34 posts tagged “cake decorator”
Someone wants a wedding cake for December 13th, so I sat down and did the math and came up with a price tag that would make me willing to do her cake. I am not crazy about the idea, but if she can pay the price tag then I can make the cake. I guess we'll see after she sees the figure. I won't hold my breath. LOL! So in the process I created a flicker account for a few of my wedding cake photos. If you've followed my blog through the bakery saga, then you've likely seen them all already. If not, they may look new. Either way, I'm glad that I have these skills and sometimes it helps pay the bills. What can I say?! flickr photos
I am making a wedding cake. It's my first one ever.
Well, that's not entirely true. I've made so many wedding cakes I've lost count years ago. I made my first cake in the late 80's - maybe 88? Not sure. And most of the time I'm pretty good at it. I'm finally out of the bakery so when someone wants a wedding cake I get to bake the thing myself.
Well… this afternoon I started baking the wedding cake. I'm doing it at church because there are two huge ovens and other great equipment and lots of room. So tonight I am realizing that I screwed this cake up every which way. WHAT?! Am I NEW at THIS? WHAT IS my problem?! (Same as usual – my back is killing me!)
So… I made the banana cake and then a little while later realized that I had too many bananas left over. Hmm… so I cut into the banana cakes and they look fine, it’s just that they don’t have the planned amount of bananas in them.
So… I made the white cake and then a little while later realized (yeah, this sounds familiar so far) that I had the pudding mixes left over. Hmmm… I had intended to use a white chocolate pudding mix in each batch and there they are sitting on the counter top just laughing at me. So the white cake is missing its white chocolate, the banana cake is light on bananas. I think I managed not to screw up the chocolate so far. But there is still time.
When I arrived at the church kitchen to work there was the Mother of the Groom there with her stuff all over the work space. Ok, so I had reserved the space but that doesn’t really mean anything. And the parents of the Groom are paying for the cake. I’m not a big fan of having the client watch the cake making process. I'm already feeling a little strange toward her because she's done a number of things to try to change the order away from what the bride asked for. I had never thought of her as being overbearing or anything but I have observed her making decisions without the input of the bride or groom. I guess I'm working from the bias that it's their wedding. But families are different. I wasn't real keen on starting the wedding cake with her in the kitchen. I already feel a little like I'm going behind her back because I've chosen to take instruction from the bride rather than then her on a few details. She kept putzing around and didn’t leave until I was well into the process. And when I pulled out the olive oil I thought she was gonna freak! Seriously! You should have seen her face!! Olive oil is good for you and I think it does something earthy, rich and marvelous in cake. Not that I could really tell the difference between a canola and olive oil cake in a blind taste test. But anyway. I was glad when she finely left, I found her presence there really distracting.
Oh, did I mention... I knocked two dozen jumbo eggs off the counter on to the floor - kersplat! They were still in their boxes so I only lost a few, but boy that is the stupidest feeling in the world.
I consider baking a cake as part of the creative process as much as anything else I do. I use a cake mix but I don’t follow the instructions on the box. Over the years I’ve developed a formulation that has worked very nicely for me. I add things and subtract things. All that to say, this is a cake mix cake, but it is better than the usual cake mix result. (And cake mix cakes are usually better than scratch cakes, they are lighter and the texture is finer.) Right now I'm feeling protective of that formula. And the mother of the groom peppered me with questions. How many times in the course of a conversation does one have to repeat that the details of my recipe will remain a mystery?! I wanted to just tell her that I wouldn't be answering that question just like I didn't answer her the first five times she asked the question.
The commercial dish washer was malfunctioning and it was very distracting. I did’t know what it was doing, but it was really loud and driving me crazy. I had to call hubby to help with that one. He walked in, pushed one button and there was instant silence. Grrrrrr! I was grateful for the relief from that racket but annoyed that it was that simple. If he had told me to push that button on the phone – I could have attained the blissful silence myself. That thing has a three minute cycle. I guess the dishes that were in there for 30 minutes could be considered clean.
And the back is killing me again today. It doesn’t make sense but there ya have it. And I got the lecture from hubby about how something is seriously wrong with me, the little tiny bit of work I’ve been doing shouldn’t result in this big pain… yibidy yibidy. ‘Little bit of work’ my a$$. And it's not that I didn't ask for help this time, I did. He thinks I’ve got to go back to the doctor and on and on he went. I’ve been to the Doc and after a whole pile of tests they don’t know any more about it then they did to begin with. So… what do I have to gain by going back there? I know I could blow another $1000 on tests, and that’s WITH health insurance. I’ve been hitting the pain meds, but clearly not enough because tonight I forgot the bananas and dropped the eggs. And even though I took a cute little blue (not viagra) pill, I'm still really feeling it. What's a girl to do?!
Hmmm… just another day here in the loony bin.
What a lovely morning! I am NOT going to work at the bakery today, which just tickles me PINK! Yesterday my hubby and our friend Ed moved the rest of my gallery display pieces to my studio. A desk, some pedestals and two jewelry display cases. I discovered that these old jewelry display cases are an excellent addition to my work area here in the studio and I’ve already loaded them down with supplies. They were given to me by the man who owns the American Motorcar Company next door – they work on antique cars. And one of them has become my soap formulation center. On the top shelf is my collection of essential oils, the blends I’ve created and some fragrance oils as well. The second shelf is full of all my natural colorants of every description that go in soap. The bottom shelf has all my herbs and exfoliating ingredients that go in the soap. And after the Fed Ex guy comes and delivers the rest of my supplies – I’m going to be in high clover! I’m really excited about getting back in the studio again and into some new adventures. I’ll be posting photos soon of some of the things I’ve already made. I started out making soap at home, but after the collision of soap and food prep, I knew I wanted to move that work to the studio. So what can I say, I think this is going to be fun! I am a Happy Happy Camper!
This cake went by so quickly that I hardly remember that I made it. The highlight is the fondant bow on the top. I made the loops early in the week and they had powdered sugar dots on them. Boss Lady fretted all week that the powered sugar wouldn't come off and I just told her it would be fine and not to worry about it. (Like telling Bush to complete an intelligent sentence with proper pronunciation.) In retrospect I should have gone over and cleaned one loop off so that she could see that it was going to be fine and quit worrying about it but I didn’t. Anyway, the powdered sugar came off fine and the cake came together nicely. The colors were gold and burgundy but I called it peanut butter and jelly. The consensus around the bakery was that those colors weren’t anything special. But the cake turned out fine. With this cake and the one last weekend, I am really tired of doing swirls.
Mary Baldwin graduates a group from their Master's Degree in Shakespeare program - both an MLitt and a MFA. And each year the bakery does a cake for the celebration. And they always want the names of the graduates on the cake. When the client came in she just kept telling me what they did last year and on and on over how great that cake had been. But when I asked her what she wanted this year she wouldn't answer, just told me to do what I wanted. Her only suggestion was to include the names and a fleur de lis. So this was my solution to the problem.
I am supposed to train a new woman to take over parts of my Cake Decorating job. She’s from Martin’s – a grocery store chain. So she’s used to doing the big bloppy sloppy cakes that cost a fraction of what ours do. I hope it works out but I have my reservations. Anyway, I had started this cake and when she saw it you could see how intimidated she got – right off the bat. I really felt for her! Anyway, I walked her through the stages that I went through to make the face and that seemed to help her calm down a little bit. I’ve got to figure out a way to make it work with her because I want out of the day to day decorating there and she’s the only option that I know of at the moment.
I am really happy with how this cake turned out. And when the client saw it she was thrilled. She kept saying it just gave her chills. And I looked at her arms and she actually had goose bumps all over. Now that is a nice compliment if I ever had one. A totally unique compliment I must say!
The second wedding cake of the weekend was much bigger and was at a semi posh local hotel. There were only 250 guests planned, but we made a total of 600 servings of cake for them. The bride’s cake served 255 people, the groom’s cake another 100 or so and then they ordered 250 cupcakes on top of all that. They packaged the cupcakes in delightful little boxes for the guests to take home with them. What a lovely idea. (Unless you are the poor schlep making 250 identical cupcakes!)
The Bride’s cake was a lovely red velvet cake, iced with butter cream and decorated in black colored chocolate swirls. (Red velvet is a pain to ice, it keeps wanting to "bleed" crumbs into the icing!) It was a striking look, the contrast of the colors was very pleasing. I think it would have been a lovely presentation once they started cutting all that red cake! I don’t like red velvet myself, I just feel like I’m doing something horrible to my body by eating that much food color (and it really takes a lot!) but there is no doubt that it is a pretty and delicious cake!
I got all five tiers set in place and all the details finished and then looked around for the flowers for the top of the cake. The florist had cut all the little orchids off the stem and my heart sank. What a stupid move that was, but they clearly didn’t know any better. So I started scouting the centerpieces on the tables to find stems of stuff that I could borrow for the top of the cake. I snipped a few twigs here and there and combined with the orchid blossoms, it turned out very pretty.
The Groom’s cake was his frat emblem on a full sheet cake that was marble white/chocolate inside. It turned out nicely I thought.
And then there were the cupcakes. The Loser cupcakes. At every turn we screwed up this order!
The first screw up happened when the elves took the order. The client wanted an “L” on each cupcake, and the order said they needed to be made out of fondant. BL told me to use a cookie cutter to make them and it wouldn’t be a big deal. I took a look at that cookie cutter and I wondered to myself… it would look better for a child’s event than for a ritzy wedding, but I knew it was the only way to do 250 fondant “L’s” without wanting to jump from the nearest bridge. (Doing a bunch of “L’s” out of Icing would have been quicker and easier but someone up-sold the client fondant – so that’s what I was stuck making.) And with the amount of cake orders I had in addition to the weddings, I was about to pull out my hair anyway. So I started in making these infernal “L’s.” The bride’s mother happened by and BL picked up one of the “L’s” to go show her. I was about half way through making them and I stopped BL by simply saying… “Don’t ask a question I don’t want the answer to!” She looked a little surprised, looked at the fondant “L” in her hand and looked at me, realizing what I was saying. She laughed, put down the “L” and went back to work laughing. I made about 275 of those stupid things the first time around and had to come back and make more because they were fragile and I broke quite a few of them.
Boss Lady is the baker and she just couldn’t keep up this week. (For good reason – because the bread elf is gone and the brownie/cookie elf was on vacation.) So I didn’t start seeing those cup cakes until it had already become crunch time. They were red velvet cake in silver cupcake liners. I had decorated the first batch and as I moved them some went flying off the board, like penguins into the ocean. Those little silver liners are slippery! I lost quite a few with that stupid human trick but it turned out that only one was beyond fixing. So I used some non-slip stuff (the same stuff that they use under rugs to keep them from sliding around) and worked late into the night finishing up the first round of cupcakes. But that was the beginning.
When one of the elves came in the next morning and looked at the cupcakes with all those little “L’s” on them… she dubbed them “the loser cupcakes” complete with full tilt New Yorker attitude and sign language. The name stuck. BL passed an edict that the client must NOT know that we named them thus, so the name really stuck.
I was stressing because the rest of the cupcakes weren’t even baked and they are time consuming. So she started the first batch but forgot to add in the rising agent and she didn’t figure it out until they were in the oven so the next batch of cupcakes didn’t rise. They tasted a little strange and they were very short and dense. She didn’t have much time to bake replacement cupcakes but she finally decided that she would at least try. It turned out that we still had to use some of the red hocky puck cupcakes to finish out the 250, but at least they were finished.
The bride’s Mom and Dad came in to package up the cupcakes. Each cupcake got the royal treatment in a red box with tissue paper and a ribbon with the bride and groom’s names on it. Only the Bride’s Mom wasn’t crazy about my little cookie cutter “L’s.” I didn’t blame her, I didn’t think much of them by that point myself. But it was the morning of the wedding and there they were, all 250 of them. BL scoured the order to see if anyone had written “cursive L” anywhere but there was nothing. It was sad because making cursive “L’s” out of icing would have been so much easier for me. The Bride’s dad just shook his head and told his wife “It is what it is” and everyone decided to be happy about it. (He was a freakin genius!)
They wanted to move the cart that I had put all the cupcakes on. But then they realized that there was no way to get the cart through that part of the bakery, it would just be easier to move them tray by tray. So the Bride’s mom picked up the one tray with the extras on it (that didn’t have the non-slip plastic on it) and I had to catch cupcakes like I was Michael Jordan. Loser cupcakes just kept trying to jump.
It is done and over. I imagine that most of the cupcakes in their pretty boxes have been devoured. It was a beautiful wedding and I’m certain that the new Mr. and Mrs. “L” are enjoying a lovely honeymoon somewhere marvelous. On the other hand, I don’t want to see another red velvet cake for a very long time. And 250 cupcakes? Never again!
And just for the record, it's the cupcakes that were losers, not the people. The people were great. And if you happen to know the lovely couple, remember that I was sworn to secrecy. :) (for all the good that did!) LOL!
This little bitty wedding cake that turned out so cute. This wedding party had about 15 guests and was in a local restaurant. The cake icing was tinted a ginger color to match a paint chip (yes a paint chip from the paint department) that the bride gave us. Then swirls of ivory butter cream finished off the look. It was a cute little thing, it almost looked like it hadn’t quite grown up yet. There was a medallion with a monogram on it that also went on the cake but I forgot to take it with me on the delivery, and then when I went back to deliver that element I forgot to take the camera. Oh well, it was cute without it. The whole cake wasn't much taller than 12 inches, plus the topper. It's an 8 inch, 6 inch and a 4 inch. I'm pleased with it. I think the folks at the restaurant were going to move it, so I hope they didn't destroy it doing that. Oh well, I have to keep reminding myself that it isn't my problem if something happens after I leave.
For a bridal shower where the bride hates pastel colors. They asked for fun, funky and bright.
I was finishing up the order and Boss Lady was standing there looking at the cake. And I said "Yah know, I'd just like to do a row of ants all the way around the border of the cake." She squeeled and laughed and told me to do it. And she promised to take the heat if the client complained. :D So those little black dashes...
This was an interesting project. A woman brought in her cake pan from Williams and Sonoma. They make beautiful things, but nothing a bakery would ever touch just because of the impractical nature of the equipment. This was a case in point. The client wanted the end product to look like the photo on the cake pan. Well, it was naked cake with a few candies glued to it. Cute, but hardly practical. Let that baby sit out for an hour and it would be hard and stale and nasty to eat. Cute but nasty. Hardly the reputation a bakery really needs. So we finally settled upon the idea of making them from Chocolate cake and putting on a very thin coat of chocolate ganache to coat them so that they would not dry out. Some of the detail from the pan was lost but not too bad. So I went back in with the icing to bring out the details and the client was very happy with how it turned out. And who wouldn’t love a chocolate cake frosted in chocolate ganache? Yummmmm!
I made this cute little baby shower cake for a lovely Momma who was tall and blonde and really beautiful with her little baby bump. And they loved how it turned out! I took the designs from the napkin they showed me and made the medallion based on a scrap booking quote. "Little hands and little feet make our life so very sweet."
