coffee chiffon cake with dark chocolate sail sculpture

I love to make birthday cakes for my friends, and at one point last year I became obsessed with making chocolate sculptures to decorate my birthday cakes with! I had seen it all over Instagram and fell in love with the way they added such artistry to cakes, in such a free-form and abstract way. 

The first of many chocolate sculpture cakes that I ended up making throughout the year, this one was for my friend Hsing, who I met at work years and years ago. At the time we were the only females on our team, and although we are no longer at the same company, we still make it a point to meet for lunches several times throughout the year.

I typically make chiffon cakes for Hsing, since she she likes the type of light and airy cake that you can commonly find at Asian bakeries. This time I decided to make a coffee chiffon cake, filled and frosted with espresso whipped cream.

I typically do a crumb coat of frosting, then let it chill in the fridge for at least a half our, before adding a second coat of frosting and smoothing it out completely with an offset spatula.

While the assembled and frosted cake chilled in the fridge, I got started on making the topper. In a double boiler, I melted dark chocolate with a bit of coconut oil, and then poured it out onto a baking sheet lined with a silicone liner. Then I positioned the silicone liner insde of a glass bowl, using binder clips to secure it in a way that would provide an interesting shape to the chocolate.

Once the chocolate had cooled, I removed the binder clips and carefully removed the silicone liner, giving me a chocolate sculpture!

I secured it to the top of the cake with a bit of the espresso whipped cream, and then it was done!

I love the simplicity of this type of decorative cake topper, plus it's edible!

Hope you had a Happy Birthday, Hsing!

minecraft wolf birthday cake with handmade fondant topper

So my previous post was about the Minecraft pickaxe birthday cake that I made for my son's 11th birthday. And here's the cake that I made for his 12th birthday (which was 6 months ago 😂)! He wanted a Minecraft cake again, this time a Minecraft wolf birthday cake! I took the same approach to making the fondant topper - using a small square cutter to cut out various colors of fondant. Then I secured the squares onto a cardboard cut out using frosting.

For the cake, he requested a lychee and whipped cream filling, so I baked up two layers of my favorite vanilla cake (recipe in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!), which I then sliced in half horizontally to give me four cake layers. Then I filled each layer with freshly whipped cream and diced lychee, which I had drained of it's juice.

Once all of the cake layers were assembled, I covered it with Swiss meringue buttercream, which I tinted gray. I typically do a crumb coat first, then let it chill in the fridge before adding a second final layer of frosting, however lately I have been doing one thick frosting layer to save myself some time.

Once I smoothed out my frosting with an offset spatula (which usually takes several iterations of smoothing, adding more frosting to uneven spots, more smoothing, etc), I was ready to add my decorations. 

I started with adding fondant letters for his name (made with tinted fondant pressed into a silicone letters mold), and then added a few of the fondant squares that I had made in advance for the topper.

Then it was time to add the wolf topper!

I added bamboo skewers to the topper so that I could secure on top of the cake. The topper turned out quite large, but I suppose it has a dramatic effect?

I cannot believe that next birthday he will be a teenager! 😭 

Happy Birthday, Matthew! We love you!

star wars birthday cake with handmade fondant luke and leia cake toppers

Usually it takes me a half year (sometimes a year!) to blog about something that I've baked, but this time I wanted to get this out in time for May the Fourth (be with you)! Anyway, I'm so honored to be able to say that I've made Marni's birthday cake for her every year since she was born, including her the cake for her mama's baby shower! This year for her 6th birthday, she was going to have a Star Wars themed party with her classmate Wyatt, who is her birthday twin, so what better way to represent the birthday twins than Luke and Leia toppers that look like them!

I got start on making the toppers about a week before the party, so that they would have enough time to dry and harden completely. While I used white fondant to form the bodies, I ended up using this pack of natural skin tone fondant for the heads, just to save time on tinting my fondant with food coloring, especially since this pack had most of the colors that I would be needing (for the heads, hands, and hair)!

For Leia, I formed sleeves with white fondant, and then use a bit of black gel-based food coloring added to white fondant, to create a silver belt for her dress.

For Luke, I also formed sleeves (but less bell-shaped than Leia's sleeves), and then used the lighter brown from the fondant pack for the belt. For the belt buckle, I used the same silver fondant that I used for Leia's belt. Then I used the back of a butter knife to make impressions in Luke's clothes to mimick the fold in his robe, as well a crease to form his pants.

Then I used the skin tone from the fondant pack to form the hands, also using the back of a butter knife for form impressions for the fingers.

For Leia's hair, I used the black from the fondant pack to roll long ropes (since Marni has black hair), which I then formed into her Leia's cinnamon-roll hair buns.

Marni is also known for her signature bangs, so I made sure to include that on this version of Leia. And for Luke's hair, I used the dark brown from the fondant pack (since Wyatt has brown hair).

Then I attached the heads to the bodies with a toothpick to hold them together, and then added their eyes and smiles with an edible food marker.

We also wanted to include Marni and Wyatt's names on the cake, so I drew their names out in the Star Wars font, which I then cut out of paper to be used as a template. Then I tinted fondant with golden yellow and then rolled it out thin, before using a paring knife to cut the letters out.

When it was time to make the cake, I baked up two 8-inch cakes using my favorite vanilla cake recipe (which can be found in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!), let them cool, and then cut them in half horizontally, giving me four cake layers. Then I filled each layer with freshly whipped cream and sliced fresh strawberries.

Once the cake was stacked and assembled, I whipped up a batch of Swiss meringue buttercream frosting (you can also find the recipe in my book!), and tinted it with black gel-based food coloring. Then I covered the top and sides of the cake with a quick crumb coat of frosting, let it chill in the fridge for 30 minutes, and then added a final coat of frosting before smoothing it out with an offset spatula (a bench scraper is also a nice tool for this!)

Once the cake was smooth, I used a food-safe paintbrush, dipped in a mixture of gold luster dust and water, to make gold splatter stars all over the cake. This was my first time attempting this technique, and it was so much fun!

After letting the cake chill overnight in the fridge, I was ready to decorate!

First I added my fondant letters, secured with a bit of buttercream.

Then I was ready to add my fondant toppers! Here they are ready to go on top of the cake.

I made sure to secure them to the cake with toothpicks, so that they wouldn't fall over during the drive to the party.

Wheeeeeee! I'm so happy with how this cake turned out!

I couldn't wait to Marni to see the cake!

I also made a 10-inch coffee chiffon cake (for the adults!), filled with espresso whipped cream and covered with white whipped cream, and decorate with rainbow sprinkles surrounding the number 6.

And now I leave you with some adroable pics from the party!

Happy Birthday, Marni and Wyatt!