Chocolate cake with penuche filling, it was a large cake for 210 guests. I loved this cake when it was done, it was a clean design and the best part it was all delicious buttercream.
To do it yourself grab a large star tip, start in the center of the flower and circle outward. Continue with your flowers around the cake.
A devils food chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganche and fresh strawberries inside and chocolate with fresh strawberries outside.
Alexa needed two cakes for her two separate birthday celebrations. She turned twelve this weekend and loves chocolate cake with chocolate hazelnut filling. Her party theme was the 80′s, she and her girl buddies had a day at the spa, a night at the movie theater and a sleep over that followed. They had the first of the cakes at her overnight party. More fun and one more cake to come for this lucky birthday girl. Making these cakes brought back some of those wonderful big hair, big shoulder pads and doing the Jane Fonda workout with my friends 80′s memories for this baker. No music like the 80′s either, right? So totally awesome.
I used an eight inch square of chocolate cake and an eight inch of the same size vanilla cake back to back to make just the right amount for a Sabrina Little Witch birthday celebration. The house was a Wilton gingerbread house I decorated and the little witch is a Polly Pocket doll with a fondant witch hat that I added and sparkled with edible disco dust. I felt like she needed a friend so the frog was a donation from a collection of small toys my daughter won at Chuck E. Cheese. The broom was a cinnamon stick with fondant bristols painted with a bronze lustre dust. The grass is piped on with a hair Wilton tip and the pumpkins were made with the help of my daughter. I would have never finished the cake without her help because I under estimated the time I would need to get the house done drastically. Crushed Oreos with a blackberry border for the walkway which were actually jelly candies I bought at Marshalls and they worked out perfectly in the mad rush to finish. Another thing I found helpful was using poppy seeds on the roof of the house which I learned from watching, Buddy, The Cake Boss on The Learning Channel.
It is so much fun using dolls on the cakes I make for little girls, besides saving money for the person buying the cake. Like the five year old in this case she will get a doll to keep, play with and it is also a gift that can hold wonderful memories. If you can get a doll that looks like the birthday girl, even better. 
A rural vintage wedding under a beautiful tent with long tables for the guests. Bell jars with the look of just handpicked flowers from the field ran the length of the table runners which matched the color of and complimented the antique pine boxes that decorated the bar and dessert table. Everything resembled how I would imagine an afternoon in the 1940′s, I wanted to sit down on this perfect summer day, laugh with friends, toast the couple, all while having one of their tall icy lemonades. Then continue the celebration by dancing all night to the retro band I watched setting up. The band looked the part for this wedding perfectly, handsome men wearing wing tipped shoes, white shirts with their sleeves rolled up and different vintage vests.
Oh yeah the cake, it was marble butter cake with hazelnut filling, moist carrot cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and fluffy white almond cupcakes with a lighter milk chocolate buttercream. The bride asked for the cupcakes and cake to have the country style hand frosted look, which looked perfect with the small paper flags she made and more of her flowers.
The first wedding cake of the season, a yummy dark chocolate with an Italian penuche filling. A modern design made to accent the gold and silver themed reception.
To make the design I pressed fondant onto a large ornate button for the circular designs. The strips were fondant again pressed onto a grater box, the smallest grate side, cut to shape then painted with gold and silver luster dusts. I then applied them with royal icing and added the dragees for a little bling when the lights hit the cake. It was a beautiful small evening wedding.
I made four different cupcakes this year for the “Yummy” cupcake gift boxes. I love trying out new recipes, always searching for the best I can find or improve upon. With the help of my daughter we baked and taste tested a lot of recipes weeks before we chose which four to include in the package. In the end we voted with the criteria being we had to love each one of the four cupcakes.
The winners were a chocolate cupcake with a surprise York peppermint patty cooked in the center then frosted with pink and white peppermint cream cheese. Another chocolate cupcake, this small cake was filled with mini chocolate chips topped with a marshmallow frosting, large chocolate chips and pecans for an amazing rocky road cupcake. A gingerbread cupcake light and moist with a lemon cream cheese frosting sprinkled with cinnamon, (That particular recipe came from a winning recipe on Cupcake Wars, Foodnetwork. com, they have seventy five recipes worth looking at.) A red velvet cupcake with a bright red inside with the traditional Southern cream cheese frosting, I added shaved white chocolate to give it a holiday look. White chocolate in or on your cream cheese frosting is always fantastic. I gained five pounds easy testing these recipes, but in the end it was so worth it, everyone loved them.
A wonderful couple tied the knot after 25 years together and celebrated with a one of a kind cake. A layer for each year they have already loved each other. The cake was dark chocolate with peanut butter buttercream filling and then covered just moments before delivery with an incredibly decedent chocolate ganache. It was a huge hit! Not a crumb left of the cake that stood a foot and a half high.
A owe a special thank you to my daughter who hung onto the base of this cake with all she had as it leaned and shook over every bump and hill until we reached the mansion at Harkness. Thanks sweetie! You are a life saver.
I was asked to make a birthday cake that mimicked a disco ball. It needed to be the approximate size of a soccer ball and have layers of vanilla and chocolate cake inside. A round cake that ended up being a learning experience from start to finish.
I was sure that doing this cake for me was what it must be like for those poor cake decorators that are invited to do the cake competitions on the food network. You know, the ones that might not have had time to do a practice run of their cake design before they arrived, but are sure with their experience and design ideas their cake will not only work but should also win the prize. Then however after the start of the competition they realize that the reality is things are simply not going as planned and a domino effect is beginning to take place. With the first disaster affecting the next part of the plan and so on and so on. This is how this cake felt to me as I worked my way through challenge after challenge.
