On my last blog entry, I mentioned that I will be on a cake hiatus. At least that was what I thought. Honestly, as much as enjoy making cakes I also get burned out after making one so it always comes to a point almost all the time I would say to myself " I need to take a break from this...".
I did have a break from my cake hobby for 2 months then I get a call from a dear friend. She is in her third trimester and I knew that a baby shower is being planned for her. About 3 weeks before her party she said she would want me to make a cake for her. I couldn't say no to her so I agreed to make her shower cake.
Topper
Weeks prior to the party I received my friend's shower invitation and it became the inspiration to her cake. It was a very cute card with a "Pea in a Pod" theme. I was happy because when I make cakes, it does take me a lot of time to research on what to make. I just followed some of the details that I found pretty much on the card. I wanted it to be simple but I wanted to make sure that anyone that saw the invitation will know where I got my inspiration from. And so I made a topper with a baby on a pea. I really had fun with this topper and to avoid any disaster I just used my favorite medium, pure MMF. But it has to be made ahead to let it stiffen.
Petit Fours
My friend said that she didn't want a tiered cake so I asked her if she wanted a round or square cake so I can decide if I make cupcakes or petit fours. She wanted a square one, I decided on the petit fours. This was my first time to make this. And it was really nerve wracking, but in spite of all that I finished at 11pm the night before her party and I was so happy.
Somehow the petit fours didn't turn out the way I wanted them to but they still looked dainty and the guests enjoyed them. For my petit four base, I used vanilla cake recipe and made another variant with dark chocolate to have a marbled effect. I also used dark chocolate ganache for filling on the plain vanilla cakes.
The glazing part was the most trickiest part of all and I didn't enjoy it at all. I know that the small cakes should be fully covered but I realized that the petit four icing was overwhelming sweet since it was made of powdered sugar and light corn syrup. So I went went just dripping some of the icing and just made sure that the tops were fully covered.
Tools and Techniques
For this cake, I purchased the following to ease with the decoration:
~its a really good tool to have, it did cut the decorating time.
Wilton Pearl Dust
Leaf Green
~ to highlight the flower cuts and the large pea pod
Ruby Red
~ to add color to the cheeks on the baby topper
This was a new experience to me and just like any of my creations I enjoyed making this cake most especially that it was made for a very dear friend.
*Sorry for the quality of the pictures, I will post more pics when I have my camera. I left it at my friends house :)
