German Chocolate Cake!

Hello!

My friend asked me to make a cake for her chefs birthday this week. She works at Franks N' Dawgs in Lincoln Park--side note: if you've never been there, go. They make the most delicious and unique dogs and sausages fresh in the smallest kitchen possible. Its unreal. GO.

Side tracked a bit..
I love love love German chocolate cake. Making it however is another story. The icing starts with boiling all your spices and sugars, butter and cream together, then tempering in your yolks to make a really simple stirred custard. A ridiculous amount of coconut and pecans (I add almonds too. :o]) is folded in, and-traditionally-it is then poured on to the cake while it's still warm. You might see a lot of German chocolate cakes with the cake layers visible, which i actually love...
I, however, decided to make my life harder by icing the sides.
Everything turned out alright! Only after icing, chilling, icing, chilling, repeat repeat repeat!
I, to this day (obviously), do not know how you would make this process easier, as this icing is thick, but still slowly slides down the cake because it is SO heavy.
I've heard some people add cornstarch to the icing, which would definitely make sense.. it would be more of a true pastry cream base.

Any hoo- After a few deep breaths and 8 cups of coffee to calm my nerves (doesn't quite make sense?), the cake went out the next morning in its lovely box with a bow and I heard nothing but good things.
Happy days, and Happy Birthday to Joe from Franks N' Dawgs!


Till next time,
Kim.

A Recent BellaTiers Wedding Tasting!

In May of this year, I will doing a cupcake/cake combination wedding for one of my old friends, Michelle.

After our tasting went really well last weekend, all the flavors are finalized, and now only the last minute details need to be covered--like the cupcake stands getting ordered.
Michelle wanted 2 different cupcakes at the very beginning when we met up a couple months ago, but quickly changed her mind last weekend when i brought four. :D
The more the merrier!

Final Flavors:

Cupcakes--- Banana cake with milk chocolate ganache icing and a fried banana chip
Carrot cake filled with apricot jam with a cream cheese icing and fried carrot
Buttermilk chocolate cake with chocolate italian buttercream and chocolate curls
Lemon poppyseed cake with blueberry italian buttercream and lemon zest
Red velvet cake with cream cheese icing (added after the tasting)

Cake--- It will be a two tier marble buttermilk cake. The bottom tier represents the bride
with a milk chocolate ganache filling, and the top tier the groom, with a strawberry
compote filling. The cake is to be rustically iced with italian buttercream and
decorated with small purple and green flowers (the colors of the wedding, yay!).

Cant wait!


Till next time,
Kim

Random Recent Work Stuffs!

This month is just starting to get busier at work, thank you thank you!
We've had a lot of tastings, one that stood out for me earlier in the month was for Brook Field Zoo. They're having a dolphin themed gala in June, I believe, so some dolphin love was incorporated in to each plate.
I'm still slacking on taking pictures of EVERYTHING, but I did get a couple shots of these little "James Bond" themed mini triple chocolate mouse paves I worked on a couple weeks ago. Each little guy has a little hand cut white chocolate plaquette, with a tuxedo designed piped by yours truly. My favorite part of this, or anything I make for that matter, is being able to create ever aspect of the dessert; it truly becomes your baby, so to speak. Same with the Dolphin tasting-me and Keith, along with our bosses draw-ups of the plate design and menus, got full reign to work the dishes ourselves.

The last picture is of a few of my bagged Macaroons (a meringue-based cookie). This particular tasting wanted 'peacock' colors, so, naturally-for those who know me well-I was ecstatic to be able to dye these guys obnoxiously bright colors!
When one of my old co-workers, and macaroon master, Mary, left Food For Thought last September, the Macaroon talisman was handed down to me by the gods. A little dramatic? Very.
In short, I just somehow began making most of the macaroons. I make them a few times a week as tasting giveaways, and sometimes for parties in mini version. My macaroon horror story--although very proud of it, was last year when we had a party for 14,000 of these suckers. It was a week of piping hell, spending 8 hours everyday mixing, piping, baking, and storing the same cookies over and over again. I had one day off where thankfully, my lovely and darling coworkers did a few batches for me, allowing my throbbing hands to rest for a night. It was rough, but I love being able to say I got through it, and with the help of the ENTIRE kitchen.. we got all the bags packed and sent with a few bumps along the way, but all that's history.


Till next time,
Kim.

The new, but not really new anymore job--and other stuff!

Hello, hello!
Woo its been a long time!
It's almost been a year since I started at Food For Thought Catering, which is unbelievable. Some days it feels like its only been a month, others...more like 30 years! I'm proud to say I still love, love my job. I work with brilliantly funny and interesting people, and I'm really starting to come in to my own in the industry. Cake land has definitely been pushed aside for quite a while, which is a complete bummer sometimes. I've turned down a lot of orders, but on the positive side I've really been able to work on refining other skills I can use later, and in time I'll be able to figure out an organized way of working both jobs..
I've just recently gotten a phone that takes BEAUTIFUL pictures, which is fantastic because until this I haven't really taken any good pictures at my job!
I mostly work at the shop, prepping for events and preparing tastings for upcoming or possible events. These pictures were all from two recent tastings, one was for a huge all day gala for Steppenwolf.
Every once in a while some of the people in the shop will get called to work out in the field at the actual events doing plate-up and working the line. My all time favorite so far was working a beignet station at the Field Museum. The gala was for the opening on the Gold Exhibit at the museum. Hundreds of people and dozens of beautifully decorated tables filled the main room of the museum. It was absolutely surreal to be there at night in the middle of it all, just casually serving the guests. I was right underneath Sue the entire time, and it was amazing.
Most of the time, however, working the field is behind the scenes.
Most of the orders that I've been taking outside of the day job have been relatively small; the only really detailed cake I've done was for a retirement/ birthday cake a few months ago for Belinda Silber at Le Cordon Bleu-Chicago, where I went to college. She got my information from one of my old chefs at school, and I made a small cake for her husbands 65th birthday/retirement brunch.
She wanted to incorporate a bunch of his favorite things, like his two cats, a few of his published books, Grateful dead, and lest we forget-Doritos.
I suppose I went pretty traditional with the vegging out on the couch retirement theme, and it was a hit! I had a lot of fun with this cake, spending wayyy too much time with the details, but no regrets! I was really happy with how it turned out and as always, I couldn't get enough of the peoples faces.

I'll keep posting more pictures from work, and hopefully some new cake orders in the near future!


Till next time,
Kim.

Masquerade Quinceanera Cake!

Hey all!
So this weekend I worked on a cake for a new client I went to high school with a couple years ago--she needed a cake for her sisters Quinceanera--which incidentally became a HUGE party. It was in a beautiful banquet hall with white tablecloths, ribbons and Masquerade decorations everywhere. I left before everything started but they were about to bring on a group of professional dancers to perform with the birthday girl.

SO! In other words this was a biggie!
The family wanted a fun cake to fit the theme and gave me a picture of a cake by PinkCakeBox.
With a few changes of course...

The bottom tier was Chocolate fudge cake with a fresh glazed strawberry filling, the middle tier was white cake with mint butter cream, and the top was red velvet with chocolate fudge.

The best part about this cake was that most of the work was in advance--a lot of things needed to be made and let to set up and dry days before I even started the cake--so the actual decorating part didnt take all too long.
The hassle--TOPSY TURVY. My god I love these cakes but man they are hard to get right!
I made the mistake of trying to shape them with too short a knife. Thank god they came out as I wanted them too and the cake was a hit.

This cake (with the right size slices) feeds up to 120 people. It was a fun cake to make and fun people to work with, another great weekend!

Until next time!
Kim

The Internship!

I've been interning at Alliance Bakery in Wicker Park for the past two months and its been great. I absolutely love going to work everyday. The people I get to hang around with are incredible and hard working and I have a great time standing for 12 hours. :D
I started out in the cake room for the first couple weeks and got to make a three tier cake for a client of theirs. I decorated an unfathomable amount of sugar cookies and worked with a few store cakes.

Since then I've been working in the kitchen and, to my surprise, I love it. I was afraid when I started that I would get bored or buckle underneath the pressure of all the production they do in the kitchen, but its exactly the opposite. There's never a dull moment, I'm always laughing about something and I've found an interest for things i didn't expect to. I get to work on everything from cake and cookie batters to doughs, icings, Ganache's, mousses and fillings.

I'm so glad that I've had the privilege to work in such a place, and its going to be really hard to walk out of there for the last time next month. I've met a lot of really funny and interesting people and seen a lot of beautiful work made and walked out the door.
I hope my next job is just as fulfilling.

Kim

Sugar Piece Final!

Hey everyone--
Sorry its been a while since i blogged... my internship has kept me really busy and I rarely find time to work on BellaTiers business unfortunately. :[

My last class (chocolate and sugar work) had a final of a sugar show piece. We had a basic design that everyone had to follow with the exception of the number of flowers, small design details and color choices. I made a ton of yellow sugar roses, which i absolutely love to do, and decided to make the base of the piece a deep green. I love how it turned out.

On a side note: the Packers need to hire me.



You literally had to choose a side with chocolate and sugar. I love working with both but I loved sugar so much more. I feel like you have to have a true passion for chocolate work to be great at it, no strings attached.

You literally burn off all the feeling in your hands when you work with sugar.. but the outcome makes it all worth while.

Chocolate and Sugar Course

Hey everyone!

Well! I officially stop taking kitchen classes in a little over a week. I cannot believe this is here already. I'm truly excited though--I start my externship on the 17th at Alliance Bakery which is a quick bus ride away from me in the city. Its a really great little place that works with a lot of French pastries and has a very large production for its size.

My last class that I'm in right now is Advanced Chocolate and Sugar. Its incredibly stressful-probably the most yet, which I definitely was not expecting. But its so much fun! I love what we get to work with. The pictures I posted are some of the things we've worked with so far. We made a small hollow chocolate egg show piece for our first practical.. and then decorative box made entirely out of chocolate. We worked with some new methods that are for the most part not even being taught yet- like the marbled chocolate base for the egg showpiece.

Chocolate is so hard to work with, especially in our hot hot kitchens, but we got them together in the end.

Most of this week we are working with truffles, bon bons and caramel candies, and then we start sugar through all next week, where our last practical will be a huge sugar show piece. Whoo!

I unfortunately will be cutting off all orders for BellaTiers through November 7th. The externship is going to take up too much of my time and my schedule is pretty much set by the week... :/

Thanks all... Much love,
Kim

Ladybug Baby Cake!

Hey everyone!

Last weekend I had a really cute order from a former photography teacher of mine from high school. Her little girl was turning one and the theme for the party was ladybugs. She wanted a big pink flower adorned with little ladybug and a little cake for the baby to tear up.

I love making individual cakes. I think they might be my favorite order to get.. and i was so excited to make a little ladybug.

The tricky thing to these cakes was the shaping. Its truly a scary thing to shape the actual cake because if you mess up its a crazy mess to put it back together, or do it all over again. The ladybug started out as a simple two-layer 4" circle mini cake that I rounded. The flower cake for the guests was a flat flower to begin with and i wanted to give it some shape. With a shaky hand I cut out each of the petals. I think that's the best lesson I've learned from my business-Go with your intuition and take chances, you can fix anything if you need to and it will most likely come out fantastic, and most importantly you never know what you can do until you try.

So after they were shaped I filled them with a vanilla pastry cream, masked the cakes with a vanilla butter cream and covered them in fondant. I started making all the little ladybugs and finishing the detail work with the flower an baby cake. Twas a long night!

Everything came out great and the customer was happy, job well done!

Much love,
Kim

More on the menu for BellaTiers!

Hey all!

So this summer I'm going to start offering a few new products along with custom cakes!
First off there will be cupcakes on the menu soon with a bunch of cool delicious flavor combinations!
I am also working on a new sweet table menu; Where I will be offering a wide range of small desserts like tartlets and petit fours!

I am so excited to get all of this moving and hopefully a new site design will be up within the next few months!

Much love,
Kim

This weekend was absolutely hectic! Even with all the pre-planning I did there was still so much to get done.
The humidity was driving me off the wall, and I blasted the air conditioning all friday and saturday!
BUT all turned out well, I'm very happy with the cakes and my clients seemed pretty excited. :]


I've got quite a few cakes booked in June---back to the drawing board!

Much love to you all--
Kim

Double Booking

This weekend I have 2 orders for the same due date. Theres so much more planning involved then single booking and theres so much stress to get everything done.
Its funny though because I absolutely love doing it. When I'm working on a cake thats all I'm doing until its done, its almost physically impossible for me to leave the kitchen. So I figure having more work is just better! One of the cakes is a two tier Minnie Mouse cake for a 2 year olds birthday party, and the other is a really classicly-designed 'open book' christening cake.

I have to do a lot of prep before hand; things I would normally have time to do while I'm actually working on the cake.
I have to bake all of the cakes a week before hand and freeze them, leaving me hours and hours of time that can now be geared towards the detail work.

For the minnie cake I just have to make the topper a few days before hand so it can dry (absolutely adorable Minnie mouse ears with a huge pink and white polka dot bow).

The christening cake is a little bit more work. I have to make about a dozen small blocks to embellish the cake, as well as a little blue bear. Then I have to make this beautiful church window plague that will accent part of the cake and let that dry.

Then this weekend all i have to do is put everything together and add detail work and the cakes will be finito!

I cant wait for this weekend and I hope the cakes come out perfect. :]

Much love,
Kim

Final Wedding Cake at CHIC

So last week I finished my advanced cake class at CHIC... it was unbelievable how short that class felt. We learned a lot in a short amount of time, especially gum paste flowers. I hate to say it but that's what I came to school for. FLOWERS. I had worked so hard to educate myself on things I had seen on TV and websites, or just pictures people wanted for their cakes. But flowers? Oh my god, they are a stressful thing! They only had to teach us the basics and you essentially have to just go out and stare at flowers and teach yourself how to make them.
It's incredible how little you can be taught and it immediately changes your views on things.

Anyway, I made some lilies.. and accidentally made them with five petals instead of six (whoops!) but lost no points, thank god. I made an obnoxious amount of Cali lilies, even though I don't like them very much... and didn't end up using them, and a lot of fuchsias.

We had to have at least 20% of the cake covered in Cornelli Lace (the squiggly-line looking portion of the cake), that incidentally became a lot harder than it looks, but is such a classic design for cakes and I am so excited to know simple it really is once you get the hang of it.

We then had to make 120 lace points-which are really-and i mean really- small designs piped out with royal icing and left to dry. I ended up doing small butterfly wings and placed them around the top of the bottom tier.

We made the cake topper in advance, and it had to be "flaming hearts" themed. We definitely had a lot of wiggle room with this one, and basically just told us to use a few elements and not just flat hearts cut out with a stencil.

All of our cakes are displayed in the massive, beautiful display case in our building for all to see and it is such a great feeling to be at this point in school. I remember the first day of class; I was scared out of my freaking mind, and i was staring at that case in awe at the cakes that were displayed, and it's so wierd to be in that place, seeing the new kids staring up at that same case just as I had.

I only have one kitchen class left... and I cant help but get a little teary-eyed when I think about it. I've met a lot of cool people here and I dont want to see any of them go.

In the end, the cake was success and next up: Sugar and Chocolate sculpting!

Welcome to the BellaTiers cake blog!!!

Hey everyone!
Getting the website up to speed has been crazy but everything should be up and updated soon! I've got a lot of new cakes coming up so new pictures are coming, we just finished the new cake order form and have a bunch of new flavors.
The whole website is going to be going through a lot of changes within the next few months and I'm really excited.

As always- thank you for your business and comments,
Much love to you all!
-Kim