Friday, February 12, 2010

A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes

This weekend I participated in the Colorado ICES cake show Sweet Times in the Rockies in Denver. It was fun to finally christen my new kitchen with some cakes! I have been really missing decorating, so it was also great to get back.

With my first cake, I bought some stencils that I just adored the designs of. I realized how much the large scroll design looked like Cinderella's carriage one morning when my daughter pointed it out to me. I was practicing the technique and she gasped "that's for Cinderella!" I took a step back and realized she was exactly right. This started me in a whole new direction where I wanted to center the cake around a Cinderella theme. I tried my best to color the cake Cinderella blue and thought a glass slipper for the top would be perfect, along with some gumpaste bows.
The "glass" slipper for the top is white chocolate that I poured into shoe shaped molds along with a heart mold for the accent at the toe. When it was set and I pieced the shoe together, I absolutely slathered it in disco and luster dust.
The rest of the cake was also covered in luster dust to make it glittery and luminescent.
I am thrilled and delighted to say that I received First Place in the Professional Category!


For awhile now I have wanted to make a damask cake and while perusing cake stencils on the internet, came across this set that I decided I could not live without. I had never used cake stencils before, but decided it is always good to learn new techniques.
I chose a square design and I wanted my corners to be super sharp and clean, so I used a technique where I cut out panels for the sides of each tier and their tops out of gumpaste and then allowed them to dry over several days. When they were dry, I took my stencils and used a thick royal icing for the designs. Basically you use an offset spatula to smooth the royal icing over the stencil, and after it is completely covered, you gently pull the stencil off and you have a beautiful design!
There is, of course, some trial and error involved in this. It takes both patience and time. But if you stick with it the work is well worth it.
Black and white damask is rather popular, and it is nearly
always paired with red or pink as an accent. I wanted to try something different and chose yellow anemones to contrast. I love how it looks! Anemones are imperfect flowers with large black centers, and I thought it would contrast with the prim and proper damask. I am really happy with how it turned out.
This cake earned 3rd Place in the Professional Category!

This was a great weekend for me and I had a wonderful time competing!


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