Trial and Error

Lately I have been searching for new flavors of cupcakes/cakes. I just want to have a list of options that aren't the usual chocolate/vanilla boringness (not boring if you love them of course lol). My first attempt was Coca-cola cupcakes, with a lime infused butter cream. I wasn't so sure at first. I was actually so worried about it, I didn't even try it. My husband was going to take them to work with him, and if they were gross, I didn't want to know it haha. This is how they turned out..

The piping wasn't perfect, but that wasn't what it was about you know? I was so worried everyone was going to hate them, but early the next morning, I got a text from my husband with this picture attached

They ate all 24 in only a few hours. Which is amazing considering there is only 5 people that work there. Trav's boss loves Coke, so he loved the hit of soda. Even though I haven't tried them, I'll have to make them again for a new batch of people and see if the consensus is the same.

Next, I tried to make S'mores. S'more anything really. My initial idea was to make a graham cracker cake, but there aren't too many recipes like that laying around the internet, so when I found one, I was pretty excited. My first attempt was a total fail. As you can see..

The mess was delicious.. and I didn't realize until after they were in the oven, that the recipe never called for flour, which would explain these disasters lol Darn graham cracker recipe..

I messed around with it a bit, and it finally worked! This time, in cake form.

I filled it with a chocolate  fudge, and topped it with a meringue/frosting. Trav happens to have a blow torch laying around the house, so I toasted it a bit to give it the s'more effect.

It was pretty good, but not what I wanted. The cake wasn't fluffy.. too dense for my taste, so I'm on to the next idea. Its top secret for now, but I'll post when I finally have it perfected.

Other things I have tried are strawberry shortcakes, which was a vanilla cupcake, with fresh strawberries, and topped with a whipped cream butter cream. They were DELICIOUS.. definitely a keeper (sorry no pic for these, but due to ill  planning on my part, I forgot the bags and tips to make them cute, next time though). I also made my first red velvet. I recently tried red velvet for the first time, and it was AMAZING! I looked online for a recipe, and it wasn't as good as the one I had previously tried, so I'm still on the look out for the perfect combination of ingredients. Thanks to my SIL, I think I might finally have the right one. And finally, the most recent creation was a vanilla cupcake, with a cream cheese icing. But not just any cream cheese icing, strawberry cream cheese. I spent all day prepping the fresh strawberries, cooking them on the stove, pureeing them, straining the seeds, and whipping them into the cream cheese. I tried a new icing tip, and it is my new favorite! Again, sorry for no pictures, but I'm sure you will see it soon. These cupcakes were a hit! I brought them to a BBQ, and everyone loved them!!

I promise I'll be better about taking pictures and posting. Like I said, things have been crazy!

Time to play catch up

I know I haven't been great at posting, but I promise, it is all coming!! My mind has been preoccupied lately, and once I get all the kinks worked out, I'll be back to blogging. ACTUALLY I have been more focused on cupcakes then cakes lately, and you will see why soon enough :) Happy baking everyone!

Hello Kitty!

This was so fun, because I never get to do girl cakes. And I can't lie, they are a little bit more fun then little boy cakes. This was for my friend Beth's daughter's 5th birthday today. The last few months she has wanted a few different things.. like Barbies, and princesses, and finally we settled on Hello Kitty.

The flavor was funfetti, and my creme bouquet-vanilla butter cream. the Kitty was fondant. I know it isn't 'fancy' but for some reason, I just love this one.

Here is Ada loving on her cake.

That picture right there is the reason I love doing this.

Do the Dew

When we were in Vegas a while ago, we were shopping at the Outlets off Charleston, and Trav and Brady found this hideous Jazz jacket, that was on sale no less, but was still $90. As they were trying it on, this guy mentions how 'awesome' the jacket is, and how he loves the Jazz.. blah blah blah, and soon we find out he is from Utah as well! Small world. As the day goes by, we decide it is time to go home, and we are waiting at the elevator and this girl is like "Trav?" and we turn around, and it's the guy from the sports shop wife, and she knows Trav! It was crazy! They knew each other in high school in Vegas, now we all live in Utah!

As time goes by, she starts sending us some messages about her husbands birthday coming up and she wants a Mt. Dew cake. How fun for me! I love doing new things that aren't generic in any way. The flavor was chocolate cake, Oreo filling, and creme bouquet-vanilla butter cream.

Who doesn't want a giant can of Mt. Dew? Yum. I sort of cheated and ordered an edible image of the label, but I really wanted to make sure the colors were correct, and I think it turned out so cute! My favorite part was this:

The nutrition label I managed to squeeze in there! I just came across this, and HAD to use it.

Happy Birthday Jeffro!

love loVE LOVE you Aubrey with an E!!

About a month or so ago, my good friend Aubrey moved away with her husband to Texas, where they are starting a new business. It was a sad day at Ruby, but it gave me an excuse to make a cake (and it feels like it has been a LONG time since I have been able to bake anything). I'm still not the best at 'hand writing' with frosting stuffed in a bag, but I keep trying my best.

One if the blogs I follow, is Cake Wrecks. It's a place where you can post pictures of cakes that decorators butcher, but still sell for money anyways. Like when I got this 'gem' for my 20th birthday.. 'Happy Brithday Day Carolyn'.. and we still paid for it. Suckers.

Anyways, (only a slight tangent, but I promise it will come together in the end) the whole time I'm piping, I'm thinking, 'This cannot end up on cake wrecks'. I was worried about the correct punctuation of 'We'll', and decent spacing and style, and went I got to Aub's name, I panicked. For a split second, I forgot how to do a B in cursive.. and then I just stubbled through the rest, just happy that my B looked readable.

When I put the cake in the car, I just put it in the back seat like I always do, never had any problems. This time, the filling was a raspberry sauce, and while sitting on the warm (slanted) back seat, the top layer, slid half-way off the bottom layer!! Not completely, but just enough that I had major damage control to do when I got to the store.

After some crafty work, it was back to almost normal, when it was time to present it to Aubrey. She walks up, she is all excited, and the first thing to come out of her mouth was..... 'You misspelled my name' I FORGOT THE E!!! All my anxiety about that stupid B, and I skipped right over the E. Ugh! It was a good laugh. Maybe I belong on Cake Wrecks after all lol.

I hope they call me on a mission..

Ok, so I know that I haven't posted a lot recently, but I have been so busy starting my decorating classes, I haven't really been able to bake much. Here are some yummy treats I whipped up for the reading of Brady's mission call

Congrats to my only younger brother (in-law) Brady, who was called to serve in the Morristown, NJ mission! He will report to the MTC August 25, and there he will learn the authentic way to fist pump!

Since the family gathered, I decided to whip up some cupcakes. The flavors were, (from L to R) vanilla cake, raspberry filling, vanilla icing; vanilla cake, peanut butter/choc icing; and vanilla cake, vanilla icing.

Not too fancy, but hey, I'm trying to update ok?? And they are pretty cute. If you squint, you will see the sprinkle are red, yellow, and blue :)

And here is my son, refusing to have a cupcake of mine, diving into an ice cream cone instead. RUDE! Congrats again Brady! I'm sure there will be more 'mission' festivities, so more LDS things to come lol

The Proposal

This is not, by definition, 'cake'. I more just want to share this sweet story. A few weeks ago, I was at work getting ready to start my shift, and my manager comes up to me and explains that this guy called in the morning, and was planning on coming in to Ruby River for dinner, and proposing to his girlfriend. Ruby River isn't where I would want to be proposed to, BUT it turns out they were set up on a blind date and Ruby River was where they met. Pretty cute right? SO, he asks if we can help, and try to plan something special for them. We told him to plan on dessert, and he told us we would see him at 7pm. We all stood around WAITING for 7:00 to roll around. For the 4 hours we were waiting, I called my SIL to bring her cake decorating tips and bags, and hoped I could pull something together in time. This is what we came up with on the first try...

(cell phone picture, not HQ) To explain what I did, I just simply melted chocolate chips, and piped them out of a bag around the edge of the bowl, then let it harden in the fridge. Lindsy happened to also bring sprinkles and stuff, so I picked out all the red hearts and used those too.

After they were done eating dinner, I 'sold' them on the delicious cheese cake. As I was going back to prepare it, the guys comes running after me and says, 'You know, right?' and I said, 'Oh yeah, I know, we are prepared'. When I brought it out to the table, she was in mid sentence and then stopped in shock when she read what it said. Then he jumped out of the booth to kneel on one knee to propose. We were all standing near by watching. It was so sweet. And they left so happy.

It wasn't so much the difficulty level that made this dessert, but the thought that made it so fun to do. I'm glad I got to be a part of it.

And the weekend goes on and on...

After my busy, busy weekend, Monday, I STILL had another cake to do. This one was for my sisters birthday. She loves Reese's peanut butter cups, so I kind of ran with the idea.

It's not fancy-smancy, but it smelled AMAZING. The cake was chocolatey chocolate cake, with peanut butter/ chocolate incing. In the filling, I crumbled Reese's peanut butter cups for an extra kick. The flowers were just plain old vanilla butter cream (colored to match the wrapping paper I used for her gift), with chocolate chips for the centers. Happy Birthday to my lovely sister Becca

Last minute is my middle name

I have a dear dear friend who came to me about 10days ago and said, 'Carolyn, are you going to make my birthday cake?', and I said, 'Sure Craig, what would you like?'.. long story short, he couldn't decide. I never really had a chance to catch up with him later, and put it in the back of my mind until last night at work. His daughter was leaving (she works with me) and she was just walking out the door. So I said, 'Mandy, did you have plans for your dads cake?', and she explained that she thought about asking me, but hadn't seen me all week, and figured it was too late to order one. Well, no way was I letting my great friend go without a cake from me on his birthday. I told her not to sweat it, and I would come through. And... I DID! I was worried when I got home and thought about all the stuff I needed to prep for this cake, but it all turned out in the end.

Craig loves Oreos, and I decided to try something new. I did a basic devils food chocolate cake, with a oreo cream filling (made with marshmellow fluff, YUM), covered with vanilla butter cream. Obviously, while I was decorating, I channeled my Baskin Robins, Sam's Club, and Smith's skills hahahahaha. But hey, it was my first successful time piping letters (probably my biggest weakness) so in the end, I was proud.

There is a first time for everything

I have made a lot of cakes in the last year. Some for birthdays, some for celebrations, some just because. But I had never done a wedding cake, until this last weekend. I was feeling a bit under the weather, so it was hard to get motivated. Somewhere, deep down, I found it, and pulled it off.

It was for my friends sister, and basically my instructions were, well, no instructions. They said I could do whatever I thought would look good, but no roses, and no chocolate. I searched and search online to find some inspiration. Her colors were red, and a teal-ish baby blue. I found a few cute cakes, but most were solid blue, with red accents.. I wanted this cake to be a traditional white cake.

The flavors were difficult too. I didn't want all the layers to be the same, and it was really hard to think of 3 different combinations that weren't just 'white cake, vanilla frosting'. The flavors I choose was:

top tier- golden yellow cake, with a chocolate fudge frosting (I know she said no chocolate, that's why I choose it to be the top smallest tier where she wouldn't cut into it, but other people like chocolate, right?)

middle tier- lemon zest cake, vanilla butter cream, and a raspberry filling

bottom tier- classic wedding white cake, white chocolate butter cream, and I chopped up some fresh strawberries to go in the middle as a filling (almost like strawberry short cake)

I went a little gourmet, and really went out of my comfort zone trying new flavor combinations, but I hope it paid off (I'm still waiting for feedback from my friend who I gave the difficult job of tasting each one).

For being my first official wedding cake, I'm really happy with it. Had I had 2 more hours, I think it make have turned out a tiny bit different, but I have decided I really love this color combination. Congrats Libby.

I'm a little behind in updating..

I have been so busy doing all kinds of crazy things, but when I look back, I honestly can't tell you what I have been doing. I hate when I put updating off, and then I have a ton to do. And since it is a quiet afternoon, (and my husband and child are both taking a rest) I will use this time for myself :)

Most of you know that my husband and I had season tickets to the Jazz. One of the greatest experiences of our lives. We had a great time, and also made some really great friends. Our friend Robyn asked me (she calls me 'her' decorator) to whip up some cupcakes for the last regular season game, to give out to all our friends as a thank you. The ushers, security, the cute man who sweeps, the guy who always welcomes us with 'tonight will be an easy game!', even Thurl Bailey.

This is what I came up with. A cookie, and a cupcake.. the perfect combination. The hardest part was me and Trav had just started our hCG diet, and couldn't have a single one! It was rough.

The flavors were vanilla and chocolate cupcakes, with cream cheese frosting, topped with a sugar cookie

And a special shout out to my favorite player Wesley Mathews #23! (Don't worry Ronnie B, you will always be in my heart lol)

Get Er Dooonne

My good friend Robyn (who ordered the Jazz cake) also placed an order for her husbands birthday. He loves trackers/John Deere/Johnny Poppers etc. My plan was to do a 3-D cake, but it did not work out like I wanted. But I think it still turned out great the way it did.

It was Trav's idea to use brown sugar as dirt, and to add the wheat stalks. My cute little husband... he must watch too much Food Network haha.

The flavor was carrot cake, and cream cheese frosting. I have never made homemade carrot cake before, and shredding carrots was quite an experience. Next time I'm using a food processor. The cream cheese frosting was also homemade, and THE BEST I have ever tasted. Definetly a recipe I'll be keeping. I really love the 'rope' border at the bottom.

Happy Birthday Randy!

WAY TO GO, CJ!

Trav and I were lucky enough to win season tickets to the Jazz, and we have made such amazing friends. This year was so special for our new friend Chris. It was her birthday on Saturday, March 27, and as a surprise at the Jazz game on the 29th, one of her best friends, Robyn, had the Jazz Bear come blow confetti all over our section, spray us with silly string, and deliver a gift. Her favorite player is CJ Miles, and she got an autographed picture of him, Jazz license plate covers, and all kinds of crazy fun stuff. But as a surprise, I got to bring her a Jazz inspired cake to share with all our friends!

This cake was a challenge! Edible images are quite easy actually, and Walmart is the best! Print your picture, bring it to the bakery, and they will make it edible. The best part is, they have copy rights for everything! So even if its a picture of Dora the Explorer, they will copy it for you.

Now, usually, I'm usually very well planned out. I had the whole cake planned, I had the frosting ready, and the edible image was in my fridge. I had the whole cake prepped and ready to go, and I was getting the edible image ready to put on the frosting. I don't know what happened, but as I was peeling the picture off, HIS FACE JUST PEELED OFF! It wasn't like his jersey, or his arm, something that I could cut off and start again, it was his FACE. And with 2 hours until the game, I sent my mom and my sister to the nearest store that would print it for us. The first store said they would, but when they got there, they said they wouldn't do it because we didn't have CJ's 'ok'. Really? I mean, I understand the whole legal thing, but its not like I was creating an ad, and using video of him without him knowing.. its a cake, that would be eaten, gone forever. So we went across the street where the guy said, 'I'll copy anything for a price' HE WAS OUR MAN! Needless to say, I got it done just in time.

The game was so fun, and Chris was so surprised! The flavor was Chocolatey chocolate cake, cream filling, and chocolate fudge frosting.

Do you have your copy yet?

From the Best Selling Authors of 'Hello! Cupcake', please welcome (drum roll, please), 'What's New, Cupcake?'!!
 

Today is the offical release date, and you know me, and my obsession with owning things... I already have my copy. And trust me, it's totally worth the investment. 'Hello! Cupcake' gave great tips on using every day kitchen items, but some how, I feel like this new book gives more! It has 2 full pages with pictures and descriptions of tools to use, and candies to use, (and where to find the hard to find ones too). Everytime I look through the book, I see something I didn't notice before, so it's like getting a brand new book every time I flip through the pages. Expect to see great things from me, thanks to this book and their adorable new ideas! 

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to...

Some of our really good friends had a little boy 6 months after we had Riley. They are going to be best friends when they grow up, that's our plan lol. Bob and Tiff are so good to us and our family, when I heard they were throwing a party, I wanted to be the one who made that cake! The theme was dinosaurs, and I was only in charge of making Ben his own mini cake. It was so fun to do. Smaller cakes are hard to do a lot of detail on, so I cheated and bought tiny dinosaurs (don't tell).

The flavor was chocolate cake/chocolate fudge frosting , and vanilla buttercream for the decorating. The best part was, Ben has never had any type of sugar before. NEVER. And let me tell you.. he was having a ball! He mushed it in his hands, rubbed it in his face, up his nose. It was probably the best and biggest mess I have ever seen a 1 year old make.

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY BEN! We had so much fun celebrating with you :)

Baby Showers GALORE

I had SO many things going on this weekend. Including two baby showers. One for my sister, who is having a girl, and one for my sister-in-law who is having a boy. Obviously, the themes for each were very different.

For my sisters we had the cutest 'Pea Pod' theme. Everything was green and pink. We invited her friends from all over Utah, and had the greatest time. Along with some really yummy food, I was in charge of making cupcakes for the party. Naturally, they were pink and green :)

Pretty cute, huh? Cupcakes are NOT the same as baking a cake. I have 2 great receipes for cakes made from scratch, and neither one turned out as a cupcake. So I had to use the good ol' fall back box mixes. They turned out yummy anyways! I made chocolate, vanilla, and lemon poppy seed. De-lish!

The second shower was kind of crazy. I ended up running late because of last minute stops we weren't planning on making, which put us back forever! But once I got there, It turned out to be an open house, and lots of people were still coming and going.

Megans colors for her babys room are red, green, orange, and blue. SUPER cute, so I tried to use that as my guide. I forgot to take pictures at the party, so I used some left over cupcakes and did it the next day before throwing them away :) I also made vanilla, chocolate, and lemon poppy seed, but only because lemon poppy seed was the flavor they used at their wedding AWWWWWWW.. I'm so romantic hahaha. She also had this FUN game. Meg and my brother pick a unique name, and didn't want to tell everyone right away, but at the shower, she had some scrabble letters, and let everyone try to figure out his name! It was so fun, and I suck at spelling (which you know, because you read my blog lol) so I had to have some help. I can't say what it is, because I don't know who doesn't know still, but trust me, it's really cute, and fits with the Farwell name perfect.

This week wasn't only crazy because of the showers, I have been a busy baking bee! Stay tuned.

Cake Release

One thing I learned while taking the Wilton Cake Decorating class Course 1, was that the key to a smooth cake, was no crumbs. And having no crumbs, starts at the very beginning of your process. Preparing your pan. Just think about it. If you have a hard time getting your cake out, and it tears a bit, you have loose cake crumbs all over. And when you are frosting, they are bound to come to the surface. I always had problems with  crumbs, until I learned about this fabulous product from Wilton, called 'Cake Release'. It's like magic! All you do is use a pastry or silicon brush, squirt it into your cake pan, and spread it around. No need for flouring, which eliminates a step. For me, that is huge. Time is valuable. After your cake is baked, it will literally fall out of the pan. Like I said, M-A-G-I-C!

Now, there have been times where I'm in the middle of baking 3 or 4 cakes for a customer, and I run out of my niffty little friend, and I have to resort to shortening/flour. Which I had no choice resorting to until I made a trip to my local Hobby Lobby store. But recently, I have found a new solution, and I am real excited about it. I haven't tried it yet, but it got 9 1/2 stars out of 10 in reviews. They said it didn't leave the cake all dry and pastey from the flour, and it wasn't too moist from the shortening. The best part is, it's things that most bakers have around the house! So if I don't have my #1 choice, at least I'll have a close second. And it can be stored! Let me know if you try it, and how it works out for you.

Ingredients


2 c. flour
1 c. vegetable shortening
1 c. vegetable oil

Instructions

In a medium bowl, mix 1 c. flour with 1/2 c. vegetable shortening on medium low speed on mixer until well blended. Add remaining flour and shortening and continue mixing until blended well. Slowly drizzle in vegetable oil and blend until homogenous mixture is obtained.

1.Brush liberally on edges and sides of cake pan using pastry brush or silicon basting brush.
2.May be stored in refrigerator for up to 6 months.

R ya redy fer the NASCAR Chet?

`Being from Seattle, NASCAR was not the norm around our house. But since I have moved to Utah, I have met more and more fans, and actually, the stereotypes are so funny. This cake was for my SIL, and if you have met her, she is good at EVERYTHING. Her whole family is. So you can imagine my anxiety when she asked me to make a NASCAR cake for her fathers 60th birthday. This cake weighed heavy on my mind for the 2 months before it was due. Needless to say, I researched NASCAR a lot. Gregs favorite driver is Carl Edward... any NASCAR fans out there?? He is the one who bump a car on purpose and caused a huge wreck, and I guess he was suspended. hahahahaha. I had already started the car when Lindsy's mom wanted to change it because of this whole scandal. Good thing Greg really likes this driver lol. The flavor was Chocolatey-chocolate cake, ganache filling, and chocolate fudge frosting.

I guess Lindsys dad was impressed I knew the sponsor was Aflac.. (thanks BING search). Hope this was everything they wanted and more!

Catching up on all my favorites!

This was my first REAL cake. I was taking a fondant class, and had to make this for Riley's first birthday party, before I even had the class that taught me how to do anything. I remember thinking how good it was, but now I look back... and even though it's good, I sure wish I had been through that class first. haha

This is the cake that I made at the end of my fondant class. If I remember right, it was lemon poppy seed, SO good.

This was for the Tadd Family Christmas party. It was actually after Christmas, so I made it more 'winter'.

Happy 30th Birthday Emmerson! He coaches basketball, and LOVES the Utes.

This one was for my good friend Jenn's niece. I was lucky to find such a perfect Tinkerbell topper.

My co-worker Mandi LOVES stars, Happy 19th Mandi :)

And Mandi also has a twin sister, Megan, who loves peace signs. It was kind of last minute, so it wasn't perfect due to the wrong size tip. I was still learning at this point. 

This was for a friend of a friend. Pretty much, my first client who I didn't know. It was also my first time working with edible images. Thank you Walmart for being WAY cooler then Target.

The day after I got the call about the HSM cake, I got a call from a good, good friend who needed a cake for her sons birthday as well. Both to be delivered on the same day. This one made me nervous because doing characters is really hard, since they are so recognizable. I have to admit, I was shocked myself when I pulled this off.

I was DYING to do a princess cake. I only have a little boy, so this isn't something I get to do everyday. This was also the first cake I carved into a shape. Harder then it looks, let me tell you! But thanks to gum paste, it turned out good, well, after the first slipper shattered like glass, true story.

At Ruby River, we go through a lot of managers, since we are a training store. One of our last managers went to the Downtown store, and as a last minute celebration, I pulled this one together. We used to put peppers on our steaks, and as a back of house secret, we use steak markers to show what temperature steaks are cooked at. Pink means medium rare. Yumm..

PHEW! Done. Looking back, I can't believe I pulled most of these off lol I really hope that after I start teaching, I'll master more of the basic skills. Let me know if you have any questions, I would love to answer them.

Introduction

So I decided it was time to create this extra blog, so that I'm not constantly filling my family blog with the cakes that I'm making.

In the near future, I'll be posting sizes, and prices, so if you are in Utah, you will have the best idea what I can do to make your special day, well, more special!

The next few post might get a little monotonous, because I will be uploading the last few cakes I have done, starting with the first, and ending in the most recent. So please bear with me :)

Thanks for looking, I hope you like what you see!