Cake-a-palooza Day 4

Well, I made it three days before I gave up on daily cake posts. I give props to all those bloggers out there who have time to post daily, or even once a week! I can barely throw a post up once every few months, but like I said, I am trying to make up for lost time!

Up next, another petite wedding cake, this time in mint green with frilly white ruffles. I kind of thought the cupcake trend was on the down-spiral, but it seems that I was wrong. As I am getting more involved at the bakery with wedding consultations, I am finding that cupcake-mania is still alive and kicking. The reason is this: cost effectiveness. Brides are seeing that a three dollar cupcake per guest is cheaper than a wedding cake at five dollars (minimum) per guest, and opting to save some money. However, they are still wanting that photo-op of cutting their cake, the beautifully displayed creation, perfectly matching their decor and theme. Enter: the petite wedding cake.

A miniature version of the show-stopper, perfectly sized to cut and share with the wedding party, or save for the first anniversary. This particular one is a little more on the modern-but-romantic side, with a mint green background, and a delicate white gardenia.

Two more cakes to come, so stay tuned!

**This cake designed and made by Bria Helgerson for Sugar Fixe Patisserie**

Cake-a-palooza Day 1

I am about to make up for some lost time here. Get ready for a cake-a-palooza. 6 days, 6 cakes. Things are about to get real crazy at the bakery, so I figured I better post these pictures now, or they will sit on my hard drive for all eternity. Seven months after starting a new job at a bakery, I find myself once again in a management position. I realized I really missed bossing people around, but more importantly I missed being able to share and implement new ideas to help improve and grow the business. So here we go, let the madness begin once again.

It is almost March and we are quickly approaching wedding season. A few recurring trends you will see throughout the next few days are: metallics applied in new ways, intricate gum paste flower sprays, unexpected pops of color, and the merging of romantic and modern aesthetics.

First up a small but striking cake. The bottom tier is brushed with a metallic copper petal dust and is adorned with gum paste poppies, leaves, and berries in peach and copper hues. The top tier is left blank to showcase the detailed arrangement.

Stay tuned, more to come tomorrow.

*This cake was designed and created by Bria Helgerson, for Sugar Fixe Patisserie.

The Ups and Downs of Cake Design

Managing expectations. That is what it all comes down to. Making sure you (the cake designer) and the client are on the same page. Making sure they know that they brought you pictures of an $800.00 cake but only want to spend $200.00, and that they will not be getting what is in the picture. Making sure that when the customer doesn't give you any pictures at all, and say they trust you to make their vision a reality, that you know exactly what their vision is. Making sure that you ask every single question you can possibly think of to make sure the customer will be happy with their cake.

A few weeks ago, I had my first unhappy customer. It has taken me a little while to stop stewing over it, but now I realize that the customer wasn't unhappy because I made an ugly cake. The customer was unhappy because I (and by 'I', I mean the bakery I work at) couldn't read her mind. She had trouble putting into words what she actually wanted, and we failed in response by not laying out an exact plan prior to making her cake. We were not on the same page, and as a result, we lost money and, more importantly, we lost a customer. As a team, we learned a lot from this cake. We learned we need to manage our customers expectations better. We need to ask more questions, provide clear sketches, gather pictures, and there needs to be more communication between the sales team and the design team.

This is all a new adjustment for me. Up until now, I have been making cakes directly for clients as a freelancer. Mostly for people I know, or through people I know. Even at the restaurant, I was dealing directly with the clients for consults and was not only able to hear what they wanted and discuss options, but to read their facial cues and hear the emotion in their voices. Now, I am detached a bit from the process since the cake consults go through our sales team. I realize that it would be impossible for myself or my fellow cake designer to meet with every client that we have at the bakery, that is a full time job, but it adds a whole new aspect to the execution of a cake.

So, when I get a chance to design a cake for someone I know and someone who trusts me, I jump at it. For this cake, I got a color scheme and no expectations. I was free to do whatever I wanted, and that is something I find I will miss working for someone else. I had been wanting to try making dahlias out of gum paste for a while now, so that is what I did. Maybe I need to learn how to manage my own expectations as well. Until I have my own shop, my own business, this is how the game goes. I don't want this to sound like I am complaining, because I am not. I get to make cakes all day, every day. Some of them I get to help design, some of them I don't, but either way it is definitely where I want to be.

Good as Gold

It's Saturday morning, and I am at home, drinking coffee, and...well, that's it actually. I am sitting in my pj-s, doing nothing. Nothing except writing this post. It feels wonderfully weird. No baking to do, no projects to work on, nothing. I get to spend some time with friends today whom I haven't seen in far too long, participate in some fall-themed activities, and share with you some goodies that I just haven't had the time to post.

A few years ago, I hinted not-so subtly on this very blog that I wanted Santa to bring me an airbrush machine for christmas. Santa pulled through, but unfortunately the machine was swiftly delegated to our second bedroom, otherwise known as the room where kitchen appliances go to die. When a friend of mine asked me to make her a anniversary cake, and showed me the picture of what she had actually wanted her wedding cake to look like (not what they ended up receiving unfortunately). I knew this was a perfect opportunity to resurrect and make use of my not-so new toy.

A smooth layer of buttercream, a quick coat of airbrush gold, and a light pressing of a textured paper towel, gave this cake it's antiqued look. For the flower, I rolled what felt like a million little balls out of fondant in multiple sizes and used royal icing to secure them to the center of the flower. Then I airbrushed the entire center and let it dry before affixing the petals.

Inside is my favorite devils food chocolate cake, frosted with vanilla italian meringue buttercream and filled with this raspberry curd mousse.

Raspberry Curd Mousse
recipe adapted from epicurious.com

12 oz raspberries
1 1/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 TBL lemon juice
2 TBL unsalted butter (room temperature)
pinch salt
1 tsp gelatin
1 TBL water
1 cup heavy whipping cream

Combine raspberries, sugar, lemon juice, and butter in a food processor, and pulse until raspberries have broken down. Transfer to a saucepan, and whisk in the eggs and salt. Place pan over medium heat, and bring mixture to 175 degrees F, whisking constantly. Remove from heat, strain through a fine mesh sieve, and let cool to room temperature, whisking every few minutes to aid cooling. Combine water and gelatin and let bloom for 5 minutes. Melt gelatin and whisk into raspberry curd. When mixture has cooled to room temperature, whip the heavy cream to medium peaks. Add the raspberry curd and mix until combined. Chill until you are ready to fill your cake.

You can skip the gelatin if you want, but I found the raspberry curd to be a little runny to be filling layer cakes with. If you are using the curd or mousse for a different purpose you can omit it.

Checking In

If I have been reminded of anything this summer, it is that life is short. Too short. The life you've grown accustomed to, your sense of comfort and control, and even the ones you love can be snapped away in a mere second. The months fly by without you noticing, or having the time to stop and realize what you are missing.

I found that I sort of checked out of life this summer. I checked out of social activities, checked out of taking care of myself, checked out of a lot of things. I threw myself into work and grief, and neglected most of everything else.

Now I find the weather beginning to cool off, there are pumpkins for sale at the garden store down the street, and I am wondering where the season went. I am also wondering what the hell was wrong with me?

My wake up call came in the form of a much needed celebration to close the summer. I have been home so many times these past few months, a few times to say goodbye to lives cut too short, but most recently a visit home for a wedding was the giant breath of fresh air that many in my family needed to come together and celebrate love and new beginnings.

Weddings have a way of doing that I think. It reminds you of how much love there is in this world. You can look around, and see all eyes and hearts focused on the two people in the front of the room, supporting them and wishing them a life full of happiness. In this case, the wedding was my sister's (which will have it's own post altogether) and there were just so many faces that I had a chance to catch up with and reconnect with. I also was scolded by more than a handful of family friends and relatives that I had not updated this space in a long time, so friends, this is for you.

I feel honored every time I am trusted to make a wedding cake. It is a big job, and often it is the first thing guests see when they walk into the reception space. It is a constant reminder of why I do what I do. I am in the business of making people happy, and to see the joy on someone's face when they catch the first glimpse of their wedding cake, or when dessert is placed in front of them at the end of their meal, is my motivation to keep creating.

When life hands us a little more than we can handle, it's easy to check out. The better path though, is to check back in, keep getting better at your job, strengthen your relationships, tighten up your family ties. Life may keep you busy and overwhelmed but at the end of the day, what is left is family, love, and passion, things that should never be taken for granted.

Ruffles!

One more wedding cake under my belt, and just a few days to recover before I start working on the next one. This cake came with a few ups and downs, and many lessons learned. I realized as I was putting the fondant on the bottom tier of this cake, that this was in fact the largest fondant project I had taken on yet. I haven't covered anything larger than a ten inch cake before. A pyramid, yes, but something this huge? Nope, not even close. For some reason it hadn't occurred to me until just that moment.

There is no more hesitation these days when someone hires me to make a cake or dessert table, I say yes of course I can do that. Whether its for better or worse, I rarely consider if I have the necessary time and means to do said project, but deep down, I know that one way or another I will get it done, and I won't stop or finish it until it looks and tastes exactly how I wanted it. If that means ripping two pounds of fondant off of a 15-inch cake tier because it has one too many wrinkles and starting from scratch at 2 am, that's what I will do.

As much as it interferes with my sleep schedule, and the cleanliness of my kitchen at times, it's the attitude I need to have in this industry. Yep, I can do that! Sometimes, the google helps, and sometimes I just jump right in and figure it out for myself. So here's to diving into the deep end, and hoping you make it out alive, and with a beautiful, and even more importantly, delicious, cake in hand.

Blue Christmas

Its almost as if I willed it to snow last night by making tons of teeny tiny snowflakes out of gumpaste. Is that possible? I wonder what else I could use this power for....

It FINALLY snowed last night. I have been having a little trouble getting into the Christmas spirit with the warm and/or dreary weather this month. The minnesota girl in me craves snow as soon as mid-november hits, and this year has been a huge disappointment so far. Maybe thats why I made a blue cake last night, I think I need to start making big white fluffy cakes with mounds of snow piled on top. It will be like my own personal voo-doo cake, used for good, not evil. Unless you hate snow I guess. Sorry in advance.

I made this cake in my second to last (yay!!) cake decorating class last night, and this morning, instead of bearing down and finishing my final costing project (booooring) I decided to make some matching cupcakes! Lucky for you, I actually took some step by step pictures so you can see how I made the toppers. No, I did not freehand pipe those snowflakes, you think I am THAT crazy? Here is an easy way to get your template transferred onto your fondant to pipe over so you can get a clean, consistent design.

First, roll out your fondant to your desired thickness, I usually go to about 1/16 inch, pretty thin for these.

Cut out your circle, and make sure to dust a good amount of powdered sugar underneath it so it doesn't stick to your work surface. Peel the excess fondant away.

Take your paper template (that you already had cutout, because you are more prepared than I am) and gently press it into the fondant circle.

Use the pads of your fingers to gently rub all of the edges so you get a nice clean imprint. Don't press too hard or you will distort your circle and you run the risk of the paper sticking to the fondant.

Carefully peel away the paper and you are ready to pipe your design.

I used a 00 tip to pipe, I wouldn't go much bigger than a 0 or 1 if you are doing something this small and intricate. Also, I used buttercream to pipe because it's what I had on hand, but you could also use royal icing, you would probably get better line quality that way.

Don't worry if you mess up a little, just let the frosting dry for a few seconds then gently scrape it off with a gumpaste tool or exacto knife. 

You can skip this next step if you want, but I think adding a few small sprinkles, strategically placed, makes for a nice finished clean look. Plus the sprinkles hide the ugly corners. Not that you'd have ugly corners, but if you did, this would help.

If your hands are naturally always sweaty like mine, you should just be able to press your finger into each sprinkle and gently press them into the buttercream. You can also use a tweezers if you are a rockstar like that.

Let these dry for a few hours, then gently press them onto your piped frosting.

Voila! Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial, I think this is my first go at one of these. I can say it is trickier than it looks to take pictures with one hand while piping with the other.

Let it snow, let it snow, and here's hoping yours isn't a blue christmas.

Carrot Cake Cupcakes

My wonderful, smart, talented, beautiful older sister turned 30 today. She is an amazing woman, strong and opinionated, sensitive and compassionate. She can kick my butt running (well doing anything athletic, really) and trivial pursuit, but is still nice enough to share a bottle of wine or a delicious meal with me. I was lucky enough to be able to celebrate her birthday with her, for the first time in years, here in Chicago and I wanted to send her home with one of her favorite treats: carrot cake.

I cannot think of carrot cake without thinking of my sister and our former backyard neighbors the Sonnabends. They have three kids, and the older two and my sister were inseparable growing up. Carrot cake instantly brings to mind a snapshot of Rian and Sara in matching bikinis with their little pot bellies sticking out, hamming it up for the camera, waiting to take on the suped-up slip and slide my dad concocted. Whenever it was time for a Sonnabend birthday, you could pretty much guarantee that a carrot cake would be blazing with candles. For some reason I always despised carrot cake, and thought it was weird that a kid would want a cake made out of vegetables for their birthday, when they could have their choice of anything. Chocolate, vanilla, fun-fetti, angel food, come on, with all the options, carrot cake? Really??

I have since come around and  now really enjoy carrot cake, I even snagged a cupcake or two for myself last weekend. Paired with a rich and not too sweet cream cheese frosting, these spiced carrot cake cupcakes made the birthday girl very happy.

Carrot Cake Cupcakes & Cream Cheese Frosting
adapted from Smitten Kitchen
makes two dozen cupcakes

2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 cups sugar
1 1/4 cups vegetable oil
4 large eggs, room temperature
3 cups grated carrots, I used a micro plane to grate the very finely, but you can use the small side of a box grater

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F, and line two cupcake tins with paper liners.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger, and whisk together. In a large bowl, whisk together the oil and sugar until combined. Add the eggs one at a time, whisking to incorporated between each addition. Fold in the carrots, the add the dry ingredients to the wet, and using a wooden spoon, gently mix just until combined, and all dry ingredients are wet.

Spoon into lined muffin tins, until each cup is about 3/4 the way full. Bake for 16-20 minutes on the middle rack, until a toothpick entered into the center of the cakes comes out clean. Let cool in pans for a few minutes, then remove from tins and let cool completely on a baking rack before frosting.

To make the frosting:

16 ounces cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

pinch of salt

In a stand mixer, combine the cream cheese and butter, and beat on medium high speed until smooth. Add the vanilla and salt and mix until incorporated. Gradually add the sugar, and beat until light and fluffy, about 3-4 minutes.

Pipe or spread onto cupcakes as desired. 

Here's to many wonderful birthdays to come, hopefully all of them with cake included.

A Sugar Flower Revelation

I sort of had a revelation this weekend. Nothing earth shattering, more so a bit of self-awareness that I hadn't realized before. At some point during the six hour long gumpaste-flower-making marathon I got to really thinking about how much things have changed over the past year or two, and ultimately how I have changed. My perspective on my work, new projects, and life in general has completely changed from a nervous, second-guessing stance, to a confident, fearless approach. Can I make a tiered, square fondant covered wedding cake, even though I have never done anything like that before? Sure, why not? Should I try my hand at making a flower out of gumpaste for a cake I am delivering tomorrow instead of purchasing a real flower to slap on top? Hell yeah, I think I can do that. No, I know I can do that.

Maybe I have been lucky, and all these projects that I have taken on (maybe some of them a bit foolish) have worked out, and worked out well. But maybe, just maybe, it's this new found confidence I have in myself that is responsible for me being successful all the new things I am trying. Letting go of the fear is paving the way for sturdy cakes, delicate sugar flowers, and new and exciting opportunities in the kitchen. I used to worry so much about completing a project on time, and completing it to my standards, that it would get in the way of my productivity and the quality of the product.

So where did this come from? It came from finally doing something that I feel great about. I got out of a field where I was always second guessing myself, and feeling like my skills weren't up to par. I didn't have the passion for product design that the job really requires, and that in turn affected my confidence with my work. I didn't believe that I could draw a beautiful spatula, for example, and therefore I couldn't, and didn't.

In the kitchen, I believe that I can make a beautiful cake. I believe that I can do something, anything, even if I have never done it before. I still have SO much to learn about pastries and cakes and decorating, but I believe that I will take it all in, and will be able to utilize all this knowledge in my new life in the pastry world.

It is really amazing what happens when you sit down to make about 35 layers of gumpaste chrysanthemum petals. I know I have talked before about baking being therapeutic, but I feel that way now more than ever.

Whew, thanks for letting me get that off my chest. Now for what you really came here for: the goods.

This cake and the macarons were made for my sister's very dear friend for her baby shower. She is due in March, and they held a lovely shower for her here in Chicago at the Drake Hotel. I went with some recipes that I know and love, which enabled me to focus on trying something new with the decor. I did a simple and delicious devil's food cake, with cream cheese frosting. The macarons are plain colored shells, some with chocolate ganache, some with lemon curd filling. Some citrus colored ribbons, and a gumpaste chrysanthemum tied it all together, and definitely made me look forward to spring.

You can find the recipes here:

Macarons
Lemon Curd
Devils Food Cake
Cream Cheese Frosting