50th Birthday Cruise Ship Cake!

Last weekend we had a 50th birthday party for one of my aunts... of course I was asked to make the cake!  My aunt and her husband are going on a cruise to celebrate her birthday, so he asked me to make a cruise ship themed cake.

The ship is made out of rice cereal treats!  I mentioned in my last post, about my discovery for how to get smooth fondant when you are covering your RKT sculptures... cover it with modeling chocolate first to fill in all the bumps!

I knew right away that I wanted the cruise ship on top... (I wasn't going to have time to make the whole cake a 3D cruise ship).  But I struggled with how to decorate the sides.  I was inspired by this graphic that I found when I was browsing "wave images".  I wanted something a little more decorative than just the "standard" wavy line...

The numbers are gumpaste.  I decorated them to look like life preservers!

That's all I have time for today, folks!  Back to the kitchen for me... working on a BIG project for this weekend!

Happy Caking :)

Icing Smiles Once Again! Xbox Cake

Last month I was approached by Icing Smiles to, again, donate a cake to a deserving child!  It was a double pleasure for me because it was for the same family I donated a cake to in February!  In February, I made a Blue's Clues cake for Alex.  This time I was asked to make a "Dream Cake" for CJ, Alex's brother, who has been battling Mitochondrial Disease.

CJ wanted an "Xbox Cake"... so an Xbox cake he got!

 Sixteen!  What an exciting birthday!  And what an honor it was for me to make his birthday cake!  The numbers are gumpaste with toothpicks in the bottom to attach to the cake.  I painted them with paint made from pearl dust, Electric Green Americolor and vodka.

The controller was sculpted with rice cereal treats!  After struggling to find a way to cover rice cereal treats with fondant and make it smooth, I think I've figured it out!  I cover it first with modeling chocolate and smooth that (you can also sculpt some detail) and then fondant over the modeling chocolate!  Genius!

 The console it's self was just a 13x9 cake (chocolate cake with peanut butter SMBC filling!), that I trimmed a little from the end to get the proportions right.  Then I contoured the front and back a little to give it the slight curve that the Xbox has... (We do not own a video game systems... so I spent HOURS staring at photo's of Xboxes to try and figure out if it did indeed have a curve!)

Working with Icing Smiles has been incredibly rewarding, both times now.  It feels good to know that I can offer a cake to a child who really deserves a reason to smile!  If you are interested in volunteering with Icing Smiles, visit their website or find them on Facebook!  You don't have to be a cake artist to volunteer, they often need home bakers, delivery drivers, fundraising or even just monetary donations.  

Happy Caking :)

Star Wars Darth Vader Cake!

Okay, the final installment of the "I made a lot of cakes over the past 2 weeks" series, lol!  3 Cakes in 2 weeks may not be a lot to some people, but I am a part-time cake decorator.  I have a 2 year old who demands my attention most of the time!  Usually I won't agree to more than one cake a week... but for a friend I made an exception :)

This is actually the first of the 3 cakes I made for my friend.  For his birthday we were going to do an Avengers/Captain America cake... but at the last minute, while he was picking out party supplies with his dad, he changed is mind and wanted Star Wars, Darth Vader specifically!

His mom and I agreed that it might not be "pretty" to have all of the guests running around with black mouths, if I were to make a "3D" Vader... that and I didn't have much time/notice after the birthday boy changed his mind!  So this is what I came up with.... I don't have many pictures unfortunately, just one I snapped at the party...

For the cake, which was an 8" chocolate cake filled with ganache and chocolate buttercream, I used the same technique as in my Tie Dye Fondant Tutorial Video (I'll post it below, again).  Then I took some edible pearl airbrush paint (cause it's already liquidy) and mixed just a tiny amount of black gel paste in to make it look more silver (you could use super pearl mixed with vodka to get a similar consistency paint).  Then I took a toothbrush (NEW, CLEAN and only for cake decorating of course!), dipped it in my paint mixture and dragged my finger over the bristles to "splatter" the cake to give it a silvery, starry effect.  I didn't want to go with star cut-outs because they can look a bit cartoon-y and I wanted the stars to look more subtle and "galaxy-like".

The lettering was gut from fondant and dusted with yellow petal dust for a shaded effect, similar to what you see on some of the Star Wars logos.

And Darth Vader's head... well, this is my first real attempt at sculpting.  I was tempted to just go to the store and buy a toy to stick on top.  That was actually my back up plan all along but it actually turned out okay!  He's made from rice cereal treats  that I covered generously with modeling chocolate (or "candy clay") and sculpted.  It took me the better part of a day, but he actually looked pretty good by the end!  I just wish I had been able to do a better job smoothing the surface.. but regardless the cake was a huge hit at the party!

I wish I had thought to take pictures of video of the process!  I hope my description has given you enough idea of how I created this cake, in case anyone is inspired by my design :)

This is the technique I used for the fondant... I just used lots of blue with a little black and I tiny amount of white....

Happy Caking :)

Balloon Cake!

Well, like I said in my last post... I've been a busy baker the past 2 weeks (busy for me at least!).

I made these cakes for a friend (who has great taste by the way), and she asked for this Balloon Cake for a joint party with her children and another child in their family.  The design was originally created by the talented Bree Meldrum of The Cake That Ate Paris cake boutique!

The original cake appears to be 10"-8"-6" rounds... this is my petite rendition- 8"-6"-4" rounds!

Let me tell you... 4" cakes are NOT easy to cover with fondant!  But I managed well enough and luckily because of the design I was able to cover the few imperfections with balloons!  The balloons were just approximately 1" circles I cut out of colored gumpaste/fondant mix and allowed to dry for a few days.  Then just stick them on the side of the cake starting at the top!

The original cake had adorable silhouettes painted on.  Not trusting my shaky hand to touch the clean fondant surface with black paint.... I opted to cut silhouettes out of black fondant!  It made for slightly bulkier figures and took a heck of a long time, but I think they came out pretty well!  At the request of my friend they all have Mickey Mouse ears, at least that is what they are intended to be, lol!

This design was so adorable and a lot of fun to work on.  I'm so glad to have had the chance to create this...  Thanks for looking!

Happy Caking :)

House of Anubis Cake!

I was asked to make several cakes over the past two weeks for a friend... she has two children with birthdays a week apart, and a 3rd family member that they have a joint party with.  So needless to say I've been a busy baker!  I will share all of the cakes, but first up is this House of Anubis cake!

Coming up with this design was a bit of a challenge... I have a 2 year old son... so I have no idea what any of the shows for 10 year old girls are about!  I even watched an episode of House of Anubis to try and find some inspiration.  What I gathered was that it's a British mystery show.  The show is very dark, literally... all of the colors are dark... greys, blacks, maroon...  But I think in the end I was able to capture the essence of the show in this cake.

The name "Emma" mimics the logo for the show with the eye symbol for the "A".  I added a gumpaste locket, called the "Eye of Horus" that is used in the show... and a rice cereal treat "Book of Isis" that was used in at least one episode, but they regularly do research in "old" books to solve their mysteries.  The side of the cake is stenciled to represent the "old-fashioned" decor of the boarding house where the show takes place, also reminiscent of the grey on grey damask pattern that is the background for the shows website...  and I piped on some black trees (and added some texture with a paint brush) to represent the "spooky" forest that surrounds the boarding school- as well as the shadowy trees on the background of the show's website.

The locket is gumpaste, the silver part is painted with pearl airbrush paint (I just painted it on with a paint brush) to make it look like metal.  The red "eye" is painted with gel color and vodka, I went heavy with the gel paste because I wanted it to remain shiny when it dried to look like a jewel.

It was difficult to come up with this cake design, but I am thrilled with the end result!  Thanks for looking!

Happy Caking :)

New Craftsy Class! Topsy-Turvy Cake Construction!

Hi Everyone!  I just wanted to quickly post about this class for anyone interested.  I recently discovered Craftsy and took the Handcrafted Sugar Flowers class with Jacqueline Butler.  I really loved the class and learned a lot.  I had signed up for Craftsy's newsletter and this morning received one that might interest you! 

They don't have a lot of cake decorating classes as of yet (2 at this point!), but seem to be building in that area.  This morning they just announced their new Topsy-Turvy Cake Construction class!  It's discounted at 50% right now, although I'm not sure how long that discount will last for.  The price right now is $29.99!

I've done topsy-turvy cakes before, but I think I might sign up for this one!

From Craftsy's website:

What You Will Learn in Topsy-Turvy Cake Construction

• How to design and create a cake based on composition, gravity and temperature considerations
• How to use equations to easily calculate the angles for each tier
• How to effectively cover cake in fondant
• How to build a structure that supports every tier
• How to transport your cake safely to its final destination

I'm particularly interested in structure and support, because I want to work at trying to create "extreme" cakes and need a better understanding of how to plan the support system.

If you are interested, you can sign up here.

Happy Caking :)

Peacock Colors: Blossoms Cake & Cupcakes

Last week I had the pleasure of working on this order.  These photos are just a small sampling of the many cupcakes that I made to match the 6" cake for the bride and groom.  The brides colors were peacock colors, so she requested simple flowers that were green, blue and purple!  I love those jewel tone colors!

To make the flowers, I used the Blossom Cutter/Veiner set by Sunflower Sugar Art that I purchased from Global Sugar Art.  The cutter that comes with it is the largest size 5 petal flower that will fit in the veiner, it goes right to the edge... but you can use any other smaller sized cutters in the same veiner to get a variety of different size flowers.  In addition to the one it came with, I also used 2 of the 5 petal cutters that came in my Wilton set.

Most of my cakes are fondant covered, but this bride requested a buttercream cake...  But a proper buttercream finish still needs to be just as smooth as fondant!  There is something so satisfying about that super smooth icing!  I used Swiss Meringue Buttercream (of course!) and you can check out my post about smoothing SMBC to see my technique!

 

Cupcake weddings are very trendy right now.  I was delighted to be asked to create this adorable design!

Happy Caking :)