Fist pump of a cake!

We were commissioned by six year old Elijah to create his Marvel birthday cake. He requested that his four favourite superheroes, Ironman, Spiderman, Hulk and Captain America to be featured on his two tiered cake.

As we prefer our cakes to be uncluttered with clean lines and high tiers, our challenge was to fit all four characters without cramping up the two-tier cake.

The birthday boy advised his mum to tell us that his favourite of the four characters were Captain America and Ironman, whilst Spiderman was his least favourite of the four.

We decided that hulk was easiest and most striking on the top of the cake, Captain America on the largest tier and Ironman on the top tier. But where to put Spiderman?

To keep options open, we made the cake board and Ironman tier red, to allow us to play around and decide where to put Spidey.

Playing around with positioning... our three sample layout mock-ups

The end result?

What do you think? Where would you have put Spidey? Which design do you prefer?

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D'oh!, Donuts, Duff

To say that I felt excited when I was creating this cake just doesn't cut it.

The Simpsons has been a much loved cartoon throughout my childhood, my teenage years, and still now as an adult. The timeless comedy has amused both the young and the old since 1989, it would be difficult to find another cartoon in the same league.

Because of this, I was actually a little hesitant in accepting this order. The pressure to do the Simpsons justice, I almost couldn't do it. For me personally, I have yet to find a 3D Simpsons character out there that I feel, looks entirely true to the 2D characters that we all know and love. Especially not a 3D Simpsons character created with fondant. Everyone knows exactly how the Simpsons characters look, and a nose out of place or one finger too many, can cause die-hard fans trolling. Because of these reasons, I was really hoping that our client would change her mind.

But there was no chance, our client insisted on having a Simpsons themed cake for her boyfriend as he REALLY loves the Simpsons. Even though I tried my best to deter her from the Simpsons, she was so determined to have a Simpsons cake that she was willing to have "anything-Simpsons-related", and trusted us to create her dream cake. It was because of her persistence and determination that we agreed and decided to give it a try.

I was so glad that we accepted the challenge as I loved every moment of it. From designing the cake and running my ideas by my client (who was always enthusiastic and lovely to deal with!), googling images from the actual TV show, to sugar sculpting the toppers and finally putting the scene together on the cake.

When we agreed to do the cake, there was no question, it had to be Homer. Full of character, personality, habits, he would create an awesome scene. The setting also needed to be well known, so either the front of the house, or the lounge room, and there would need to be beer. Alot of beer.

So I got googling. I was ecstatic to find the image of Homer, passed out with a part-eaten donut in his hand. Of course, there has to be donuts!

Then I found an image by someone named "Ben", who drew the exact scene I wanted to recreate. Some of the aspects of that image didn't seem to be exactly how Matt Groening draws, so I combined Ben's scene with Matt Groening's masterpiece.

I started off with sugar sculpting the couch, and when I was happy with how it turned out, I started on Homer's head.

It felt like forever to get his proportions as accurately as I could best do it and finally, I was happy with how he looked. In fact, I was quite smug about it... until....

I placed him on the couch. Gasp. Shock horror... His head was almost a third of the size of the couch. Do I redo Homer's head from scratch, or do I make an entirely new couch? I chose the couch.

So after a new couch was sculpted, this time in proportion to Homer's head, we were able to sculpt the rest of Homer's body, and then add all the finer details, including his signature white Y-fronts. As the birthday boy's name is Alvin, we decided that it would be most fitting to brand his jocks after him. Creating the rest of the scene, the beer cans, donuts, rug, lamp table, complete with lamp, books and phone was just pure enjoyment.

Finally, for the side of the cake, I really really wanted to recreate the outside of the Simpsons house, yet at the same time, I wanted to do the Simpsons introduction sky theme. After speaking to my client and hearing that she was planning on decorating the party with clouds, the decision was made.

So there it is, our Homer Simpson cake for Alvin (Klein), complete with a fondant 30 donut! Happy 30th birthday Alv!

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Cinderfella...

We absolutely love themed cakes, especially one with a good story behind it. For this week's cake, we were commissioned by a lovely wife to create a wedding anniversary present to surprise her husband, Sid. This amazing couple are hilarious to be around and spend much of their time laughing at one another.

She was happy to leave the design entirely to us, but requested that the cake to be comical and lighthearted. She mentioned that her husband is a hoarder when it comes to clothes and shoes. He can rival Imelda Marcos in the shoe department and teases that he actually won a radio competition for being a "Cinderfella". His favourite colour is lavender. She sent over a few photos of the shoes he has sitting by the back door and a recent photo of him, and then left it with us.

Making a joke out of his name together with the title he was crowned in the radio competition, we decided on "Sid-erfella". A Sid topper holding back a wardrobe that is bursting at its seams, with shoes strewn across the bedroom floor. To make the cake more bedroom-like, we created a "wooden floorboard" effect out of fondant, and embossed and hand painted each "plank of wood".

What an ideal client!! Thank you for trusting your anniversary cake to us, we are thrilled that you both loved it. Happy Anniversary Sid and Tiza xxx

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“Thank you Liz, Khanh and Cake Me! for the creativity. Amazeballs! You are uber skilled! Sid-erfella was completely surprised!

Sid loved loved loved it. He couldn’t believe he got a cake that’s so him. Sid literally had no words, haha that doesn’t happen! The cake is so yummy, it’s awesome, so much love put into it.”

— Tiza

Noah's Ark

Now this weekend's party was truly a party fit for a prince.

Noah, or kunchu (meaning prince) as his mother likes to call him, had his first birthday party probably mostly-planned whilst he was in-utero. We had created Noah's mum's bridal shower cupcakes, his parents' wedding cake, Noah's smash cake, and now his first birthday cake. So it came as no surprise to us when his mother requested to book us out for the second Saturday of September for the next five years, and is currently deliberating on the theme for his third birthday party.

Cupcakes for Noah's mum's hens, Princess and the Frog theme

Although this is only Noah's first birthday, Noah's mum is no novice at throwing awesome parties. Her wedding was a two day affair spanning two weekends, first at Nine Darling Street then at the beautiful Regent Theatre. Noah's party was no different. Face painters, balloon artists, a petting zoo, and of course, a party fit for a prince would also have a Cake Me! kids session ;P.

Sample cupcake for the Cake Me! kids session

Playroom transformed into the Cake Me! kids classroom

The eighteen friends of Noah's were aged between three and twelve. The kids were amazing. For me personally, it was a challenge catering for such a big range of ages and abilities, however all the kids were so eager, so enthusiastic, and all remained focused for the entire ninety minute session. Even the younger ones whose parents warned me prior to the class that their child probably wouldn't be able to last, they were still seated right until the very end. Even though Noah was too young to participate, the class was tailored to the theme of his party and the eighteen kids created their own monkey cupcakes. We loved how the kids were so confident with fondant and wanted to express their own individuality at the end, some giving their monkey a white hairdo, and another little girl gave her monkey a matching chef's hat to the one she was wearing.

The Noah's ark themed party was announced to me a few weeks after Noah was born, and I was so excited to have complete free reign on the design. Weighing in at 31.5kg and 59cm in height, the cake was enormous to say the least. Just the cake batter alone was 14kg. As my four year old put it, "there's enough cake for everyone in the whole world!".. Yes, just about!! Each plank of "wood" was individually cut out and stuck on, each animal lovingly hand sculpted, lustred and hand-painted. Everything was fully edible, including the "sea", "ark", "boathouse" and animals (with the exception of cocktail sticks and wires for the water droplets). Naturally, I wanted to build an ark and put lots of fun animals on it.. But I decided to make the cake more meaningful and relevant to the birthday boy, so I had to do some research.

The first animal on the cake are giraffes. Just before Noah was conceived, Noah's parents went to Africa and stayed at Giraffe Manor. The whales represent Hawaii, where Noah first holidayed. Noah's mum studied in New Zealand, so obviously sheep came to mind. So to make it fair, I asked Noah's mum what animal would represent his dad?... She replied, "hippo" for reasons I won't write in this blog, but it rhymes with hazy and pat. ;p Finally to represent Noah the cheeky and fearless little one year old, monkeys and lions.

Some people may question whether Noah will even remember his first birthday party when he's older? We don't know that answer, but judging from his smile all day, he had a super, fantastic day. But if you question any of his party guests whether they would remember Noah's first birthday party for years to come? They most definitely will.

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"You find magic wherever you look...."

“... sit back and relax. all you need is a book”

— Dr Seuss

To celebrate Noah's first year we were commissioned to create a Dr Seuss inspired smash cake. Moss17 Photography captured this sweet moment for Noah and his family.

“I know it is wet and the sun is not sunny, but we can have lots of good fun that is funny.”

— Dr Seuss

Noah loved his first taste of white chocolate cake and silky smooth Swiss meringue buttercream. True to the book, "Cat in a hat" however, this clean little boy realised that he was making a huge mess and he started to cry!

“And this mess is so big
And so deep and so tall,
We cannot pick it up.
There is no way at all!”

— Dr Seuss

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Up, up, and away!

What do you get when you put two tiers of love, a woven basket of fondant, together with some dry ice? A hot air balloon cake of course!

To welcome Spring, blue skies and warmer weather, we are so excited to share our latest cake with you all... the hot air balloon cake we created for Olivia's first birthday party.

The theme of this cake was inspired by Baby Livvy's favourite book "I see clouds in the sky" and photos from her recent family photoshoot by Yulia Pavlova.

Although I have competing deadlines this week and am stretched with time to write a full blog, I couldn't resist putting together some photos for this blog.

Baby Livvy's very creative mummy, Sotty (of Little Sotty!) artistically handcrafted all the decorations for the party, including a "design your own hot air balloon" craft station for the kids!

Feeling inspired yet?

“Dear Cake Me!, Thank you so much for making us the most gorgeous cake to celebrate our precious Livvy’s first birthday. Your attention to detail is amazing and I love how you were able to design and personalise the perfect cake for me, based on the party’s “Clouds and hot air balloons” theme while incorporating the colour palette from the birthday invitation. Not only did the cake look amazing but it also tasted devine! It was so nice to be able to plan the rest of the party knowing that the cake was in the hands of someone I trusted and knew would do an amazing job. Thanks again”

— Sotty

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