class went. I was surprised how nervous I was, but it went well.

Mario birthday Cakes and cupcakes

My son got invited to a classmate's birthday party, and I was asked to make a cake and cupcakes for the party! After looking at some inspiration online I found a few cute patterns to base my cake on and I was ready to bake. I have a few great recipes that I've collected and perfected over the last few years. But the birthday boy wanted a yellow cake! I've never been asked for yellow cake so I soured the Internet and my favorite sites looking for some well rated and reviewed recipes. I tried 4 different recipes and they all fell flat! It was terrible! I'm not sure if it's the altitude, or what but it was a nightmare. Luckily the last try didn't fall too badly and it was usable. I carved the face, and was really pleased with how great it turned out!

I don't normally do cupcakes, and while they are very time consuming, it was a fun change. But I'm glad I got to do a cake too. Cakes are just SO much fun to do and it really MADE the cupcakes. I enjoyed it! And it was great to get back into cake making. Things have been really slow since the move, so if your in UT give me a call! I really miss it!

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!

Finally another cake!

This "cake" blog hasn't had a lot of cakes in the last little bit. But I hope you guys don't mind that I've included some of the other foods I've enjoyed making. But back to real reason we're here: CAKES!

This one was a job, which I've been turning down lately because my husband had been living in another town because of work. But he recently got let go (sad) so he's living with us again (happy!). So I was able to take this job when it came along.
A law firm actually hired me to make a cake for a retirement party for a local county judge. They were VERY specific in some of the instructions they had. A large sheet cake with a Ford Explorer on it and Firestone tires. But they didn't care about color, or what I made it out of etc... It seemed the tire was the important part, so I suggested a cute carved, fondant covered tire cake, but nope... Sheet cake. Ugh, I don't even have a sheet cake pan. Oh well!
So I found this image and decided to go for it.
I decided to use fondant and layer it to create a slightly 3D look to this 2D image. The first layer was black, and I airbrushed pearl where the windows would be. Then the red layer (a real pain, I had to do it 3 times before it worked. Also the wheels. Finally the bumpers, grill, lights, handles, explorer plate, etc... And last the Ford logo! I used gold and silver and pearl airbrushing to try to make it more realistic.

It took WAY too long, but in the end I was really happy with it. I ended up using a few doll hairs to make my own tiny paint brush to paint the Firestone wording onto the tires. Also the tiny explorer plate turned out GREAT! The only part I wasn't super happy with was the Ford nameplate. In the end the perfectionist in me was pleased enough. With any cake there is always something I wish I could change, and that is certainly true of this cake. But it actually turned out much better than I originally thought it could/would! So yeah! Happy happy!