Category: Cakes

baking, Cakes, Decor, DIY, Halloween

Ghouls’ Night- A Perfectly Pink Halloween Party

by Sara StaffordLeave a Comment on Ghouls’ Night- A Perfectly Pink Halloween Party
Ghouls’ Night- A Perfectly Pink Halloween Party

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When you think of Halloween, the first colours that come to mind are typically orange and black! I decided to push the envelope and go with a blush pink Halloween party a la Lauren Conrad. I figured I love everything pink so why not incorporate it everywhere and anywhere I can?

Grab your ghoul-friends and get this pink party started!

Continue reading “Ghouls’ Night- A Perfectly Pink Halloween Party” →

babyshower, baking, Blogger, Cakes, DIY

OH BOY! DIY Baby Shower Cake + Cupcakes

by Sara Stafford2 Comments on OH BOY! DIY Baby Shower Cake + Cupcakes
OH BOY! DIY Baby Shower Cake + Cupcakes

OH BOY! Fondant Converse Shoe Cake + Baby Face Cupcakes!

When I was asked to make a cake and cupcakes for a baby shower I immediately jumped at the opportunity!

This was my first time making anything of this sort so it was really fun to be able to play around with a few things and get creative.

I had come across a few different cake and cupcake ideas on Pinterest so I decided to combine a few for my final products!

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Here’s a closer look at the baby face cupcakes. I used a round cookie cutter to make perfect shaped circles for the faces and blue fondant for the hat and soother. I used a small amount of fondant for the nose and then edible food markers and my gel food colous on a paint brush to get the desired effect on the faces. I LOVE how these turned out, so cute! 🙂

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For this specific design on the cupcake I iced the cupcake with a simple swirl and then made two different sized/coloured circles to go on top. I finished it off by writing on it with the edible markers. These are really great for writing as well as doing any small details!

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For the soother I used a heart shaped cookie cutter and added some extra fondant on the bottom and for the white portion. I used the other end of my paintbrush to add the holes (this really brought it to life!)

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THE CONVERSE ON THE CAKE…

BY FAR the hardest BUT BEST part of the entire cake…the handmade fondant converse shoes! These MADE the cake. Luckily I found a stencil online for this so it was just a matter of playing around with it for a bit and then adding in my own touches at the end. I made an edible glue out of water and gum paste to hold everything together. For the laces I struggled with using fondant so I opted for some yarn, which ended up turning out great! I used white fondant around the bottom of the shoes and used the edible marker to add the star and stripes.  I used a toothpick to add little details to the sides of the shoe. I made these a couple days ahead of making the cake and stored them in a container in the fridge. This was a great idea to have them done and out of the way so when I made my cake all I had to worry about was decorating it and not spending hours on these!

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Not bad for my first time molding fondant into shapes eh?!

DRUM ROLL PLEASE…..

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Here’s the final product!!! I tinted the fondant that covered the whole cake in a light blue and then made three different colours/sizes of circles to go on the cake. I also used these colours as little rolled balls on the base of the cake, I think this really finished it off!

baking, Cakes

Saint Patrick’s Day Guinness Beer Cake!

by Sara StaffordLeave a Comment on Saint Patrick’s Day Guinness Beer Cake!
Saint Patrick’s Day Guinness Beer Cake!

On the weekend I attended a Stag and Doe for my boyfriend’s brother. It was a Saint Patrick’s Day theme so I decided to make this Guinness cake for them. After all…you can’t celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day without a Guiness!

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If you look further back in my blog you will see the Budweiser beer-mug cake that I made. Since this was my second time around making it, I have started to perfect the construction of these! I was happy with how this one turned out as well and it was a huge hit at the party! It was such a hit, that everyone was too afraid to cut into it and instead were taking tons of pictures of it! Moments like those make me realize why I love doing this type of stuff so much!

Pictured below is everything you will need to create this cake along with some helpful hints! 🙂

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  • Your favourite cake mix and icing (any kind will work!) I went for white cake and white icing so I could easily dye the icing.
  • An empty can (I used a tall can of Guinness)
  • You’ll be making four 6″ round cakes (I made 2 extra just to be safe)
  • 1 or 2 small baking tins (the container of icing is shown inside to depict the size). You can go bigger if you’d like but I found this to be the perfect size. This is Wilton brands smallest tin (I picked this up from Michaels $12.00 but got 40% off with a coupon!)
  • White fondant, I used some to wrap the balloon holder with so the icing would stick better to it.
    • Spatula to spread your icing
    • Large tray of your choice
    • Candy melts
    • Balloon holder (long plastic yellow stick in picture) I got a pack of these for $1.00 from Dollarama
    • Flower wire (I picked up a pack of these from Michaels for $4.00 and used three of them inside of the balloon holder)
    • I used the top of the balloon holder and put it upside down and put some candy melts on the bottom to stick it to my tray
    • Fool colouring “gels” It’s perfectly fine to use your everyday liquid food colouring but I bake a lot and this pack by Wilton I got on sale at Michaels and has a ton of colours! Again I used a 40% off coupon so I got the whole pack for around $12.00. You only need to use a little bit and they will last a really long time. The colours are great and it helps in not throwing off the consistency of your icing, etc.
    • Piping bag with Wilton large round tip
    • Buttercream icing (I used store-bought Wilton brand but you could make your own)

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Steps:

  1. Bake your four 6″ round cakes and LET COOL COMPLETELY!
  2. Use a serrated knife so that your cakes are even when stacking
  3. Lay the first layer on a plate. Add a small amount of frosting at the top just enough to go almost to the edges (don’t add too much or it will spew over the sides!)
  4. Add your second and third layers (don’t forget to frost the top of each layer!)
  5. I didn’t cut the top off my last layer as I knew I was going to be adding a lot of white icing to add the effect of foam so it helps if it’s already rounded!
  6. Next I iced my cake using just regular store-bought chocolate icing so I didn’t have to play around with any gel colourings this time around. For the foam I mixed a little bit of white icing with the brown so that it wasn’t stark white since Guinness foam has a little brown tinge to it. I used the golden coloured gel mixed in with a little bit of white and brown for the gold detailing.
  7. Next I stuck my balloon holder with flower wire right into the cake and then into the beer can. To help reinforce I turned the pop-tab on the top of the can so it was covering the hole in the can and this helped it hold really well!
  8. I then iced the ballon holder with the same colour icing I used for the mug. Again, the messier you can be here the better result you will get! I had to keep repeating this step a couple of times until the icing hardened. I added some of this icing right up into the mouth of the can to make it look like it was coming out of it.
  9. To get the logo as close to the real deal as you can simply print off the logo and trace it onto parchment paper using edible gel writers. You can then transfer this directly onto your cake and fill it in (remember your cake needs to be pretty much dry to do this otherwise you will just take your existing icing off with you when you pull the parchment off.) This was an awesome and extremely helpful trick I learned in my Wilton cake decorating course, and one that I will use for many cakes to come!

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I’d love to hear what you thought about this cake! 🙂

xoxo

Sara

baking, Blogger, Cakes

Pouring Beer Mug Cake

by Sara StaffordLeave a Comment on Pouring Beer Mug Cake
Pouring Beer Mug Cake

“The King of Cakes”…”Older Butweiser”

For Birthdays, Super Bowl parties, or beer lovers this beer mug cake is sure to be a crowd pleaser! (The Super Bowl is now only a few days away, this would be perfect to take to a potluck, and would be the talk of the party for sure!)

This is one of the most extravagant cakes I have made to date and once I figured out to construct it, it actually wasn’t too bad assembling and decorating. I’d LOVE to hear what you guys think of this and if you’d try it out yourself.

Pictured below is everything you will need to create this cake along with some helpful hints! 🙂

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  • Your favourite cake mix and icing (any kind will work!) I went for white cake and white icing so I could easily dye the icing.
  • You’ll be making four 6″ round cakes (I made 2 extra just to be safe)
  • 1 or 2 small baking tins (the container of icing is shown inside to depict the size). You can go bigger if you’d like but I found this to be the perfect size. This is Wilton brands smallest tin (I picked this up from Michaels $12.00 but got 40% off with a coupon!)
  • White fondant (I bought this thinking I might need it for the handle but I actually went with rice krispies covered in the same colour icing as the mug.) Either will work it’s all personal preference.
    • Spatula to spread your icing
    • Large tray of your choice
    • Candy melts
    • Balloon holder (long plastic yellow stick in picture) I got a pack of these for $1.00 from Dollarama
    • Flower wire (I picked up a pack of these from Michaels for $4.00 and used three of them inside of the balloon holder)
    • I used the top of the balloon holder and put it upside down and put some candy melts on the bottom to stick it to my tray
    • Fool colouring “gels” It’s perfectly fine to use your everyday liquid food colouring but I bake a lot and this pack by Wilton I got on sale at Michaels and has a ton of colours! Again I used a 40% off coupon so I got the whole pack for around $12.00. You only need to use a little bit and they will last a really long time. The colours are great and it helps in not throwing off the consistency of your icing, etc.
    • Piping bag with Wilton large round tip
    • Buttercream icing (I used store-bought Wilton brand but you could make your own)

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Steps:

  1. Bake your four 6″ round cakes and LET COOL COMPLETELY!
  2. Use a serrated knife so that your cakes are even when stacking
  3. Lay the first layer on a plate. Add a small amount of frosting at the top just enough to go almost to the edges (don’t add too much or it will spew over the sides!)
  4. Add your second and third layers (don’t forget to frost the top of each layer!)
  5. I didn’t cut the top off my last layer as I knew I was going to be adding a lot of white icing to add the effect of foam so it helps if it’s already rounded!
  6. Next I tinted my frosting. I had two different bowls of icing one for the beer mug and poured beer and I kept the other plain white for the foam. I used the “golden yellow” colour from my package of Wilton gel colours (I wish it would have turned out a little darker, next time I will mix it with other colours!) Just remember when mixing your colours to only add a little bit at a time and to mix all your icing at once so that the colour is consistent (it’s really hard to get the same colour twice when mixing more than one colour)
  7. You can now use this colour to frost your entire cake! I used a Wilton spatula to help make it as smooth as possible but don’t worry to much about it being perfect! I didn’t frost the top of the cake with this colour as I knew I was going to be adding a lot of white foam bubbles with the white icing!
  8. To make the “head” of the beer I used white frosting in a pastry bag with a coupler and a large round Wilton tip. This is where you don’t have to worry about it being perfect and actually the messier you are here the better affect you get! I ended up bringing some of the foam down the mug and onto my platter to add the affect of beer foaming out of its glass.
  9. Next I stuck my balloon holder with flower wire right into the cake and then into the beer can. To help reinforce I turned the pop-tab on the top of the can so it was covering the hole in the can and this helped it hold really well!
  10. I then iced the ballon holder with the same colour icing I used for the mug. Again, the messier you can be here the better result you will get! I had to keep repeating this step a couple of times until the icing hardened. I added some of this icing right up into the mouth of the can to make it look like it was coming out of it.
  11. I moulded the rice krispies into a handle shape and covered this in the icing that I used for the mug. Using large toothpicks or skewers is best for holding them in place in the cake
  12. Lastly I piped on some grey lines using the same round Wilton tip and some red icing to write Happy Birthday on my platter. This is where you can get creative and add a label to your mug and personalize it however you like!

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THAT’S IT! It may seem like a lot of steps but once you get going it’s really not too bad! Now that I know exactly how to make it, I know the next time I make it it will go even more smoothly! I PROMISE you that everyone will love this cake and you WILL get lots of questions about the illusion of the floating can (it’s AWESOME!)