Branding!

SO it has been almost 5 years since I started BellaTiers... and I'm FINALLY getting a logo designed. I met this really nice lady-Kiley Peters-through my brother who is helping me create a whole brand for my business at an extremely discounted rate, as I rarely have extra money laying around. In exchange for her kindness I am just to make her cakes for the rest of her life! Sounds reasonable, no?

I'm very, very excited. I meet with her later this month to go over some potentials and hopefully BellaTiers will have a cute little logo that I can stamp on everything I possibly can!


Till next time!

Amy's Cabaret Show 40th Birthday Cake!

Allo all!

This cake was a group project for me! My friend and co-worker Keith Davis is good friends with Amy Armstrong--a well known Chicago cabaret singer who I've seen twice now--she's absolutely incredible and hilarious, and was having a 40th birthday concert at the Mayne Stage. I was overjoyed to work on this cake for her in exchange for tickets to her show. There was an after party with around 75 people, so we also made three different flavors of mini cupcakes for the event, along with this cake. Amy had mentioned to us her favorite flavors and colors-which we incorporated wonderfully thanks to Keith's cake recipes. The cake was a very rich, chocolaty cake with 5 layers of caramel butter cream filling. Covered in my marshmallow fondant and ALL edible decorations. We went half-sies with the topper. I worked on the piano and Keith made Amy. :o]

All in all the show was amazing, Amy loved her cake, the guests loved (and devoured) the cupcakes, and it was a fun little cake to work on in good company.

Happy Birthday Amy!


Till next time!

Lisa and Mitch Wedding!

Hello!

Two weddings in a row-oh my!

This cake was for a friend of mines sister's wedding! Lisa and Mitch Springer were wed at a small, BEAUTIFUL banquet hall on the water in Batavia, IL.
This event was a very different one for me, because I was there the entire time. Lisa and Mitch invited me to the wedding and I got to bare witness everyone enjoying the cake-what a great feeling. WEIRD, but great.
Did I mention this wedding was beautiful?

The cake was to be very simple, and 'nature' themed, as the entire ceremony and reception was. The focus color was sage green, so we went with a very simple vine and sage green leaf design wrapping around the three tiers of the cake.
Ran in to a small issue with the board! Lisa and Mitch liked the idea of having an actual piece of wood underneath the cake. I have seen this quite a few times but underestimated the complexity of actually getting a piece of wood of the right size. After ordering what I thought would be a perfect round piece of a tree trunk online, I felt completely at ease and waited for it to come in the mail. a week before the wedding, and I get this tiny, OVAL piece of wood that looked nothing like what I ordered.
After hyperventilating and frantically calling every lumber yard in the Chicago area with no success, I emailed Lisa with some new ideas. Thankfully she was not upset with the mishap at all and we moved to the decision of marbling fondant to look like wood grain, and covering a simple cake drum with it. Phew!

We had discussed different types of butter creams, as the groom did not like the very American style cream that is very heavy and overly sweet. This being that traditional American butter cream is the simple butter whipped with powdered sugar and milk.
I assured them I would make a lighter butter cream-Italian-that is used widely in the industry because of it's stability and airy texture. It is made by whipping a meringue with sugar cooked to a very high temperature. After it's cooled quite a bit, it is then whipped with butter and flavorings.

The cake was three tiers of buttermilk marble cake, and a vanilla bean Italian butter cream filling. Everything was iced with the same butter cream and adorned with the light brown vines and sage green leaves.
I absolutely loved the porcelain topper. Lisa had seen it featured on another cake online and ordered it immediately.

Another fun cake, and a great wedding.
Congrats Lisa and Mitch!


Till next time!

Michelle and Brandon Wedding!

Hello, all! I've been seriously neglecting this blog lately, no bueno!
To make up for it I'm posting a series of far too many posts all at once-yay!

So a while back, I worked on a cake/cupcake combination for an old friend of mines' wedding. Michelle and Brandon we're married at this beautiful little boat house, with everything covered in green and purple (their favorite colors). I had done a tasting a few months ago with many different flavored cupcakes and Michelle wanted them all!
We had researched some cupcake towers online and I had found a small company that sells through Ebay, where they supply many different styles and sizes for a very reasonable price. Michelle went and ordered two of them to hold the 130 cupcakes, and only spent around $30.00--which was pa-retty awesome if you ask me.

Cupcakes:
Red velvet cake with cream cheese icing, cake crumble garnish
Carrot cake filled with apricot preserves and topped with cream cheese icing, fried carrot garnish
Chocolate buttermilk cake with chocolate butter cream, chocolate curl garnish
Lemon poppy seed cake with blueberry butter cream, candied lemon zest garnish
Banana walnut cake with milk chocolate ganache, fried banana chip garnish

The cake was a two tier square buttermilk marble cake. The bottom tier had a milk chocolate ganache filling (Michelle's choice), and the top tier had a strawberry compote filling (Brandon's choice). The whole cake was iced in a vanilla bean butter cream and decorated with marshmallow fondant vines, green ribbon and small purple flowers.

Michelle also threw in a small grooms cake in to the equation. The story behind it is a simple one: after a long day at work, Brandon enjoys several hours of XBOX time. When the system is turned off for the night, Brandon always leaves his remote in the exact same place: the corner of their bed. Michelle thought it would be funny to recreate their bedspread, and place an XBOX remote on top. Their bedspread was a simple white background with tiny lines of different colors, and I made a completely edible remote out of rice krispie and marshmallow fondant to place on top. The cake was Brandon's favorite-red velvet with vanilla butter cream.


Congrats Michelle and Brandon!!!

Till next time!