Cake Boss

I love watching cake making shows. My friend Taylor and her mom really got me into them. Back when I worked at Baskin Robins I was given the opportunity to decorate the ice cream cakes at one point, it was so much fun. After my best friend made a fondant cake for her daughter's birthday I decided that I really really really wanted to make Madison's first birthday cake, but I definitely wanted to get some practice first.

My two main concerns were taste and cuteness. So I watched a few videos on how to make a fondant cake, and read some pointers on foodnetwork.com. I also googled some ideas of some designs I wanted to try. Then I headed to Wal-mart and spent what I considered WAY too much on all the cake creating equipment. When my husband found out how much I spent he nearly went into cardiac arrest, but I assured him this was an investment because if I did a good job, then I'd make all the future birthday cakes for the family and it would save money in the long run. He did not seem as enthusiastic as I did, but that all changed when my first cake came

out.

Alright, so my first cake was a decorating disaster, but it tasted fantastic. I used a yellow cake recipe off the internet, whipped strawberry filling, crumb coated the cake with butter cream frosting and used a rolled butter cream fondant to cover it. The problem I had decorating was I was a little too timid with the fondant and ended up folding over one of the sides, plus my butter cream frosting was really liquidy and melted everywhere. I was sad it didn't turn out as I had imagined, but my husband was really sweet and encouraged me to give it another try. My first cake was supposed to go to my co-workers, but I was too embarrassed to bring it in as planned, so my husband brought it to his work.

His coworkers loved it, and they begged for another one. This was just the encouragement I needed, and I got started right away on another one. I decided to step it up by making it a two tiered cake, and got a different butter-cream frosting recipe. This time I had absolutely no problem. I had a routine down already to help the process go more smoothly.

After my 2nd cake came out amazing, I am confident that my daughter's cake will too. My co-workers asked me to make another one for a fellow co-workers baby shower, so wish me luck in that one coming out good too!