Jan's shower cake and petit fours

I was so happy to be able make a cake and petit fours for sweet Jan's baby shower. Rosie and Melanie did an amazing job hostessing her shower. The cake and petit fours were inspired by the adorable invites.

Happy birthday sweet Mabry (and a recipe!)

Mabry turned 6 last month! For her party this year she wanted a dog and cat theme in pinks and leopard print. As much as I thought I was keeping things simple this year and doing lots ahead of time. I found myself scrambling the night before and was saved by my sweet Rachel just as I have been for every one of Mabry's parties. I threw all of the decorations and treats I had been making/accumulating over weeks at Rachel and, as always, she did a far better job of arranging and decorating than I could have. Meanwhile, I made Mabry's cake. I first covered each tier in dark ivory fondant, placed a band of pink around the bottom of each tier, then a ribbon of darker pink around the centers. I applied edible glitter to the dark pink fondant ribbons and bows and hand painted the leopard spots using a small paint brush with brown and black gel paste food coloring which I diluted with clear vanilla extract. For the flavors this year she wanted chocolate and vanilla. So I made 2 layers of each flavor per tier. I've already shared the chocolate cake recipe I used, as well as the buttercream; but have not yet blogged about my yellow cake recipe. It is one of my prizes! It took a lot of trial and error to create and I'm excited to share (see end of this post!)

More dessert table shots:


Earlier in the week I made and froze pink iced bone sugar cookies and white chocolate dipped Oreo cat pops:

It was a VERY special day for Mabry spent with her family, friends, and even her kindergarten and mother's day out teachers!

Kitty cat Mabry with Auntie Rachel.

And now as promised, my yellow cake recipe!

Until finding this recipe I was disappointed with each yellow cake recipe I tried. The problem with homemade butter cakes is usually the texture. They may taste great; but are often have a crumbly, cornbread like texture. Many professional bakers actually use cake mixes for yellow or white cakes! This recipe comes from cake queen Sylvia Weinstock; but I have modified it to make it easier with, at least for me, more consistent results. The original recipe can be found here.

Yellow Butter Cake

2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour (sift before measuring)
2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 1/2 sticks of butter (room temp)
1/4 cup canola oil
2 cups sugar
4 large eggs (room temp)
2 t vanilla
1 cup sour cream (helps if at room temp)

Preheat oven to 350. Butter and flour (or spray with Baker's Joy) two 8X3 baking pans or one 12X3. Line with parchment.

Cream butter until light and fluffy. Add sugar, salt, vanilla, and baking powder and continue to cream until fluffy and light (I cream for at least 10 minutes).

Add the eggs one at a time on low speed, until each is just incorporated. Scrape down the sides of bowl between additions. Add the canola oil and mix on low or by hand until well combined.

Sift 1/3 of the presifted flour into the bowl and stir by hand until just combined . Stir in 1/2 of the sour cream until just combined. Repeat until you have incorporated all of the flour and sour cream.

Pour the batter into prepared pans and smooth with a rubber spatula. Bake for 60 min for the 12 inch or 45-50 for the 8 inch. Test for doneness with a skewer or toothpick.

Should I post this?

I feel a bit guilty. Underneath the fondant, I assure you the horns were sawed off! Gig 'em! :)

Wrestling Mask Cake

An unexpected bonus to making cakes...one stays current on what is popular with the kiddos. This Rey Mysterio mask cake was for a 9 year old wrestling fan. It was really fun to make. I think it actually turned out kind of surprisingly pretty.

Jed and Rachel are having a baby!!!!

For the past few weeks I have enjoyed daydreaming about (some might say obsessing over) the details for Rachel and Jed's shower. We are excitedly awaiting the arrival of baby Hummel--about 9 weeks to go! But in the meantime the four sisters: Lacy, Adrienne, Kate, and I threw a shower.

The event was a cocktail hour open house at Rachel and Jed's loft. We tried to capture a modern, fun feel in the color palette of gray, pink and lime green.

The Scene: Industrial loft, Houston medical center.
Lime green pom poms hung from duct work, electric
lines.

The Desserts: I made a tiered cupcake stand to display a small
cake and 3 flavors of mini cupcakes: pink velvet, coconut with
passion fruit buttercream, and almond with cherry filling and
Amaretto buttercream. Other desserts were key lime tartlets by
Lacy, Tobblerone almond truffles, and brownie buttons with white
chocolate raspberry ganache.

More desserts, pink candy and the amazing invitation framed. I was so in love with this invite. I found it at minted.com and thought it was perfect for the type of event we were creating. The colors and city skyline design were a springboard for our decor.

Wishing tree with black and white baby pics of Jed and Rachel hanging from monofilament and lime green card stock leaves available for guests to write wishes for the baby or suggest baby names. Urban clothesline on brick wall made from white Christmas lights hung with with adorable custom onesies (made by Kate) and leg warmers.



FOOD!!! Various hors dourves including prosciutto wrapped asparagus, shrimp nachos with mango pico, seared beef tenderloin/bleu cheese butter/arugula with balsamic drizzle atop bruschetta, marinated manchego/roasted red pepper crostini (easy appetizer I make often--recipe here), smoked salmon canapes, fig bread with bleu cheese and candied pecans, assorted cheeses.

In lieu of corsages, Mabry and I bejeweled a pair of crunk cups for the couple!


Mama and Papa in front of the favors:

I was so excited to find a city skyline stamp which I used on the favor toppers and the menu cards. The favors were pinned to a fabric covered cork board placed near the door.

The sisters: Adrienne, Rachel, me, Lacy, and Kate. Love you all!!!

The adorable Miss Henley.



Mazeltov from Mabers.

Hot Pink Zebra!

A fun cake for sweet Kyleigh who recently turned 15! Thanks Susan asking me to make this.:)

Kyra's Carnival

Please excuse the background (it's the back of my car!) This cute cake was for a little girl celebrating her 4th birthday with a carnival themed party.

Close ups:

Fondant popcorn!!!

Butterflies and Buttercream

I found these butterfly cupcakes pictures that I hadn't posted yet and thought I'd share. Like most decorating projects they are not difficult to make--just time consuming. All you do is draw right and left wing shapes with a dark marker on a piece of paper. For each butterfly, just lay waxed paper or parchment over your template and use dark chocolate candy melts for the border and the color of your choice to fill.

These cupcakes are frosted with has become my go-to, easy buttercream recipe. It is different from most powdered sugar buttercreams in that it is not overly sweet. The taste and texture is more similar to a Swiss or Italian meringue buttercream; but it is soooo much less work.

I found the recipe here. My only modification is to add an extra cup of powdered sugar. If you really don't like sweet icing, try it with just 2 cups to start. You can always add more. Hope you enjoy!

Less Sweet More Buttery Buttercream

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup warm milk (I usually use 2%)
1/4 cup cold heavy cream
salt to taste (optional)
vanilla or almond extract (optional)

Cream butter and powdered sugar until combined. With mixer running pour in the warm milk and mix to combine. The mixture may now appear curdled. With mixer still running pour in cold cream. Turn mixer up to a high setting and beat until the icing comes together. This sometimes takes several minutes. Don't worry it will eventually come together.

Dance Recital Cake

Mabry had her first dance recital on Saturday and I couldn't let the event pass without a special cake. I kind of threw this together while I was making the monkey cake in the previous post. It was inspired by one of her costumes:

Here is Mabry backstage in this costume:

The recital was so special. She danced to "Do Re Me" from The Sound of Music, a really sassy song called "Mama I'm a Big Girl Now", and "Yellow Polka Dot Bikini." Her teacher, Miss Teffany, did an amazing job. The recital was quite the production! For any one in the Corpus area: we highly recommend Teffany's Dance Studio in Calallen!

Mod Monkey

This first birthday cake was inspired by the "Mod Monkey" plates and decorations used for the party. The birthday boy's mom emailed me a link to the plate and we went from there. The top and bottom tiers were vanilla and the middle chocolate. I also delivered a little vanilla smash cake iced in buttercream so that the birthday boy could make a big mess! Happy 1st birthday Logan Gage and thank you to your sweet mama for letting me make your cake.

Frog Class Cake

Mabry volunteered me to make a cake for her Mother's Day Out end of year party. She was in the frog class so we thought a frog cake might be fun. I used Rice Krispie treats to make the head and then sculpted chocolate cake for the body. The kids screamed when they saw it!

The cake was served with lily pad sugar cookies:

I love my cut out cookie recipe. It is so easy, so good, and it makes a ton of cookies. They are shortbread like in texture with a great buttery flavor. Justin and Mabry like to eat them plain, un-iced. In fact, Justin refers to them as "the devil's cookies"! They are the type of sweet you can eat a ton of because they aren't overly sweet and rich...very dangerous.

The recipe came with a copper cookie cutter I ordered online and I am very grateful to have it. I have tried many others; but this is my favorite so far. Hope you enjoy it to!

Big Batch Sugar Cookies

2 cups butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 t vanilla
6 cups flour
1 t baking powder
1 t salt

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix dry ingredients and add to butter mixture. Stir to combine. Chill in large pancake shapes wrapped in parchment paper for 1 hour or overnight. Preheat oven to 350. Cover baking sheet with parchment. On surface dusted with powdered sugar, roll and cut dough into shapes. Bake for 8-10 minutes until just beginning to brown around edges.

Notes: I usually chill or freeze the cut out cookies on the baking sheets until they are nice and cold prior to baking. This helps the shapes stay cleaner and minimizes spreading.

When I decorate cookies, I usually pipe a border with royal icing and use a glaze made of powdered sugar and half and half or milk to fill in the border.

Shower Cakes and Petits Fours

One shower---two cakes. The first part of the couples shower was a "pamper party". So I made this cutesy sleeping baby cake. Once the sun went down the party shifted to.....

Michael Jackson karaoke shower!!!

I also delivered 80 pink velvet with buttercream filling petits fours for a garden themed shower. Ever wonder what 80 petits fours look like? Wonder no more:


Thank you Rosie and Leslie. You were both such fun to work with. I loved collaborating with you Leslie on your shower cakes. Congratulations Mama and Grandma! :)

Mabry's a Graduate!

Mabry graduated from her Mother's Day Out program and I got to make the cake for this very special event! Mabry just loves MDO and so do I. We are so sad that this is her last week. The graduation was so neat. The kids sang songs, walked down the aisle of the church to Pomp and Circumstance, received Bibles and diplomas, and best of all.....got to toss there caps at the end (this was huge for Mabry). It was an unforgettable event in her little life. In fact we have reenacted the ceremony several times since in our living room!

The cake was inspired by the logo of the school: a rainbow with the words "a great place to begin." Each class has an animal name (Mabry is a frog). So I sculpted fondant animals to represent each class.

And now presenting the MDO class of 2010:

Lovely Laura's Wedding Cake

I was blessed to be able to make a wedding cake for sweet Laura a couple of weekends ago. It was such a neat collaborative process that we went through together to come up with a unique and beautiful cake. Initially I was worried that I wouldn't be able to come up with something that she would love because she was so open and easy going about what she wanted in a cake. After she emailed me pictures of three very different cakes that she liked I was even more concerned. Once we talked and I learned which elements she liked from each cake: crimped fondant, gold ribbon, white anemones with black centers, the vision started to take shape.

Once I saw the cake in the room, I new our design was meant to be. The Crystal Room at the Sheraton Gunther is bathed in gold with a beautiful black foliage print carpeting. It was perfection!

Thank you Laura for trusting me with your cake and for being such a joy to work with! I pray you and David will enjoy a happy and blessed marriage.

The reception site...bathed in gold.

See the carpeting was black...perfect! (Note my assistants hard at work on the left)

Anemone close up.

Antique Rose Cake

After having such fun making gumpaste anemones last week, I decided to try one of my favorite flowers, a pink peony. I think it turned out more like a garden rose, which I also love. I decorated the cake with some left over ribbon from the wedding cake I did the weekend before and some royal icing piping. The leaf of the flower was rubbed with bronze luster dust which I also brushed along the edges of the petals for a sort of antique look.