Have a Daisy Day!

"Have a Daisy Day" - that was the cheery message I stuck inside each of the press giftbox containing a daisy cupcake! I decided to post about this 'blast from the past' - a project I was pretty proud of from last year - when I received this really nice photo from my customer. Again, I may be good with cakes, but most of the time my customers take better pictures than I ever could!

I was asked to create press gifts for the Marc Jacobs Daisy fragrance launch - the brief required it to reflect the fragrance. I took one look at the bottle (pic above) and knew exactly what I wanted to create. The fondant daisies were more tedious than I thought though, as the centers had to be delicately painted with gold petal dust. This project was pretty daunting too at the time, as I made individually-boxed deluxe cupcakes as gifts, and additional smaller ones to serve up at the event. This meant a whole week of cutting, shaping and painting lots of daisies .... in that early part of my 'cupcake career', it was quite stressful indeed!

What I love about the whole creation is actually the makeup of the cupcake itself. It reflected the 'notes' or 'bouquet' of the fragrance - vanilla as the cake flavour, a dousing of jasmine syrup, then a light filling of homemade strawberry conserve topped with a grapefruit buttercream swirl! I wonder if anyone noticed on first bite though, haha!


The photo above was from a later related event - a party at the Marc Jacobs boutique in Pavilion Shopping Centre. I just thought it did justice to my handiwork! I was told later that some guests actually thought they were for display and not to be eaten! Anyway, I felt honoured to have been able to create cupcakes for a well-known international brand.

Babylicious 'Fullmoon' Cupcake Giftbox

I remember I had babies in the days when the best personalisation offered with 'fullmoon' giftboxes are crudely rubber-stamped names of your newborn. I ended up choosing the best-tasting supplier and consoled myself that at least the food inside was delicious.

For the uninitiated,'fullmoon' gifting is an age-old chinese or rather Malaysian-nyonya tradition of announcing the birth of a baby with gifts of symbolic food - red-dyed eggs, 'angkoo' (steamed glutinous rice 'cake' with a mungbean filling), curry chicken and turmeric glutinous rice. Of course modern moms would more than gladly do away with these fattening and not-so-pretty selection in favour of something appropriately pretty and babyish ... thus the cupcake option.

Pretty decorated cupcakes are perfect for baby-themed celebrations. Everyone coos at buttercream prams and booties, babypink fondant blooms and the new symbol of babyhood - the yellow duckie! Perched on top of delicious cupcakes, these are almost too pretty to eat!

So I started to offer it as a 'fullmoon' gift idea to friends and customers ... with a twist. That is to have tradition and beauty in one box! The giftbox thus consists of 4 pretty cupcakes, plus some of the classic symbolic food such as red eggs and preserved ginger, and sweet potato 'angkoo' - all deliciously homemade. Meanwhile, omitting curry chicken diminishes the anxiety over it turning bad if not delivered on time.

Being particular about presentation, I also made sure the boxes had the ideal trimmings and the all-important baby profile card! Basically, everything's handmade with love ... as I would for my own baby. The end results - proud parents are usually thrilled to bits, and many have told me that their lucky recipients totally loved them as well.

These are premium giftboxes, and are priced at rm27 per box (complete with computer-generated baby card with baby pic), minimum order of 10 boxes. For parents who prefer the handcrafted hand-embossed baby profile card with sticker photo as shown, an additional rm2.00 is charged per card.

Action Cartoon Cupcakes for the Boys

Oh boys will be boys, and they do want the most 'non-pretty' decorations on their birthday cupcakes - as long as it is their favourite cartoon or action character. So I took on daunting tasks earlier this year - recreating edible Spiderman and Pokemon characters!

Doing cartoon characters meant a lot of research and printing tons of cartoon pics for the pattern to be traced out. I remember having to negotiate with Mitch to select the simplest 4 Pokemon characters that were at least 'doable'!

While Spidey was all buttercream piping, Pokemon marks my first foray into a painstaking drawing technique using candy chocolate (compound choc). This is pretty sweet chocolate but allows me to create cartoon-like decorations that are fun and perfect for kids! It's always nice to discover new decorating techniques and different styles.

Now I wonder what these boys will want next year .....

Dreamy Cream Cheesecakes!

Dreamy and creamy ... that's how I love my cheesecakes! I've said my first love (cakes, that is) is mousse cakes, yet I have a craving for cheesecakes more often than I admit. In fact, I love all types - Japanese souffle, Boston-style, mousse (chilled) or NY-style in all it's denseness!

I remember when I first tackled a cheesecake recipe and it turned out grainy and crumbly ... in the days when I can't tell a 'bain-marie' from Marie Curie. Well, I've moved on, and have finally baked the cheesecake in the perfect texture and taste to my liking! Thanks to Rose Levy Beranbaum of Cake Bible fame, my cheesecake is an adaptation and though it is quite different from the original Cake Bible recipe, the Cake Bible indeed provided the 'understanding' so to speak.

So here is the creamiest baked cheesecake ever - not crumbly or crusty - sinfully rich and meant to be savoured in small servings! I love fruity cheesecakes because I think the fresh tangy berries and fruits balances the richness of the whole indulgence - hence my all-star flavour: "Racy Raspberry"! Racy Raspberry is topped with a delectable spread of ruby red homemade raspberry conserve or - when in season - the deluxe version gets a generous pile of glazed fresh raspberries.

Two other great flavours that I love to bake is the Durian Lime and Banana Toffee Crunch. All these premium cheesecakes feature luscious toppings that brings a new flavour dimension to the cheesecake itself, and a light frosting of light whipped white choc ganache adds the finishing touch. Oooh.... dreamy indeed!

I usually bake these as treats for my friends (or myself) rather than customers simply because they start at rm90 for a 9" cake (approx 1.8kg). But for those who have tried them ... second or even third helpings are a must!

Birthday Cupcake-Cake for Pretty Girls!

Birthday themes for young girls never stray far from the colour 'pink', flowers, some hearts maybe, and pretty butterflies! Everything nice... as the poem goes!

So whether it's for a precocious 4-year old or young ladies approaching their sweet teens, these cupcakes put a smile on their faces. I particularly like the little fondant bluebirds - they add a 'fairytale' touch befitting a princess indeed!

And for musiclovers, I did play the 'Happy B'day' tune on the piano to get the notes right, but have to adjust the bars and omit time signatures to fit the notes! Now if only I can insert a little gadget in the cupcakes to actually play the tune! That would be pretty awesome indeed!