Radio controller cake

The story of this cake started already a while ago, when one of my co-workers asked if I could make him a leaving-party cake for work. He couldn't say which kind of a cake he'd want, but once I asked whether he'd prefer "basic cream cake" or "one of those WOW! cakes", the choice wasn't difficult. For the model of this cake I can yet again only blame myself, as I was the one suggesting this (also work-related) radio controller as the model of the cake.

The warm weather caused the cake wanting to
melt each time it was removed from the fridge

And although we agreed about the cake way over a month ago, I cut it really close with the execution. I forgot to take pictures and measurements of the controller before my holiday (so that I could have made the non-cake parts well in advance), so didn't get the pictures until this Monday. Originally I had planned to make the cake this coming weekend, but then I heard that the person in question was going to be on holiday next week. Although my co-worker said it'd be enough to see pictures of the cake and to know that it's being served at work, I wanted him to be able to see the actual cake live as well.


On top of everything, the other cake order for this week took time away from this cake's preparation, so it really was a close call... but I managed to get it done!

Inside the cake was a caramel filling, decorations are made out of sugar fondant / gum paste.

It's all in the details :)

  

Just in case someone didn't believe this was edible... :)

Gelatin-free first birthday cake for a girl

This teddy bear seems to have
become my "signature" decoration :)

This sweet first birthday cake took its idea from this example cake, and as you can see, I didn't exactly let my imagination run wild with the implementation :)




This cake was requested with a gelatin-free strawberry filling, so I modified my usual strawberry filling by adding white chocolate to firm the filling up a bit..







Gelatin-free strawberry and white chocolate filling:
(for a ø20cm cake)

180 g         strawberry purée
90 g           vanilla flavoured quark
90 g           white chocolate
2 dl            double cream


Melt the chocolate in a microwave or on a double boiler and let it cool.
Mix the strawberry purée and vanilla quark together. Whip the cream in a separate bowl.

Add the slightly cooled chocolate into the strawberry-quark mix, and carefully fold in the whipped cream. Mix until smooth.

Chocolate cheesecake

Today was one of my friends' birthday, and with another friend we decided to invite ourselves over for a surprise celebration.

Originally I wasn't supposed to make any kind of cake, but I just couldn't resist the temptation, so this cake was the result of ingredients I happened to have available. :)
I didn't have cream cheese, but happened to have mascarpone, so I altered a previously used chocolate cheesecake recipe:




Chocolate cheesecake: (this recipe was for a ø15cm cake tin - for ø24cm multiply the amounts by 2,5)


90 g          dark or digestive biscuits
25 g          margarine

2               gelantin leaves
1 tbsp       water
125 g        milk chocolate (because I didn't have enough dark chocolate in my cupboards :) )
125 g        mascarpone cheese
0,2 dl        caster sugar
0,5 tsp      vanilla sugar
1               eggs (separated)
1 dl           whipping cream


Place the gelatin leaves into a bowl of cold water and melt 100 g of the chocolate. Chop the rest of the chocolate into small chips.

Crush the biscuits and mix with melted margarine. Place a baking sheet into a springform pan and spread the biscuit crumbs evenly by pressing gently into the bottom of the pan. Put in the fridge to set.

Whip the cream with vanilla sugar. Separate the egg yolk and mix it with mascarpone and slightly cooled melted chocolate. Whisk the egg white with sugar until it forms hard peaks.
When the gelatin leaves are soft, squeeze out excess water and melt them with a tablespoonful of boiling hot water. Add the gelatin into the mascarpone-chocolate mix, add the chocolate chips and carefully also mix in the whipped cream and egg whites.

Spread the mix on top of the biscuit crumb layer and leave to set in the fridge for several hours before serving.

Golfer's birthday cake

This cake continues the series of birthday cakes for my cousins' children :)


This time with a golf theme for a 14-year-old Valtteri, and the filling was summery strawberry.




Congratulations Valtteri!

Chocolate swans wedding present

Some say tempering chocolate is easy. It's not.
At least not at the first time.


I have once before tempered (milk) chocolate successfully, so I decided to make a hand-made chocolate wedding gift for my cousin.
I bought a silicone swan mold earlier this summer for possible future wedding cakes, and wanted to try it now in action. And although it took me ages to get the tempering right (doing it over and over again), the finished result was pretty good. Although I think I still need practice piping the texts...


Congratulations Satu and Jani!

Animal parade cupcakes

This weekend I was asked to make chocolaty cupcakes for my cousin's son's birthday party, and I was also given an animal themed cupcake set to go by.

The cupcakes were made using a recipe I've used before, but for the frosting I decided to try something new. I can't remember which idea came first - that I would incorporate white chocolate into the frosting or that I'd use green-coloured frosting and pipe grass (in keeping with the animal theme) - but eventually I decided to make a green-coloured white chocolate frosting and pipe it with my grass/spaghetti tip.

I searched for the perfect white chocolate frosting recipe from both Finnish and English sites, but eventually decided that the American style white chocolate and buttercream mixes would simply be too sweet in order to taste good, so I used this white chocolate frosting recipe:



White chocolate frosting: (enough for 24 cup cakes)

250 g         white chocolate
100 g         margarine
125 g         mascarpone cheese
2 tbsp        icing sugar


Melt the white chocolate and let it coold down slightly. Mix together margarine and mascarpone cheese and add the white chocolate and icing sugar while continuing to mix. Add food colouring if desired. Keep whisking the frosting until it's fluffy enough.



Chocolate chip muffins: (makes 24)


300 g        margarine
3 dl           caster sugar
4               eggs
7 dl           plain flour
4 tsp         baking powder
5 tbsp       dark cocoa powder
3 dl           milk
160 g        dark chocolate chips


Whisk margarine and sugar together until fluffy. Add one egg at a time. Mix together all the dry ingredients in a separate bowl and add into the batter along with milk. Finally mix in the chocolate chips.

Pour the batter (I used a piping bag which makes this a lot easier) into cup cake cases and bake in 225°C for about 12-15 minutes. Let cool.