The Cute Little Cake that Could!

After all the Christmas mayhem, I took a much needed hiatus from baking!  This is the first cake of the year, and who better to make a cake for than my sweet little sister?!  

This is a red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, covered in fondant.  The flowers are gumpaste and fondant. Both recipes can be found in an earlier post, here.

 Boy does this cake have a story! I found out my sister was coming home and was 100% sure I had everything I needed to make her a Red Velvet cake.  Welp, I only had 1/2 cup of white sugar in my whole house! This never, ever, happens to me  (I blame the new WeightWatchers Diet).  On a whim, I decided I would use light brown sugar for the rest of what I needed (it has yet to be tasted, so I'll report back).  I had a wonderful time mixing the batter in my new Kitchenaid Pro600 (thanks mom and dad!), and I got the cakes in the oven.  While they were baking, I mixed up some cream cheese buttercream, and it looked/tasted great.  The cakes came out, and when I turned them out of the pans, parts of the bottoms stuck! UGH! I blame the brown sugar. I pop them in the freezer to speed cool and come back in about 30 minutes.  The cakes are fine, but my cream cheese buttercream has gone gloppy (I don't have a better word).  I try to frost the cake, but it is just not working out with this gloppy, yet delicious, mess of frosting.  I get very discouraged and almost give up, then I decide to just cover the sucker in some fondant I had - VOILA! Now, there are some problems at the bottom because the gloppy frosting wanted to come out (guess it didn't like being hidden, ha!), but I think it turned out just fine ... I will report back when the taste test comes in!

I made these flowers out of fondant and gumpaste a couple weeks ago, and they are my favorite.  I love them. 

Sweet For Sirten is on WeightWatchers! So, stay tuned for some lightened up cake and frosting recipes - this should be fun! 

Happy Baking! 

Tie Cupcakes inspired by Men's Wearhouse

This evening, I made some cupcakes for my husband to take to his new job.  Since he started his job, I have had lots of quality alone time - he has been working 12 hours days all week!  I miss him and, I guess, baking is what I do to make myself feel better.  I had these cupcakes frozen, so I sat them out to thaw this morning.  They are a mixture of White Velvet cake, White Almond Sour Cream cake, and White Almond Sour Cream cake with berries.  They are each iced in white chocolate buttercream and the decorated with homemade buttercream fondant. Recipes will follow in a later post; here are some pictures:

Happy Baking!

Wilton Gum Paste and Fondant Class

This month, I have been taking the Wilton Gum Paste and Fondant Class.  We don't bake much, except for the final cake, but we make flowers and bows every week.  Everything is made from a half and half mix of fondant and gum paste, and most is made in stages to allow for proper drying. I just finished my second class in the course, and I wanted to share some of my work!


Two Calla Lilies, Carnation, and medium sized Rose

 

Close up of Rose with calyx and leaves



Gum Paste Bow

Everything from this course so far!



We are learning more flowers next week, and the following week we will produce our first complete cake decorated with fondant and gum paste - I'm super excited!

Happy Baking!

Birthday Weekend!

My little boy turned 1 this weekend, so, we had a small family party for him!  I, of course, baked my heart out the day prior, and here are the results:

The Smash Cake - Vanilla butter cake, covered in marshmallow fondant, with strawberry buttercream and fresh strawberry filling.  The 1 is made of a gumpaste/fondant mix and the decorations are marshmallow fondant.



Football Cupcakes! Vanilla butter cake with chocolate buttercream, and fondant footballs with royal icing accents.

The smash cake was so much fun to make! My son's favorite food right now is strawberries, so I made him a strawberry cake. I used my vanilla butter cake recipe, found here, in an earlier post.  The strawberry buttercream was a basic buttercream recipe with about 1/2 cup fresh, pureed strawberries added in.
 

Smash cake torted and filled with fresh strawberries and strawberry buttercream

Smash cake covered in a crumb coat of strawberry buttercream.

The football cupcakes are the same vanilla butter cake as the smash cake.  The chocolate buttercream is a basic buttercream recipe with approximately 1/4 cocoa powder (to taste) added. 

I think he liked it!

Everything all together for his birthday table!

This weekend was also my friend from work's mom's birthday, so she asked me to make a few things for her.  I was originally going to make red velvet petit fours ... I attempted these and the results were delicious, but hideously ugly =(  SO, her petit fours turned into red velvet cake balls (bon bons) covered in chocolate.  I will never attempt petit fours again, until I am much more experienced! They were a horrible experience; so bad, I am not even going to post the pictures. In addition to the cake balls, I sent my friend with a mini red velvet cake and some strawberry cupcakes:

The cupcakes are the same vanilla butter cake and strawberry buttercream I used for the smash cake.  The flowers are some I made in my decorating class and have been saving to use for something "pretty".

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Strawberry cupcake - vanilla buttercake with strawberry buttercream.  The purple and yellow flowers are gumpaste/fondant, the pink flowers are royal icing.



Some of my "left overs".  Chocolate covered red velvet bon bons, strawberry cupcakes, and a mini vanilla buttercake covered in chocolate buttercream.

 For the red velvet bon bons, I used my red velvet cake recipe, found in an earlier post, here.  I mushed up the cake and mixed it with some cream cheese buttercream frosting.  I then formed the mixture into ball shapes. I melted down some dark chocolate and white chocolate, and drizzled over the balls to achieve the look I was after.  I allowed the cake to show on the bottom, because I wanted to show the red velvet.  The ones pictured here are not the best ones, as I did not get a picture of the pretty ones I sent with my friend.  I have got to do better about keeping my camera handy!

I had so much fun this weekend!  I'm exhausted from being so busy, so I probably won't be baking again for a while, well, for at least a couple days.

Happy Baking!

Wilton Flowers and Cake Design Class #1

Tonight was my first class in Flowers and Cake Design!  We learned all about gumpaste, fondant, and how to mix them together to form flowers.  The 'button flower' is a complete pain to mold, but very cute when finished.  It would be perfect for a picnic basket cake.  The pansy is a much more laid back flower to make, even though it looks more complex.  Here are some examples (I was not as careful as I should have been in transporting these home, so I apologize for the 'mushed' look):

button flowers and pansies

purple button flower

pansy

In the spirit of good news, I have my first real cake order for this weekend. WOO!  I will be making a Barbie cake.  Wish me luck and watch for a post with the finished cake on Saturday!

Happy Baking!

Strawberry Deliciousness!

For the first time since starting this blog (or avidly baking), I am proud of the way something I made looks! At the request of my bestest friend, I made fresh strawberry cupcakes.  I used this recipe and added 1/4 cup more strawberry puree to the batter.  They turned out wonderfully!  I loved the bits of strawberry in the frosting and how moist and light the cakes turned out.  I played with some Wilton rolled fondant and cut cute little flowers for the tops =) This baking adventure is definitely my favorite so far.  Here are the results: