A 'cake Disaster'. I Don't Even Know Where To Start With This Mess.

Decorating By MBalaska Updated 19 Dec 2014 , 8:09am by MBalaska

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 4:25am
post #1 of 45

It starts with me having limited artistic decorating skills, and goes downhill from there  arggghhhhh.  I'll be glad when the new year starts up and this one is behind me.

 

A request for a 60th wedding anniversary "sheet cake" with trees and a path, with the words "60 years along the path together". chocolate cake & white cake with buttercream.

I hated the idea, so I came up with this cake design, which I dislike altogether due to lack of imagination and skill on my part.  (I would have dearly loved to make nice neat white fondant 'round' cake with gumpaste flowers).  ahhhhh  happy thoughts.

 

and while taking just One More photograph, just before putting it in the car, the plastic light cover popped off and smashed the top of the cake, crushed the name on top, knocked down the fondant trees, and squished the border.  Oh fudge and damnation.....that was a first for me, and I'm sure I'll recover my composure soon.

 

cake disaster.

60th wedding anniversary. requested a sheet cake with trees and a path with "60 years along the path together"

 

 

Ok this was a family cake and not a cake-for-profit.  and on the bright side I did get my buttercream rosette swirls on the side a bit rounder.  I hate doing square-rectangle cakes as it's so time consuming to get the sides square and neat, so I just slapped on some quickie easy bit tip rosettes.

 

ANYHOW, this was a three strikes and I'm out cake.  Strike one: Its a stupid design idea that I hated.  Strike two: it got smashed.  Now here comes strike three:

I've never made stand up trees like they wanted, so I dosed up some fondant with lots of tylose and corn starch, and put in sticks to stand them up in the cake to survive the frozen iced up crummy pot holed roads I was driving on without being knocked over.

 

The cake sat for about 2 hours before being cut and served, on a table off to the back, and people were walking by and looking at it and grabbing snacking goodies from the table.  When I went to cut the cake, and I pulled off the trees - some of the stucks were missing!!!   They weren't in the trees, they weren't in the cake - that I could find.    so where the !@#$%^&*  did the sticks go????     Would people actually pull the trees off the cake and pull out the sticks???????

 

Then later I had all of the trees laying on a plate and was walking to the trash can to throw them away.  A woman said why are you throwing them away.  I explained that I had made them out of sugar so they were food safe and edible - not plastic- but that they were now hard as a rock and not meant to be eaten.  So she grabbed on off of the plate, stuck it in her mouth and took a huge bite out of it like a Clydesdale chomping a carrot and ate it.  I tossed the rest into the trash and walked away speechless.

 

thank you fellow baking buddies for letting me blow off some heat here, No one else could understand.  Glad that's over with.

44 replies
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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 4:52am
post #2 of 45

this is the type of light and cover, it's similar.  So you can see how it would be one long smash across the top

 

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000HJ75PW/?tag=cakecentral-20

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remnant3333 Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 5:28am
post #3 of 45


I think the cake is cute despite your camera mishap!! Really strange that the sticks disappeared.  There's no telling what people will do!!

 

I love the swirl roses on the side and the little trees!! 

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FioreCakes Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 7:07am
post #4 of 45

The cake is cute!! You're being too hard on yourself! What kind of sticks? lollipop?

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jayajaya Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 7:14am
post #5 of 45


OMG!

You must have felt like you were in the twilight zone... I know I do when things like that happen.

The woman who ate the tree.... she doesn't eat people as well? Invasion of the body snatchers?

hahahahaha  :-)

 

Reminds me of a smashed cake I had once... thankfully un-iced! I smashed the whole thing up with raspberry jam and a bit of jello powder a-la cake pops, and let it set in the fridge. Held together real well, was nice and fudgy, and I got more compliments on it than I do on the regular cake. Go figure!

 

That was a chocolate sculpture cake for a work xmas do. We are a small pharmacy, so it wasn't a paid for one either.

 

I'm now wondering if anyone would have removed the sticks if there had been any - I want to lay a trap now and see what happens. Would that be mean? Meew hahahahahah.

 

I bet that light cover never, ever fell off before, and will never fall off again. I think the universe agrees about the design. I know I do. Creative or not, there is no way that is gonna be right. You did a great job of a bad idea, and those trees are adorable.

 

I think you did great, and considering the turn of events, you can always say you have the best sense of humour going.

 

I would like to ban cakes in December, myself. There's just no time.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 7:43am
post #6 of 45

I'm thinking that laughter would be the best medicine for this one, or liberally applied doses of strong alcohol.  the sticks were wood.

Any humor would be helpful. :razz:

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 7:48am
post #7 of 45

For all of the technique tutorials and classes we can buy, I'd like someone to start a 'Cake Design' business.

One of the talented professional cake designers who is artistic with hand drawings should sell custom hand drawn designs to Bozos like me.

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Pastrybaglady Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 7:53am
post #8 of 45

Wait, the light fixture FROM THE CEILING fell and hit your cake?!!!  So not cool.  I can only imagine your feeling of stunned amazement.  8O:mad::cry:  So sorry MB!

 

And what's up with the tree chomper?  I would have walked away from her quickly.  I bet the cake was still delicious! though!  The worst is over, on to the next cake.  I'm going to start looking over head when I place my cakes from now on...

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:01am
post #9 of 45

you've all made me laugh and that helps!!  it is one of those little under-the-counter lights, (click on the amazon.com link)  had my ceiling lights fell the whole cake would have been one big cake pop at the end of it all.  :)

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jayajaya Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:15am
post #10 of 45

Look, name whoever you like.. van gogh, picasso, da vinci, waterhouse, turner, no-one, NO-ONE, could have made that design look any better than you did.

 

I'm so on your side... it was a baaad idea. It really turned out cute, and you made a Christmas miracle!

Not so much a Bozo after all...

 

I know what you mean about designs, but even when 'expert' cake designers do something... there's always something I hate about it. You're better off with your own ideas. That way if you hate it, you hate it for itself, and not from following someone else's dumb@$$ idea. Give me my own dumb@$$ idea, every time!
 

Thanks pastrybaglady for the mental image of the ceiling light coming down and smashing the cake..hahahaha, my cheeks are hurting from laughing. Some cakes I have made, I WISH that had happened!

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bubs1stbirthday Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 11:23am
post #11 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pastrybaglady 
 

Wait, the light fixture FROM THE CEILING fell and hit your cake?!!!  So not cool.  I can only imagine your feeling of stunned amazement.  8O:mad::cry:  So sorry MB!

 

And what's up with the tree chomper?  I would have walked away from her quickly.  I bet the cake was still delicious! though!  The worst is over, on to the next cake.  I'm going to start looking over head when I place my cakes from now on...

Haha that reminds me of the time our boss changed the light in the toilet under the light cover. He was the next one to use the toilet... he was sitting there when all of a sudden something cracks him on the head.. haha he hadn't screwed the thing back up properly. Lucky it was him and not one of us that got smacked in the head by it.

 

No doubt you will soon be able to look back and laugh at the light fixture hitting the cake.. of all the things that you could plan for I think that has to be the most unusual :-)

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cazza1 Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 11:50am
post #12 of 45

Now tell the truth MB.  You psychically willed that light fitting to jump out and attack your perfectly innocent cake because then you had a good excuse for not liking it.

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BeesKnees578 Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 6:15pm
post #13 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by MBalaska 
 

For all of the technique tutorials and classes we can buy, I'd like someone to start a 'Cake Design' business.

One of the talented professional cake designers who is artistic with hand drawings should sell custom hand drawn designs to Bozos like me.


This made me laugh....you HAVE to have some sort of artistic/creative talent or you wouldn't be doing THIS!  Artistic and creative are two different things in my book, anyway...if you have a block, go to the craft store (or online) and look at some scrapbook paper for inspiration!!!  That's my favorite thing to do!

 

Thanks for the giggle.  Just sorry it was at your expense!  :lol:

 

And it was a cute cake!

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-K8memphis Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 6:35pm
post #14 of 45

your cake is pretty you worked hard -- i like it -- are those two toned little blossoms there? 

your border is so bold and straight and uniform it pulls the whole thing together kid you not -- all except for the elves raining down elflectrical things -- and obviously the tree lady enjoyed it too -- you did good, mb, battle scars/scares make you tougher/sweeter

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:11pm
post #15 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by cazza1 
 

Now tell the truth MB.  You psychically willed that light fitting to jump out and attack your perfectly innocent cake because then you had a good excuse for not liking it.

 

Oh hell, @cazza1, you must be channeling my hubby's thoughts !!  He looked at it and said "Well it's not bad for a cake that you didn't want to make that way."  You are both right. HA

 

I was literally so deflated because I couldn't make a nice lacy cake, that you may both be right on target.  I decorated it """ grudge-ingly""""    I have now told the truth.  OUCH:-X

I thought of making two little bears sitting on the path together.  But I was decorating with a bad attitude.   Oh the shame of bad attitude baking.    It's a lonely path to go down.  ha.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:19pm
post #16 of 45

Remnant3333, FioreCakes, jayajaya, Pastrybaglady, bubs1stbirthday, cazza1, BeesKnees578, -K8memphis,  thank you all for joining in and having a laugh at my ‘comedy of errors’ with the cake elves throwing light covers at my cake. 

 

It was almost like the cake elves grabbed that light cover and said out loud, “Oh you want to go there do you, well take this!”  KaBoom shakalaka.       Life throws you lemons, make lemonaide, and stop whining.  Things can always get worse, ALWAYS.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:27pm
post #17 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by -K8memphis 
 

your cake is pretty you worked hard -- i like it -- are those two toned little blossoms there? 

 

Yes @-K8memphis you have a good eye!  I'd cut just a few tiny flowers to put along the path out of the same purple fondant as the path, (I'm amazed at reading everyone's posts here that it's really making me face the truth about my lack of ingenuity or interest in making a nicer looking cake) anyhow I'd put some purple tiniest plunger cutter flowers there and I just hated it.  So I started cutting out some other white & pinkie colored flowers and just strewn them along the path.  I popped the little white ones into the dark purple ones and it muted the hard purple color and looked better.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:32pm
post #18 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by remnant3333 

 

I love the swirl roses on the side and the little trees!! 

 

Thank You.  I was looking at my other swirl roses on my other two cakes, as this year is the first time that I've tried that technique and I kept getting oval shaped ones.  They were all wonky.  So I figured that this was a good time for me to practice.  I used the same tip as I had used before, but just did a simple 360 degree type of swirl - going around the clock only once.  I think that I was just trying to go around the clock with the icing one and a half to two times before, so it lost it's roundness.  Does that make sense?  maybe.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:38pm
post #19 of 45
Quote:

Originally Posted by FioreCakes 

You're being too hard on yourself!

 

Probably! as it was free family cake only.   

'cake buddies' are so valuable,  @FioreCakes, it helps when you put sugar, flour, butter, eggs, & milk in it's proper prospective. :) 

cheers.

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 8:49pm
post #20 of 45
Quote:
Originally Posted by jayajaya 
 

Look, name whoever you like.. van gogh, picasso, da vinci, waterhouse, turner, no-one, NO-ONE, could have made that design look any better than you did.

 

I'm so on your side...

 

 

:razz:I'm thinking maybe  'Granda Moses' the artist who started painting at the age of 70 or 80 or something, smiles. and I'm glad that you're on my side @jayajaya!!!

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jgifford Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 11:00pm
post #21 of 45

As one whose piping looks like a dyslexic 2-year-old got loose with a can of spray paint, I understand.  I'm not artistic or creative - - well, maybe a little creative.  But I have to have the inspiration to start. 

 

I was so proud when I "came up" with the idea of doing a Black Velvet cake.  Then I got online and wouldn't you know it, it's been done before!

 

I think your cake is very pretty and I really like the ice blue color.  And I'm jealous of your round rosettes.  ;-D

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MBalaska Posted 14 Dec 2014 , 11:17pm
post #22 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by jgifford 
 

As one whose piping looks like a dyslexic 2-year-old got loose with a can of spray paint, I understand.  I'm not artistic or creative - - well, maybe a little creative.  But I have to have the inspiration to start. 

 

I was so proud when I "came up" with the idea of doing a Black Velvet cake.  Then I got online and wouldn't you know it, it's been done before!

 

I think your cake is very pretty and I really like the ice blue color.  And I'm jealous of your round rosettes.  ;-D

 

 

@jgifford 'Black Velvet Cake'.....never heard of it.  So of course I had to google it.      http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/black-velvet-cake/1aed303d-a84b-4f7f-a4ba-9909c80e7124

how interesting!  there are so many cool things that I can think of using that cake for.  It would be brilliant for a macho-manly cake, Thanks for sharing !! 

 

 

{ps: no need to be jealous of the rosettes, it's taken me quite a while to get them round.  See this cake is really oval - the recipient of the cake still loved it (happily) but I knew better.]

http://www.cakecentral.com/g/i/3281741/a/3415188/smbc-rosettes/sort/display_order/

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cazza1 Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 12:24pm
post #23 of 45

I am really wondering about what that black velvet cake would taste like considering that it has a whole bottle of black food colour.  YUK.

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-K8memphis Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 12:32pm
post #24 of 45
Quote:
Originally Posted by MBalaska 
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by -K8memphis 
 

your cake is pretty you worked hard -- i like it -- are those two toned little blossoms there? 

 

Yes @-K8memphis you have a good eye!  I'd cut just a few tiny flowers to put along the path out of the same purple fondant as the path, (I'm amazed at reading everyone's posts here that it's really making me face the truth about my lack of ingenuity or interest in making a nicer looking cake) anyhow I'd put some purple tiniest plunger cutter flowers there and I just hated it.  So I started cutting out some other white & pinkie colored flowers and just strewn them along the path.  I popped the little white ones into the dark purple ones and it muted the hard purple color and looked better.

 i didn't read everything but i don't think you are either -- your two toned blossoms are not only very interesting they are brilliant in the design and the way you arrived at it is very clever aka ingenious -- you made a beautiful cake no matter how many issues you had -- is it a letter perfect kerry vincent competition worthy cake maybe not -- who says it has to be most cakes are not -- yours is a beautiful cake with tons of hard work -- even though the skies were falling the skies were falling --

 

stop beating yourself up

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-K8memphis Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 12:38pm
post #25 of 45

of the two recipes i just looked up -- one did have a bottle of black -- just say no -- the other had espresso and dark cocoa powder --

 

however  i got some black cocoa powder from king arthur flour company  and made a oreo cookie 'cake' -- holy moley --- it's got almost a half pound of chocolate besides the cocoa powder -- it is perfectly magnificent -- i dream about it at night -- with some buttery abc buttercream inside -- just ridiculous --

 

but no no no no no i'm with cazza just say no to a whole dang bottle of black food color

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-K8memphis Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 1:48pm
post #26 of 45

and i forgot to say the oreo cookie cake is solid black -- it looks like a giant oreo -- and zero black food color

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jayajaya Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 9:25pm
post #27 of 45

Black velvet cake??? Hmmm.

We're not big on the velvet cakes in Australia, generally speaking... most people shy away from all that food colouring... but that extra choc version with the espresso sounds fab. I wonder if I can track down any king arthur black cocoa powder?

So what makes it black then? Activated charcoal? Oreos don't seem a true black to me...

I'm thinking of a film noir chocolate sculpture cake... the maltese falcon or the like... hmm difficult...now you got me started thinking. OMG...nooo...help! hahahaha Mum's birthday is coming up and she loves Bogart, as do I... trial time!

 

Thanks k8memphis!

 

 

Recent 'quickie, cheating' cupcakes for a little girl's high tea party. Thank heavens for mini marshmallows :-)

This was the overflow from the cupcake carriers, I always seem to have enough mix to make more cupcakes than the recipe gives. Those darned cake elves! At least they made more, and didn't eat any.

 

They kinda matched my apron there... I thought they would be great for babyshowers, you could do lemon, green, blue etc etc. What do you think?

 

Well MBalaska, you can say you had a smashing good time! I wonder if the tree chomper knows of her newfound fame? She's the latest comedy sensation, hahahaha.

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Ann Marie Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 9:53pm
post #28 of 45

OMG!  I haven't laughed this hard in a long time!  Thank you for that!  You might want to start on a side job as a comedian!  But, seriously, you are too hard on yourself!  The end result was just fine. 

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-K8memphis Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 10:34pm
post #29 of 45

Quote:

Originally Posted by jayajaya 
 

... but that extra choc version with the espresso sounds fab. I wonder if I can track down any king arthur black cocoa powder?

So what makes it black then? Activated charcoal? Oreos don't seem a true black to me...

 

 

Thanks k8memphis!

 

 

 

 

 

here's the black velvet recipe with espresso i found on google: http://www.food.com/recipe/black-velvet-cake-444778

 

the black cocoa powder is here:  http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/black-cocoa-12-oz 

 

i don't know about shipping overseas but there it is -- as far as i know it's just cocoa no charcoal -- oreo cookies here are true black --

 

those are beautiful cupcakes!

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MBalaska Posted 15 Dec 2014 , 10:36pm
post #30 of 45

King Arthur has black cocoa:

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/black-cocoa-12-oz

 

 

Amazon.com has black cocoa:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005IR6E5A/?tag=cakecentral-20

 

Savory Spice Shop has Onyx cocoa:

http://www.savoryspiceshop.com/spices/cocoablk.html

 

 

there's probably other places that sell it also, so the big dose of coloring is not necessary.  I've turned my chocolate roll-out cookie dough 'black' with just a small addition of black gel coloring.  It's already pretty dark just with normal cocoa powder.

Well you've all taken my mind off of my 'Crash Cake'  by distracting me with Chocolate.  Well Done baking buddies :lol:   Chocolate always does the trick!!

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