Romantic Damask

Lately I've been seeing damask styles everywhere! I actually think I might be late to jump on this technique. I've specifically seen them in beautiful cake designs. I decided to try it out recently and was quite pleased with the results.

This cake was quite daunting to me as I hadn't done something like it before. I planned and researched and imagined myself making it for a whole week! I am grateful that I was given the opportunity to make it.

But imaging yourself doing something is TOTALLY different from actually doing it (duh).

For example, I didn't imagine all the dishwashing, cleaning, scrubbing, and back pain but all those things were as real as ever!

That's probably what I hate most about making cakes...the cleaning :(

Back to the cake...I was super excited when I got my order of stencils from Flour Confections. I love that store and spend hours on their website all day errrday! They are so efficient with delivery and answering questions and have a lot of products that you can't find at other baking supply stores. Their prices are also not bad...compared to some other stores *cough* Golda's Kitchen *cough*.

I was so nervous about getting the stencilling right. I watched many Youtube videos that said it was tricky and gets better with practice. It definitely wasn't as bad as I had imagined it to be!!

Mind you, there were still some things I wanted to scrap and fix but all in all, I think the cake turned out beautiful and I'm happy that the people I made it for were also happy. Inside is a yummy rich chocolate cake with coconut swiss meringue buttercream....THE bomb dot com!

I miss my photographer roommate who took such beautiful pictures of my creations. I'm doing my best with my little point and shoot but honestly...apples and oranges. And I don't have the creative angle and eye of a photographer. MUST....LEARN....PHOTOGRAPHY!

Return of the Cake Pop

Last week I had a cupcake project lined up for the upcoming Easter holiday. Unfortunately, things didn't turn out as planned and pretty soon I had 24 cupcakes that looked like a mini version of this disaster that had happened before. I'm starting to think that it's either the baking soda that I'm using, or my roommates are giants who stomp around and cause my cupcakes to deflate. Both are very plausible reasons.

Anyway, instead of throwing out a batch of cupcakes that looked terrible but tasted great, I was persuaded to turn them into cake pops.

Oh the dreaded cake pop.

The last time I made these, I had chocolate in my hair, a shake in my hand, and a crazy look in my eye.

Cake pops are not my most favourite thing to make. To be fair, I've only given them one try but that was enough for me to file the idea away and nervously laugh at trying it again.

Don't get me wrong. They're cute as a button. Looking up pics of other people's cake pops makes me want to try my own.

But then the horrible memories come flooding back.

The biggest problem I have is that it is So. Damn. Time. Consuming.

They're expensive, finicky, and take a huge set up too.

All for 5 minutes of a bite of cake.

Anyway....enough with my complaining.

This time around I used chocolate melts from Bulk Barn and I noticed that the chocolate cracked and oil oozed out of the crack. Not a cute look. They were easier to melt and work with though.

I spread out the work over a few days rather than trying to cram it all into one day which helps loads!

I also decided to add Nutella instead of buttercream icing to the cake crumbs which ups the yumminess factor but adds to the weight of each cake pop.

Although I don't like making them (and did I mention all the dishes I needed to wash?) they are definitely cute and can make for really cute designs. I'm going to keep working on them and trying to figure out a method that works best for me. When I do, I'll do an in depth tutorial called 'The Idiot's Guide to Cheap Easy and Cute Cake Pops'.

Happy Baking!

Spring Flowers!

I feel like a bear that just came out of hibernation.

The weather has been soooo unpredictable! Back in fall, people were saying that we were going to have one of the hardest winters ever. So obviously I went and bought a really warm (and expensive) coat and a really sturdy (and expensive) pair of waterproof boots.
And then winter didn't come.

But I'm not disappointed. As I might have mentioned before, I wasn't really built for winter. Not one hair on my head likes winter or snow or cold.

And then all of a sudden it became really warm and breezy and sunny and just DELICIOUS!

After a long time, I was able to try something new in terms of baking and decorating to celebrate the good weather.

I baked some chocolate peanut butter cupcakes with a recipe I found in a cupcake book. I have to do a review on this book sometime soon.

I also watched a video on some pretty fondant flowers and was inspired to recreate the look. I gave it a try and it was pretty easy!! It took me a few tries to get the hang of it but the outcome is quite pretty.

If you want to try this and think the video is a little unclear, let me know and I'll do another post with step by step pictures and explanations.

I'm also really happy with how I photographed these. Obvious credits go to the sunlight but I like to think I had something to do with it too :)

Happy Baking!

Monkeying Around

Okay guys its time to get serious. Theres no time for monkeying around and tomfoolery (where the hell did I hear that word and why am I using it?)

I recently received a request for some cute little monkey toppers for 2 year old baby twins. These were a complete joy to work on because they totally distracted me from the rest of the cray cray that is my life. I'm going to start using more hip words like cray cray and oh em gee because apparently I'm getting old and thus feel the need to connect with the inner youth in me. BOO YEAH! Wait do they still say that?

I used chocolate fondant for the bodies and skin coloured fondant for the rest of the bodily features.

I followed this tutorial and I think they came out cute as a button. I absolutely hated the skin colour fondant I was using. It smelled gross and was so much harder to work with than the fondant I use regularly. It was also overpriced and came with very little in the packaging. Overall, a very bad product.

But this post is about monkeys and not fondant.

I wanted the girl monkey to be wearing a tutu but when I tried to wrap it around her, since she was sitting down, it just ended up looking like a frilly weird skirt. So nixed that idea and gave her a blanket instead.

I wish I could have made the whole cake so that I could tie in the theme of the cake to these monkeys. I also made a few letter blocks out of fondant but didn't manage to get a good picture other than with my phone and lets face it, with my crackberry, it may as well not be a picture at all.

I hope the twin babies and their mommy liked them!!

Happy Baking!

Hockey Jersey Cake

My boyfriend is a huge Leafs fan. He has stuck with them through the good and the bad and has made me a default leafs fan.

So naturally for his birthday I was going to make him a hockey themed cake. I initially thought of making a hockey rink (arena?) but decided that there wouldn't be enough actual cake to eat or too much cake. Still want to try that sometime though.

This cake was relatively simple to make. I had originally planned on adding a buttercream border at the bottom to hide the imperfections of fondant but I didn't have enough time.

It is also much harder to cover a square or rectangle cake in fondant than it is for a round cake.

And it is also much harder to fit a Tamil name onto a tiny little maple leaf.

After I made the cake, I realized I should have done the BACK of the jersey with his name as the players name rather than the front.

I then smashed the cake into a wall and started all over again.

KIDDING

I brushed my shoulders off and put it in the books for next time.

I also just realized that this is the first 'boy' cake I've made. It kind of killed me that I couldn't put anything pink or pretty on it :(

I guess what matters in the end is that he loved it, even though he doesn't really eat cake....weirdo.

On a different note, I know I kind of fell off the face of the blogworld this past week. Its only because I'm running around like a chicken with its head cut off. I will be back to some much needed baking soon with more pics and funnier posts than this one....I hope.

Till then...Happy Baking!!

Review: Wilton Global Fondant and Gum Paste Mold

Since I have a bit of time (a reallllyyyy tinnnnnyyyyy bit) between cakes and school work I thought I would do a quick product review on the impression mold I used for the bharathanatyam (dance) cake.

The Global mold is one of 3 or 4 I believe. It is made of silicone and comes with a bunch of designs on one sheet all relating to a certain theme. I received it as a birthday gift (ironically from the same friend that I used the mold to make a cake for) and was super excited to use it. I think its the most 'ethnic' looking one of the molds.

The instructions to use it were fairly simple. Wash the mold carefully before the first use. Obviously...this goes for any kind of tool you buy...if you even think about skipping this step, just picture a giant warehouse with rats running around on top of your products boxes...ya that's right...get scrubbing.

To use, you basically push in the fondant on top of the design you want and roll a rolling pin over it to make sure you fill every crevice. Make sure you sprinkled cornstarch onto the mold beforehand so that the fondant doesn't stick. Then just lift the fondant or gum paste out and TADAAAA.

Pshhh, who am I kidding...we all know things don't work that way in real life...

The biggest problem I had was that I had to make sure the impression wasn't overfilled or else I would have to trim the excess fondant off by hand which resulted in extra work...and we all know how much I hate extra work.

Eventually I got the hang of it and was able to fill each impression with just the right amount of fondant so that there was no excess.

I also found that I didn't need to use cornstarch! My fondant didn't stick to the silicone at all. I don't know if this was because my fondant was just the right amount of stickiness OR because the heavens were smiling down at me because I'm special....personally I think its the latter.

What I like MOST about this mold is that once you pop the shape out, you can manipulate it to form other shapes. I used the 4 petal flower impression and then cut them in half to make my own border. Winning!

What I didn't like was that the borders that came with the mold didn't look good when I made them. They were hard to fill without showing breaks or folds. When I did manage to fill it properly, there was always excess fondant that I had to then trim off. I also think it would be a hassle if you have a larger cake. The borders are not that long. I'm not too sure because I didn't use the border design and I decorated an 8 inch cake but I would imagine that you have to do a few borders and join them together resulting in more divides in your border. Again, not a big deal but since I'm a perfectionist and get crazy twitchy eyes when things I make have tiny flaws, I consider it a minus.

I think the mold would be better if they changed out the border designs and added some other impression designs and also if there was some way to fill the design and cut away excess fondant before popping the fondant out. Not sure how they would do that and make it convenient but I'll let the creative design engineers over at Wilton work on that one. The cavities were also quite deep and I think I would like it better if they were a bit thinner so that the work doesn't stick out of the cake oddly.

Regardless, I would give this product 7 out of 10. I think the mold is a great tool to give your cakes that extra flair if you are pressed for time. The intricate designs are great and you have an option among a few patterns to choose from. The product is very durable and seems like it will last a long time. I'm not sure about the price since I received it as a gift. But again, if you get it, make sure to check at Michael's first because they have those blessed coupons that make it easier on our wallets.

Next time for product reviews I think I should take some pictures of me actually using the product. All this text on the page is just boring...except for those few people who read my blog just for the writing...anybody? Ya didn't think so.

Happy Baking!

Camera Cake

I am so damn tired right now. Like tired and cranky and snappy. But I am so excited about this cake that I just had to do a quick post on it.

Disclaimer: If you are a photographer or a camera geek and are cringing at all the ways this cake is not super detailed like a real camera is, you should leave now....

Still here? Okay good : )

My goal for this cake was to get the basic structure of an SLR (or DSLR?) camera down and add a few of the obvious features the camera has. My roommate is an amazing photographer and has an awesome Nikon. So I added that signature red Nikon thingy. And also tried to pipe on the Nikon logo as best as I could.

It was also a new experience trying to cover a non-round cake in fondant. It wasn't as hard as I was anticipating but still not the most perfect job.

I kind of cheated. The lens part isn't cake. Its actually a bunch of rice cakes glued together with peanut butter and covered in fondant....OH WELL :)

And finally, a note to myself for next time...do not attempt carving a cake if its super moist. I used chocolate cake and it fell away at the touch. The structure would have been much cleaner and less lumpy if I had used a different recipe I think.

Next time I attempt a camera cake, I'm going to try to add more detail and also get the size proportion a tiny more accurate. But at the end of the day, I was super proud of my first structure cake.

Now on to an upside down topsy turvy circus cake....KIDDING!

I also find it ironic that my roommate took pictures OF the Nikon WITH her Nikon...bahaha!

2 down...1 more to go!!!

Pink Butterflies and Polka Dots

I love pink. Anyone who knows me knows I love pink. I like other colours too but if I had a choice, I would go for pink.

























A friend of mine turned 21 recently and I made a cake for a little gathering we had. In my culture, 21 is considered your 'key' birthday. Before you all get excited thinking you get the keys to a house or a car, its really just the key to your adulthood...or virginity...or something like that.

So usually people make cakes in the shape of keys, but it's kind of cliche and so I made her a butterfly polka dot cake :)

This friend of mine, is an amazing person. Funny, energetic, smart, and gorgeous. But she doesn't like chocolate cake. Well, she says she doesn't like chocolate icing on the chocolate cake, but chocolate cake with vanilla icing is like having steak with a side of couscous...its just plain wrong :)

I am deathly afraid of making vanilla or white cake. I don't know why...oh wait yes I do...because they turn out horrible! With chocolate cake, its always moist and rich but the vanilla flavour just isn't rich enough for me to mask things like dryness, or a tough texture (not that a cake should be dry or tough but just in case).

But a birthday without cake it just wrong and so I plowed forward and used this vanilla cake recipe and this buttercream recipe. In short, the cake tasted good but I found it a little on the dry crumbly side. I would have liked it to be more moist. The buttercream was amazing! Sweet, light, and fluffy. I wouldn't recommend it for piping though. I also added a layer of strawberry jam between the two layers of cake because the thought of vanilla cake with vanilla icing seemed bland. It turned out pretty good.

I used fondant to cover the cake and made circle designs and a butterfly out of cookie cutters. I also got a chance to use lustre dust on the butterfly...pretty sparkles.

The biggest problem I had with this cake is that since I refrigerated the cake and didn't give it enough time to thaw before I covered it in fondant, I had a lot of air bubbles and 'droopy' fondant. It looked bloated and puffed from the bottom, kind of how I look after I've had one too many cupcakes. Hopefully no one minded though :)

And I saved this for last because I wanted to leave a lasting impression. Whenever you start a new project, whether that be baking or DIY projects or writing a book, it never ends up being just your work...it is the love, work, and support of all those around you. Making this cake, I realized how much of that went into this cake. From my incredibly talented roomie who took these AMAZING pictures which make my cake look 50 times better than it actually is and keeps me grounded so that I don't obsess over the details, to my dedicated and determined new roomie who even in her hectic schedule still manages to get me the perfect ribbon in the perfect shade of brown. From my patient yet sarcastic sister who spends hours walking the aisles of Michaels with me, to my friend who sits at the table and watches me roll, knead, and cut fondant while supplying very...ahem...calming and rich music :P. My super patient boyfriend who is always encouraging me to keep going and listens to all my whack ideas even at 1 in the morning and finally, all the people who are actually brave enough to eat what I make and don't squint their face in disgust. A huge thank you to all of you! I can't and won't ever be able to do all I want to without you. I love you guys :)

MM is fast approaching, and I have a few more projects lined up.

I have 3 birthdays coming up in one week! Each person is different and unique and I'm so excited to make these cakes for them!!!

I'm also going to be making some cake pops for a school event. AHH SO MUCH BAKING!

Have a great weekend!!!

My second birthday cake!

First of all, please accept my MOST deepest and sincere apologies for missing MM this week. I had something planned but unfortunately, with moving, and my sister's surprise birthday party and everything in between, life got hectic. REGARDLESS, no excuse is good enough as this was my second week *runs into corner and hides*

BUT...hopefully this post will bring me back in the good books. I've been planning and scheming and organizing my sister's party for the past few weeks and have been ITCHING to blog about it. It's finally over and I can blog to my heart's content!!

The first birthday cake I ever made was for a very good friend of mine. It was a 2 tiered square cake. I'll do a more detailed post on it later. It was good for a first attempt and I had a TONNE of help from my roommate but I still couldn't see past its flaws. The Transformers cake I made for my sister was my second ever and took a tonne of planning and research. I made a cupcake tower...yes..the tower...as well as all the cupcakes and the cake at the top. I also had to do all this into the very late hours of the night as it was a surprise.

I used my very favourite chocolate cake recipe for the 8 inch cake. I had to buy the fondant and the buttercream for the crumb coat because I was pressed for time and had no energy. I used chocolate buttercream to fill the cake after I torted it and also used it to cover the cake. I made sure the cake was even and flat and straight. I watched videos on YouTube like this and this to figure out a technique.

I then covered the cake in yellow fondant. I coloured all the fondant 24 hrs before hand. That was definitely the most fun part about this cake....okay I'm lying. It was a pain. Especially getting the black to be black. I sweat up a storm and my shoulders ached the next day.

Once I got the cake covered, the rest was easy. I printed out a picture of the Transformers logo thingy...which in case you haven't caught on is the theme of the cake( I wondered many times in this process whether I had a sister or a brother. Trying to make a transformers cake look girly is VERY hard) and used a knife to free hand cut the different parts out of grey fondant. I guess it would have looked neater if I traced around the printout and cut it into sections but at 2 in the am, I wasn't thinking straight.

I mixed some silver lustre dust with peppermint extract and brushed it onto the cutouts. I painted some areas more dense than others to get a metally, worn out effect. Not sure if it worked :S. I then positioned it onto the cake and cut black strips of fondant to add to the sides. TA DAAA...the cake was ready to 'roll out'...get it? like the Autobots rolling out....okay I'll stop.

So that was it. I'll do another post on the cupcakes and the cupcake tower all made from scratch. I am so proud of this cake and the look on my sisters face when she saw it was totally worth it!!