Mekala Ashokkumar

Frozen theme cake

2017-03-07T22:43:00.000-08:00

Lil Mishita wants a Princess theme cake for her birthday every year... She decides the princess she wants for her next birthday almost after she finishes her party...This year her favorite was Frozen princesses Anna and Elsa.. Her mom gave me few suggestions on the cake and this one is our Signature Vanilla cake with raspberry filling. The entire cake is covered in buttercream with fondant accents.

They both looked very beautiful!

Peppa Pig and friends cake

2016-07-28T00:49:00.000-07:00

The cake was ordered by a client for her daughter's 3rd birthday. When the client said she wanted Peppa Pig and its friends, I had no idea what the characters are actually about. She sent me a sample pic of the cake with all the characters. Except for the Peppa pig and the cat, I had no clue. So, I started watching Peppa Pig episodes just to understand the characters. So, here goes

Peppa, the Pig

CAndy, the Cat

Danny, the Dog and

Pedro, the Horse

They were all 2d characters. Managed to pull them all in 3d with fondant except for Peppa who was given 2d look with 3d figure. :)

The girl was so excited to see the cake. She was all smiles! It was worth all the effort :)

Fondant Dora and Boots

2014-09-03T23:29:00.001-07:00

I think all the kids love Dora and Boots! Mine does :)
This was something I did for a lil girl who was turning 4 and I got the most wonderful feedback.
The girl loved it and didnt even allow anyone to touch Dora! She played with the Dora figurine for more than 4 hours and when I happened to meet the client the next day, they told that she was playing with Dora on that day too!
I couldn't have expected a more. She was PERFECT!

A cute lil Bumblebee cake

2013-10-07T20:04:00.000-07:00

This is a lovely bumblebee cake that I did for a one year old boy. This is the second time I am making this cake. I don't like repeating designs. However, I loved doing the first time and so did I for the second one too! It is such a simple cake, yet a happy one! Cute too...... The original design was modified by the mom, who first ordered the cake.

Mickey Mouse Cake for my son

2013-07-17T09:12:00.002-07:00

My son turned 5 and he wanted a tall(really tall) cake. How can I say no to my lil one?! I took inspiration from lot of cakes, looked into lot of figurine tutorials and made his cake. Seeing lot of weirdo Mickeys on cakes, I thought I should get at least a decent one. I had the Disney clubhouse characters! I asked my hubby whether we could use that. He gave a BIG 'NO'! So, with my son on vacation with me, and making arrangements for his birthday party, it took me around 5 days just to finish off the characters! Mickey and Minnie took a lot of time! Goofy was falling apart most of the time. Pluto was the easiest of all! Donald and Daisy didn't give me much trouble. My son was adding, Pete, Chip n Dale, Mickey car.... I said, there wont be any space on the cake for them and will do it for him next time! He somehow got convinced and said okay! A big relief!

The top tier had lemon cake with lemon curd and lemon buttercream with white chocolate ganache outside
Middle with white chocolate cakes, raspberry filling and bottom tier had dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganache!

So, here is the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse CAKE!

We added Donald and Daisy at the last! But some naughty kid broke Donald's leg! :)

For more pics, please do visit my facebook album - Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Cake

Nutella cake in a mug

2013-02-12T09:13:00.000-08:00

I usually don't post any recipes on my blog, since I am no expert baker..Just a self taught!
This is a recipe that I found at www.livelovepasta.com/. Such an easy and delightful recipe. Anyone can do it and doesn't consume time, a max of 15 mins. If you are craving for a chocolate cake and not in the mood to bake a big one, just try this!

Recipe:

4 tbsp fine sugar
3 tbsp cocoa powder
4 tbsp self raising flour
3 tbsp milk
3 tbsp vegetable oil
3 tbsp nutella
1 egg beaten slightly, just use a fork!

Add all these ingredients one by one in a large microwave safe mug. Whisk the ingredients with fork until its all smooth. Pop it into the oven and microwave for 2.5 - 3 mins. Top it with a tbsp of nutella and indulge in this luscious treat!

Gumpaste Orchid

2013-02-11T11:14:00.001-08:00

This is my first attempt at sugar orchid. Its been a long time since I got Scott Clark Woolley's Sugar orchids DVD. I love the way he teaches and makes the orchid so beautifully. Was so afraid to start it and also worried about the time frame that I need to commit. But after attempting the cymbidium orchid, now I am sure I can make these any time.

A closer look at the throat of the orchid.

It was very beautiful! This sure is one of my proudest creation!

Designer cupcakes

2012-11-17T09:33:00.001-08:00

I got an opportunity to do some beautiful cupcakes. Referenced with google and made these. :)
I don't want to dump this page with all the cupcakes that I made. So, please visit my facebook page to have a look at them. http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.363795057040166.87383.148517531901254&type=1

Here is bouquet of flowers with sugar butterfly on top.

The entire set!

A cherry blossom!

A rose rounded with pearls. I got this from google.

Flavors were vanilla and chocolate with white chocolate meringue buttercream fillings. Covered in fondant and decorated with gumpaste.

Fairy cake and a Tom and Jerry cake

2012-10-09T21:56:00.000-07:00

My friend ordered for two cakes for her twin cousins. One girl wanted a fairy cake and the other wanted tom and jerry cake. Both wanted roses on their cakes. Fairy took lot of my time. Tom and jerry was easy to make as I had made them earlier as a cake and also had the book of Debbie Brown's Cartoon characters which has all the instructions. I had to sit 2-3 days just for the roses. Loved it!

Made wings of the fairy and butterfly out of gelatin. The gumpaste fairy turned out to be beautiful! Another close up shot of the fairy

Tom and jerry cake had figurines jumping out of it yelling surprise with a gift between them. Saw a similar cake on net and thought wud be a good idea. It was a purple color cake shimmering all over. But with poor lighting, I got a cake that looked like grey! Here is my tom and jerry cake.

Eggless Pizza Cake

2012-07-02T00:42:00.000-07:00

This is a total vegan chocolate cake made for a friend's son. I have never ever tried a vegan fondant before. But luckily, my first trial came surprisingly good! Tasted better than the usual fondant that I make with Gelatin. The only problem was it was bit gooey in texture! It wasn't able to withhold the shapes. I am definitely doubtful of using this type of fondant to make figurines! The design was chosen by the 3 year old who likes the Dominos Veg Extravaganza pizza. He loved it and that is all that matters at the end of the day!

Parisian Macarons

2012-06-19T21:15:00.000-07:00

I used to hate the idea of making sugar syrup, waiting with the thermometer in hand for the syrup to reach the right temperature. But I am with the thermometer most of the time nowadays. This was my first attempt at the parisian macaroons. I failed 2 attempts after that when I tried to change the ingredient measurements. So, with macaroons I learnt that I need to stick with whatever measurements that has been given. Can't throw away so much almonds into trash! This is a lemon flavored macaroon with lemon buttercream filling. Finished all in a day! Gonna try French macaroons soon!

Boquet of roses cake

2012-06-04T12:44:00.001-07:00

This is a Devils food cake with Midnight Ganache filling. Frosted with chocolate ganache and covered in vanilla buttercream rosettes, its one hell of CHOCOLATEY cake. Turned out so beautifully. Of course, I will have my lil mistakes here n there. ;)

Basket weave cake

2012-03-31T09:57:00.002-07:00

My favorite of Wilton's course 2 cake. I loved doing the basket weave after a long time. Made the royal icing flowers ahead of time. I had lil trouble. Probably my tip had grease and royal icing was breaking. But managed somehow! It was a lovely cake. I made this couple of months before for a lil girl and I am taking the same order again for her lil sister(she too wants the same cake!!!!). This is a vanilla cake of Ann Warren with vanilla buttercream. Flowers and butterfly are made of royal icing.

Dora / Jungle theme cake

2012-02-06T11:21:00.000-08:00

A small girl's request! She wanted Dora and jungle animals. Dora and all animals are totally edible. Dora took long time in the making. But the final product was totally worth it! Searched the net to get a good Dora pic. In every pic she was in a shirt n shorts. There was one doll pic where she was wearing a beautiful dress. Took my inspiration from that cute lil ' doll.

The animals were a big hit in the party. The sugar bugs, flowers, mushrooms and butterflies accented the cake beautifully!

SweetHeart Cake

2012-02-03T01:57:00.000-08:00

Here is my first attempt at eggless vanilla cake. I have tried chocolate cake a few times but never a vanilla. A girl requested me for an eggless cake for her hubby. I used condensed milk in place of eggs and turned out, the cake had amazing texture. The was interested in my floral cakes. My floral cakes are usually covered with meringue buttercream. So it was bit of a challenge for me. I found out a recipe for whipped cream buttercream and I am in love with the taste! I had trouble getting the colors right though. However, at the end the cake looked perfect! Would make a great Valentine gift as well!

Ooey Gooey Molten Chocolate lava cake

2012-01-09T11:36:00.000-08:00

I wanted to try Chocolate lava cake from long time. I broke 3 of my ramekins and just had one left. Don't have time to go and buy ramekins for my experiment! So, I added Wilton's silicon cupcake mold and a small size bundt mold to my experiment! Searched thru' lots of recipes and went with Paula Deen's. It was lip smacking good! Tried soft center and gooey center. A big hit, my son loved it! Got a very good review from my neighbor as well!

The Gooey Center Choco lava cake:

The soft centered Choco Lava Cake!

Car Cake for my son

2011-12-05T09:34:00.001-08:00

There were 2 cakes that I made for my son this birthday! One was on the actual birth date and the other for the party. My son love CARS! He has hell a lot of car toys and of course broken a lot too! He has this hot wheels car set that he got as present last year! He loves playing with them all the time. I took one as my model and made this cake. He was so excited while making this cake. He came n kissed it lot of times. After the cake cutting, he started crying! He was upset that his car broke! Poor lil' boy! So we didn't cut the Tom's head on the party day! Didn't want him to cry! ;-)

The cake here is yellow butter cake with buttercream frosting covered in red fondant!

Tom and Jerry Cake

2011-12-03T11:38:00.001-08:00

Here is the Tom and Jerry cake that I made for my son's 3rd Birthday Party! Went thru' lot of trouble while making this cake. But it was all worth it! My son was very happy. Couldn't ask for more!

Baby Shower Cake

2011-11-21T09:24:00.001-08:00

This is an Espresso cake with Mocha buttercream made for a preggo girl's sendoff. The sugar baby is made of fondant. Really loved the way the baby turned out, considering its my first attempt with fondant baby figurine. I heard that she loved the cake. Hope the baby did too! :) Made more cupcakes personalized with everyone's name on it.

Here is the upclose shot of my sugar baby cake topper

Baking Ingredient substitutes

2011-11-09T21:07:00.000-08:00

After coming back to India, I am mostly looking out for substitutes in baking since we don't get all the baking supplies and sometimes have to order from distant places. Here are some of the substitutes I used in my baking and got successful results! Its not my own substitutions. These are something that I gathered all over the net and thought would be helpful to other bakers too!

Self-raising flour
I had the biggest trouble with my sponge cakes, since I got used to baking all mine with the self raising flour when I was in US. I searched and ended in vain. I was happy when ibcablr told me they had the self raising when it was actually just maida and i ended with brick like cakes for my son's birthday. Somehow I realized that something is wrong with the flour and added some baking powder(something flashed at that time) and it went better.
So, here is the substitute

½ tsp baking soda
1 tsp cream of tartar
8 oz plain all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt

Mix well just before adding the liquid

Espresso powder substitute
If you are unable to get instant espresso powder and a recipe you are contemplating calls for this ingredient, it is worth noting that you can substitute espresso powder with 1 to 1 ½ teaspoons of regular instant coffee, preferably dark roasted. The regular instant coffee that is used as a substitute for espresso powder will give the same cooking results as the espresso powder and the only difference that you will find is that the coffee won't give off the deep roasted flavor that the espresso does.

When using instant coffee as a substitute for espresso powder you should try to use coffee powder. This is mainly due to the fact that many instant espresso powders are quite fine and mix very easily whereas many of the instant brands of coffee are quite chunky and granular and a much harder to mix. One way to avoid this is to mix the coffee with boiling water first

Sour cream substitute
The sour cream is used not only for texture, but for the tang it has. It's used in a lot of chocolate cake recipes. Sour milk can be a replacement, which is also a buttermilk replacement in baking recipes - milk with vinegar, or lemon juice. To make 1 cup use 1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar with enough milk to make 1 cup. Otherwise sour cream and plain yogurt are interchangeable in a recipe. So how ever much sour cream, use that same amount of plain yogurt. To do the sour milk trick, or even buttermilk, you'll be effecting the texture and crumb of the cake, and will also need to cut out some liquid from the recipe.

Cake Flour substitute

To make 1 cup of cake flour, add 2 tbsp of corn starch to the bottom of the measuring cup and fill the rest with all-purpose flour. Or, remove 2 tbsp of all-purpose flour in every 1 cup specified in the recipe.

Pastry Flour Substitute

To make 1 cup pastry flour from regular all-purpose flour , remove 1 tbsp all-purpose flour for every 1 cup.

Dutch Processed Cocoa powder
To make 3 tbsp of the Dutch processed cocoa poweder, use

3 tablespoons (20 grams) natural unsweetened cocoa powder plus 1/8 teaspoon baking soda, or
1 ounce (30 grams) unsweetened chocolate plus 1/8 teaspoon baking soda (reduce fat in recipe by 1 tablespoon)

Strong brewed coffee
1/4 cup (60 ml) equals 2 tablespoons (10 grams) instant espresso powder dissolved in 3 tablespoons hot water

Corn Syrup
Liquid Glucose can be used in place of corn syrup. Its more like a condensed form of corn syrup. Take a one cup measurement container and add 2 teaspoons of water into the cup, then fill the cup up with glucose. Heat it a bit in the microwave to melt it down, glucose is so thick. Blend and proceed with the normal instructions. Or, in some recipes you can just replace the corn syrup with equal measurement of liquid glucose.

Cream of Tartar

1 tsp of cream of tartar can be replaced with 1 tsp of lemon juice or white vinegar

Crème fraiche

Some of the substitutions that can be followed to make a cup of creme fraiche are

1 cup (225 grams) sour cream
1 cup (240 ml) whipping cream plus 1 tablespoon buttermilk or yogurt
1/2 cup (120 ml) whipping cream plus 1/2 cup (112 grams) sour cream
1 cup (225 grams) mascarpone cheese

Sour cream

1 cup (225 grams) plain yogurt
3/4 cup (180 ml) sour milk, buttermilk or plain yogurt + 1/3 cup (75 grams) melted butter
1 cup (225 grams) creme fraiche
1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar plus enough whole milk to fill 1 cup (240 ml) (let stand 5-10 minutes)

This is a note that I refer to when I don't have the right ingredient and I think would benefit others too! Have fun baking! :)

Fondant cake

2011-11-04T12:07:00.000-07:00

Its been busy for the past few days and so couldn't post much. The Bangalore weather makes me even more lazy! I will try to post the pics and go blah blah later on. :) Here is my fondant cake that i made for my hubby's friends.(Not really!) Will write the story later on!

Buttercream barbie

2011-08-21T07:26:00.000-07:00

Had tough time doing my barbie.When I started with doing the cake, I realized that I didn't have eggs. Felt lazy to go out and buy some. Thought of dropping the idea of making my barbie. Something flashed in my brain. I had some thermocol saved from electronics purchased. So started with the dummy creation. But then I couldn't find my barbie doll! Ransacked through my things and finally found it. Tried new buttercream recipe from a youtube video of SeriousCakes. It came out wonderful! Am going to use the same recipe for all my cakes hereafter. With ideas from over the net, started my barbie doll. Couldn't ask for more. Being my first barbie, I am really happy the way it turned out!
Here is my beautiful buttercream barbie!

Cinnabon Cinnamon Rolls

2011-07-13T11:25:00.000-07:00

Whenever we go to the mall, the aroma of the freshly made cinnamon rolls at the Cinnabon shop will pull me! Will definitely order some rolls and cinnamon sticks. The cream cheese that comes with it has the heavenly taste! Just thinking of it, made my mouth drool! So searched for the recipe and found it @food.com. Here is the recipe:

Ingredients
Servings: 12

1/2 tbsp dry yeast
1 cup warm milk
1/2 cup granulated sugar(I grind the sugar in mixie for a few seconds)
1/3 cup margarine
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
4 cups flour

FILLING

1 cup packed brown sugar
2 1/2 tablespoons cinnamon
1/3 cup margarine, softened

ICING

8 tablespoons margarine
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup cream cheese
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon salt

Directions:

Prep Time: 1 hr
Total Time: 1 1/4 hr

For the rolls, dissolve the yeast in the warm milk in a large bowl.
Add sugar, margarine salt, eggs, and flour, mix well.
Knead the dough into a large ball, using your hands dusted lightly with flour.
Put in a bowl, cover and let rise in a warm place about 1 hour or until the dough has doubled in size.
Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface, until it is approx 21 inches long by 16 inches wide.
It should be approx 1/4 thick.
Preheat oven to 200°C.
To make filling, combine the brown sugar and cinnamon in a bowl.
Spread the softened margarine over the surface of the dough, then sprinkle the brown sugar and cinnamon evenly over the surface.
Working carefully, from the long edge, roll the dough down to the bottom edge.
Cut the dough into 1 3/4 inch slices, and place in a lightly greased baking pan.
Bake for 15 minutes or until light golden brown.
While the rolls are baking combine the icing ingredients.
Beat well with an electric mixer until fluffy.
When the rolls are done, spread generously with icing.

Enjoy the rolls!

Cupcakes covered in fondant

2011-07-03T13:20:00.001-07:00

Yet another floral cake

2011-07-03T13:11:00.001-07:00