Pretty in Pink

This swiss-dotted beauty has custom handmade silk flower sprays, complete with beaded crystals to compliment the bride's tiara and the cake topper. The top tier was strawberry cake with french vanilla filling; the middle tier was vanilla with pistachio filling; and the bottom tier was chocolate with a chocolate mousse filling.

Aloha! Blue and Gold

For a tropical-themed Cub Scout Blue and Gold banquet, this is a white cake with mango puree buttercream and lime curd filling, iced with a classic egg yolk and sugar syrup buttercream. The bottom tier is draped with a modeling chocolate "grass" skirt, and the top is ringed by chocolate painted palm trees. Tropical flowers made with fondant and hand painted surround the cake and the chocolate "29" topper. Hand-made chocolate fondant coconuts are sprinkled all over the top of the cake, and were a huge hit with the scouts. The coconuts tasted like Tootsie Rolls!

Daisy Display

This gorgeous Springtime bouquet is made of fondant daisies. Lemon cake with strawberry filling and lemon buttercream made for a delicious cupcake display as well the main cutting cake. A tiny matching fondant daisy topped each cupcake, the colors of the brides bouquet. The fondant on the cake was brushed with shimmer powder to make it look like the satin of her dress.

A Rose by any other Name

A simple sheet cake, yellow with buttercream frosting. I was asked to provide a cake for a church function, for a group of ladies. Roses seemed fitting for a ladylike occasion. Deep burgundy compliments a deep golden yellow with simple star drop flowers.

Here, a detail shot of the roses and star flowers. I used two sizes of roses, a full size rose for the center, and the outlying roses have one less row of petals.

The border is a simple shell border. To bring out the main golden yellow color, I piped the star flowers on the shells.

Lacey

Cornelli Lace is one of the harder decorating techniques, but is a beautiful effect. The surface is covered with piping, the line is continuous and cannot touch or cross itself. I did this cake for a friend's open house, where they had requested a very simple sheet cake.

I really liked the effect of the border of cornelli lace. It was a nice touch to formalize this simple cake, to fit the occasion.

Basket of Flowers

I really like to do daisies. They are one of my favorite flowers, so pretty and casual. Brown Eyed Susans are simply a variation on a daisy. Here I paired the Brown Eyed Susans with tiny, dark blue Apple Blossoms.




The side is a basketweave effect. I finished it with a rope border on the bottom, and the flower border surrounds a simple font on the top. The flowers are royal icing, and were dried on flower formers for a more realistic curved look.

Fall-ing in Love

I love the fall. Early fall, when flowers are still blooming and the colors are rich and vibrant with the change of season. This cake was for a wedding open house style reception. We weren't sure how many people were going to be coming through, so we made plenty. A typical two tiered wedding cake, with an additional matching sheet cake just in case.

When doing tiers, pre-assemble the cake before delivering to make sure it all fits and the colums are positioned correctly. Then take it apart and transport with colums in place. You reassemble the cake at the event. So here are shots of the seperate tiers, the final cake, and the extra sheet cake.

I used white daisies, blue forget-me-nots, red primroses, and rusty chrysanthemums. Top and bottom borders are the shell borders, and I used a ruffled garland on the sides.

Sotas? Sotas Anyone?

Course 3, Wedding Cakes!

I had survived the first two grueling courses. Hey, it's hard work learning not to lick the frosting off your fingers! I think everyone was sick of frosting after the second week, and those who buy my cakes need not fear me licking. I don't actually eat my cakes very often, I have played in the frosting too much.

For my last assignment, I chose to do a chocolate cake. Tip: chocolate cake is one of the worst for crumbs. Plus, the crumbs also show up the worst. Well, not thinking about this, I ended up with the worst crumbs all over the frosting of the wedding cake. PANIC!

Then I remembered a decorating technique. Very sophisticated, daring, bold... The Sotas! This "hard to master" (wink wink) technique consists of getting a very small round tip, thinning out your frosting, preferably with a tiny bit of karo syrup or piping gell, and squeezing the bag like crazy. All over the place, like a frosting pile of angel hair pasta. Seriously! I tell you what, it not only works fabulous, the teacher was impressed (as was the class), and you couldn't see a single crumb!

Finished, in all it's glory!

A top view. You can really see the amazing texture the sotas gives the cake. The flowers are petunias. Beautiful flowers, and actually quite easy to do.

Just a detail shot of the top. The petunias have stamens in the middle, if you look closely, just like the real flower. These are plastic balls on top of hard strings that you set in the flower before it dries.

Incidentaly, my son's speech therapist came to work with him the next day and saw the cake sitting on the table. She was so impressed that she bought the top of the cake from me to take to work for a friend's birthday! Less cake I had to eat...

It Rained Flowers

This cake was my course 2 assignment. We learned some color flow basics, which is a mixture that is thinned out, poured into a shape, and left to harden. We also learned several types of flowers with petals that are shaped. Pansies, Daisies, Daffodils, and several more. Again, I did several flowers in royal icing. The ones I liked all got piled on top and cascaded down the side. I have done the cascade on other cakes, but lost those pictures.

I also used a reverse shell border. You do a shell in one direction, then switch to the opposite direction, and so on. This border is quite easy to get mixed up on, and takes lots of concentration if you are doing a large cake. I also like the Oval cake pan set that was used here. Now, if only my color flow butterfly hadn't broken...

My First Class Cake

This cake was the first one I was assigned and brought to class. It is a basic exercise in drop flowers, leaves, stems, and writing. All are covered in Wilton's first class. I was so excited to start the class and learn more about doing cakes. I had taken in high school, a Christmas gift from my parents. But several years later, a friend asked if she could borrow my oven, hers was on the fritz, and she needed to bake a cake for her class. I remember sitting there watching her do flowers and thinking "I could do that!" So I signed up and away I went!

For this one, I made lots of simple drop flowers in different colors. In class we only played with white frosting, so I went crazy at home. The best ones I set aside, and used on top of the assignment cake. There are flowers on the side as well. This cake taught me the importance of planning, at least a little, your design.