Unknown Gender Baby Shower Cake

I had a request for a simple baby shower cake... one bootie blue, one bootie pink, because the gender was a surprise.  This chocolate cake with chocolate Swiss meringue buttercream was covered in fondant and the cute phrase: "Pitter patter little feet, babies make our lives complete... Congratulations."

Congrats on the wee one's future arrival!

Reptile Birthday Cake

I had less than a week to make a reptile-themed cake for a 6-year-old girl.  Yes, that's right, a GIRL!  I took the order because it was for someone I know plus I thought it was doable (it was finished 12 hours before the deadline... I am a hopeless procrastinator).

The party was being held at a reptile zoo (boy, was it busy for a Sunday!) and I delivered it using the worse roads ever, but the cake arrived intact.

The top tier was vanilla cake and bottom tier was chocolate cake, both filled with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream.  All the decorations were fondant.  I thought it would be cute to have 6 things to represent her age, since she was going to have a number 6 for her candle.  My favourite item was the lizard dusted with gold.

Apparently, the cake was devoured and not even one reptile was left.  That's when you know you have satisfied everyone's belly. :)

Happy 6th Birthday, Victoria!

Summer is Over!

August has come and gone... September is upon us (Happy Labour Day!).  Back to school... but first, here are few orders created during the past week:

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Three Little Pigs Birthday Cake

Little Joaquin turned 3, and the theme was The Three Little Pigs (obviously, lol!).  The fondant pigs were swimming atop of a chocolate ganache "mud" bucket cake.  The chocolate cakes were covered in chocolate fondant "wooden planks" and green fondant.  The filling was chocolate Swiss meringue buttercream (the family loves chocolate).  The evil wolf was made of fondant, with the wanted-poster invite as inspiration.  Little Joaquin savoured biting into the wolf, lol!

Happy 3rd Birthday, Joaquin!

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60th Birthday Cookies

Our friend's in-laws were both turning 60 later this year.  They decided to throw them a surprise party, MONTHS before their actual birthday, lol.  So, I made these teal/white/disco dusted sugar cookies for their favours.

Happy 60th Birthday!

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Sports Birthday Cake

My colleague ordered this cake for Japhet, who turned 13 this year.  He plays football and soccer, so the theme was sports-related.  One layer was chocolate, the other was vanilla, and the filling was chocolate ganache.

 

Happy 13th Birthday, Japhet!

July, Where Did You Go?!

July.. the month that flew by...!  What was I up to... here's a synopsis:

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Red Velvet Cake Pops & French Macarons

I was requested to make some sweets for a wedding... and the bride-to-be wanted macarons and cake pops... in ivory, grey and pink colours.  The macaron Swiss meringue fillings were filled with opposite-coloured shells.

Congrats!

 

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Butterfly Cookies

This design was based off a face painting on the birthday girl... cute! :)

Happy 5th Birthday, Mieke!

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Shoe Cookies

My co-worker was leaving for school in the States (to become a lawyer)!  She's such a fashionista, I made her shoe-shaped sugar cookies with pink outlines in different designs.

Good luck, Jola!

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Hollywood Cake

An 18-year-old requested a glamorous cake for her birthday for her Hollywood themed birthday party.  The stars had to be gold and the other colours had to be red and black.  The red marshmallow fondant was flavoured with black cherry Jell-O.  The top tier was vanilla cake with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream while the bottom tier was chocolate cake with chocolate ganache flavoured Swiss meringue buttercream.

Happy 18th Birthday, Melanie!

50th Birthday Cake

Someone from work wanted a cake for her mom's birthday... her golden 50th birthday.  So, this was the result:

The vanilla cake was paired with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream, topped with fondant and fondant decorations.  Lots of gold accents here: the numbers, letters and stars and wire were coloured with a gold spray; the pearls were gold lustre-dusted.

Earlier in the morning to early afternoon, the weather was horrible... one of the worst conditions you can get for fondant: RAIN.  Luckily, it let up by delivery time, but we still had to combat fondant's Nemesis #1: Humidity.  Good thing I put toothpicks to help keep the numbers upright for the 40-minute (very) bumpy ride because it arrived intact.

I hope the birthday lady enjoyed her surprise cake!

Happy Birthday!

May Days

Did someone say "French Macarons?"

I finally got to take some pics, and here are a couple I made for my father-in-law's birthday...

These almond treats are surprisingly simple to create, you just need a bit of time to wait and the right piping consistency.  I tried a few recipes, but I think I will stick with the no-aging-egg-white method.  I added the colouring as the last step so I didn't have to make so many batches.  I filled it with hazelnut chocolate spread, but could have easily used buttercream or ganache.  YUM!

Happy Birthday, Ralph!

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My son's school had their fun fair and I wanted to do something different... so I decided to donate two dozen sugar cookies in a basket.  I figured, people were more likely to bid on an item they could see in person.  I hope the highest bidder enjoyed it!

Gateau St. Honoré

A long time ago, my aunt-in-law (who loves to bake) requested that I make this cake for her birthday.  I had no clue what this was, so I Googled it.  Lots of images popped up, but I chose a recipe from Food Network Canada's website since it looked the least intimidating.

Her birthday was last week, and I fulfilled her request.

If I added up all the hours I spent on this cake, I would guess 3 to 4 hours in total, which was during a 2-day span (the recipe didn't give any indication of how long it would take... probably because it would scare people from trying it).

The elements include:
l.  puff pastry base (store-bought... I had no time to make it from scratch... apparently the "cake" part)
2. pastry cream with vanilla bean (I burned my hand with the hot cream during whisking) to cover the base and fill the profiteroles (a.k.a. cream puffs)
3. choux paste (I made a double-batch by mistake, had extra to make more profiteroles)
4. profiteroles dipped in caramel (I burned the caramel and had to redo it)
5. topped with fresh raspberries, from scratch whipped cream, half flavoured with raspberry jam (no time to make puree)

For my first attempt, I think I did well... she wished she asked for two! :)

Happy Birthday, Heather!