Cake, Jar and Sprinkles

A number of people often asked me "How do you learn to bake?" or "When did you started baking?" I always fumble on that question because I always try to think what is the most humble way to answer. I guess I'm just a person who thinks too much about what I say to others. 

I learn baking on my own. I remembered how I helped my sisters baked during Hari Raya. I was always made to do the 'dirty' job like sifting the flour, releasing the cupcake liners from the stack. It was those pesky little jobs that most bakers hate.. I should say some.. HAhaha.. And I still remembered how my 3rd sister and I used to bake through the night. We had those flour sifter where it looks like a big metal cup and there is this pusher thingy at the handle where you have to push to sift the flour inside. I guess my description is bad eh.. It was the most tiring thing we had to do but I had a blast and enjoyable time with my sister. 

Back to the question, I learn to bake on my own. By trying out recipes. I was really inspired by one blog. Her pictures and recipes were so fascinating. I was in love and I just knew I had to bake. You can visit her blog. Her blog led to other awe inspiring blogs where they are so committed to take nice pictures and bake such good stuffs. 

I started in 2009 if I'm not wrong. I bake for fun. To try out recipes and I really wanted to decorate those cupcakes. Some bakes went really bad and awry and some turn out good. My decorations started really simple. Then, I went for Wilton courses to learn more decoration. It was all trial and error. 

Through time, I realised that baking was therapeutic. It makes me happy and de-stress. And best of all, the happiest moment is watching someone eat my goodies and seeing their reaction and telling me from the bottom of their heart that it's really good. I bake in hopes that people can appreciate flavours and the goodness inside the cakes. 

It's been 3 years now since I first started baking. Being able to sell my cakes and goodies is a great feeling but I really want to ensure that I'm selling quality cakes. Flavour-some cakes. I hope people can appreciate it one day. 

I was asked to make wedding favours for a friend last week. It was really a cool idea of cake in a jar. It was Red Velvet in a Jar. It's really something new and unique in Singapore. However, there is a shop that sells cake in a jar. They are called Grin Affair. I have yet to try it. Hope I can try it one day. I rarely have enough time for myself these days. 

It was really an enjoyable experience. Something new for me. Inventive. I really love it. And I knew I had to give my best for this. I made 2 kinds of cream cheese frosting for the red velvet. The ones in the middle is cream cheese mixed with mascarpone to give it more creamier and tangy flavour. The top cream cheese frosting is basic cream cheese frosting which taste really good but not so sweet and has a good consistency to be piped. The minor details inside that jar were mini chocolate chips in the middle layer which was purely experiment-ational. It was actually for aesthetic reasons BUT it goes really great with the red velvet. It adds texture while you're eating it which increases your enjoyment, honestly. And I managed to get some cute sprinkles from Artistiq Sugarcraft. I bought quite some time ago and was saving it for this special occasion. I knew this special sprinkles had to make its debut with something unique.

We went to the venue and tied the spoons to the jar with the help of the bride and groom's friends. The completed work looked really good!! I totally love it. I wished it could have been my wedding favour. Haha.. 

I love the spoons. It was imported from USA, I think..The bride and groom bought it. It's compostable. How cool and green is that? I love any ideas that are environmental friendly. At the end of the day, it was all worth it when people came to me and tell me that it was "the bomb"! hahahaha.. A lot of people complimented the red velvet, even the groom.. I was really relieve and happy. 

I would really like to thank the bride and groom for giving me the honour of helping them and my husband and friends for being so supportive to me and that keeps me going. 

I love Ruffles and Anything Sweet.. on Cakes

I chanced upon this blog while I was surfing the net quite a while ago.. She had a very interesting blog where she will teach you different techniques to decorate cakes and cupcakes. It was really interactive. You could even pay to watch video tutorials. But there was one cake I fell in love with.. which is the petal effect cake.. You can see it by clicking here..I knew I had to do it one day. 


When someone wanted to order a rainbow cake and it was the birthday of a pretty lady.. I decided to make a pretty cake.. :) I was quite nervous about it because it should be done with a stiff/frosting buttercream. I was never a fan of the very very sweet buttercream. I always like my cakes with swiss meringue buttercream. The only thing bad about SMBC is that is gets kinda melt-y very fast especially in SIngapore's weather. SMBC doesn't melt on the cake but it melts in the piping bag when I am piping it. Maybe because of the warmth from my palms. So, fridge is my best friend and I had to do everything very fast. 


This is how it looks like:

I found out that it is possible to do this design with SMBC but you got to be patient and not fuss about some messy parts. I have a lot more to improve on it though. I couldn't get the joining end to blend that well. So, I covered with some pearl dragees. It looks kinda empty on top but I think a nice big flower would look good! 

Oh, if you're wondering how the insides look like.. Hmm.. 

Well, this was the layers before I manage to put the SMBC filling in between. But the cake makes you smile doesn't it? :)


~Somewhere over the rainbow
Way up high..~

Gradients and New Knowledge

I've just recovered from all the body aches I got from my class with Sharon Wee... Don't get me wrong, she's a wonderful teacher but I just didn't know a double barrel cake would require such great amount of physical strength... ;D 


I had the privilege to attend a course by the talented Sharon Wee from Australia who came all the way here to Singapore... Wish I could attend all the courses but my schedule and financial means only allowed me to attend one class... I was attracted to it because of the Peony flowers that we get to learn and also the skills to cover very tall cakes... There are so many things you can learn technically from Sharon. The most stress that I got from making the cake was contemplating on the design of the cake.. The next stress was covering the 2 tiers of cake.. Hahaha.. The last stress was making the flowers...


The design was killing me since the past few days even before class.. I was going through pictures of beautiful cakes in the internet like an addicted person every night before I sleep... Im not kidding you. I think even my husband was lazy to entertain me. Hahaha.. Poor him.. I just know I wanted to do something simple yet eye-catching.. Colourful yet subtle.. Fascinating yet clean.. Modern yet vintage-y.. See what I mean.. I'm contradicting myself at every thoughts and imagination I have.. In the end.. I decided on a colour scheme which was not so common but had the vintage feel to it.. But actually I got the inpired by a lady who wore the colours that I chose... It was just one random morning where I was walking behind a random lady who was wearing a 3/4 teal coloured skirt with a sleeveless peach-salmon coloured top.. I just knew there was no turning back.. As for the designs, I wanted to do something modern and clean.. I kept thinking over and over again whether my white peonies will go with the colours I chose.. I was ultra stress!! But I just did it and guess what.. It's beautiful and unique! 


While watching Sharon demo how she covered the double barrel cake, I actually held my breath until she finished covering the sides in one swift movement.. I was thinking to myself, can I do that?? Suddenly, my palms became sweaty.. It is usually not.. Hahaha.. I was really nervous.. Hence, I covered the smaller cake to warm myself up for the challenging task ahead... When I had to finally cover my tall cake, I took a deep breathe and stood straight.. I was really scared something bad would happened.. But I was really paranoid as the cake is ganach-ed all around.. Any mistakes would mean I would have wasted the fondant which was a lot of hardwork to roll.. Well, I still manage to cover it with no problem.. 

It's been a long time since I make wired flowers.. Honestly, I'm still not good at curling the petals and the peonies needs to be really curved to be nice.. I was initiall having problems wiring the petals. I had to the each petal over and over again as none of the petal I did was good enough.. I hate being so critical of my own work and such a perfectionist at times. I just like to stress myself... Finally after some time, I just had to not bother about being perfect.. I realised I was wasting time and I was really lagging behind everyone.. 

I was really happy with the end result.. Im very very proud of myself.. Although I was really tired and my back was aching like crazy from kneading and rolling strips of fondant, it was all worth it.. I'm not really sure I can repeat all this task or this cake after this class.. Actually, I'm more worried about whether the chocolate ganache will set if I do not have the luxury of having aircon at home unlike in class.. I really need to experiment.. I also learn from Sharon that beautiful looking cakes and flowers can be achieved with the simplest tool that you have at home.. You don't have to buy special cutter from different flowers.. All you have to have is imagination and creativity.. And being happy with what you do.. "Do what you like, don't have to follow others".. That's what she always says... 

A friend I made in class who has the same taste as me.. How cool is that? I love her falling petals idea..

I'm definitely going to work towards making this kind of modern, clean cakes because it's very me.. It's what I love and it makes me really happy.. 


~Love me love me..
Say that you love me~