The Perfect Pair!

I am overdue for a new post and I have just the cake to use.  This past Friday, I had to pleasure of working with Christina Garrou, who I consider to be a far better cake decorator than myself.  I did my first large wedding cake.  This cake set a few new milestones for me because it was the largest cake that I have ever attempted but it was also the first one that I did for a stranger.  And one day, when I am a fabulous cake decorator, I will look back on this cake as my first real accomplishment but I truly could not have done this one with Christina.  I baked the cakes on Thursday night and let them cool in the refrigerator then on Friday, before Christina came, I iced the cakes and stacked the layers (not the tiers).  When Christina got here, we both start in on the roses.  We figured that we would need about 20 fondant roses to fit perfectly for the design for the cake (more accurately, we needed 9).  We rolled out fondant and cut 1 1/2 by 7 inch strips and began rolling them up to form the base of the flowers.  While I finished forming the inside layer of the flowers, Christina began forming the outside layer.  She is actually brilliant for the way that she went about doing this.  She rolled out fondant in the shape of a circle and placed the base of the flower in the center of the circle and formed the shape around the inside.  Sort of similar to the orange flower on the anniversary cake that I did but thinner and with a rose in the center.  Then Christina rolled out the fondant and showed me a much better way to lay fondant over the tiers of the cake.  My biggest mistake, thus far, is that I do not roll out the fondant thin enough before I lay it over the cake.  Next, we stacked the layers and wrapped red satin ribbon around the base of each tier, put the cake topper in and began positioning the flowers.  Now, to keep the flowers in place, we used pins with pearl tops and pushed them in the center of the flowers.  It added a little flare to the flowers plus kept them in place.   Added a few leaves and, presto, a beautiful wedding cake was born.
        It was truly a wonderful day.  Working with Christina was so much fun that I really want her to consider working with me again in the future.  She is so amazing at what she does and I can learn so much.  I am not quite as fabulous at this whole thing as she is but I am learning and getting better.  Decorating cakes is the most relaxing thing that I have ever done for myself.  For someone that does not sleep and is constantly worrying or stressing about something, it is nice to know that I have found something that keeps my blood pressure at normal levels.  So for those of you that read this little blog of mine, thanks for letting me share my hobby with you.

  

Do baby's love cake?

Do Baby's love cake?  Because if they do, I think that this would be the perfect cake for them.  I am just so excited about tonight's cake.  It took me a total of 7 hours to do this cake but I think that I have found my niche.  I wish that every cake request was for a baby shower cake!!  So tonight's post will be short.  I will share a recipe for Lemon Cake and just post the picture because it really feels like I can put this one in the win column.

Lemon Pound Cake
3 cups of self rising flour
2 cups of sugar
4 large eggs
1 cup of sour cream
1 1/2 sticks of butter
about 2 large lemons (w/ some zest- should be about 1/3 cup)

Cream together sugar and butter in mixer
Then add eggs, one at a time
Next add juice and zest
Gradually add flour
Last add sour cream
Once mixed well, pour in greased pan and bake for about 30 minutes

The Cake wore white

So this cake is very special because it was made for my friend Heather.  Yesterday, my friend Laura and I went to Raleigh to see our friend Heather.  We told her that we were just going to meet her for lunch but we really were surprising her with some gifts for her upcoming wedding.  I guess that you would call it a mini bridal shower because we had a great lunch, close friends, some peach bellinis and a beautiful cake (oh yes, I will gloat about this cake).  
This cake was actually pretty important for me to get just right.  Heather has been a pretty great friend to me and when I was getting married, she dealt with her fair share of phone calls from me being stressed out and as a bridesmaid, she made my whole wedding experience just that much better by being such an amazing friend (I also have to give a shout out to Laura Dough for this).   Laura and I didn't do much but we just wanted Heather to know that she was loved.  Now Heather and I are not the mushy type but this is my blog so I can be any way that I want and I want to be mushy for a minute.  She is the one that introduced me to my husband and my husband introduced her to her soon to be husband so I really feel like we have a special friendship.  Plus, two years ago, we worked on a campaign together in Charlotte and she was really the only one that kept me sane some days.  I am just so happy for her and everything that life will bring for her because she really is such a great person and friend.  And honestly, pretty damn hilarious too!!  So Heather...I dedicate this blog post to you.  You are going to be such a beautiful bride and I really am so thankful to have you as a friend!!  


P.S.  This cake is the bomb.com...seriously one of my favorites :)

This cake soars to new levels

So this weekend I had the honor of making two beautiful cakes for some very special people.  Since I want to give each of them their own blog, I will write about one tonight and one tomorrow night.  
The first cake of the weekend was for a little boy named Evan who turns one on Tuesday.  Evan is one of the happiest children that I have ever been around.  He does not fuss and boy is it easy to make him smile.  It is true what they say, smiling is contagious because being around that little man for just ten minutes will absolutely make your day.  So for his birthday, I did an airplane cake.  The cake was surprisingly hard to make and not my favorite cake but it was such a great challenge and I have learned some new dos and don'ts about making odd shaped cakes.  The first lesson that I learned was: be careful of what type of cake you are using when making a decorative cake.  Thus far, my cakes have been mostly of the pound variety which is a more dense cake making it easy to mold and ice.  The cake that I used for this cake was red velvet which, while it tastes good, is a very crumbly cake.  Plus, to make matters worse, the icing that goes with red velvet cake is made with cream cheese.  And here comes the second lesson: be careful which icing you are using when decorating a cake.  Buttercream is the best icing to use if your end goal is to have a pretty cake.  Do not expect to have the most beautiful cake if you are going to use cream cheese icing because it is sticky.  Now that may not be the most descriptive word but I can not really think of a better way to describe it.  Buttercream is light and it spreads smoothly and evenly but cream cheese icing has a mind of its own.  But the biggest lesson of all: Do not do a very difficult cake for your first uniquely shaped cake because you will be heartbroken if it is not perfect.  Try a car or a train first.  There aren't as many curves to work with so your blood pressure will not skyrocket.  An airplane is not for amateurs like myself.  With that being said, Erin, Lane and Evan seemed very happy with their cake and that is really all that matters.  Seeing that little guy smile brought my blood pressure back down and made all the frustrations seem totally worth it. 


So Happy Birthday Evan!!  I can't wait to find out what cake I will be making next year.  I hope that two year olds are into iphones because I've got that one down pat.  :)

The key ingredient to a happy life...

So I just baked two cakes this evening...one for my friend Erin's baby boy and the other is a surprise for the recipient so I will reveal later.  But for my friend Erin's little one, who turns one on March 8, I am sooo honored that she asked me to make the cake.  I have not finished it yet so I will not post any pictures until this weekend but I had to write tonight.  


Baking cakes is so therapeutic for me.  Sometimes I cry and sometimes I laugh but by the end of the whole process, nothing makes me feel better about myself.   There is such a sense of accomplishment in doing something that you know other people will enjoy.  And, even though I gripe about this, Bryant always comes in the kitchen to help.  Normally the help annoys me because he has a tendency of taking over my projects but still, it is nice to share it with him.  There aren't many cakes that he hasn't had a hand in, figuratively, of course.  
Recently, we have been trying to find some hobbies to do together.  My friend Kim does some really fun and quirky stuff with her husband and I think that Bryant envies that because he keeps stealing their cool ideas.  Like this past Sunday we went geocaching.  Now for those of you who do not know what this is, I will explain; it is a website that gives you GPS coordinates to a location with a box that has all different kinds of treasures.  Not exactly my thing but he really enjoys it.  
Another thing that he wanted to do was start a book club together.  I have to admit, I am in a another book club and I have to read for school so I have not been all that great at participating in our couples book club.  But I have to say, of all of hobbies that we are trying to do, nothing is better than having him interested in one of my hobbies.  I love that I get to share baking with him.  So, since baking cakes makes me happy and Bryant makes me happy, tonight I am going to just post some pictures of cakes that I have baked with my husband!


P.S. The Family Law book cake is from our wedding.  It was the groom's cake.  I have to say that I feel pretty witty about that one.  For our wedding...Family Law...Bryant is a lawyer...Morrison is the author...funny right?  :)