Yankee Stadium Cake

Yankee Stadium for Jonny's Yankee themed bar mitzvah!

Chocolate cake, oreo and chocoalte ganache filling, chocolate ganache frosting, and lots of decorating.  Notice the LED scrolling message board!  

This cake was a home run!

Mazel Tov Jonny!

Giants Football Helmet Cake

It isn't every day that you hear about a 13 year old girl who is such a fan of the NY Giants football team that she wants her bat mitzvah party to have a football theme.  Boys, perhaps.  Girls, not so much.  But to me, it indicated that the 13 year old girl is an independent thinker and has a great deal of confidence at an age when many girls are insecure and just want to look and act like each other.  I admire and wholeheartedly support her doing her own thing.  Very cool.

This cake was made for that young woman, who is named Lexa (Shayna is her middle name), for her bat mitzvah.  The cake is a life sized helmet cake, made from delicious, fudgy chocolate cake, and filled with altering layers of Oreo filling and Nutella buttercream.  The whole thing was covered with a dark chocolate ganache.  Everything is edible, even the facemask (although you probably wouldn't want to eat it because the gum paste used to make the mask has hardened, so it can stand up).  At the event space, Lexa's mom surrounded the cake with tall thin taper candles placed on the board (the football field).  The cake was then used in the candle lighting ceremony, in which Lexa called up family and friends to help her light each of her 13 candles.

This helmet wasn't large enough to feed a whole party (the helmet feeds 30-40 people, depending upon how it is cut), so I had baked additional sheet cakes to ensure everyone got some cake.  One sheet cake was chocolate with Oreo filling and chocolate ganache, like the helmet, and the other was vanilla with raspberry swiss meringue buttercream filling and vanilla bean swiss meringue buttercream on the outside.

I received a call from Lexa and her mom the day after the event, and they and their guests were still raving about the cake and thrilled at how realistic it had looked and how good it had tasted.  They told me that one of the guests at the party had suggested sending a photo to the NY Giants!  Others didn't want to cut into the cake, but Lexa and her family finally did, so they could have their cake and eat it too.

Mazel Tov, Lexa!  Put that independent thinking to good use in your life.  I expect to hear great things from you! Touchdown!!!

Triple the fun! Triplets Bar Mitzvah Cake

Congratulations to triplets Ethan, Caleb and Louisa!  I made this cake for their b'nai mitzvah celebration (yup, that the plural) which was on a fabulous fall day at the beautiful Keeler Tavern in Ridgefield, CT.

When I make cakes for people, I try to personalize the cake for the recipient.  I like to use colors they like, and I also often incorporate the recipient's interests in the cake design, so that the person receiving the cake knows it was really made especially for him or her.  That's a much harder task when making one cake for 3 kids with different interests, preferences and personalities.  That said, I was pleased with how this cake turned out, and even happier that the triplets and their parents loved it!

On the bottom of the cake is Ethan's tier, which is made of lemon butter cake, filled with lemon meringue buttercream and raspberry jam, and topped with lemon meringue buttercream.  The covering is blue, Ethan's favorite color, and the football (which is 100% edible, made of rice krispy treats and modeling chocolate) and the penant flag reflect his love for his New England Patriots.  He's also a big Red Sox fan.  (I blame their father for this Boston passion. Sigh. They should be Yankee fans, not Red Sox fans.  But what can you do?)

In the middle is Caleb's tier.  Caleb is a soccer player (he plays goalie), and he too roots for Boston-based sports teams.  Caleb's favorite color is orange, but their mom asked me to incorporate the lime green color which was a theme in the party decorations, along with blue and purple (no orange in the party decor).  Finally, on top, Louisa's tier has an edible ipod perched in front of it and handbags around the sides, as Louisa loves to listen to music (James Taylor is a favorite - she has excellent taste!) and she likes to accessorize.  Purple is Louisa's favorite color.  Both Caleb's and Louisa's tiers (the top two tiers) were made of chocolate cake with the crowd favorite cookies and cream (aka Oreo) filling, which has big chunks of real Oreos in it.  The outer frosting was a vanilla swiss meringue buttercream.  There wasn't a bite left from the entire cake, which was made to serve about 80 people!

On top of the cake is the logo used in the b'nai mitzvah invitations: a modern take on the two scrolls of the torah, although to me they look a little bit like candles too.  As a result, I thought it was the perfect thing to use on top of the cake.  I think the topsy turvy design added a bit of whimsy on this cake made for newly minted teens.

It was a fabulous day for the triplets, and I wish them all the best!  Their parents should be very proud of their terrific trio!  And of course, the triplets should thank their parents for everything they do for them.

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!