The Dark Side of Cakery

As much as I love cakin' and designin' I find myself among those falling prey to its dark secret. Have you ever noticed that the vast majority of great caketicians seem to be carrying a bit more "love" than the average consumer? As with everything there are of course exceptions, however it seems that "quality control" amidst our search for confectionary perfection is doing cake artists and desert designers everywhere a bit of a disservice.

I know that being in the celebration business can be time consuming, hectic and at times draining but a persons health and body images is one of their greatest and most lasting masterpieces. So on that note I am issuing a challenge for myself and anyone else who would like to be involved. I've gotta wise up and EXERCISE some control over my cake addiction. My aim is to strike a balance between what makes me happiest (cakin') and what is going to allow me to keep it up (my health).

To start I am enlisting the help of a personal trainer to get me off my cake lovin' butt and keep me on my toes. This guy is AMAZING! He's young, fun, affordable and HE KNOWS WHAT HE'S TALKING ABOUT!!!!

You can chck out Bron Schuler and his blog at www.absinfitness.blogspot.com. You won't be disappointed.

As for me, I'll keep you posted.

TTFN - Stay Cakin'!

Just A Quickie

Hello All!

Just wanted to pop by with an informative tidbit. Cakin' will begin its tutorials very soon; the first one mostly likely to be the shoebox cake I just finished up. And there are lots more planned to follow so stay tuned.

On a side note:

This blog is in definite need of some feedback! Let me know what you want to know. Whether it's tutorials and educational info, upcoming events, more photos or just random cakery tell me what you want and I'll try my best to give it to you.

Well let me go before this turns into a full blown session! I'll be back but TTFN.

Bonus Footage.....

I know I said I was done but here's a side note with regard to classes.

Cake decorating is on the upswing right now but finding good classes can be both pricey and difficult. A great resource that is gaining popularity is Meetup.com. They have groups for everything you can think of and most of them offer MAJOR classes/workshops at discounted prices. And cake is no exception.

Go to www.meetup.com, put in your interests and where you're from. You'll be amazed what you'll find.

And just an FYI:

CakeDDS may be offering classes of its own soon so keep your eyes peeled!

Soaking It All In

Ok first let me apologize. I know my sporadic posting is annoying and it kinda defeats the whole purpose. It annoys me too! But now that I've caught up to the rest of the planet and figured out how to post from my phone I'll do better. I promise.

Now where have I been this last month? Cakin' of course lol. I've been taking as many classes as possible to keep the skills up and learn some new ones. Even the art of kitchen chemistry (ooh I like the way that sounds lol)takes practice.

I was fortunate to recently learn from some of the best doing it; Ms Colette Peters and Ms Charmaine Jones (DIVA! LOVE IT!) And even got into some airbrushing. I told you I've been busy.

Not only did I learn some amazing cakery from these ladies but they really teach you how to survive in all this yummy nonsense. That alone was worth the price of admission!

Since this is getting kinda long I'll go into all of the pretty details later. But in the meantime check out their stuff if you're not already a fan.

Ms Peters:
www.colettescakes.com

Ms Jones:
www.cakediva.com

If I Were An Elf Santa would SO Hire Me!

It's been a busy few days for CakeDDS. In the last 3 days we made 6 full cakes, 52 mini cakes and some other misc treats. Now, I'm not complaining in the least, cakin' is something I love. It was a lot of work though. Here's some of the Valentine's Day treats we came up with:


Zebras & Hearts
The "zebra" cakes are chocolate cake with oreo frosting covered in chocolate ganache and white chocolate drizzle.
The "hearts" are chocolate cake with fresh strawberry filling covered in chocolate ganache and eventually topped with a pink champagne heart.




Here are just some of the mini cakes we made. Carrot cakes with cream cheese frosting covered in white chocolate ganache.


An overview of some of the finished products from this marathon baking session. A little of this, a little of that....


A cake "candy box" made of red velvet cake and cream cheese frosting. 100% edible including the lid and the candies inside.

All the single ladies! All the single ladies!
Everything you need for VDay night and then some. Chocolate cake with strawberry filling, dressed in pink champagne frosting & MMF.

Today's Debate: Store Bought Fondant vs MMF

For those of you that don't know MMF stands for Marshmallow Fondant. There seems to be a bit of a debate in the cake community regarding the use of store bought fondant vs marshmallow fondant. They both obviously have their pros and cons: Store bought is easily accessible and immediately useable yet usually tastes pretty horrible. On the other hand MMF is far less expensive and can be flavored to compliment the cake it is being used on but can be a bit time consuming to make.

I have used both and I can say that I've been won over by the MMF hands down!

The texture of MMF is smooth and elastic like store bought but it tastes SO much better. Not to mention that it takes about $3 to make compared to the $15+ for the store bought stuff. Plus the MMF because a part of the cake, not just some gross covering that everyone pulls off before they eat their slice. It colors and flavors easily and is easy to work with. Not to mention the recipe is incredibly easy.

The recipe that I use can be found at

http://candy.about.com/od/fondantcandyrecipes/r/mm_fondant.htm

Try it out and enjoy!

Capoeira

For those of you who were chomping at the bit to catch a glimpse of the capoeira cake here it is.

The top layer is chocolate cake with oreo frosting and the bottom layer is yellow cake with strawberry filling and vanilla icing. And of course we make everything from scratch.

Ok, so it didn't turn out as amazing as I had hoped due to some unforseen circumstances but hey it happens. And it still tasted great.

My kids better never say I don't love them lol. There's photographic proof.