10/30/2009 0 Comments Teacher-Themed Birthday CakeThis cake is a sour cream chocolate cake covered in a milk chocolate caramel frosting. It is covered in a milk chocolate modeling chocolate/ fondant mix (which for the record, tastes better than fondant but is considerably more challenging to work with!). This is the amount of chopped chocolate (a mixture of milk and bittersweet) that went into the icing alone! 27 ounces in total just in the icing!! There was more chocolate in the cake and more again in the fondant so you would need a sweet tooth to eat a slice of this! Each side of the cake had a different teacher-related theme. The front of the cake had a fondant "black board", two fondant apples, a piece of looseleaf made with fondant and food safe markers and a gumpaste pencil. The left side of the cake featured a fondant coat rack with scarves, back packs, and sneakers. The right side of the cake had "artwork" that was supposed to resemble drawings that students would give to their teachers. The canvas is fondant and the paintings were done with food coloring gel. A fondant pencil laid on the cake board beneath this. The back side of the cake featured a chalk board with algebra equations that the internet states would be at a Grade 4 level (since the birthday girl is a teacher for Grade 4 students). Some gumpaste chalk was piled beneath the chalk board. On the top of the cake, I attempted to make the teacher herself out of gumpaste based on a photograph that I had. She is sitting on a carpet and has fondant books scattered around her. The cake board is covered in fondant that was made to look like a hardwood floor using an impression mat, a pizza cutter, piping tips and brown food coloring. The Happy Birthday lettering was added to the edge of the cake board. I had wanted it to be on the looseleaf but I just couldn't get letters small enough to fit and the looseleaf wouldn't have fit on the cake board if it were any larger! I'm very happy with how this one turned out!
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10/27/2009 0 Comments Vegas-themed Mini CakeThis is a recipe that I have been wanting to try for ages now! It is a chocolate cake soaked in a salted caramel and topped with Whipped Caramel Ganache Frosting and sprinkled with Fleur de Sel. Yum!... And I must say the recipe lived up to my expectations, and then some! The occasion is for a married couple to start celebrating with champagne and cake before heading to Vegas for a well-deserved vacation later in the evening. The cake was wrapped in a piped milk chocolate collar and topped with white chocolate dice and milk chocolate and white chocolate poker chips and placed on a cake board covered in solid white chocolate. It's a 4" cake and this recipe made tonnes of cake so there were many cupcakes from this batch as well which means that many more people will get to sample it! I hope this cake brings much good luck and the couple hit the jackpot in
Vegas! :-) 10/24/2009 0 Comments Little Mermaid Birthday CakeThis cake is a Vanilla-Walnut Buttermilk Cake filled with fresh chopped banana chunks and walnuts and iced and filled with a Chocolate Italian Meringue Buttercream. The whole cake is covered in vanilla fondant. The top tier was cut in half to give the shape of the cake. I really liked that Ariel sat in front of the top tier of the cake. Ariel, Sebastian, Flounder and all of the starfish, shells, etc were all handmade with gumpaste and fondant. The clamshell Ariel is sitting in was brushed with lustre dust. The birthday girl's name is Darya, which as I understand from her mother, means the sea which gives a nice added meaning to this birthday cake. The cake is viewable from 360 degrees as there are accessories along the back of the cake board as well. The "sand" was done using brown sugar. I really liked this finished cake and now I'm on to my next project... a big change in theme from this as it's a chocolate-y Vegas themed cake!
This Almond Raspberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake is one of my all-time favorite recipes and I haven't made it in some time now. I thought a coworker's birthday was as good a reason as any to make it again. The cake board was covered in a raspberry colored fondant that was rolled out on an impression mat with flowers and hearts on it. The lettering was done with fondant as were the flowers on the top. Simple but oh-so-yummy for a mid morning treat at work to celebrate a birthday!
10/19/2009 1 Comment Bridal Shower CupcakesThese cupcakes were done for a bridal shower and the turquoise color of the
buttercream was inspired by the color of the bridesmaids dresses and color palette for the upcoming wedding. Each cupcake was topped with two piped white chocolate hearts. The cupcakes were sour cream chocolate cake topped with a Tahitian vanilla bean Italian meringue buttercream. This buttercream is quickly becoming one of my favorites - it is a bit tricky to make but the results are oh-so-worth it! Yum! 10/13/2009 0 Comments Root Beer Float CakeThis cake was done for a friend's birthday and I've wanted to try making a
root beer cake for some time but had never found an appropriate occasion. The cake layers were root beer cake, it was filled with vanilla pastry cream and topped in a vanilla bean Italian meringue buttercream. The buttercream recipe was a new one for me and it was heavenly and I think will become my favorite buttercream to be made often in the future! The cake was wrapped in a Callebaut white chocolate collar, which was made using a chocolate transfer sheet to get the pattern. The cake was topped with roses and leaves made from modeling chocolate and pink gumpaste flowers. I took this cake to a restaurant off Robson Street on Friday night and in my opinion, it was a fairly "plain" cake. People were stopping on the sidewalk as I was walking from the car to the restaurant and it attracted much attention in the restaurant. The people at the next table actually asked our waiter to negotiate getting a piece of the cake and when they tried it, they loved it! Wow! And two of the waiters also tried it and it was a hit with them as well... Now if only my business cards had been ready before Friday, I might have been doing a few more cakes sometime soon! The new business cards should be ready for pick up this week though so at least I won't be caught unprepared again! 10/6/2009 0 Comments Mile High Devils' Food Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Buttercream and Piped Chocolate LatticesThese cupcakes were made for a potluck lunch and it's a recipe I've been wanting to try for quite some time now! Having tried a sample now, I think I should have made time to make them earlier! The devils food is light and moist and the brown sugar buttercream is absolutely heavenly! Yum!
10/4/2009 0 Comments Fairy-themed Birthday CakeThe cake was vanilla buttermilk cake iced in strawberry Italian meringue buttercream covered in a lightly strawberry-flavored fondant. The toadstools were made with gumpaste brushed in food coloring and dusted with lustre dust. The flowers, leaves and grass were all done with gumpaste as were the butterfly, banner, "6", and the fairy on the top of the cake. The colors appear brighter in the photo than they did on the actual cake - the
flowers and fairy's dress are a hot pink, not orange, as many people think from these photos! 10/2/2009 0 Comments Chocoholics' Wedding CakeThe roses and leaves for this cake were all made with modeling chocolate. I've never worked with modeling chocolate before so it took some practice before I got used to it but I was happy with how these turned out in the end. The cake was three tiers - all Ferrero Rocher cake (chocolate-hazelnut cake filled with chocolate-hazelnut filling and fresh toasted, chopped hazelnuts and covered in a chocolate-hazelnut ganache). Each tier of the cake was surrounded by Callebaut white chocolate panels which were made using chocolate transfer sheets to give the abstract design. ... A close up of the top tier of the cake covered in modeling chocolate roses and leaves. The top view of the cake... now that's a lot of chocolate! ... A close up of the side of the second tier.
I absolutely LOVE this cake - I wish a lifetime of happiness for the couple's whose wedding it was for and I hope they like the cake as much as I do! |
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