Since I'm pleasantly surprised to see we have so many Western New Yorkers ...

Seriously, is anyone interested in starting a Western New York (Buffalo, Rochester, Olean, Batavia, etc.) ICES chapter? We could rotate counties to meet in. I'm game!

Plus if I find anyone interested in carpooling to the big ICES convention, that would be awesome.

I have their clear vanilla and almond. They're ok. I bought a huge bottle of the almond because I use that so much. I think maybe Penzey's is a little better, but this is fine for me generally, especially since most of the stuff I make gets donated to bake sales. I don't want to spend a lot.

I have the Wilton butter flavor and cannot stand it. It's too buttery smelling. Maybe that is just the way imitation butter flavor tends to be?

I think that maybe things have gottem easier to have a home kitchen. I know a lady that was able to start a cookie baking business from her home about 4 years ago. She claims she had her kitchen inspected. I also heard that the regulation to have a spearate kitchen has been relaxed, not sure if that is true or not.

Hi, i'm from over near Albany. The ICES weekend in April in East Greenbush is really an easy drive from Rochester area. The fire house that we meet at is not that far off of I90

It takes me 3 hours (doing the speed limit pretty much) from the Albany area to get to Syracuse

Jillk-I'm interested, but have no idea where to start or what ICES is--I have a general idea, but have never thought myself to be good enough to play with the big dogs there. I'm open to learning more tho'...

Barbaranne--from my experience researching in Rochester, there are 2 seperate levels of business ownership. They aren't particularly appealing titles but...

"Non-potentially hazzardous" baked goods can be made and sold through a family kitchen that has been inspected through the dept of agriculture. These include cookies, double crusted fruit pies, brownies--stuff that won't mold or go bad if left out for 2 weeks--just go stale and not taste good. There is not a lot needed to get this certification--I have a friend who did it and she said it was almost TOO easy...Contact the USDA in Roch, they are very helpful.

then there's:

"Potentially hazzardous" which includes cakes, cream pies etc...(stuff that can potentially be harmful if not prepared and stored properly) for these you have to be licensed through the health dept. which is MUCH MUCH MUCH more regulated.

*****If anyone has info that is different from mine--PLEASE SHARE!! I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, this is just what I have found in my own searching. Please tell me if I'm not understanding it correctly. I know someone said cakes are included in her certification in Buffalo. If it's different in Roch tell me! (Sorry this is so long!) Thanks!!

This is funny. I was going to open the email about the topic reply notification for this thread, but instead decided to open an email from someone in my homeschool group. She is looking for a cake decorator in Rochester! She is looking for a cake with a book character on it. So, if anybody that sells cakes and wants to send me a personal message with your contact info, I can foward it to her.

Just giving this a bump to see if anyone's still interestedin this topic... should we let it die out?

Anywhere in the greater Rochester area to purchase Bettercream? I've learned from this topic that's it's actually made in Buffalo, but was hoping there was a place closer to home to purchase some (I'm in the finger lakes) .

Sorry, I don't know where to get it, but your post reminded me that I wanted to contact he company to find out.

Here's the link:
http://www.richs.com/regions.cfm?rid=1623

There is a phone number to get the info.

Hopefully someone here already knows.

Hello! Glad that I've stumbled onto this thread- I've posted before trying to locate cake folks from upstate NY. I'm a hobby baker and would love to hook up with local cake decorating fanatics.

Anything more on starting a local (western NY) cake club? I'd be very interested.

Hello everyone!
I grew up in Cazenovia ( near syracuse) I now live in oneida. I love capco/ top of the cake, it seems much cheaper than jo anns and micheals. It would be great to know cake people near me. It seems that "normal" people aren't nearly as excited about new cake techniques as I seem to be. lol

I also love top of the cake- they're so very nice there! I work full time Monday through Friday and can't often get there during the week days, when they moved to Capaco I didn't realise they'd be closed on Saturdays... I had to call for directions and someone was there and opened the store so I could go! I'm closer to the Utica area, we've not had any cake type stores here in a while...

now that I'm living in oneida (I'm a cake decorator at Walmart). I'm closer to Utica as well. One store that I like around here is Kountry Market in Vernon on rt 5. It's a meninite bulk food store. It's the only place close by I can find sleve fillings, richs products, and some really cute sprinkels.

For really cute sprinkles I would go to the Regional Market in Syracuse on a Saturday morning... there is one vendor that sells herbs/ spices/ and a fabulous sprinkle assortment. When ever I make it out there I usually treat myself to new sprinkles

oo i forgot about the sprinkles at the market! only bad thing is i usually go skiing saturdays, so no sprinkles for me

Am I 7 years too late? Anyone in the Rochester area still caking? I just moved back from being in Vegas and working the pastry/cake scene on the strip. Anyone? Bueller?