Happy Thanksgiving Turkey!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Had a wonderful evening with my son last night baking cupcakes!  It was so great to just de-stress with him and have fun....after making a few cakes for others recently and the stress that goes along with that.  We made a few turkeys as well.  Not the typical turkey, but sugar dough turkeys!



Don't stress... ANYONE can do these easy little turkeys.

Roll out three balls of brown fondant. One big and 2 smaller.

Roll the 2 smaller balls into cone shapes and pinch one end to make the turkey legs.  Add a tiny ball of white to those ends for the bones. 

Simply use some water and carefull pinch them to the larger ball (the turkey).

Voila!

These turkeys were done in under 5 minutes!

My turkeys turned out pretty well, I was happy with them.

But oh, I learned a very valuable Thanksgiving lesson last night.

Spending time with your kids is WAY important.

I spend valuable time - many many hours stressing over the cakes I do for others...the scrutiny I put myself under for the perfect cake decor.

That's all well and good.  I do luv what I do.

But my favorite turkey cupcakes were not my own.

Austin's cupcakes were my absolute FAV!

My  year old's turkey cupcakes are my favorite EVER!

His happiness and creativity are of the utmost importance.

The works of edible art we made last night are WAY better than any other cake I've done recently!

The imperfectness of them makes them SO perfect to me.

Anyway...please give thanks for your blessings today and everyday!

Fondant Ribbon-Monkey Cake

Recently I had the opportunity to make a baby shower cake for a friend's daughter's shower.  Not just any cake, but a 3 layer fondant cake.  I was very excited to take this one on.  I love fondant work.  Now I know I am not "The Boss" or a "Pro" but can do a pretty nice job! I was pretty excited to sculpt the little monkey for the top of the cake to match the baby's bedding.

Today I wanted to share a few quick tips on making the chocolate fondant ribbon bow that wraps the top layer of the cake and drapes down the front.  Perhaps in later post, a series of  'how to' will come on the rest of the cake.  

Fondant is a sugar clay; mold able & pliable.  You can buy pre-made fondant in craft stores, white or pre colored or you can make your own with marshmallow.  Now, I am not that fond of the making & mixing part of cake decor... I luv the creative decor part, so I buy my fondant.

So, first things first.  I roll a hunk of fondant into a thick snake.  Much like we did as kids in art class, playing with clay.

(personal note: I do realize what the snake of chocolate clay resembles so please forgive me.  This was the color choice of the customer - so bear with me!)

Gently roll the fondant snake flat into a long ribbon like piece.  About 1/8th of an inch thick.  Not too thin that you cannot work with it and pick it up. Trim the side edges with a sharp knife or pizza cutter for a straight edge.

Wrap this around the joint of the top and middle cake as shown.  I like a free flowing 'wrinkled' appearance on my ribbons.

To make all the remaining pieces of the ribbon you will need to make the snakes and roll them flat.

Next, take 2 trimmed flat fondant pieces cut to about the same length and fold them into a circular shape, pinching the edges together to form the bow of the ribbon as shown.

wrap a shorter piece to cover the joining of the 2 bows to resemble a knot.

Allow these to sit and air dry to the side while you make the rest of the ribbon.

Continue making 2 more very long strips.  These will be the tail of the ribbons.

Attach these to the cake with a bit of water or cake icing for your glue. 

Allow them to roll and fold down the cake, gently draping the edges.

(& covering and mistakes you may have made in icing!)

NOT that I would have make any! Ha Ha.

Last you will want to attach the completed bow that has had some time to firm up.  Gently 'glue' the bow onto the overlapping of all of your tails like so...

Place cake back into the fridge to cool for PARTY TIME!

Enjoy!