♥ Hello Kitty ♥

My friend's daughter Aeriel, the recipient of the My Little Pony cake, requested for a Hello Kitty cake for her birthday celebration in school. If you read my earlier post, you'll see I made a cream cheese frosted Hello Kitty cake for another little girl. The feedback I got was that while they enjoyed the cake, it didn't really look like Hello Kitty. Some kitty fans I know even told me it was a poor attempt. Well I thrive on feedback and challenges so I was eager to have the opportunity to give kitty another go.

This time round, I made Kitty with gum paste and fondant. You'll see why it is the preferred ingredient, it looks almost like the toy. You'll never have that smooth and neat finish with cream, hence my first kitty looked a little melty and perhaps my proportions weren't the best. Still I would recommend fondant for Hello Kitty orders from now on, even if it's going to be on a cream cheese cake. 

Hello, Kitty!

I baked a four-layer chocolate cake in a heart shape and had it covered in the softest shade of pink fondant. It's the first time I'm covering an irregular shaped cake and I have to say, it wasn't as difficult as I anticipated, but I did run into a troublesome spot - the tip of the heart. So what's a girl to do? Add on more hearts of course! Something I'm sure the birthday girl would be more than happy to have.

Work in progress

I also had Aeriel's name set on a heart. Instead of piping or stencilling, I decided to roll out a long piece of fondant and try my hand at some font-making. I was glad to hear that Aeriel signs her name with a heart for her 'i' too. 

Aeriel ♥ Hello Kitty

It was pure joy assembling this cake. It's girly, sweet and oh so Sanrio! For this order, I bought a really  pretty Hello Kitty cutter. It produces such a nice Hello Kitty shape that I made two with fondant to embellish the sides of the cake. I'm definitely looking forward to using them again!

No such thing as too many Kitties on one cake

Happy Birthday again!

♥ Hello Kitty ♥

To all Hello Kitty fans reading this post, tell me what you think? And do share any kitty cake ideas that you may have with me. 

Epic Cake!

I took on an ambitious order and think I may have made 'The Cake' to date.

It was so nice to hear from an old school mate - she found out that I had this cake venture so she contacted me for a series of cakes for her daughters. Doesn't seem that long ago we were a couple of blue-uniformed schoolgirls running around CHIJ ; )

My friend's daughter celebrates her 5th birthday this month and I had the pleasure of baking her a My Little Pony cake! I remember the pastel-coloured ponies from my own childhood and I absolutely love the flowers, rainbows and hearts that surrounded the ponies. I went on to plan a cake that I would have loved for myself when I was 5 years old.

The birthday girl wanted Pinke Pie, Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash on the cake. She also wanted flowers, hearts and ribbons. I don't' have daughters, my two sons want trains, trains and trains. So you can imagine my excitement at making this cake.

I quickly got to work on the embellishments.
First the flowers...

Little pansies in colours of the rainbow

Then the rainbow, hearts and bow...

Hearts are fun to make

Next comes the main feature... Pinkie Pie! In the days leading up to Pinkie Pie, I had actually gone to a party supply shop and found My Little Pony cake toppers! They were beautiful so I bought them and looked at them long and hard. There was no way I could have done a 3D pony with fondant or gum paste that would come close to the toppers. So I relented and decided to use toppers (my friends all say - "There's no shame in it!"). Still I could not accept not making a pony with fondant. So I decided to make Pinkie Pie myself. To differentiate from the toy toppers, I decided to make her 2D but work on her mane so it looks like it's blowing in the wind.

Pinkie Pie

I had her set on the top tier as the main feature...

Riding on a chocolate cake

Looking at this picture now, I kinda like the simplicity of Pinkie Pie on a plain fondant covered cake. But this was going to be my epic cake, so this is really just the start of putting it all together.

Rainbow delight 

The bottom tier is set on a plush buttercream green grass field dotted with flowers where Little Ponies run free. A pretty fondant rainbow brightens the design and adds extra sweetness.

Here's the complete stack. Notice the hearts on the cake, they stand out instead of lie flat on the cake. I got around to using gum paste and managed to make these hearts. They are great coz they harden up much better than fondant and could be used without losing its shape.

My Little Pony Paradise

Happy Birthday Aeriel

Hello Kitty!

I knew it was a matter of time before the famous Japanese bobtail kitty cat finds me and my baking adventures. A friend recommended a mummy to me for a heart-shaped banana cake with Hello Kitty on it. The cake is meant for her little girl's birthday celebration in school, so I made a double layer heart-shaped cake and 12 cupcakes for the kids.

I love heart-shaped cakes and I've got a great silicone pan that consistently produces beautiful heart-shaped cakes. It's not often that I get a request for it, so I was delighted at this order.

This was going to be a fondant / cream cheese challenge again but because it was going to be picked up the night before the party, I was afraid it may have to go into the fridge because of the cream cheese. There is one thing worse than cream cheese for fondant and that is REFRIGERATION. Fondant doesn't do very well in our weather but putting it in the fridge just makes it sweat and weep its colours so don't ever put it in the fridge. And since we will NEVER have Californian weather , I always just recommend air-conditioning.

After frosting the heart with cream cheese (mmmm), I placed the carved Hello Kitty on top and decided to frost it in a whiter shade of sugar icing. Then I outlined Kitty's face with royal icing to give a definitive look. The birthday girl loves the colour yellow so the cream cheese was tinted buttercup yellow for the border piping. The result is not too bad but you can see why fondant is still a favourite when you want to achieve that clean and neat finish.

Hello Kitty

Happy Birthday Joie!

I have another Hello Kitty order coming up soon and will be trying the fondant approach next.
Stay tuned for more!