Cake

Follow my journey and experience in my new baking and decorating adventures in fondant. Enjoy the photographs

1. Cian’s 4th Birthday

(Design adapted from Planet Cake)

This is where it was all started, my first fondant cake. After watching loads of you tube videos and using books as guidance, I made this cake for a friend of my son’s 4th birthday. The design was up to me and since I don’t have any experience in fondant, I followed the Planet Cake book. I didn’t want to ruin the boy’s birthday party by having a worse birthday cake ever The cake size was 9 1/2 inch and it was Dark Chocolate Mudcake filled with Dark Chocolate Ganache.

2. Theo’s 1st Birthday

(Inspired by The Giggle & Hoot TV Show)

This was for my youngest boy. He loves Hoot The Owl from the ABC Kids Programe. Let say there were lots of dramas happening in the night of making. The Hoot’s head was way too heavy and my support straws didn’t really work. I had to pulled the head off and re-attached it few times until I got it right. I learned a lot from making this cake. This cake was assembled and carved out of 2 round cakes (8 1/2 inch and 9 inch). They are Dark Chocolate Mudcake with Dark Chocolate Ganache.

3.  Senan’s Farewell

This little boy is Nathan’s friend and they were moving out of country. This was a farewell cake at their playgroup. I asked him what kind of cake that he likes and he said that he want a rainbow cake with a unicorn and rainbow, so VOILA!! The trees, clouds, grasses, and a pot of gold are compliments to the cake as they were kind of going well with each other. I had loads of fun with this cake. The cake was 6 layers White Cake (coloured in 6 different colours) and filled and covered in lemony Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

4. Nathan’s 4th Birthday – part 1

(Design originated from Debbie Brown)

This cake was for my son’s birthday at his preschool. The design was based on the Gorgeous and Gruesome by Debbie Brown. I used 3 round cakes of Dark Chocolate Mudcakes (one 9 inch and two 7 inch), filled with Dark Chocolate Ganache.

5. Nathan’s 4th Birthday – Part 2

(Designed originated from Andrea’s Sweetcakes’)

The top tier was 7 inch round rainbow cakes (6 layers) filled with swiss meringue buttercream. The bottom tier was 8 1/2 round Dark Chocolate mud cake filled with Dark Chocolate Ganache. This was my first figurine and it took me 2 hours. I am pretty pleased with the overall result but will try to do a much neater and better one if I have a chance to do it again (anyone want to order? )

6. Michael’s 5th Birthday

(Designed originated from Debbie Brown)

The little boy loves and crazy about dinosaurs. He requested a red dinosaur for his cake. The cake size is 7 inch (carved) and it is dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache.

7. II Nonon’s 53th Birthday

The birthday cake was a gift to our aunty. I was planning to do different design than what pictured below, however my skills and tools restricted me to do so. My hand was slightly wet while applying the fondant and that is a big no no in fondant. I couldn’t achieve the perfect smooth surface that I dreamed The tiny flower blossoms were a huge compliment to the cake as they gave contrast to the bottom tier as well as covering my flaws. My first attempt on making the rose flower (actually second because I re do it as I wasn’t really happy with the first one and my son broke some of the petals). I am pretty happy with the result as I didn’t use the cutter or any tools, just my hand, plastic and spoons

The cake size is 7 inch and 5 inch. It is lemon poppy seed white chocolate mudcake with cream cheese filling and covered in dark chocolate ganache.

8. Karina’s 4th Birthday

This was my first fondant cake for a girl and I was so excited. Her mom and I decide to do a rainbow cake with the meringue buttercream. I decided to coat the cake with the dark chocolate ganache instead of buttercream so the edge could be more sturdy while covering it with fondant.

Her mom requested a Dora Cake as it was the theme of the party but asked me to do just a Dora cut out instead of a figurine as she didn’t want her daughter to gobble Dora and has a sugar overload I didn’t expect that the Dora cutout would be such a pain. It was so tiny and took me almost 2 hours of cutting and assembling. I almost gave up as it was 5 AM in the morning, tired with no sleep, but then the thought of having no Dora cake in the Dora party pushed me.

Here is the sketch that I send to her mom. I didn’t do the monkey as planned though.

9. Cathy’s Birthday

This present birthday cake was a gift to my son’s preschool teacher who celebrate her 50th birthday. The other teachers organized it and leave the design up to me. I choose this design simply because I thought it would be fun to have a present cake and I really want to try making a bow fondant. So there it is a gist box present cake. The cake is chocolate cake with strawberry swiss meringue buttercream covered in milk chocolate ganache.

10. Elva’s Birthday

This is my first paying customer How exciting, but I was nervous at the same time. I was worried with my limited experience (officially 5 months experience) and skills, I was going to mess up someone’s surprise birthday party. Well, I discussed the design with her friends over emails. I drew few sketches and we were juggling between two themes. Finally she choose the picnic in Paris in autumn theme. She requested me to make few French bread and pastries as the birthday girl loves them. My plan on making a royal icing Eiffel tower turned disastrous as the royal icing wont harden (completely my fault though). I finally do the handmade Eiffel tower using fondant.
The cake was Black Forest (3 layers of  moist chocolate cake filled with velvetty swiss meringue butter cream, spread of blackberry jam and tangy cheeries in between and glazed with chocolate ganache).

11. Mr. Kitchen Produce’s Birthday

(Design originated from The Designer Cake Company)

I wanted to make angry bird cake so bad that I pushed the idea for Mr. KP birthday cake. Well here it is (drum rollllll pleeeaaaseee….) The Angry Bird Cake. I was intended to make something more elaborate with lots of details but time constraint and tumpeng order limit me and his birthday is on the popular month of December (can’t help it). I decided to copy The Designer Cake Company idea (her one is much better, thanks for inspiring me) as this design is much simpler with less details. I had so much fun making this cake as I didn;t have the pressure to be perfect and it was for us anyway The making of each figurines was so much fun, I had a blast.

The cake was banana cake, very moist and it was kinda bad idea to stack 4 thick layer of 3 cm each sandwiched together. The cake was so moist that it kinda wobbly without any support. Maybe part of that happening was my fault, because I didn’t trim the excess top Once I finished ganaching, the cake was straight to the fridge to hardened. I was worried that it was going to fell apart (it wasn’t though). This was a challenge. However, next time I’ll do the banana cake, I now how to handle them better.

12. TRSP’s Birthday Cake

This was my second paying customer (so happy ) The initial design was provided my customer that is the pig sleeping. She gave me a picture of pig sleeping on the mudpit (I am not sure who is the designer, once I found out, I will put the designer name in as credit). She requested several foods to be scattered around the pig. In fact, she emailed me the list of food. I added a few twist of my own to the cake, like the fence, grasses and stones, just to make the cake more complete.

The cake is Lapis Surabaya (Indonesian sponge cake which has lots of egg yolks… (literally a lot .. like 30 egg yolks). The layer is vanilla, chocolate, and vanilla; and filling in between the layer is strawberry jam.

13. Brandon’s 1st Birthday Cake

This was certainly a challenge for me. It was also the first time I could get those sharp edges ganache (Faye Cahill style), still not perfect yet, but I am pretty please with it. The thing that I regret is that I should take more time smoothing the side of the cake, as some of the bubbles trapped in between the fondant and the cakes (as you could see in the picture).

As for the design, I came up with few different sketches and mum loves this one. The challenge was the rainbow. It was huge and heavy. As I have to make them few days ahead before I actually bake the cakes, it made it hard for me to guess the height of the first tier. Well I was lucky I guess, the rainbow height fit perfectly.

I really wasn’t happy with the name blocks. I was experimenting with the dark choc mud cakes. Once they are cooled down, I cut them into cubes and applied the ganache. Once the ganache firm, I apply fondant. It was so tiny and messy because of the ganache, I was just so frustrated. I was rushing as well and no having enough coloured fondant made everything worse. Well, this is my lesson

14. Pina’s Birthday Cake

(Design inspired by Peggy Porchen)

This cake was for my son preschool teacher. They let me do anything I like in terms of the design. The requirements was it has to be a chocolate cake and pinks here and there. I was inspired by Peggy Porchen mini cakes design, so here it is a bouquet of roses. (Psttt check out The Designer Cake Company, her one is so neat. I didn’t know that she did  a tutorial until I did this one. So check out the her page You won’t regret it )

15. Emily’s 5th Birthday Cake

(Design originated and inxpired by Teresa’s Tasty Temptations and Cake by Kerin)

This cake was really  a challenge for me in terms of structure. My fist thinking before i start the cake was that I have to have a versatile cake for the top so I can carve the cake in order to have a cool roof . I used classic butter vanilla cakes, which is perfect for carving but a little bit to heavy for the column to support it. So my lesson was to have a slimmer tower on the top.

Dont ask how many support I have in this cake. So many that I lost count I have one go all the way through the cake. I have to cut few cardboard boards and pierce the middle so that the main dowel could go through them. The cardboard boards is to be place under each cakes.

The rapunzel hair was supported with the wire and I made them to be able to disassemble just in case the top of the cake wobble on the way to deliver them. The delivery was like a heart attack waiting to happen for me. I had to take off the roof and wait until the birthday girl ready to blow the candle then I attached it again into place.

16. Aaron’s 3rd Birthday Cake

The Thomas figurine took longer than i expected (maybe 6 hours.. not really looking at the time but it was a very long time), Percy was quick though. I prepared all the figurines few days ahead of time so I have enough time jsut to concentrate on the cake itself.

As for the name blocks, I use foam this time as it was neater

17. Liam’s Baptism Cake

I wasn’t really happy with how this cake turns out to tell you the truth. I was rushing in and didn’t have enough time. I spent 2 hours on decoration them which was not enough (as I am still learning).

I want the colour to be much softer than this. I wanted to do more than this, adding few cutout to make it looks more like a quilt. Well, lesson learned, do not take so many orders I didn’t sleep for two days in a row.

18. Koko’s 3rd Birthday Cake

19. Florencia’s 4th Birthday Cake

20. Florencia’s 4th Birthday Cake

21. Kaka Martina’s 21st Birthday Cake

22. Florencia’s 4th Birthday Cake

23. Brendan’s 5th Birthday Cake

24. Zaara’s 4th Birthday Cake

25. Halim’s Birthday Cake

26. Ocean’s 2nd Birthday Cake

27. Mama Esther’s  Birthday Cake

28. Florencia’s 4th Birthday Cake

29. Mengwei Xie’s Graduation Cake

30. Ira’s 1st Birthday Cake

31. Rachel’s 11th Birthday Cake

32. Ira’s 1st Birthday Cake

33. Dylan’s 6th Birthday Cake

(picture coming soon)

34. Jennifer’s 6th Birthday Cake

If you have any inquiries, please email me at linda.kurniawan@gmail.com