Willie's Cakes

Today, meaning yesterday, I had every intention of posting, but now it's 12:31am and I missed posting something on the 1 year anniversary of this blog. But seeing as I'm still awake and it's still Sept. 11 somewhere, I think it counts.

I've been making cakes for everyone in Willie's family for a while (see Lindsay's cake, Lindsay's dad's cake, there was also a Lindsay's grandma's cake, but I was lazy and didn't take a photo). It was about time that Willie had a birthday and wanted a cake. But she ended up with two! How's that for a birthday treat?

She called me to order a mint chocolate cake - chocolate cake with chocolate mint buttercream. Said to decorate it however I wanted. She usually is the cake pickerupper (?) in the family, but said since it was her birthday, she'd get someone else to do it.

Two days later her husband called and ordered another surprise cake, red velvet, for a dinner they were having with friends the same night (choc. cake was for the family celebration at home).

Decided to do similar colors for both cakes and wanted to play around a little with simple gumpaste flowers. The handwriting on the chocolate cake admittedly isn't my best work (actually looks like it was written by a 99 yr old with the shakes) but I love how all the colors work together.

red velvet

chocolate mint

Gabe's snake cake

I've had this post sitting in my drafts file for a week and I'm finally getting it together to post. Gabe turned 5 at the end of June and requested a snake cake -- specifically, one that "looked like a giraffe." I had no idea how I was going to make a cake big enough to feed the hoards of kids at his party (40+) with just one snake (and a 13" x 17" board), so decided late the night before to add a bottom layer made out of two 9x9 cakes. Cake was chocolate with vanilla bean buttercream (pretty much the only buttercream I'm making these days - it's that good!). To make the snake I made 4 6" layers and split each one. Then assembeled three cakes with three layers each, all spackled together with buttercream. Cut a hole in the middle of them and then sliced in half sideways and pieced it together. I used the remaining 2 layers to cut out the head and the tail (the remainder of the cake is still in my freezer, where it's slowly being chipped away by Doug and I).

The scales are made out of gumpaste which I cut into diamond shapes a couple of days before. Bad move - they were way too hard to bend on the cake, so I placed them on the night before and by morning had melted enough to smoosh them on. Finally, my overly warm kitchen is good for something! Last thing - see the nose? I didn't even think about snake's having noses until my 5yr old told me. Learning new things every day!

Bottom layer

One of three three-layered 6" cakes

Piecing the snake together

Snake on a cake (this one is really blurry for some reason, not sure why)

Adding the head and the tail

Frosted snake

Pointy scales

The finished cake, taken by Doug, in our attic studio

Max and Stella's cake

Max turned 5 on June 8 and one of his best friends Stella turns 5 on the 21st, so we decided to have a joint b-day party (I should add they go to school together and have almost all of the same friends.) Maxie's cake ideas ran the gamut from subway car, to race car, to Amtrak train, to (well, I guess his ideas weren't that broad!) Finally he decided on a racetrack cake, which just so happens to be the same cake he wanted last year, for his 4th birthday. Perfect! Again with the cobbler's children thing, I didn't have a ton of time to get things together and make a new completely original cake, so I was very happy.

Same size - two 9-inch layer cakes, chocolate and vanilla bean, with chocolate buttercream filling, outside was colored vanilla bean frosting and chocolate cookies for the dirt. Last years cake had green coconut for grass, which people loved, but I thought it made the whole thing look like a monster so I decided black/white stripes fit in better.

I think someone has photos of the cake in action, with flags, candles, etc, and I'll post them when I get them.

Stella's name was on the other side, also in orange.

The 9-inch layers pieced together

crumb coat - looks a little bit like boobs, I think

Lining up the circles

Doug's cupcakes

Note to self: I really need to start making Doug take ALL the photos of my stuff. My little camera (and my meager skills) just aren't cutting it! Moving on...

Doug's birthday was May 26, but we were traveling home from a wedding in PA that weekend, I was out in LA for BEA the next, and so on and so forth. The poor guy never got a proper SaraBakesCakes birthday celebration (the cobbler's children, etc., etc.,). I made it up to him yesterday with a cupcake of his own design. Spice cupcakes with a banana in the middle, topped with an attempt at Nutella buttercream. The problem was I tried to just flavor the vanilla buttercream I already had with the Nutella, but that just added to the sweetness and didn't provide a lot of hazelnutty flavor. Don't tell the parents, but I also dumped in a lot of Frangelico, which sort of worked but it was still way too sweet, in my opinion.

Next time I'd make an italian buttercream and flavor that one. For those who care (ha) - flavoring a powdered sugar buttercream does work really well when the flavor you're adding isn't already really sweet (like peanut butter or bittersweet chocolate).

I wish I'd taken a photo of the cross section with the banana inside, because it looked really cool. And the papers?? I just bought them when I was in LA at Surfa's - a magical cooking supply store. Next I'll bust out the orange and yellow ones - I need another special occasion for those!

a cup in a cup

We have all this old cool serving ware from Doug's grandmother. I hope to use more of it in my photos. This is from a 20 piece demi-tasse cup set.

Cupcakes for Summer Birthdays party at Maxie's school

There were four kids with summer birthdays at my son's school and right before school ended they had a party for all of them. If it's not obvious, the letters are for each of the bday kid's name. I bought the Wilton letter/number set - and made them out of gumpaste. Not a big fan of the Wilton stuff, but this did the trick. Vanilla bean cupcakes with vanilla bean buttercream.