Cake #34 - A Strawberry Experiment

Cake #34 - Thinking ahead to Shannon's and Kasey's wedding next year, and wanting to test out some of the interesting new 'things' I found at my local Bakery Supply store, I wanted to make a strawberry cake or cupcake and use the ready made filling. I also wanted to test out their cake mix "creme cake" and see how that came out. That recipe called for way more eggs than normal cakes so I as expected the cupcakes rose beautifully (almost too high) and were pretty good. Not that tender but maybe next time I will bake them less. (Still prefer my own cake recipes to the ready mix, but alas, this is an experiment.) 

I used a 'corer' to remove the center of the cupcake and then filled it with the filling, which I liken more to the gel that is used in a fresh Strawberry or Peach pie to hold it all together. It was o.k...like a jelly donut, but not really that spectacular. 

I also tried to use some "whipped" frosting that was frozen ready made, and 'strawberry' flavored. It too was just 'o.k.' The flavor was akin to marshmallow cream and not all that strawberry. Was it o.k.? Yes, but it was just that...o.k. I don't think I would use any of those 3 items again. There was another strawberry filling option that I will try next week and they do have some OTHER great stuff there like amazing carrying boxes, ready made wedding candy flowers and some decorator icing, plus colors galore and dusts and sprays that will be great for the decorating I am sure. 

Here's how they came out...delicious enough, and with the chopped fresh strawberries, (oh and a nice dusting of powdered sugar right before serving,  that made it! The ones that were in the fridge were even better.

Cake #33 - USA USA USA! 

This is actually an older 4th of July fondant cake...actually 3 of them...made by Shannon. This is either 2022 or 2023, but isn't it cute. She used cookie cutters for the letters, ready made fondant for each of the cakes and cut strips on the blue/stripes one, and stars on the other. 

Cake # 32 - Cupcakes for Cal State Fullerton LaCrosse event (that bombed out due to rain). So we had all these lovely CSUF school colors (blue/orange) colored cupcakes to share with family! If they hold it again, we will just make more!

 

 

Cake #31 - Shamrock Cake

Cake #31

This was made for Shannon and Kasey's engagement party on March 12, 2023, an Irish-themed one, right around St. Patrick's Day. And of course being the Patricks, we had to do it right. The model for this was a napkin ring that had been on my table since we started decorating for St. Patrick's Day. I looked at it and thought that's such a pretty sparkly version of a shamrock and then realized I had a heart pan so I could probably duplicate it relatively easily... and on short notice since Shannon forgot to mention her desire to have the cake until a few days before. 🙂😘

 This was a simple white cake done in the heart-shaped pan which I had to do four times the day before I decorated. I also created the middle with a small round pan and left the raised tops on rather than cut them off since that seemed to go well with the pedal theme of the shamrocks.

The tedious part was the decorating because except for the center, they were all covered with a star tip. I used a bigger star tip though hoping to cover more territory more quickly. The sides were also a little challenging because by the time I got to the sides the buttercream had softened quite a bit and it was not as nice a star coming out. I did make my standard buttercream though a little more powdered sugar than usual and actually with 1/4 of the butter substituted for shortening hoping again to give it a little more stiffness. Not sure that really worked that well. Next time I might do half and half or just more powdered sugar to solidify it as I don't really like the taste or texture of the shortening frostings.

I intended to crumb coat them first and then frost them with the star tips but just didn't get around to it. So I put the cakes in the refrigerator ahead of time which helped a little.

The centerpiece doesn't show that well in the photo that it is coated in edible gold glitter. It really came out pretty and didn't taste any different than if it were plain sugar on top. Actually you really couldn't taste it at all. The glitter was expensive so you would have to use it sparingly. I haven't worked with the glitters that much but I liked this effect for sure so I will definitely do it again. I did buy some alternate forms of it including some gold dust and a spray on gold glitter which I will probably try next time.

When I was done decorating, I moved enough junk out of my freezer temporarily into a cooler (which lol I forgot to put back in the freezer until the next day) that I was able to freeze all four after they were decorated. That made transporting them the 45-minute drive to the venue less challenging. That was something I considered when deciding on the design, that I really had to have it in multiple pieces in order to transport it. (I did have to buy the gold plates it was on and although it was pretty the roundness sort of detracted from the cloverleaf shape of the cake itself.) I also happened to have three cake takers, and one that I could stack and fortunately the hearts fit the smaller stacker and everything arrived pretty intact.

I do wish I had made one more piece for the stem, probably an 8x8 square and then carved it into the shape of the stem but I just ran out of time and energy. All in all I thought it came out pretty well this shamrock, four-leaf clover, Irish, St Patrick's Day, engagement party cake and my estimation of how many pieces I would get out of it was right on target. One piece left at the end. :-) congratulations Shannon and Kasey.

Cake #30 - Duplicate of #18 (oops)

 Boot and Cowboys. School dance...Let's start with the ponies.....then the hats...then the boots! 2015.

 

 

COOKIES IN A BUCKET OF 'SAND' BROWN SUGAR! (Filled it with other filling first, (junk newspaper etc., then saran wrap and the last 2 inches were the sand. 

Cake #28 - Wedding Sunflower Cupcake Bride and Groom Cake project

Cake #28- Wedding Sunflower Cupcake Bride and Groom Cake project

 

This was one  of my most ambitious projects in quite some time,  but I loved it. I was asked to do a wedding project that started out as 36 sunflower themed cupcakes (no problem) but which turned into 140 cupcakes and settled down at 120 plus a double layer 8" bride and groom cake (you know the one that is usually the top tier of the wedding cake that the bride and groom put in the freezer until their 1st anniversary.)  Half were to be plain white frosted and the other half decorated as sunflowers. The vision of the wedding planner was to fit the Fall country style of the wedding, and included a gorgeous display of a couple of wooden crates among which were scattered the cupcakes with the bride and groom cake on the top, and among the cupcakes were mason jars with tea lights, some string lights, artificial flowers and maybe a photo in a frame or two of the bride and groom. I thought..sure, I can do that! 

The trick was to make sure everything was done fresh, yet ahead of time enough to make sure I had time to decorate everything especially the sunflowers which turned out to be quite labor intensive. Each sunflower was made of one Oreo, or two or three smaller ones. As I  went, I learned the single Oreos stayed on the cupcake tops more securely as the two and three ones tended to bend somewhat in the middle causing the icing to crack. Mostly I just added more icing to cover it up, but some of the small ones got a little thicker than I wanted for this reason. 

At first I intended to frost the cupcakes individually and with a softer but sturdy buttercream/shortening frosting and the pipe the sunflowers onto each individual cupcake. The wedding was to be an evening outdoor wedding, and the weather was calling for monster heat here in CA all week. Thus, melty cupcakes wasn't going to work.As I experimented with a royal icing sunflower, I decided the safest way to create the sunflowers to last was with the royal icing dyed buttercup yellow, and with the leaf tip, piped onto the edge of each Oreo. I did a bottom layer of petals, probably about 15-20 presses, and then another layer of petals on top 15-20 presses, and then the final layer of actual "petals." Needless to say my arm and back hurt by the time I was done with 75 of these 3 petal layered cookies but since I spread it out over time, it wasn't too bad.

(I froze some of them to try to improve the drying but found that just drying on the counter in a fan was good enough and made them very easy to put (adhered with frosting) right to the top of a green frosted cupcake.Using green allowed me to get the "look" of leaves without having to fit more piped work onto the cupcake.)

One day I made 15 of the sunflowers, the next 15 more and the final day, another 30 plus 15. This gave me the extras I needed to put on the Bride and Groom cake to cascade off of the side.

 This too worried me if I would be able to pull that off, as with the heat especially, using anything other than royal icing wasn't likely to stick to the side of the cake. I could see it---beautiful cake made in the shop, but the minute it's transported elsewhere, it slides right off and gets ruined.

The planner initially wanted to pick everything up and didn't seem to want them boxed. I initially wasn't that concerned about "delivery." I just assumed she had like 10 cupcake holders or was borrowing some from someone. I had 3 I could loan, but as I went along I realized transport was going to be a big component of the project that I needed to really consider, lest my hard work all go to waste if she didn't have that many transporters at the ready and they got ruined on the way to delivery.   Fortunately I had bought these awesome cardboard cupcake boxes that held a dozen cupcakes each, (that I would have returned if I didn't need them), but ended up using all of them and they were just terrific. They were only a few dollars each, were easy to assemble, really sturdy, had a glassine top so you could see the cupcakes, AND an insert for the cupcakes, with finger holes at the edges, to help remove the cupcakes without disturbing them. I would definitely buy them again.(Maybe I will put the link here for the place that sells them if I remember.) 

I initially packaged all sunflowers in one box and all white cupcakes in another. Then I realized how big the sunflower cupcakes were in relation to the whites and decided to pack the remaining  boxes with one white cupcake to one sunflower like the photo at the top, such that the sides of the sunflower hardly touched anything this way.  I was sure they would dry better and be more easily removed once they arrived at the destination. 

 The 8" double layer fondant-like smooth frosted cake itself turned out great, though it will presumably land in the freezer for a year now anyway--but I am confident when it comes out to celebrate the first year of marriage, it will still be delicious! 

 

 The bride also wanted some sunflowers spilling down the side of the bride and groom cake, and when I contemplated how to go about it, initially felt the flowers would "run" off the side so they would probably have to be on top.  As I  created the 75 or so sunflowers I ended up using on top of the cupcakes, I found they were so sturdy that they could indeed be placed aside the bride/groom cake, which I understood would rest atop one of the crates so that would be the high point and the cupcakes would cascade down the different crates to the bottom layer. I made a handful of extra sunflowers to use in the event that some of them broke, and had enough left at the end that I thought I would use them all on the cake sides and on the top. I definitely liked the look.

The ribbon on the cake was my least favorite part--at first. I used wired ribbon so it would hold its shape too as it surrounded the bottom of the cake. I felt that would probably be enough to join the cake bottom to the cake plate, but it really wasn't. AND I was really disappointed in myself that I picked the silver mirrored cardboard cake plate bottom, as silver just didn't seem to go with our Fall colors. Oh well, too late! However, I later learned that their floral centerpieces were exactly the same Fall colors in the ribbon, plus silver sprigs of a cattail type of "flower", so it actually looked like it was going to blend/match perfectly.

 But alas after I put it on, the ribbon took on the grease from the butter in the frosting and didn't look so great. I put it back in the freezer until the next day to contemplate my options--when you aren't sure what to do about a problem, do what I do, if you have time--really, just sleep on it. It's funny how ideas do come in one's sleep or by morning.

Thankfully while I had a couple of ideas, by the time I took it out the next day, it actually looked fine as the grease had by then, absorbed into the entire ribbon so that it was not splotchy like it was the day before, and was not noticeable at all. The ribbon merely looked a little darker in color all over, than it did the day before.


So I went with it, and then assembled the sunflowers on the side with more royal icing as my "glue". I felt I still needed a pearl dot border so I added it where the ribbon met the cake plate and after I put on all the sunflowers I had left, I was done.

After the Bride and Groom cake was done I went to work on the cupcakes. Half were white frosted in a thick swirl pattern,  and the other half green frosted like big flat petals. The sunflowers were set atop the green ones and allowed to firm up and dry.

I added a few "ladybugs" here and there by using red M&Ms and painting on black dots.

Delivery in the boxes was super simple and as I understand it they all made it fine to the reception, such that this now become probably my favorite project next to Shannon's Movie Night Birthday event at the theater, see Cake #4  and #4 Revisited where I posted a few more pictures than I did the first time.:-)

Cake #4 Revisited - The Movie Theater Cake

Cake #4 Revisited - The Movie Theater Cake from about 5 years ago.

When Meghan first started this blog some years ago, she put in a small pic here and there. I think the idea was mostly to showcase one cake every couple of weeks/months until all the ones I have ever done and photographed were posted! Ha Ha..like that will ever happen.

So when Cake #4 went up, there was only 2 pics of this rather ambitious project, and while I won't do too much explaining, I did want the pics up here too. It was a fun tiered cake that I was able to frost smooth like fondant, and then decorate like a movie theater event. This happened mostly because I stumbled upon just the right ribbon that I was able to make look like a film reel by leaving it on the spool it came on and just adding some grey and white colored fondant to the top of it. I bent the ribbon back and forth every couple of inches so it resembled the frames of a film reel. Shannon decorated the white bags with the red and white stripes and the popcorn sign.

 I  used mini marshmallows "painted" yellow with food coloring and snipped with scissors twice, to make them look like popcorn inside.