So I've been dabbling a bit in decorating.. I've made a few cakes now, and some of them have even not been that bad! My latest cake was one for work. Two of our finance engineers (Yay Katie and Dan!!) have recently passed some pretty tough exams and their manager wanted to have a celebration cake for them. I was beyond gleeful when he asked me to make it.
It's.. What?! Leaning?!! No- it's most definitely not. Don't you think I would NOTICE if it was leaning? I'll show you leaning!!
OK- it's leaning.. I'll call off my guys.. In the end, I think it was the lack of refrigeration that got me. You see, when you first make the cake, you freeze it. Freezing makes working with it easier, as there are less crumbs and less likelihood of breaking. But, once the cake is put together, it defrosts. I do put in some infrastructure to keep it upright, but sadly, because red velvet cake is oh so soft and gentle, the infrastructure moved around. Something to keep in mind for next time.
Let's talk about the bow though! I read the article on making a bow here and I just had to try it. It looked fantastic! I also used the Cake Boss website for another reference- and I liked that they made the bow with upright and sideways pieces. The construction starts off pretty easy. I wanted it to reach to the very edge, so I measured the diameter of my cake, halved it, and added a centimeter for the loop. I then made loops that were 2 centimeters wide, and the calculated length long. I needed to put them on something to keep the loop, and I found some shot glasses! I used largeish ones- the small ones won't be big enough to make a pretty loop.
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I made about 22 loops- I used ALL of them, I recommend making a few more to be safe. I also made some stars on wire. These I used at the very last minute for decorating the cake.
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Two days later, I made some royal icing and stick the loops together- taking care to make some upright and some on their sides so that the bow looks nice and messy!
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This also has to dry for quite a while, until it's solid. And.. That's it! Be VERY careful when putting it on the cake! I broke a couple of loops this way..
Lemme skip to my favourite part? The cake!!! It was magnificent.. The freezing really doesn't affect the cake at all- just be sure not to freeze them on top of each other! It was irresistible: gentle and sweet. Just lovely. I was SO happy that they wanted a Red Velvet cake with white chocolate icing- it's my favourite!
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Is that just GORGEOUS?? I want to just take handfuls of it and rub it on my face..
I should make a quick note- Ralph and I are in a teeny tiny little place at the moment, and this cake took up most of it. Not only did Ralph not mind- he REALLY helped me with putting decorations on the cake- the most tedious part, AND he drove me to work the next morning so that I could try to make sure the cake stayed in one piece. And.. It almost didn't! But we made it :-) Thank you thank you!!
Next time- I'll need to figure out how to refrigerate. I would change almost nothing else. If I can dry the bow in an air conditioned room- I would definitely go for that, as mine was very soft and difficult to work with.
OK- it's leaning.. I'll call off my guys.. In the end, I think it was the lack of refrigeration that got me. You see, when you first make the cake, you freeze it. Freezing makes working with it easier, as there are less crumbs and less likelihood of breaking. But, once the cake is put together, it defrosts. I do put in some infrastructure to keep it upright, but sadly, because red velvet cake is oh so soft and gentle, the infrastructure moved around. Something to keep in mind for next time.
Let's talk about the bow though! I read the article on making a bow here and I just had to try it. It looked fantastic! I also used the Cake Boss website for another reference- and I liked that they made the bow with upright and sideways pieces. The construction starts off pretty easy. I wanted it to reach to the very edge, so I measured the diameter of my cake, halved it, and added a centimeter for the loop. I then made loops that were 2 centimeters wide, and the calculated length long. I needed to put them on something to keep the loop, and I found some shot glasses! I used largeish ones- the small ones won't be big enough to make a pretty loop.
.jpg)
I made about 22 loops- I used ALL of them, I recommend making a few more to be safe. I also made some stars on wire. These I used at the very last minute for decorating the cake.
.jpg)
Two days later, I made some royal icing and stick the loops together- taking care to make some upright and some on their sides so that the bow looks nice and messy!
.jpg)
.jpg)
Lemme skip to my favourite part? The cake!!! It was magnificent.. The freezing really doesn't affect the cake at all- just be sure not to freeze them on top of each other! It was irresistible: gentle and sweet. Just lovely. I was SO happy that they wanted a Red Velvet cake with white chocolate icing- it's my favourite!
.JPG)
Is that just GORGEOUS?? I want to just take handfuls of it and rub it on my face..
I should make a quick note- Ralph and I are in a teeny tiny little place at the moment, and this cake took up most of it. Not only did Ralph not mind- he REALLY helped me with putting decorations on the cake- the most tedious part, AND he drove me to work the next morning so that I could try to make sure the cake stayed in one piece. And.. It almost didn't! But we made it :-) Thank you thank you!!
Next time- I'll need to figure out how to refrigerate. I would change almost nothing else. If I can dry the bow in an air conditioned room- I would definitely go for that, as mine was very soft and difficult to work with.
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