domestic goddess

Gong Xi Fa Cai

2012-01-20T17:04:00.001+08:00

Just finished baking the last batch of Oriental Sugee Cakes for this year's Chinese New Year orders. Phiew! It's been a short and busy first month of the year. It seemed only a short time ago that we were busy with Christmas and now, the lunar new year celebration beckons. We're off to Penang for a week and I will be back in my kitchen even before I've had enough of pineapple tarts! Here's wishing you a happy and prosperous year ahead with the Water Dragon *showering upon us!
* water signifies $$$$$$ ;-)

Superheros

2012-01-20T16:38:00.002+08:00

I had to do a comic strip speech bubble for this cake! The cake was serving as a platform to feature this young superhero's favourites namely Superman, Spiderman, Batman and Ultraman. This small (slightly over 2kg) two-tiered Chocolate Fudge cake was simply decorated with a skyline of cutouts so that mum can place the 4 toy figurines on the cake itself. Emblems associated with each of those superheros were manually cut-out (eyes crossed by the time I finished them). Superman was supposed to stand near the speech bubble to personally wish Shahjahan a very Happy Birthday! Still waiting for mum's pictures on the cake with the toys on the cake.

Superman

Spiderman

Batman

Ultraman

Angry Birds Ver.2

2012-01-20T16:26:00.000+08:00

Apparently, this fowl-flinging game is one of the most popular game to date with over 300million downloads and gamers play something like 200million minutes a day! I have 2 versions of the game on my 'gadgets' and thankfully, both my children aren't hooked on them. Both the MOTH and I had to kinda learn the game from them and see for ourselves what the big deal was. Well, it's a straightforward game that challenges you with physics- something I have no clue of... and I guess, its appeal is in the satisfaction of killing something???? Anyway, this small Devil's Food Cake of 1.3kg was for a small child of 2....hmmmm

A Clinelle Christmas

2011-12-30T23:46:00.003+08:00

Found this photo lurking in a folder of this year's Christmas cakes. Been baking so much that I've forgotten about this cake. An ex-colleague called up a couple of days before his office function checking if I was baking for Christmas. Well, yes and despite not fitting in any more cakes for the season, I had to do this for him. He's dear to me because he pretty much was the only one who supported and appreciated the fact that I was quitting my much-loved job to stay at home. The one thing I appreciated most from him was his gift of a huge and heavy organic cookbook. Organic produce wasn't something you can find as easily now as 11 years ago. That book was most informative and it was something I held on to, something I could look forward to doing while embarking on the unknown territories of a stay-home mum. I had something to work on- learn about organic produce, cooking and baking organic food for my little family. After all these years, our home diet is nearly 70% organic (it's still hard to get genuine organic products to replace everything here!) and I only bake organic breads, cakes and pies for our personal consumption. Much thanks to you, Ben for helping me set my path to wellness so early in the days when it wasn't even popular!

2011 Christmas

2011-12-26T21:40:00.005+08:00

What a month this has been! The year-end term holidays began almost 6 weeks ago. I said to myself that I'll slow down, give myself a real rested holiday this time round and dedicate most of those days to entertaining the children. There were enough advance party cake orders for the month and Christmas orders were expected, so I pulled the reins on further orders. 3 weeks down and I still hadn't felt the respite! My regular Christmas clients started placing their orders and by the end of the first week of December, I decided that I can't even send out my annual Christmas orders 'spam' this year! This kind of business pattern has been going on for the past year and I'm very grateful to all Great Bakes' fans for your continuous support. I thank you for being with me this year and hope to see you again next year! January 2012 is a week to go, and I'm already receiving Chinese New Year (year of the dragon starts January 23, 2012) orders! But do let me catch my breath and catch up with my MOTH, Young Master and Little Miss this week, then bring it on!!

Flying Bryan Bear

2011-12-26T09:02:00.001+08:00

Aunt Felicia said that Bryan loves aeroplanes and that's actually quite simple. I had a choice of modelling a run-by-mill aeroplane or one that's more suited for a 3-year old. I believe an A380 (my favourite aircraft so far) may be lost in a toddler, so I went for a Fokker-type plane with a brown bear in old-fashioned goggles and neck scarf piloting it. Had a message banner running across the skies, too! Such a simple and colourful cake, ya? This Devil's Food Cake (less sweet chocolate) cake was to feed 30 people and finished weighing 2kg.

Boobsy Newcastle United Fan

2011-12-26T07:45:00.001+08:00

Following the earlier Sexy 45 cake, this one had a breast enlargement.Wifey requested for larger boobs and cake to be in Newcastle United colour themes - black and white, for her Magpie-supporter husband's birthday today. Turned the Lemon Poppyseed Loaf into a chaise lounge and Miss NUFC, well....."draped" on it? When the cake was completed (1.3kg), photo was taken, I realised that I forgot to put on the red stilettos on her! So, off came part of her toes and on went the red shoes.

Princess Ballerina

2011-12-25T12:27:00.001+08:00

4-year old Zahira (Ashaz "Lightning"'s sister) is still in love with the colour purple but has entered the age of Princesses and Ballerinas, and all things pretty I'm sure. While last year's Double Birthday Carnival featured a Circus Tent, this year she went for a Princess Ballerina cake. Mum said that she loves buttercream and would like the cake to be covered in buttercream. For weeks I haven't had time to dwell on what I'll be doing for this theme until on Thursday, this idea came to me. Kind of a spin-off from the very popular Barbie cakes with the ball gown skirt of cake. But this version required tutu ruffles...lots of it. I've been using fondant so much of late that I was afraid I've lost most of my buttercream piping skills! I gave Zahira's mum a heads up in case I messed up the buttercream piping but she reiterated that her daughter loves the buttercream part of the cake. So, we agreed that it will be covered in buttercream nonetheless. If the ruffles weren't materialising, I'll change the cake design. That would have been a boring cake. Out came the nozzle and piping bag. I did the first row of ruffles and it was beautiful. From that row onwards, it was a breeze. I still have it!! Yay! In fact, the piping of ruffles were finished within minutes. Much, much more faster compared the fondant ruffling if I had used that method. The final part of the cake-the top, was still covered in fondant for a smoother finish. Mum was over the moon upon seeing the cake and I hope Zahira was, too! This Vanilla Strawberry Swirl Cake finished weighing 1.8kg.

Lightning McQueen

2011-12-25T12:10:00.002+08:00

This must be, what...my 3rd or 4th Lightning? I think I'll be putting a plug on future orders for this! Can we have other characters for Cars from now on? I think the other cars are just as interesting and pretty characteristic, if you asked me. Anyway, this 1.4kg Dark Orange Chocolate Cake was for Ashaz who turns 2 this weekend (I also did his 1st birthday cake last year - Double Birthday Carnival) and will again, be celebrating it with his sister just as before.

Cinderella To The Ball

2011-12-12T11:31:00.001+08:00

Another cake I thoroughly enjoyed working on. I was happy to hear that little Bianca loved Cinderella because I have been itching to do a carriage. When I researched on Cinderella, the colour scheme was very much of blue, silver and dark. It was after all, supposed to be magical and she was off to a ball at night. But it was a little girl's birthday and I really wanted a more colourful cake for her. Cinderella's ball gown had to be blue as "history" states, so I stuck to covering her cake skirt in baby blue. Little Miss said that Cinderella was spot on while the MOTH said that she looked a tad over-nourished, especially when she was supposed to be starved by her step-mother and step-sisters.. Well, this fairy godmother decided that she'll be better off looking "over-nourished" to be marketable to the prince!

For the carriage, I waved my wand and had the pumpkin (cake) turn into a little pink parlour instead of a glass carriage (I wouldn't know how to do a sugarpaste-glass version). And I think it turned out quite pretty. I had meant for the scrolls as the wheels just as it was with the glass carriage but that didn't work out. So, I had them sit on pink discs for support. The pink carriage sat on green turf with a variety of blossoms on the side. I almost forgot about Gus and Peg (the mice). Thank you, Little Miss for the reminder. They're main characters in Cinderella's life! The cake finished weighing 2.4kg.

Thomas the Tank Engine

2011-12-12T11:02:00.001+08:00

Here's another popular telly character with toddlers - Thomas the Tank Engine. I've not seen any episodes because my children were never into it when they were toddlers. In fact, they weren't into any specific programmes and were never at any stage, followers of these popular programmes. They watched them but were never hooked on any to have a favourite. I'm not complaining... Anyway, this 3-year old's mum wanted an Elmo for her boy but you know my stand on these characters. I suppose I could do a Sesame Street cake but to only focus on Elmo, all eyes on Elmo...that, I have a problem. There's the eyes that needs to speak, and a smile that needs to be cheeky. Such expressions are very hard to copy with sugar and I can't bear having a deformed Elmo and scar the poor child's vision of cheeky Elmo!

So, mum suggested Thomas the Tank Engine. Well.....said I'll try my best. We had Chocolate Cake (finished weighing 3kg) for the base that acted as walled tunnels for the other four trains coming through the side. Thomas sat atop the cake.No problems with the tank. It was the face I was concerned about. Thomas's face was 2-D, he has those cheeks and obvious nose, plus a cheerful disposition! Sigh...you wouldn't believe how stressed I was. The final face was just ok. It was a face but it didn't quite look like Thomas. It looked more like an older Thomas...a sombre, out of steam Thomas. See? I told you!

Vroom! Vroom!

2011-12-04T22:58:00.001+08:00

Love, love, love this cake. I was a little concerned when this toddler's aunt and uncle mentioned about having a car just like his own. I mean, he's 2. I was expecting Hot Wheels or Matchbox cars. Well, he did own a car, a miniature white BMW-like convertible. Large enough for him to sit in it and "drive" around in the house! I must say, it reminded me of the one my brother had when he was younger - a blue, metallic fibreglass Volkswagen. He had to paddle it, of course. This one on the other hand, I'm quite sure it has an accelerator! The aunt was very efficient and supplied me with pictures of the car from all angles and that was a great help. I included every detail deemed possible and I was happy with the results.

Especially happy with the model of young Hassan. His aunt had a team Ferrari shirt for him and wanted him to wear it on his birthday. So, I re-created that syndicated shirt. The Chocolate Cake car sat on top of a 10" square, chequered flag Chocolate Fudge Cake. Yum... The whole cake finished weighing 3.6kg. Hope the doting aunts and uncle got some nice pictures of the young driver with the cake for me!

Up, Up & Away!

2011-12-04T22:53:00.001+08:00

Every young man's dream - be a pilot (and have girlfriends at every airport-of-call ;-)), gadgets, footy, a race car and maybe an alter-ego like the Sith Lord??? This set of Favourite Things Chocolate Cupcakes were aptly designed for a lad turning 21. Big step to adulthood!

It's A Boy!

2011-12-04T22:21:00.001+08:00

Can you see what little tokens I've painstakingly (yet, lovingly) made for this box of mini cupcakes? Yes, those are tiny pacifiers, bibs, booties, teddy bear faces, onesies, stacks of nappies and safety pins, milk bottles, formula containers, packets of wet wipes and a blankie, all sitting atop "buttons". It was awfully therapeutic working on them despite the size...must be the fact that this new baby isn't mine!! Hahahaha...yes, an evil joke but honestly? Two's more than enough for me. Below's the gift-packed mini cupcakes.

The new grandmother also wanted a couple of regular-sized cupcakes to be given away. For these Neopolitan (marble cake of strawberry, chocolate and butter) and Vanilla Butter Cupcakes, I stuck with the blue and white colour theme.

Smurfette

2011-12-04T21:53:00.001+08:00

After this second toadstool featuring another Smurf, I'm still not feeling the love for these guys! I know, I know, how not to love them blue gnomes right? Well.....nonetheless, the toadstool house is always fun to do. I chose a pastel palette this time round since it was for a sweet young lady of 3. With such a pretty name, I wanted to "prettify" the cake with lots of flowers and a pink mushroom cap. The cake also features Smurfette, the only female in the whole village! I could have done more Smurfs but I felt they would take the limelight away from Smurfette. So, I chose to add Papa Smurf peeking through the one of the side window of the toadstool. Another special treat for Giselle was I baked a Lavender Fairy Cake. This 1.6kg cake was made with some French Lavender I got hold of, recently. Fairy Cake is basically a sponge cake that's really light but this one smells divine. I made myself a cup of Earl Grey later and added some Lavender-infused milk, it was the best tea I had.

Gift-Box Teddy

2011-11-26T11:46:00.001+08:00

I'm quite sure this soon-to-be-six little lady will be delightfully surprised at what her mum had thought for her as a cake for her party this weekend. Even my Little Miss was smitten by the whole cake. It all started with mum looking into Smurfs and Pocoyo since these were popular, but I wasn't too keen to pursue it for a 6 year old girl who'll be entering Year 1 in a month's time. I personally felt that those two cakes, especially Pocoyo weren't age-appropriate to Heyley. So, I gave mum a couple of ideas and she went for a teddy bear theme. She wanted something that guests will notice when they step into the room. Well, I hope this cake did the trick.
Now, girls any age wouldn't say no to Teddy but I can't do sculpting (plus there'll be too much cake wastage), so had to think out-of-the-box (literary). Inspired by a British cake designer, I stacked the chocolate cakes and had Teddy pop out of the gift box. I made Teddy's head out of rice crispy treats (completely edible but it'll be hard on those milk teeth). I could have done the head in cake as well, but it would be too heavy to sit on the already stacked-cakes support. My first attempt at home-made rice crispy treats was hazardous. Scalded my fingers trying to sculpt it into a ball whilst hot (hardens really quickly) and I doubt I'll attempt it again anytime soon. The box cover was done two days ahead.
A lot of breath-holding with this cake but I'm pleased with the outcome. My scales went screaming when I weighed this Chocolate Cake - a whopping 4kgs excluding the boards used in the cover and as the base!.

Purple & White Hantaran

2011-11-24T10:23:00.001+08:00

Chose to keep this purple and white-themed hantaran cake simple because it's a small cake. Can't tell right? Well, this cake was only 5.5"x 5.5" with a 2.5" height. And no, I did not cover the cake with layers after layers of fondant, mind you. I simply chose to visually add height by using vertical stripes in various shades of purple (violet) and placed emphasis on the centrepiece. I also avoided complicated swirls and imprints because it will crowd the flowers. My reliable retailer of gumpaste flowers as usual, has some of the most beautifully crafted roses in violet and white. They are not cheap but like I said before, they're worth every sen if you look at them here. Realistic and looks a million bucks! This Lime-Syrup Sponge Cake weighed only 1.3kg without the flowers (those are charged separately as they are retailed). Chose to do this cake because it's a moist cake (and was further moisten with the lime syrup) and will stay moist in the next couple of days for the wedding.

Sexy 45

2011-11-22T17:15:00.001+08:00

My dearest cousin sister and I were pondering over what to surprise her girlfriend on turning 45 last weekend. We truly wanted to cheer her up and trust me, no matter what all the Sophia Lorens and Goldie Hawns of the world say about 40 being the new 30, 50 being the new 40 etc. (in SL's case 70 being the new 50??), the fact is we cannot defy gravity. Spiritually, yes. I whole heartedly agree that we are as young as we feel but physically, well.....I have some complains myself. And don't go all Oprah on me. No one ever complains about the pot-belly bloke but a muffin-top woman....I rest my case. Nonetheless, we both agreed that we should have a pin-up girl to represent us all - imaginatively. The girls love Great Bakes' infamous carrot cake and since cream cheese is dairy, there's no way I can work with the cake in advance so our sexy 45-er has to lie on the side, full frontal. The finished cake weighed about 1.5kg.

The Tennis Pro

2011-11-22T16:23:00.001+08:00

This was an easy cake. The client pretty much knew what she wanted (even did a rough sketch down to detailing what her boyfriend wears for his tennis sessions!) and I just had to put in the finer work. While I was given attire details, I wanted to add a couple of accessories to complete the cake. If the birthday boy was an ardent tennis player, he'd have a favourite player. When you look at what he's wearing (and the colours), I think it's a give away that he's a Federer fan. I was right (phieww!). So, I chose to make a miniature replica of the Wilson-Federer tennis racquet and the bag that goes with it. The Nike water tumbler was modelled after my daughter's pink version. The client also requested for the Wimbledon logo on the 1.8kg Lemon Blueberry Cake. I believe the birthday boy was so pleased with his unique present that he chose to wear the same ensemble during the party!

Pocoyo Off To The Zoo

2011-11-08T17:27:00.001+08:00

I know Pocoyo's awfully cute and what not, but I have to say this...Not again!! Yes, another cake dedicated to Pocoyo but I do appreciate the fact that 1-year old Trisztan's mum thought out of the traditional Pocoyo box. She suggested a scene with Pocoyo visiting a zoo. Sure enough, there is a Pocoyo-Zoo scene and instead of trying to recreate, I copied the scene. I was happy with the finished cake because it was simple, to the point (as is with the series), bright and cheerful...but most importantly, it met the client's need to stick to a cake size/weight. It's a tall order when I have to work with limitations because there is a need to compromise and expectations need to be managed. So, I work honestly. If it can be done, I will do it but if it can't, I will not deliver substandard work. Cheers to yet another successful Pocoyo cake!! Psssttt.....Let's get off the Pocoyo bandwagon shall we? *wink*

Halloween

2011-10-29T15:12:00.004+08:00

Happy Halloween, folks...

- Jack Skellington

Vanilla Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

Angry Birds

2011-10-29T15:10:00.002+08:00

I've tried this game several times and just don't get it. Little Miss and Young Master on the other hand are very good at it. Though I've been told, they not actually that good because they haven't even gotten past the first level!! To be fair, they hardly get to play the game much less touch my phone... Apparently, children younger than mine ace in Angry Birds. Like this child. He's turning 4 this weekend and his uncle (and aunt-to-be) wanted to meet his request for an Angry Birds cake. I spent the whole day working on the birds and pigs! Didn't help that it was pouring yesterday evening and they all started to get shiny and sticky. So, I had to turn on the bedroom air-conditioning to keep them dry...decorating during the monsoon season is getting to be really expensive!!!

The Red Bird (I think that's what it's called) on the catapult.

The Green Pigs amongst the broken structure.

The rest of the attack birds waiting for their turn.

I understand that different levels have different structures and birds and what nots but I decided to stick to the basic idea of Angry Birds. Birds vs Pigs period. Covered this 8", 1.7kg Vanilla Butter Cake in green buttercream using the grass tip. Needless to say, I had carpal tunnel syndrome after that.

Favourite Things

2011-10-29T14:49:00.000+08:00

Haven't done these Favourite Thing Cupcakes for some time now and it was fun personalising them. These were for the client's best friend whose favourite colour is gold. Well, it would have been much if everything was in gold (too wedding-y) but I'm glad with a few other colours to mellow it, the set of 16 Lemon Cupcakes turned out really pretty.

These 16 Lemon Cupcakes on the other hand was for her husband. All of his favourite things and I was especially pleased with these two- a watch and a Canon camera! Not bad, eh?

Toy Story

2011-10-10T15:31:00.005+08:00

This was a last-minute cake but here's the thing, I had the honour of doing Noah's 1st birthday cake last year (Pocoyo and friends). I almost turn this down because I had lots to do this weekend and I was under the weather. But mummy was an old friend and all she wanted was a small and simple 2-D Toy Story cake. Well, yours truly can't SIMPLY do a cake even if I wanted to!! Of course, I gave it some thought. It's a small cake (1kg Devil's Food) and I wanted it to be impactful although it was 2-D. So, I decided to do colourful swatches that'll attract 2-year olds - Woody's shirt, Buzz Lightyear's uniform, the bedroom's Clouds wallpaper and the movie's logotype background in red that featured Noah's name in yellow and blue. With a couple of cast cut-outs, I thought the cake looked attractive and adhered to the theme.

Pocoyo Party

2011-10-10T08:58:00.003+08:00

Oh I love this cake!! I really do. Little Kay-Lee had a cake of toy blocks last year for her 1st birthday and this year, she's into Pocoyo. The last few Pocoyo cakes I did were for boys and I was pleased as Punch to be doing one for a girl. Mum asked for a pastel pallette but Pocoyo and friends are mostly in strong and bold primary and secondary colours. It's the beautiful educational-part of the programme to be introducing these colours to toddlers and I also kept to using white as the base colour as is in the series. I checked online for an episode of Pocoyo with a party-theme (there's usually one episode in every toddler educational programme, trust me....I've done my time with these series with my two), and that's how this cake was designed.

I've always loved having Pocoyo help blow out the candle, so I had Pocoyo in the same pose and all his friends donning party hats. I was particularly happy with how the candy cane poles and party buntings turned out. They really gave the cake a party atmosphere. I also added 2 characters which were not in my previous cakes - the red Octopus and the small bird on the pole. Everyone's out to celebrate Kay-Lee's 2nd birthday!! This 9" Devil's Food Cake finished weighing a hefty 2.5kg!

Smurfs

2011-10-10T08:45:00.002+08:00

Gosh, I was really reluctant to do Smurfs for the fear of turning them into goblins! But on hindsight, they are technically goblins aren't they? Blue goblins who happen to be irritatingly happy all the time except for a couple of them... Anyway, the client wanted a small cake for a 40-year old fan and I decided to do build a toadstool house out of Lemon Poppyseed Cake. I didn't really focus on specifics when it came to the 2 male Smurfs since they all look alike but I did do a Juliet-like scene with Smurfette on the balcony. A surprisingly simple cake weighing only 1.2kg, though I think I'd go mad if I had to make more Smurfs for a bigger cake. Something in the blue that doesn't agree with me nor do I find them cute.

Marathon Maniac

2011-10-10T08:36:00.003+08:00

What a great testament to embracing your golden years with gusto! This "young man" is in his 60s and is a self-proclaimed Marathon Maniac. He travels the world to participate in marathons and as he celebrated his birthday the night before with a couple of thoughtful friends, he leaves the next day for Sydney to another race. He was in awe of this 1kg Lemon Poppyseed Cake depicting, in his words, a younger version of him!!

Pretty in Pink

2011-10-10T08:22:00.004+08:00

These Lemon Poppyseed mini cupcakes were customised for the client's ob-gynae for the services rendered during the birth of her baby girl.

For the Love of Cars & Balls

2011-09-25T21:39:00.005+08:00

To be honest, after the whole day of doing eye-straining sugar cut-outs the day before for 60 cupcakes, it was the thought of this cake that kept me going. I was looking forward to making this little cake for my ex-manicurist. Her only son turned 2 on Saturday and she's been planning for a cake from me since last year! We've been talking about her son's favourite things and that got her into the mode of observing her son more carefully. After a couple of months, she told me that her son's very fascinated with cars and balls. Now, that's a tough one. How do I get these two things together and make sense? Well, I put that thought away for some time and just last week, it hit me! Dhaarmin is 2 and when my two children were at that age, I used to let them watch The Wiggles. It's an Aussie educational programme with songs and dances, and they loved calling out "Wake up, Jeff!!!" In that programme, the four guys have a car they call... The Big Red Car. Yes, just exactly that. The whole cake theme would be an episode with The Big Red Car introducing popular sports to children! So, I bake an Orange with Chocolate Swirl Cake for the car and a couple of sports balls (1.6kg in total). I had The Big Red Car driven by not the boys but the a smiley Snooker Ball and 3 other popular sports balls - the Baseball, Basketball and Football. I also made out of sugar paste a small tennis ball and golf ball as candle holders (which I didn't photograph). Mum was ecstatic when she saw the cake and I hope young Dhaarmin recognises The Big Red Car and names all the sports!

Office Birthdays

2011-09-25T21:27:00.005+08:00

The staff at the local Cargill (manufacturer of animal feed and nutrition) celebrated their monthly birthdays (June-September) last Friday and I baked for them Chocolate & Orange Swirl and Lemon Poppyseed Cupcakes. The theme was animals that they produce feed for. That's as much as I could do for a product like that! 4 bags of animal feed and these animal cut-outs (as simple as they look,) took me the whole day! I didn't even get to cook dinner that day...sigh.

Roller Disco

2011-09-18T08:14:00.009+08:00

Another current tween/teen pastime that's caught me unaware- Roller Disco. I mean, I know they're quite popular in the US of A but here? I know there's an ice-skating rink in the mall and I know there used to be a roller-skating rink somewhere downtown but that was like 20 years ago. I'm guessing they're revived roller-skating and incorporated the disco theme, supposedly you can roller-dance better to Funky Town and Saturday Night Fever than a Bieber song? Nevertheless, despite my ignorance, I think Roller-Disco would be cool. I can just visualise us 'oldies' revisiting roller skating, bobbing to songs we're more than familiar with, embarassing the hell out of our kids and muttering under our breath "please don't fall, please don't fall" while trying to 'do our thang'? Hmm...I think I'll stick to the rink-side. I've got brittle bones.

It's a 9-year old's birthday with a small party of 20. So, I baked a 9" Lemon Poppyseed Cake (finished weighing 2.1kg) for the girls and covered it in bright pink. Next, I made an LP (for the young ones- LP stands for long-playing microgrove record, no cassettes or CDs in the early 70s) for the top of the cake and attached a pole for the disco ball. No, we cannot NOT have a mirrored disco ball for a disco party! Because it's a small-ish cake, I also did a couple of time-consuming cut-outs for the cake instead of many 3-D figures. A 70s roller-skating chick and silhouettes of boys and girls with afro hair, mini skirts and bell-bottoms doing disco moves. Made the birthday girl figurine as centre of attraction AND lots of edible disco dusts! p/s: After these pictures were taken, I realised that the name was spelled wrongly. Thank goodness it was just replacing one alphabet or I'll have to redo the whole disco pole!

Star Wars

2011-09-13T16:58:00.006+08:00

Young Master turns 11 today and he said "for fun", he'd like a Star Wars-themed cake. He's a huge Star Wars fan and the character he loves is Obi Wan Kenobi. So, here's my version of not-so-Old Ben...

and the Sith Lord... Young Master and Little Miss said that these two versions look like kids. I think they do, too... especially Darth Vader. He looks like a kid dressed up for Halloween! Our young Padawan loved it and was especially happy with his choice of cake - Chocolate Fudge layered between Vanilla Butter Cake and Rich Chocolate Cake. This 7" cake finished weighing 1.8kg.

Happy Birthday Obi Wan! May The Force Be With You...

Rainbow

2011-09-13T16:35:00.007+08:00

"Red and yellow and pink and green, Purple and orange and blue,

I can sing a rainbow, Sing a rainbow, Sing a rainbow too.

Listen with your eyes, Listen with your ears,

And sing everything you see, I can sing a rainbow,

Sing a rainbow, Sing along with me"

The Rainbow Song was all I was humming in my head while working on this simple but apt design for a 5-year old. This little 7" Rich Chocolate Cake weighed only 1kg.

Hari Raya Aidilfitri 2011

2011-09-12T11:12:00.003+08:00

This year's Hari Raya cupcakes - the one and only set this year! Was away for a week prior and during the long Raya holidays so I missed out the festive bake-rush this year. Nonetheless, these were Lemon Poppyseed Cupcakes.

Hip-Hop Breakdancer

2011-09-12T10:47:00.003+08:00

This young man is a hip-hop breakdancer... I know hip-hop and I know breakdancing. But hip-hop brakdancing? I can only assume it means breakdancing to hip-hop music. Nevertheless, I Googled for a couple of pictures of hip-hop breakdancing and my jaw dropped. These kids can really do stuffs! I can't imagine the number of emergency room check-ins with the kind of the stunts they do! #mumspeak# Anyway, I had to decide which stunt was possible to work on using sugar with my limited skills and I chose a move that was kind of what they call a Jackhammer. To top it off, the birthday boy actually wanted a trampoline for his birthday but that wasn't possible with them living in a condo. So...he'll have to make do with brakdancing on a cake trampoline ;-)

This 8" round Vanilla Butter Cake weighed 1.5kg. Great size for a small party of 10.

70th Mahjong Treat

2011-09-12T09:15:00.002+08:00

This mahjong cake was called for to celebrate a 70th birthday a weekend ago. The last time I did a similar cake was for my mum-in-law's 90th birthday in May and it was a huge hit. I had intended to do a full table this time round but the large party was scaled down at the request of the birthday boy so I had to reduce the size of the cake, too. I couldn't have done a "smaller table" because the mahjong tiles need to be actual-size for better effect. So, we had a 1/4 of a table. I also did away with the green felt and placed the layers of white mahjong "papers" to represent the majority of our home mahjong tables. The 13-tile winning combo is again featured here (I can't think of any better combo than this to wipe out everyone's winnings!) with the usual suspects - dices, chips and the directional token. This 10" Devil's Food Cake weighed 2.4kg.

Cars vs Transformers

2011-08-22T07:45:00.005+08:00

You see, it's all been either or when it comes to themes but when you get a fan of both Cars and Transformers, you'd try to do something that can bring them together - A race! Both are completely different thematically and to have them "work", there weren't any other way but to put them in a race. I wasn't going to do any Transformers sugar figures or turn McQueen into one (I balk at those Star-Wars-Transformers toys they came up with...). So, I chose the Camaro-Bumblebee to go side by side with Ford GT40-Pontiac Firebird-Corvette-Lightning McQueen on the tracks....well, both my cars shape alike from using the same cake pan ;-p

Top view of the 2.5kg Vanilla Chocolate Chip cakes.
Lightning McQueen

Bumblebee

Mountain Biker

2011-08-18T09:51:00.004+08:00

This 1.2kg Neopolitan cake was for the daddy of the earlier child with Lightning McQueen and Mickey & Minnie cakes. When your child has 2 cakes to mark his birthday (only a day apart), shouldn't the daddy get one, too? Well, yeah! This was just a small cake to not only commemorate his birthday but also his new pastime - mountain biking. Forgot the eyebrows when this picture was taken but rectified that this morning and he looked much better.

Mickey & Minnie

2011-08-18T09:18:00.003+08:00

As far as I would go with Mickey & Minnie...cut-outs on the 15 mini-cupcakes and their infamous ears in 800gms of Neopolitan cake - my take on the marble with strawberry, chocolate and vanilla.

Lightning McQueen

2011-08-17T05:54:00.004+08:00

My second Lightning McQueen with this 2.6kg Lemon Poppyseed Cake for 3-year old Jeun Yip. He's got a series of toons on this character which I never knew existed! I always thought there were just the 2 movies and a couple of short story books on this infamous car. Well, he loved the cake and I wouldn't have done this cake any other way. To simply highlight the car would be to plonk it on a brightly-coloured surface and dress it minimally. I have contemplated on doing scenes but that would call for a Cars-themed cake not a Lightning McQueen cake. So, maybe next time.

I re-designed the Cars logotype to incorporate the birthday boy's name and age.

Peter Rabbit

2011-08-12T14:58:00.008+08:00

9-year old Divya Faith loves Peter Rabbit. Truth be told, I've almost forgotten of the existence of Beatrix Potter's classic The Tale of Peter Rabbit until now. The past two days saw me reminiscing over other, also popular stories, written and illustrated by Miss Potter like Jemima Puddle-duck, Benjamin Bunny, Tom Kitten and Miss Moppet. I vaguely remember the story of three girl rabbits - Mopsy, Flopsy, Cottontail and their brother Peter. And that Peter was a very mischievous rabbit who's always in trouble with Mr McGregor (whose garden he'd "thieve" from). For the cake, I wanted to reflect the little scenes of which Peter was involved in like sneaking into Mr McGregor's garden to eat vegetables till he was sick in the stomach, chased into hiding in the watering can after loosing his jacket and Peter's blue jacket hung up for a scarecrow.
You'll notice that I've made two extra characters that aren't directly involved in The Tale of Peter Rabbit - Benjamin Bunny, Peter's cousin in the brown jacket and Jemima Puddle-duck. I added them because I believe that they all crossed paths when they were living in Hill Top Farm. And that Divya will explore the other beautiful tales written by Miss Potter if she hasn't already!

Jemima Puddle-duck

Fondant Cakes

2011-08-01T09:19:00.003+08:00

Had an order last weekend for a couple of cakes and boxes of cupcakes for no particular event. Just to be given away to friends...isn't that great? I was left to my own devices again and remembered Buddy Valastro's Fondant Cakes. Carlo's Bakery sells what they call Fondant Cakes. It's basically cake finished with fondant and decorated with floral cut-outs. They're simple but looks great. With the right family of colour contrasts, the cakes and cupcakes will look awesome. I chose to use baby blue as the base colour and a blue, deep red and light pink for the cut-outs...colours didn't turn out right in these pictures. The cakes were in various sizes and for this batch, I made the Oriental Sugee Cake and Dark Orange Chocolate Cupcakes. Both very decadent cakes.

Yellow Daisies

2011-08-01T08:41:00.003+08:00

This post is so overdue.... I've kept the last two months easy and not taking in any cake orders just so I can sort out a couple of things in the homefront that are also long overdue. But I'm back now and August will be zooming past real quick (pun intended and you'll see why..) Back to these mini cupcakes. This is another of Little Miss' playmates when they were little and she's always been a "yellow" fan. Loves all things yellow then (had a yellow Power Ranger cake years ago) and still do. Mum wanted something simple in yellow for her school mates. So, I made a batch of yellow daisies and butterflies.

Little League Soccer

2011-07-10T18:50:00.005+08:00

Hard to believe that it's been 8 years since this ragazzo carino's madre and I were whispering to each other at a playgroup that we think we're pregnant! Little did we realise that we'd be exchanging baby clothes (her first-born was a girl, mine a boy and vice-versa for our number two), going through completely different pregnancies this time round, betting on who'll have the baby first (our children were born 9 days apart), ranting about our confinement ladies during the 1 month and subsequently lots of time together comparing notes about our children. They're all "grown" now and sadly, we hardly get the kids together anymore. Everyone's just occupied with one thing or another. Nonetheless, the affection we have for each other is still there and these children are like your own. So, baking and decorating this cake was very much like it was for one of my own. The 2.2kg Rich Chocolate cake was soccer-themed featuring the young man and his best mates in the team.

They recently won an under-10 tournament and I thought it was fitting to have the 3 boys hugging this giant football to show how much they love the sport!

8th Birthday with Chelsea FC

2011-07-04T09:05:00.004+08:00

Little Miss' classmate turned 8 last weekend and his mum had way in advance been planning to have his birthday cake baked by yours truly. How sweet! Well, the young man's first request was for a "Kamen Rider"...clearly, none of us adults knew what it was. Young Master enlightened me and said that it was some Japanese group of heros or something along those lines. Errr...I have no affinity with such characters. His mum wasn't too keen on that either and gently steered him towards his other interest - football. And football it was.... Chelsea being his favourite team. This 2.1kg Devil's Food Cake - my less-sugar version of the chocolate cake went off very well with the kids and parents alike.

Fernando Torres was chosen as the highlighted player for the club cake.

Mini Cakes

2011-07-02T18:16:00.002+08:00

By the time I remembered to photograph these mini fruit cakes, I've packaged them into their boxes. The wedding theme colour was white and silver, so these mini gift cakes were covered in white fondant and adorned simply with small white blossoms with miniature sugar pearls. The ribbons were provided for to coincide with the theme. I'd much prefer not to do these mini cakes in squares (2.5"x2.5") because it is awfully hard to cut them proportionately without a lot of wastage. I'm one not for any wastage of cake if possible. I've got a set of mini round tins for round mini cakes. Have yet to try them out, but will definitely do it soon to see if the cakes will turn out better.

White & Soft Pink Hantaran

2011-06-27T16:21:00.007+08:00

This 3.5kg (9.5") non-alcoholic Rich Fruit Cake was the choice of this regular client as a hantaran gift for a wedding last weekend. The dulang (tray) was to be adorned with fresh flowers so I had to come up with a design to complement the tray. Theme colour was white but we decided to add a dash of light pink to soften the harshness of an all-white cake. It turned out very romantic and most suited for the akad nikah (marriage solemnisation ceremony).

Pale pink and white butterflies dropped in for a visit.

Smaller cakes of the same theme was requested as gift for each guest at the VIP table during the wedding reception. So I covered a 5" square (1.2kg) Rich Fruit Cake using the same base design with a smaller rose and more white and pink blossoms!

Miniature Poodles

2011-05-16T16:43:00.002+08:00

I'm sure Natalie wanted a real dog and mummy said (like I did with my children), "no you're not getting one. You're can get a sugar version from Aunty Deenie...". Lol!!! I like dogs but not enough to scoop it's poo or worry about it's happiness in our little garden. I have enough trouble with the 2(+1) I own now.... BUT! I enjoyed making the two miniature poodles here. The cake's for a little family of 6, so I baked a 7" round chocolate cake. I associate poodles with Paris, so I went back to using the chocolate and pink colour combo. It's always pretty. The 1.3kg cake was simple and to the point for an 8 year old's request for a poodle (or two).

Pocoyo & Friends

2011-05-16T15:42:00.004+08:00

2.1kg Chocolate Cake - Pocoyo and friends (3rd take..)
As I put up this post, birthday boy's mum dropped me a line to tell me that the cake didn't "turn up well". I thought Pocoyo and his friends collapsed yesterday en route to the birthday venue (it was pouring and rain is every sugar figurine's worst nightmare) and that would have been devastating to the poor child. But it wasn't. It was the cake itself. It crumbled into pieces when it was cut. I think it's time I talk about cakes instead of their designs.
You see, my cakes are always freshly-baked from scratch. By that, it means the cakes are baked at the earliest, the day before it's due to be picked up. If you're a regular with home-baking, you'll realise that freshly-baked-from-scratch cakes are always moist, soft and light. Pre-mixes result in drier and denser cakes. What I've learnt over the years is that store-bought cakes (as well as a lot of other cake suppliers) bake their cakes between 2 to 3 days earlier. There's a good reason for that. Cake's a whole lot easier to shape, cut and styled after it's been "aged". Plus, they've got a lot of orders to deal with. They need to bake all their cakes by Wednesday, take turns working on your design on Thurday and Friday so you can have your cake on Saturday. Basically, you're getting a couple of days-old cake.
While I don't compromise on the freshness of my cake (that's why I only have time for 1 cake order a day), I do try to improve and educate. I can always bake (and I do have) denser resulting in richer cakes, but that may be too much for our palate (and health) in the long run. Majority of us love soft, light and flavoursome cakes. Cakes you can have more than one helping, right?
Cake-cutting skills are almost non-existent here. Most just butcher the cake using a butter knife! Every household needs a good serrated knife. A bread knife is another good investment. With a sharp serrated knife, in a saw-like motion, gently slice the cake. You'll get a beautifully-cut cake not matter how thin your slice is. A lot of hotels and good restaurants now have a good cake knife for occasions when their guests bring their own cake. Those plastic wannabes you get from bakeries are crap. They're only good for store-bought cakes. I've even used a good short steak knife and it's great! Please don't press the knife down on any cakes the way you would an apple. It just doesn't work on good cakes.

Nevertheless, I hope with this little information, you'll probably be a bit more discerning but do get to enjoy your cakes better.

Baby Dino

2011-05-09T12:00:00.002+08:00

Can't believe little Hamzah is 2 already! People's children always seem to grow up faster than your own don't they? Good for me though because I truly enjoy baking cakes to mark milestones. Especially birthdays when I get to see the child's changing interest every year. Little Hamzah loves dinosaurs and I wanted to create something that was more suited to his age. While a busy jurassic scene would be awesome, it may be a bit much for a 2-year old to comprehend or appreciate. So, I decided to feature just one adorable baby dinosaur. Just one look at it and he'll know it's a dinosaur. Nothing beasty nor any showing of fangs, just a surprised little dino caught running off to play hide! This 9" Moist Lemon Cake finished weighing at 2.2kg.

90th Mahjong Birthday

2011-05-04T10:05:00.003+08:00

It was mum-in-law's 90th birthday last weekend and we all headed home to Penang for a grand bash. While the "official" birthday cake was well taken care of, we decided to bake her favourite Oriental Sugee Cake to surprise her at home. At 90, mum's still bright with a memory that'll put many half her age to shame. We think it's her weekly mahjong session that keeps her mind alert!

1st Racing Car

2011-04-27T08:53:00.003+08:00

This very little cake - only 7" in diameter, was for little Sean who's turned 1 last weekend. He loves chocolate and race cars. With such a small surface to work on, there's little I can do but that's fine especially when we had a feature character on it. I modelled a race car after the famous Lightning McQueen in Cars and had a busy side design instead. I think it's spot-on. The Rich Chocolate Cake finished weighing a good 1.5kg.

Hantaran

2011-04-22T12:52:00.003+08:00

This peach-coloured Hantaran cake had me stumped for quite awhile. What colour would the flowers be? You see, I'm no good at making life-like gumpaste-flowers. So I pretty much have to rely on store-bought ones and their colour range is limited. I have a good supplier with fantastic quality of flowers. Very expensive but I wouldn't settle for anything less to follow through Great Bakes' cakes! I was at the store pacing the floors for half an hour before finally deciding on a light pink box of large roses and two boxes of medium and small white roses. I must say, they were good matches. The 8", 2kg non-alcoholic Traditional English Fruitcake looks classy.

Baby Girl Announcement

2011-04-17T12:45:00.004+08:00

Baby Rhea came to join her two brothers about a month ago and these 120 regular-sized cupcakes were made to announce her this weekend. I went back to using the pink and white colour combination as nothing announces a baby girl more than these colours. Instead of the usual onesies, I made little dresses this time because after having two boys, I'm pretty sure mummy is dying to dress her up! The cupcakes were a mixture of Devil's Food, good ol'Butter, Citrus Yellow and an introduction to the light Peanut Butter Cupcake.

Each silver box housed 4 cupcakes and they were neatly ribboned with a personalised announcement tag.

12th Golden Birthday

2011-04-12T07:55:00.002+08:00

What an honour to be baking for this young lady again this year. Made a batch of 72 minis for the young lady last year for her 11th at school with lots of pretty daisies and a mini of herself buried in her book and her swim gear. She's an ardent reader and an accomplished swimmer. This year, she turns 12 on April 12. By American culture, it's her Golden Birthday. Golden Birthdays are basically the birthday when you turn the age of your birth date. Mum gave me an update on what she's been up to the past year and I had to come up with something! At her age, she would know of charm bracelets. So, I turned all things that she is and love into gold charms. So, we have Thomas Sabo-inspired Converse shoe charms, books, an old-fashioned calendar with the birth date and month, her age 12, swimming medal, rabbit (her animal zodiac), theatre masks, map of Australia (she was there recently for theatre) and the lucky charms -4-leaf clovers and a horse shoe. A couple of hearts for love and stars to realise her dreams. I think I'll get my daughter a charm bracelet for her 19th Golden Birthday! But before that, we've got my son's Golden Birthday to plan....turning 13 on Sept.13 in the year 2013. That should be a cool one....

Alice In Wonderland

2011-04-10T14:47:00.013+08:00

This little girl was born a year ago with little mini cupcakes I made to announce her birth. How time flies and today, she's celebrating her first birthday. Aunty Deenie is back to make her 1st birthday cake. Mummy's beautiful idea to hold a "Alis in Wonderland" tea party got me beaming from ear to ear. You wouldn't believe how much you can do with this theme. A theme that can result in a beautiful cake. One thing I was sure NOT going to do was to design it based on Tim Burton's version. That version would suit a grown-up theme party perfectly and not for a one year old. So, I chose the version I grew up with...the 50s Disney version.

I decided on the Mad Hatter taking centrestage on this cake and not Alice because no.1- Alis is to be the star of the party (not Alice) and no.2- it's a 3pm birthday tea party. It was only appropriate to feature the table with tea-time goodies...look closely and you'll see that I've made some lemon macarons as well!

Next, we have Lewis Carroll's Alice in her trademark blue dress, white pinafore, white stockings, black Mary Janes and the black ribbon to keep her hair up. Not the 19 year old... She's about the enter the tiny door.

Here's the White Rabbit in his waistcoat with the pocket watch (should have made that bigger) and his black umbrella which he carries with his all over the place. Can you almost hear him saying "I'm late, I'm late, For an important date!"? I put him near the royal garden because some say that he's late in announcing the queen's arrival there. Oh! The Cheshire Cat.. can't forget him can we?

This is the Queen of Hearts and not the Red Queen. She's a more regal queen and the differences are obvious. No tumour in the head of this one, too scary looking for kids don't you think? She is in her garden after the roses have been painted red by her two gardening playing cards. p/s: The Queen's skirt's cake.

Last but not least, the two fat twin brothers - Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Alice will meet these two fellas very soon and be caught in one of their many rhyming games! This version of the twins are based on the 1871 illustrations in Through The Looking-Glass. But I made them smile instead of the grumps they were.

This moist Lemon Poppyseed Cake finished weighing 3kg. Isn't a very big cake, mind you. Just enough for about 50 people if they can find their way to cutting up the cake....

Digger & Ballerina

2011-04-06T08:10:00.003+08:00

This little princess of an old friend requested for a "Digger & Ballerina" cake. Had her mum scratching her head on the relations of both but really, kids don't have explanations why they just love certain characters though they're unrelated. They just do! And I think this young lady is a very balanced girl to be indifferent towards stereotyping. I've never done an excavator before and had to choose one to model after. My daughter suggested the yellow excavator from Bob The Builder (it is Scoop, right? It's been too many years..). That was a brilliant idea and I'm pretty sure Rebecca will recognise this character since she's only 4. I was apprehensive as usual at modelling a known character. Flaws are highly noticeable. Nonetheless, held my breath throughout and I think it turned out beautifully. Next was the Ballerina. I wanted to do Wendy (also from Bob The Builder) dressed as a ballerina but decided not to do the blonde hair in the end. I wanted it localised a bit in case the birthday girl sees herself as the ballerina. This little 7" Butter Cake finished at 1.5kg. Yeah, the excavator added quite a bit of weight.

Is It A Boy or A Girl??

2011-04-06T08:05:00.002+08:00

Don't know if the baby will be a boy or a girl, yet but I think these mini Espresso cupcakes will celebrate either fine. Got a lovely textured mat some time ago and used it here because it looks very much like a baby blankie. They're so cute!

English Bird Cage

2011-04-04T11:29:00.004+08:00

Pretty, pretty, pretty cake! Only 1 word can sum up this cake - PRETTY! I hardly do pretty cakes and it's nice to do something like this especially for 2 very special (and pretty) people! It's a mother-daughter birthday and I was pressed for time. Not doing the cake was not an option for me and this bird cage was all I could think of when the phone call came! Mum loves flowers and daughter loves New York. So, I used pink and chocolate colours that's very NY for the cage. The yellow daisies and purple fillers are for mum. The 2 bluebirds - the 2 ladies are never to be caged-in ;-) and are always on the go! Happy Birthday Auntie Dibah and Aifa!!!

This 2.3kg design (Carrot Cake here with cream cheese separately) will also be great for an engagement or as a Hantaran cake.

60th Birthday Dartboard

2011-04-04T10:55:00.003+08:00

Hope my son will be as thoughtful as this one when we're 60! Apparently, this young man's dad used to play darts when he was still working. Now that he's retired, darts kind of got the pensioner's card as well. Nevertheless, I personally hope that he'll take it up again when he sees the cake...I think it's a great game to keep the mind sharp and eyes constantly exercised. This 1.7kg Rich Chocolate Cake-board was modelled after a Winmau (not that it matters since I think all of them look the same ;-P)

Making this dart was agony. Just when I thought I've organised the "parts" on that dart carefully and put it on the cake, it rains. My room aircond had to come on at 5pm that day just so the dart doesn't die on me.

Weekend with the Girls

2011-04-04T10:13:00.008+08:00

Wish I was there!! This young lady turned 11 with a weekend retreat into nature with her girlfriends last weekend. The Orange Poppyseed & Devil's Food Cupcakes are yummy combinations - one's refreshing and the other...well, it's chocolate! I thought I had designs for these cupcakes under my hat. I mean, I've done all these things ages ago but clearly, it was AGES ago! I was stuck after the tents, sleeping bags and 3 girls on the old tyre tubes. Believe it or not, I had to really think! And at 9.30pm, with the kids asleep and the MOTH walking into the kitchen every half hour asking if I'm done (rushing me to have my shower before hantu cubit..), I was desperate! So, I shooed and shushed the MOTH away, and went back in time (*twillight zone tune*).

We always had Maggi Mee at camps! Never forget to bring our lastik (*snigger*) and a kite if we had a vast clearing at the campsite. And have picnics by the waterfall or pond.

Tents are the usual accomodation but always a treat to sleep under the stars on a clear dark night.

The waterfall! We love waterfalls!

If the running stream's got strong currents, sitting on an old tyre tube is so much fun.

And bird-watching - this is the 20th century version. Our time, we don't watch birds. They're everywhere and there's no need for binoculars to spot even the rarest bird!

Rocking into the 8th!!!

2011-03-21T16:52:00.004+08:00

Hah!! Another "blank canvas" for me to play with! Well, partly blank-lah. Two weeks ago, the early-planning Claire's mummy ordered 40 cupcakes for her school celebration and hinted that she loves Taylor Swift. Great! Apart from guitars and some cool pairs of boots, I was thinking of ordering a couple of edible prints with Taylor Swift on it. So, it would have been pretty much a fan kinda bunch of cupcakes UNTIL....mummy checked with the birthday girl about highlighting Taylor Swift. The young lady said "NO! The boys may laugh at me!". So, mummy said to just do a simple music theme with notes etc. Yaaaawwn.....
Seriously, I didn't start thinking what "music theme" was going to be until a day before I had to bake those chocolate cupcakes. The best ideas seem to always pop into my head at the very last minute, very dangerous... Nevertheless, I like Taylor Swift. She's all-American pretty and writes some pretty good songs for the kids. How? Silhouettes, of course! And there we have it, the shadowy female guitarist(s) and her adoring fans...

And, an extra order of Lemon Poppyseed Cupcakes to go for the kind neighbour.

10th Year Milestone?

2011-03-18T15:06:00.004+08:00

I'm a historical saga buff and love the juicy bits that goes on behind the courts of King Henry or the drama during the War of the Roses. So, can you blame me for thinking of The Tower when I got the free reins (wohoo!!) to come up with a Chocolate Fudge Cake for a young squire turning 10 this week? Inspired by Debbie B (cake designer extrodinaire), I chose to do this as also a reminder to us mums that our boys are growing up and that we should start letting them out of our (tight) grip ..snif, snif... Do you know that by 10 during those days, boys would already know how to joust? And our 10 year olds can't even cross the road without us screaming "look left!! no! look right!!" Gosh...we mums.

This small chocolate cake with chocolate fudge filling came up to 1.8kg! That's a lot of fudge there...

By the way...

2011-03-14T17:22:00.004+08:00

Forgot these...the host of the earlier 1st birthday party is a doll for remembering 4 other people who's sharing the same birthday as her son. Since they were expected to attend the party, she wanted a cupcake for each of them to share the birthday joy. Isn't she sweet?? I made miniature birthday cakes to top these cupcakes with a tiny candle each.

Ocean 1

2011-03-14T16:56:00.008+08:00

This 1st Birthday cake was a joy to design (as was with all the 1st birthdays I've done so far). The one other time I did an under-the-sea theme was for a little girl and that set of cupcakes had a girlier tone to them. So, this time I butched it (doing away bows and lashes ;-))and adopted a dolphin for young Ayden. The 2-tier Lemon Poppyseed Cake finished weighing 2.5kg.

Donnie the Dolphin attempting to help the birthday boy blow out the candle.

Ozzie the Octopus takes his place on the bottom tier.

Cowie the Crab and Sammie the Seahorse fool around the reefs with two mateys.
The back of the cake's just as busy with starfishes, jellyfishes,

school of fishies and more sea anemones.

Traditional 80th Birthday

2011-03-14T16:41:00.005+08:00

Gosh, what a week! I had an order for 400 cupcakes featuring the traditional Chinese symbols of longevity - The "Shou" character and the Longevity Peach. These were for an 80th grand birthday celebration in Kuala Pilah. Note to self: Don't do mass order again.. I was bored out of my skull baking and topping them off (not to mention spending a couple of days cutting 200 of the chinese character and hand-making 200 peaches!). No joke when you're flying solo.
Lesson learnt... MOTH 1 GODDESS 0.

How To Train Your Dragon

2011-03-07T08:43:00.010+08:00

Apparently this little laddie loves "How To Train Your Dragon"! Who doesn't? It's such a hilarious yet, heart-warming movie. Because this little man is only turning 1, I didn't really want to re-create the same dragons in the movie. Too dark coloured and very sharp teeth....nah. So I decided to make brightly-coloured baby dragons. I hadn't been able to really laugh the past week and these little fellas made me laugh. I had to give each and every one of them a character of its own and they turned out awfully cute. First, let me introduce....

the Dragon Hunter.

Then, we have a variety of the Chinese dragon,

...the little green baby dragon learning how to fly,

...Dopey,

...forever-tail-hugging Dopey 2,

...the crumpled-horn dragon and

Mr.Identity Crisis.

Oh, I forgot to get a shot of the newly-hatched purple dragon with its pacifier! Never mind that, you can see it in the main photo above. I also had spotted dragon eggs on the rest of the Brownie Cupcakes - filled with assorted chocs. Happy Birthday Samer!

Mini Birthday Treats

2011-03-07T08:40:00.002+08:00

Simple butter mini cupcakes topped with buttercream from the kids and grandkids to celebrate the patriach's 64th birthday.

Liverpool

2011-02-18T09:23:00.003+08:00

Finally! LIVERPOOL!!! After all the MU cakes I've done, the MOTH and Young Master were pleased to see the other Reds. These Vanilla Butter cupcakes were topped with buttercream 'grass' and all things a KOP will recognise. I especially enjoyed making Luis Suarez sliding on the grass (after scoring, of course!) to mark him signing with Liverpool this year. And of course the Barclay's cup...

No.7 Luis Suarez

Rapunzel

2011-02-18T09:16:00.003+08:00

Rapunzel was all I could think of given the very short notice for this 5-year old's birthday today. Her mum was listing Barney, Mickey Mouse & Friends and Tom&Jerry as her favourites and you know me.... *shaking head*. Just enough for 6 mouths, these two skirt-cakes weighed 850gms and is a special diet Chocolate (with whole strawberries) Cake. That meaning : eggless, gluten-free, dairy-free and nut-free.

Chinese New Year

2011-01-30T11:53:00.005+08:00

Kong Hei Fatt Choy, folks!! Here's wishing you the best in health, wealth and happiness for the coming year of the Rabbit. Your support in the past year is much appreciated and thank you. Yum Seng to another great year ahead. See you in a bit!

Pearl Drums

2011-01-24T17:06:00.004+08:00

This was for a lad who turned 13 last weekend. His favourites were everything of Manchester United or his drumming. No prizes for guessing which one I chose to work on... of course, the Pearl Drums!!! I had some choices to make when it came to designing the cake. I either modelled a set of drums out of sugarpaste and plonk it on a sheet cake or actually do the drums. The latter was more my kind of thing. But then came the question of how do you suspend the "drums"?

Cakes are heavy and I didn't have Buddy Carlos' skills nor the resources. So, I took a different viewpoint and voila! The set of drums as you see it from the front. Tristan's mum did ask if I was going to do the cymbals, well... I had to cheat on that. With the downpour every evening and only less than a week's notice, there was no way the sugarpaste will dry thoroughly enough to stand on it's own. So, I covered a paper plate with sugarpaste instead. Worked beautifully.

The young man sports a Justin Bieber hairstyle, loves Linkin Park (see the logo on his tee) and the usual accessories related to drumming - music notes, song book, headphones, his drumsticks and not forgetting the essential mobile phone (between the pages of his song book).

Under The Sea

2011-01-22T09:34:00.007+08:00

An 'Under The Sea' theme for a toddler celebrating her 2nd birthday. The cupcakes were absolutely healthy orange and cranberries. The party's special guests were...

Miss Tina Turtle, Miss Sally Starfish,

Miss Callie Crab, Miss Ollie Octopus,...

Miss Sandy Snail, Mrs Fanny Fish and her little girl Miss Flower,

Miss Connie Clownfish...

Miss Molly Mermaid, Miss Selina Starfish,
and partly hidden is Miss Jessy Jellyfish.

Hollywood Glam

2011-01-20T18:31:00.011+08:00

The children are growing up too soon!! This beautiful girl grew up right before my eyes and it's amazing to see the change from an adorable 8-month old bub to a sweet young thing of 10! She's now a confident young lady who (again, is growing up way too soon..) loves everything about the glamour of Hollywood. Can't blame her though, it's always interesting to see how people in the magazines and telly live... Her source? E! Hmmm...maybe she has a thing for Ryan Seacrest?? Do you Isa?? LOL!

Anyway, the birthday girl hearts ("loves" in tween language) watching...

E! News,....

...life in the fab lane with KLS

(no, she don't actually have a star on the Walk of Fame),...
KLS's Baby Phat bling logo,...

..one of her bling, bling fabulous tunic,

The Kardashians - Kourtney, Kim & Khloe...

(yup, they don't have a star either...;-)

...and DASH Miami with

a pair of their signature animal print bikini.

Have a FABULOUS year ahead babe!!

Bride & ManU Fan

2011-01-12T09:46:00.002+08:00

The Bride and her Manchester United-fan groom. A friend is attempting to bake her niece a 4-tier wedding cake this weekend and she needed some help in this department. Most happy to help "top-off" the cake!

Double Birthday Carnival

2011-01-10T15:19:00.008+08:00

I simply love mothers who dare to venture away from the television screen! This lovely mum planned for a double birthday celebration over Christmas for her daughter (3 years) and son (1 year). Her party theme was Carnival. She had her home draped in colourful fabric, hired a clown and gave away party packs in popcorn boxes. Simply beautifully done and I was commissioned to do the cakes.
What represents a carnival theme better than *drum roll* a circus tent! Ideas are always great but materialising it to something completely edible is another story. Good thing that this project were the last cakes for the year and I wanted to end the year with a great cake. The rich chocolate cake weighed 3kg - the whole structure including the tent was cake. I'm very pleased with the finished result.

The twin acrobats holding up the cake and candles.

Mr Clown...

The tiger and the monkey.

While the Circus Tent cake was for the big sister, little Ashaz had his own No.1 Moist Lemon cake. This cake was of a simpler design so not to outshine the 4-year old's. After all, a 12-month old is merely a "featured guest" even in his own party..LOL!! Wait till he's older and he'll start asking for a cake to top his sister's! This cake weighed 2.2kg and was iced with buttercream.

The circus pals - lion, bear and elephant.

Christmas 2010 Gingerbread Men

2011-01-10T15:16:00.002+08:00

Forgot to include these guys into the earlier Christmas 2010 album and am still searching for photos of the other gingerbread cookies made - lost in transfer...

Christmas 2010

2011-01-07T18:01:00.007+08:00

2010's Christmas theme for the Traditional Rich Fruit Cake was Gift-Wrapped. It was simple yet festive-looking for this little cake (6", 800gms). The moist brandied fruit cake was covered in marzipan (almond paste) before being iced with fondant and "gift-wrapped".

The Traditional Rich Fruit Cake - as it is...

I also introduced the sinful Mint-Filled Brownie Cupcakes in boxes of 6 for the festivities. They were great as table-fillers and needless to say, were yummilicious...

Pocket Frogs

2011-01-07T17:33:00.003+08:00

For those of you who are not in the know (like I was), Pocket Frogs is an iPhone game and has quite a following. This big daddy is apparently very in to the game and his girls thought it was appropriate to do something along those lines. Since, I don't have an iPhone nor am I familiar with the game, I stuck to doing a screen capture of the game. This Death-By-Chocolate cake weighed 2kg.

Pastel Pink Hantaran

2011-01-07T17:27:00.002+08:00

This was a very simple 1kg (7") Rich Chocolate cake used as a Hantaran. Theme colour was pink in pastel.

Shaun The Sheep

2011-01-07T16:59:00.008+08:00

These cupcakes (and more coming up..) are a month late in posting. I was so worn-out from the 2010 Christmas baking that I needed to chill for sometime. Of course, school re-opened this week and was in a roundabout for a couple a days but otherwise, all's good and I'm back! This 3- year old laddie clearly enjoys his daily dose of Shaun The Sheep lots, for his mum to ask for them I've only heard of them and went Googling for the characters in the show. Two words - BAD TEETH. Seriously. What's with the showing of teeth in all the characters? And bad ones, too, if I may... can't understand why the toddlers love 'em.

Pidsley & The Pig

Bitzer & The Farmer

Shaun The Sheep and The Flock

And the cakes - Lemon Moist and Vegetarian Chocolate Mud Cake with Strawberry Filling.

Pororo & Friends

2010-12-02T16:23:00.002+08:00

Another toddler cartoon which I've no idea whatsover. This time, even my children couldn't help me in it because it was out of their league (a 7 and 10 year old..) but the birthday girl's mummy was super efficient. She emailed me the website of Pororo along with her order (I seriously first thought she typed Pororo incorrectly and meant Pocoyo instead ;-p). With 2 boxes of these Rich Chocolate and Orange Cranberry cupcakes, little Giselle turned 2. Happy Birthday!

Baby Shower

2010-12-02T16:00:00.003+08:00

I'm happy that Baby Showers are finally catching up in this part of the world. I personally feel that it's a great opportunity for girlfriends to gather and talk shop before the baby arrives (and the new mother will practically go AWOL for the next 6 months!). It's also good to receive baby and mummy pressies in advance so the mum-to-be gets to tick off some baby stuffs off her looooonnnng list and buy only what's left then. Enough of me getting nostalgic now, this 8" Rich Chocolate feeds 20 people comfortably and weighed 1.8kg after the work's done.

I attempted to make my first pregnant figurine and I think I overdid the leaning-back-since-my-belly's-big. But again, think that's how I looked like when I was pregnant the first time. Absolutely huge, I was! Anyway, the giraffe was a mandatory figure and that's another first for me. I'm so thankful that its neck held up despite the downpour that evening.

The rest of the cake was topped with a baby blanket, some onesies, self-help books (my favourite being the "What To Expect" series), the diaper bag with a milk bottle and pacifier, and a stack of nappies.

Princess & The Frog

2010-12-02T15:49:00.004+08:00

This 400gm Rich Chocolate (mini) Cake was a little present to a young lady who just turned 6 not long ago. Most girls still love their princesses and fairies at this age, don't they? I thought since the newest Disney princess was from The Princess & The Frog, I did my version of her for this cake. Of course, my Little Miss highlighted to me (quite gently, like I was her ugly stepmother ready to yell...) that the latest princess is Rapunzel..... and I'm to remember that it's showing now in the cinema. Hmmm...

Gift-Wrapped Sugee

2010-12-02T15:37:00.003+08:00

I love "Gift-Wrapped" themes... So much so, that I'm extending the theme across this year's Christmas Cakes!!! For those of you who've received my 'spam' for this Christmas' Traditional Rich Fruit Cake orders, the theme I've mention is along this line but in obvious Christmassy colours and tinsels attached to the cake. Now, back to this cake - it's Great Bake's signature Sugee Cake, 9" and weighed 2.3kg. Can't never have enough of this cake...yumm.

Glitzy Dinner Party Treats

2010-11-23T12:47:00.003+08:00

These Rich Chocolate and Lemon Poppyseed Cupcakes were commissioned for a private dinner party at the fabulous 3rd Floor in JWM downtown last weekend. Request was simply a star and the initial "R". Yes, the simpler the request, the more freaked out I can get. Me being me, I couldn't just do a star and an "R"... I had to think and reeeaally think. Up to the very day itself, I still couldn't decide what to do! Even went to watch Harry Potter to see if I could get some sparks of ideas. I wanted to do something glamourous to complement the host and still keep it classy and not OTT, also like the host. In the end, this design came to mind. I pretty pleased with them and think they'd have gone well at dinner.

Miniatures

2010-11-23T12:17:00.004+08:00

I could only muster up these with less than 24 hours notice.... mini cupcakes of Lemon Blueberry and Butter Chocolate. Prettily boxed up for Hari Raya Haji.

Mickey Mouse Clubhouse

2010-11-23T12:03:00.002+08:00

Yes, yes...a Disney cake. The best I could summon out of my wand was the clubhouse when this 2-year old wanted a "Mickey Mouse cake". Yikes...luckily the mummy was awfully cool about my proposal of "something along those lines" and not a through and through Mickey Mouse cake. I suppose it worked! So I baked an 8", a half-round and a mini ball Rich Chocolate Cake to replicate the mouse's clubhouse. Whole cake weighed only about 1.6kg!

Office Birthday

2010-11-23T11:59:00.002+08:00

Another group of officemates celebrating a birthday at work with these yummilicious Lemon Poppyseed Cupcakes. I've always enjoyed "making faces" and will always do!

Wedding Hantaran

2010-11-23T11:50:00.002+08:00

This 8" moist Lemon Poppyseed Cake weighed around 1.6kg. I did a very simple design using pearl sugar to complement the set of dulang hantaran that was entirely covered in fresh flowers.

Rose Pink Birthday

2010-11-09T08:57:00.003+08:00

This is by far, the sweetest-looking cake I've decorated. I just love the colours - in pastel yet, vibrant. It was a 1.5kg Lemon Poppyseed Cake for a small dinner party celebrating 2 ladies' birthday. They wanted an after-dinner cake that goes well with coffee and tea. Lemon!! I made little daisies, mums and free-form blossoms in feminine colours and lined the sides with 4 different shades of rose pink stripes. Think this design will be lovely for a garden wedding!

88th Birthday Bash

2010-11-09T08:45:00.005+08:00

These cupcakes and a little main cake was ordered to celebrate a patriach's 88th birthday last weekend. Order was simple: Butter cake with buttercream icing with "88" on each of them including the cake. It's a very chinese request hence the very chinese finish with these cakes. I like them purely for it's loudness. Buttercup yellow in buttercream was chosen as the base colour to subtley complement the red of the eights on the 50 cupcakes. The main cake was just a little under 1kg and thinly covered in buttercream as well. Made 9 longevity peaches, a pair of golden eight and the chinese character "sau" that means longevity. "Yam seng" to the "sau seng kung" and with all those eights, here's wishing his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren "fatt-fatt-fatt"!!

Racing into 7

2010-11-08T18:59:00.007+08:00

This little man is the last in our children's playgroup to turn 7 and what's better than to make it a race! Birthday boy requested for chocolate cake (2.2kg here) with a racing theme. Instead of a big race car model, I thought it'll be more age-appropriate and "cute" to have a mini race track on the cake with funny race cars and drivers. As I made the little race cars, I told myself that I need to make something distinctive for the birthday boy and what did I make for him? A tortoise.... slow and steady, wins the race.. Happy Birthday Jae!!

M34

2010-11-02T16:58:00.002+08:00

It was either this or a fighter plane. This 12-year old had me literary blown away when his mum called me with his choices. As you would have known by now, I'm no fan of creating any replicas of syndicated television characters (some Walt guy is mainly responsible for this phenomenon) and I always tell mothers to please let your child dig deep and tell you what he or she really loves. So, I really had it in my face this time when this young man did tell his mum what he would love to have for his cake. My first email reply to mummy was "OMG!!!!".

But you know what, I was actually looking forward to creating it. Even more so using his favourite brownies - a very tricky "cake" to mess around with. The brownies cannot be baked too fudgy nor too dry. Could have done a brownie cake but hey, Great Bakes call a brownie- a brownie and a tiramisu-a tiramisu. No bastardised versions when it comes to cakes and desserts.

I have no idea what rifle is this but looking at it, I'm guessing it's some World War II machine gun? M34 what?? I'm glad the MOTH was hanging around when I was working on creating the textures and he could tell me how some parts should look like. Basically, it could have been better but to an untrained eye and a non-gun-educated person, think it can pass off as a machine gun-lah!

Cosa Nostra

2010-11-02T16:21:00.004+08:00

These cupcakes were ordered to commemorate a couple's union and as much as the Mafia theme sounds inappropriate, it actually is appropriate if you examine the mafioso's commandments (despite the methods used to handle "issues"...). I doubt if these youngsters know them since it was meant to just be a theme, but I think some of their guidelines on how to be a good, respectable and trusty member (or husband/wife, in this case) should be kept in mind:

* never look at your brothers' wives (brothers as in fellow gang members).
* do not go to pubs (yes, yes..)
* respect your wife (oh, definitely!)
* always be on time (are you here, yet?)
* don't get entangled with the police (just pay up...)

and my favourite commandment - when asked for any information, the answer must be the truth (hear, hear, except when I ask you if I look older than the day you met me...)
I also like "omerta". The MOTH was surprised I didn't know the meaning of this word when he suggested to include it on one of the cupcakes. He of course, gladly "enlightened" yours truly. Omerta is their code of silence..... :-I

Sexy Six

2010-11-02T16:01:00.004+08:00

Another humour cake this month and for a celebrant turning half a century old. His wife wanted a cake (2kg chocolate) to tease and how appropriate to present her gym-going hubby a possible version of himself! Don't we all have "visionary" husbands like hers??? ;-)

A Little Humour ...

2010-10-18T10:10:00.007+08:00

Thought this cake would be appropriate for the newly-weds' casual wedding reception at Courtyard last Saturday - groom who only drinks Coke and bride who loves her booze!! This 3.8kg Chocolate Fudge cake was the main table's centrepiece and both loved the depiction of themselves. Apparently the scene repeated itself that night after the party!! Lol!

Cake viewed from the top.

The anxious groom.

The drunk bride.

Ivory & Gold - Table Wedding Cakes

2010-10-18T09:41:00.009+08:00

These 6", 7" and cupcakes were designed following an ivory and gold (and white) colour theme for a casual wedding reception. A cake was placed on each table of 10 and 12 guests, as a centrepiece and as a self-serving wedding cake. Each cake weighed around 1kg plus. Flavours were Lemon Poppyseed, Chocolate, Butter, Marble, Lemon Blueberry and Chocolate Cherries.

Kay-Lee turns 1

2010-10-18T09:32:00.005+08:00

Another 1st birthday with toy blocks in butter cake (2kg). This time round, I made alphabet blocks to spell out the birthday girl's name. Kinda stressed out when I only started covering the little square cakes (20 of them!!) at 10pm, the night before I leave for Beijing and hadn't packed at all.... Told the MOTH to remind me never to put myself through such timelines again. Nevertheless, I'm tickled that 1-year old Kay-Lee had her first taste of cake and it's from my oven!! Many more birthdays to come Kay-Lee!

Noah Turns 1

2010-10-05T15:04:00.010+08:00

Mummy and Daddy decided on a Pocoyo-themed party for baby Noah's 1st birthday last weekend and it's always an honour for me to bake a child's 1st birthday cake. Pocoyo is absolutely cute and love him even more that he doesn't speak a lot (you'll appreciate that if you had my kids..)! It's an excellent programme for tots who's mostly visual at this age than really be able to listen to full conversations. Anyway, back to the cake - it's a small 2-tier marble cake graced by Pocoyo and his friends.

What started as Pocoyo walking about and whistling, I figured he'd be better off helping the birthday boy blow out that massive candle! The pink elephant was supposed to be standing until the wet weather brought her down to her knees, so she had to sit to be safe. But I am very pleased with the yellow bird and the dog. Both held up very well - one with skinny legs and the other trying to scale the cake. The party also had over a hundred mini cupcakes in chocolate and vanilla butter to supplement the little cake. It's painstaking to work on minis...