Sweetheart Cake with Rhinestones

We did this lovely "Sweethearts" cake for a birthday party this past weekend. It features a pearl luster finish over the entire cake, heart appliques, and rhinestones.

http://www.sublimebakery.com/

Thirteenth Birthday Cake

We did this sweet little cake for a thirteenth birthday party last week. Pink, black and white color theme, with stripes and dots, bursting balls topper and name banner.

http://www.sublimebakery.com/

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

Like most Pastry Chefs and Cake Designers, I have loads of cool tools and gadgets in my bakery kitchen. Some are used for very specific tasks or techniques and are used rarely. Others are absolutely indispensable on a daily basis. Below are a few that I can't live without.

Bench Scraper:

This is my Favorite of favorite tools in my kitchen. I use it to gather and portion doughs including scones and pate sucree. It's the preferred "knife" for cutting our gooey S'Mores Bars and dense Sublime Bars. And it is the ultimate buttercream smoother when icing cakes. There are many bench scrapers on the market and I've tried most of them. This is the best. It has a solid wood handle that fits well in the hand, a strong stainless steel blade, and most importantly, a sharp 90 degree angle at the outer edge. If I had to run my bakery on the proverbial desert island, this is the one tool I'd take with me :-)

Syruping Bottle:I trained under a Pastry Chef with a classical French background so I use many techniques in my kitchen that are tres Francaise. I always syrup my cake layers before torting. I can't tell you how many pastry brush "hairs" I had to pick off of cakes before I discovered this beautiful tool. It's a syruping bottle and it has tiny little holes in the rubber top and volume measurements on the side you can squeeze out just the right amount of syrup "rain" onto your cake. I LOVE this tool!

Propane Torch:

I've used kitchen torches for years. You know the fancy little ones from the kitchen shop catalogues? I always had to have one of those. Well, this propane torch from the hardware store kicks butt over those other torches. In addition to browning meringues and brulee-ing your creme, this thing is awesome for helping cakes release from their pans (turn the pan over and torch the bottom to heat it up, the cake will slip right out) and glossing ganache. The propane tank on this thing is HUGE, I've used it every day at Sublime for 3 months and I haven't changed the tank yet. And the best part? It costs under $20!!

www.sublimebakery.com

Where it All Began

People often ask me how I learned to bake. Did I have a gourmet mother who set a daily example of culinary excellence? Or a grandmother who taught me all her secret recipes and old-school techniques? No. And no. Mom was the "cake-from-a-box" and "dinner-in-a-casserole-dish" type. And both grandmas lived several hundred miles away. So I taught myself from books and I started early on experimenting with recipes.

When I was about 9 I received my first cookbook, Betty Crocker's Cookbook for Boys and Girls. I made only one recipe from the book, "Favorite Brownies". I made it over and over and over. This one page is yellowed with age, creased and smudged, with a dog-eared corner. The rest of the pages are still pristine and white, having rarely seen the light of day. After a while I started to make changes and additions to this basic brownie recipe, learning through trial and error how to be creative with baking. Eventually I settled on my signature recipe. I made it for friends and family, boyfriends and teachers. I even made it for my priest.

Over the years I have tried many brownie recipes but I always come back to my reliable variation on the basic Betty Crocker. At Sublime Bakery we make an amped-up version of the basic, adding espresso and cinnamon to my original signature recipe.

I still have my first cookbook, it has traveled far and wide with me and now lives on the bookshelf of my office at Sublime Bakery.

Yoda

Guess who...

We created a 3-Dimensional bust of the STAR WARS character Yoda for a surprise 40th birthday party this weekend. Inside is our popular Peanut Butter and Jelly flavor combination. My client tells me that her husband, the birthday "boy", is a huge STAR WARS fan, and I have to admit, I am too. I grew up watching the classic trilogy. Han Solo was my favorite character (I'm a sucker for a tall, dark and handsome rebel!) but Yoda was always a close second.

May the force be with you!!

http://www.sublimebakery.com/

Truman's Safari

We did this fun Safari-themed birthday cake for a client whose son turned 2 this weekend.

Naughty or Nice?

We have two new items in our pastry case this week:

"Naughty" Chocolate Mousse with Whipped Cream and a Gilded Macadamia Nut,

and a "Nice" Organic Yogurt, Fresh Fruit and Granola Parfait.

Which will you choose?

www.sublimebakery.com