Golden Inspiration Wedding Cake

Edible sequins are one of the new big trends in cake design, at least with Chattanooga wedding cakes  We shared one a few weeks ago that had "large" sequins but now we have one with tiny sequins.  I'm just going to say it, I used A LOT of gold! But it's SO pretty! We baked and iced a 6/8/10/12" combination in all buttercream.  We created the lines with a little pairing knife dipped in warm water every few minutes.  The borders were fondant and the sequins were colored quinns painted gold.

 

You can get a five pound container at Pfeil and  Holing.  Don't kid yourself, 5 pounds is a big container; it should last you a while!

We bought a bunch of these flowers to make the cake more economical for the bride.  As usual, my favorite flowers are the big pretty garden roses from Cal-Java.  They are SO big and pretty and they really popped against those gold sequins!  I hope you get a little bit of golden inspiration from this pretty cake!

Our Cross Country Cake Adventures

 A few months ago I was approached with a rather odd request... make my nephew's wedding cake.  Now I know that upon first read that doesn't seem terribly odd, but let me finish... his wedding was going to be in New Hampshire, and I live WAYYY down south in GA.  Yeah, see?  But Sean and his fiance Kirsten were such a cute couple that I just couldn't turn them down.

Delivering a fully decorated wedding cake 17 hours and and little over a 1000 miles away can be a daunting task and honestly one that I didn't feel I (nor my cake) was up to.  So several months ago I started formulating a plan to actually make the cake there.  The venue where the wedding was held was an absolutely gorgeous working orchard named Allyson's Orchard.  I spoke to Fran, the venue manager about my dilemma, and she graciously offered me their kitchen space to work on the cake all week long.  The kitchen had the essentials, oven, sink, and refrigeration, but any other tools I needed I had to bring with me!  GULP!

So I went back to the drawing board, because everything we were bringing (Chaddy and I, a weeks+ supply of clothing, and all the components we needed to make a cake had to fit in our Honda CRV.  It's not a compact car mind you, but it's no stretch limo either!  So I made the decision to bake the cakes and make the icing before we left and freeze them.  That way, the only "major" appliance I would need to bring would be a Kitchenaid mixer to re-whip the icing.  I would place all the wrapped frozen layers in our big marine cooler along with some disposable ice packs (the kind I get when I order chocolate) and we would just stack, fill, ice, and decorate on site.  Theo couple had chosen a mud cake, which is very dense, so I really did feel that the frozen layers would hold up to the drive.  I also began the process of making the gumpaste flowers and wrapping them to thwart the nastiest, kickiest delivery driver.

 

Well, Sunday morning came and we packed everything up in the cooler, along with our 2 suitcases, and our Rubbermaid tote of kitchen goodies and we left the sweltering Georgia heat on our way to New Hampshire.  We left late because we were up late the night before, so we made it to Frederick, MD (my sister and the groom's Mom's home) really late Sunday night.  I was somewhat worried about the contents of the cooler, but the outside felt cold, so I decided to not risk opening the lid and letting any cold out and just let it ride.  We visited with my sister for a few minutes and hopped in bed.

We awoke (late) the next morning and after a quick shower and breakfast, we were back on the road to New Hampshire.  We drove at a good clip, made a few stops for food anf fuel along the way, and reached our hotel late Monday evening.  I thought I had never been SO tired of being in the car!  We stayed in Keene, NH and was a pleasant surprise it was!  We were within walking distance to downtown and we explored it pretty extensively during our off times.  But I digress...

Tuesday I called Fran at Allyson's orchard and she agreed to meet us and show us the kitchen.  It was a very nice catering space and I knew it would work well, as long as everything had fared well in the cooler (which had STILL not been opened since Sunday morning at this point).  We got the cooler inside, opened it, and believe it or not, everything was still VERY cold.  Those disposable ice packs were still mostly frozen.  The cake gods had indeed smiled upon the work I was trying to do.

I made gumpaste blueberries!

We pulled out the layers and let them thaw a little more while we unpacked our kitchen and got setup for the week.  Over the course of the next few days we worked on the cake a little each day, just like normal, stacking, filling, making the textured bands, and coloring those gumpaste flowers.  When we left the orchard on Thursday the cake was all done and we had the whole day Friday to spend with the rest of the family. who had now joined us at the same hotel in Keene.  It was like a mini family reunion.

I made an extra trip over to the venue on Saturday to set the cake out in the venue space (just a few steps away from the kitchen space I had been using) so that the caterer's would have all the cooler / kitchen space they needed.  A quick trip back to the hotel for a freshen and a change and it was ceremony time!

Now I go to a lot of weddings, but we're there while the linens are going on and the DJ is setting up; We rarely get to see ANY of the wedding, and especially not the ceremony.  It was nice to get to witness all the love and all the pieces of the puzzle fit together so nicely.  Sean and Kirsten had a beautiful ceremony outside by the lake and then the reception with a crazy good BBQ dinner.

When you start adding up gas, mileage, and all the other expenses, this was definitely the "most expensive" wedding cake I have ever made, but I wouldn't have changed it for the world. The new Mr. and Mrs. Seymour loved it, and I loved seeing the smiles on their faces all throughout the night.

And even though I like to preach that other decorators shouldn't take orders they don't know how to do, the lesson to be learned is that it's OK to stretch your wings and go outside your comfort zone on some occasions, just as long as you have a good game plan!

A very special Thanks to Fran and the entire staff at Alyson's Orchard for extending their hospitality, sharing their beautiful facility, and making my task much easier!

Pleated Fondant Wedding Cake

We have done a few cakes like this, but I do have a little advice and "new thoughts" on the technique of the pleated fondant.  I've noticed on some of the FB cake groups I'm in that a lot of people ask how to do this look.  Many people are doing a version of it by cutting several angled pieces of fondant and layering them on top of each other.  It's a much flatter look.   There is nothing wrong with that version, but it's not the same as trying to make the fondant look like pleated fabric.  If you are brought a picture like this cake but don't make it the same way, out of one piece of fondant, the look will be very different.  BEFORE you sign a contract saying you will do it , try it on a cake dummy so that you can prove to the bride and yourself that you can get the same look.   If you are a customer and you aren't SURE your baker can do something, offer to pay for a small trial run, like a top tier size. 

This cake was made using 3" styrofoam  cake dummies in between the tiers.  I painted all the flowers with an airbrush ahead of arranging them.  The flowers we stuck in if they had wire, but most were "glued" in place with royal icing.  My advice here is use as many different size flowers as you can so that you don't have blank spaces.  I  have been known to make a few roses petals and squeeze them in when the are soft so it looks very full.  We also airbrushed the dickens out of this cake when it was all stacked and ready to go!  My bride wanted a pearl finish so she got it!

Anytime you have a tier of cake floating above flowers you have to deal with hiding the edges of the cake boards.  For me, ribbon is the answer because it is not heavy and you can pull it tight so it doesn't sag.  Buttercream borders can fall off due to gravity, as can fondant pearl borders if they are large.  Have you ever noticed that when the bakers in Europe make this type of cake, they still have a larger cake board under each tier?  So a 6" cake would have an 8" cake board, then a 10" cake and 12" board, etc.   I don't like the look myself, but it sure would be easier! 

                                                  

*I owe you a close up picture.  I accidently deleted it :(

Gumpaste Flowers... Buy or Make?

 Do you buy any of your gumpaste flowers?  Let me guess!  If you are a cake hobbyist, you make your flowers.  It's fun and challenging and your time does not equal money.  If you sell cakes professionally, I will guess that you buy at least some of your flowers.  Why would you not?  Are you some sort of flower purist? Do you think it's cheating? I made some beautiful ranunculus for a magazine shoot and they took me eight hours per flower! 

When I meet with a bride, I ask if they want flowers and then if they want fresh or sugar flowers (they don't know what gumpaste flowers are...yet).  They will often hesitate and I fill in with "I buy most of my flowers and they are often close in price to fresh flowers".  At that point, they are interested.  If I said the flowers would be three times more than fresh, I'd hear "I'll just use fresh".  There is a rare bride in Chattanooga that would not baulk at a handmade flower price, but as I said that is rare.  On some cakes, I really want to use gumpaste flowers so I will make it even more attractive, as in price.  I charge the cost of the flowers plus shipping and the time and supplies it takes me to paint them (if needed).  I include extra flowers in the price to allow for breakage.  If I have to buy a flower that I will never need the extra (5 for the cake and have 4 left) then they pay for the whole box because that is still fair.  If you book a cake in January with gumpaste peonies, order them then because they will be out of stock when you need them.  Just write on the box of flowers so you don't accidentally use them on another project.  We also will make extra petals to add some softness and fill in gaps between flowers. 

 

The flowers from the pictured cake were bought from Cal-Java and Wholesale Sugar Flowers.  The challenging part was that the cake was ivory/yellow because that is the color of my buttercream (with whitener added) and all the purchased flowers were bright white so they had to be painted.  Luckily, I could paint them with the airbrush so that cut down on my time. 

We entered a contest and won so our cake picture is one the front (and some inside) of the Wholesale Sugar Flowers catalog.  We really like their flowers and the prices! Please let us know how you sell your gumpaste flowers and if you make them, buy them or a mix of the two. 

A Tale of Two Shoes....

There are a lot of shoe box cake tutorials out there, so I won't bore you with another.  I do want to give you a few helpful hints I learned on the first, wait...actually second shoe I have ever made.  How have we gone this long and never made a shoe cake?  Just lucky?  Nah....just kidding it was fun.  I was instructed by the buyer that I could change the shoe a little (thank goodness) and add a red sole to the shoe bottom.  Oh those pretty, sexy shoes!

My first attempt - Everything was way too thick!  Don't do this!!

 The first thing I did was to buy a shoe kit from Jennifer Dontz.  I guess that is pretty lazy or spoiled of me but it sure did make things a bit easier.  Really, the styrofoam form was the biggest help, but I'm sure it could be done with a posterboard form or something else the shoe tutorials advise.  The shoe in my inspiration  picture had a black sole and a cream insole.  Now I had to add a third layer to this and still make it look delicate.  My first attempt was bad, just bad (see below!).  It was too thick and looked silly when you look at it from the side.  I decided to get my pasta machine out to get things nice and thin.  I rolled all three layers of gumpaste (50/50 mix) as thin as I could on the cream and red, but a little thicker on the black.  I put the three layers together and gave it a little roll and cut out the sole.  I did go back and paint the little bit of red showing on the sides so it would look more seamless. Easy squeezy!

This is WAY too thick and not delicate at all.  The pasta roller helped!

The ankle strap in the inspiration picture was crazy!  It was sticking way up it the air!  I really could not make it happen and I hate that.  I told the customer up front that I probably could not duplicate the crazy straps so the pressure wasn't crazy like if he expected it.  I tried putting a wire in the straps, but thin wire was too wimpy and thick wire was too bulky for the look of the straps I needed.  In the end, my straps were just gumpaste with no wires.  I used some rhinestones from the scrap booking department that already had glue dots.  Handy!  No one was going to eat the shoe so why not?

To hold the straps in a gravity defying position, I poked two sets of skewers in either side of the styrofoam mold.  Then I took a long piece of scotch tape and wrapped around each set of skewers.  This gave the straps something to rest on while drying.  I let the shoe set up for a couple days before the straps and then for another six days with the straps installed.

For traveling with the shoe, I got a 10x10 box, cut the top off and put a 10" square cake board in the box for stability.  Since I use grippy/shelf liner under everything, I added a good piece on the cake board.  I left the shoe on the form and put it on the cake board/shelf liner and anchored it down by gently hammering (with my baby hammer) with 2" pieces of strong floral wire (Wal-Mart type).  I didn't want to ruin my expensive piece of styrofoam ;)

 A very sweet friend of ours gave us a glorious recommendation to his good friend.  Unfortunately he doesn't realize that we really only make wedding cakes.  I just felt like I had to make this shoe box cake.   We were given a picture to follow very closely.  I wish I knew the original cake artist.  If you do, please let me know so that I can credit them.

Buttercream Comb Cake and Comb Tutorial

 You guys know that I'm all about some buttercream cakes and when I can duplicate a fondant design in buttercream, well I'm just about the happiest girl on the block!

I made this dummy cake a few weeks ago (so this is actually royal icing, but it still works with the good stuff) and I wanted it to have the look of fondant strips.  It took me a while studying a few I found online in order to figure out just how I needed to make my "grooves" to give me the exact shape I needed.  Then on my first pass I used it upside down!  But it still looked neat, so I realized that I got two looks from the same comb.

So How Do You Make It?

Well, I had several freebie plastic bowl scrapers that I picked up at a food show a few years ago.  They are flexible, but still still sturdy enough to mold buttercream.  At the time of this writing I haven't found a source for you to get these, but I will keep looking and update the post if/when I find some.  UPDATE:  Amazon has this for about a buck each - looks like it would work.

From there I just used a T-Square to cut the side straight (the bowl scraper was originally very curved) and used a ruler to measure each of the indentations on the comb.  Then I used a Sharpie and my ruler to complete the cuts.

The possibilities of this technique are only limited by your imagination.  You could do waves, or even something like dental molding, just keep in mind that you want your design to remain fairly shallow, as we are taking away buttercream, and there's still cake underneath that really needs that buttercream.

What design would you make if you made your own buttercream comb?

FULL DISCLOSURE:  As a member of the Amazon Affiliate program, I receive a small commission if you buy a product from the links on my blog.  I actually own the products I recommend and all thoughts and opinions are my own. 

Wedding Cakes in Rustic Locales

At least in my area, barn weddings seem to have become very popular.  Maybe the rustic setting is coming back in style, or maybe it's easier on the budget, but I am delivering more cakes to these rustic locales than ever before.  I delivered this cake just this weekend to the barn at High Point Farms.  This design was based on a cake the bride found on The Knot, and I thought it worked very well in the rustic setting.

There are some things you have to be aware if you're planning on having or making a cake for a barn wedding.  There are many types of "barns" - some are nicer than your house; some don't have fully formed walls.  See the light coming through in the background of the photo?  That's sunlight from the outside world.  If you don't specifically know the barn, you should treat it like you would an outside cake.  I recommended fondant for this cake and I'm so glad I did.  When we arrived the barn was cool enough, but it had sawdust / wood shaving floors.  Every time we stepped, you could see sawdust floating through the air.  If I had delivered a buttercream cake, those guests would have had extra fiber in their dessert for sure!

Now for this cake... It was a 3-tier fondant cake, with a rose stencil on the bottom tier, and an extruded rope wrap on the top tier.  The flowers are gumpaste ranunculus in the bride's colors.  The toppers are small corn husk dolls that were made for the bride and groom.

As always, thanks for stopping by and have a great week! 

Cup a Dee Craft Time!

I have had a problem for quote some time.  When I meet with brides and we start discussing gumpaste flowers, they usually will want to see them.  And I'll confess right here and now that I buy a lot of my gumpaste flowers.  I have found that they look better than the ones I make and when I factor in the time it takes me to make them, they are more cost effective for the client (and me!).  So I wind up going into the pantry to pull out box after box of roses, lillies, etc. to show to the bride.  It's an "unelegant" moment to an otherwise classy and elegant consultation.

Then I had the idea to put a sample of each flower into a shadow box.  That way the bride can see each flower up close and personal.

To make your own, you'll only need a few things:

• Shadowboxes to hold all your flowers (I used 2)
• Floral pins, staples, hot glue, or other method of adhering the flowers to the back board
• Wire cutters
• Some gumpaste flowers to display (of course!)

I bought 2 18x24 shadowboxes at Michael's Craft Stores.  They were buy one, get one free so that was a bonus!  The back of the frame is also where you will pin your flowers, but it comes right off!  Word to the wise... when you flip the back over, make sure your hangers are facing the right way, you don't want you flowers hanging upside down!

Start arranging your flowers out on the board.  I tried to line mine up so that similar flowers were together and things lined up as nicely as possible.  Did you ever have to do a leaf collection in grade school?  Channel those memories here!  I found that clipping the wires with my snips made things look a little nicer.

Once you have things looking like you want, you can start affixing your flowers.  I initially used big floral picks/staples, but they didn't really hold like I wanted them to.  I found that hot glue worked best, although I know that sort of ruins my board if I want to rearrange things in the future.  I also found that some of my flowers were a little too big to fit in the shadowbox and got crushed at first. Most of them I was able to manipulate so that they would fit.

Once you have all the flowers arranged, make sure you have cleaned up any gumpaste or wire bits from the board and put it into the shadowbox frame.  Then just mount it on the wall and you will have a very nice display for customers to look at as they pick out flowers for their big cake!

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!