iPad Cake

I can't believe how fast kids are growing up these days.  A year ago, my nephew requested a Spongebob Square Pants cake for 9th birthday.  When I asked him what he wanted me to make for him this year, he replied with an iPad cake and all the apps!

This cake was a white almond sour cream cake (adapted from Cake Central) with strawberry swiss meringue buttercream (adapted from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes).  The frosting didn't hold up well with all of the fondant laying on top.  I noticed a lot of bulging and air pockets later on.  Next time, I would treat it as a filling and use a sturdier frosting as a dam. 

The details were  made with a mix of store bought and home made fondant.  I used royal icing on the cake and an edible food marker on the banner for the lettering.  The bottom was heavily coated with silver luster dust.  I say heavily because I realized too late that I didn't have enough white fondant.  So, I ended up mixing together all my available fondant and I happened to have a lot of pink fondant.

Just like last year, he wasn't shy about pointing out my mistake.  I forgot the camera lens.  But we fixed that by sticking the candle there.  Overall, he was very happy with his cake as I was to make it for him.

Championship Belt Cake

First time working with chocolate ganache (adapted from Cake Central) as I needed to cover the chocolate cake as clean as possible without using a lot of MMF because the birthday cake recipient doesn't like it.  Read it works wonders as many have come to replace butter cream with ganache under fondant even.  After this first attempt and a bit more practice, I might be converting as well.  It was easy to work with.  Loved that I could just take a hot spatula and smooth out all the rough spots afterwards.  However, I could've done a cleaner job.  One thing I had problem with was the luster dust.  Wanted the fondant pieces to pop out but I couldn't quite get it.  The "buttons" were mini M&Ms.

SPECIAL NOTE: I got help with this one.  My sister drew on the falcon and my brother did the blocked text with the edible ink pens as I am far too artistically inept.  Thanks guys!

Hello Kitty Cake Pops

Inspired by Bakerella's blog, I jumped into making my first batch of cake pops.  After losing a few heads and ears in the bowl of candy melts, I made a good two dozen cake pops before calling it quits.  At the same time, my edible ink pens were refusing to write on smoothly anymore.  The bow was made using jumbo sprinkles and mini m&m's.  Thank goodness these things freeze well as I still have another two dozen cake truffles left.