Painting the handbag cake

I put the dragees on by hand

The handbag cake is an actual pistachio almond cake on the inside underneath the fondant. I looked at the real handbag and eye-balled the measurements. After dyeing the fondant pink, I rolled it out and cut out the pieces one by one.  I used by buttercream “glue” to stick it the pieces together and then edible paints and markers to add the finishing touches. Gold dragees are edible sugar decorations that I use to add a little luxury to my cakes.

Fondant High Heel Shoes

The fondant high heel shoes were made a few days in advance to set and dry into the perfect shape.  She brought me a designer shoe from her closet so I just had to look at it to replicate it.

The birthday girl’s first initial is H so I thought it would be cute to use the letter H on the handbag. The cake was a big hit at the party and a definite conversation piece. We had the pleasure of watching guests walk by the cake and admire the craftsmanship.

The finished product

Fun Flowers and Ribbon on Wedding Cake

The couple chose a variety of delicious flavors including carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

Carrot Cake Layer of the Wedding Cake

Two layers of the wedding cake were white sponge cake filled with fresh whip cream and strawberries.

Fresh Whip Cream with Strawberries

After putting buttercream on the wedding cake as “glue,”  I enrobed the cake with marzipan and worked on the fine details.  The couple chose to have the flowers put on the cake at the wedding site.

Buttercream Dots

Mousse Filling for Wedding Cake

 Brides who choose to have their wedding reception at the Grand America want a beautiful, elegant cake that fits into the five star surroundings. I started making this wedding cake with the freshest ingredients: whipping cream, belgian white chocolate and strawberries for the filling.

Strawberries in Wedding Cake

The cake is a three tier round pistachio almond cake. I use rings to layer the cakes and help the mousse set into the desired shape in the fridge. They come in a variety of sizes – I used 6 , 10 and 14 inches. After the white chocolate mousse sets in the fridge, I take the cake out of the rings and use buttercream to “glue” the marzipan onto the wedding cake.

Elegant Ribbon on Wedding Cake

I hand score the marzipan and add little edible sugar pearls onto the wedding cake. The cream ribbon is the final touch before heading to the Grand America.  Note to brides – don’t bring wired ribbon to your pastry chef.  It is very difficult to use! This ribbon was perfect though.

Delivering Wedding Cake

My bakery is about 5 minutes away from the Grand America but I always make sure the “cake limo” is super chilled with air conditioning blasting during the hot summer’s months here in Utah. After I arrive at the hotel, I put the cake on the hands on wedding planner Sam Do so she can finish the cake with beautiful fresh roses.

Putting Roses on Wedding Cake

Here’s a simple way to serve many wedding guests. Have a small wedding cake like this bride and groom did. They chose a 10 inch and 6 inch wedding cake enrobed in fondant with a buttercream piped design. The inside flavor was bavarian creme custard layered between white sponge cake.

This beautiful two tier wedding cake serves forty people but wait there are more guests!  The bride and groom also ordered two sheetcakes – mango mousse and chocolate raspberry for their wedding reception. Other featured desserts from my bakery were caramel brownies and chocolate brownies.  It was a smart, simple and economical way for this couple to delight their wedding guests with a little sugar on their special day!

Our wedding cake for display only

I made a wedding sheetcake and froze it solid for the journey. The wedding cake did quite well in the styrofoam container and stayed in hotel freezers until the big day. On the wedding day,  the kitchen cut and plated the wedding sheetcake. Guests loved the flavor combination of pistachio cake with luscious lemon mousse and blueberries! The mother of the bride especially liked the marzipan and the leftover cake.

A slice of lemon pistachio wedding cake

Mango Mousse Birthday Cake

Great food is made of three components: flavor, texture and color. The cake is layered with delicious white sponge cake and mango mousse and drenched in a syrup.  The mousse is made from milk products and I folded in fresh raspberries. You can also use frozen fruit. The top layer is bright orange mango puree which spreads quite easily.  It makes a nice topping because of its flavor and shiny texture. I used more raspberries and sugar flowers to finish the cake. It was a hit!  The 1/2 sheet cake yields 36 to 48 slices depending on whether you want dessert slices or tokens. We had thirty something adults and kids at the party so there were a few leftovers that guests were more than happy to take home!

Closeup of the birthday cake layers

Sugared Grapes on Wedding Cake

Most of my wedding cake business is by referral. This bride found us because she was a co-worker of friend. She wanted a grape theme on her wedding cake. The buttercream for the grapes was dyed purple and piped onto the marzipan.  I dipped fresh grapes in a simple syrup of sugar and water and dredged them through granulated sugar. We transported this wedding cake in our delivery van otherwise known as “The Cake Limo” to Park City. At the country club, I decorated and topped the wedding cake with grapes. It was such a hit that the bride and groom invited us to the reception. We dashed to the factory outlets and bought appropriate attire for the event. Because we are on baker’s hours we could not stay for the wedding cake cutting but we still had a really fun time!

The entire wedding cake

Marzipan Wedding Cake with Fuschia Ribbon

A bride has been dreaming about this special day for years.  Some have bride books. Others bring an array of wedding cake photos from the internet and magazines to show at their initial meeting.  For the past few years, a popular trend has been to wrap the cake in ribbon. At this point, the bride has her colors selected for her wedding theme and she will usually drop off the ribbon at my bakery before the big day. After the cake is made, enrobed in marzipan in this case, a minor challenge is “gluing” on the ribbon. In the magazines, it really doesn’t matter how they get the ribbon to stay because nobody is going to eat the cake and more than likely the cake is just decorated styrofoam for the photo shoot. Well here is my secret. Are you ready? I use corn syrup to stick the ribbon to the cake. It works quite well. Try it at home!

A marzipan princess cake for my daughter

My daughter celebrated her 10th birthday this weekend.  As the daughter of a pastry chef, she is used to incredible birthday cakes from Martin’s Fine Desserts! She had a luau themed cake made fresh the day of her birthday.  Tropical sugar flowers decorated the cake and the kids sure enjoyed licking the flowers.

Tropical sugar flower decorations

My daughter gave me specific directions for her birthday cake. Usually, I use syrup to make my cakes moist but she did not want that.  Instead she chose a genoise white sponge cake for her birthday cake without the syrup. She likes custard made from fresh milk and strawberries so I used that to fill the cake.

Here is a cut of the birthday cake

She really loves the taste of marzipan and enjoys playing with it in the bakery. Rolling it. Dying it. Eating it. The marzipan was dyed green and enrobed the cake. Buttercream acted as the glue to make the marzipan stick to the cake. If you have been reading my posts you will see that these techniques are similar to how I make my wedding cakes. Kids took home extra birthday cake and treat bags.  No leftovers at this birthday party!

Mango Mousse Wedding Cake Enrobed in Fondant

This weekend Chef Martin made a wedding cake enrobed in fondant while an Italian Cooking class was taking place at the table next to me. Stay tuned for the video later. Anyway, fondant is fairly simple to use – even for a hobby chef.  You can buy it at different specialty stores that carry supplies for making wedding cakes. The bride brought me her ribbon, a photo of the style of cake she wanted, her deposit and left the rest up to me. 

Rolling Pin Takes On Fondant

The mango mousse wedding cake was made previously in the day and covered in buttercream. Here’s how I work with the fondant. I knead the fondant for several minutes then roll it out on my granite tabletop. I used about five to six pounds of fondant total for this three tier wedding cake. Powdered sugar keeps the fondant from sticking to the table.  I roll the fondant 1/8 inch thick and make sure it is bigger than the cake so it will enrobe the wedding cake properly. The fondant is carefully placed on the wedding cake.

Rolled Fondant Onto Wedding Cake

I trim the excess fondant and then smooth the fondant onto the wedding cake by hand.

Trimming the fondant to fit

Using an pastry tool to smooth the fondant

Next come the hand finishing details that Martin’s Fine Desserts prides itself upon.  I use a bowl scraper to make indentations into the fondant on a diagonal.

Hand finishing details

There are three tiers to this mango mousse wedding cake. Here’s a few details about the cake: Mango mousse and small pieces of mango fill the layers of white sponge cake. The sponge cake is soaked in a rum syrup beforehand. The tiers are 6 inches, 10 inches and 14 inches. I start with the top two tiers and add the ribbon. Then come the pearls “glued” on the cake with buttercream.

Adding the ribbon and pearls

The top two tiers sit on the 14 inch base tier. This entire cake will serve about 100 people. The couple also ordered a mango mousse cake sheet cake (not pictured, sorry) because there were 160 guests invited and they did not want to run out of wedding cake for friends and family! 

The final details - almost

Sugar calla lillies decorate the rest of the cake. See the top of the blog post for the finished product of the cake chillin’ in the cooler before delivery.