I have learned a great deal in the past few weeks and below is my first sculpted display cake. It is a baby bag with fondant shoes, keys, pacifier and a bottle. 

We have also worked on a cake for Miley Cyrus:

There are many skills needed to be a cake decorator and I am blessed to be working in such a place where I can learn so much.

Specialty Cakes

Mini Cakes:
Chocolate cake filled with buttercream and covered in fondant.
Handmade marzipan bears on top.













Wedding Cake:
Vanilla Cake filled with French buttercream and raspberry jam.
Iced and decorated in Swiss buttercream.

Fish Sculpture

For my final exam in my Sugars class we had to create a fish sculpture.It was about 3 feet tall with only sugar supporting it.  The biggest requirement was that you had to use about 10 different techniques of sugar work. So for example we had to pour sugar into molds or pipe it in a bag, we also poured it into granulated sugar and over ice cubes. These different techniques created different looks and really helped make this piece look like the ocean. This is one of the coolest and scariest thing I've had to do in labs but it was definitely worth it.

Sugar Sculptures

   Along with working with sugar, we have also been working with pastillage. This is a product that has a consistency like play dough or fondant. You can roll it out and cut out shapes, then let them dry and put them together to create a sculpture. We did this and then added pulled sugar elements. We could either do a sugar rose or a sugar bow; I did the roses. To make the roses, you start with the same sequence for pulled sugar. Once it is ready to work with, you pull each petal individually and shape the way you want. Then you put them all together to create your rose. We also made some leaves and flares to add to the piece. I really liked this sculpture and we had a lot of creative freedom. This was my final sculpture:

And here is a closeup to one of my roses:

Sugar Artistry

    Working with sugar can be dangerous and complicated but so far it has been one of my favorite classes. One of the very first things we learned how to do was pulled sugar. To do this you cook sugar, water, glucose, an acid together until it reached between 305-320 degrees. When it gets up to that temperature, you pour it on to a silicon mat and you can add color. Now you can start bringing in the edges and eventually folding and pulling the sugar. Be careful because it is hot!! Once the color is incorporated you can now start pulling and making different shapes. The first thing we made was candy canes. To do this you just take a rope of red and a rope of white and twist them together, then shape into a cane shape. We also added mint extract to the sugar while it was cooking to give it flavor. These came out really cool!

Entremets and Petit Gateaux

Hey everyone, I'm back!

I have now started my final term of labs and my first class is Entremets and Petit Gateaux. An entremet is a cake based product with different layers of flavors and textures. A petit gateaux is basically a small entremet. Both are usually made in ring molds then covered in a glaze and decorated. The different flavors should compliment each other but give variety with sweet, salty, bitter and sour. To do this you can use ganache, short dough which adds texture, chocolate mousse, flavored Bavarian cream, pastry cream and of course have a layer of cake. These are very intricate and delicate but they are very intriguing to customers. After they are filled you let it freeze and then glaze it. In the picture on the right, we used a mirror glaze. It is raspberry and glazes just the very top of the entremet. After the glaze sets, then you can decorate it. This usually includes chocolate piping, fruit and something that can create height.  These are difficult to decorate because if you mess up you can't go back and fix it. Overall I think these are interesting to make and the different layers are really what makes these entremets delicious.

Napoleon

Napoleon is a dessert that most people love once they've had it. It is also known as Mille feuille which translates into "a thousand leaves". Now to make this pastry, you start off by making a simple puff pastry. This is good for using up your extra dough and scraps. You make a sheet of it and then proceed to cut it into 3 equal parts. Once you have this you spoon a layer of diplomat cream, which is equal parts of pastry cream and whipped cream, on top of one layer of the puff pastry. Then you repeat this so you have two layers of puff pastry and two layers of cream. Keep the top layer of puff pastry off so you can put fondant on it. This kind of fondant is a glaze and is made of mostly sugar and water. When working with this fondant you have to move fast because it will set very quickly. So you take your top layer of puff pastry and pour some fondant over it and spread it out with a spatula so that it is smooth. Then to decorate your napoleons you can pipe straight lines of chocolate all the way across the pastry. Then by taking a skewer just run it through the chocolate going across in the opposite direction. This just makes it look
more presentable. Let this set for a few minutes just so it can harden and then place it on top of the other layers. Then you can cut out your different pieces. And there you have your napoleons.