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Easter Cake

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
I still cant figure out how I don't have the final picture of this cake. But I digress...

Our Easter cake marked a couple of firsts for me.
  1. Basket weave - something I have put off for a long time...but quickly learned there is nothing to it. I would suggest to anyone new to decorating that is going to attempt a basket weave - crumb coat the cake in the same color you are going to make your basket in.
  2. Cereal Treats - I made the easter eggs out of cereal treats. Originally I was going to wrap the eggs in fondant and pipe decorations on them. However, I did not have any fondant premade in the fridge and I was far to lazy after finishing the basket weave. I just frosted them instead. 
  3. Not taking more pictures of the finished cake.....I still can't believe that! Sheesh!

It was not what I had planned exactly, but the kids and guest liked it! It was a very festive centerpiece on the dinner table. 

Thanks for stopping by again! I am really glad you are here sharing in this experience with me.

Until next time...

CHEERS!

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The Star Tip

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
I have decorated a few cakes using only the star tip...they are a lot of fun to make. I pretty basic decorating technique and anyone can learn in seconds. Here are some examples of mine:


The Girl Scout. I made this for Brooklyn's Girl Scout troop. They were having a Halloween party/birthday celebration for the founder of the Girl Scouts.



The Burbank Titans. This cake was a special request for Brooklyn's cheer squad. They were having a "cheer hair party" for a competition the following day. This is what I came up with. The frosting is actually dark purple, but in the picture it looks almost blue.

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Brooklyn

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
Once again, I bit off more than I could chew with this cake! I went idea hunting and found a very nice 3 tier princess cake. All three tiers were tapered and with the top being "quilted". Gorgeous cake! I attempted it...

Shaping cakes is easy to do in theory...but when the knife touches the cake you quickly realize there is no turning back - no do-overs. I was happy with the shape of the bottom 2 tiers; however, the top "quilted" tier was a disaster! I did not even get the chance to try the quilting technique as I had binned the poor cake.

So once again I was back to a 2 tier cake. The outcome was nice though. Brooklyn loved her cake and all of her friends want the same cake for their birthday. One thing I did learn from this was, if a client gives you full creative freedom to make whatever you want for them, if a particular element does not make it onto the cake they will never know (unless you start a tell-all blog - my secrets are out....lol).

So I guess that makes the score: Whimsy Cakes - 2, Sean - 0

I will revisit this cake and the Topsy Turvy again in the future! As always, I hope you are enjoying the stories. Please comment on anything you like (or don't like) so I know you are out there. What do you think of the new blog layout....pretty nice I think.

Ok....I have 20 pounds of fondant to go make...until next time!

CHEERS!
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Payton

Posted by Sean Bordeaux

This past February, Payton turned 1 year old. I had seen a cake that had "painted" fondant the overall effect was very nice. So in my usual "can do" approach to decorating cakes, I attempted the technique. I was not very happy with the out come - not my best work. However, it went over well with all of the guests and more importantly, the birthday girl.

Its pretty straight forward...apply the fondant to the cake, then use your gel color of choice thinned down with water. This technique is much better suited for creating something like wood grain. I used a fondant impression mat that I then filled in with butter cream to make the middle tier. These mats are pretty handy for creating fine detail on the fondant.

This cake, as with all of them, was a learning experience. Thank you for stopping in and reading. I would like to add a little side note: I am not a big fan of advertisements on blogs. I do however like the amazon ads. It allows me to post a specific item. I think this is more of a tool than an ad because those who do not have access to a Hobby Lobby or Michael's can see what I am talking about and purchase the tool direct from Amazon.com. I will not do this often...just when there is a special or new tool I used in the creation of the featured cake.

Until next time...

CHEERS!

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Cheyenne

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
Our good friend Priscilla asked if I would make a cake for her daughter's birthday. She gave me full creative freedom, just asked that purple, black and white be incorporated into the design. In my mind I thought that purple and white would be no problem....but black?! I had never even made the color black.

I did attempt to make black fondant! It proved impossible. Even using gel color, the amount needed to change the color to jet black was turning the fondant into a gummy mess, and I think anyone that had eaten it would have had black teeth for weeks. 

...Back to the drawing board...

Michelle had come up with the idea of making the shell boarder black to separate the layers. EUREKA! What a great idea. The butter cream was difficult to bring to black, but I kept working at it and found mixing purple and black gels made a perfect jet black. At any rate, this cake still came with a disclaimer to avoid eating the black icing or discolored lips and mouths would ensue.




I also experimented with "shimmer dust". This stuff is expensive but well worth the cost and time it takes to apply. You almost needed sunglasses to look directly at this cake (well that may be an exaggeration...but it was beautiful). Another new addition that this cake helped add to my repertoire were the "shooting stars". They were made out of fondant and applied to the cake with floral wire. Pretty nice effect!

Well thats the story behind this cake....I am trying to get you all caught up. I should have started this blog 2 years ago. I do have a graduation cake to make for this Saturday, then a birthday cake and another graduation cake. I will try to get some more of the old ones posted before I add the new.

Thanks for reading!

CHEERS!
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Congratulations Graduates 2009!

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
By this time, word of my cakes had traveled around our close circle of friends. I was asked by two of our friends, Anna and Danielle, to make graduation cakes for their kids. I was honored! These would be the first cakes I would create for others.

First was Evan and Anna's son, Little Evan. Evan was graduating from the 8th grade. He is truly one of the best all around kids I have had the pleasure of knowing. He is an athlete, musician, and Nation Honor Roll inductee. Just an all around great kid!


The cake was a 14-10-6 3 tier cake. The school colors are blue and white. The middle tier was gold with stars to honor Evan's induction to the National Honor Roll. We were all very proud of him.

My best friend in the whole world asked me to make her a cake for her graduating kids. Kayla was graduating High School and CJ was graduating 8th grade. This cake proved challenging...the school colors were different (Reavis: Navy and White / Liberty: Red, White and Blue).



It was not my goal to have this cake look like a 4th of July cake...but that is how it turned out. Also, I did not have a star cutter for the middle tier. So they were all cut out by hand. I did attempt the mortarboard cap for the top tier; however, the fondant was not cooperating and I ended up ditching it. 

This cake also marked a new filling: chocolate fudge butter cream. Really good but almost ended in disaster as it melted between the layers in my hot kitchen.

Sorry for the short post! These were pretty straight forward cakes and nothing major happened that stands out in my mind. I would imagine thats a good thing for me...but does not make for an interesting read...lol



Stay tuned...you will be able to laugh at me soon enough!

CHEERS! 

<------
PS:  Sheesh...nice of Amazon.com to place this =)

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EPIC Fail? Almost!

Posted by Sean Bordeaux
With several cakes under my belt, I decided it was time to up the difficulty level. Apparently I believed "anything you can do, I can do better..."! Brittany had just graduated High School and we were throwing her a graduation party. I searched the internet high and low for the perfect cake to recreate...and I found it. 

Picture from pinkcakebox.com


This is a very whimsical cake. They are typically called Topsy Turvy or Mad Hatter cakes. I quickly learned I had bitten off more than I could chew.

Needless to say my mind was set...I was going to create a Topsy Turvy! The amount have cake it took to make this cake still floors me to this day...and mind you...this was not only my first attempt and a whimsy cake, but my first attempt at ANY tiered cake...period. Ya...looking back this was foolish. 

I started baking the layers a few days in advance and freezing them (mistake #1). Once it came time to assemble the cakes, I took them out of the freezer to defrost. I crowned the layers and noticed that the centers were still cold but not frozen. I decided to go ahead filling, carving, and crumb coating the tiers (mistake #2). I began noticing that the cakes were sweating though the crumb coat...there were beads of condensation. I feared the worst but the cakes dried and everything was fine. I wrapped the bottom tier in plastic and moved it on the turntable to the washer machine (mistake #3). I wake up the next morning to find the bottom tier in the wash sink. "Someone" had moved the cake to add a load of laundry into the washer. The *facepalm* moment comes when that "someone" returned the bottom tier to the washer....the cake survived the wash cycle but I am guessing the spin cycle proved to much!

Well there was not enough time to re-bake the tier. So we moved forward with a 2 tier Topsy Turvy. Everything went off without a hitch after the washer incident. There were a few things I did learn from this cake. Notice how the blue fondant looks cracked? It turns out this is a result from using corn starch as a dusting agent on the counter to roll the fondant. I have since switched to Powdered Sugar and never had this problem again. Also to maintain with "school spirit" I colored the cake of the middle tier (now the bottom) blue. The idea was good in theory; however, it turns out that blue is a very unappetizing color to eat.



I can't help looking back at these early cakes and laughing. The tools I was using...its amazing to me I was able to make anything. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed reading this. I am finding it therapeutic telling the story behind my cakes. Stay tuned...more to come...

CHEERS! 
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