Handbag & Shoe Cakes

One of my favourite cakes to make is the Handbag & Shoe cake. This amazing combination never fails to bring a smile to a woman's face. I mean, we all love to trot around town wearing sexy looking heels and carrying a smart looking and matching bag, right? So this cake fulfills that fantasy for most women, both working or stay at home, young & old.

The first bag I made was a pink/black imitation of Chanel's Cambon line clutch bag. The smaller picture on the top right of the collage is the original bag. I think I did a pretty good job ya? Just don't sue me ok, Chanel? It can't compare with the real thing, of course.

The next bag cake was my own design. This time I tried to make a matching high heel and some other small cosmetics pieces as well. You know, one of the most fun part of being a cake decorator is you get to be a designer as well. From shirts & ties, to bags and shoes!

My third bag creation is a special request for a red Chanel bag. My friend ordered this cake for her friend who is very sick and hoped that it will cheer her up during this dark period of her life. So when I made this cake, I was thinking a lot about the recipient, whom I have not met, and hoping that it will bring a smile to her. This is another reason why I like to decorate beautiful cakes...for the joy, comfort and happy feelings it brings to the people who see it. 

For this shoe, I tried to make it higher and more sexy, to match this lady, whose description I heard from my friend. Making the high heel was extremely fragile and it broke in the middle. Luckily I was able to patch it back and it did survive the journey to the recipient intact!! 

This fourth cake was my most recent. It's for hubby's colleague's wife who is also our friend. She is a capable career woman, and working mum. Initially I wanted to make a leopard print bag and shoe but luckily I checked with her husband on what's her style and he said she's not a "leopard girl" and usually favours the colour black. However a cake is not nice if it's all black. I decided that a beige and brown tone might fit her taste. Thankfully, she was delighted with what I made :)

 
I'm looking forward to making the next bag cake. Wonder who it will be for?

Cupcakes for Dads

When Father's Day came round the corner last year September, I was approached by my church's Sunday school coordinator to help make 40 cupcakes for the Dads. They will be given out to all the fathers on Sunday, along with 2 chocolates in a noodle box that was decorated by the kids. I decided on a shirt & time theme for the cupcakes.

And did I have fun designing all 40 combinations of shirts and tie. Every single one was unique and different. All the dads received one such cupcake each but I don't think many of them had a taste of them. There were too many hungry children eyeing those cupcakes! And fathers, being fathers, providers of the family, how can they say no to their children?

Baby Nursery Baptism Cake

I've made quite a few birthday cakes but for baptism, this is my first. In fact, the ceremony and celebration of baptism was very new to me. I searched up the internet and found thousands of cakes to mark this special occasion. From there, I got an idea of what kinds of cakes were suitable for the event.

The Godmother of the baptized child ordered this cake and allowed me a free hand to design it. She only specified that she wants the words "God Bless" and the child's name on it. This was really cool and I decided to make a Baby Nursery cake after some research. The base cake was extremely tall and I added a baby bed as a second tier. 

Little baby toys and accessories made of fondant were done days ahead, including a teddy bear, blocks, a pacifier and baby bottle. I covered the sides of the cake with strips of pink and white fondant and glued Hello Kitty/My Melody cut-outs on it. For the top of the cake, I scattered dessicated coconut onto the icing to achieve the 'carpet' texture in a room. The 'bed' cake, covered in yellow fondant bedsheet and a pink fondant quilt, with the sleeping baby, was placed on top. The headboard was made with butter scotch cookies.

I'm hopeful God would be pleased with the results :)  

Cut The Rope Cake

Oh dear, I feel that I'm getting more and more forgetful and disorganised. I can't remember my email password and I realised it's been 4 months since I've updated this blog, or any of my other blogs for that matter. A thousand apologies for being so slack. 

Alright, no more excuses. Today I'll share the story about the Cut The Rope cake. This is another cake inspired by electronic games, like the Angry Birds. This time it's Om Nom, that little candy swallowing green monster that is not frog nor dinosaur.

My friend's son was a fan of the game and so because of this cake, I had to educate myself about the game, even played a few rounds and consulted the experts (my children) on the finer details. The interesting thing about make cakes for people, I learn different things and gained a little knowledge each time.

For the inside of the cake, I suggested orange poppy seed cake with orange juice buttercream for a little something different. The flavour was very well-recieved although I learnt my lesson not to bake a deep cake all at one go. The cake took a long time to cook and I had to cut away a bit of burnt cake on the sides. 

Om Nom was replicated using fondant and the little elements of the game, like the spider, stars and candycane decorated the sides to complete the look!  

Angry Birds Cake & Cupcakes

I love Angry Birds. So do my kids and many others. Not many birds can look as cute when they are angry and suicidal, throwing themselves from catapults.

This little girl Joanne loves the black one especially. So for her birthday, I was given the theme of Angry birds to make some cupcakes for a small party. I made six little angry birds and a big black angry bird mega cake-pop. 

The angry birds were really easy to make actually. In the center of each was a Lindt chocolate, wrapped in fondant. For the details, I literally sat my phone next to me with the internet images of each bird as I modelled them. I especially enjoyed making the pigs. For the giant black angry bird cake-pop, I rolled a big ball of crumbed chocolate cake mixed in chocolate frosting and then covered it with black fondant.

Another order came for me to repeat the angry birds two months later. This time, it was a  small cake order and I decided to bake them into 3 mini cakes instead. The top of the cake was covered with coco pops instead to imitate soil terrain and the Happy Birthday words were made with brown coloured fondant to imitate wooden blocks that the pigs sit on.

Initially my plan was to make the 'Happy' sit on top of 'Birthday' but the structure was extremely unstable and couldn't balance on the cake. Luckily they didn't look too bad sitting apart either.

Flash Cake

This cake had many firsts for me. 

First of all, it was my first time making a sugar figurine of a person and it was my first time hearing of the superhero Flash. I had to google to get an idea of the man and then I recalled vaguely this very unfamiliar red suited hero during my childhood days. It was also my first time making a non-dairy cake. 

Flash Cake

Luckily, Brandon's mom was very patient and understanding. She volunteered to supply me with the non-dairy cake mix and chocolate to make the cake for her lactose intolerant son as she wanted him to have a taste of his own birthday cake.

Following the cake mix instruction was easy, only problem was it didn't raise. Probably because no eggs were added. The 8" cake turned out slightly crispy and really short. I had to rush to the supermarket to get another pack of mix to make one more layer to get the cake looking taller. The cake was then coated with non-dairy chocolate ganache (made with non-dairy chocolate, soy milk and margerine) before covering with fondant.

I then made a lightning flash shaped platform for Flash to stand on. It was a rectangular block of madiera cake, cut diagonally and slided apart to make like a "Z" shape. As it was for a 3 year old, I made a cute version of Flash and I hoped Brandon did get a taste of the cake. 

XBox Cake

As I was just starting out, I welcomed any opportunity to make cakes for anyone that requested it but I didn't expect one day to receive a request for an XBox cake. It was for R's 18th year old son's birthday and he loved to play the Xbox, just like my sons. So it was no coincident that I happened to have the real machine just sitting at home to be my model.

It appeared to be a rather straightforward cake to make at first, one rectangular box with a few controls buttons. I was more worried for how to shape the handheld remote control. I'd already planned to make it life-size, so I took the whole xbox and used it to trace its outline onto baking paper. The cake was huge, it consisted of two layers of chocolate cake baked on my rectangular grill pan and can served about 40. I'd earlier spent considerable time (and much breath) making the grey side panels and punching out hundreds of little holes using a straw for the ventilation. I wanted it to be dried and hardened so that I could just attach it to the side of the cake. It did but only one problem, it was just slightly taller than the cake. I had to increase the height of the the cake by piling on more chocolate icing. ;p

The anticipated challenge of the remote control was solved when some cut off of the crown of the cake came to be in a triangular and sloping shape. Which was fantastic! I kind of parked them together, place the template over it and sliced off the excess cake. It must be some angels blessing me cos I'm not sure how I actually achieved it now.... The little knobs and buttons I'd made earlier attached nicely and it became to look more and more realistic.

Covering the main cake with white fondant was more difficult than I'd thought. I thought it would be easy cos I don't have to cover the sides, but I guess I'm just not experienced enough. There were dirty smudges and uneven patches which I desperately tried to cover up. After the cake was covered, it was time to add the details. That was the most fun part but also the most tedious. You wouldn't notice the details until you start to imitate it. To make it realistic, I even tried to imitate the power sockets and the bar code on the behind side. Thanks to this project, I increased my collection of tools by 1 edible black in pen and edible silver dust. I realised that if I paint the dust on white fondant, it will take on a metalic colour, which was great for the main button on the controller.

The finishing touch was putting on the Happy 18th Birthday words on the cake. I had a sudden inspiration to spell "HAPPY" with the little grey dots of fondant (ventilation holes) and the "18th Birthday" appeared as wordings on an Xbox disc.

It was not a perfect cake but I'd put in a lot of effort and I really hope Liam liked the cake and appreciated the loving thoughts of his mom who ordered this cake for him. Especially after I heard R was hospitalised and they actually brought the cake to the hospital to cut it with her, I wished my cake could bring about some happy moments for them. I wish R the best of health!