It happened again...

Just when we were getting settled and in the swing of things here in our new life in Calgary, a wrench was been thrown back in the gears.

We moved. 

Again. 

Back to the city we left a year and a half ago...

That was a fast and fun experience, one I'm very happy we got to have some fun out there.  But we are both very happy to be back home with our families and friends.

We are settling into the new house, and I'm getting very close to start baking again.  I'm doing a test bake in the new oven for this upcoming weekend (pictures to follow!) and then I will start doing some Christmas baking.

Here's to the next adventure!

So many more cakes

Sorting through my photo library today, delaying heading to bed, I realized that there are so many cakes I haven't featured in a post as some were from a good chunk of time ago and others didn't turn out that great and I was embarrassed to show them.  Well, now they all get their day.  And even a bad cake still offers a lesson, which I am all about these days.  So enjoy a plethora of cake photos.

Try not to get too hungry on me here

One of my first cakes, for a friend of my moms.  That old cake recipe was a pain!  It took so many batches to get any decent amount of cake, but I swore by it for a good two years.  I often think about trying it out again, but it's so expensive to make compared to my new recipe.

This lemony number was for a colleagues mother, who was a big gardener.  I was fresh out of pastry school at the time, and was very keen to put all my new skills to work.  These flowers were very fun to create.

 

My first fondant cake and I went big with 3d, made for by best friend at the times 23rd? birthday.  Maybe 25th.  I can't remember any more.  She lived in her pink high tops, and even switched to them after the insanely high heels we picked out for her wedding shoes.  Sorry about that Catherine!  This was a real hit with all the girls that night.  I knew she wouldn't want to cut it until her husband got home, so I made a second plain cake for us to eat.

Most of my cakes in the beginning were for the people I worked with.  This cute one was for a relatively new employees baby shower.  Even though it was well known that I did this for a business, I didn't often get asked to make a cake for a group function like this.  Normally a Costco cake was on the menu.  Nothing wrong with that... that carrot cake is delicious, but it was an honour to finally get to make one for the group.

 

Ugh.  The snake cake.  This is the first cake that I have ever wanted to throw out and not give to a client.  This was the summer of 2013, during the really humid August we had in Southern Ontario.  This was actually the reason Fella and I bought a portable air conditioner for the apartment.  It was upward of 40° in the kitchen when I was working on this, and the fondant was way too sticky.  I put it down in the basement for the night where it was relatively cooler (by comparison anyway), and when I went to get it in the morning it had melted to this pile of goo.  This snake had been round and firm the night before.  Scales were imprinted from head to tail, I airbrushed colours and details all over it.  It looked like a snake.  I don't think I ended up charging the customer anything more than ingredient cost for it.  I was so angry at myself all day.  The worst part, being a co-worker, I had to see her all the time.  The boys at the party still loved it, but I knew it would have been much better, because it had been 8 hours earlier. 

 

Another of my early cakes, and I can't remember anything about the client.  I think this was a birthday cake, and being very new to the game I didn't really have the grasp of quantity.  This was a full slab cake, so 22"x16" and about 3 inches high.  These days I would suggest that size for 50-70 people.  I'm pretty sure there were 20 at the party.  They got one heck of a deal!  This was also before I started using fondant, so I had to get creative with my buttercream, which worked out well.  I kept the cake in the fridge after icing the green and then ran my spatula across it to get the textured look to the 'felt' of the table.  And all the cards and chips were made of a frozen sheet of butter cream that I cut to size and placed on the cake still frozen to maintain the shape.  It's a great technique, but time consuming.

 

After finishing at pastry school, I got more adventurous with 3d cakes.  Sculpting was a lot of fun, but it took quite some time to figure out how to pipe on a vertical surface, as seen in all the saggy windows.

 

A quick and easy 8" cake attempting to make it look like a bakery cake, like the ones I made at my bakery job of the time.  I didn't have access to the chocolate shaver, so I just chopped up some white chocolate discs to get the side details.  It didn't pack quite the same punch though.

One of my first cakes where I drew a real life 'thing', rather than a cartoon.  My attempt at a human spine certainly has some cartoony qualities to it, but it was very obvious to my co-workers what it was.  I tried to shade with various colours of beige, but it didn't turn out exactly as I had hoped.

 

This was one of my first fondant cakes, and I had a hard task of re-creating the birthday girl's favourite bottle of wine.  The label ended up looking pretty darn close to the real thing... that flower was fun to make.  The bottles themselves were not as smooth and straight as I wanted, but I think it's pretty obvious what it is

 

Those booties up top were my first go at modelling with fondant.  They are adorable, and the lace actually when though a hole.  The cake itself wasn't anything fancy, but what's what the clients wanted, so it was pretty much perfect.

 

Dora is so popular for little kids these days, and all the supporting characters are so well loved that they get just as much admiration as Dora.  This was my first go at the theme for my photographer friends littlest girls birthday.

My first wedding cake.  Friends of a friend got married, and really only wanted a cake for the ceremonial cutting.  Orange was the colour, and they wanted something very simple to match their low key wedding.  They enjoyed it, and it helped get me started.

My family has really benefited the most from my new business foray.  This will have been my first real 3D cake.  My brother was very big into fly fishing at the time, and I wanted to try something big to show my family that this was the right direction for me.  I will have just graduated (with honours no less) from school, and was frantic learning the ropes at a new job, but still had to make something spectacular for Jeff.  Everyone was blown away.  He and my sister-in-law fought for all the marzipan details.

Another fresh out of school cake.  I had nailed making perfect roses, and was happy to have a request for a cake matching the birthday girl's china "Old Country Rose". 

Wedding cake number two, the paisley cake for the Paisley bride.  This bride grew up in Paisley, Scotland and wanted to have that reflected in her cake.  She left the design up to me, as long as the shape of the paisley was correct, the details inside didn't matter.  I spent a lot of time researching it, and I was very happy with the outcome.

It's fantastic to look back on some of my first cakes to see how much I have progressed in these 7 years since school.  I can't believe it has really been that long sometimes.  What a fun time I've had making so many cakes.

Milenium Falcon, take 2

One of my favourite things about this job is the creativity and individuality that goes into each cake.  I like the whole process of designing a cake - sketching it out or finding similar cake photos and turning it into my own.  I've always liked that I don't do cookie cutter cakes, that I need to think for each one.  Partly for the fun of it, and partly so that everyone gets a cake that is as unique as they are.

But it's happened a few times now that I've made a cake once and really wanted to make it again.  Either to make improvements that I figured out on the way, or because it was just so darned fun.

The Milenium Falcon was definitely one of those cakes.  As soon as I figured out the technique for making the Lego look realistic I've been dying to have another go.  Fortunately for me, I have no shortage of geeky customers looking for just such a cake.

Laura's son is a very big Lego Star Wars fan.  He's 8, and has more sets than we do (which made Fella jealous when I told him).  He wanted his party to be Star Wars themed, so Linda knew exactly what she needed from me.  Having made one already, I knew what steps I had to do, and how to improve it.  I know what I would have to do next time, but I couldn't have been happier with how this one turned out.
 
No how-to this time, as I've outlined in the previous version. 
 So this is just about the photos, and the small improvements.

I've gotten into the habit of covering the cake board to fancy up the presentation.  This blue is the same as the blue on the light strip/engine? thing at the back of the Falcon (which sadly I didn't grab a picture of)  Laura loved the colour choice, being that it's her favourite colour.  Happy coincidence!

I decided to print of the lettering for this rather than use my normal alphabet cutters, and while it's not perfect, it has a much more authentic look to it. 

Next to to its Lego doppelganger.

Senna, since I was lucky enough to deliver this to you personally I know you loved the cake, so I hope you had a fantastic party!

Unicorns and Rainbows

(Sometimes I think I should change my names to Jen's Last Minute Cakes.  I prefer to have at least 2 weeks notice, a month is even better.  But recently, most of my orders have come in within a week of needing to be eaten.)

Sadly, I made this cake back in October, right before all the craziness happened that ended up with me living a few provinces westward.  With the customer only wanting the birthday girl's age on the cake, I can't for the life of me remember who this was for.  I've gone through my Facebook posts, my calendars, scoured all the photos... nothing.  No name.  No mention.  It bothers me, because I remember making it, and I don't want to forget my customers.  It's not me.

Please, if you were at the party, or this was for your daughter let me know so I can update this to be more personal.  As soon as I know a name it will all come back to me.

Until then, here are some vague details.

I know I printed out a template of the unicorn to get the right.  I used the dough extruder from the Holy Orange! cake to get the rainbow colours just the right size.  The clouds are just a bunch of balls squished flat.  They were oddly satisfying to make.

  Until the mystery is solved, that's all I have, unfortunately.

Today's Lesson:  Details!  Keep a log of dates and names.

Dirty Thirty Subaru

My move out west left me scared and nervous for many reasons.  I hated the thought of leaving all my family and friends, and missing so many important events in their lives.  After a few months, we heard some great news ... friends of ours from a few hours away back in Ontario were also relocating to Alberta.  And 5 minutes away no less.  Yay!

Due to distance and working around 2 pilots schedules, we didn't get together very often back home.  In the 4 years I knew them they came down for a birthday party, I got up there twice, and fella a few times on his own.  Fella and Gary worked in the same company so they passed each other a few times more.

For me and the slight depression I was going through, this was fantastic news.  Friends from back home, also moving away from friends and family, one with no job lined up yet, just like me.  We found a local restaurant with an awesome special every Wednesday, and on their first week in town, we decided that we would meet there every week.  Well anyone not working would be there (we've only missed 2 nights in 3 months... not a bad record)

Then Sarah let us know that she was throwing a birthday party for Gary's 30th.  As usual my ears perked up and I asked about the need for a cake.  Sarah mentioned that it was a cigar party, and I thought about making a large cigar, but they have a tendency to look like a few other things if not done just right.  Then I thought about a humidor, but my last box didn't turn out the best.  At a pizza night that Gary didn't make it too, Sarah was talking about the party, calling it his Dirty Thirty, and I had a brainwave!  Gary is into racing and has a rally car!  His Subaru, driving through a mud puddle, covered in dirt!

Perfect.

I have started every cake with a sketch of how I want it to look.  I hadn't really placed much emphasis on having a prototype of sorts, but after my big wedding cakes last fall, I found this was a big help.  I love being creative and just letting the cake become what I envision, but having a plan makes the whole process just fall into place.

This was my plan for the Dirty Thirty-mobile

Thanks to the magic of Facebook stalking, I was able to find a picture that Gary made of how we wants to paint the car eventually, but this gave me a perfect profile, and shots the the front and tail end of his car.  It was the perfect tool for shaping the cake.  After baking and layering the cake, I printed and cut out the car and used it to sculpt the cake.

I didn't get it exact, and it ended up too round to get all the final details spot on, but I didn't know that yet.  It looked spot on from the cut out, but I didn't take into account the icing, and how that would change things.

I remembered to take lots of pictures along the way, so here is how I made my first car:

The sculpt was finished, so I popped it in the fridge to firm it up, then put on a crumb coat of butter cream

Cut out some holes for wheels...

 Then cover with fondant.  This was too thick, which hurt the accuracy of my details later on.  But the Blue Beast was coming to life!

 A quick trim and it's starting to look like a car.  It was right here that I noticed it was too round to be a Subaru.

 I had earlier made a short rectangular layer to be the bit of ground with the mud puddle.  My measurements were off, and I noticed here that the car was going to be just as long as the puddle.  Seeing as there were only 10 or so people coming to the party, less cake was better, but my initial drawing was off.  I really should have made the car smaller to begin with, but oh well.

I also, here for the mud, accidentally created the perfect consistency for butter cream.  I've been making it according to a wonderful recipe for a few years now, and it's delicious, and by putting in a little more dairy than called for it has given me a usable putty for a few years now.  In order for my mud to be fluid enough I added an additional third in small increments and oh my, this was so much easier to work with.  I will be doing this from now on.  Not only will it go on smoother, but it will also go further!

 Car meets mud!  And also a ton of details.  I had Sarah send me a few picture of Gary's car, so I knew exactly where I needed colours and logos.  Any references you have when making a realistic cake the better.

 The back end complete with plate cut out and trim indents

 The front end featuring Gary's black hood and scoop

And finally, all covered in mud!

I had a lot of fun making this but definitely need to remember to stick to my initial measurements.  For some reason, I didn't think 10" long was going to be impressive enough, so I changed it to 11, and then didn't take into account how much frosting and fondant add to the cake.

Happy Birthday Gary... Your Blue Beast was fun to recreate!

Changes!

Big news from Jen Bakes Cakes... Now baking from Alberta!

In a very short but complicated time, I went from working my regular job and baking from the Greater Toronto Area, to quitting; packing up a brand new to us apartment and moving westward.  It was a large adjustment to my new life, but I'm finally ready to get back into cake mode!

My new house has a nice big kitchen (which was a must in the house hunting process) but awkwardly laid out.  I have a nice big section of counter that will work perfectly for decorating.  I've made a few small things already... A cake for my fella's birthday, and for my dad this past weekend, but now I have a real order.  Yes, it's for a friend, but it's nice and complicated, and gets me back into 3d sculpted cakes.

Stay tuned for a full post for my first Albertan cake!

Portal of Power!

Sarah has become a fan of my work.  I didn't take much... She had a cake I made for my niece and she was sold.  Her husband was the lucky recipient of the Milenium Falcon this past winter, and she warned me a few weeks later that the little man's birthday was at the end of the summer.  Sure enough a reminder email came in:

"Jen... Skylander cake... go!"

That pretty much summed up the conversation.  I swear she was describing it in Greek or Mandarin.... Barely any words made sense.  I got cake, figure and online out of it.

So Skylander (which is not Highlander in space, much to my disappointment) is uber popular for the little guys these days.  Apparently.  Do you know Skylander?  I didn't have a clue.  So you get an action figure to play with in real life, then a stand for it that acts as an online portal... place the figure on the base and you get to play with that character in an online world.  Or so I'm told.  If you place 2 on it... apparently they will go into battle mode.  Fancy!

"Sure Sarah.  I can make that work"

Research away, and yep... A streamlined cake for a family dinner was easily doable.  I could have gone into crazy detail for this, but as usual, timing wasn't easy (I have to stop taking orders on weekends I'm working).  I knew cutting a few corners wouldn't take anything away from the cake, and little W would know it right away.

I decided to get a little fancy and  make it in action... it glows to tell you the character is online.  So I had some fun with bright orange for the portal and the fun symbols around the side.  

I got carried away doing the stone effect, but I think it looks great.

Sarah was blown away, and I can't wait to hear how the little guy liked it.  And hopefully I'll get a picture with his new figure on the cake, making it look all official like.

The cakes that almost weren't

If you are a cake fan, there would be nothing worse than losing your baker two weeks before your wedding.

Sadly for Kendra and Nate this is exactly what happened.  

Luckily for Kendra and Nate, their photographer was my friend Samantha.  They mentioned their plight, and were sent my way.  Normally, bakers like a good 4-6 months before a wedding to plan everything and get their schedule arranged. Looking for a baker 14 days before your wedding generally means you aren't getting a cake.

It was tight, but I knew I could make it work.  

His and Hers Cakes

The neat thing about this cake is that there was actually 2 of them... a his and hers - something to reflect both of their interests.

From our first conversation, it was clear that their previous baker didn't really include them in the decision making process, and they had no idea what their cake was going to look like.  After asking a few questions, I came up with a quick sketch that they fell in love with.  Not bad for 20 minutes while at work:

I mean on break... I was definitely on break and not neglecting my duties at all. 

We met a few days later and made a few small changes, and they could rest easy and focus on more important things. 

It wasn't easy - they took a lot of time to figure out how to make everything work.  I had never really done anything like this.  My monkey cake was just a couple of monkeys I made following a tutorial.  There was no tutorial for all of these - just pictures and stuff around the house.

It took a better part of a week to get all the bits made just right, but man was it fun!

Have a look:

Congratulations Kendra and Nate.