Pretty in Pink

Yesterday was my friend Charmaine's surprise baby shower that took place at her in-law's residence in Piscataway, New Jersey.   Her sister, Noreen, informed me about the surprise shower about a month ago and so I volunteered to create and design a cake for the occasion.  They are expecting a baby girl and so the color themes are pink and brown.   I browsed through my cake collections and decided to apply some of the new design techniques I learned from Elaine MacGregor's tutorials, particularly the ribbon insertion on fondant and of course a fellow Filipina cake decorator, Mayen, on making a baby carriage.  Following the basic techniques, I incorporated my own design in this creation.  I also added some cute cupcakes to complement the main cake.  

This baby carriage cake was made of a moist chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream filling, covered with marshmallow fondant.

These cupcakes which I really adore are also made of moist chocolate  with vanilla cream custard filling. 

The baby shower turned out to be very successful, not to mention the wide delicious spread of food that everyone brought and prepared.  The  hospitality and humor from both sides of their families just completed this heart-warming and love-filled occasion.  Congratulations, James and Charmaine! 

My Favorite Things

February 13th was my friend, Jennifer's birthday.  She and I share a lot of things in common, especially our love for food.  Wines & crabs would be at the top of our list of "Favorite Things".  

She and her husband are expecting a baby soon!  Their families and friends are very excited about it especially that this is their first baby.  When they found out that she's pregnant, she was put on a NO WINE and NO SEAFOOD diet, which her husband STRICTLY enforced.  She's the only person I know who could eat crabs for hours until she passes out.  So just imagine how painful it was for her to see my photo at  Joe's Crab Shack (holding a big claw of a king crab) that I posted online! Of course she  commented, "Thanks a lot Liv...!"  Last Super Bowl event, we had dinner at their place and decided to open a bottle of wine.  That was a torture for her!  All she could do was to sniff the bottle  and drink her coconut juice.  Hahaha!  I felt a bit sorry that she couldn't have any, but what the heck, it was a good wine! 

And so I thought it would be so perfect to create a Crab & Wine cake for her birthday!  Hmmm... I wonder what she wished for... :)  They're not real  but at least she can eat them! :)  

Happy Birthday, Jennifer!!!

The crab and wine are all made of rice krispies with marshmallows and covered with fondant.  Inside is a chocolate cake filled with chocolate pudding.  The wooden barrel is edible and is made of fondant & gumpaste, hand sculpted, carved and hand painted with edible gel colors.

Black and White Swirl

       I have always wanted to design a black and white cake.  In my opinion, this color combination is classic and exudes elegance and boldness.  A friend of mine, Dories, celebrated her birthday last week and so I decided to create this cake and bring it to her surprise party, in Brooklyn, NY.  I made my sketches and browsed through my photo collections to get more ideas, but every time I'm in the process of decorating my cake, I always seem to get diverted  from my original design.  I guess this is when the frustrated artist in me kicks in. Hahaha! 

      This is a moist red velvet cake with cream cheese filling and covered with home-made marshmallow fondant, all made from scratch.  I initially intended to use royal icing to create the black swirls on the cake but instead, I thought it would be more interesting if I used  rolled fondant to give more texture and boldness to the design.  Black and white colors project a contrast that really appeals to me.  
     After placing the fondant swirls, I hand-painted each of them with edible  black gel to make them stand out and have that glossy effect.  I placed clustered roses on top and scattered a couple of petals around it, also made of fondant.  I made these roses a week ahead, enough time to let them dry.  They  are all hand made and I did not use any flower cutters at all :D - a technique I learned from a fellow cake decorator on YouTube  :). The roses represent passion and love from her family and friends surrounding her on that very special occasion.   Happy Birthday, Dories!