Matisse

This cake was made for the Sweet Sixteen party for a lovely young woman named Matisse.  She was indeed named after the famous French artist, Henri Matisse; I am a fan of his work, and think her name very cool and creative.  So of course the question was how to combine the interests of a contemporary 16 year old with some inspiration from her namesake?  This cake was the result.

Matisse, like many girls of her age, loves fashion and shopping.  Her mother told me that Matisse was born in a hospital room with a view of Bloomingdales, sealing her fate.  Her mother and I decided to use this funny story as the theme for the cake.  Her mother also asked if I could incorporate the artist Matisse's iconic signature into the design.  The artist was also known for his cut-out designs (the work at right hangs in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC), some of which had a motif of what looks like a 4-sided flower.  Thus, I was inspired by flowers by Matisse the artist, but made my own version in colors loved by Matisse the 16 year old.  It is hard to see in the top photo, but the flowers go up the sides of the bag in addition to being scattered on the board holding the cake.

Finally, a certain 14 year old daughter of mine had the brilliant idea of adding some teen-appropriate details, including a lip gloss, eye shadow and necklace from fondant.   She even made the eye shadow and lip gloss herself, and I think she did an amazing job!

The cake itself was the shopping bag, and there were two flavors in two tiers.  The bottom tier was chocolate cake with oreo filling and chocolate buttercream on the outside, and the top tier was vanilla cake with raspberry buttercream and fresh raspberries, with chocolate buttercream outside as well.  Everything was covered by the green fondant "bag".

Here's to Matisse and I hope she had a fabulous party and birthday!

The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games is the first book in a young adult trilogy by Suzanne Collins.  The books have been extremely popular among the middle and high school set, and so it is no surprise that the movie, which opened a week ago, has become the must see film of the spring.

I received an order from Michael's mom to make a birthday cake for his Hunger Games themed birthday party.  The kids were going to see the movie, then retreat back to Michael's house for pizza and a surprise birthday cake.  The plan was set - I was to make a cake with the logo (a "Mockingjay pin") on the cake.  The pin appears on the cover of the book, and plays an important role in the plot.   (My husband joked that a Hunger Games cake was an oxymoron.  I think he's got a point, don't you?)

The first step was to make the logo pin, as it needed to dry a bit in order to hold its shape.  Everything was sculpted by hand - every feather on the wings and tail, the body and head.  Then the whole thing got two coats of food-safe gold paint, which also needed time to dry.  (This may be a sculpture, but everything is 100% edible!)  Just before the cake was ready to be delivered, the Mockingjay pin logo finally was placed upon the actual cake.  

The cake was a delicious yellow (vanilla) butter cake made from scratch, filled with oreo frosting and chocolate buttercream.  The outside was covered with more chocolate buttercream, which has a delicious chocolate flavor and is ideal for those who really like chocolate but aren't card carrying chocholics like me.  The whole cake was then covered with black fondant (sugar dough) and a black ribbon was placed around the bottom edge of the cake.  I took this photo before I put the cake on the board I used to transport and serve it.  I'm sorry I don't have a copy of the whole thing on the cake board because it looked cute.  I put writing on the board in the same font that is on the book's cover saying "Happy 12th Birthday Michael! May the odds be ever in your favor".   (That's a quote from the book, and I thought it was appropriate for a birthday celebration).   

I hope Michael and his friends enjoyed the movie and the party and that Michael liked his cake.  I wish Michael the happiest of birthdays.  May all his wishes come true. 

Flower Power

I just got back from a fabulous gum paste flower class given by the extremely talented Jacqueline Butler of Petalsweet Cakes in San Francisco.  I've been admiring her work for a couple of years since I first saw it online.  She makes the most fabulous sugar peonies, hydrangeas and a variety of other flowers - her work is truly sugar art.  The two-day class focused on one of my favorite flowers, the peony, as well as the French tulip, with its frilly petals.  Not surprisingly, these beauties are labor intensive, but I think they are worth it.  I'm thrilled with the flowers we made and can't wait to use them on a cake, now that I know how to make them.  Jacqueline's style is to use a very soft color palate, and I think it is beautiful, but I'm not limited to that.  Wouldn't a bright pink peony be just amazing on a white cake?

Early Spring Wedding Cake!

We certainly are having an amazing March, with spring-like weather even though the calendar still says "Winter" for a few more days.  Influenced by this nice weather and thoughts of my yard bursting into bloom in the coming weeks,  I was inspired to make another display cake full of flowers.  This cake is covered with white, lavender and pale green roses, deep purple ranunculus, and reddish purple carnations, complemented by shiny green leaves and bare brown branches. The cake also shows a trend in cakes these days: tiers with different shapes and heights.   The purple tier is a hexagon sandwiched by round tiers, and the base tier is a square.

All the flowers on the cake were made by hand, petal by petal, out of gum paste (a type of sugar dough which hardens as it dries).  It is a time-consuming process, but well worth the effort. The flowers are technically edible, but I'd say you probably wouldn't want to eat them as they're very dry and brittle.

I love spring, and the flowers and colors on this cake make me happy.  I hope they make you happy too!

Magic Maple Syrup

Isn't this amazing???
This fondant-covered cake looks so real, and the bottle of syrup seems to be suspended in mid-air.  The bottle, syrup and butter are made from modeling chocolate, but we're not giving away the secret of levitating syrup bottles!   


This cake is one of the reasons why I love taking cake classes.  I made this cake at a class taught by the fabulous Lauren Kitchens, a Texas-based cake artist who has been on a number of Food Network cake shows and challenges.  She was a great teacher and shared her tricks about making incredible cakes like this one.  Now I can make a waffle cake for you for  Father's Day, or perhaps as a Groom's Cake, or even as a birthday cake.  And I can do a lot more along these lines.  Imagine a floating watering can pouring 'water' onto a pot of flowers, or a mid-air can of beer pouring into a frosty mug, or some spaghetti dripping into a bowl off a levitating fork... what kind of magic cake do you fancy?

Guy Smiley or Nancy's husband?

Nancy made this Muppet version of her husband, Andrew, out of modeling chocolate and fondant.  Isn't he cute? She is anxious to Muppetize someone else!  Are there any volunteers?

Mazel Tov!

When Chelsea was planning her bat mitzvah, she and her mom decided they wanted Nancy to make the cake for the party.  They had tasted the cake at Claire's bat mitzvah, and loved it -- and that's saying something since Chelsea isn't a big fan of cake in general.  The top and bottom tiers are made from chocolate cake with chunky Oreo filling and chocolate ganache frosting.  The middle tier is a luscious lemon butter cake filled with raspberry jam and lemon swiss meringue buttercream, and frosted with the same lemon buttercream. (By the way, Nancy is a card carrying chocoholic, but this lemon-raspberry cake is one of her favorites.)

Chelsea is a lovely and fun girl who is very sporty; she wanted a cake that wasn't too "girly" and didn't have a specific theme.  This design, with its happy colors and geometric patterns, got both Chelsea and her mother's enthusiastic stamp of approval.  The rose on the second tier and the bow on top are both made by hand from gum paste, an edible sugar dough that dries hard, and so can hold its shape.  The bow was dusted with a sparkly blue edible glitter which doesn't really show in this photo but was clearly visible in person.

The candles around the perimeter of the cake were used in a candle lighting ceremony at the party.  The 13 candles were lit one by one with help from family and friends who are important to the bat mitzvah girl.  There were a lot of photos from the candle lighting ceremony with the cake surrounded by Chelsea and the candle-lighers.  After the ceremony, the cake was cut up and served for dessert.  We are thrilled that our beautiful and delicious cake helped add to the happy memories of a special day for a very special girl!