A Wedding of Red and Pink

My boyfriend and I had just returned from Thailand when his mum informed us she was going to marry her long term partner :) and she asked if I would make their cake for the occasion.

The small and intimate wedding was held at Blue Water Grill in Applecross...such a gorgeous location and we had matching wonderful weather. We had agreed on cupcakes and a small top cake for the bride and groom to cut into for photos, the cupcakes were vanilla bean with buttercream frosting and the cake was red velvet with white chocolate ganache.

I'd never made a red velvet cake before, but was pretty happy with my efforts...and then I tried crumb coating it in the ganache...near disaster! The cake was so soft and crumbly and the ganache slightly soft, the top layer of the cake kept sliding to one side so I had to keep repositioning it as the chocolate set. Lesson #1 - need more practise coating with chocolate ganache = watch more YouTube videos.

The night before the wedding...or should I say the morning of...I finished up at 2am. The pearls on the cupcakes had to be airbrushed with a pearl shimmer as did the cake.

The cakes were a hit at the wedding, the Persian Fairy Floss wilted after 20 minutes but I knew this would happen so took backup floss. One of the waitresses was that impressed with the red velvet cake that she placed an order for her mums 50th birthday in March...woo! I think I shall attempt cream cheese buttercream frosting next.

Took a Bash at a Wedding Cake

Best Bunnings tool ever!

One of my very best friends married her love on the 10/11/2012...and I was lucky enough to play the role of bridesmaid AND wedding cake creator!

We had been to a wedding expo earlier in the year she spotted a cake she loved the look of...and one that I figured wouldn't be completely out of my experience range...I was excited to be making my very first 'grown up' wedding cake!

The wedding was held in Busselton, as we are all originally from the area and I headed down on the Thursday morning to pick up the cakes for the bottom 2 tiers. I decided to have them made by Rachel @ Icing Indulgence for a number of reasons...1) I was staying at my dads place and had never used his oven. 2) I didn't exactly have hours and hours of spare time to bake and 3) I dreaded the thought of the cakes turning out terrible and the wedding cake being a disaster.



I have a wonderful selection of aprons from Europe...you'd
think by now I'd remember to wear one



Rachel did such an amazing job, the bottom tier was 4 layers of chocolate mud cake with chocolate ganache filling and the middle tier was 4 layers of vanilla butter cake with white chocolate ganache filling...then the top layer was good old Coles Light Fruit Cake with white chocolate ganache also. These cakes were HUGE! There were only around 40 people at the wedding and this cake would have fed 3 times that many people.

Once I was set up at my dads place, the decorating began. I've never rolled out so much fondant...let alone covered such big cakes in the stuff. My dad, step mum and step sister had a great time supervising my work...and before I knew it 6 hours had passed and I had something that resembled the wedding cake we had seen at the expo all those months ago. I also got to give my new airbrush a good workout and I am in LOVE with it!

Soooo much fondant 

So here are a few snaps of the creating and the creation. Tips for my next wedding cake...take a tool box so I can glue down that diamante strip that has come slightly loose and scissors to cut down that bit of dowel sticking up from the second tier. All in all I was extremely happy with this cake and I think it went down a treat on the day :-)

To my best friend Kristy and her new husband Mike...I wish you both a lifetime of blissful happiness and never ending love. Thank you for letting me play such a big part in your wedding...the memories I have from the day I will never forget and I only hope that I look that in love on my own wedding day xxx

Please excuse all the white space...I cannot for the life of my arrange my photos how I want them.

The creation! 

A Whole Lot of Sweet

I won my boyfriend over with these cupcakes ;)

We were set up by friends and he knew I loved baking so I took along some Ferrero Rocher cupcakes to our first date...one year later and I'm teaching him how to decorate!

Wedding Party

A work colleague eloped and got married in Italy...she asked me to make her some cakes for the big wedding party they threw when they returned.

I decided to try my hand at white chocolate ganache and it came out pretty well!

I loved making the accompanying cupcakes...I'm pretty sure I made close to 100...my first big order.

The 80's Cake

The night before my cousins 30th birthday party...I get a frantic phone call...the cakes haven't risen. Half an hour later a very flushed cousin, best friend and another friend walk through my front door and we had new cakes baked in no time.

I'd never covered a cake in fondant...only watched YouTube videos so we decided to wing it. Armed with latex gloves, we start kneading lime green colour gel into 3kg of white fondant....while bestie prepped vodka jelly shots.

We made 2 tiers, one chocolate and one vanilla...one of them was gluten free but don't ask me which. To add to the 80's theme we did some pac-man cupcakes :)

We had such a fun night, drinking champers...eating pizza...I had a Columbian housemate at the time and I think she thought we were all nuts...making cakes until 2am but we ended up with a fantastic cake! 

Arsenal Part 2

Another update...some photos of the birthday boy and his cake...

Well here is the finished product...my first and quite possibly my last ever soccer cake haha

It was a frustrating task having to cut all the shapes by hand (because I forgot to buy a cutter) and after the first layer none of the shapes fit in together so I had to cut each one to fit separately.

Quite happy with the overall look though...you can even eat the Arsenal logos!

  

Arsenal

I'm in the process of making my first soccer ball cake...after purchasing my first soccer ball cake tin.

The cake took FOREVER to bake, but was so soft and fluffy once it was done. The other half helped me level it, I stired some sweetened mixed berries through white chocolate ganache and filled the cake with it...yummo! Then a thin layer of buttercream on the outside and ivory fondant.

Tonight I'll complete the cake design.