Falling Leaves Tree

Here is another fun cake that I put out for the Craft Show Bakery. It was a fun and simple cake. I am starting to realize that sometimes I can take the fondant pieces and use them on top of a buttercream'd cake and make it look pretty cool. Making fondant pieces is super simple compared to trying to cover a cake in total fondant.

In the end the cake was very cute and sold pretty quickly. I even had someone ask for a second one..........which I would post with this one if I could get the printer to cooperate with me. Dang technology. The second cake I layed the fondant pieces on before they had hardened - so they melded into one another more and they ended up looking more like a cap of fondant laying on top of the cake. It was very cool - oh, and I also painted the pieces with gold glitter - so they twinkled a bit.

This cake was Pumpkin Spice with a Cinnamon Buttercream icing and Vanilla Fondant pieces over the top. Very delish!!

With a Cherry On Top

How TOTALLY cute is this? I saw this in a picture and thought, "Hey I have some leftover brown and red fondant!!" and I needed to decorate a few cupcakes for a "thing" so why not.

I used a cute cake paper that lent itself to Ice Cream Sundae (or was that just in my head - I mean the paper is perfect right?)........and topped it off with a buttercream to look ice creamy.......and then fudge and a cherry. There was also a surprise on the inside - Cinnamon Cream Cheese Filling - yummmiiieeee!!!

Too Cute!!

The cupcake is a White Cake filled with Cinnamon Cream Cheese inside - topped with a Vanilla Buttercream and deocrated with Vanilla Fondant.

Chocolate Ganache as an Icing......ooooohhhhhh

I saw something like this in a picture on the internet. No idea what kind of cake it was, but the overlay was a Dark Chocolate Ganache like this one. Then they also had a tree on it in these sorts of colors, but it was all done in fondant.......and I didn't feel much like messing with coloring fondant - sooo soooo sooooo much easier to color buttercream icing.

In the end it turned out very cute. The dark background is a nice change for the effect of colors to play off of. The cake was bought from the Craft Bakery by a friend and she raved about how great the moistness inside was. My guess is that once the chocolate hardened NONE of the moisture got out - keeping it nice and moist inside. She loved it so much that she asked a larger one to share with her family on Thanksgiving. I am totally curious about eating a piece of this cake now.........maybe it will show up at one of my families events. Yeah, yeah, I know - test the things you give away - I do, but not ENCASED in chocolate - I just put a bit of ganache on a piece of cake and tasted - yum - but I think that sitting combined for a few hours like this and then tasting would be way different. You know - that flavor combo of a layer cake after the cake has had a chance to mesh into the icing that is between the layers? That is the BEST part!!

This particular cake was Marble on the inside and Chocolate Ganache on the outside - and buttercream for the decorations.

Perfect Fondant Edges - FINALLY!!

Tah Dah!!!!!! I have been working so hard each time I do a fondant cover to get the edges perfect with minimal cracking......you notice my goal is NOT even to try to keep the fondant from cracking at all......Geez O I would be totally happy with just a little cracking - but generally I get a TON of cracking up the side from the base and or off the edge - but not this time......

I was sooo sooo pleased. And just a few minutes earlier I had been finishing off another cake for the Craft Show Bakery Table and I had been growling loudly enough that Dave shuttled all the children out of the kitchen - possibly for their safety, but most likely just in case a curse word escaped my lips. See the BEAUTIFUL curve over the edge into the base!!!!

Do You Hear that???? Listen really really closely............yes, it is.........Angels are singing that very high pitched song that you hear in movies and stuff when there is a total moment of ZEN!!

AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! Now the real trick.........can I do it again???

This cake was a Pumpkin Spice cake with a Cinnamon Buttercream icing underneath a Vanilla Fondant......yummy!!!! It sold.....yea!

Hostess Wanna Be's

Okay so the last post hinted at this..........but I didn't want to give it away too soon. When I was doing the Baby Shower Surprise cupcakes Dave was lurking around tasting things. He loved the center filling of the cucpakes and noticed that there was some left. I also had chocolate cake batter left and we were headed to a party the next day.............he asked nicely what I might be doing with all that left over stuff. And so I did this for Dave (mostly).

Baked out the batter into cupcakes - hollowed them out using my dorky makeshift tools (I did though go to the store to get a cupcake corer - apparently they are all the rage and the store sold out - can you say Christmas list?). Filled the cupcakes with the yummy goo - but I topped the hole with a tiny bit of buttercream to seal it smoothly...........because.............

I made a Chocolate Ganache and topped the cupcakes with it. The ganache becomes solid and takes on the fudgy texture similar to a Hostess cupcake. But I didn't want the ganache sinking into the hole with the filling............thus the cap.

Then I took some buttercream and made the swirlies. Perhaps I could be sued for copyright - but really isn't the saying......Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery?

And OH MY GOODNESS..........I am not a huge chocolate person, but this cupcake had the perfect blend of chocolate, not too over the top sweet because of the semi sweet chocolate ganache and the creamy filling. I think we will totally be seeing these cupcakes at bake sales!!

These were a Chocolate Chocolate Chip cake with a Cream Cheese Marshmallow filling and a Chocolate Ganache top..........perfect!!

Baby Shower Surprise

Cupcakes are very wanted these days - guess is it the no fuss no mess thing they bring. You can skip plates, forks and only use a napkin for cupcakes. But sometimes the center icing melded into cake part of a cake is the BEST part - so fillings are becoming popular. Often people ask me if I have a giant syringe that I put the filling in with............nope..........I use this.........a candy thermometer sheath and a sharp stick - usually a skewer.

I take a bunch of perfect cupcakes and poke the plastic tube in, twist and pull out the cake. Then use the skewer to make the cake drop out. I get a bunch of cupcakes with holes. Then I fill the holes up.

Cover the top with some fondant and the person biting into them never knows about the surprise........until the hit it. Everyone loves a surprise right?

Now this particular set of cakes was going to a baby shower. And the mom to be had a cute idea of how to surprise the guests in telling them the sex of the baby. Only when she went to her doctors appointment the baby turned on them and hide the surprise of what he/she was. When she called to tell me that she sounded so sad and I felt kinda bad...........so I whipped up some fondant baby bottles to put on top of the cakes. Nothing overly creative - I only had 20 minutes to make 24 bottles. So they are mildly basic - but you get the idea.

So here was what the final product looked like - I didn't put the bottles on because I didn't ask her if I could. Instead I brought the bottles and gifted them to her and let her decide.

Normal cupcake right?

Surprise!!!! It's a boy cupcake!! (Yes I know stereotypes stereotypes)...........

I kept one cupcake back to taste and put a baby bottle on this one for my own use. So - again - normal cupcake.........

Surprise!!! It's a Girl!!!!

Too bad it didn't work out for her - this would have been a super cute thing to do. I hear now that it is very popular.

There were 24 cupcakes. Half were Milk Chocolate with a Chocolate Buttercream icing - the other 12 were White Silk cake with a Vanilla Buttercream icing. The filling on all of them was a Cream Cheese Marshmallow...........tasted a smidge more delicious then the center of a Hostess Cupcake.

Kaylyn's Colorful Cake

Okay this cake STARTED colorful. I mean when I finished with the Red Velvet mix it was popping out of the pan Red!! I had never really completely followed a Red Velvet recipe - always thinking that 2oz of red dye seemed over the top. This time - since it was for a friends daughter - I thought I would go the whole 9 yards. OHMYGOODNESS is this red??

So I totally doused that with some plain old Vanilla Buttercream........to temper that eye popping color. Well and also so that I could add more color that would pop off.

Because Miss Kaylyn is a very colorful and sweet girl. To match her personality it was decided that she would have various colors and a cute whimsical cake. I think we hit that - how about you?

I created a banner out of fondant - the number 14 out of fondant - and then strung some fondant beading onto wire for a kinda fun addition. Although honestly I think another tier would have matched the wire beading a smidge better. Next years birthday right?

This cake was obvious Red Velvet cake and covered in a Vanilla Buttercream and some Vanilla Fondant.