Crystal & David's Engagement Cake; Styled Shoot

The beautiful people in these photos are Crystal and David.

I met Crystal through a mutual friend at a party a thousand years ago. With another friend, we escaped the party (because we knew no one) and ran across the street to get ice cream sandwiches.

Seven years later, Crystal is a makeup artist. She's been doing makeup for weddings and engagement parties, (she even did my spray tan for my wedding) and partnering with other vendors to put together styled shoots.

I was so happy when she contacted me to make a cake for a styled engagement shoot with her fiance, David.

These photos are just a taste of what photographer, Tito Vilela, captured during their shoot last month.

Though it's small, I love seeing professional photos of my cakes. I wanted to keep it simple for this cake - black on white with a monogram and some subtle detail work.

I am really pleased with how it came out.

Huge thank you to Crystal for putting this together!

Birthday Mocha Cake & Espresso Buttercream

My Brother-in-law loves coffee and chocolate... like, loooooves them... a lot. So, for his birthday this month, it was a no brainer to turn coffee and chocolate into a cake.

It was also really easy to make. Everybody wins!

I added a little Kahlua to the buttercream for a hint of liqueur flavor. The cake & buttercream combination was perfectly chocolately and espresso-filled without being overwhelming.

Can't wait to use these flavors again.

Rainbow Birthday Cake

This cake was just fun.

Though I'm not sure you can avoid fun when you're making a cake for a toddler's 3rd birthday.

Bright colors combined with the look on her face when she saw it = happiness.

I felt like a kid rolling out and dying fondant for the rainbow.

Then I had some extra (everything), so I made little rainbow cupcakes.

It's chocolate cake with fresh whipped cream and strawberries. I love anything with fresh whipped cream. So yummy.

Gimme S'more; a caking adventure

I've been super inspired by a thousand recipes I've seen out there on these amazing blogs and so many more. 

These bakers and food bloggers are so exquisitely creative in their food inventions, I decided I wanted to follow in their footsteps and create something of my own – not just an adaptation.

Also, just so we're all on the same page, this is a flavor adventure. Next time I'll try and make it look pretty, I promise. So for my project I sought out no recipes. I took what I knew about cake batter and frostings/fillings and I applied it to transform one of my absolute favorite desserts (even to this day); S’MORES. 
I thought long and hard about the best way to create a s’mores cake, but this plan was the winner:

Chocolate cake with chunks of graham cracker mixed in (mostly for aesthetics) with marshmallow filling, frosting, graham cracker pieces and crumbs between the layers, with toasted marshmallows and graham crackers on top. 

Big chunks of graham cracker. :)

Once I baked the cake and mixed the frosting, putting it together was easy.

I let the cake show through the sides because I knew I would cover it later.

Then I covered it with marshmallows

Grabbed my trusty propane tank and sparker from the garage

 Lit the marshmallows on fire and threw on a TON of crushed graham cracker

...but as I was "toasting" the marshmallows with my trusty propane torch, something happened that I hadn't foreseen - the frosting started to melt... a lot. There was a little too much heat coming from the torch, but I couldn't dial it back or else the marshmallows wouldn't have enough "toastyness". 

Though not perfect, I think it still came out looking pretty cool and, most importantly, delicious. If I want to put the 'mallows on the outside of the cake next time I will have to find a more mellow toasting technique - maybe just slower so there's less heat on the cake at one time, or maybe I'll try toasting them before I even put them on the cake. Either way, lesson learned. 

I hope you enjoyed reading about my caking adventure. This recipe still needs some tweaking, but I am excited for it to be perfect. Soon I will be able to add it to our flavor repertoire you can order one for yourself... and the outside of yours does not have to be covered in melted frosting and toasted marshmallows... unless, of course, you want it to. ;) 

Katie & Blake's Lemon Berry Cutting Cake

First of all I would just like to thank Katie for choosing my absolute favorite flavor combination. - lemon with lemon curd and fresh berries. I almost made extra so that I could make a little cake for myself too. Luckily, we did have a little extra lemon curd and raspberries, so I got to enjoy it after all. ;)

Katie and Blake were planning on serving bundt cakes to their guests, but they still wanted something a little more traditional so that they could do a cake cutting (which I would love to see some pictures of *hint hint*).

For that, they came to me. :)

I custom made a little 7" cake top and piped a lace design to around the sides to match Katie's dress. I'm pretty happy with how it came out and I think they were too!

Before I added the topper and the florist added baby's breath

A couple different views after we flowered and topped it. How cute is that topper? 

I know you've seen the cake now, so what more could there possibly be to see? Well, I thought the display they had set up was really adorable, so I thought I would share a couple shots I took of that too...

I just love the "Sweets" sign and the chandelier. Super cute.

Thank you so so much, Katie & Blake! I am honored and proud to have been able to make the cake for your wedding! Congratulations! 

Port Hueneme Wedding Cake

This cake was so easy...and so difficult.

The cake itself was easy-peasy (and so delicious says me and my husband who got to eat all the extra).

I got this commission via facebook and I was so excited about it, I let myself agree to having it delivered on the same day my cousin was getting married in Newport - totally the opposite direction.

I spent weeks/months trying to coordinate someone to drop off the cake for me. My friends had to work/entertain inlaws, my cousins from the other side were all out of town at college or had a previous commitment (to the other event I would have gone to on 5/19). Finally, Kim suggested I try TaskRabbit. 

In a day and a half, I had two people bidding for me to pay them to take my cake to Port Hueneme. Hooray! I picked one and in the days before the cake delivery we had a little snaffoo. The venue wouldn't be open to vendors until 2:30 and he'd hoped to deliver it earlier. I worried that he wouldn't be able to deliver it if he couldn't drop it off early, so I spazzed out and tried to find a backup delivery person in case he couldn't.

Oh, by the way, this was a vanilla cake with cream cheese filling and strawberries. Yum yum yum. 

Helen's German Chocolate Cruise Ship Cake

This past weekend was my soon-to-be cousin-in-law (is that a thing?), Helen's, bridal shower!

She and my cousin, Matt, met on a cruise a few years ago. Their romance has been centered around their love of travel and the open sea. :) Helen's shower theme was, of course, nautical. So, my aunt asked if I would create a cruise ship cake for them!

I was delighted and excited to help in any way I could! As usual, I ended up procrastinating and staying up far too late the night before the shower adding the finishing touches, but when I was finally done, I had made a pretty adorable cruise ship/tug boat ;) German Chocolate cake.