3D Spider Cake / Halloween Cake
3D Turkey Cake/Thanksgiving Cake
It’s about time I learned how to cook a turkey I say!! A turkey made out of CAKE that is!
Somehow Canadian Thanksgiving has managed to sneak up on me. While learning how to cook a turkey for a big dinner is honestly on my list of things I want to learn how to do, this year will not be the year! Paul and I will be furiously filming this weekend in order to be prepped and ready to go to Buffer Festival next weekend in Toronto! I’ll give more updates on that later.
This 3D carved turkey cake is surprisingly easy. The hardest part is having the patience to ice the turkey legs and wings. I found that freezing the cake “pops” worked well, and gave me a bit more time before the cake became soft, and was a serious problem to cover in buttercream. Carving the turkey shape is simple, and again, if you’re having difficulty with that, try freezing the cakes before starting to cut them. You will definitely want to freeze them if you are using cake mixes. The cake mixes are much softer and lighter than homemade cakes (as a rule) so carving them is super challenging.
I found the cutest “Peas and Carrots” candy from Jelly Belly on a recent trip to the States. I haven’t looked for them in Canada, but I’m sure they can be ordered online. I found that they were the perfect addition to the cake, as adding some colour seemed to be a must. If you can’t find the peas and carrots, making them yourself out of fondant, candy or modeling chocolate is also a possibility.
Another way I found to add colour to the cake was the addition of the bed of “lettuce” on the serving plate. This again is an optional step, but I think it really adds to the overall presentation of the cake. I used a simple petal tip, but you could do without a tip, and simply spread it onto the cake.
Whether you’re with or without your family near or far, I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving weekend!!
Toffee Pecan Cake INSIDE a Pumpkin
Sometimes getting to be an old fashioned baker is just want I need to kick start myself again. I love making cake designs, but sometimes I miss the excitement of a new, flavourful recipe. Feeling the need to experiment with a new recipe, I went in search of a Fall way to spruce it up, after all, I can’t let down my followers on YouTube! They like exciting things!! So, with those requirements in mind, I came up with a Toffee Pecan cake INSIDE a pumpkin!
The toffee pecan cake itself is delicious. The flavour of the pecans and their crunch, combined with the crunch of the toffee bits makes for a delicious cake. You could put any kind of cake inside the pumpkin, but like I said before, I was really wanting to try out a new flavour combination.
Baking a cake inside a pumpkin takes a long time, and it can take an even longer time than “long” (haha,) depending on the size of the baking pumpkin. My pumpkins averaged between 5″-7″ and took between 1.5-3 hours to bake completely through. It will seem for the first hour or so like you didn’t put enough batter in, but the cake rises up through the top of the opening near the end. So, don’t fret like I did. I managed to refrain from adding more batter while the cake was in the oven though, and I’m glad I did. The cake ended up rising perfectly.
The cake stays incredibly moist, despite the amount of time it is in the oven. The pumpkin meat around the outside keeps the cake moist, and the foil wrapped around the outside helps with this as well. When taking the pumpkin out of the oven and off of the baking tray, be careful as it softens a bit while baking.
Finding baking pumpkins proved to be the most difficult task in this recipe. I had to travel to a nearby town, about a 30 minute drive from my home. It was to a market that specialized in local produce from nearby farms and orchards. The baking pumpkins are smaller, and therefore sweeter than a pumpkin used for a jack-o-lantern.
Rubik’s Cube Cake – Surprise Inside Cake!
Rubik’s cube has been around longer than I have been alive, but it’s still a popular toy that exisits in many stores. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that, and was quite shocked to be able to find one in the store on my first try.
The point of the Rubik’s cube puzzle, is to have each side of the cube (9 squares) be one solid colour. You have to do that without taking off the stickers!! Unfortunately the new cubes don’t have the stickers, so there is no cheating by way of the 80’s!
I’ve never had the luck of being able to solve it, but in all honesty, I haven’t really tried. I made this cake because I think it looks cool!! I know there are genuis’ out there that have actually tried to solve the puzzle and CAN solve it! I applaud you! Apparently, the current World Record is held by a gentleman in the Netherlands and is attempt was completed in 5.5 SECONDS!!! I can’t even imagine how he could do that!! It takes me 5 seconds to figure out how the thing moves.
Making this cake is a little time consuming, but the WOW factor when your guests cut into it will definitely cake it worthwhile! You can prepare your cake batter ahead of time, as well as prep your fondant squares. The cake batter should be coloured in the colour theme of the Rubik’s cube- red, orange, yellow, white and green. The fondant squares work best if they are a little bit pliable, but I ended up putting on some that were rock hard, and they worked fine too. The hard ones don’t mold to the side of the cube as well, so some of the corners stick out.
When you’re lining up the rectangles to make your cube, make sure you’re paying attention to the side the will have the 9 blocks shown when the cube is cut. Otherwise, if you cut on the wrong side, you will be shown only three rectangles. Other than that, making this cake is pretty fool-proof!! Unlike the Rubik’s cube itself.
Skittles Poke Cake with Skittles Buttercream- Collab with MyCupcakeAddiction!
Homemade Cherry Pie Recipe
Until our videos last fall (2013) I had never baked a real pie before. Sure, I had used a premade pie crust, and premade filling, and called it a pie, but looking back, it really wasn’t. My adventures last year with Apple Pie and Pumpkin Pie had given me the courage to knead more dough and attempt a cherry pie! You can find the pie crust recipe in the Apple Pie video.
The thing about cherry pie is that I don’t (well, didn’t) even like it! I don’t know what came over me when I decided that cherry would be the flavour I would go with this fall. What I soon learned though, is that I had never had good cherry pie. Oh, man, when I had my first bite of this pie, I was in love. I find that artificial cherry flavour is one of the worst flavours there are- it brings be back to cough syrup as a kid (and that is not a good thing). Using real cherries for this recipe is a must in my opinion. If you’re stuck you can use canned cherries in a pinch. but I take no blame for pies made with canned cherries!
The sweetness and tartness of cherries can very greatly, so with this recipe, you can adjust the amounts of lemon juice and sugar accordingly. If your cherries are really ripe and sweet, lessen the amount of sugar. If your cherries are sour, lessen the amount of lemon juice, or add additional sugar. The recipe is pretty flexible that way.