Emergency Cake Surgery

(Finished cake)



So a few weeks back my former English teacher had a birthday and he is so awesome I decided to make him a cake. Its a very simple cake with stenciled words I cut out myself and chocolate frosting. Just so all of you know, making your own stencils is a pain in the butt. First you have to find what you want to stencil, then adjust the size on the computer, print it off, and finally cut it out. If it is small its not so bad, but apparently cutting out "Happy Birthday" in fancy font is no easy feat.

(Stenciled words made out of sugar sprinkles.)

(Homemade stencils.)

The first attempt at the cake did not go so well. I had tried to make it a chocolate cake with delicious whipped ganache filling and a chocolate buttercream icing, however I accidentally over mixed the ganache (at least I think that's what I did) and it didn't quite turn out correctly. I tried to salvage it and make it work and, even though it tasted just fine, it refused to stay between the layers. I quickly iced the cake trying to trap it in but still the ganache found a way out by pushing the icing off. I quickly stuck it in the fridge to try to firm it up, however my attempt were futile and I was left with this:

(Whipped ganache pushing icing off the cake)

 

After realizing my original plan would not work i tried to use what I was left with by pulling the layers of cake apart and scraping off the ganache. It was important to get all the ganache off so that the cake wouldn't absorb it and become too moist. I then re-iced the cake and stenciled on the words. The chocolate buttercream frosting (recipe page) was a huge hit. I received multiple compliments on it and some people said that was their favorite part. After everyone got through with the cake I was left with only leftover icing to take home (pictured below). However my friend Shelby later got a hold of the cake carrier and when she was done it did not look like there had been a cake on it at all.

(The cake after the party was over)

Fathers Day

Happy Fathers Day to all dads out there! So this year i did not make a Fathers Day cake, so i decided to talk about the one i made last year. Ironically this is the third cake I've ever made. So I'm still going in order! YA! Anyway... This cake, contrary to what you might think, was actually made for my grandpa, not my dad, who prefers pies. When I made this cake I could not decide on a design. So then I went to the ever handy dandy Internet! I have an entire folder on my computer of baking designs. One day I will put some of them on here. You can see on here that i put small white dots between the red dots. I would suggest putting some space between the dots. As you can see on the left side of the cake, close together dots don't look very good. Compare the left side to the right side. The right side defiantly looks better. Also as you can see in the birds-eye view below, when your icing gets cracked and messed up like mine did, you can dip the icing knife in water and smooth it together. When writing words, or drawing pictures, sketch it out with a tooth pick first. Those are the best pieces of advice right now. HAPPY FATHERS DAY!!!!