Slideshow of my baked goods (2009-2011) - Part III

Crowns and Jewels....oh the lovely princess cake for my niece Grace. I have the cutest little niece ever. She loves everything to do with princesses and the colors pink. For her four year-old birthday party, her mother commissioned me to do a two tiered princess cake. Since I just made a wedding cake for class, I was excited to practice my new fondant/decorating skills on a new cake (and get paid for it too!). I thought this would be a piece of cake - no pun intended - ok...maybe it was intended:). But this cake ended up being a lot more work than I thought.

Most of the problems were involved with baking the cake. For whatever reason, my cake layers would come up uncooked, sunk in or cracked. It was a nightmare. But at the end of the day, I was able to pull it off.

I used fondant for most of the cake, including the flowers and crown which took a week to make. The thing with working with fondant decorations is that you must think ahead. Fondant decorations require drying time. It's like working with clay - it's soft and pliable at first but it will harden as it dries over time.

Here is the finished cake...TA DAH....

Slideshow of my baked goods (2009-2011) - Part II

There are three cakes featured in Part II:

1) Golf course cake for one of my sister's boyfriend's birthday

2) Wedding cake for one of my Wilton Cake Class projects

3) Bow tie cake for one of my Wilton Cake Class projects

1. Golf Cake Overview

This is where my love for fondant began....the golf cake was probably one of my first cakes outside of class that I started to play with fondant. As you can see, I became very creative with the cake. I recreated a golf course with a yellow birdie (see, I love little birdies!) using fondant, brown sugar, and colored icing (for the grass and wording)

2. Wedding Cake with Pink Roses Overview

This cake started as a two tiered plain jane white cake but ended up being a simple yet elegant and classy wedding cake. I made a number of pink roses with fondant prior to class and didn't know how I was going to use them. I started decorating my plain white cake with the roses, strategically placing them on the tops of the cakes. Later on, I added some beadwork around the base of the cakes for a finished look but something was still missing...it needed more but I didn't know what or how much more. With the help of the teacher, I decided to keep the cake simple by adding a trio of white dots all around the side of the cakes, allowing the pink fondant flowers to be the focal point of the cake. It worked...sometimes keeping things simple and classic is better than over complicating things.

3. Square Bow-tie Birthday Cake Overview

We had to make a two layer square cake for class. Instead I was over zealous and baked a four layer cake. Probably because I wanted this cake to not only look good but taste good too. It was one of my sister's birthday that week and I wanted to bring a cake for her birthday dinner, which happened to be the following night. Instead of throwing out my class project cake (hard to eat a whole cake with just a hubbie and a newborn), I wanted to save and serve the cake.

We learned how to make a bow and decorate with fondant. It is a simple to use cut outs from rolled out fondant for decorations. I loved making this cake. I use some of the techniques I learned from the bow-tie cake and wedding cake to make my niece's princess cake - in a future post coming soon!

Slideshow of my baked goods (2009-2011)

My first cake after taking my first Wilton Cake class. I was trying to employ some of the techniques I learned in class. I made a chocolate birthday cake with vanilla buttercream for my brother's birthday. I love little birdies and found this whimsical bird design that I recreated as a sugar decoration. To add a bit of flavor to the cake, I did what our local Carvel use to do their cakes, add a bit of crushed almonds around the outside of the cake. I also added crushed almonds between the layers as well. Everyone seemed to enjoy the cake. I've come a long way since my first cake....but do have nostalgia over my first simple cake.....

hmmm....instead of a slideshow, I may just do short posts of some of my baked goods from the last year or two.....stay tuned for more...my fingers are getting antsy... :)

I'm BACK......it's 2011 - has it really been a year?

I was on sabbatical for a few months.....hmmm maybe for a FULL year:). Oh how time escapes us so quickly. Looking back at the year, I did work on a few more cakes/cupcakes but didn't get a chance to post about them. I'm going to post a slideshow of some of my cake/fondant work from this past year - so I can get you all up to speed.

As a side note, I've recently moved to a new state and have not had too many opportunities to work on a my beloved baked goods. My baking equipment are packaged away in cardboard boxes itching to be unpacked (soon I hope!). I'll be sure to get back to the baking once we move into our new home - expected move in date - June 2011! In the meantime, please enjoy my latest blogs on interior design, as that is my new hobby for the time being.