Mmm... Chocolate - June 2008

I made this chocolate candy bar cake for Caleb's Kindergarten teacher at the end of the school year.  Earlier in the year we had asked her to tell us some things about herself, and one of the things she said was that she LOVES chocolate.  Caleb liked that.  :)

I baked the chocolate cake in a square 8-inch pan.  After it was cooled I cut one side off a few inches in to give it the rectangle shape of a chocolate candy bar.  Then I made 8 square sections on the top of the cake, and carved between them to make raised squares, like the sections of a candy bar you can break off.

Next, I crumb coated the cake with chocolate buttercream icing and waited until that set.  I wanted the top coat of icing to be as smooth and shiny as possible so it would look more like chocolate candy than chocolate icing.  So, I melted the chocolate buttercream in the microwave for a bit to thin it out so I could pour it on the cake.  It was messier to clean up around the cake later, but I liked the look it gave it.

Now I had heard that when you are carving indentations into a cake that you are going to ice or fondant you should carve a little deeper than you want so when the icing fills it in you can still see the design.  So, that's what I did, forgetting that the icing I was going to be using would not be as thick as usual.  I thought maybe the icing would kind of pool in between the squares, but it didn't as much as I would've needed it to.  So, my squares ended up being much taller than I had anticipated.  [I was hoping when Caleb's teacher saw it she didn't think 'why is she giving me a chocolate Lego brick'.  :) ]  Oh well, it was just a chunkier chocolate bar.  :)

Once the icing set a bit and I cleaned up the chocolate around the base of the cake, I piped some lines with the icing (not melted) around the tops of the squares, and the top and bottom of the rectangle base of the chocolate bar to give it some better definition and a little bit cleaner lines.  I also cut thin lines into the chocolate between the squares to mark where someone would break the sections off.

The little mug and apple are both made with fondant.  The 'Thank You' message is piped on the board with buttercream icing.

I was happy with how the cake turned out, and Caleb's teacher was excited to get this chocolate-y creation.  :)

Penguin Cupcakes Waddle Your Way - June 2008

I made these penguin cupcakes for Cara to celebrate her birthday in 3rd grade with her class at school.  She was going to be having an animal themed birthday party that summer, but she didn't really have an idea of what she wanted for her school cupcakes, besides that she wanted it to be an animal.  So we went on the Family Fun website, looked at some ideas, and this is what she picked.

I baked and cooled the cupcakes, then iced them with vanilla buttercream.  I used round chocolate covered chocolate mint cookies for the body and the head (like the Keebler Grasshopper Fudge Mint cookies).  For each penguin you will need 1 1/2 cookies (3 halves).  For the eyes I used a little of the vanilla buttercream icing to make two large dots on the head, and then I placed an M&M Mini on each dot.  I wanted to use all brown ones, but I ran out, so I used blue and green also.  The beak and the feet are dried apricots cut into the appropriate sized triangles.  You can put a small dot of icing under the beak to help it stick to the cookie. 

I thought these cupcakes turned out really cute, but they're also pretty simple to do.  Cara and her class really enjoyed them.

Parties I've posted this link to: