An amazing class with Ron Ben-Israel!

I just returned from Savannah, Georgia, where I participated in a sugarpaste flower Master Class taught by the wonderful and truly gifted Ron Ben-Israel. The class took place at Custom Cakes, owned and operated by the very kind and gracious Minette Rushing (with help from her caring and talented staff). What a fabulous three days! Ron was a terrific, patient and detailed teacher, and I feel fortunate to have spent time with him getting feedback on my skills, and getting to watch the incredible artist at work! The flowers we made included peonies, sweet peas, roses, calla lilies and cattleya orchids. It was a fantastic class, and I would absolutely recommend it to anyone interested in developing their skills. Minette's cake studio was a wonderful environment to learn in, and she made all of us feel so at home. We were spoiled each day with morning coffee and pastries, a delicious lunch, and wonderful snacks and cookies in the mid-afternoon. She truly knows how to host an event! Thank you again to both Ron and Minette for a wonderful experience!

Here are a few photos from our class, posted with permission from Ron.

Dry petals and leaves ready for dusting with color:



Ron making rose leaves:



Dusting a cattleya orchid:



Completed peony, roses, orchids, calla lilies and sweet peas. Beautiful!

An amazing class with Ron Ben-Israel!

According to my mom...

...my relationship with cake actually began when I was given an Easy-Bake Oven at about 6 years old. She remembers me mixing up the batters, placing the tiny cake pans under the incandescent light bulb, and waiting for them to "bake". The cakes would come out an opening on the back of the oven, and then I'd decorate them with the ready-to-mix frosting that were included in the kit. I'm pretty sure both the cake and frosting mixes only required water and some stirring to create the edible masterpieces, but I imagine I thought I was quite the chef. So simple, but so much fun! Thanks, Mom, for the great stories and wonderful memories...

I thought I would post a couple of photos of cake decorations that were created with some inspiration from the simple ingredient, sugar. Cake designers frequently use vases for their sugarpaste flowers that are made out of a granulated sugar and water mixture, and I wanted to try it myself. The mixture looks like wet sand, and is pressed into small molds and then turned out to dry for a day. Once the outside layer is set, the damp sugar inside can be scooped out to form a cup or vase to hold bouquets of flowers.

The first cake was designed based on some Victorian-style linens. Here is the sugar vase filled with sugarpaste flowers, including gardenias, hydrangea, peonies and filler flowers. It was made with two pieces, a small cup for the top, and a solid base, "glued" together with royal icing:


And here is the finished cake:


The second sugar vase was made for a dear friend of mine to place on the top of her wedding cake. She wanted something soft and delicate, but not cutesy, and for the vase to look almost like a little bowl (please note that the actual cake was created by the wonderful Patisserie Angelica in Sebastopol, California). The flowers included green and white hydrangea, gardenias, ranunculus and freesia:

According to my mom...

The story goes like this...

It all started with the "work-weekend". When I was growing up, my parents would schedule an entire Saturday and Sunday that would be dedicated to outdoor chores. Mostly, it consisted of a great deal of yard work, tilling the dirt around flowering plants, trimming all the trees and hedges, and then sweeping and hauling it all into a huge yellow bin parked in the driveway. I would participate during the first day, but would inevitably be asked by my mom to bake something for dessert for Sunday dinner. Early Sunday afternoon, I would put down my rake, take off my gloves, and hand them over to my sister, who would soon be climbing up a ladder onto the roof to help clean out the gutters. At first, I was just happy to get out of the clean up, but soon I found great joy and happiness during those afternoons in the kitchen. It didn't matter if I was baking from a mix (Duncan Hines Brownies!) or trying a new recipe from scratch...it was creative and fun, and the result made my family very happy.

As a young adult, I continued to create cakes for friends and family, immersed myself in professional baking courses at The California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, and later studied the art of sugarpaste flowers with Scott Woolley, Colette Peters and Nicholas Lodge. And while my first career training Assistance Dogs steered me down a different path for 15 years, I knew the time would eventually come to follow my dreams of cake.

You have found me in the early stages of the development process...brainstorming, making lists, choosing a business name (done!), creating a website (no, first a blog!), writing the business plan (I should start!), marketing, networking, taking photos, trying recipes, creating new designs, practicing my craft and showing it to as many people who are willing to look! It certainly is very exciting, and a bit scary at the same time. This blog is dedicated to my experiences in the world of sugarcraft and beautiful cakes, and my goal is to capture and share the entire adventure!

So, I'll start at the beginning and post a photo that instigated this whole thing! First up is the little fondant cake that quickly became a favorite. The "springtime cake" created for a baby shower...pale green blades of grass and delicate blossoms topped with a big pink bow:

The story goes like this...