Sugar cookies

 Christmas time is cookie time.  This year I made cookie bouquets for clients and family.

I found large santa boots at a local holiday supply store and purchased them back in September.

First I make a sugar cookie dough and allow it to rest overnight.  The next day I roll out the dough and cut the necessary shapes.  Allow the freshly baked cookie to completely cool before trying to work with it.

 I personal frost the back side of the cookie as it is the flattest surface and gives me the desired finish.    

Some cookies are frosted with a "cookie frosting" and some are frosted with standard cookie frosting.  The difference is the "cookie frosting" is very thin.  Once the frosting as set or crusted you can then add all the details.

The house was turned into Santa's Workshop.


The large circles became Santa's head, the trees were trimmed and the holly leaves were inserted in a group.  The remaining cookies were candy cane, Santa's boot and a candle holder (not pictured?)  I use a shredded color paper to cover the styrofoam block that hold the cookies in place.

The final picture is the finished cookie bouquet. 

Kathy and Joe

A former pastor and his wife are very dear friends and they recently celebrated their Golden Anniversary as a couple.

There sons arranged a wonderful intimate dinner party with 2 of the bridal party in attendance.

The cake featured a 12" square of Spice cake with a sour cream buttercream filling and a 7" square of Almond cake with fresh raspberry compote.  The frosting was buttercream with gold dragees.  The fall flowers were gumpaste, and included a tiger lilly, burgundy carnations, lotus pod, wheat and pinecones.  The fall leaves all around were also gumpaste.

What a lovely evening at an historical inn, good food, drink and visitation was enjoyed by all.  Congratulations Joseph and Kathy!

Olivia

Baby Olivia is due in January of 2012. Her Mom, Aunt and Grandma our over the moon about her arrival.  (I am sure dad is too)

The bassinet is all cake.  I used a large oval and baked two 3" high layers which were each split three times for filling.  The bottom was Chocolate cake with white chocolate mousse and the top was banana with banana custard.  The hood of the bassinet was made of royal frosting, and the baby was mexican paste and dressed in fondant

Air Soft

This sheet cake was for a young man who was receiving his first Air Soft Gun.  

The gun was made of mexican paste and then dusted with grey petal dust.  The cake is a 13x9x2 and was airbrushed in a camo motif with very small leaves for a true fall affect. 

Italian Cooking

This is a birthday cake for a man who loves to cook Italian food.  

It is a long loaf pan, Almond cake with Raspberry compote filling.  I covered the cake in fondant and then hand marked the woodgrain in the sides.  Next it was airbrushed a rich brown.  The top and cabinet doors were added next in white fondant and scored with their pattern.  

All the items were hand molded fondant.  The spaghetti is long lines of fondant piled in the pot and then I made the "water' out of a very small amount of isomalt.  The pan of sauce and meatballs are done by rolling small balls of brown fondant and rolling them in red piping gel, too cute.

Halloween

What a fun holiday!!!  I found a spooky tree at a local hobby shop and decided to make some cookies to hang from it.  This is a tradition my parents did when I was a child.  They did several different trees through the year for corresponding holiday treats.  

I baked a 4" sugar cookie with a whole for hanging.  I frosted them with smooth frosting and then piped on the gauze for the mummy and added sugar eyes.  The spider web is first frosted then while the frosting is still wet, you pipe several circles and using a toothpick pull the lines out from the center making the web pattern.  The spider cookie is frosted and then I added a fondant spider.  

The cookies are hung on the tree using twist-ties bent in an S shape to make the cookies easy to get off the tree.

Fall

I love the fall in the Northeast.  The air is crisp and the trees are beautiful.  This is a simple birthday cake for two who share the date. 

 It is a 10" Dark Chocolate Mayonnaise cake with peanut butter mousse.  It features gumpaste fall leaves and fondant pumpkins.

Spiderman

 Our eldest grandson turned 5 on Sept. 15.    He loves Spiderman.

This cake design was taken from a poster I found on Google.

I used a 13x9 cake,  three layers high and one-half of the large egg pan for his head.

I created inserts for  the 13x9 pan, so when the cake was cut, his inside would be blue and red checkerboard.  The blue was colored white cake and the red was red velvet. Fresh Raspberry compote was used as filling between the three layers.

I first carved the shape, crumb coated it and chilled it several hours. I then covered the cake in blue and red fondant. Again chilling several hours. I then cut out the spider for his back and rolled approximately 6 strings of fondant at a time. By the time I had rolled out the 6th string the first one was stiff enough to handle easily. It took considerable time to put the web on his suit.

Our grandson was so excited. We all had a great time watching him celebrate with his favorite super hero.   Happy Birthday Asher!!!

New Kid

What a fun baby shower theme!! This cake is from 2012 Wilton yearbook. I molded the body of each baby in beige chocolate clay using the brownie silicone baking mold. The head is also beige chocolate clay wrapped around a malted milk ball. The chocolate was then left to dry and set up overnight. The next day each baby was dressed head to toe with fondant.

The blocks are a chocolate peanut butter cake with peanut butter mousse. They were base-coated in white buttercream and then trimmed in fondant.

The new mom was just thrilled with the end result.

Cookies

 Cookies for special occasion or just because you want something sweet.   I offer cookies in 45 varieties.  They may be purchase by the dozen or assorted trays.

Caramel cups, Almond Crescents, Pecan Tassies, Pizzelles, Peaches, Walnut Rugula, Fudge Puddles, Rich Chocolate Rum, Fig Newton, Rolo, Sarah Bernhardt, Chocolate covered Cherries, Pecan Supreme, Almond Crunch, Crunchy Jumbles, Chocolate Marshmallow, Cream Wafers, Coconut Thumbprint, Cinnamon Rings, Peanut Butter Blossoms, Madeline, Tri- Colored Marzipan, Lemon Cream Apricot Wraps, Pineapple Supremes, Moravian, Spritz, Lady Locks, Key Lime, Pistachio-Chocolate Pinwheels, Buckeyes, Lemon Nutmeg Shortbread, Almond Fingers, Lotus Blossoms, Strawberries, Cranberry-Raspberry Pinwheels, Raspberry Linzer Hearts, After 8's, Butter-Potato Chip, Eggnog, Chinese Chews, Orange-Almond, Cranberry-Ginger Shortbread, Mint Kisses.

I also offer hand-painted and airbrushed sugar cookies.

Lotus Blossom

A few years ago, a cooking program was featuring this cookie; however, they could not tell the viewer how they were made as they were entered into a cookie contest and the submitter would not tell how they were done. After a lot of bloggers kept asking the women who submitted the cookies to share, she asked her mother to at least let her take a picture of the irons that are used to make the cookies.

I carried the picture for a few months looking for the irons to make these. I eventually found a highly skilled craftsman to fabricate them for me. He did a wonderful job and they work beautifully.

The small cake in the middle is the one that Prince William of England requested for his wedding. With all the buzz here in the states about the Royal Wedding, I really wanted to taste this dessert. I contacted a fellow cake decorator in England and she said it was a very common dessert for high tea. She sent me the recipe and a special ingredient that we do not have in the states. It was so much fun making, quite easy to make, and so decadent to the taste. I finished off the cake with a chocolate clay rose.

It was a big hit with the ladies in my book club.

Damasks print

This cake was a "day before pick-up" order.

Sometimes a client will call me in the morning and want to pick a cake up the next day, this was just the case.  This type of order can be done if the client allows me to choose the design, as the art work take considerable time.  I, as a rule, always make additional flowers when preparing for a wedding in case I should break one or two when wiring the arrangement.  This practice  helps me to have flowers available for last minute orders, such as this.

The cake features buttercream in a pale blue with the damasks in dark blue. This is done by base-coating the buttercream and chilling the cake until set. Then with room temp buttercream in the opposing color, lay the stencil against the side of the cake and in a single swipe, spread the dark color on, and gently remove the stencil.

I then finished the design with shell borders, the birthday message and white gumpaste roses.

Just Desserts

This table of cakes was for a wedding, in which, the couple wanted "just dessert"

Each cake was a different flavor and the also requested very basic designs. Flavors were Lemon with lemon custard, White with fresh raspberry compote, Chocolate with fudge, Spice with walnut custard and the Steelers logo was to honor the groom and the flavor was Red Velvet with cheesecake filling.

At the reception all the cakes were displayed on a single table and they were set upon individual pedestals.

Hokie

This cake was ordered for the groom the be served at the rehearsal dinner. The bride sent me several pictures of this cake from the internet. The original design is not mine.

The cake was chocolate with fudge filling covered in chocolate buttercream then dark chocolate fondant.

Virginia Tech's mascot is the Hokie (turkey) he is made of the dark chocolate fondant as well. All the trim is orange fondant.

I apologize for the quality of the picture, my husband took the picture with his blackberry and then emailed it to me, so its not real clear. I forgot the camera ( I do that a lot).

Ashley

I offer cakes in round, square, heart, oval, hexagon, paisley, teardrop, triangle and petal shapes.

This cake features a 12" 9"and 6" in Almond with a Fresh Strawberry compote. The 12" and 6" cakes were covered in white fondant and the 9" was covered in a medium blue fondant.

The 12" and 6" tiers where draped in a paisley pattern then hand painted in deeper shades of blue as well as piped in white and painted in silver accents. The 9" center cake was first painted with the paisley markers then filled in with a number of blue shades to create a very striking print. Again this layer was piped in white and over painted with silver.

This cake will feed 100 quests. However, this wedding had 300 in attendance, so the bride opted to make up the additional servings in sheet cakes. She ordered a full sheet and a half sheet cake in Chocolate cake with the Peanut Butter Mousse as well as a half sheet cake in Almond with Fresh Strawberry compote. This gave equal amounts of cake for her two flavors.

Her flowers are the Dendrobium Orchid in vivid purple and mini white Calla Lily.

Heidi

Intwined Hearts.

This bride also chose a square design in buttercream with piped hearts for her pattern.

The cake is a 16" Almond cake with Fresh Raspberry compote, a 12" Chocolate Peanut Butter cake with Peanut Butter Mousse, and a 8" Italian Cream with Vanilla Custard.

Her colors are tangerine and guava. Her flowers are navelino mini gerberas, robina pink lily, Virginia white alstroemeria and green button mums.