Pink and Brown Cupcake Tower

Pale pink and chocolate brown is such a wonderful combination for a wedding. I made this cupcake tower of 50 cupcakes this past weekend. Here is the original sketch of the cupcake tower.
The cake topper was chocolate and vanilla layers with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream. The orchid is handmade out of gumpaste.
The cupcakes were Chocolate Sour Cream with sweet Chocolate Buttercream and Lemon cupcakes with Vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

Baby Block Cakes

Isn't this such a lovely vision of cake layers? It's the "before" picture of my latest baby block cake.This cake was Neopolitan: Chocolate, Vanilla and Strawberry Cake Layers with some Raspberry filling between the Vanilla and Strawberry. And the rest is Vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream - yum! This flavor combination idea came from Martha Stewart's Wedding Cakes book.

The ball was 4 layers of lemon butter cake. And all other decorations were made out of sugarpaste.

I also pulled up some of my old baby block cakes. This one is from a couple years ago - it was for my sister's baby shower. It was also a Neopolitan Cake.
Ah Memories... this is one of my very early cakes from a few years ago - I must've spent about 10 hours on it and I think I only charged $40 for it. I think it was vanilla cake and marshmallow fondant.

ha ha - for some reason I used buttercream for some of the decorations over the fondant and I really should have ironed my tablecloth. Well, you gotta start somewhere! :-)

Dinosaur Cake

I made this cake this past weekend for a little boy turning 2 who loves dinosaurs of all kinds. I love this color for the dino. I planned to add more decorations to it like dots or scales.... but I didn't want it to look too much like a dragon. Then I just fell in love with the plain red dino with the happy dino face.

Here's what his mom wrote me that evening "Big success...rhys loved it...once we cut the tail (boo hoo)...he hugged him and kissed him. We have pics!!!! Thanks a ton!"

I am excited to see their pictures. And here is a picture of the cake pre-fondant. The cake is Chocolate Sour Cream with Vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

Tour de France Cupcakes

Whether you are a cycling fan (like me) or not, I'm sure you have caught a glimpse of the Tour de France this year. It's quite an exciting one!

All that cycling requires lots of refueling - how about some chocolate sour cream cupcakes with lemon buttercream. The toppers are made with sugarpaste and logo is painted with edible food coloring.
Also fitting in this post - a Triathlon Cupcake. This past weekend, I did a few wedding cake tastings. One of the clients was celebrating his birthday and is an Ironman athlete. So, I made him a special cupcake for his birthday - chocolate fudge with chocolate buttercream.

Party Cake for Gail Vaz-Oxlade and TV Show: Til Debt Do Us Part

A couple of weeks ago, I was lucky enough to be asked to design a cake for the TV show Til Debt Do Us Part. They were celebrating their 100th episode and it was also the host, Gail Vaz-Oxlade's, 50th birthday. The party was held on the the rooftop terrace of The Fifth Grill and Terrace in downtown Toronto. For this cake, I tried to really incorporate the elements of the show (the money jars, credit cards) and of course Gail, her big black bag and her TV crew. Her TV crew is so important to her and she truly appreciates them.

The cake was 3-tiers: Chocolate Sour Cream Cake, Lemon Cake and Banana Cake. I was also able to incorporate the glass money jars in the cake and even made sugarpaste coins and bills inside. Aside from the sugar people, the calculator was one of my favorites to make.

I was also lucky enough to attend the event in Toronto and meet Gail and her daughter Alex. They were the most friendly, down-to-earth and wonderful people. They loved the cake, appreciated the small details and even saved some of the sugarpaste items.

Lots of pictures today - most of them (I'm sure you can tell which ones) were photographed by Tanja at Double Crossed Photography.



These next 3 photos are sound guy and the 2 cameramen looking at themselves made out of sugar. I love the picture below as the sound guy, John, is laughing that I included his rolled up sleeves in his sugar character.


Behind the Scenes: Some of my regular readers have asked that I post some of my "in progress" pictures. You can see how I made the sugarpaste money and divided them up into their proper amounts. I know, I know - that is a bit excessive... :-)



Cake Decorator's Tip: The event was held on a hot evening on the rooftop terrace in downtown Toronto. Can you imagine how worried I was about that? I was trying to negotiate an inside spot to display the cake - but there was a nice breeze, so I set up on the terrace. However, throughout the evening I kept my eye on the cake and was ready to repair at a seconds notice in case any of the sugar characters started to tilt over. So my tip really is to get yourself invited to the event! :-)

Canada Day Cakes and Cupcakes

July 1st is Canada Day. It's time to Celebrate!


Time to celebrate with a cake.... or 2 or 3 or 4. Actually I made 9 of these. They were Chocolate Velvet Cake with Swiss Meringue Buttercream.


Or we can celebrate with some cupcakes. These are Strawberry Cupcakes with Strawberry Buttercream. Happy Canada Day!

Simple and Elegant Wedding Cake with Calla Lilies

Calla Lilies are such beautiful flowers and they come in so many different colors like white, pink and all shades of purple.

I just love making cupcakes or cakes with this elegant flower in sugarpaste.

Here's the wedding cake I made the other week with sugarpaste calla lilies.  The wedding took place at a wonderful restaurant in downtown Toronto called La Maquette.

The top two tiers were vanilla cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream and the bottom tier was Chocolate Sour Cream with chocolate buttercream.

Cutest 1st Birthday Cake

Some of the stuffed animals these days are so cute! I made this cake as a replica of the little boys favorite stuffed animal, Buster. The character is actually named "Winnie the Horse". I think this is one of my most favorite cakes!

It was a lot more difficult to carve out this cake, but the mother sent me picture of the stuffed animal from all different angles so that really helped (see below). The main body was 4 layers of vanilla butter cake and each of the feet were 2 layers of vanilla butter cake.

I wonder if I could re-create my favorite childhood stuffed toy. Mine was a baby boy with a plastic head and pink stuffed body with small white polka dots. I carried it around all the time and I named it "Oh Boy" for some strange reason... What was your favorite childhood stuffed toy?

Personalized Cupcakes - What would your 4 designs be?

Just a quick post this morning, as it's going to be a busy day of cakes and cupcakes. I wanted to share a fun personalized set of cupcakes. The birthday boy loves photography, painting, rockclimbing and skiing.

They were 1 dozen chocolate fudge and 1 dozen vanilla butter cupcakes. I think my favorite is the paint palette. What's your favorite? What 4 designs show off your personality and hobbies?

Super Mario Cake with Shy Guy Red

A client of mine wanted a surprise Super Mario cake for her boyfriend's birthday. She said that she "googled" his favourite character, Shy Guy Red, but no cake pictures had come up.

I did the same and she was right - no Shy Guy Red. However, I found some very cool websites and some awesome Super Mario cakes posted all over the internet. Here's a link to a site called Geekologie with lots of amazing "geek" cakes including Super Mario ones.

And of course, here is the Shy Guy Red vanilla cake with swiss meringue buttercream covered in fondant. Characters are handmade out of sugarpaste.