So I've given you a little bit of back story so far. Why I love cake (obvious), my manic days of throwing together cake-coctions leading up to my cake lesson with Jayne! But now what?
By now I had started to bother my Facebook friends with posts about baking, or selfies with an icing sugar covered face. People were starting to notice.... hey, looks like Kirsty can bake. And so came my first official order!! I must admit the message terrified me, the sister of a good school friend popped up on my Facebook messenger asking me to make her a cake, and cupcakes for her beautiful little girl's christening. Nooooo pressure then. Although I was now petrified and regretting all my cake-bragging statuses, I love the sound of a challenge and this certainly was that.
Problemo number 1 - normally if a cake collapses or sinks or ends up looking like a dog has had a good chew on it, it's not worries, it's only for family... we will laugh it off together.
Problemo number 2 - cupcakes are those things what I referred to in post numero 1 - up until this point cupcakes had mostly gone into the oven with raisins in, and come out of the oven straight into my gob.
Problemo number 3 - THIS IS SOMEBODY'S CHRISTENING. There are bound to be photos, people are going to eat my cake.... what if someone gets ill? ... should I immigrate and hope that Amy forgets she ever asked me.
So after my head had finished spinning I agreed.... two tier cake. Pink. Flowers scattered. Diamante cross. 50 matching cupcakes. Challenge accepted. Here's what was new about this particular caking challenge....
- New cutters! For a nice scattering of flowers a total of 5 different shaped and sized metal flower cutters were purchased. I had plenty of practice goes on how best to shape these flat sugarpaste cutouts into vaguely realistic petals.
- New edibles! After a good amount of research I discovered the beautifully coloured Sattina Sugarpaste in blush pink - perfectly pale and just the right tone for a christening.
- New strategy! This cake would not be thrown together like my previous bakes. I set aside three evenings to get the two-tiered cake baked, ganached, then decorated. This left me with the morning of delivery day to knock out 50 cupcakes.
- New techniques! Time to try ganache. This was my first attempt at this (save for a few practice runs). Made from cream and melted white chocolate it sets hard, gives a great solid base for sugarpaste, and tastes delicious!
So here are the results... not bad eh? Total flowers individually cut and shaped.... 200+ !
And here's the feedback, which made for a very happy Kirsty - Amy said:
"Kirsty made our daughter's christening cake in March this year. We asked for a two tier cake as well as 50 matching cupcakes and were thrilled with the final result. The cakes all looked so professional and neat and we lost count of the number of friends and family who commented on the cakes and asked where they had been made. Kirsty took the time before starting our cakes to research exactly what we wanted to achieve the right look, and her research paid off... they were perfect. More importantly, they were absolutely delicious! In particular the cupcakes, which in my past experience when buying from a shop, can be incredibly sickly, but we didn't have that problem! They were the perfect flavour and texture... one just wasn't enough. We have already put in our next order."
Lots of love
Kirsty
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