Cake for Kristen

Cake decorating class is on hiatus for the Christmas holiday. So far I've been averaging baking and decorating a cake a week. I was starting to wonder what I would do for this week/past weekend. Kristen, a friend in my class, mentioned her birthday was on Saturday and wanted a cake, but felt weird making one for herself. Bingo! I offered to make her cake for her. I needed the practice and something to do with the lovely fondant roses I had been working on. It helped to have something to do being snowed in on Saturday too.

I had some leftover chocolate buttercream from the Oreo cake. I mixed some raspberry preserves into it and used that for the filling between the 3 layers; 2 milk chocolate and 1 white in the middle. The exterior is chocolate buttercream.

My problem is, I start making cakes without thinking about how I am going to transport them. I have a cake carrier from my grandmother, but the cover was too low for this cake. I ended up using the bottom portion of my cake carrier inside a large cardboard box, balanced on the seat in my car. It made it to Kristen's with few noticeable smudges. One leaf fell off the bottom border, but it was easily re-attached.

You should check out Kristen's work on her blog Let Them Eat Cake.
She makes some really beautiful cakes.

On a side note, I had a very positive admissions interview at The Cambridge School of Culinary Arts on Monday. By the time I was sitting in the unemployment office an hour and a half later, I got a message from the director of admissions telling me the wonderful news: I had been accepted in to the Pastry Program starting in January 2009! I bet no one has seen such a look of joy and happiness on the face of someone waiting to file for unemployment.

I'm still working out the details and trying to secure financing (the big IF factor) before I can officially announce my student status. So everyone hope that it comes through. I got the will, now I just need the way.