Hawaii Bridal Shower Cake

A Hawaiian themed cake for a bridal shower. The lucky couple was honeymooning n Hawaii, hence the luau laid back theme. This was a very simple cake however the bride loved the details added especially the heart with the couples initials on it.

Daring Bakers Challeng #1

The September 2009 Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon. She chose the French treat, Vols-au-Vent based on the Puff Pastry recipe by Michel Richard from the cookbook Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan.

Today I had my first attempt at a wonderful pastry. Vols-au-Vent is a puff pastry very similar to a croissant or danish. I think the difference here is that the Vols-au-vent does not use any yeast. I could be wrong since the only croissants I have dished out from my oven are the ones that come in metal cylinders :)

This was absolutely delicious and heavenly. I don't think I can buy the frozen stuff again from the supermarket after tasting this. There is no turning back at this point. Due to the versatility of the "Puff" I also incorporated a savory dish because I'm not all about sweets all the time.

My first puff was a classic lightly sweetened fresh whipped cream with strawberry's. I added some powdered sugar over the puff to give sweetness to it. The puff alone is not sweet.


For my savory Vols-au-vent I have a braised lamb roast sliced thinly with a Moroccan inspired sauce consisting of dried apricots and prunes that were slow cooked with the lamb.

Baby Showers

This cake was many celebrations and memories combined into one. Everything in this cake is edible. I was surprised that I did not have to support the crib with skewers. I made some modeling paste to use for the crib. My turnaround time was tight for this cake but the modeling paste dried fast so I could start assembling the crib pieces. Frogs and ladybugs were the theme for this cake. The cake is a moist yellow cake with a delicious merengue icing. I think the frog looking up at me is just to cute...I just want to say awww.

Mini Cooper Cake Old School

I had the opportunity recently to do a classic mini cooper cake for a customer. The cake is chocolaty chocolate goodness. The filling was an Italian Merengue, which I think is the most stable, best tasting buttercream ever. The model she gave me did not have the mini cooper emblem we are all familiar with. The emblem on the hood was more of a square of some sorts. I had to add the wings for some type of mini cooper recognition. To get the silver color all I did was color my vanilla fondant gray and paint over it with nu silver dust with lemon extract.

Oh Fishy

It has been a while since I posted some of my work. It's hard to find the time to post sometimes when you are busy with actual orders. My website has yet to be updated with my most recent photos and I'm still trying to find a way to make my gallery great without hiring some web designer person.
This order was great. It was for a 4 year old boy who requested a fish theme for his party. For the kids go the cupcakes and for the adults the cake. The cupcakes were Vanilla. Looking for a great vanilla cupcake recipe was just a massive endeavor. There are some recipes by some famous shops ie. Magnolia in NYC and Billy's Bakery that were kind enough to share there true and tested recipes. Most reviews were positive (Thanks to Martha Stewart's website), some not. I tried them both as well as a recipe from Confetti cakes also in NYC. Let me tell you not all vanilla cakes are created equal. Either the cupcakes are too dry as I noticed with the Confetti cakes recipe or way to buttery as I experienced with both the Magnolia and Billy's recipes. One thing that really turned me off as well was the egginess of some of the recipes. You could just smell the yolk, for me that is a turn off. Ultimately I think I liked Magnolias recipe the most. But as far as flavor they were definitely better the next day and did not loose there moistness. As for confetti cakes, it did not taste bad but it was much drier probably because it is made with egg whites as opposed to the whole egg. Ultimately what I decided to do for this order is make my own recipe sort of an adaptation of Billy's Bakery recipe and a Yellow cupcake recipe from Bakers illustrated. I think it turned out well and I want to try it again to perfect my idea of what a vanilla cupcake should be. Unfortunately due to all my baking and taste testing I'm sort of vanilla cupcaked out.
For the cake, I made a chocolate cake with actual chocolate chips baked in ( A mixture of dark and semisweet). This is great for chocoholics.
The fish were a concept that I came up with and ran with it. I thought they turned out adorable. I painted them very simply. I was tempted to use luser dust on them, but I had to control myself. (I always am tempted to use glitter on everything). Fish were made from modeling paste so the kiddies could eat them up.
Ultimately the customer was very happy not only with the design but also with the taste which makes it more worthwhile.

Next..a few days ago I made a classic mini cooper. I will post the one later:)

Happy Graduation

This book although daunting at first really turned out so beautiful due to the school colors and details requested by the client. Inside is a red velvet cake filled with Swiss merengue buttercream with a hint of cream cheese. The cream cheese was a bit difficult to work with so before I started laying the fondant on I had to make a batch of Italian merengue which is much more stable then Swiss. They both taste the same pretty much. The difference between them is with Italian merengue has a boiling sugar water mixture added to the egg whites vs. Swiss in which egg whites and sugar are heated over a water bath. Other then those differences merengue is the way to go for buttercreams due to its awesome light not to sweet taste.

The cake board was made with fondant pieces and painted to resemble a wooden floor. Making something look inedible at of something edible is so much fun. My cake carpentry was pretty good there.

All details are made of either fondant or gumpaste. The tulips were not as hard to make as I imagined. They were hand painted deep purple.
On one funny note, as I was ready to deliver the cake I noticed that the word "Congratulations" looked odd, but of course I spelled in "Congradulations". How dumb was that!! Well at least I caught it, I will need a proof reader for all my future orders I suppose.
The family was so gracious and I was so happy to provide them with the cake for there daughters great accomplishment.

Spiderman Cupcakes, Cupcakes in action

Happy Birthday!!

Can you tell where the cupcakes are, this arrangement is so neat but purely accidental. As I was taking my regular photos of this order I realized that the cupcakes fit perfectly on the images, very cool. I had a small order for two dozen Spiderman cupcakes. I had full "artistic freedom" which was really a challenge with spider man because I ended up spending a lot of time trying to decide what to do. The birthday boy just like every small boy between the ages of 2 and 10 loves spider man. I did not want to frighten the kids with spiders and webs. But I did underestimate the kids and they weren't at all frightened by the weird eyes popping out of the cupcakes. At the request of a friend I was talking to about designing this I did not make pink spidys for the girls attending the party..I guess that's best since we don't want to confuse the kids :)

The cupcakes were a variety of white and yellow cakes filled with Italian merengue buttercream (It tasted almost like vanilla ice cream to me). I think all fondant topped cupcakes should be filled with something. Although the cakes I make are moist, cupcakes need some sort of cream. Overall I was very please with this and most importantly the kids :)