A rainbow sea-themed birthday cake*

Today's cake was for a repeat customer who enjoyed last year's dolphin cake so much they asked for another sea-themed cake. This cake's interior is a 6 colour rainbow filled with white vanilla buttercream. Meant to feed 30 people I created a second tier to hold a sugar paste dolphin and a rainbow. The rainbow was a good test in my cake engineering and it's easy to forget that you always have to work against gravity.

 The final additions to the cake are handmade gum paste figurines. One turtle, a beluga, an orca and a seal pup. This little girl loves her sea animals. Such a fun cake to make.

    

Mod Monkey cake for a 2 yr. old

I sent out another birthday cake yesterday. This time it was a Mod Monkey cake for a 2 yr. old girl. Mod Monkey is not my own design but rather a popular birthday theme package that you can buy online. Here's the link to the hundreds of different items you can get for a Mod Monkey themed party. 

The client had requested a 6" cake along with 18 cupcakes coloured pink and green. The two requirements for the cake were awesome flavour and No fondant. We went with a vanilla cake and a traditional buttercream which is more kid-friendly than Swiss Buttercream. The monkey's face and  No. 2 was created from modelling chocolate. Very yummy.

Finding Nemo "Squirt" birthday cake for a one-year old

The latest cake order I had was so much fun! This order was for a little boys first birthday and I was to make a 3D "Squirt" turtle Cale in red velvet along with 6 large fondant decorated turtle cupcakes and 50 mini buttercream covered cupcakes in the shape turtles. This order took quite a bit of planning but I'm really thrilled with how it turned out.

When the client picked up the cake she seemed happy with what I created and it just so happened that they were holding the birthday party at where I work my day job. Later I was able to talk to the server who did the party and see if everyone liked the cake. My co-worker's eyes went big and she said,"You made that cake?! I took pictures of it because I've never seen a cake like that before." Nice! I asked if there were any leftovers and she told me, "No. I was hoping she would leave me a little cupcake but she didn't." My kids complained of the same thing.

Happy 1st birthday Joshua. I had fun making your cake.

Gluten-free chevron cake

Today's cake is a 6" gluten-free cake I made as a thank-you gift. I'm going to share with you all my pit-falls with this cake as I think it's always useful to learn from someone else's mistakes.

I had bought a gluten-free all-purpose flour mix and mixed up a batch of cake and poured it into two 6" x 2" pans. One pan was a professional Wilton pan and the other was a springform pan I had. I had to bake them longer than was directed but I thought that was normal considering their was no gluten to form structure. The Wilton cake was finished while the springform kept testing unbaked. I mean really unbaked, like wet batter unbaked. I left the cake in the oven for more than an hour and even though my toothpick tester didn't come out clean, I hoped than it would finish baking in the pan. I could feel that the bottom of the cake was getting over-done.

Once the cake cooled I unmolded it and cut off the top. The photo below is what I found. I have never had this happen to me before and I was totally surprised. Now I know.....use the proper metal for the proper cake recipe. Springform pans are for quiches, cheesecake and similar cakes that can't be inverted. 

I had to make up a new batch of cake but I had run out of my AP flour mix. This time I had to create my own mix with tapioca flour, rice flour and potato flakes and hope the it would taste similar to the other gluten free mix. There was a difference in flavour but not hugely. Gluten free AP flour is really expensive so I would like to figure out make my own. Any tips?

from the springform pan

proper cake pan

4 layers crumb-coated in buttercream

Flower made of modelling chocolate

Finished chevron design

 Once I finally had a decent cake crumb-coated, I covered it in marshmallow fondant. The orange stripes are a mix of fondant and modelling chocolate and were added in panels. This is a technique I had never tried before which I had learned through a class on Craftsy taught by Jessica Harris. I highly recommend the courses there.

So what do you think? After all my cake hurdles I was still able to create a pretty elegant looking cake don't you think?