'Tis the Season for saying thank-you!

I donated a certificate for a 50 serving cake to the Epilepsy Foundation and the good folks at the Gebauer Company were the winning bidders. They ordered a chocolate chocolate cake with raspberry filling and chocolate buttercream frosting as a centerpiece cake for their winter holiday party at the Cleveland Skating Club.

The sign is an exact replica of the one that greets visitors to the Gebauer plant complex. It was made out of Rice Krispie Treats, covered in fondant, and scored to replicate the stonework. The logos and address were impressed with an alphabet press and colored with food grade markers. The snow is royal icing. The rocks are marbled fondant and the hand modeled cardinal is the state bird of Ohio.

"Weighty" Birthday Cookies and the World's Smallest Violins

The hexagonal cookies were made for a gentleman celebrating his 45th birthday. He was a power lifter in his teenage years, hence the barbells. Each cookie was individually wrapped because they were going to be shipped. To minimize the possibility of damage to the decoration, the inscription was done using edible food markers. The cookies are vanilla sugar cookies covered in fondant.

The violin cookies were made as favors for a private party honoring a Grammy-nominated violinist hoping to release a solo CD . Each cookie is about 4 inches tall and includes all of the parts of a real violin. The strings are piped from royal icing and the rest of the decoration is hand-cut fondant.

Custom Logo Cookies

These cookies were made using a hand-cut, custom stencil. They're vanilla sugar cookies covered with vanilla rolled fondant.

The background color matches the New York Life logo. The small cookies are marbled fondant with piped royal icing letters.

Thankful Gifts!

These 3 "gifts" and the accompanying cupcakes were made for a reception at Plymouth Church. The theme of the annual stewardship campaign was "Gifts" and these cakes were made to represent the new logo of the stewardship committee.

The largest cake is pumpkin spice with cheescake filling. The blue cake is chocolate brownie cake with caramel ginger filling and the purple cake is lemon with peach passion fruit filling. All are covered in borderless rolled fondant with handmade gum paste bows. The cupcakes are pumpkin and lemon with buttercream icing tinted to match the fondant counterparts.

125 & Going Strong!

Willoughby Hills Friends Church celebrated its 125th birthday with this HUGE cake--the largest horizontal cake I've done to date!

The custom designed cake board was cut from a 31 inch square, covered with Fall themed paper, and embellished with orange satin ribbon and green pearl headed pins.

The 190 serving cake was composed of 3 different flavors: white almond sour cream with mocha mousse filling, milk chocolate with oreo mousse filling, and yellow buttermilk with black raspberry preserves. The icing was homemade buttercream. The Bible verses decorating the cake were piped in buttercream tinted in Fall colors. The church logo was hand piped on a gum paste plaque.

All I can say is, "Thank heaven for double doors!"--or we'd have never gotten this behemoth out of the house or into the church!

Labors of Love & String Theory

Some cake decorating is, in this fast paced day and age, quite lovely--but tragically impractical !Actually doing some of these techniques could take days, if done correctly.

The techniques on the yellow cake are called Lambeth, named after a baker and decorator who made the most amazing cakes in the 1940's. Each line of royal icing is individually piped and the flowers are also hand piped. Not all of these motifs would be used on a single cake, but the idea of the decorating method is to have an intensely decorated cake.

The green cake shows examples of Australian curtain stringwork that is piped with a tip whose opening is about the size of a pinhead. The top of that cake is crimped in a pattern that is then highlighted with piping, too.

My Cake is a Barbeque?

I donated a certificate for a 35 serving cake to a silent auction at church. The certificate winner asked for a smaller cake and some cookies for a Labor Day barbeque. I found a similar cake on the web, some wonderful cookie cutters and this was the result.

The cake is a sour cream marble cake with oreo mousse filling. Everything "on the grill" is hand modeled and edible. The cookies are sugar cookies with fondant decoration.

The family was really delighted with the cake & cookies. They thought it would be the star of their event.