Bowl Me Over

Unique people deserve unique cakes. Jimmy is unique, or at least his mother tells me so. His favorite sport-ish type thing to do? You guessed it... bowling.
I used the Wilton Sports Ball pan for the bowling ball, and a 9x13 carved up for the pins.I covered the ball with chocolate icing, then used what was left of the white icing to smear it into the chocolate to give it the marble look that bowling balls are notorious for.

I even gave it finger holes, though I wouldn't recommend actually using them.

Gone Fishin'

Every once in a while, I get to do something kooky.Again, I got to play with food-safe markers... fish and kelp later, we have a cake......with it's own hip wader-wearing fisherman......made from icing, pretzels, and a marshmallow.

Getting a little Racy?

Forever Earnhardt
This is a half chocolate, half yellow sheet cake for my good friend's birthday. if you haven't guessed, he is a HUGE Earndhardt fan. I used the same method for the picture as I did on Zieger Field.

The Old Car
Another friend, another race fan. My mother is also a big Junior fan, so I really had to keep her away from the cake. She was happy with a picture of it, though.

I used the race car shaped pan from Wilton and did my best approximation of the car, using Mom's model as a reference.

Did you miss?

This cake was for a dear friend that works on the factory floor. Her fellow QC cohorts and I plotted deviously for this cake. I knew she liked shooting, and how funny would it be to give her her own "age target"? Note 4 shots in the 10, 2 in the 5, 1 in the 1, but what's this on the line...?

Is that last one a 5 or a 1? What are you trying to say here?

Truth be told she was actually turning 52, but the reaction was priceless. In all fairness, she had a rather good sense of humor about the whole thing, and the "head" of the target was angel food so she could take some cake home to her diabetic son.

Birthday ala Zieger

I love the Zieger family. Mom and the two boys are awesome, and I love doing cakes for them.


Exhibit #1: Birthday at Zieger Field
Ben loves baseball, and after talking it over with his mom, we came up with this. The diamond is regulation size (to scale), and I tried to replicate the criss-cross mowing pattern in the "grass".
I attempted to duplicate the Wrigley Field score board, substituting his name on the board. I also scored the home team with his age (13).
Ben's mom also loaned me a picture of Ben in full baseball garb which I transferred to the cake in black icing as an overlay on the field.

When we met to transfer the cake over for his birthday she brought Ben with her, and I wasn't even sure if he liked it. He just nodded and left. She told me later that after we were out of sight, he grinned from ear to ear raving about how much he loved it, but asking his mom if he acted "cool". I guess it's a teenager thing.

An unusual occurrence happened during the construction of this cake... I goofed on the icing. I pulled chocolate and (what I thought was) regular butter cream out of my freezer, but as it turned out, I had thawed the pre-made batch of cordial cream filling (where all I had to do was add confectioner's sugar to make it thick). I couldn't figure out why the icing was so thin and sticky. It dawned on me after I found the faded label on the side that this was the marshmallow and butter starter for the cream. I learned 2 very important lessons that day: 1. always mark your containers with permanent marker and 2. the marshmallow cream and butter starter mixed with chocolate butter cream made a very tasty icing. I'll have to try to replicate my mistake later for future use.

Exhibit #2: Martinsburg Madness

I am an alumnus of Martinsburg High School, and Zay plays football there. Who knew cake carving would come in handy? It took me some research before I found a helmet that resembled the team's the best. It took a LOT of dye to get that bright orange color, too!As much as he loves football, he's more into street hockey now, and wants that for his next birthday cake. We'll have to wait and see what Ben has in mind for his.

Rack 'em Up!

Gladys asked me to do this cake for her son's birthday. I must admit, I've been wanting to do a cake like this for a while.
Everything on the cake is edible, even the pool ques and the balls

I made the balls out of fondant, skewered them with a tooth pick, and "painted" the balls (I can't say that without giggling) with a food safe marker. I tried my best to get the colors as accurate as possible, but the blue only goes so dark.

I even gave the cues a wood grain, and the table felt a slight texture to resemble the real thing.

I've been told that he almost didn't want to cut the cake, but hunger and a sweet tooth finally gave in. Gladys did show me a picture of Eddie with his cake... I've never seen a man so happy in my life.