Hello....Kitty

Finished Kitty Cake

I've been wanting to post this cake for awhile but since I made it at the beginning of December, and tis' the season, my time has been taken up with teaching and lots of other fun stuff. I've also had some time to reflect on the past year and it has been AMAZING. I've had so many awesome students come from all over the world, been sharing my bakery space with one of my sweetest friends and have been so fortunate to have been in touch with so many people through facebook, twitter, etc. It has been so exciting and I am so grateful for all of it.

Nude Kitty (made out of gum paste)

Of course since it is December the Food Network has been re-airing the Holiday Cake-off from MANY years ago! (I think about five years or something like that)

Sugar bow with disco dust (glued on with egg whites)

I'm also looking forward to next year with lots of projects underway and teaching internationally.

Wishing you all a wonderful holiday filled with lots of sweetness. I told Kitty it wasn't nice to ignore me while I was working on her...hee, hee! Happy New Year!

THE First Birthday Cake

Perhaps it's only my fellow cake designers who can understand the stress (I put on myself) for my daughter's first birthday cake. In fact, my husband jokingly reminded me TWICE that he ordered a sheet cake, NOT a sculpted cake (a.k.a. cake that will take days to bake, sculpt and decorate) but OF COURSE I was not going to serve a sheet cake at my own daughter's first birthday party.

"Owl Eyes"

So the stress actually started months ahead of time deciding on a design. I finally chose an owl because we affectionately coined the phrase for my daughter "owl eyes" for when she should be sleeping in her stroller but we see her bright large eyes looking back at us.

My inspiration: sketches and tear sheets

The colors came from the plates and napkins I chose, and the style was modeled after all those fabulous Owl pillows, back packs, change purses that are around now. I used a special textured rolling pin to make the medium-pink color look like corduroy on the back and in the ear and pocket details. I hadn't used that rolling pin since the first sock monkey I made, in 2005 on the first Food Network Birthday Cake challenge. Lots of stitching, everywhere to make a cute and cuddly owl.

It was made of our old-fashioned vanilla cake with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream, very simple but delicious.

And it is kind of appropriate I joined twitter today and I am using this "bird" cake photo for all my tweets! Follow along...

**Top photo by my talented cousin Jordan Pique

The Cake Boss is coming to Town Hall

One of the sweetest guys around is my friend, Buddy Valastro. It's hard to look at all the styled photos of him from his TV show because he looks so serious and that isn't him at all. He is the type of guy that would do anything to help anyone. He is releasing a new book and is giving a live performance next week at Town Hall, it should be a lot of fun!

Here is a special discount code for the tickets:

Discount offer valid October 4th 10am – November 2nd 10am.
Password: CAKE
$5 savings on price level two and three tickets.
Previous purchases do not apply.
Valid online only.

PRESS RELEASE:

Buddy Valastro: The Cake Boss

The Bakin’ with the Boss Tour

The Town Hall · November 3rd · 8pm

- Tickets are on-sale Now -

America’s favorite baker Buddy Valastro will bring his “Bakin' with the Boss Tour” to The Town Hall on Wednesday, November 3^rd at 8pm. Tickets are on-sale at ticketmaster.com, 212.307.4100, or The Town Hall Box Office. Tickets are $39.50, $49.50, & $59.50 plus applicable service charges.

In this live interactive event, the baker and star of TLC's “Cake Boss” will share the stories behind his hit TV series and his colorful Italian family, answer audience questions, and give a live demonstration of the techniques that have made him one of the most successful and renowned cake artists in the nation. Buddy will even invite audience members to join the fun on stage. The whole family is invited for a night of “bakin’ with the boss” one will not soon forget.

One of the centerpiece shows of the TLC network, a third season of “Cake Boss” debuted May 31^st on TLC. Viewers continue to celebrate the mouthwatering desserts and not-to-be-missed Valastro family moments occurring in bustling Hoboken, NJ, home of Carlo’s Bakery, which celebrated it’s 100^th anniversary in June. On November 2^nd, Free Press (Simon & Schuster) will publish Buddy’s first book, Cake Boss: The Stories and Recipes In the book, Buddy shares recipes and his family’s inspiring, fascinating, and poignant life story.

Columbus Day

This cake wasn't done for Columbus day but the theme seemed fitting. The cake was created recently for one of my favorite clients. It was her son's fifth birthday and he is interested in world soccer and flags. Since Columbus supposedly sailed around the world, here is a world globe, an airplane and flags of over thirty countries made out of sugar. All the details on the globe are piped in Royal Icing and then hand painted with petal (flat) powders mixed with lemon extract. All the flags were made individually out of gum paste, that's right each one was researched and then created by me, one at a time! Some flags took over two hours....check out the British flag, that's a lot of stripes!

The cake was our traditional Vanilla cake with Chocolate ganache and Vanilla Buttercream.

Martha Stewart Radio

It's almost Halloween! One of my favorite holidays filled with costumes, candy and fun desserts. Tomorrow, October 6th at 3pm I will be the guest of Mario Bosquez, the host of the Living Today show on Martha Stewart Living Radio on Sirius Satellite. We will be discussing Halloween Cake Ideas. The show airs live so I will be taking all sorts of baking and decorating related questions.

Just in case you can't listen live or if you want a copy of the interview:

you can sign up for a FREE 7 day subscription at http://www.sirius.com/freetrial/register, and record the interview while it’s LIVE onto your computer.

Icing Smiles

We were recently introduced to a non-profit organization that is using the incredible talent in the baking industry to improve the lives of critically ill children.

As if Kate Sullivan wasn't already my cake hero. Now there is just one more reason to love Kate, owner and master creator of Lovin Sullivan Cakes in NYC. She recently made a cake for the organization Icing Smiles.

Cake by Kate Sullivan of Lovin Sullivan Cakes

Tracy Quisenberry is the founder and executive director of this AMAZING organization. Icing Smiles just became operational in January and already has volunteers in 31 states consisting of both professional bakers and hobbyists. They are working hard to expand their network of bakers, volunteers and donors to serve as many families as possible. Please take a minute to check them out and consider how you can help "Bake a Difference" You do not need to be a professional cake designer to help. Read more about the cake Kate made for Icing smiles here on her blog. You can also stay in touch with Icing Smiles via Facebook. We are on sabbatical until the Fall but Confetti Cakes is looking forward to joining this organization's list of generous and talented cake designers.

Rachael Ray Airdate

Happy Spring!

Make sure you tune in to the Rachael Ray Show on Monday, April 26th at 10 am (in New York) on ABC. Me and my friend, Buddy Valastro (a.k.a. the Cake Boss), will go head-to-head to see who can provide the best cake tips!

The show is syndicated, so please click here to check your local station and time. If you miss it, don't worry-there will be a clip of the segment on the Rachael Ray website once it airs.

Cake Girls

For those of you who haven't heard my friends, Brenda and Mary Maher of Cake Girls lost their bakery in a fire last month. You can help by purchasing a t-shirt, the proceeds go to help their staff while they rebuild their bakery. Aside from being AMAZING cake artists they are super kind-hearted people.

Here's the link: http://www.thecakegirls.com/

Private Lessons

Hello Everyone! We are back to work with a new line-up of private classes being offered! I will be teaching on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays starting this April. Feel free to visit our Classes page to see all the info and take a look at our class list to see what we are offering. If you are interested in taking a private lesson, contact us with the following information: Name: Email: Telephone: Possible Dates for classes: # of Days: # of People: Class interested in (i.e. Cookies, Cupcakes, Sculpted Cakes, etc.): For any other special requirements or questions you have, feel free to ask us and we will get back to you as soon as possible. Thanks again for your support!! Best Wishes!

February 2010

Our producer Stefanie

I am officially back to work this month. There is nothing to get you going like a TV segment on national television. Two weeks ago, I was on the set of the Rachael Ray Show with my friend Buddy Valastro, a.k.a. the Cake Boss. It was a lot of fun, despite having to fit my post-baby body into my pastry jacket; thank goodness for my mom who knows how to move some buttons over and I knew where to find Spanx :-) It was especially exciting to see familiar faces since I was on the show last year. This time I had the much bigger dressing room; last time Paula Abdul was assigned to it. The show date is TBD but should be in March, I’ll keep you posted.

Gotta love false eyelashes from the Rachael Ray Show

This month, Bride's magazine hit newsstands with its annual edition of the 50 Best wedding cakes in America, which I am honored to be a part of. I haven't seen the entire magazine yet but I loved the way our cake turned out. It was my first time designing an oval cake. I think it was a nice marriage between the classic look of the colors with our hand made sugar flowers. I decided to create Japanese Anemones after seeing a spread in Martha Stewart Living showing the real life anemones.

This past week I had a very talented student from Thailand. We created two sculpted cakes, a handbag and an open gift box. We also had a surprise guest. Nick Malgieri, head of the pastry program at ICE, stopped by and gave my student and me signed copies of his gorgeous new book, The Modern Baker.

That’s all for now, if you would like to be notified with our new class list then please join our mailing list by contacting us here.