It's my birthday...

It was my birthday yesterday (I'm 22!) and to celebrate, I went out for dinner and drinks with some friends last weekend. As people wished me happy birthday, they also asked who made me a birthday cake... why, ME of course! People seem to be a bit shocked that I would do this on my own birthday, but the truth is, I love baking and who better to make something perfect for me than me?! (I also plan on making my own wedding cake when the time comes :p) This year I made cupcakes, for ease of eating on the street (the restaurant didn't allow cakes to be brought in). I made a combination of my most favourite things, and ended up with these:

Chocolate chai cupcakes with pear cream filling and caramel buttercream :)
Topped with Crispearls and a marzipan pear
Photocred: Carolyn Chin

Photocred: Carolyn Chin

This week I've been super busy prepping a wedding cake for my cousin Tiffany's wedding on Saturday! Stay tuned for lots of pics!!!

Cupcake Training Camp 2012

This past Sunday was Cupcake Training Camp held at Coeur des sciences at UQAM. The event was a cupcake sale benefitting Jeunesse, j'écoute and La tablée des chefs. This was the second year I was able to participate, and I did so with three of my classmates, Catherine Martz, Élodie Vanasse and Marianne Lafleur. We each made 50 cupcakes, and thus were allotted half a table to serve them ourselves. My contribution was spiced chocolate cupcakes with a banana cream filling, topped with a toasted marshmallow frosting and a banana chip. Here are some pictures from the event!

Élodie's lime cupcakes with chai marshmallow frosting
Photocred: Catherine Martz

Marianne's pineapple coconut cupcakes with marshmallow frosting
Photocred: Catherine Martz

Catherine's grapefruit cupcakes with pomegranate marshmallow frosting
Photocred: Catherine Martz

My cupcakes! Spiced chocolate cupcakes with banana cream filling and
toasted marshmallow frosting
Photocred: Catherine Martz

Our table with 200 cupcakes
Photocred: Catherine Martz

Myself, Marianne and Élodie
Photocred: Catherine Martz

Nonna Maria was impressed with our cupcakes!
Photocred: Pedro fait de la photo

Our team :)
Photocred: Susan Moss

This spring's event was a lot of fun to take part in. The next full fledged Cupcake Camp Montreal will be held Nov. 18, 2012 at the Palais des Congres. I hope to be able to once again participate :)

A lovely Tiffany box

For my cousin Tiffany's upcoming wedding, I decided to make her a cake to celebrate her bridal shower. It was only appropriate that I make a classic blue Tiffany box cake for her :) She loved it! It looked pretty darn good and tasted so yummy!

My last order of my busy week! Put together in a  couple hours :)

I both love and hate working with silver dust- so pretty yet
so hard to get the right coverage!

Proud of my creation!

My lovely cousin Tiffany <3 

DELISH- dark chocolate and vanilla cakes layered with raspberry
cream cheese frosting

february madness

Last week was quite hectic with 5 orders- practically one a day ! The first two have already been posted.. and as soon as I posted them, I had to get straight to work on the next three.

Valentine's Day cookies

Sugar cookies flooded with royal icing

Double birthday cake

Top tier- spice cake, middle tier- dark chocolate cake, bottom
tier- red velvet, all layered with cream cheese frosting

Crown cake toppers painted with real edible gold

A baby picture of the birthday "kids" when they first met! So cute :)

Check back soon for pictures of my fifth order from last week. It was definitely my favourite to make :) Gotta go upload the pics!

Love is in the air

Yesterday I had a cake tasting with a couple whose wedding cake I'm making in May. They wanted carrot cake, so I made two different kinds, both layered with a fluffy, spiced Italian buttercream. I used Canadian Living's Best Carrot Cake and Cake Boss's Carrot Cake. Can you guess which one they chose? :)

Of course, it is Valentine's Day tomorrow. It's fun to do orders for this occasion because they're only meant for 2 people, so they're mini and cute! 

Red velvet cake with white chocolate buttercream and dark chocolate
covered strawberries

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone :) Hope your day is filled with love, whether you are in a relationship or not. Stay tuned for a Tiffany-themed bridal shower cake and an African inspired birthday cake!

Catching up

As you can tell by the lack of posts in January, it was quite a slow month for the cake business. I had a few projects here and there, but nothing big. Here are some pictures of my January baking :) 

Chocolate sheet cake with vanilla buttercream for an office function

AJ's second birthday- Red Sox cake. Vegan chocolate cake with
vanilla buttercream. 

Red velvet brownies with white chocolate buttercream- yum!

I'm currently working on a friend's birthday cake and a wedding shower cake. In about a month, I'll be working on a special wedding cake as well as some macarons wedding favours! Stay tuned for pictures :) 

back to baking

I just got back from vacation- I spent a week in beautiful Nassau, lying on the beach and exploring the city every day :) It was heavenly. Now it's back to baking time! Here is a cake I had forgotten to post last month- a Christmas cake for a family gathering. I was unsure of how to go about drawing the lion, and in the end, instead of attempting to cut it out in fondant, I used red buttercream with a small star tip to achieve the shape as well as some texture and height.

Vanilla cake layered with vanilla bean buttercream and strawberries

And voila my first cake of 2012, a chocolate cake layered in chocolate and decorated in chocolate! The birthday boy is a huge fan of milk chocolate, so of course I put in as much as I possibly could! The cake was a big success with all the guests.

Dark chocolate cake with milk chocolate chips, layered in a milk
chocolate ganache and decorated with dark chocolate curls and Crisperles