The Preakness Winners Barn Party Cake

Hi Ya'll!

I am doing a quick post on the Preakness cake I did about 2 weeks ago for the winners of the Preakness held at Pimlico Race Track in Baltimore, Maryland. This cake was the biggest cake to date that I have ever done! It ended up serving about 300 people!!! And boy was this cake heavy!!! I can't tell you how much it weighed once it was completed but the hubby and I had a heck of time loading it into the van. It almost didn't fit out the front door of our house! We had to tilt it slightly sideways to get it to fit. At least I know what are the max dimensions I can fit through the door:)

I know some of you are thinking how did little ole me land such a big job..well it definitely goes back to making sure you please your clients. A client of mine, P, who I did her wedding cake last year, works for the Maryland Jockey Club (the organization that runs the Preakness). So she approached me back in the beginning of April and asked me if I would be interested in doing the Winners cake. She went on to say how she loved her wedding cake so much and how everyone raved about it that when she needed someone to do the Winners cake she thought of me first:) Of course I was very pleased that she thought of me instead of one of the local bakeries in Baltimore. So we talked over next couple of weeks about design and flavor. I had to send her some sketches and once she approved we were off to the races (lol)! She wanted a plain design with vanilla cake and vanilla buttercream in order to make sure everyone ate it. The final design changed slightly from the original but in the end she loved it and said all of her co-workers liked it and they will be using me from now on for the Winners cake! Such an exciting thing for my  business, we now have our first official corporate client:)

As you can see I did a lot of air brushing for this cake. I also made chocolate horse shoes that decorated the cake as well as fondant Black Eyed Susans.I had to include all 11 horses that were racing so those are the names scattered around the middle cake. The design is a lot plainer than what I normally do but she wanted to keep it simple for the first year and I am glad she did! The middle cake is a double stacked 12x18 airbrushed in brown. The 2 side cakes are 14, 10 and 8 inch rounds airbrushed in yellow. The signs on the top were made from fondant and had the Preakness 2012 logo on them. Each tier is wrapped in black ribbon.

My next post will be my carrot cake recipe and more information on my allergy free line:)

Peace & Blessings
Kima

I'm Back!!!!!

Good Evening Ya'll!


I know I have been gone for a little while now.. its not my fault! I have really busy these last couple of weeks as well as having some MAJOR computer issues (my laptop crashed). So now I am forced to use the hubby's desktop until I can get another computer. So I just wanted to let you all know what is going on and tomorrow I will be back in action with a brand new post! I have lots of cake pictures for you all and even one my cherished recipes gasp! Yes its true. I will posting my carrot cake recipe which is great for cupcakes too:)

Peace & Blessings
Kima

Buttons, Bows & Florals

Good Evening Ya'll!
It always seems around here that I will have a quiet week and then mid week I'll get some phone calls and everything changes. This week was no exception, I started with no orders just 2 cakes I planned on doing for some co-workers of my hubby (one birthday and one had a baby a while ago). I have been so busy that I wanted to do something for them because they really support my husband at work and are really good friends to him, so this was going to be my thank you them. Well Wednesday comes and I start to plan out what I was going to do when I get not one but two cake orders, one for today (Friday) and one Sunday. So since I was already baking I just baked up the rest of the cake layers I needed. But since both of these are kind of detailed, the other 2 cakes have been put on the back burner until tomorrow so I can work on them. So needless to say those pictures will be in my post for Sunday. Today I wanted to discuss some older cakes I have done in the last two months. All three of them were made for birthdays for women ( I don't get many birthday cake orders for men.. men love cake too).

All of them had some kind of feminine element to them whether it was bows, ruffles, buttons or flowers. I am starting to see that as a trend this years especially buttons and fabric looking flowers seem to be very popular. So the first cake was for a new client who wanted to order a cake for her grandmother. The only request she had was that it was a lime green color on the outside and the filling to be key lime. So I use a key lime curd filling and the covered the outside of the cake in lime green fondant. I could have just stopped there and put Happy Birthday on there but I always take these kinds of opportunities to do something different. So I use some button molds I recently purchased here via Etsy.com. I dusted them in pearl luster dust and glued them on in a diagonal pattern coming done the side of the cake. Once I did then I added a bow and dusted that in more pearl dust. It gave the cake the extra something it needed. My client was soo surprised and happy.

The next two orders were done in the same week and were for some family members. The first was for my little sister in law who celebrated her 18th birthday and the second one was for my cousin in law. Since were visiting my in laws I brought both cakes along with me instead of shipping them like I normally do. My sister in law was very surprised because she had no idea I made her a cake ( I love surprising her:). I wanted to make her cake more sophisticated than the last cake I did for her 16th birthday. So I went with black and teal and a touch of bling. She loved it which of course makes me happy. I did a vanilla double barrel 5 inch cake on top and a regular 6 inch root beer cake on the bottom. I also added some white ruffle flowers for a pop.

The cake for my cousin in law (which I never met until she came to pick up her cake lol) was one I had fun with because she gave me free reign and just told me a few things she likes. She said she was girly and her favorite color is yellow so I made her a hat box cake filled with pearls and flowers. So ultra feminine that I giggled while making it because I knew as soon as I started adding the flowers in she would love it. Of course she did and was so over joyed because she thought she was getting a simple cake. I told her I don't really do simple cakes.. I always have to over do it on some level. I think its just apart of my cake decorating process:)

I love how I got the lid to sit at the angle.. which too me forever to figure out. LOL. And once I did I was like duh!

So that's it for now until Sunday when I will showing you guys one very feminine Parisian graduation cake and bright baby shower cake.

Until then
Peace & Blessings

My Take on Naughty Cakes

Good Evening Ya'll

Time seems to be flying for this month.. its the end of the month already.. Where did the time go? May is upon us already and I will be gearing up for a big month full of cakes:) So to wrap up April I wanted to tackle the issue over "naughty cakes". This topic was brought to my attention via  a client of mine, M. who wanted to order a naughty cake for her finance for his birthday. When she called me so was at the end of her rope because everyone else she called either hung up on her (her words not mine) or told her they didn't go them. So when I asked her what she wanted and she told me I had to laugh a bit because I was like you were hung up on for that... she wanted a cake in the shape of breast that showed a little bit of nipple. I was like okay I can do that. She was sooo happy that I was able to do it and I was happy to do it for her. Now this is my take on "naughty cakes" and I know every cake decorator is different so you will probably get a couple of different views on this subject but this is mine. Now I am a very devout Christian and thus I do a have in terms of what I will and won't do business-wise. At the same time I make cakes and do them because I love to make cakes and but also to make money as well.  So the only theme that I will not tackle is the male anatomy, particularly some one calling to ask for the male anatomy in the nude. That is a cake that I won't do. Nor will I do cakes nude cakes of the female anatomy below the waist line (a nice way of putting it ;). I will do male and female torsos as well as 3D figures scantily clad, but not nude. Anything above the waist line for me is free reign and I will do it for a client.

Now I know some decorators out there don't have those kind of restrictions but for me I am not comfortable with doing anything more than that, if they are more power to them and I will refer people to those decorators. That is the great part about cake decorating, there is a decorator out there for everyone:)

The best part about this story is that not only did she love the final product, her dad did as well and three weeks later he ordered a cake for someone at his job for their birthday. So it just shows you never know when you will get a referral.

Below are the two cakes that I did for daughter and father. I did get a kick out of doing them to see how real I could make them look and the experience helps me grow as a decorator.

Red & Black Breast Cake- Vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream filling 

Steelers & Penn State Female Torso Cake- Chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream 

Peace & Blessings 

Kima

Getting Organized

Hi Ya'll!

I have finally..finally...finally gotten my upstairs office all worked out thanks to my wonderful hubby:) When I moved out of my shop about six months ago I had no time to stop and get myself properly organized with an office. I had too many orders to do and the holidays were coming up so the office got put on hold. So now six months later my office is finally coming along. There is still work that needs to be done to it but at least I can work in here on my projects instead of working downstairs in the dining room like I was doing before. The hubby is happy because now our first floor looks like a regular house again with the exception of the cake displays I have around (I couldn't help myself lol). I have been working in the office all of this week and it has helped me concentrate more (no tv in the office) so I am producing more in a shorter amount of time. I also like it because it is on the 2nd floor of the house and my son can play in his room and I check in on him with just a few short steps:)

Once I have it all finished I will post some pictures but its not at that point yet..I still have more go to but I am happy with the results so far.


Now on to today's topic.. which is cookies! Yes I know I don't talk about cookies that often and that is because people assume that since I do cakes and cupcakes I don't do decorated cookies..which is quite the opposite I love when I get cookie orders. And most orders come from my repeat clients who want something different to go along with their cake order. Well these sweet cookies below were requested by a repeat client of mine J, back in March for the birth of his second girl. He wanted the cookies to pass out to friends who stopped by his house when they brought the baby home (soo cute I know;) He had a few requests that they be jerseys, the color lavender (absolutely no pink he said) and have the family last name on them. So I chose lavender and white as a color scheme and added some luster dust and flower to make them more feminine. In the end I like the way they came out and he loved them.

I also made 2 onesie cookies for the now "big sister". I only have one child but I know from friends and family that some times the older child feels left out during the birth of a new baby. So this was my way of making her feel special too. 

Now its time for me to go do some baking... 

Until then 

Peace & Blessings 

PRIMP Anniversary Cake

Good Evening Ya'll!
I hope you guys have been having a good week so far..mine has been up and down but I am still blessed nonetheless so I will keep on moving :) So in my attempt to work backwards with the cake orders, this cake was done about 2 weeks ago. The cake was for the owner of PRIMP Agency here in York,PA. PRIMP Agency is an agency that is full service from putting together photo shoots to hair/make up. They do it all! So I asked the owner if she wanted a cake at her anniversary party in Baltimore, MD and of course she said yes! And on top of that she gave me free reign to do whatever I wanted to do as long as it stayed in the realm of fashion. So I was over the moon! I don't get to do that many fashion cakes, so I jumped at the chance to do something different. The cakes were white chocolate and vanilla bean. I also covered the cake in chocolate ganache which I am learning it works great with fondant and provide a super smooth surface (if you do it right) to work with. I wanted the cake to be fun with a slight sophistication to it so I made the color scheme gray, pink, yellow and some white. Ya'll know that I am in love with the pink/gray and white/gray combo so I used it all in this cake. I also added in some zebra print for some fun.

So as you can see I had way to much fun with this cake. I also hand molded all of the toppers. I love the way the dress form and dress came out. That was my first time doing something like that and I think I will do it again maybe even trying make a cake like that. I love the shoe and will be working on some more shoes to sell. Here is a close up of the top.

Also you will notice some feathers..yes a first for me and I will most definitely use them again on a cake. I want to do a wedding display cake with some feathers on it. I also used my new alphabet letters on this cake as well. And of course I added in one of my fantasy flowers in hot pink.

So that's it for now and another post is coming soon..
Until then
Peace & blessings

Ruffle Flower & Buttons Birthday Cake

Good Evening Ya'll!
Once again I have fallen behind on the blogging... I do soo good and then I get busy and what happens I forget to blog or don't have the time too. This has been the case the last couple weeks..I haven't had a slow week yet. My Etsy shop is getting orders all the time and with my cake orders it seems like I am always working on something. Add in my crazy 2 year old Jayden and I think you guys get the picture. So finally I've had an afternoon to myself to relax and since Jayden is fast asleep I figure this would be the perfect time to blog:) 
So of course I am working backwards with this post. I did 3 cakes this week (one of which I didn't get a picture of) with a host of figures I had to make to be shipped out all across the country. The one cake that stood out this week was this little adorable pink, gray and white color scheme cake for my client B, whose is repeat client of mine. She ordered a cake for her great grandmother's birthday. Since this was for an older woman I wanted to do a little bit more sophisticated color scheme and think pink and gray are so cute together. I also didn't want to do anything too juvenile in the design so I made some ruffle flowers. I purchased some buttons mold online a few weeks ago and this was the perfect opportunity to try them out on a cake. And can I say I AM HOOKED! I am in love with molds, not only are they so easy to use but they had detail that would be hard to get if I was doing it by hand. So instead of regular centers for my flowers, I made the buttons the center and the result is very pretty. I also have some alphabet cutters I used on this cake as well. The overall look is sophisticated with a bit of whimsy due to the lettering. Needless to say B was really excited when she saw the cake because all she asked for was flowers and happy birthday on the cake. Everything else she left up to me.

Well that's it for this post.
Peace & Blessings