The butterfly gets its name from the texture of its wing: soft and buttery. Which suits them well as decorations atop a cupcake's buttercream finish. These chocolate engagement cupcakes were prepared for an engagement party and the symbolism of the butterfly's metamorphosis couldn't be more fitting.
Dark chocolate cupcakes were topped with tinted chocolate buttercream and light grey butterflies and white flowers made from fondant. Of the five dozen in total, approximately one dozen were reserved and topped with white buttercream with a coral butterfly.
A very big congratulations to the happy couple.
-Danielle
I didn't want to interrupt this blog's holiday spirit so I held off on sharing all of the pictures from this month's cake inventory. Now that the season is winding down, here they are!
1) Based off the wedding cake pictured here , I prepared this small marble cake in the same style with white and dark chocolate pleats accented with chocolate roses. Happy birthday, Talia!
2) My friend Brandon is convinced the global economy should be backed by sterling. I believe the global economy should be backed by cake. We've reached a compromise, I think, with this 30th birthday cake. Happy birthday, B!
3) To celebrate the upcoming nuptials of a lucky couple who are tying the knot at a vacation destination, I made this pink beach-themed bridal shower cake. Opalescent shells and pearls were placed along the sandy beach (brown sugar) lining the cake, with piped buttercream coral and finished with a congratulatory greeting on the top. Congratulations, Tina and Alvin! And bon voyage!
4) The fourth iteration of cake sushi: the birthday girl loves dynamite rolls so I crafted a wooden sushi serving box out of chocolate cake and placed some dynamite maki and salmon, tuna and red snapper nigiri. Little extra features included a bamboo border, chopsticks and a personalized fortune cookie. I always love the opportunity to do something I love (sushi!) with the freedom to customize each cake. Happy birthday, Maddy!
5) This wedding cake was filled with alternating layers of red velvet and chocolate cake with cream cheese buttercream. The bride's and bridesmaids' bouquets had beautiful blue orchids and white roses so I accented the cake with edible flowers. Congratulations, Jackie and Barry!
6) This coconut cream birthday cake was fashioned to look like a Tiffany & Co jewellery box. The bow, tag and "22" charm were made from gumpaste. Happy birthday, Michelle!
It has been a busy end to 2011 and I can't wait to see what 2012 has in store for sweet&splendid!
-Danielle
This chocolate and vanilla buttercream cake was made for a bridal shower.
The bride-to-be's favourite flower is the tulip, so I crafted a small bouquet out of gumpaste and painted them with orange, magenta and yellow petal dusts.
I absolutely adore tulips and can't believe I never thought to try to make them out of sugar before. Here, they are attached to painted gumpaste stems tied together with black satin ribbon and resting atop the quilted cake.
Lastly, I made a dragee-bordered gumpaste decal to rest on the corner of the cake with the BTB's first initial. Congratulations to the bride on her upcoming nuptials!
I also had a request to replicate this cake for a sweet 16 birthday. Wanting to change it up a little bit, I modified the colours and added a gumpaste cutout of Van Gogh's Starry Night:
The birthday girl's favourite colour is blue, so I played that up and added several tubes of blue paint and lots of blue buttercream on the palette.
I added a few more tubes of paint and included the birthday girl's age in the paint tubes ("1" and "6" in the background).
Another busy day of baking!
-Danielle
You don't need a destination wedding to enjoy a beach theme reception!
The bride and groom-to-be requested a beach themed cake to celebrate their engagement. They asked for a fondant-free buttercream finish and turquoise accents.
Once the buttercream was smoothed out, I piped some coral detail and added white chocolate seashells and gumpaste pearls and frangipani flowers.
The hardest part about this project was covering up the cake inside! It was a grasshopper cake (chocolate-mint buttercream sandwiched between layers of chocolate mud cake) so I needed quite a bit of buttercream to cover up the dark cake inside. But, the job is now done and I am happy to have finished my first beach-themed cake!
-Danielle
