Farm Birthday Cake

This is actually a very late post. I made this cake for my son's third birthday 3 months ago.

The story began when I made a plan to make a small party to celebrate my son's 3rd birthday party. This is the first time I and my husband were going to invite some friends to come over for this party. Because this kind of event had to be prepared, I started to make a design for his birthday cake about 1 month before. My son is crazy in love with alphabet. He loves to sing ABC song and play with any kind of alphabet toys. So, I planned to make an ABC train birthday cake.

I've come up with a lot of ideas but it seemed none of them were good and easy enough to make. I just didn't get the feeling for it. I knew if I didn't get the feeling then the cake won't be good enough and I won't be satisfied with it. Of course I wanted to make a good impression.

Seeing me struggling with it for weeks while the clock is ticking, my husband suggested me to check another theme for the cake. He thought that farm cake with a lot of animal on it would be great and cute enough for my son. He would still love it even though it is not an alphabet. Beside, I won't need a lot of  carving and because I still had a lot of other things to prepare for the party.

He's right. So, farm cake it is.

1 week before the party, I started to make the animal fondant toppers for the cake. I had a lot of fun making some ducks, chicken, some cute little piggies, a cow, a horse (only its head actually), and a lot of carrots and corns. You can see how messy it was. ^^

I also made a barn, a sign board, a cart, and a lot of hay.

This time I was not using vanilla, or chocolate or red velvet any kind of common cake that I usually used. For this farm cake, I was using lapis Surabaya or Surabaya layered cake. Lapis Surabaya is a classic Indonesian sponge cake. It is very popular and common to be used as a basis cake for any kind of birthday cake in Indonesia.  I have no idea why it's named after capital city of East Java, which is Surabaya. Maybe it was made for the first time in Surabaya. 

This cake is made from 3 layers of 2 layers of vanilla sponge cake and 1 layer of chocolate sponge cake and glued together with strawberry jam in between. Sponge cake? Before you ask, I can tell you that this is not like regular sponge cake. This kind of sponge cake has a very rich taste because the original recipe requires about 10-15 egg yolk for each layer.

I didn't want to use too much egg for my cake. So, I made the cake based on Wu Lan's Kitchen recipe with a little bit adjustment. Because my cake pan is bigger than the original recipe, the result of my cake was thinner than it should be. So, I added 1 more layer of sponge cake to make the cake higher. Forgive me because I totally forgot to take a picture of my lapis surabaya. I made it late at night in the middle of chaotic preparation for the party. 

Ingredients : 

For  vanilla layer 

• 6 egg yolks
• 3 egg whites
• 70 gr white granulated sugar
• 40 gr all purpose flour
• 15 gr corn starch
• 1 1/2 tbs milk
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 65 gr butter melted
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp ovallete

(make it double for the second layer)

For the chocolate layer

• 6 egg yolks
• 3 egg whites
• 80 gr white granulated sugar
• 30 gr all purpose flour
• 15 gr corn starch
• 10 gr cocoa powder
• 1/4 tsp instant coffee powder
• 1 1/2 tbs milk
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 65 gr butter melted
• 1 tsp ovallete

(make it double for the second layer)

Preparation : (for each layer)

1. Preheat oven for 170 C (338F) 
2. Prepare a baking tray (I'm using 26x26x7 cm baking tray) and line it with baking paper. set aside.
3. In a big bowl beat together eggs, egg yolk, sugar, and ovallete with hand mixer until thickened.
4. In another bowl, mix together flour, corn starch, and baking powder ( add cocoa powder and instant coffee powder) and sift all those dry ingredient mixture
5. Add sifted dry ingredients and milk into egg mixture and beat them again on high speed until the batter become pale, soft, and there's a ribbon tail formed when the mixer is removed from the batter.
6. Add half of the melted butter and vanilla extract into the batter.
7. Using a rubber spatula, mix the butter by folding the batter until the melted butter are mixed well.
8. Add the rest of the melted butter, fold it again until well mixed and no more trace of melted butter on the cake batter. 
9. Pour the batter into the baking tray and even the surface with spatula. 
10. Bang the tray on the table few time to remove the bubbles.
11. Put the tray into the oven and bake it for about  20 minutes. 
12. Remove the tray from the oven and let it cool for about 10 minutes. 
13. Repeat all the process for all the layers
14. Once all the cake are ready, stack all the layer together with using strawberry jam between each layer as a glue. (Tip : you can always use buttercream instead of strawberry jam)

Once my cake is done, I covered them with pandan flavored buttercream frosting. Well, it is just an regular vanilla buttercream with some pandan paste and green food coloring. Now, here comes the fun part. It's time to put all those little tiny creatures on the top of the cake.

First, I place the barn on the top of the cake. After that, I made a small pond for the ducks using blue buttercream, and some fondant.

And I made a muddy puddle for the piggies using mixture of vanilla buttercream, cocoa powder, and nutella. The taste was quite good actually. 

I place the cow and some hay, carrots, and corns around the barn and the cake started to look good. 

Look! There's a chicken on the top of the barn. My daughter said it's kind of weird because it supposed to be a bird nest. But I think a chicken and its nest can do just well. ^^

And there's a cart with hay as well.

I made this board using fondant as well, wrote my son's name using melted chocolate, and stick it into buttercream covered cup cake. The story was I needed a place to stick the board but it seemed that I couldn't find a perfect spot for it. Lucky me, I just happened to have one left store bought cup cake on my fridge. I decided to cut the top, turn it upside down, trim the edge, and covered it with green buttercream. Now, I had a good place to stick the board.

After that, the finishing touch was easy. I made a fence from pretzels stick glued with chocolate and stick them to the edge of the cake. I threw some fondant flowers, grass, and stones and it's done. I LOVE it and satisfied with the results. When i heard my son started to sing "E-I-E-I-Ooooo.." when he saw the cake, I knew he loved it as well.

Now, the cake is ready to be cut ^^ Happy third birthday, my lovely son.

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Frozen Birthday Cake

"Let it go... Let it go.... Turn away and slam the door." I bet most of you already know what song that is. Yeap!! That is Let it go from Disney Frozen movie. My daughter was crazy in love with that movie and the songs. And now she wants a Frozen cake for her 9th birthday. Hmm.... another project for me.

First, I was thinking to make Elsa cake using an Elsa's barbie doll. The concept is like making a usual barbie cake, but this time just change the barbie doll, with Elsa's doll. After days of thinking and googling, I found a problem. I could not find an Elsa's barbie doll. Anywhere. I had to buy it online but the price was not cheap as well. It's not that I could not afford it, but it's not that worth it. That's why, I decided to change the whole idea by making a cake using  Disney Frozen movie character figurines. I had to buy it online as well (I found it on ebay), but the price is much more affordable.

After days searching on the internet, I wanted to make a tier cake with stairs and I will decorate the cake with the Frozen figurines. The whole cake will be made by using combination of vanilla and chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream to cover the whole cake. I wanted to make it looks like a snow mountain. Don't ask why the mountain has stairs on it. Just let it be. ^^

About 5 days before my daughter's birthday, I found on the internet, a picture of Frozen cake decorated with blue hard candy. It looks gorgeous. It seems the hard candy is not that hard to make and I think it is a good idea to decorate my cake. I only need white granulated sugar, light corn syrup, water, and royal blue coloring agent. The problem is, light corn syrup is not  easy to find in here. To be exact, I can not find it anywhere. Well, based on my memory from what I've learned in University, in making hard candy, light corn syrup is needed to help make the hard candy more clear and transparent. Basically it will make the candy is clear like glass and not opaque. But it is optional. Because of that, I decided not to make blue hard candy without light corn syrup. I couldn't find it anyway.

It worked (after 3rd attempt) . I got a clear thin blue hard candy. After it's done and cool completely, I store it inside a zip lock bag. 4 days after, when I started to decorate the cake, I kind of regret that I made the candy too early. I do not know why but the candy is not clear anymore. They become opaque. It seems that the sugar are crystallized. I didn't have time to make a new one, so I keep decorating the cake with that opaque candy. Sad, indeed but it worked just fine.

Since the beginning, I wanted to learn how to make a spiral stairs cake. I was so eager and curious to make it until I did not really pay attention to the detail of the overall cake. It was until last minute when I decided to  cover an ice cream cone with white chocolate melted to make snowy trees and trying to stick some blue hard candy to the tower using white chocolate. And my first plan to dust the cake with powdered sugar as the finishing touch to make the snow a little bit more real was totally forgotten until my daughter blew the candles and cut the cake.

 I have to admit this cake was not my best especially with the details but not really that bad either. Now I know hot to make a spiral stair cake and  I can still see the frozen movie over there complete with Sven, Kristoff, Olav, Anna, and Elsa. I'm really sorry for prince Hans. I have no place for you over there. You had to stay in Arendelle anyway.

Well, now, let me share some pictures of this cake.

When I made this cake, I still had two nice big sliced of vanilla cake and a lot of buttercream frosting. I decided to make some small cake using those leftover cake, cover it with frosting and fondant, wrapped them nicely with transparent plastic and ribbon. It would be a nice going to home gift for my daughter's friends after party.

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Minion Birthday Cake

Last month, one of my daughter's friend was celebrating a birthday. And it just happened that she loves minions. I and her mother were just chatting around, and she asked me if maybe I could make a cute minion cake for her daughter's birthday party. I said yes without thinking! Few hours after the deal was made, it seems that my nervous thought was just awake and started to question my ability to make it. Will I be able to make it? How if I ruined the cake? That's mean that I would ruin a girl's birthday. I don't want that to happen. I almost never make a sculpted cake before. Well, I've made some before. But those cake were not  meant for selling purpose.

Calm down and be positive. It's  great challenge. This could be a good opportunity to start what I've been dreaming lately which is turn my hobby into a business. I've made a Pirate Boat Cake before. So, basically I know how to carve a cake. Beside, there's a lot of tutorial on the internet. How hard could it be. (Maybe if her mother knows this she would not order the cake from me. Thanks to her for putting such a big faith in me.^^ ) 

Well, I'm so glad I decided to go on and trust my skill. Voila!! I'm so happy with the result. 

I'm not saying it was perfect. But it's not bad for first attempt. I was not saying it was easy either. But well, I made it. :) This is the rough sketch of the cake that I wanted to make. Sitting minion with banana cupcake (But later I changed the cupcake with a small round cake with candle on top).

To realize that sketch, my first step, is to make all the details of the minion such as the Gru symbol, his overall button, the goggle, and the hair. I made it about 5 days before final assembly. Thanks to Ann Reardon from How to cook that for sharing a nice tutorial how to make minion cake. From her video I could learn how to make the big and nice silver goggle and all those tiny minion hairs. 

This minion cake is built from vanilla cake with vanilla butter cream. I've made 1 + 1/4 recipe of vanilla cake and bake it in a 15 cm round cake pan. I don't have 15 cm round cake pan, so I made a disposable cake pan by myself using a cardboard and aluminium foil. Well, I guess I miscalculated the size of the cake. I made the cake too much. The order were a cake for 15-20 people. But I think the amount of the cake that I baked could feed about 20-25 people. 

After the cake is done, the real work is begin. Cutting, stacking, sculpting, and shaping. 

After about 30 minutes, I managed to sculpt and shape my cake from the left picture into the right picture. Not bad, right?  The height of my minion cake to be is about 23 cm (the cake only) with 13 cm diameter.  

I coat the cake with vanilla butter cream twice. First, I coat it with a thin layer of butter cream and put it into the fridge until it firm up. This first layer will catch the crumb cake that fall from the cake so it wont get mixed with the the next layer of butter cream. After I finished with second coating, I put the cake again into the fridge before move to the next step.

Now, it's time to cover the cake with yellow fondant. It turned out, covering a big cake with fondant is not as easy as I imagined. I accidentally tear the fondant and had to re-roll it again. Too bad I didn't have fondant smoother as well. Making the hand was not easy either. I had to use small ramekins to prop the hand and prevent it being broken. After the yellow part is done, actually I had to make a pants for my minion. But I was a bit nervous so I decided to do it later and put the eye and black goggle strap. 

For the pants, I made a simple template using a paper and cut the fondant by following those template. It was quite hard to make it without a template. I always made it too big and had to redo it again and again. After the pants is done, its time to put all the small detail on my minion such as his tiny little feet, the pocket with Gru's symbol, the buttons for the pants, his hands. goggle, hairs, and finishing the detail for the small round cake. And the banana of course! ^^

By making this cake, I got a lot of leftover cake crumbs. I can eat it just like that. But it was too much and most of the crumbs were really crumbly and I couldn't even poke it with a fork. Well, it just happened that I had white chocolate bar and leftover heavy cream. So, it was possible to make a cake pop out of it. Remember my "failed" cake pop? Using the same recipe, but with white chocolate instead of dark chocolate, I could make about 20 cake pop out of my leftover cake crumbs.

Make an oval shaped cake pop and put it into fridge to make it nice and firm.  After all the cake pop are nice and firm, first dip half part of it into blue melted chocolate. Before the blue chocolate became dry, insert cake pop stick into the cake pop and put 2 mini chocolate M&M's or choco chips for the minion shoes. Once the blue part is dry, dip the other half into melted yellow chocolate and stick the eye and the hair of the minion. I was using chocolate sprinkle for its hair and edible eye for its eyes. But maybe I should use another kind of white candy because my daughter said that the eye did not taste good. Well, next time better.

Tip : If your melted chocolate is too thick, add some vegetable shortening (I'm using Crisco), pop it into microwave for a few sec, stir it well until all the shortening are melted and mixed with the chocolate. Put it back into microwave and reheat it again if needed or if there is still lump on the chocolate mixture. 

It was only needed a few minutes to make all the chocolate dry. After that,  I start to make all the detail. I put leftover yellow and blue chocolate into zip lock bag, melted some pure chocolate candy and put it into another zip lock bag as well. I used it to draw all the detail such as minion's hands, goggle straps, and their pullover. It was not easy as I imagined. I could not make it as smooth as I wanted. Besides, I had some problems with chocolate and Crisco lump that clogged the tip of my pipping bag. But hey!! The result is not that bad. I even think that they are quite cute. Don't you think so?  ^^

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Blueberry Cake

Last week, when I was trying to find cake recipe on the internet, I stumble on a nice picture of a blue cake. That cake was soooo blue and looks awesome. After I read it further, it says that it's a blue velvet cake. I found that the cake was using some blue berry for its ingredients and quite a lot of blue dye. I really want to make it because it looks so blue and pretty. But I don't really want to use that much of blue dye. Well, I've made red velvet cake using raspberry concentrate. And it happened that I have a box of blueberry in my fridge. Maybe I could make a blue velvet cake with blueberry concentrate or something similar. Or maybe I could even throw in some blueberry inside the cake to increase the blueberry taste.

First, I made the blueberry jam. I had to admit that I let too much liquid evaporated but it doesn't matter. Meanwhile waiting for the jam become cool, I started to make the cake batter. After the batter was done, I pour all the jam into the batter and mix it manually. The result was not like I was expected because the batter turned out purple and not blue!! I added few drop of blue dye and hoping that the color would turn like the one on the internet. But after drops of blue dye, I couldn't get royal blue color like the picture. To be honest, I started to regret my decision to add some blue dye. Why didn't I add purple dye instead to make a purple cake instead of blue cake. Well, what's done is done. Can't be undone. I pour my blueish batter into the pan, and put it into the oven. 15 minutes inside the oven, I just realize that I made another mistake!! I totally forgot to add some fresh blueberry into the batter. Oh well...

After the cake was done and completely cool, I cover it with butter cream cheese frosting and decorate it with some fresh blueberry. (Forgive me for a bad and plain decoration. I was not in a mood to decorate a cake) Like as usual, I made a small round blueberry cake and few of mini cupcake. The cake taste good and even better with butter cream cheese frosting on it.

Ingredients :

• 192 grams (3/4 cup) AP flour
• 1/2 tsp cacao powder
• 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
• 30 grams unsalted butter, room temperature
• 92 grams white granulated sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 120 ml (about 1/4 cup) milk
• 1/8 tsp salt
• Royal blue coloring agent
• For blueberry jam : 150 grams fresh blueberry + 30 grams white granulated sugar + 50 ml water

Preparation :
First, lets make the blueberry jam

1. In a pot, boil together blueberry, sugar and water until the blueberry start to break down.
2. Stir until almost all of the liquid are evaporated.
3. Transfer it into a bowl and let it cool completely.
   

Now, lets make the cake. 

1. Preheat oven for 180 C (350 F)
2. Prepare a cake pan, grease with butter, and line it with baking paper. Set aside. (Tip :  you can always use a muffin tin instead)
3. In a bowl, mix together flour, cacao powder, baking powder, and salt.
4. In another big bowl, with a electric or hand mixer, beat the butter until creamy.
5. Add granulated sugar into the creamy butter and beat again on high speed until light and fluffy.
6. Add egg and vanilla extract into the butter mixture and beat again.
7. Add about 1/3 of flour mixture alternately with about 1/3 of milk. Mix well before adding another 1/3 of flour mixture and milk.
8. Add blueberry jam into the batter and fold it manually with a spatula. 
9. At this point, once the blueberry jam is well mixed with the batter, you should get a purple batter.
10. Add few drop of blue coloring into the batter (if you want to make a blueish cake) and mix well.
11. Pour the batter into prepared cake pan or muffin tin.
12. Put it into preheated oven and bake for about 30-35 minutes or until skewer inserted into the cake comes out clean.
13. Take it out from the oven and let it cool completely before cutting or adding buttercream on it.

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Mickey Mouse Birthday Cake

Hip hip hoera!!! my little baby son is turning 2 now. He's growing up soooo fast. He's getting bigger and smarter. It feels just like yesterday I gave birth to him and hold his tiny little body in my arm and now he's able to run, jump, recognize a lot of words. It has been 2 years already having him by my side. That's why, this time I really want to make him nice birthday cake for him. He likes watching mickey mouse on TV. So, I decided to make a mickey mouse birthday cake for him.

My first idea was a birthday cake shaped like mickey mouse clubhouse with a lot of Disney figurines surrounding the clubhouse. But it turns out if I was going to make that cake,  I would need a lot of cake and a lot of carving unless I have half round baking pan. Besides, no one sell Disney figurines nearby. I had to buy it from Ebay. I had no time to wait for the delivery when I only had 2 weeks before his birthday. Well, looked like that I had to scratch that idea and find another idea for his cake.

Google google google....

And I came up with this idea.

Mickey mouse standing on the top of the cake with some stars as his background. (sorry for this bad pictures. ^^) I would be using vanilla cake and red buttercream to cover the cake and some green buttercream to make some green grass around the mickey mouse. I think fondant is a good material for making the mickey mouse figurine and the stars. I usually change my mind in the middle of the way, but at least now my plan and design is ready. So, lets get started.

1 week before the big day, I made a mickey mouse fondant figurine. I bought white and black fondant. 2 days before making the figurine, i colored some of white fondant into red, yellow, and skin color. I've read and learned how to make mickey mouse fondant figurine from internet and I was really glad I'm living on this internet era. A lot of people shared how to make mickey mouse figurine step by step including the pictures. They are so awesome. Too bad I couldn't make the body. My mickey mouse was a little bit too chubby. The body was too heavy and I made his leg too skinny. They couldn't support the body and my mickey fell down each time I tried to make him stand even when the fondant was already dry. That's why I decided to cut his legs (ouch) and modified it into a sitting mickey mouse version. It was much more easier.

Mickey mouse fondant figurine

I think my mickey is good enough even tough my sister said that it seems my mickey just had a plastic surgery on his nose. Well... hmm... yeah... maybe it's too big. But I like it anyway and I consider it good for a first timer fondant figurine maker. And the most important thing is my son recognize it as a mickey mouse. Not as an alien or any unshaped strange creature. ^^

I made the stars from the fondant as well and using bamboo skewers for the stick. I tried to use cake pop stick but the stick was too big for the small stars. I made it manually using a knife because I do not have 5 pointy star cookie cutter. I let it dry overnight and brush it with golden glitter dust as a finishing touch.

Do you remember my cute mickey mouse cookie cutter? I was using it to make mickey mouse sugar cookies before. Now I'm using it again to make some 2D mickey mouse fondant figure. I just roll out my fondant, and cut it into mickey mouse shape using my cookie cutter. I will use this to write my son's name and maybe i will stick it in front of the cake.

2 Days before the due date. It's time to bake the cake. I'm using Ann Reardon's vanilla cake. It is delicious and moist. Trust me. From one of her  recipe, I could not only can bake 1 full round (20 cm/ 8 inch) cake, but I still have a lot of batter for 15 cm round cake, and about 20 mini cup cakes. That was quite a lot of cake. Well, after all those cakes were done, I wrapped them with a plastic wrap and put them in a plastic container to keep it soft and moist.

Based on my idea, i supposed to make a bright red buttercream to cover the cake. So, one day before his birthday, i made a white basic butter cream. My plan is to color it with red coloring agent until I get a red butter cream. And then, here comes the problem. A big problem. It was very difficult to make a red butter cream. I can not get red buttercream but I got pink one instead!! Pink mickey mouse cake for my son? Absolutely not. I have few type of red coloring agent I tried to use all of them, and none of them could give me a nice red color. I tried to add few drops of orange, green, and blue coloring agent to make the color become darker. Yes it was darker but still not becoming dark deep red like I want. It was really frustrating because I do not want to add too much coloring agent. It safe and foodgrade, but still a chemical agent with maximum usage. Beside, too much coloring agent will ruin the taste of the buttercream.

Thanks God, on those desperate time, I remember that I still have red modeling chocolate that I got few months ago as a birthday present from my friend. I've been wanting to try it  and compare the taste with fondant. I heard that modeling chocolate's taste is much better than fondant.

Well, rolling a huge amount of modeling chocolate was not as easy as rolling fondant. It was not as elastic as fondant. I had to knead it for a long time as well because it was so hard and firm before i roll it out. But yeah!! I did it! Now my cake is covered with red modeling chocolate. I got the color that I really want.

Now, it's time to assemble my cake. The final form is a little bit different than my design. Because of the excessive amount of cake, I put a small tier on the top of the lower cake. I covered it with green butter cream, cover the outer side with yellow fondant, and made small orange dots around the cake. I sprinkled some mini M&M's and colored sprinkles, put the mickey mouse figurine on the top of it and stick the stars on behind.

Because now I covered my cake with modeling chocolate, I thought that writing my son's name on the cake would be a little bit difficult if i were going to use fondant. So, I decided to put some mini cup cakes around the main cake, add some buttercream on the top, and stick the fondant on the top of it.

Voila!!! Done!! What do you think about my cake? is it cute?

After blowing the candle, I let my son play with the cake and he (together with his sister) "redecorate" the cake. Which one is better? His or mine? ^^

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My very first Tier cake

My daughter was celebrating her 8th birthday last month. She's getting bigger, smarter, and prettier. She asked me a tier cake for her birthday cake. On no!! I never made a tier cake before. Beside I don't have a small baking pan for it. I only have 9 and 8 inch baking pans and I don't really want to use it to make her tier cake because it was way too big. This year she only celebrated it with her 2 best friends at home. So, who will eat all those big cake.

About 1 weeks before her birthday, when I was doing some window shopping in a mall nearby, I found this kinderbakset. It is a box that is contained of many small cooking tools for children such as mini round and rectangle baking pan, mini roller pin, and some small cookie cutters. I was so happy to find it and bought it immediately. The size of the baking pan is so perfect for my tier cake.

Now, that I have the pan, I'm ready to make the cake. I already used chocolate cake for her birthday treats (no stick cake pop) so it seems that vanilla and orange cake with vanilla and orange butter cream frosting are perfect for her birthday cake.

What you think about my cake? :) Is it pretty? I colored my butter cream and decorate it with some fondant flowers Thanks to my friend, she gave me her leftover fondant to make this cute flower and even borrowed me her fondant cutter!!! I felt I was really lucky. 

I wrote her name on the cake by myself using store bought icing on tube.

First, I thought, it would make my life easier but I was wrong. The icing was hard to squeeze out and can not stick to the cake nicely. The other one was too watery and too pale and transparent. Kind of disappointed even tough I managed to write her name on the cake.

Do you know that this small  part is actually made from combination of my leftover chocolate cake that I made before for her birthday treats and some leftover scraped orange and vanilla cake that I got from leveling my cake. The story was that I forgot to think about her candle. When the cake was done, my husband asked me where would I place the candle if I put a tiara on the top of the cake. I did not have a small candles otherwise I could place it on the top of the first tier. And suddenly this crazy idea came into my head. I pile up some leftover cake that I have, make it stick into each other with butter cream, cut it square, cover it up with some more butter cream, and decorate it with some chocolate candy and flowers. Voila! Now, I could stick my candle. 

I found this cute little pink tiara in a grocery store and I put it on the top of the cake. To prevent the synthetic pink fur from the tiara stick into the butter cream, I roll a thin layer of fondant  and place it on the top of the cake. After it dry I can place the tiara on it without worrying the butter cream. My daughter loves this tiara. Right after she blew the candle, she and her friend took the tiara and play with it.

This is after I cut my cake. I was using cake pop stick for its support. So, of course I needed to be careful not to serve a slice of cake with cake pop stick inside. My daughter and her friend loved it. Especially the orange cake and orange butter cream. And so did I. :) Well, I have to admit this is not my best cake but i really did my best to make this cake. Next time better, for sure!! Promise

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Orange Cake

It has been three weeks after my last post. Oh my, after having such a busy week, finally I have a chance to update my blog. I want to share one of my favorite cake. Orange cake.

I've made this cake few times already including for my daughter's birthday cake. Actually, I got the recipe from here. Moroccan Orange Cake.  It's an easy recipe indeed. But in my opinion, it didn't have enough strong orange flavor. First, I wanted to increase the amount of orange juice. But if i do that, that's mean that I increase the volume of the liquid of my batter. My batter will be thinner than it's supposed to be and I worried that it will ruin my cake. That's why, I tried to concentrate the orange juice by boiling it before. For the first time, I was kind of afraid that the juice will taste bad and bitter after boiling process. But it was not. I added some sugar into the juice just to increase the sweetness of the orange juice itself.

This orange cake is really good with orange cream frosting or sugar glazing or even chocolate ganache.

Ingredients :

• 2 eggs
• 75 grams (3/4 cup) white granulated sugar
• 63 ml (1/4 cup) vegetable oil
• 128 grams (1 cup) AP flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 100 ml orange juice + 3 tbs white sugar
• orange zest from 1-2 orange
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• few drop orange coloring agent (optional)

Preparation :

1. In a small pot, boil mixture of orange juice and 3 tbs sugar.
2. Once it's boiled, reduce the heat and simmer it until you get about 65 ml juice left. Stir once more, set it aside and let it cool completely.
3. Preheat the oven to 180 C (356 F)
4. Prepare a baking pan and line it with baking paper (I was using 21x8 cm loaf pan. But you can always use 20 cm round pan). Set it aside.
5. In a big bowl, beat together eggs and sugar on high speed until it become thick and pale.
6. Reduce the speed and add vegetable oil gradually.
7. In another smaller bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
8. Stir in the flour mixture into the egg mixture.
9. Add orange juice, orange zest, and vanilla extract and stir the batter again until smooth. 
10. Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and level the surface.
11. Put the baking pan into the oven and bake it for about 35-40 minutes.
12. Remove from the oven and let it cool completely.

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No-stick Cake Pop

It's January already. It's almost me and my daughter's birthday. Forget mine. But I really need to start to think what birthday treats that I should make for her birthday. Every year she will bring something for her friends at school. Last year I brought her cheese and caramel pop corn. I pack it in a small glasses and give it a nice wrap with paper napkin and ribbon. This year, my daughter wants me to make her cake pops for her friends. Well, actually, i do not really like cake pop. First, it's too sweet for me. Second, it's time consuming because i never use ready to use butter cream or instant cake in a box. Instant cake in a box and ready to use butter cream could be way too sweet. I do not really like the idea mixing them together unless you have a sweet tooth. So, i definitely need extra time to make my own cake and butter cream. Beside, during the process, this cake pop needs a lot of time in the refrigerator to keep it solid and firm. Third, making cake pop is tricky. If the cake-butter cream mixture is too moist or too dry, the cake will crumble and broken easily even with chocolate coating. If I'm using cake pop maker, the cake will be too dry and taste not good. Thinking about this is stressing me already. But I really want to try it. I consider it as a challenge.

I think, just a regular round cake pop is a bit too regular. I want to try another shape. Well... my husband said i should make a regular one considering I failed two times making it before. But I really want to try something new. Besides, I want to use my cute silicon mold that I bought few months ago.

     
It's so cute. I tried to bake a cake once using it. But i was very disappointed with the result. There was a weird silicone aftertaste on my cake. I tried to cover the aftertaste by coating my cake with chocolate dip but it didn't help much. I never used it again after that and i feel like i wasted my money on this silicone mold.

Until I got this crazy idea. I want to make cake pop but instead of making it round shape, i want to try to press the cake mixture into this silicone mold so i will get this cute mushroom and clover leaves shape cake pop. If i can do it, then I will get a cute mushroom or clover leave cake pops. To realize my idea, I need cake pop dough first.

During my "research" time on Google and Youtube, I found this great idea. New recipe of cake pop. Thanks to MyCupcakeAddiction channel on youtube. You should really check her channel. I love her great cake pop recipe. She uses mixture of melted chocolate and whipping cream instead of butter cream to make cake pop dough. I tried it and the result was awesome. My cake pop was much more firm, not oily, and can hold its shape better and longer than using butter cream. So, this is the recipe :

Ingredients : (for about 30 cake pops)

• 750 grams chocolate cake
• 200 grams dark chocolate, chop into small pieces
• 130 grams whipping cream (She suggests to use with at least 40% fat, but i was only able to find with 35% fat. But the result were still great)

Tip : Check my Chocolate cake recipe. But for this cake pop, i reduce the amount of the sugar and cacao powder. I was using only 175 grams white sugar and 35 grams of cacao powder. I worried if the cake pop will be too sweet and or too bitter because the cake will be mixed with dark chocolate and still need to be dipped and coated with another chocolate melt.

Preparation :

1. Put chopped dark chocolate in a microwave safe bowl.
   
2. Pour the whipping cream into the bowl and stir it lightly.
   
3. Put it on microwave (640 watt) and microwave it for 30 seconds.
4. Take it out from microwave, and stir the mixture. Stir and scrap until the bottom of the bowl to prevent scorching.
5. Put it back into the microwave, microwave it for another 30 seconds, stir, and repeat this process until you get a nice and smooth chocolate mixture. Be careful not to burn your chocolate. Just keep stirring it after each 30 second. 
   
6. In another big bowl, crumble the cake until you get a really fine crumbled cake. 
   
   
   
   
7. Pour half of the chocolate mixture into the crumbled cake.
8. Stir it with spatula carefully until all the moisture are absorbed by the cake.
9. Pour the rest of the chocolate into the cake and stir it again until you get a lumpy cake-chocolate mixture. 
   
10. If your cake pop dough is a little bit too wet, put it in a refrigerator for about 30 minutes.
11. Prepare a plate or baking sheet lined with a baking paper. 
12. Take about 1-1 1/2 tbs dough and start rolling it into a ball shape. Repeat this process until no more dough left.
13. Put all the ball into refrigerator for few hours or you can keep it overnight.

After you get a firm and nice ball, now it's time to make the cake pop. 

1. Prepare a rectangle or square styrofoam block to stick your cake pop later.
2. Melt your chocolate dip in microwave safe bowl (follow the direction on the back of the package of your chocolate.
3. Dip the tip of the cake pop stick into the melted chocolate and carefully insert the stick into the cake ball.
4. Put it back into the refrigerator if needed.
5. Dip the cake pop into melted chocolate (Tip : Do NOT stir or wiggle your cake pop inside the chocolate melt. Just dip and take it out).
6. Decorate it with sprinkle if you want.
7. Stick it on the styrofoam block and leave it until the chocolate hardened.
8. Store it in the refrigerator until serving time. 

That was the original cake pop recipe. But, because I wanted to use my silicone mold, i didn't make cake balls but I filled in my mold with that cake dough,press it firmly, and put it in my refrigerator for few hours before i take the cake out of the mold. The result was like what I thought. I got a very cute little mushroom and clover pressed cake.

My idea was to insert the cake pop stick into my mushroom or clover cake and dip it into chocolate like regular cake pop. Unfortunately, there was an unexpected thing happened during that process. My chocolate melt was too thick. First, I thought that i accidentally burned my chocolate. I remade it. But it's still too thick. My friend who came and helped me tried to melt the chocolate using double boiler (au bain marie) but the result was the same. She tried to add a little bit of whipping cream. It helped to make the chocolate thinner but it kept the chocolate wet and dripping. I tried to dip my cake pop into those thick chocolate dip but the result were not good especially on my clover cake pop. I couldn't see the clover shape anymore!! It feels like i was having a panic attack. I do not have more time to remake or make a new idea.

My friend had an idea. She suggests me not to dip and coat all surface of the cake with chocolate. But just dip it on one side of it and sprinkle some colored sugar on it or any kind of sprinkles that i have. I tried and it worked much better than trying to coat all the surface of the cake with chocolate.

So, this is what I did :

1. I melted my chocolate carefully with microwave (Carefully microwave chopped chocolate for about 20 seconds, stir, and repeat it until all the chocolate are melted. Reduce the microwave time if needed)
   
2. I took one of my shaped cake.
   
3. Dip one side of it into the melted chocolate.
   
   
   
   
4. Sprinkle some colored decoration on the top of it and let the chocolate dry and hardened 
   
   
   
   

I didn't use any stick on them at all because it was not easy to dip the cake into the chocolate with a stick on it. Beside, I think they are cute enough already. I will save my cake pop stick for another occasion.That's why I named it no-stick cake pop. I can't name it cake pop because it has no stick. I can't name it truffles either because it does not have round shape. So, no-stick cake pop it is. After I've done with all those no-stick cake pops, I left them overnight and put it in a small plastic bag and tied the bag with a ribbon.

My daughter loves it, her friends love it, and even my husband (who usually hates cake pop) like it.

PS : Few days after that, I found out from internet that I can make my chocolate dip thinner by adding shortener (Crisco, or in Indonesia we name it mentega putih) during the process. Add about 1-2 tbs shortener for each 200 grams candy melts or chocolate melts. But add it gradually (1 tbs at the time) until you get the thickness that you want. I will definitely try it next time on my next cake pop project. :-)

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