Cake Life @ The Velvet Buttercream

Two words: Buttercream Icing... Traditional white buttercream icing As i've mentioned in my most recent blog... I have a really busy week ahead of me with five wedding cakes, two shop orders, as well as shop display cakes.  From what I have counted I have a total of 25 ordered cakes, but a total of over 30 takes that will be completed by the end of the week.  Naturally you've got to have something to cover the cake in! This week I spent eight and a half hours making icing for all the cakes due this week!  Just under 150 pounds of pure fat and confectioners sugar..  Now when I mention the weight it's a combination of our two icings, traditional buttercream, and Italian buttercream.  Between the two icings there are 42 pounds of butter! Imagine eating two slices of cake and what it would do to your hips. Oh well, that wicked amount of fat keeps me in a job.  So do yourself and a cake decorator a favor, and go buy some cupcakes or a single serve cake slice.  You wo

As a follow up to wednesday's blog, I had told you about my experimental cakes that I was going to make.  Both cakes sold within 12 hours of their creation.. Definitely a success in my book, especially for being a dessert cake. The chocolate turtle cake consisted of me having to make Kahlua caramel which was one of the main ingredients besides the chocolate cake.  Now just a little background into my caramel making history.. I haven't made caramel since culinary school and I wasn't exactly sure how to make it.  So I did what any new age culinary connoisseur would do and I google'd it.  I found some great tutorial videos on how to make sure the caramel would remain a sauce and not turn into a brick. I first started with a half cup of butter and two cups of brown sugar, let the two come to a boil in a sauce pot.  After boiling for 1 minute I added a half cup of Kahlua and allowed the mixture to cook for an additional 30 seconds before adding one cup of heavy cream.  T

This week I am planning to experiment with some new cake flavor combinations!  I have three flavors in mind that I am dying to try out, the flavors are coconut cake with fresh peach filling and coconut buttercream icing, a chocolate turtle cake with Kahlua caramel buttercream, and last but not least citrus cupcakes with fresh nectarine compote and buttercream icing. Just an example of the Coconut peach cake I want to make After this past weekend's peach festival here in Annapolis I have really been feeling the need to play around with different flavors.  Really just trying to branch out from the normal basic cake flavors.  Some of my long time readers know that I have been yearning to play around since I first started with Albertson's two years ago.  Now two years later I finally have free reign to make what I want! An example of the chocolate turtle cake with Kahlua caramel buttercream filling When Aaron plays with cake flavors.. the customer wins! I shall report back

Today I delivered a beauty of a wedding cake, it was a four tier Yellow and Carrot cake finished with Italian buttercream icing and a Swiss Dot style design.  I have to admit that it is by far one of my best cakes in my opinion! The only downside to this beautiful cake was that I had to deliver it to Cambridge Maryland which is about an hour and a half away from Annapolis.  Of course the bridge traffic had to add to my drive time..  It was easily backed up beyond Rowe Boulevard (about 9 miles), and was moving at a snail's pace.  I spent about 45 minutes in the bridge traffic alone, but thankfully I had planned for this type of problem. Not only did I prepare for the bridge traffic, I also brought along extra supplies just in case something happened.  I brought Icing, piping bags, icing tips, scrapers, large turners, non slip rags, as well as a heavy duty turn table.  Now I know that seems a little drastic but I failed to mention that I brought the cake in two separate pieces.  It

Chocolate Chocolate can be poured, baked, made into a sauce, served as a sweet dessert, or a savory seasoning for an entree.  Chocolate really is one of the most versatile spices available! When it comes to cake, chocolate is always up at the top of the chart for being the favorite.  Palate Pleasers has a recipe for chocolate cake that is by far one of the best scratch bake recipes I think I have ever tasted.  It's interesting that when baking the cake the batter is entirely in liquid pouring form instead of a more pudding like consistency.  I imagine that is why the chocolate cake is so moist. I wish that there was tastevision available on youtube so that you could taste what i'm talking about.  We all know generally what chocolate cake taste's like, but this recipe is out of this world amazing!  Since I don't have a way for you to taste what i'm talking about, i'll just share with you some of my chocolate cakes that I have made.  ENJOY! I know I