OK, I know that most everyone here loves to decorate... but do you love to bake? Everyone buys me cook books and thinks I love to cook because I make cakes. I HATE BAKING AND COOKING! My dream is to have someone else do all the mixing & baking and let me decorate to my hearts content.

Anyone else?

I love to bake and cook, my dream is to have a maid just to clean the kitchen because it's always a mess.

I LOVE to bake.

I love decorating too, but really it's more of an excuse to try out new recipes and such.

I used to make all sorts of cakes and cookies and other baked goods but nobody in my family would eat them (everybody was on a diet) so when I found out I could bake and then sell them to people, then bake more I was ecstatic!

Remember, not all of us here decorate cakes for a living. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of watching my grandmother make bread. I love to bake! It's the dirty dishes that I don't like.

Cooking, baking & decorating are my idea of clean fun! Though it does leave a mess..lol. That's the only thing I don't like. I, too, dream for a cleaning fairy to magically appear when I'm done!

I love it.

(I do not decorate cakes for a living, though.)

The best part for me is baking.....bread, pastries, cakes, cookies, everything!!
I got into decorating about 1 1/2 years ago and need to work on so much more.
I also love to cook too!! Any excuse to have a party!

Knowing not everyone decorates and not everyone bakes the cakes that they decorate, (maybe someone else bakes, while they decorate). My feeling is if you don't like baking, then MAYBE the cake business isn't for you. If you don't have total control over your cakes, (minus of course the oven it's baked in), then that's a problem in some peoples' eyes.

Baking is/was and always will be a science of sorts. You need math skills as well, and some people aren't totally up for the challenge of both of those. Not to mention the patience to wait for a cake to be baked.

I love cooking and baking, but I don't like the mess either, it's just part of the job. I can look in my sink right now and ask myself, where'd all these dishes come from? And the answer would be, the TWO things you just cooked or baked!

If I make a mess, I expect to have to clean it up. It's all part of baking and cooking.

I love the baking part more than the decorating! (and mind you, I LOVE to decorate, too!).

I, too, hate the dishes, but that's just part of it, so I deal.

I love doing cakes, tortes, cookies, breads, cinnamon rolls (an ancient family recipe!), but I just canNOT do pies! I can make a KILLER crust but I can NEVER get the pie to thicken correctly and they make a mess in the oven. The only pie I've been able to manage was one called a Fresh Berry Berry pie that you cook and thicken the filling on the stove top while blind baking your crust, fill the baked crust and refrigerate.

Lisa

I feel ya!!!! Thats why cake dummies are so essential!! I have two kids, not enough time or many events to actually make real cakes for. I think cake dummies are wonderful, because then you are able to practice your skills, without having to bake a cake. When I first started I always made real cakes, but then my house was overrun with cake, I started to HATE cake!!! My husband felt obligated to eat the cake, not good! Anyways, I think if you plan on doing it professionally, someone else would make the cake, and you would design the cake! They are both such unique talents on there own. Plenty of people are wonderful bakers, but awful decorators and vice versa! I would suggest trying the cake dummies, see how it goes!

Two of my favorite things in life are cooking and eating. Doctor keeps telling me I have to give up the eating part of it (doctors are no fun). I don't do much decorating either. Mostly just for friends or my Red Hat gatherings.

As far as cooking goes, I'll cook for anything or anybody. I live alone so when I get in a real cooking mood, I just start calling people to come over or call them to stop and pick up a bowl of this or that. They love it when it's pork fried rice or chicken and rolled dumplings. I made the mistake of letting people know I could bake bread and now I get volunteered to make the bread for every pot luck. Do alot of cooking and baking for Lions Club when we have special dinners. I don't mind the cooking or the cleaning--it's the loading it in the car and unloading. Always feel like a pack mule when I go to anything!

My daughter has decided that beings her husband started working evenings, that I should cook for her and the kids. Told her that would be fine if she furnished the groceries. She agreed but I haven't seen the groceries so she hasn't seen the meals. I get upset cooking for them because the kids are such picky eaters. I like to cook for someone that really gets in and makes a hand at eating!!!

I thought daughters were suppose to be spoiled, Squirrelly. Mine likes the decorating part much better than the baking part also but so far I haven't let her reel me in to doing the baking. Maybe when she starts getting more orders. She works full time as church secretary, several hours a month for United Way giving smoking cessation classes and sells Avon. Also is district manager of the Girl Scouts, Vice President of our Lions Club, and in several groups at school and church. Has 4 kids so baking is not her first priority! Luckily she has a good husband that helps with the responsibilites around the house.

I agree about the generation gap. Mine didn't learn how to cook until she got married. Didn't want any part of the kitchen when she was a teenager. I learned alot from my mom but I credit my home economics teacher for teaching me the proper way to organize and use a kitchen. My mom taught me how to cook with love and my teacher taught me how to cook with a recipe. Wouldn't have had it any other way.

Diane

Ummmmm---Squirrelly? Can I come and be your daughter, too!!???? PLEASE??

Sounds like she has it MADE! lol!!\\

Of course, I'm guilty of the same thing when it comes to sewing or alterations. I take my pants to my mom so she can "just pin them" for me. Then, about 3-4 days later, when I STILL haven't hemmed them, I call and bribe her with brownies, dinner, cake, etc, so that she will do the sewing. lol!!

I just love my mom!!

Lisa

Baking is definitely my thing. To me, cake decorating is high-maintenance, fuss and drama and I have no patience for it. I would be the happiest camper if I could just bake and assemble the cakes and then have someone else deal with the fuss of decorating.

Sounds to me like the ones that just like to bake, need to get together with the ones that just like to decorate. You guys could make a fortune!!! Now to find a few that just like to clean up the messes and you've got it made!!

If you need someone to help you count your money, just call me.

Diane

I love to bake, cook, decorate- Always have! I remember watching and learning from my mom and now I am trying to do that with my kids - I am glad I have willing participants so far!! My big issue is space!!! I never have a kitchen big enough to spread out in. (Military Spouse with Military quarters!) But we will make due because I would not give up my lifestyle for anything. I am planning my dream kitchen in my head! But until that day I would like some kitchen fairies to help me clean!!!

Squirrely, you can adopt me too. I sometimes don't like to bake and cleanup and all that. Sometimes I just want to decorate and be creative. Other times, I just want to bake. Cookies, pies, breads, and cakes.

Ken

Sure I will adopt you too kiddo!
Hugs Squirrelly

Squirrelly, you're going to need a bigger tree to keep all these people in. Hope you have enough acorns stored to feed them.

Diane

I like to bake--but not as much as cake decorating requires me too. I consider it just part of the job to get to the fun of decorating.

I remember one of my earliest memories is baking brownies to earn my cooking badge and I have been excited about food ever since. Wanted to add another vote for having a helper cleaning in the kitchen as I love cooking and baking. My kitchen is dirty right now from cooking for some delegates who are teaching at a conference my church is hosting. I'm also another military wife planning that dream kitchen in her head. I guess I am a baker who is not so much into deocorating. I like it but not quite sure it's for me yet. So if I ever venture seriously outside of the restuarant arena I may have to find a decorator.

I guess it's only been recently that I have come into the business aspect of making cakes. I have done so many over the years for free thought I'd make a go of it since I'm home during the day but I still love to cook. Someone told me today they have a saying that good food is love and always feel it when they come to my house. I think those are words to live by.

Well gotta run, dishes are calling.

I have always loved to cook and bake ...thanks to my Mom who was a typical country cook...she had to have the table loaded with different foods for every meal! But I really love to bake...cookies, cakes, breads, pies. Then almost a year ago I decided to teach myself cake decorating and from that moment on it has made my baking so much better..cause now I am always trying new things. My greatest joy right now is baking and decorating with my 3 year old grandson...when he comes to the house he always asks, "Nanny are we going to make a birthday cake?" He is the light of my life. And yes I do have to admit....I enjoy the cleaning up part because I am a neat freak and my dear Mother taught me to clean as I cook...so in the end there is not much of a mess.
Debbie

I dislike cooking with a passion, but I love to bake cakes, pies, cookies and breads. I am the only one in hubby's family that bakes so every year for the past 25+ yrs I've gathered all the nephews/nieces and we've baked cookies/decorated them for the holidays. We have many wonderful memories of those times, helped bond our relationships too.
My sis and her hubby got me into decorating, sis is a whiz at making bc roses and whipping up the icing, bil is good at doing the basket weave and smoothing the icing, I am good at making all the other bc and fondant flowers and baking. So together we do pretty good. We enjoy working together and it is fun sharing the clean up and expense too.
My youngest daughter won't have anything to do with "kitchen work." My eldest daughter is a wonderful cook but would rather leave all the baking to me. She does bake breads and pastry but preferes not to.
I am happy that my teenaged grand daughter loves to work along side me when I am decorating, she is a whiz making figures with fondant and bc icing, very artistic, but she isn't into decorating the actual cake, that she gladly leaves in my hands.
Our cake decorating as you can tell is only for our enjoyment and another way to express ourselves artistically. We have learned a lot from this site, a lot more than from our classes.