CurlySue

Ah, when you added the water you were creating caramel actually. That's why it was chewie and not crunchy. If you had added more liquid you'd get caramel sauce. I probably would have used your cooked sugar as is....it should have been fine........just a bit darker. ← Ah, thank you Wendy! I just thought that sugar reached temperature because of the water that was being boiled out of it, so I figured adding water to cool it then letting it get to temp again would be fine. I should know more about the science of what I'm doing before I do it!! I'll try again.

Ooh! I meant to ask a peanut brittle question too... I made some the other night and was busy doing something else at the same time and lost track of the sugar and cooked it to about 330 degrees. Since it was only supposed to cook to 300 I dumped a little water in it to cool it down (to about 220) then let it warm back up to 300 then finished it. The brittle is not so brittle, more "pull your teeth out" than brittle. Do you think that it was a problem with overcooking it then cooling it, or did I not reheat it to the proper temp the second time around (my thermometer is a bit wacky that way)? Thoughts?

I use Americolor and really like it, mostly because it's a gel and not a paste and seems to mix more easily with my icing.

I did end up making them last night and was considering nuking them tonight until they're mostly warm, then throwing them in the oven finish them off. I'm going to be adding bleu cheese to them and I figured I'll nuke them, add the cheese, put them in a casserole and finish off in the oven for an hour or so. We'll see...

Ok, thanks for the help everyone! I'm not a great cook, but when I do cook I at least like it to be as good as possible. I hate gummy mashed potatoes!!

Hmmmm.... bummer. Ok, well better that I know it doesn't work than to experiment on my guests! I guess I'll just make it tonight and set it in the crock pot to warm tomorrow? I'll have to put it on a timer though because I can't imagine mashed potatoes sitting at warm for 11 hours is a good thing... Or should I just leave them refrigerated and nuke them before dinner?

I'm having guests for dinner tomorrow and will be getting home late so I want to do as much ahead of time as possible. I hate serving re-heated mashed potatoes but I'll make them tonight and just warm them tomorrow if I have to, but I was really hoping to cook them in the crock pot while I was gone during the day tomorrow then just mash them when I get home. My problem is that I usually steam or boil potatoes for mashed potatoes, so I don't know if cooking them in the crock pot during the day will work, and if so, how exactly do I do it? In water? Just a little water? Completely submerged? No water at all? Any thoughts?

I agree completely, your version is beautiful, too! Here's a suggestion for the future--take a cardboard box or piece of styrofoam the size and shape of your cake and make a paper template, folding a large piece of paper as if it were the fondant/choc plastic. Then you can see where the folds can be removed by cutting before you drape it, you can cut out the pattern and place it directly on the cake with no lumps! Better yet, if you make the same size cake all the time, you can reuse the template over and over by tracing it onto a piece of acetate, sheet vinyl (clear tablecloth material, etc) or some other reuseable material. ← Yeah, if I did these a lot I think that would be one of the two things I would change. First, I would use chocolate plastic, not fondant. The fondant just seems too heavy for this, and as Wendy said... stretchy. Second, a template would definitely help because I'm guessing that EC does cut their plastic before they apply it (and they know how to do it like the back of their hand, no doubt!) to avoid "the bulge". Every cake is a learning experience... even those I've done a million times. It's what keeps things interesting! Next comes building gumpaste beach furniture.

Finally got my pics off my camera... Ok, here's a shot of the side where I was trying to do the "package" effect. As you can see I failed miserably. First, I cut my fondant too narrow so I couldn't get it to reach all the way to the bottom of the cake, so the flap ends up half way down the cake (kind of like when I'm wrapping Christmas presents!). You'll also notice my problem with the huge lump of fondant that got folded under. I don't know what to do about that other than cut it before folding the top down and that seems nearly impossible since I woudn't know where to cut it until the fondant was actually on the cake and by then it's stuck already and too late. I guess chocolate plastic would work better. Anyway, here it is: Here was the final product. Not bad, but not as perfect as I was hoping for. Luckily the customer wasn't as picky as me and she loved it:

Ruth, that looks fantastic! I think you're right... I think Elegant Cheesecakes wraps their cakes completely (bottom too). Your attempt came out way better than mine did. I think my fondant was too thick and it created a bulge under the seam on the end where yours didn't. I'm guessing the chocolate plastic can be rolled much thinner than the fondant. I'll post a pic of my attempt as soon as I download the photos from my camera.

Hi CurlySue, I'm so glad you asked this question! I've recently attempted the "wrapped corners" in rolled chocolate fondant with middling success -- my corners were close, but not at precise as I'd like. I will attempt to post a picture this evening when I'm at home. My method was to simply drape the fondant over the top of the cake and nudge/ease/fold the fondant over the ends until it vaguely resembled a package corner. I'd love to hear any other tricks for getting that clean look. ← I'd be interested in seeing your pictures Ruth, thanks. Unfortunately I have to do this cake tonight myself, so maybe I'll have some info tomorrow, after the fact. I'm thinking of doing exactly what you said you did and we'll see how it goes.

Yeah, they use modelling chocolate I think, but the process would be the same I'm sure.

I love the effect that Elegant Cheesecakes does on their package cakes where the fondant gets folded over on the edges to look like actual paper. My problem is that I can't for the life of me figure out how to replicate that look. It looks to me almost like they wrap the entire cake in fondant, which I wouldn't want to do, but I'd be happy to get as close to that look as possible. Anyone have any idea how I might achieve that effect? Thanks in advance for any help... Links to the effect I'm referring to: Pacakge 1 Package 2 Package 3

Wendy, thanks so much! I think that's exactly what I'm looking for. Some type of metal plyable enough to bend and shape and possibly even "etch". Gotta love Home Depot! I'll try to find something there. Thanks again.

Thanks everyone. I've used the pin prick method in the past and it's just too much of a pain, not to mention it rarely gives a good, clear impression. Also, the cake will be buttercream so any kind of fondant impression isn't possible. It would be easy to use something to emboss the design in fondant but unfortunately not so easy on buttercream, not even frozen buttercream because the paper sticks to the buttercream eventually. I can't get a piece of the embroidery to copy because she's buying the dress off the rack at David's, so it's all pre-made. The sugarveil stuff would probably work but honestly I don't want to spend the money on yet another cake toy that I'll probably never use again. Ugh. Why did I take this order?

Thanks so much for answering my (and all) the questions!! I TOTALLY understand what you mean by your pricing "strategy". I do the same. If a customer seems like they're going to be a pain they get my "special" pricing structure. They get the PIA fee which ranges depending on how crabby I am! Glad to see I'm not the only one! Also thanks for the info on the chocolate. I'll definitely have to work that back into my decorating box because I stopped using it because it never seemed to work right for me. It seems like you really enjoyed doing this cake and I'm glad you did. We all need an opportunity to do work that we actually *want* to do occasionally, for fun... to rejuvinate our senses, even if it isn't paid. Modeling chocolate isn't stretchy at all.....if.....you work it at a rather cool temperature. The key to working with modeling chocolate is to keep it cool. After I knead it, it's too warm to work with, so I flatten it out into a disk and throw it in the cooler for a few minutes. I'm constantly bringing my chocolate in and out of the walk-in, to keep it at the right temperature. Modeling chocolate that is too warm is totally un-manageable. Luckily I live in a cool climate....I can get away with a lot of things that my friends in warmer parts of the country can't. However, the summers can get pretty warm here, and there have been some days that I've had to do my chocolate work at night, because the days were too warm to do anything. Sometimes I'd have to work directly in the walk-in. I hated that. Anyway, after I rolled out, embossed, and cut my strips, I set them in the cooler for about 5 minutes, so they would be easy to handle and a cinch to get on my pots without losing their shape. With fondant or gumpaste, refrigerating does no good.....they're stretchy no matter what, and on top of that, the longer they sit the more they dry out, and then when you go to put the strip on your cake, you get ugly cracks. Modeling chocolate is the way to go when you need straight, exact type stuff......like pot rims. I knew someone would ask this! And, believe it or not, my price for this kind of work isn't set in stone. I have a general formula to figure it out.....sort of. This is going to be kind of confessional here, because my "formula" is more emotional than uh, practical. When I worked at the cake shop, the formula was "subject to quote from the pastry chef". This meant that my salesgirls couldn't quote a price on a big project, because only I knew the variables involved. They'd come back and tell me what the client wanted, how many people to feed, what my lead time was, how many other projects I had in that time frame, etc. Sometimes I'd talk to the client personally.....what am I saying? Gee, MOST of the time I talked to the client personally. If the client was a real pain in the arse, I'd quote an outrageous price, just to make them go away. If my quote didn't make them go away, then whatever I quoted would be what it was worth for to me to deal with them. So, for instance, if you were a jerk and wanted that cake, and you wanted in less than a week, then I'd quote you $1800. But, if you were really nice, and gave me a huge lead time, I'd charge about $750. Think I'm kidding? Nope.....! Most of the time though, I charge for my cakes based on difficulty levels, and the time it takes me to do them. My general formula was my (estimated hours) x (my wage, doubled). Then I'd add in the food cost and overhead, and that was the price. Then there's delivery and set-up fees if applicable. ←

I'm hoping some of you brilliant people have an idea that will work for me. I have a bride that wants me to pipe the design from her dress onto the sides of her cake. Normally I just freehand this kind of thing but this design is somewhat complicated and would just be better if I could somehow transfer it onto the cake then pipe over my transfer. So here's what I'm thinking. I can get a photo of the embroidery on her dress and make a black and white paper drawing of the outline that I need to pipe. My problem is getting this design onto the cake. I've tried all kinds of things in the past for transferring designs, some have worked better than others, none is dependable enough to work for this particular application. I've thought the best way would be to emboss the design into a really thin piece of metal then wrap the metal around the cake and transfer the pattern into the icing. My problem is that I don't know what kind of metal to use, and where one might find something like it. I imagine something like really thick aluminum foil. Something sturdy enough to use a stylus on to emboss the pattern, but thin enough to bend around the cake, at least partially. Does anyone have any ideas what I might be able to use? If you have a completely different idea on how I can transfer this design I'd be up for that too!

I can't add anymore to the "wow's" that have already been said. It's an amazing cake. I can just imagine how special the Mom-to-Be must have felt. Question: You say you used modelling chocolate rather than fondant because it's less stretchy. I'm assuming by modelling chocolate you mean the chocolate/corn syrup concoction? How is this less stretchy than fondant? It gets so warm in my hands whenever I do anything with it that it's far worse than fondant (for me) to deal with. I'm curious if you have a secret trick or something!! Oh, and I also wanted to ask (and you don't have to answer if you don't want)... If you had made this cake for sale, what would you have charged? It looks like it would have fed 80 people or so? I'm guessing a minimum of $6 a serving so around $500?? I think that would be a bargain, but lots of people would have a stroke over that price. Every potential sculpted cake customer should have to see this thread!!

I just wanted to comment on this. When I started my business I had *nothing* but my internet site. I did some dummy cakes and put the pictures out there and hoped for the best. My first year I did about 30 wedding cakes and countless party cakes, all based on my website. Of course word of mouth has helped now and I get a lot of referral business that way, but I did in fact (and still do) get many, many orders from visitors to my website. It really works! I've had several clients tell me they wanted to shop bakers but most didn't have websites so they didn't even bother with anyone without a website. Brides especially are very internet savvy and some will buy based solely on the quality of your website... I've had clients tell me exactly that. It's an amazing advertising medium. It's also great for other decorators too.

Hey Sharon! Great job on the new site!! I know what a pain it is to do a new website because I just got done revamping mine for about the 50th time. I'm using the same code as you (from Jacque) for the gallery so if I can be of any help whatsoever please don't hesitate to ask. I think you know how to reach me, otherwise you can PM me here. I was sorry to hear about the "picture thief" and am glad you finally got that resolved. Amazing. I'm so glad your site is up though, you're one of my favorite decorators!!

Thanks Keith. I did disassemble my airbrush and soak all the parts and reassemble. I know what you mean about that little "mini lever" behind the big lever. That one always gets me! I'm pretty adept at getting the thing back together, other than that little stinker! I emailed KopyKake to see if they could offer any advice, or at least advise on what replacement part they think I should order to correct my problem. I heard the guy there is pretty good at troubleshooting these so we'll see. I'm anxious to try the badger too. Just as I was about to use it my air tank crapped out on me. I had gunked some stuff on the nozzle and it got stuck and I couldn't get the air on! LOL! Seems I'm really bad at "gunking" stuff and ruining it. So, my prime opportunity to try the badger passed me. My husband fixed my air tank now so I'm ready to go, other than a cake order to use luster on! Isn't that always the way? I'll let you know as soon as I try it. I might just test it now for the fun of it. Like you said, it was real cheap (especially with the coupon) so if it works even for most of my applications I'll be thrilled with it.

Just to add to Keith's response, I have an KopyKake airbrush and have used it for both color and luster dust. I've totally destroyed my airbrush by sending the dusts through it, probably because I let it get gunked up once and have never been able to get it clean since. Now my brush spits and doesn't do fine lines anymore. Basically it's worthless. Since, I've purchased a cheap Badger airbrush set from Michaels (using a coupon) and for $13 got an airbrush that I can use STRICTLY for doing dusts and such. I've heard the Badger is better for this application because the dust never goes through the brush, making it impossible for the brush to get clogged. I haven't used mine yet so I don't have any firsthand experience with it but it sounds logical and others have said it works. So, rather than destroying a $100 airbrush, I think this investment is well worth it if you plan on using a lot of dusts and are lazy like me and don't get things cleaned well! On another note, does anyone have any idea if my airbrush can be saved? Or do I need to buy a new one?

sherri, thank you SO MUCH for posting that. I have a custom cake business. I've been in business 5 years. I'm very successful, if I do say so myself. All of my cakes start with a box. I'm so tired of feeling embarrassed for being one of "those" bakers. You know, the kind of baker the "Real" bakers look down on because I use a MIX <gasp>! I'll tell you what though, I spent TWO YEARS doing taste tests with all kinds of scratch cake recipes and never once did someone prefer the scratch cake over my doctored mix recipes. Were my scratch cakes bad? No. Well, maybe a few of the first ones but I improved and the scratch cakes were great. Why weren't they as popular as the mix cakes? Because *my* clientele likes mix cakes. The people who pay my bills, who order my products WANT box mix cakes. Yes, I know there are people out there who can sniff out a box mix a mile away and wouldn't dare eat one, but those are not the people paying my bills. Those people are few and far between compared to the people who like and pay for my measely box mix recipes. I give the customers what they want, and frankly the cakes are darn good. Mixes are reliable and far easier than scratch baking. And after putting in a 40 hour day at my "real" job, I hardly have the time or desire to fight with scratch recipes all night long, especially when my customers don't even like them! Do I enjoy scratch baking? Sure, when I have tons of time and I'm baking something special for me, I love to pull out a recipe book and give a scratch cake a try. Can I taste a difference? Yes, I can. And sometimes it's not good! Like sherri, I think lots of scratch cakes just suck. Do I appreciate what it takes to make a good scratch cake? I sure do. I also appreciate what it takes to run a business and to make my clientele happy. For me it's all about the money and keeping the customers happy.

I agree with the hammer. If you put a bench scraper down along the grid on the chocolate and whack it lightly with a hammer a few times, then continue to move it down along the grid so that you hammer into it evenly, eventually it will break pretty close along those lines.

On the topic of waiters... I pay for dinners out with my hubby a LOT. I grab the check and I place my credit card in the slot and I set it next to me. The server picks it up from next to my arm, swipes my card with MY name on it, then returns it to my HUSBAND to sign. That's an automatic 5% tip deduction. It angers me in a way few things do. And the "do you need change for that" is beyond rude. If they don't ask, I usually say "we're all set". If they ask, I say "of course I need change". Again, automatic 5% tip deduction. Food terms generally don't bother me. I do dislike adults talking like children, but that happens in so many instances I just let it go. A non-food related irk that I'm sure you don't care about but I feel the need to express is the very recent acceptance of the word "cops", especially from newscasters. They are POLICE OFFICERS. They deserve some respect.