‘Hunter’ Guitar Birthday Cake

Guitar Birthday Cake

This weekend I got to make a special cake for a very special person…my brother! For his party, he asked that I make a cake replica of one of his guitars. So, this was the final result!

The cake was fun to make and I think it came out as close to the original as I could have accomplished. The cake itself was my Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake that I covered in Satin Ice White/Vanilla Fondant.

The body of the guitar was all cake (I used a template that I traced and cut to fit the shape and design of the guitar & carved the cake to the specified dimensions), with the neck being cardboard that I cut to fit a drawn

Neck Detail

outline and covered in fondant, airbrushed, and added detail to mimick the design on my brother’s actual guitar.

The ‘strings’ were made of Royal Icing that I tinted with Silver Airbrush Foodcolor (The Duff Goldman Brand).

Happy Birthday Hunter!

Monsters, Inc./Fall Themed Birthday Cake

Sully Birthday Cake

Alongside my friend Shayla’s birthday, I also got to make a super cute and very special cake for a sweet, sweet little girl named Sierra.

After talking to Mom and Dad (and Shayla too!), we decided that we wanted to do a cake and cupcake tower to go along with a Monsters, Inc./Fall theme for the Birthday Girl. So, with that in mind, I decided to make a topper (I used an 8 inch cake, instead of a typical 6 inch round) that featured Sully as the centerpiece, since he’s one of the Birthday Girl’s favorite Monsters, Inc. characters.

To accomplish my plan, I first made an 8 inch cake that featured Traditional Vanilla Cake Batter with Vanilla Buttercream on the inside. I then proceeded to use a color scheme that matched Sully, to make sure the theme of the cake was uniform. To get the blue fondant, I simply took some Satin Ice fondant (you can order this online at www.thebakerskitchen.com or www.amazon.com) and colored it to match the blue hue that I desired. Since Sully is light blue, I figured this would be the best foundational color for the cake. So, with this accomplished, I wanted to add some detail to the cake that incorporated some fall colors, as well as sticking to the Monsters theme. I decided to use some simple circular cookie cutters to make varying sizes of dots in dark blue, orange, and purple. For the border of the cake, I simply colored some Vanilla Buttercream in both light and dark blue and piped a scallopped border followed by a Grass Tip to make the “fur” detail.

The main guy on top however, took a bit more effort! To make Sully, I decided to use Gum Paste instead of fondant, since Gum Paste will dry and hold its shape much quicker. After coloring the fondant, I hand- molded Sully’s body and used a Wilton decorating tool to give the illusion of fur. I then proceeded to mold Sully’s head, create eyes, a nose, horns, and eventually moved onto the arms. To attach the arms, I molded the Gum Paste into the shapes that I wanted, and then used toothpicks as supports to secure the arms into the trunk of his body. To ensure that the arms stayed put, I supported them with some left-over fondant I had wrapped with Cling Wrap. (You can use anything as a support while the Paste dries). I then used the same Wilton decoraing tool to make fur indentations, as well as secure the arms to the body by mashing the Gum Paste together, thus closing any cracks in the Paste. The trunk of his body was also secured with a skewer that served as a support when I put him on top of the cake.

I wanted to give the illusion that he was jumping out the cake, so to accomplish this I took some fondant, cut out wave-shaped pieces, and placed them around him to look like he had jumped through the top of the cake. To finish, I used Vanilla Buttercream, dyed dark blue, to write a Happy Birthday greeting.

Monster-Themed Cupcake Tower

The cake was accompanied by 40 cupcakes, consisting of Vanilla and Chocolate Cake Batter with a mixture of Vanilla and Cream Cheese Frostings. The cupcakes featured monsters, as well as Fall decor to match the theme of the party.

The cupcakes were assembled on a Cupcake Tower that was set up at the party. These towers are easy to assemble and inexpensive. If you’re interested in buying one for your next party or event, they are available online at www.efavormart.com and multiple other sites on the web.

Happy Birthday Sierra and happy baking!!

Peace Sign ‘Shayla’ Cake

‘Shayla’ Peace Sign Cake

This weekend I had the priveledge to make a few cakes for some very special friends of mine… One of them being my friend Shayla. 🙂

I have known Shayla since our Freshman year of High School, and she absolutely loves peace signs! I’ve told her for years that if she had been born in the 60s-70s, she’d have been a Flower Child, Tree Hugger, or all of the above! Lol! (Shayla, you know I love ya!).

So, with some help from her ‘adoptive family’, we decided to make her a cake that was totally Shayla. Thus, the Peace Sign/Flower Power Cake was created. The cake itself was Marble Batter (Chocolate and Vanilla) with Vanilla Buttercream. The cake was decorated with Satin Ice Fondant that I colored in Electric Green (Lime), Hot Pink, Orange, Yellow, and Purple. I used Daisy Cooker Cutters to create the flower detail on the sides of the cake, and simply rolled out Fondant ‘pearls’ for the border in alternating colors. To complete and personalize the cake, I used my Cricut Cake Printer to create the lettering used to spell out the birthday girl’s name.

Oh, and how could I forget to mention the peace sign?? To create it, I simply rolled out some fondant and used an 8 in. cake pan to draw a circle the same size as the top of the cake. I then transferred the cut-out to the top of the cake, used a stencil I had made of a peace sign, and cut out the middle sections with an exacto knife. I then simply pulled away the top layer of fondant to reveal the peace sign!

This cake was fun to make and it’s a great cake to make if you’re starting out in the baking arena!

*You can order the food coloring used for this cake (Americolor Food Gels/Airbrush Food Color) at www.amazon.com or through the manufacturer at www.tcpglobal.com.

Happy Birthday Shayla!!

‘Meghan’ Topsy-Turvy Cake

‘Meghan’ Topsy-Turvy Cake

This cake is very similar to the cake I made for my friend Katonna’s birthday a week or so ago. The cake was a Topsy-Turvy design, featuring pink and black fondant with polka-dot and stripe details. The flavor of the cake was Marble (Vanilla & Chocolate) with Vanilla Buttercream.

The top tier of the cake was decorated with pink polka-dots, both large and small, and was finished with three pastel pink ribbon roses.

The bottom tier was covered in pink fondant and was decorated with black fondant stripes.

The borders around the cake tiers consisted of fondant “pearls” that were made by simply rolling small bits of pink and black fondant into pearl-shaped balls and placing them around the border of the tiers.

For tips on how to carve a cake like this one, check out the “Cake Carving” Post that I uploaded last week! There are some great and simple techniques that will help you create a cake like this for someone you love…or…for yourself! 🙂

Happy Birthday Meghan!

‘Katonna’ Topsy-Turvy Zebra-Print Cake

Topsy-Turvy Zebra-Print Cake

This week I had the priveledge to make a friend and co-worker of mine a birthday cake for her __ birthday. (She has now reached the age of no return!!…just kidding…she’s just suddenly gotten secretive about that two digit number…)… Anyway, having gotten some ideas from the Birthday Girl a few weeks in advance, I decided to go with a theme that I knew she liked…zebra print and diamonds.

The cake ended up being two tiers, since she liked the idea of the “Mad Hatter” or “Topsy-Turvy” design. The top tier was Vanilla Cake Batter with Vanilla Buttercream, while the bottom tier consisted of a Strawberry Cake Batter and Strawberry Buttercream. The entire cake was carved and then covered in fondant, with the top tier featuring the Duff Goldman Brand of fondant in pre-dyed black, and the bottom tier with Satin Ice Fondant that I dyed a pastel pink.

The top tier of the cake featured pink-colored fondant diamonds that I made by using a medium-sized square cookie cutter. I simply adhered the fondant cut-outs to the cake at an angle, giving the appearance of diamonds. There are diamond cookie cutters and templates that can be bought online or at craft stores, but a simple square cookie cutter like the one I used, or even cutting a diamond shape by hand with an exacto knife or pizza/fondant cutter will work as well. Whatever works easiest for you…

The very top of the top tier was finished with four ‘Ribbon Roses.’ Ribbon Roses are extremely simple to make. You take a piece of fondant and roll it into a log. Use a fondant smoothing tool as a guide to roll the fondant into a perfect log, or snake-like shape. Once you roll it to the length of your choosing (for larger roses, create a longer piece of rolled fondant, and for a smaller rose a shorter piece), take a rolling pin and flatten it out long-ways. Then take your newly flattened piece of fondant and fold it in half longways. Then, grab one end, and roll it in once–this will be the ‘bud’ of the rose. Then gradually ‘wrinkle’ the fondant, pinching at the bottom after every ‘petal’ and repeat until you have a beautiful ‘lil rose.

(If my hand-written directions were less than helpful and you’re scratching your head at home thinking, “What?!”…then go to YouTube.com and check out this link: http://www.youtube.com/user/09165067633#p/u/2/Mm_IDwMficM

or type in “How to make a gumpaste ribbon rose” in the search box).

The bottom tier of the cake featured Royal Icing zebra print. This was fun to do and allowed me to try out a new technique. I’m calling it the ‘Royal Icing Transfer’ technique, but I’m sure it probably has another name in the cake world that I do not know as of yet. Anyway, all I did was place a zebra print stencil (these and many, many more are available online for purchase at www.thebakerskitchen.com or www.sugarcraft.com) on the fondant (with the help of my hubby to make sure it didn’t come off) and with a spatula, applied a fairly thick layer of black royal icing. Once applied, I then thinned the royal icing, by scraping away any excess I could. Once I was satisfied with the look, the zebra print stencil was pulled back and viola…there emerged a not-so-bad-for-a-first-attempt-zebra print. 🙂 I did have a few boo-b00s here and there, but it’s okay. If you have the same issue, don’t sweat it. There are ways to cover up mess-ups…you can add fondant designs, you can pipe more detail, you can try to remove it and start again (don’t recommend this though as it could make a bigger mess) and/or just hope that no one notices. From a personal standpoint, I’ve learned that the average person will not pay as much attention to the perfection of the design as you do. (This is coming from a wanna-be perfectionist when it comes to decorating, so please know that a few mistakes are okay…it’s not the end of the world, and you’ll get better as you keep decorating).

For example, on this cake I had a gap where the stencil border had been, so I was left with a blank column in-between two sections of zebra print. So, I took some fondant and made the letter “K”, representing the Birthday Girl’s first name. I filled in the space with the letter and added a braided fondant border of alternating pink and black for the bottom tier, and oversized fondant pearls for the border around the top tier.

One thing I did not do on this cake, but that’s definately do-able is adding candles (roll fondant into oversized pearls and stick candles in them–the fondant acts as a stand) and/or a greeting on the cake board.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the post, and I hope you take some of the tips provided and use them for your next cake!

Golf-Themed Birthday Cake

Golf-Themed Birthday Cake

 September is truly the month of birthdays. Between my family and my work family, there are A LOT  of birthdays this month.

So, in continuation with the September Birthday Phenomenon, I made a cake for a friend of mine based off of a Golf-Theme.

The cake was Red Velvet with Traditional Cream Cheese Frosting and the cake was colored green to match the beautiful landscape that all golfers would be familiar with. The cake also featured some fondant detail that displayed part of a golf course, and showcased a small golf ball very close to going and making a Hole-in-One…

Happy Birthday!

“Kramer” Birthday Cake

Earlier in the week I was asked to make a Carrot Cake for one of the doctors at my office. So, in compliance with the Doctor’s orders, this cake was made especially for Dr. Kramer.

The cake was a simply decorated 8 inch round cake featuring Cream Cheese Frosting and Cream Cheese Frosting Rose and piping detail.

Happy Birthday Dr. Kramer!!

“Rene” Birthday Cake

"Rene" Birthday Cake

This week I had the opportunity to make a cake for a sweet, sweet lady who I had the pleasure of making a huge cake for last year! For her birthday, the Birthday Girl decided that she wanted a Vanilla Cake with Raspberry Buttercream Filling with Chocolate Buttercream Frosting to finish it all off! The cake also featured Buttercream Roses and Writing detail.

The flavors of this cake were very similar to the flavors that Rene chose for the German Beer Boot Cake that was made for her husband’s birthday last year. To check out what flavors and details were used in the German Beer Boot Cake, take a look at the picture below, or check out the blogpost on the cake, listed under “German Beer Boot Cake.”

German Beer Boot Cake

Chocolate Birthday Cake

This birthday cake was made for a dear friend’s son’s birthday that is…well…today! Happy early birthday Chase!! (I hope you’re already in bed instead of updating blogs like me…oh well!). The cake is Yellow Cake Batter with a rich Chocolate Buttercream. The cake was simply decorated with a buttercream border, and featured a piped-on skateboard design and greeting.

“Angel” Cupcake Tower

This weekend I got the chance to make a special birthday cake and cupcakes for my aunt Angel. I wanted to do something super cute and chic, and at the same time incorporate some elements that I know she loves.

Knowing that she loves to read, and that she loves Victorian themes and colors, I wanted to in some way or another incorporate at least one of those aspects into the cake. So, with that in mind, I decided to make a Hat Box style topper with Victorian Cameo detail.

Hat Box Topper

The topper that I ended up making consisted of three layers of Strawberry Cake with Strawberry Buttercream, as requested by the Birthday Queen, and covered with Vanilla-flavored fondant tinted pink. I made the top to the Hat Box out of cake boards that I cut to the desired shape, taped them together, and covered them with a thin layer of the same color fondant that I covered the 6 in. topper with. The top itself was finished with a fondant rope handle and buttons, while the cake was accented with fondant “tissue paper,” pearls, and a Victorian Cameo painted with Silver Luster Dust.

Victorian Cameo Detail

The Cameo itself is marvelous!! I found a great silicone mold for Victorian Cameos online, and I simply pressed a piece of fondant, approximately the same size as the silicone mold, trimmed the excess fondant off with a sharp knife, and placed in the freezer for a bit (10-15 min.). After it was set, the Cameo was ready for the cake!!

The cake and accompanying cupcakes were assembled at the party on the featured Small Cupcake Tower.

The cake topper and cupcakes were Strawberry with Strawberry Buttercream.

Happy Birthday Princess Angel! 🙂