Monday, June 21, 2010

Baby Oblad's Cake

We had a great day yesterday as we celebrated the upcoming arrival of Baby Oblad. Our friends Stephanie and Paul are expecting their first little boy this August and we couldn't be more excited for them. We had a lovely potluck-style luncheon in Victory Park; of course, my contribution was the cake. I chose to do a blue, white, and green striped fondant 12 in. round cake (white cake with vanilla buttercream) with a dome of white roses on top. To make the cake glisten, I brushed each fondant stripe and the top of the cake with some watered-down piping gel and then sprinkled on some sanding sugar. (It made the fondant more edible as well.) This might be the most technically perfect cake I've ever made; I credit the homemade buttercream for that. As with the banana pecan cupcakes, I made a vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream for the filling and as a coating under the fondant. The consistency of the homemade buttercream made a world of difference and gave me a super smooth coating under the fondant. The taste was superior as well. I would considering foregoing the fondant all together for a smaller cake and just using the buttercream; that's how smooth this stuff looks!


The dome of roses on top was inspired by a wedding in which I was a bridesmaid about a month ago. I took home a floral arrangement and after a few days completely took it apart and analyzed its construction. It seemed pretty straightforward: a shallow dish with a wet floral foam taped to the dish with waterproof floral tape. As long as the foam stays wet, the flowers inserted into the foam stay fresh! So I picked up some Oasis foam, a shallow dish, and waterproof tape from the craft store and whipped this little guy up with about 2 dozen white roses. I think the next time I have a party I'll definitely make some nice big dramatic floral arrangements with this technique. It was so easy!

1 comment:

  1. It was a gorgeous cake and tasted great too :) Thanks Pam!

    ReplyDelete