Hello, it’s me again-

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends. And now that means we are in full on holiday season mode.

A wonderful time of year most of us love, but it comes with it’s own level of stress, right?

Too much to do and not enough time?

And as perfectionists and artists, we worry about doing everything perfectly for everyone.

Sound about right?

We try to be the best we can be at our craft, but sometimes we put undue stress on ourselves in the process.

Especially during the holidays. Which got me thinking back…

In my previous life, when caking was still a passionate hobby, (but before it became my full time business), I was a Registered Nurse. A job that carries a lot of responsibility (and pressure) – which I took very seriously.

I have always been a perfectionist, always trying to do better, be better; reach that brass ring that really is unattainable.

So I spent a lot of my nursing career (and my life) kind of beating myself up for not being perfect.

Then one day in the lunch room, I noticed that the management had put up a poster next to the table.

“Strive for excellence not perfection.”

Wow, I can honestly say it was one of those life moments that just hit me over the head like a loaded piping bag. “The powers that be” had given me permission to be imperfect. Had told me that being very good was good enough. That trying to always improve was an honorable goal, but it’s OK to not be flawless

That day really was a turning point for me. I have carried that message in my mind and heart ever since, and applied it to all areas of my life: parenting, being a wife, friend…

…….and caking.

I always strive to do my best in my decorating and teaching. I always try to learn more and improve my skills. But I no longer beat myself up if each cake is not perfect, because perfection in cakes, as in life, is simply not possible.

I now embrace the fact that cakes have backs for a reason

We are always our own worst critics, and sometimes that strips the joy out of the hobby we love. And I don’t want that for you.

Therefore, I give you permission to not be a perfect cake decorator.

Strive for excellence – not perfection. Love your work at the level it is today. Welcome the joy it brings to other people in all its imperfect glory.

And have fun. Cuz that’s really what it is all about.

Especially during the holidays — cut yourself some slack.

If all your cakes, cookies and other goodies don’t come out as perfect as you hoped for, it’s OK. They are still wonderful and the recipients will love them.

You are juggling a lot. And doing it well.

Give yourself a big ole pat on the back.

I do.

Happy holiday baking,
Sharon

The post Are Your Cakes Perfect? appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

The age gap between me and my older siblings was too big for them to be my playmates.

In fact, I think I was more an object for their entertainment …they harassed and tortured me for their own evil pleasure.

All of them but my brother Michael.

He was never mean to me. He never stung me with rubber bands, beat up my teddy bear, or forced me to look at skeleton pictures. He never scared me with a vampire face, or tricked me by wrapping rocks to look like candy just to see me cry from disappointment. He never talked on the phone late at night when I was trying to sleep, pulled me off the desk chair to do “college work”, or ate all the fresh cherries at the beach so that I got none. (You’ll hear that story soon.)

Nope, not Mike. (You others know who you are and what you have done. I wonder how you sleep at night.)

Michael doesn’t have a mean bone in his body. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him utter a cross word. He taught me to play chess, did word jumble puzzles with me, and took me on vacation to the Grand Canyon.

Heck, he took my very first cake decorating classes with me! How cool is that?

He is the most gentle, kind and selfless person I know, and has always looked out for me.

Case in point, he’s good to me still to this day.

Whenever my PC gets all bogged down with junk and viruses, and starts running badly, I can always take it in to him for a full clean-out and tune-up.

Just like he did this week.

So how do I thank him for his help? By doing the only thing I know how to do: BAKE!

But, Mike can’t have sugar, so I make him sugar free cakes. Gives me a chance to try out some new recipes.

Over the years I have collected a nice little stash of sugar-free recipes.

Not all are created equal: some are really bad.

It takes a lot of trial and error to be successful with sugar free baking but here’s a few tips that will help:

• Not all sweeteners work like regular sugar, so spend some time learning about them and how they perform in baked goods.
• Some natural sweeteners don’t work well on their own to create a chewy texture in baked goods. They need another sweetener to help them out. Coconut sugar and honey help create this well. Just check the dietary restrictions of the recipient to be sure they can consume these.
• Many natural sweeteners take less time to bake. Rule of thumb is 5- 10 minutes less, but be sure to check the progress while baking.
• Baked goods using a granulated sugar substitute don’t rise as much as regular recipes. Try adding ½ cup of nonfat dry milk powder and half a teaspoon of baking soda for every cup of sweetener.
• Some sweeteners don’t like heat. Aspartame, for instance, loses its sweetness during baking, so aspartame based sweeteners should be reserved for recipes where you can add it at the end of the cooking process, like pudding or icing.
• Sugar substitutes don’t activate yeast. Retain at least two teaspoons of sugar in the recipe, or replace with another natural sweetener like molasses or honey.

Now go forth and bake sugar free goodies with confidence!

And be kind to your little sisters

Happy caking!
Sharon

PS. I’ve got a bunch of yummy sugar free cake, filling and icing recipes in the online school.

Details here:

http://www.sugaredproductions.com/membership/

The post Brotherly Love appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

You log in to Pinterest to gather ideas for a client, or to find some inspiration for your next event. As you scroll, you start to admire all the amazing cakes you see. You oohh and ahh at the amazing cake paintings, the perfect cookies, and those incredibly innovative cake pops! Then it begins….cake envy.

Cake envy goes a little something like this: you start to compare photos, you start to compare colors, you start to compare styles. Before long you begin to give into the idea that you need to be “better”. What you contribute to the world is NOT cutting the mustard! We have all been here; today I am asking you to stop!

Please do not misunderstand me, as cake decorators we are all artists. We should never stop trying to get better, to grow, to improve. But YOUR style is necessary. The community needs your contribution! We have all heard the sayings about snowflakes: no two are alike. The same goes for artistic styles. To try and imitate or duplicate what someone else is doing, is robbing yourself and the world of all the beautiful work you have to offer! Do what moves you. Embrace your style, it’s yours and it’s beautiful.

The next time you feel cake envy kicking in, pull up this article. Remind yourself you have just as much to offer the community as anybody else. We are ALL needed! We are ALL valuable. We are ALL good!

Until next time; happy caking!

Sharon
Sugared Productions Online School

The post You don’t have to be like “them” to be great! appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

I’m bringing back an older post from the archives due to it’s high popularity. A  fun project I made for my son’s graduation last year. See how I made it:

I was very pressed for time in getting it done, as well as preparing for the big party we threw for him, so this is not a high quality professional photo tutorial by any means.

It is more of an explanation of how I created the cake with a few craptastic photos that I took added in. This in no way represents the quality of tutorials I deliver in my online cake decorating school, LOL.

The method that I used would not apply to every letter of the alphabet, but hopefully you will be able to take away some techniques from this tutorial that you can apply to other cakes. So here we go!

 (click to enlarge:)

The diagram above basically shows how the cake was constructed. The very bottom portion was Styrofoam cut from a 2 inch thick sheet cake dummy. Because the bottom of the letter has those cut angles on each side, I wanted to be sure that the base was strong enough to support the weight of the tall side of the J. I put a piece of regular cake cardboard on top of the Styrofoam for food safety reasons. Then I built the cake above that. This cake was about 17 inches tall, and after it was ganached and covered in modeling chocolate it was about 3 inches deep, (front to back). So it was basically a very tall and skinny cake. (caps and I would say it served 15 – 20).

I baked 2 inch high dense chocolate cakes in two pans: a 9 x 13 and a 12 x 18. I overfilled the pans so the cakes would bake over the top, so that when I leveled the cakes they would be as close to 2 inches tall as possible. I then cut pieces from those sheet cakes as I built the cake.

I used ¼ inch foam core to support the “tiers” of the cake. I did not want to go any higher than 6 inches of cake without internal support. I used bubble tea straws for support as indicated in the diagram above.

NOTE: I built the cake while it was actually lying flat on its back on a big board. Then I ganached it, partially covered it in modeling chocolate. And not until then did I stand it up, secure to the base board and finish it. You will see more of this process in the photos that follow.

I made a paper template in the actual size I wanted the finished cake to be. (photo above). I then used this as a guide to to make the foamcore ganache templates, and also used this as a guide to build the cake.

The photo above shows the section of Styrofoam cut out for the bottom of the cake. IMPORTANT: the size of this Styrofoam base is about a1/4 -1/2 inch smaller all the way around than the paper template itself.

The reason for that is that there has to be enough room around the cake, once built, to apply a thick layer of ganache. If you cut this Styrofoam piece exactly the same size as the template, and build the rest of the cake to the exact measurements of your paper template, you will have no room for ganache later when you use the cardboard templates.

Above you see two templates made from one quarter inch foam core. These were my ganache boards. These were covered in press and seal plastic wrap, and used as the guide for the bench scraper to ganache the cake after it was built.

This next portion I am going to explain, I do not have process photos of:

I built the cake lying flat on the bottom foamcore template. I had the entire thing lying on the larger foamcore board (that you see in the photo below). Once the cake was all “stacked” and built, I then put a layer of ganache on the entire top surface of the cake. While the ganache was still very soft, I put the top foamcore template (covered in press and seal) on it and pressed firmly down. I used a level while pressing down on the top template to get it as level as possible. I then left it alone for a while so the ganache would firm up. Then I took a larger foamcore board and put it on top of the entire cake and flipped the entire project over. I removed the previously bottom, but now on top, foamcore template. Repeated the process of applying a layer of ganache, putting the (press and seal covered) template board back on, pressing firmly and getting it level. I left that to set up until firm.

Then I ganached the sides of the cake and used the edges of the two templates on the top and bottom of the cake to guide my bench scraper, to give me the sharp outline of the letter. (We have instructional videos in our online school on making spreadable ganache, as well as using two template boards like this to create a perfect shell.)

I put a very thick layer of ganache on all sides of the cake, because I wanted it to be super stable once I stood it up. I wasn’t sure how the cake was going to react to standing up straight, so I went really heavy with the coating of ganache. (You can see here why it is important that the Styrofoam base and the entire cake once built, was smaller than the actual template boards. It left space for ganache to be applied around the outer perimeter of the cake.)

Remember that the top and bottom templates are covered in press and seal plastic wrap. The smooth sides of the plastic wrapped templates are against the ganache. Once the whole cake was covered in ganache, (as you  see in the photo above), I left it overnight to totally set up. The next day, the templates popped right off and I repaired any divots in the surface of the ganache with some fresh ganache and let that set up totally before starting to cover the cake.

Next came the covering of the cake. I decided to use modeling chocolate so that I would have more workability time and be able to blend seams and such better than if I had used fondant. In retrospect, I’m not sure I would do that again. The modeling chocolate showed a lot of blemishes and was rather “delicate”. I wonder if I could have gotten a cleaner looking surface using fondant with tylose. (I realize that these photos do not show the imperfections in the surface of the cake, but there were many.)

Back to the covering of the cake: I first covered the sides of the letter. I rolled out strips of modeling chocolate and wrapped them around the sides of the cake. I did not cover the whole perimeter of the cake in one strip of modeling chocolate. I did it in sections and placed the seams in the inside corners of the letter as indicated in the photo above. Next, I covered the top surface with modeling chocolate, trimmed it, and blended the seems joining the side strips to the top piece with my finger.

Note: notice in the photo above that I did not cover the Styrofoam at the base of the cake. I did not want to stand the cake up onto modeling chocolate, because the weight of the cake would have caused it to squoosh out the bottom and not given a clean look.

Then it was time to stand the cake up. I slid the cake a bit so that the bottom edge of the Styrofoam was even with the bottom of the rectangular cardboard you see in the picture above. Then I put my hand under that cardboard and used that to stand the cake straight up onto the wood grain fondant covered baseboard. I put some melted white chocolate on the cake board where the bottom of the J would be standing on it.

Here is the back of the letter, right after the cake was stood up onto the board. Two wooden dowels were then driven through the cake and down into the baseboard as indicated above. I decided not to put a long wooden dowel down the tall side of the J because I was not traveling with this cake. If I were going to have to bring it to another venue, I would recommend doweling that side too. That being said, the cake was pretty stable once it was all assembled. I think the ginormous amount of ganache surrounding the cake made it very stable.

To cover the back of the cake: I rolled out modeling chocolate onto a piece of foam core, popped that into the freezer for about 10 min., then cut out the letter shape using my paper template. I popped that back into the freezer for another 7 min. or so to get it super firm. I used shortening, applied liberally, (as you can see in the photo above), as the glue to hold the back panel on. The back panel was very firm from being in the freezer, so I just stood it up and attached it to the back of the cake, being careful not to put too much pressure onto the precariously standing cake. I then used my fingers to smooth the seam where the back panel and the side strips of modeling chocolate met.

Here is a photo of the cake after it is standing up and doweled into the baseboard. The holes on the top of the cake created from the wooden dowels were plugged with little pieces of modeling chocolate and blended in as well as possible. (However, they were visible.)

NOTE: I wanted the front of the cake to have some dimension and have that “collegiate font” look. So I actually created another panel with red modeling chocolate in the shape of the J, but made it a bit smaller then the front of the cake. I applied that to the front of the cake, then I outlined that with black fondant using the semicircle disc of my clay gun.

NOTE: the woodgrain fondant board was made by putting fondant onto a cake drum. I scored it to create planks, used a wood grain impression mat, and painted it with airbrush color diluted with vodka. Once that was dry, I dusted it with brown petal dusts to give it more dimension. Glued a 5/8 inch black ribbon around the side of the board. (We have video tutorials on woodgrain boards as well in our online school. Shameless plug #2, LOL)

This photo shows the (broken) tassel laying on the board after we cut the cake. The tassel was made using a clay gun. I built it on an 18 gauge wire in the shape of an upside down L. That allowed me to insert the wire into the front of the cake, to give the illusion that the tassel was actually dangling in front of the cake. ( The wire was coated in white chocolate before being inserted into the cake.)

The bulldog was simply an edible image applied to a piece of fondant, and allowed to dry to create a plaque.

Now to cutting and serving:

The first piece was cut where indicated.

Then cut horizontally right along the top of the ¼ foamcore board that was holding up the top portion of the cake.

Continued to serve the top portion.

Then after the top foam core support board was removed, I just cut across to create pieces from the tall side of the cake. You can see the wooden dowel sticking out on the shorter side. All the cake has been served on that shorter side and right under that little bit of brown is the Styrofoam.

(I call this an action shot. I was moving so fast, the camera couldn’t keep up with me!) Terribly blurry picture, but you can see me removing a bubble tea straw as I came across it while serving.

Cake to ganache ratio is ridiculous. I did have emergency syringes of insulin on standby.

And in case that wasn’t enough sugar, I served it with whipped cream and caramel sauce I had 911 on speed dial.

If you look close enough, you can see the patch on the top of the modeling chocolate where the other wooden dowel was inserted. They were  visible and it did bug me LOL. The way to avoid that would have been to stand up the cake and dowel it to the baseboard before any modeling chocolate was applied. But I did not want to cover the entire cake with modeling chocolate in the standing position, so I chose the lesser of two evils. (But the patches still bugged me, LOL)

_____________________________________________________________

And so that is it! I hope that this gave you enough information to help you to try to create your own tall, skinny standing cake.

Check out my online cake decorating school!

 $5 for 30 days of full membership. Use coupon code OFF50 

www.sugaredproductions.com

Happy Caking!

Sharon
 

NOLA Photography http://bentzphotography.com/

The post 3D Standing Letter… in Cake! appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

I want to share with you this cake I made for my son’s high school graduation. I was very pressed for time in getting it done, as well as preparing for the big party we threw for him, so this is not a high quality professional photo tutorial by any means.

It is more of an explanation of how I created the cake with a few craptastic photos that I took added in. This in no way represents the quality of tutorials I deliver in my online cake decorating school, LOL.

The method that I used would not apply to every letter of the alphabet, but hopefully you will be able to take away some techniques from this tutorial that you can apply to other cakes. So here we go!

 (click to enlarge:)

The diagram above basically shows how the cake was constructed. The very bottom portion was Styrofoam cut from a 2 inch thick sheet cake dummy. Because the bottom of the letter has those cut angles on each side, I wanted to be sure that the base was strong enough to support the weight of the tall side of the J. I put a piece of regular cake cardboard on top of the Styrofoam for food safety reasons. Then I built the cake above that. This cake was about 17 inches tall, and after it was ganached and covered in modeling chocolate it was about 3 inches deep, (front to back). So it was basically a very tall and skinny cake. (caps and I would say it served 15 – 20).

I baked 2 inch high dense chocolate cakes in two pans: a 9 x 13 and a 12 x 18. I overfilled the pans so the cakes would bake over the top, so that when I leveled the cakes they would be as close to 2 inches tall as possible. I then cut pieces from those sheet cakes as I built the cake.

I used ¼ inch foam core to support the “tiers” of the cake. I did not want to go any higher than 6 inches of cake without internal support. I used bubble tea straws for support as indicated in the diagram above.

NOTE: I built the cake while it was actually lying flat on its back on a big board. Then I ganached it, partially covered it in modeling chocolate. And not until then did I stand it up, secure to the base board and finish it. You will see more of this process in the photos that follow.

I made a paper template in the actual size I wanted the finished cake to be. (photo above). I then used this as a guide to to make the foamcore ganache templates, and also used this as a guide to build the cake.

The photo above shows the section of Styrofoam cut out for the bottom of the cake. IMPORTANT: the size of this Styrofoam base is about a1/4 -1/2 inch smaller all the way around than the paper template itself.

The reason for that is that there has to be enough room around the cake, once built, to apply a thick layer of ganache. If you cut this Styrofoam piece exactly the same size as the template, and build the rest of the cake to the exact measurements of your paper template, you will have no room for ganache later when you use the cardboard templates.

Above you see two templates made from one quarter inch foam core. These were my ganache boards. These were covered in press and seal plastic wrap, and used as the guide for the bench scraper to ganache the cake after it was built.

This next portion I am going to explain, I do not have process photos of:

I built the cake lying flat on the bottom foamcore template. I had the entire thing lying on the larger foamcore board (that you see in the photo below). Once the cake was all “stacked” and built, I then put a layer of ganache on the entire top surface of the cake. While the ganache was still very soft, I put the top foamcore template (covered in press and seal) on it and pressed firmly down. I used a level while pressing down on the top template to get it as level as possible. I then left it alone for a while so the ganache would firm up. Then I took a larger foamcore board and put it on top of the entire cake and flipped the entire project over. I removed the previously bottom, but now on top, foamcore template. Repeated the process of applying a layer of ganache, putting the (press and seal covered) template board back on, pressing firmly and getting it level. I left that to set up until firm.

Then I ganached the sides of the cake and used the edges of the two templates on the top and bottom of the cake to guide my bench scraper, to give me the sharp outline of the letter. (We have instructional videos in our online school on making spreadable ganache, as well as using two template boards like this to create a perfect shell.)

I put a very thick layer of ganache on all sides of the cake, because I wanted it to be super stable once I stood it up. I wasn’t sure how the cake was going to react to standing up straight, so I went really heavy with the coating of ganache. (You can see here why it is important that the Styrofoam base and the entire cake once built, was smaller than the actual template boards. It left space for ganache to be applied around the outer perimeter of the cake.)

Remember that the top and bottom templates are covered in press and seal plastic wrap. The smooth sides of the plastic wrapped templates are against the ganache. Once the whole cake was covered in ganache, (as you  see in the photo above), I left it overnight to totally set up. The next day, the templates popped right off and I repaired any divots in the surface of the ganache with some fresh ganache and let that set up totally before starting to cover the cake.

Next came the covering of the cake. I decided to use modeling chocolate so that I would have more workability time and be able to blend seams and such better than if I had used fondant. In retrospect, I’m not sure I would do that again. The modeling chocolate showed a lot of blemishes and was rather “delicate”. I wonder if I could have gotten a cleaner looking surface using fondant with tylose. (I realize that these photos do not show the imperfections in the surface of the cake, but there were many.)

Back to the covering of the cake: I first covered the sides of the letter. I rolled out strips of modeling chocolate and wrapped them around the sides of the cake. I did not cover the whole perimeter of the cake in one strip of modeling chocolate. I did it in sections and placed the seams in the inside corners of the letter as indicated in the photo above. Next, I covered the top surface with modeling chocolate, trimmed it, and blended the seems joining the side strips to the top piece with my finger.

Note: notice in the photo above that I did not cover the Styrofoam at the base of the cake. I did not want to stand the cake up onto modeling chocolate, because the weight of the cake would have caused it to squoosh out the bottom and not given a clean look.

Then it was time to stand the cake up. I slid the cake a bit so that the bottom edge of the Styrofoam was even with the bottom of the rectangular cardboard you see in the picture above. Then I put my hand under that cardboard and used that to stand the cake straight up onto the wood grain fondant covered baseboard. I put some melted white chocolate on the cake board where the bottom of the J would be standing on it.

Here is the back of the letter, right after the cake was stood up onto the board. Two wooden dowels were then driven through the cake and down into the baseboard as indicated above. I decided not to put a long wooden dowel down the tall side of the J because I was not traveling with this cake. If I were going to have to bring it to another venue, I would recommend doweling that side too. That being said, the cake was pretty stable once it was all assembled. I think the ginormous amount of ganache surrounding the cake made it very stable.

To cover the back of the cake: I rolled out modeling chocolate onto a piece of foam core, popped that into the freezer for about 10 min., then cut out the letter shape using my paper template. I popped that back into the freezer for another 7 min. or so to get it super firm. I used shortening, applied liberally, (as you can see in the photo above), as the glue to hold the back panel on. The back panel was very firm from being in the freezer, so I just stood it up and attached it to the back of the cake, being careful not to put too much pressure onto the precariously standing cake. I then used my fingers to smooth the seam where the back panel and the side strips of modeling chocolate met.

Here is a photo of the cake after it is standing up and doweled into the baseboard. The holes on the top of the cake created from the wooden dowels were plugged with little pieces of modeling chocolate and blended in as well as possible. (However, they were visible.)

NOTE: I wanted the front of the cake to have some dimension and have that “collegiate font” look. So I actually created another panel with red modeling chocolate in the shape of the J, but made it a bit smaller then the front of the cake. I applied that to the front of the cake, then I outlined that with black fondant using the semicircle disc of my clay gun.

NOTE: the woodgrain fondant board was made by putting fondant onto a cake drum. I scored it to create planks, used a wood grain impression mat, and painted it with airbrush color diluted with vodka. Once that was dry, I dusted it with brown petal dusts to give it more dimension. Glued a 5/8 inch black ribbon around the side of the board. (We have video tutorials on woodgrain boards as well in our online school. Shameless plug #2, LOL)

This photo shows the (broken) tassel laying on the board after we cut the cake. The tassel was made using a clay gun. I built it on an 18 gauge wire in the shape of an upside down L. That allowed me to insert the wire into the front of the cake, to give the illusion that the tassel was actually dangling in front of the cake. ( The wire was coated in white chocolate before being inserted into the cake.)

The bulldog was simply an edible image applied to a piece of fondant, and allowed to dry to create a plaque.

Now to cutting and serving:

The first piece was cut where indicated.

Then cut horizontally right along the top of the ¼ foamcore board that was holding up the top portion of the cake.

Continued to serve the top portion.

Then after the top foam core support board was removed, I just cut across to create pieces from the tall side of the cake. You can see the wooden dowel sticking out on the shorter side. All the cake has been served on that shorter side and right under that little bit of brown is the Styrofoam.

(I call this an action shot. I was moving so fast, the camera couldn’t keep up with me!) Terribly blurry picture, but you can see me removing a bubble tea straw as I came across it while serving.

Cake to ganache ratio is ridiculous. I did have emergency syringes of insulin on standby.

And in case that wasn’t enough sugar, I served it with whipped cream and caramel sauce I had 911 on speed dial.

If you look close enough, you can see the patch on the top of the modeling chocolate where the other wooden dowel was inserted. They were  visible and it did bug me LOL. The way to avoid that would have been to stand up the cake and dowel it to the baseboard before any modeling chocolate was applied. But I did not want to cover the entire cake with modeling chocolate in the standing position, so I chose the lesser of two evils. (But the patches still bugged me, LOL)

_____________________________________________________________

And so that is it! I hope that this gave you enough information to help you to try to create your own tall, skinny standing cake.

Please consider joining our online school!

 $5 for 30 days of full membership. Use coupon code OFF50 

www.sugaredproductions.com

Happy Caking!

Sharon

The post Standing Letter Cake appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

It’s time for Mardi Gras down here in New Orleans!  Another excuse to indulge in yummy treats ;)!  This year, I have found some really great recipes to help you celebrate!

This first one is from my very own big sister, Barbara!

From SugarEd Productions:

Mardi Gras King Cake

AND we have a full length video tutorial on how to make this iconic cake in our online school. Here is a preview:

From Amanda Rettke of The Food Network:

Mardi Gras Hi-hat Cupcakes

From Baked Bree:

King Cake Cookies

From Catch My Party:

Mardi Gras Printables

From Spicy Southern Kitchen

Mardi Gras Monkey Bread

From Dixie Delights:

Throw Me Something, Mister!  Cocktail

From Sweetopia:

Mardi Gras Mask Cookies

From Sweet Pea’s Kitchen:

Mardi Gras Cupcakes

From NOLA Mommy:

King Cake Cookies

From Plain Chicken:

Easy King Cake Knots

From Myrecipes.com:

Mini King Cupcakes

From Bakingdom:

Topsy Turvy Mardi Gras Cupcakes

Wow!  So many cute (and yummy) ideas!  I hope you are able to try a few of these and have fun celebrating Mardi Gras!  I’m off to another parade!

Happy Mardi Gras!

Sharon!

The post Celebrating Mardi Gras Round Up appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

I hope you all are having a great summer so far. Down here is NOLA it is hot and humid as always! I hope those of you that were in the path of the recent tornadoes and bad storms are doing ok, and that the effects were minimal. I pray daily for those who sustained injury to home or person.

Well, graduation season is just ending, so I thought I would post a picture of this cake I had to get done really quickly. (And I apologize for the low quality cell phone pic at that.)

My oldest son has graduated from college this summer (how in the heck is THAT possible?) He has 3 cousins also graduating from high school and college, so my sister in law and I combined them all into one big crawfish boil/BBQ party.

There were 3 schools, 5 colors, 2 genders, and 4 graduates I had to incorporate all into one cake somehow. And I had to do it in 48 hours. I have been so insanely busy getting the new online cake decorating school website ready, (more on that coming very soon!), I just did not have a lot of time to do stuff ahead of time. So I went for a clean and simple design incorporating the 3 schools and the graduates’ names.

I applied colored fondant bands with coordinating trim, each tier representing the color of one of the schools. I used clip art of the school logos and printed them out onto edible icing sheets. I applied those to a fondant backing and let the plaques dry firm overnight. The next day I applied them to the bands with melted white chocolate. (Be aware of summer heat of you use chocolate as glue!)

I used this JEM alphabet cutter set to make the names. I made the black hat by cutting out a grad hat silhouette shape from black fondant with some tylose added, and let that dry until firm. I put that into my food dehydrator to speed up the process and make it very hard. I glued sucker sticks to the back and inserted that into the top of the cake.

A few fondant curly ques and balls were the finishing festive touch.

Not an overly complicated design, and even with all the opposing colors, it still seemed to work. The grads loved it, so that is all that counts, right?

I hope all of your grad cakes are a huge success this year. Enjoy the summer and have fun with your family and friends when you can.

I will be back soon with a post letting you know more details about our online school opening soon. We will have a library of new and exclusive  photo and video tutorials, recipes, articles, a message forum, photo galleries, and lots more for our members to enjoy. Stay tuned and sign up for our newsletter here to be kept up to date on all the news!

Happy Caking Everyone!

Sharon

The post Quickie Graduation Cake appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

It is Mardi Gras down here in New Orleans. One of my very favorite times of the year. Great family fun going to the parades and watching all the wonderful marching bands perform while trying to catch all the goodies thrown off the floats. I wish you could all come down here and experience it with me.

But even if you can’t come down and see it, you can still enjoy a bit of Mardi Gras at home by making your own King Cake! My sister Barbara is the master of homemade king cake, so let’s visit the blog archive where she will take you step by step through the process to ensure your success.

KING CAKE POST HERE

You can find the plastic king cake babies several places online like here.  Note: be sure to tell the king cakers to be on the lookout for the baby to avoid choking.

I hope you guys give it a try. If you do, let me know how it turned out!

Happy Mardi Gras!

Sharon

The post King Cake! appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

Those of you that follow me on facebook  know that I have a new love in my life.  My new schnoodle puppy, Lucy. We have never had a dog before, only cats, so this is quite a different experience. All I can say is that we are head over heels, over the moon, crazy in love with our sweet little girl.

She has the best personality and temperament,  is smart and trains quickly, and is simply off the charts cute. Some of my Facebook friends think I might be a little obsessed with her, but that’s just nuts. Just because I post pictures of her every day, have bought her an entire wardrobe of doggy clothes, and hand feed her food with a platinum spoon does not make one obsessed.

So look at my cute baby in her Halloween costume! Lucy the candy corn witch:

 Are you dying of cuteness ?

Since my other obsession is cakes and confections, as soon as I put her in the costume I had an inspiration for a cute idea: candy corn witch hat cake bites. But I did not have any cake baked. I had brownies baked. So I used them instead. (See my last post about being lazy busy.)

Let me show you how I made them:

You will need candy coating (any brand) in the colors you like, or start with white and color it with oil based candy colors.

I wanted a former to make the hats, because I knew hand forming them would not give me the precise and uniform look I wanted. I was going to use those pointy paper cups that you see at the water cooler, but could not find any. So I thought I would try using ice cream cones themselves to form the hat tops, but when I opened the box I saw the styro protector they were in, and that looked perfect to try.  So I cut off a piece from the top to the size I needed.

Shown here are the two halves of the protector, separated. I took a wad of brownie and mushed it up really well. It was very sticky so I rolled it in powdered sugar, and laid it in the former. (I know it looks kind of gross, but it is Halloween after all!)

Then I closed the former, so that it encased the brownie mixture, and packed it down in the center with my finger.

 Next I inserted a long toothpick down into the brownie.

When you open the former you have a perfect cone shape. Also note I made a mark on the inside of the former so I would fill all of them to the same height.

Use the toothpick to dip the brownie into white candy coating and let all the excess drip off.

I put the candy coating into paper cups (bathroom size) to make the dipping easy.

 Stick the coated cone into some styro to dry fully.

When the white coat is dry, take the cone off of the toothpick and hold it at the point.

Dip into the orange chocolate to make that layer. Allow the excess to drip off.

Stick it back on the toothpick to fully dry. Then repeat with the yellow coat.

I made the hat brims with yellow candy coating poured into the bottom of muffin pans. Pop into freezer for 5-7 minutes and they come right out the pan. (I promise this pan is clean, just well used and stained.)

I used black fondant to cut strips with a strip cutter to form the hat band and tiny bow.

I was not sure if my idea translated the way I wanted it to, so I asked my son if he knew what these were, giving him no clues. He said they looked like hazard cones. That is now burned into my mind, and when I look at them I can see nothing else. Dang kid; no Halloween candy for him!

 Caution: construction ahead! Oh wait, that’s not right.

 Cute Halloween brownie bites!

 Sweet Lucy the candy corn witch.

 Cute candy corn hazard cones witch hats.

They were easy and fun. If you are not into the hazard cone theme, these would be great in traditional colors of black, or a combo of black, green and purple, or black and orange…..

I also see some Christmas trees done this way in our future.

Let me know if you try them!

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And in the interest of full disclosure, here is what Lucy really thought of her Halloween costume:

 HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!

Sharon

www.sugaredproductions.com

 Thank you to Katharine Bentz Photography for the beautiful photos. (Yes, the craptastic ones are mine.)

The post Witch Hat Brownie Bites appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.

Hello Sugar Friends!!

I hope you all are doing well and had a wonderful 4th of July. God bless this wonderful country we are so fortunate to live in.

I know it has been a really long time since I made a blog post.  Things have been just insane behind the scenes here. We have been filming heavily, as well as creating other forms of content, in preparation for opening our new online membership site. It has been a full time job, but I am very excited about all the wonderful things we will have to offer you there.  We still have some tweaking to do in regard to the website, but we are optimistic we will open before the end of this year.

Once we open, we will be adding new content weekly, in the form of new and exclusive video and photo tutorials, articles related to baking, running a business, food safety, and cake photography. We will have a message forum, photo gallery, recipes, weekly games and prizes, and periodic live web cast demonstrations. We also have some guest video instructors lined up that I am sure you will be very excited to see on our new beautiful set with me!

We are working very hard to build the best cake decorating community we possibly can for you. We value and appreciate each and every one of you. Our mission is to provide the highest quality cake decorating instruction possible at a valuable price. We have the most loyal and wonderful customers in the world, and we love you!

Here is a sneak peak of just a few of the many new videos we will will be adding to the new site….

So be sure to subscribe to our blog and newsletter (entry form on homepage) to be kept up to date on all the newest happenings!

Keep on caking and hope to see you on the inside in a few months!

Sharon 

The post Checking In appeared first on Sugared Productions Blog.