I decided to move my blog to blogger. Over the next several days, or weeks, I will move my old posts. For now I will only add new posts over there.
A new post is up. Please visit me over there: http://rachescakes.blogspot.com/
Snowman Cake January 14, 2009
Apparently I have reached my space limit for pictures so I can’t post a picture of this cake. I don’t know if I want to put links to my pictures, move my blog, or pay for the upgrade.
The cake was a 12″ vanilla cake. I stirred half a cup of soft peppermints into each layer. I used my regular buttercream recipe, with 1/2 tsp. peppermint extract instead of vanilla.
I left the icing white that filled the cake, but I tinted the icing blue that covered the cake. I made a snowman out of fondant.
If you ever need to crush candies, I found my nutcracker to work quite well. I tried a rolling pin, meat tenderizer, and food processor, but for various reasons, none worked real well.
It was a really cute cake and all reports say it was tasty. Hopefully I’ll figure out how to continue posting my pictures.
Mummy Cake Update January 11, 2009
The cake was a hit, the perfect amount of strawberry flavor.
I also found out the Sarah-Jane uses rolled fondant for her version. That really explains why her’s look so much neater. I’ll have to try it her way.
Bummed December 5, 2008
I was hired by my husband’s company to make cakes for their monthly employee appreciation lunches. It is a pretty good deal, they pay slightly more than they would pay Kroger, I bake a higher quality cake, and I get to experiement with decorations. It is a great learning experience. I saw a cake design on My Sweet and Saucy’s blog. Scroll down to the 4th and 7th pictures. The cake with the dots, yep that was my inspiration.
I knew mine wouldn’t be quite as nice since I was using cream cheese icing instead of fondant. I spent tons of time making the beads, even more time placing them on the cake. They had to go on individually. I kind of imagined being able to sprinkle them on and only having to place a few, but I was wrong. Normally when I send cakes to my husband’s work, he just takes them. Since this was a stacked cake, I didn’t trust it traveling in the car pre-stacked. I went with him before work this morning and stacked it there. The dowels I used to support the top layer were slightly too long, even though I had checked last night. When I set the top layer on, there was a huge gap! I fortunatelyhad icing along to cover the cake board, so I just left the tip off the bag and filled in the gap as best I could. Since the cake was cold, the icing wouldn’t really smooth out though.
The other problem is that I envisioned tall layers like my inspiration cake. Even with 6 layers, this cake doesn’t look as tall as the one I was copying. Even though I am disappointed, the cake still looks OK. I guess the amount of time I spent on it just doesn’t translate to how well it turned out. I didn’t want to take pictures, but, as my husband pointed out, this is all about learning how to improve and documenting my improvements.
Oh and if you are ever making beads or pearls for a cake, buy a silicon bead press or buy them pre-made. They aren’t difficult to make, but they are tedious. The presses are kind of pricey if you plan to do lots of wedding cakes, you will easily earn back the cost in time saved. The press can be purchased at Sweetart County Kitchen. Pre-made pearls in white can be purchased through Earlene’s Cakes. I’ll probably do a post in the next week on how to make the beads.
Groom’s Cake October 18, 2008
I’m two weeks late, but late is better than never, right?
The wedding was beautiful and it was so fun to see all my family. My brother requested a cake with a loon and a pheasant, the state bird of his and his bride’s respective states. Unfortunately I couldn’t find anything that was similar of both birds. I did however, find many, many loons. He was disappointed, but when I showed him the only cake sized pheasant I could find online and in 6 states, he consented to an all loon cake.
The cake was 6 layers of chocolate with chocolate fudge icing. Half of the cake had lemon filling, the other half chocolate fudge. Around the edges were Pepperidge Farm Pirouette Rolled Wafer cookies in chocolate fudge and French vanilla. The cake was a hit!
Vote September 7, 2008
A few months ago I submitted a cake to a baby shower website for a contest. The contest is now up. Here is my cake: http://www.baby-shower-guide.com/baby-in-a-pea-pod-cake.html. You can only vote once and I’ll admit that there are several better cakes, but feel free to vote for my cake anyway.
It’s too bad I didn’t know the contest hadn’t started yet, I had another cake that turned out much better that I could have entered.
Yes you can… September 2, 2008
…torte, ice, and put borders on a cake in 15 minutes. Actually 11 minutes if you have everything ready to go. I’ll post pictures later. I could have done it neater but I wanted to see how quickly I could do it.
Cake Wrecks August 5, 2008
I discovered a new cake blog yesterday, http://www.cakewrecks.blogspot.com/. Unlike most of the other cake blogs I have found, this one doesn’t contain cakes I’d like to copy. This is the blog where I hope none of my cakes end up. The author posts pictures of “professional” cakes gone awry and commentary to explain. My husband and I laughed so hard at a couple of the descriptions that we were in tears. If you need a good laugh, check it out!
Is this a good deal? July 23, 2008
I saw this on Craigslist and think that the asking price is a little high, $400 for what is listed. What do you think?
“Make over $300 per cake profit! Everything you need to start your own wedding cake business except the oven and the mixer. Includes: two sets of round 2″ cake pans and separators in sizes 6″, 8″, 10″, 12″, 14″, 16″; columns in two sizes, wedding cake stand; bags, couplers, over 60 metal professional decorating tips and flower nails, tip saver, tip covers, professional food colors, brushes, design markers, delivery sign and much more. “
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Giveaway opportunity July 22, 2008
Donna is running a contest on her blog to win the 2009 Wilton Yearbook. Visit her here to win.
