Elephant Birthday Cake

I've never made a sugarpaste elephant so it was nice to make something new. I already have my basic animal shape which I can then change the colour and face to work with said animal so for the elephant it was grey sugarpaste body with the big ears and long trunk. To give it a more girlie look I used a pink powder to give a blush to the cheeks.
The cake was a Victoria sponge covered in white fondant and finished with a blossom trim and Happy Birthday message.

Purple and White Roses Cake

For this birthday cake I was asked to make a Victoria sponge with raspberry jam and vanilla buttercream, cover in white fondant and decorate with purple and cream roses with a Happy Birthday message. I started working on the roses first so I mixed purple fondant with a small amount of sugarpaste to give it more strength and so I could roll the icing thin to give them a more delicate look. I find the best way to make fondant roses is to start with the large petals and build them in a flower forming cup, then add a small rose in the middle to create the open rose. For this cake I made three purple and three cream roses with a mix of large and medium leaves.

 

Christmas Cakes 2013 part 2

These are the two Christmas cake orders I had over the holidays. The first is a giant chocolate cupcake made to look like a Christmas tree. The filling and stump of the tree was chocolate buttercream with vanilla green buttercream icing to create the branch swirls. To decorate I used sweets, sprinkles and fondant gingerbread men.

The second Christmas cake was a fruit cake covered in marzipan and white fondant with a reindeer head and holly decorations. For the reindeer head I used a cutting wheel to create a face shape and then smoothed it to create the final shape which I then placed on top of the cake to add the features. 

Christmas Cake 2013

Over the Christmas period I attended a Christmas market where I made way too much but it was a 5 day market and what I didn't want was to run out of fruit cake and all things festive. It turns out though that Christmas cake is so not popular any more... who knew, I certainly didn't as I'm a fan :-)

A new addition to my Christmas treats are the little Gingerbread Houses which I have finally worked out how to stick them together in a presentable fashion and not with a bucket load of caramel glue which is super messy. I also put together 'Build Your Own Gingerbread House' kits which I sold a number of but got quite sick of being told that a number of supermarkets (who will remain nameless) were also selling build your own kits. My reply was 'well these are home-made gingerbread and not mass produce rubbish with lots of chemicals in so they last for 10 years instead of 3 months' yes I was slightly sarcastic but 5 days of it would send even the most charming of people sarcastic. 

Anywho here's my Christmas collection for 2013  

Bike Cake and Cupcakes

The Bike cake and cupcakes were for friends of mine who recently turned 30 and 36. The bike cake was for Ian who turned 36 and was a surprise gift from Sarah. My brief was very detailed she wanted a figure of Ian with a pint in his hand and sat up against a tree, bench or wall along with a bike in a country pub garden scene.

The figure and wall I knew I can do easily but as soon as she said bike I panicked slightly as I've never made one before. I had a look through all my cake decorating books but they had nothing on bikes so I went to the Internet to see if anyone had any suggestions. I found several options but the one I went with had clear instructions and pictures for ever stage. 

Before I started piping out fondant I printed out a picture of a bike at the size I needed and then placed greaseproof paper over the picture so I could pipe straight onto the picture. The wheels were the hardest part as the spokes are made out of angel hair pasta and painted in a silver dust. I had to make two handlebars as one broke as I tried attaching it to the bike and the peddles broke as well but other than that it was a case of building it in sections, allowing to dry thoroughly and then fitting it together starting with the wheels to the frame, allow to dry and then glue the peddles, seat and handle bars on. 

I finished the pub scene of with a fence around the cake and piped green royal icing around that to look like grass which I also used on on the wall. The final stage was placing the figure and bike on top.

The cupcakes were for Sarah who just turned 30 and her favourite colours are black and pink, the pink is my fault I think I had an influence on her at uni. The flavour of the cupcakes was lemon with a pink vanilla butter cream icing and black flowers, butterflies and a big glittery 30. 

Word of warning: My first batch of cupcakes were ruined due to the black paper cases peeling away after being baked, the second batch I used the metallic black cases which were perfect so be careful when choosing your paper cases, cheap isn't always cheerful!!!