Coronation Street Cake

I got an email about a cake that had a Coronation Street theme. In the end, the design that was finalised was a rectangular shaped cake that doubled as the brick wall with the 'Coronation St' sign on the side of it, a figure of the birthday girl sitting on top of the cake. 

I started with the figure first. It was a bit last minute so I had to make sure I made the figure so it dried in good time. The brief for the clothing was- converse trainers, jeans, poncho and hat. I had a picture to work with and included a bit of make up on the face- red lipstick, a bit of blusher and mascara! 

The brick wall was great fun to make too- I had a fantastic time making the white sugarpaste come to life as a brick wall. I made the 'bricks' first with a ruler and cake tool (dresden tool I think it's called). Then I airbrushed the top of wall first and mixed yellow, peach and a bit of brown to get the stone effect. I airbrushed the bricks with a yellow first, then orange, then red, and finally some dark purple to get the multi coloured effect that I love on some kinds of bricks. I also airbrushed a bit of green on the bottom part of the wall to simulate algae that we often get in this very English climate. I finished the wall with some flowers, and added the name of the birthday girl to the board. 

I got a very lovely reaction from my customer 'better than I thought it would be' or something to that effect (sorry, Callum, can't remember what you said exactly!!!). 

On to the next cake!! Have a great day folks :)

Postman Pat and His Black and White Cat

Time to play spot the mistake!! To play, read on...

This Postman Pat cake was created for a little boy who turned 5 at the weekend. Postman Pat, Jess (the cat), the Royal Mail truck and postbox are all handmade. The sky was spray painted blue,, and the background was handpainted using edible gel colours. 

So... have a good look at the pictures and see if you can spot the rather glaring mistake I made :)

Queen Elsa Cakes

Frozen madness still lives on! These cakes were made for a little girl who turned 6 and loves the movie Frozen and of course, its characters- Queen Elsa, Princess Anna and Olaf. The dress of Queen Elsa is all cake- vanilla sponge with French vanilla and chocolate buttercream in alternating layers. It's not showing on the photos, but a lot of glitter was used!

Tulip Painting

I made this birthday cake for a lady who loves tulips. It is an extra tall cake measuring 7.5"  high, 6" in diameter. The bottom layers are Victoria sponge, the top layers are chocolate cake, all filled and iced with French buttercream, which is lush.

I was a bit worried about delivering the cake as it was so tall I thought it might topple over. It was fine, though. I needn't have worried. The cake was securely fixed to the cake drum with melted chocolate!

Onto the next project!

Ghostbusters: Giant Marshmallow Man

Lots of people asked me if this was a toy or a cake. It is cake for sure. The last two photos show the cake when it was in progress! It is vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream. The underside of the 'torso' is styrofoam. The head is made of rice krispie treats and everything else is gumpaste/sugarpaste. It is my first 3d cake of a standing figure, so I'm really happy that one, I've made it, and two, it stayed standing! The cake box acted as background too and really set the cake off.

There was a lot of work that went into the cake. The armature (support) took a while and next time I will use threaded metal poles for added stability. Covering the cake in sugarpaste took two tries as the sugarpaste wasn't strong enough so I used the panelling method which worked better.

I do love this cake!

Minion Cake

I love minions! I can't wait for their movie, coming out next year I think? I have made a minion cake topper, but on my list of 'cakes to be made' is a minion carved cake. It's not carved as such. I used 6 inch cakes and topped with a half sphere cake for the top of the head. Putting the details on a cake is the best bit- cake comes alive almost! My favourite bit is the hair- I was worried that they wouldn't stay put, but they did! This is a tallish cake- 9" high and 6" in diameter. The mini cake is 3" round and about 3" high. Mini cake was actually taller and didn't look right, so I cut off the bit above the green stripe, and placed the yellow fondant on top, then added the blue candle with yellow flame. Cake is chocolate and vanilla buttercream, same with the mini cake. 

All together now "Banaaanaaa"...

The Handbag Cake

Had a great time this week making up a handbag cake. My brief was pastel pink, and as little carving as possible to maximise servings. I added the brown for the leather look on the bag, and embossed the recipient's name on the silver clasp. I then added some flowers and scrolls to soften the look, as the bag seemed a bit too 'solid'. I screwed a centre dowel onto the cake drum because the cake was being picked up by my client, and I wanted to make sure the cake was more than secure.

The cake is chocolate and vanilla buttercream. All in all, a lovely cake!