Choctastic for Chocoholics

So, Lisa contacted me again after I had done a gorgeous 8" chocolatey chocolate cake for her Dad's 60th birthday...

A friend of hers wanted the same for a 70th birthday, except she wanted 2-Tiers (an 8" on a 10") brilliant!

Chocolate overload & some, you see the original cake I'd done for Lisa's Dad was a chocolate square sponge, filled & covered with delicious chocolate ganache, then adorned round the edge with Cadbury chocolate fingers & topped with Malteasers.

This 2-Tier was to be identical. Bare in mind the original cake took 600g of chocolate in the ganache, 3 boxes of fingers & just over a box of malteasers. This 2-Tier took 1.2kg of chocolate for ganache, 7 boxes of fingers & 3 boxes of malteasers... Plus obviously the chocolate sponges too!

Now this week has been particularly trying in the kitchen as I've had so much on, cakes, house, chores, school, appointments, clubs - it's been full on & some... So there were a couple of glitches along the way, but I do feel despite the occasional panic attack & error, as fraught as it may be I deal well under pressure.

We've all enjoyed the excess chocolate cake, so none went to waste! Want to know the gory details where errors occurred?!

First off on bake day my 8" sunk in the middle quite drastically, I had a mass baking 6" sandwiches, 8" sandwiches, 8" square, 10" square, 12" square... I accidentally opened the wrong oven 5 mins before end baking, wouldn't have been a problem on the right oven - alas the top oven had 15 mins left, so epic fail.

So then another 8" square needed baking from scratch... Not a problem, got that sorted & all was back on schedule.

So day 1 of ganache process first layer to fill, cover, set... 8" goes perfectly to plan, then on to the 10" - argh, as I unwrap it from cling film & move it to torte (slice in half, to fill) 1/3 breaks off! Eeeeeek, panic! So instead of my usual Thursday night karaoke jaunty to de-stress, I'm on a mad dash to Tesco for more butter & eggs then up all night baking a new 10" square!!!

So yesterday was a mad decorating day & some, I had to torte, fill, cover, set the 10" & while that was setting I started work on the 12" Victoria square - this was a last minute corporate cake for a 25th year anniversary that I took on for a friend Jan, made sense as Duncan is providing the entertainment for their celebrations.

So the Victoria is filled, jammed, layered, crumb coated & put in the fridge to set, while the chocolate 8" & 10" are out to have their second ganache coats, the 10" I had pre-dowel'd worth the first ganache coat (so it stoopid support the top tier). My kitchen smelt heavenly, so deliciously chocolatey!

I then second coat ganache'd the 10", stacked on the 8" & second coat ganache'd that top... I then had to Malteaser & Cadbury finger the beast! As you can imagine, I had to work pretty fast before the ganache set & so that the malteasers & fingers did not melt (advantages of having cold hands). But yes, I managed it before the school pick-up!

All that was left was ribboning & some fondant work to the board, what a choctastic success - it looked absolutely fabulous!!!

Just so you know, the 12" corporate cake was finished yesterday evening too & looks totally wonderful too... But you can judge both by the photos x

posted from Bloggeroid

Shaped Pans... I have 2!!!

What's the title all about? Well quite basically shaped cake pans!

I currently own 2 myself, a Wilton Giant Cupcake & a Wilton 3D Skull... I love them, just wish I got to use them more - still the Skull is very new for me & Halloween is upon us soon, with a couple of cakes to knock out!!!

I've made a fair few Giant Cupcakes, but not done 1 for a while... I may actually attempt a Christmas version, just because I've not seen anyone do this - I wonder if it's possible to bake a rich fruit cake in the tin?! Not so sure about lining the top, but should be able to line the base ok.

Without further a do, here's a couple of pictures of some of the Giant Cuppies I've previously made & my Skull! Enjoy.....

         

Never enough time...

Well, I never seem to have enough to do all that needs doing in a day that is for sure!


Today I have been literally sat at the laptop since, I did the chores & had my shower, I've been updating & trying to get content on my website you see...  I am sure people that look at websites think it is a 2 second job & everything is just there for you - WRONG!!!


It takes an absolute age, or maybe that is just me?!  I've been amending pages, getting rid of 'SPAM' comments (I'm so glad they're saved for approval before going live, more about that in a different blog), trying to add photos to my galleries (that hasn't happened, so need to get assistance from my friend Lorraine) it all just takes so long & you feel like you are getting nowhere... well that's how I feel about it.


It's so disheartening, as I really want to make my website look beautiful & add photos etc, but it just doesn't seem to get very far along at all.  Still bestie had a look around & left a comment for my guest book that I approved - So at least I have 3 guest book comments now, some news for the latest news page, I've linked this blog to the site, changed the sites header logo, edited the text on the home page & managed to put the correct picture to Lorraine's testimonial.  Doesn't sound like much does it?!


It took all afternoon though as I was trying & trying to upload pictures to the cupcake gallery but to no avail, it will be fully photo functioning one day - no idea when that day will come though as like my title suggests, there just isn't enough hours in the day!!!


Anyway, if you would like to take a look at my incomplete website, you can find it here: So·phis·ti·cakez!