Cake Life @ The Velvet Buttercream

January, February, March, April... May

2025-05-01T18:00:00.000-07:00

“Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” - Ferris Bueller

I'm always so surprised at how fast life moves around here.. Ferris Bueller had it right all along, you better stop and look around or you could miss it. These past few months have just flown by, one day we are planning for the weekend orders and the next day it's here. The next week we are figuring out what we are going to make for the next holiday, and BOOM it's already time for that holiday.

February was beautiful and busy with lots of reds, pinks, chocolate, and strawberries gallore. The season for love and desserts.. honestly i'm not mad about it. I love chocolate, and I love cake, so the more the merrier. February however was not uneventful as the age of 40 began to quickly take hold. My age was starting to show and my body was starting to have issues. Four weeks later I was down 21 pounds and on a better journey trying to get healthier. It's been almost three months since i've had fast food and i'm proud of that. Eating lots of sweets has never been a big factor in my weight, it's always eating bad when you are short on time. So cheers to the changing of lifestyles.

April was a month of progress and change, a month chaotic fun around here. Every weekend was crazier than the next and we were all just enjoying the ride. A little about my husband and I, we work polar opposite schedules and he wanted a change in jobs and lifestyles. So we began planning the change for the lead baker position which was going to finally bring in my husband into the shop full time. Anytime you add such a core position there is always a learning curve that will take a lot of time. Andrew knew all of our products and in the past has made some of them, but has never fully worked along side me. We are now entering our third week of training and it's starting to get a bit easier. He's gotten on board with baking fresh cookies first thing every day, making all of our breakfast pastries, and has officially made vanilla cake batter at least five times. I'm pretty sure his eyes roll everytime I tell him that we need to make another batch of it. He's doing a great job and I hope that if you make it into the shop that you can tell him that!

April and May are wedding cake season for us and boy have we had a busy one. This coming weekend we have five very large orders.. not sure how that happened, but it did. Plus a ton of cupcakes and our regularly busy weekend as well. June couldn't get here soon enough.. i'm ready for a break! Next up....

So that definitely happened..

2025-01-07T23:10:00.000-07:00

Wow what a finish to 2024.. We had a stellar August in which we were celebrating the bakery's 2 year anniversary at the storefront. We had a grand sale on our medium cupcakes of 2 for $2, and we also held a raffle in which guests could enter to win free cake or cupcakes for a year! The month of August was great, we had a stellar turnout for the anniversary in addition to a great overall start to our fall season.

Now I realize that fall doesn't start in Phoenix till late October, but I like to get a head start on the fall decorations to help get everyone in the mood. There's something soothing about the fall leaves, the change in weather, and people's love for one another. Lets not forget people's love for their holiday flavors and spiced everything! This year at the bakery we added a cherry pie in addition to our several other offerings and it was even moreso a hit this year than it was last year. We made 142 pies, tons of fresh bread, dinner rolls, and lots of other desserts! I am getting ahead of myself.. I forgot to mention that I slipped and sprained my ankle just before October! So this entire time I was hobbling around the store walking in a boot. The doctors advised to stay off of it as much as possible, but apparently those doctors have never met me.. I worked like normal and iced my foot often. Here I am writing in January and I don't think my foot is still any better. Also right around Thanksgiving one of my molar's cracked and was not repairable.. to add insult to injury I was now also having to deal with mouth pain.

By the time Christmas came around I was just happy to enjoy time with family and get at least a little bit of R & R. Despite the tough holiday season, I wouldn't take it back for anything. I learned many new things and really tried to find my way around the bakery turning the terrible 2's. It's like having a toddler that really pushes your buttons, but you learn and it makes you a better person for it. So here we are in January and i've got two more pages of inventory to complete, along with a new dummy display wedding cake, AND a live TV segment with FOX 10 Phoenix coming up. Cheers to 2025 and what may come of it.

Dreams really come true

2024-07-02T13:53:00.007-07:00

It's not every day that you wish upon a star and it actually comes true.. but in my case, hard work, long nights, and endless hours of baking and decorating has yielded our storefront.
Some of you know me from before I opened the store, you used to pickup the cakes in the parking lot at my home and we would chat about the future and how excited I was to open a storefront. I always told my guests to keep your eye open and someday it would happen. Just over seven years after taking my first order at home we had finally began the search for a physical store! The plans and financials seemed solid to me, but little did I know that it wasn't enough. In the day and age where you are fighting large corporations for a space you have to make every concerted effort possible to be the best option. My business plan was 17 pages long and solid, but it always kept coming back to the financials. I was required to have liquidity up to $120k which is a tall ask for a small business startup, and honestly I thought that they were trying to discourage me from making this happen. But never let it get the best of me and so I applied to six or seven different lines of credit and took a small loan from my parents in order to get into this space.

May 11th, it was a bright and sunny morning not too hot, a perfect day to get great news. It was almost like my grandfather was looking over my shoulders because at 11:07am I got a text message from my commercial realtor telling me that we got the space. Holding back tears I called my mom and dad with the news. I barely made it to the end of the words "we got the store" before I burst into tears. I could hear the excitement and tears on the other end of the phone.

That wishing on a star, or holding your breath when you go through a tunnel, crossing your fingers, all of it.. It's true if you push yourself hard enough. <3

2,514 days

2024-06-29T14:09:00.003-07:00

It's been 2,514 days since I last posted on this blog and so much has happened..

For those of you who don't know me, I'm Aaron, Executive Chef and Entrepreneur at The Velvet Buttercream. I'm heading into my late 30's, I've got a wonderful family, husband, two kitties, and a sprawling small business.

When I began writing this blog I wanted to talk about my life as a cake decorator and I found it quite entertaining to tell you all about my crazy day to day. As this blog progressed it became so much more than just writing about being a cake decorator and it became more of my life as an entrepreneur.

I'm happy to report that "The Velvet Buttercream" concept is no longer a concept, and now a full functioning storefront averaging 50-70 cake orders per week and a display case full of little desserts ready for that quick sweet treat or small gathering. We have a team of 9 employees here who keep the show running on a daily basis. The atmosphere in the bakery is modern and contemporary, you won't find pink's and purple's on the wall here. It's not that I don't like those colors, but more so that it's just not my vibe. I went with a more modern white wall with a darker blue accent piece and a black roof, think of it as rustic boho.

Pre-store opening, August 2022

We now have two display cases packed full of fresh desserts made in house, from scratch based ingredients. We've got desserts ranging from cupcakes, to tartlets, macarons, cake slices, and even fresh fruit tarts. It doesn't stop there, in the last year we bought a standing freezer to house ice cream cakes, ice cream cookie sandwiches, ice cream pints and half pints. We also have a small bread section where we make fresh bread loaves, ciabatta, and rolls.

In years past I had mentioned that I wanted the bakery to be a neighborhood bakery where our guests could pickup a variety of items. Now two years after opening the storefront I think we have finally gotten to that neighborhood bakery vibe.

Our display cases in June 2024

All of this couldn't have happened without a few bumps in the road.. but I'll have to save that for a later time.

Till then, welcome back to my Arizona Cake Life <3

Has it really been 8 months?

2017-08-11T22:01:00.004-07:00

Wow.. so it's been 8 months since my last post and i'm pretty shocked at how fast this year has flown by. The Velvet Buttercream has really taken off like a weed in terms of sales! I've made large advancements in showcasing the profitability of the bakery and proving that I know how to manage the business and not just make the delicious cakes ;)

In january of this year I began making preparations to begin counting inventory so that I know how much I have vested into my company. February was my first initial inventory, March would be the first month when I am able to see how much i'm actually spending per month. Now that i'm 7 months into counting inventory I've noticed a stable food cost, which I will admit is very high, however.. I do still find myself buying select items from a grocery store since there would be no way in hell i'd finish a full case of lemons before they went bad. I anticipate the number to continue dropping considerably once my shop is open. For now though it will have to suffice.. :/

Some fun trends that have made large changes in the bakery have been the addition of the medium sized cupcake at $2 each, the "tall" cakes or as I call them "tall-boy" which is our 5 layer cake that stands about 5" tall, and the removal of any buttercream variant that is not light and fluffy (I.E. traditional buttercream). The Velvet Buttercream is now the primary buttercream, as it always should have been.. the only other option we offer for buttercream's are the Black Velvet Buttercream, and the several variations of Italian Buttercream (Kahlua, Salted Caramel, Bailey's vanilla cream, and Coconut). In all honesty, the Italian Buttercream is a close variant of The Velvet Buttercream, except that it's a lot more rich in flavor and smooth on the tongue. I'm drooling just thinking about it....

In the dog days of summer, business has slowed ever so slightly, but August and September are poised to pickup with the mild fall and winter months ahead of us. I'm looking forward to the addition of the cakes currently in the test kitchen lineup.. Tiffany Blue Velvet Rose, Malibu Strawberry Velvet (coconut cake), Caramel Pecan Spice cake, a Cranberry spiced Meringue pie, and so many other amazing things.

Stay tuned <3 p="">

What a year!

2017-01-04T14:37:00.003-07:00

To say that 2016 was a bumpy ride might be an understatement. We started off the year with a completed business plan and overambitious goals to launch the business by spring 2016. A slap in the face by the big banks set me back quite a bit. It made me realize that I needed to take a step back and gain the following of customers along with a stronger business plan to show that I am serious about moving forward.

Fast forward to the end of the year "The Velvet Buttercream" saw significant sales increases up to the final three months of the year when sales quadrupled. We posted sales gains for 9 out of 12 months, the 3 months we did not just so happened to be our slow summer season locally here in Phoenix. We've been continually adding new items to the web store with the most recent items being our "Peanut Butter Cup" cake. Currently we are working on a cake tentatively called the "Black Velvet Mocha", it's sure to be a death by chocolate sort of cake.. because naturally you can't have a bakery without a super chocolaty cake ;) Also we are adding several cookies and some power bars to our webstore, along with a full redesign! So many changes so little time.

As we begin 2017 I can't help but look to 2016 for much needed guidance on what to expect. Our business plan since it's initial creation has undergone three revisions and hopefully it is in its final change. Things are looking up for us as a future contender in the Phoenix Metro bakery competition as the leader of all things cake and pastry (hopefully coffee too). For now we will continue to proceed with caution to ensure that quality standards are held high. Sales will only come when the product is good and proven. As much as I love the sales gains, the standards have to be kept in check because it only takes one bad cake to taint the name of "The Velvet Buttercream"

So 31 came and went..

2016-08-24T17:08:00.000-07:00

In my last blog I was talking a lot about how far i've come in one year with "The Velvet Buttercream", and to be honest it's been quite the journey over the last year. I don't regret any single moment of what i've learned or the money i've spent in the last year. The Velvet Buttercream seems to get all of my attention lately, even the interested people in my life have fallen a bit to the wayside in favor of the bakery being number one. Maybe that means something?

What I love most about my home is... the people inside.
and... the bakery down the street.

Anyhow, my 31st birthday went on as planned even with all the chaos going on in my life at that moment.

Speaking of which..! I forgot to tell you that I got a new job :D Holy crap I couldn't even wrap my head around it. I went in to LaGrande Orange to drop off my resume on a monday and ended up chatting with the Executive Pastry Chef for about a half an hour or so. I setup a stage (a tryout) for friday and all went well. I was asked to scratch bake a cake, fill, ice, and stack it (3-tier) in exactly 5 hours. I don't think I had ever sweat so much lol. I was super worried about if it was going to finish on time but hey, I made it happen. Who needs 48 hours lead time right?? I was notified during the stage that I already had the position and that the tryout was simply a formality to make sure I knew what I was getting into. I gave my notice to Whole Foods that afternoon and I never looked back. It was definitely tough having to leave everyone again, but I realize now more than ever if you don't do anything for yourself.. no one is going to do it for you.

So fast forward to my birthday party which was saturday, we had a pool party, got super drunk.. you know all those things a 31 year old is supposed to do. Sunday morning I drove back home with an awesome hangover and my cat Noel. Oh how wonderful it was to be back in the mountains where the temperatures never broke 90 degrees.. ever.

So 31 came and went.. I have a new job as a Pastry Chef and I have never been more energized to start working on the bakery again. I love the Velvet Buttercream and I never realized how much time I've been wasting by not working on simple tasks.

So the website is now mostly updated, i'm going to be adding a full webpage relating to the "Business Plan" itself which should be able to help me showcase all the work i've put forth. Also the business plan is getting a considerable edit which should help lure investors.. I can make this work, I know I can! Will you join me on this rollercoaster ride? There's a giant cupcake at the very end loaded with icing.. you'll love it <3 p="">

Yaaaaaasssssss! #website #roll

2016-06-14T21:32:00.000-07:00

So the website is finally updated and all of the text that needs to be there, is finally there! Hey, I even got the mobile version of the website up and running.. I'm on a roll lately :D (Check it out: www.velvetbuttercream.com)

Over the summer months i'm going to be looking for a new place to live so that I can expand my product line for The Velvet Buttercream from just cakes, to adding artisan bread, cookies, muffins, gluten free. & vegan options. I know that it's a huge undertaking but I just can't make it work. So where will my living adventures take me now? Purchase a house, condo, just rent a single bedroom apartment, or rent a two bedroom apartment and ask that the refrigerator be all mine. I guess only time will tell.

Next on The Velvet Buttercream's checklist is to update the business plan which is another huge undertaking. I'm trying to make the business plan a bit more cost friendly for investors. I'd like to bring the opening expenses under $100k.. my current estimations are very close! Honestly I have a hard time imagining a bakery that isn't up to my personal standards for looks and finish. I worry about opening a business that looks cheap and can't go toe to toe with the big coffee/bakery houses here in Phoenix (cough, LUX).

The 10th anniversary of my 21st Birthday is almost here!

2016-06-13T21:43:00.001-07:00

Why hello there, glad to see you all again! I know that it's been quite some time since my last post and I apologize. I always seem to end my last blog by saying that i'll write another one soon.. but i'm pretty horrible at keeping up with that. I think i'll start setting an alarm to remind me to write about the week.

Anyway, I've been really busy between trying to keep my day job happy and trying to keep myself motivated about The Velvet Buttercream. I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't burned out from creating cakes day in day out, plus trying to get the bakery off the ground.. It's exhausting to try and make all of this work, and honestly i'm becoming burned out from it all. The one thing that still keeps me excited about The Velvet Buttercream is that many of you are excited about the project, it's you who keep me in the game and are always pushing me to move forward. For that I thank you. :)

So here we are ending the first week in June 2016 and i'm trying to get things back on track again, since naturally there's always something to derail it. The derail this time around was based around losing the second full time cake decorator at my main source of income. I had honestly never hated going into work more than I had during that one month period while waiting to get another person in. Now that we are past that horrible period, I can provide updates of the bakery and the cool stuff i've been doing.

How about a couple pictures first?

And last but definitely not least.. The velvetbuttercream.com website is now up and running, every page is 98% complete as is the mobile version of it as well!. Check it out and let me know what you think :D

What's "Velvet Icing?"

2015-11-19T21:07:00.002-07:00

Have you ever been so entrenched in ideas of flavors that your mind is always having your mouth water?

So if your not familiar with "The Velvet Buttercream" icing, it's a traditional icing with a nice smooth velvety taste and yet it's whipped to be as light as a feather so that it's not very harsh on your palette. The fantastic part about this icing is that it can be paired with almost anything as the replacement for a "traditional" buttercream.

Velvet Buttercream

As you could imagine the pairings with the Velvet Icing must be unique and help each flavor versus fight against one another. Flavors like Chocolate cake, Blackberries, Raspberries, Chambord liqueur, and Velvet icing. If your not familiar with those flavors, it's like heaven in your mouth! The rich moist chocolate chambord cake filled with blackberries and raspberries finished with velvet buttercream. It's like music to my ears, not too sweet & not too rich.. it's juuuuusssstttttt right! I haven't chosen a final design for it yet, but stay tuned because that is right around the corner. For now i'll post this teaser photo which is kind of what i'd like it to turn out like.

Did I make your mouth water yet? If not, just wait till I start describing other cakes that I want to sell.

So.. I've been kinda busy!

2015-11-10T21:31:00.002-07:00

It's been a minute since I last wrote to you guys, but boy let me tell you.... I've been busy!

In the past month since my last post I've managed to check off almost 96% of my list of to-do's for the bakery. Which includes:

Setup the website www.velvetbuttercream.com
Setup the email address ajcuriel@velvetbuttercream.com
Speak to coffee vendors
Speak to Phoenix New Times regarding advertising
Speak to a Ford Fleet salesman & friend about a 2016 Transit Connect
Finish the Profit & Loss Statement
Create Concept statement
Create Vision statement
Create Mission Statement
Finish Demographics
Finish Competition Analysis
Create Marketing
Create Target Market statement
Create the Cake menu
Create the Drinks menu
Edit the Initial purchase ledger for the 100th time
Create the 5-year forecasted sales
Create Labor forecast
Edit the Mock schedule for the 20th time
Create an Exit strategy
Create a new Cake Order form
Get signed up with the "Greater Phoenix Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce"
Go to my first networking event!

Now.. you might be able to see why posts have been so limited :P But hey, you're hearing from me now so that's all that matters. Creating this business has been a second job all in its own and yet I still haven't yielded a paycheck from it -_- All in time I suppose, right?

Anyway, allllllll of that stuff is done and now i'm holding the first copy of the rough draft in my hand! Four years worth of work (though most of it has been in the past 6 months), and now I feel like I have nothing to do. I suppose I can always work on writing more recipes..

On a totally separate note, I have a new revision on the bakery logo's. Though the change is very miniscule it's enough to make a difference on the side of the building.

Anyway, it's late. I'll write a new post again soon, I promise :)

Oh my, how time flies!

2015-10-10T21:26:00.000-07:00

As I sit here trying to write this blog, I'm enjoying the sounds of ATB's "Let you go" and looking back at everything I had written over the past years and i'm blown away by the memories it brings. I was in a bad place for a few years and didn't have the willpower to write about what I loved.

Time heals all wounds and so it has begun.. the time to start writing again. So much has happened in the past few years I don't even know where to start with trying to tell you! My last post was regarding my naming of the bakery concept (because back then it was only a concept). I'm sure as you could have guessed by the page re-design, the name morphed from "The Holbrook Bakery, Romo's Bakery, The Red Velvet Bakery, to The Velvet Buttercream".

It's funny how difficult it is to choose a name for a bakery. In this day and age when a single word name is the best option(Sauce, Dough, Pieology,Sprinkles, etc), I opted for something different. Why try to follow the trend when you can make your own path?
The Velvet Buttercream became the concept after I had kept hearing people complaining about thick sugary buttercream icing. I personally have no problem with it, but I wanted to make something that other people would enjoy. An icing that's light and fluffy, but also has the same properties as a traditional buttercream with a velvety taste. That's right, I spent three years doing my own R&D creating this recipe. Several hundred dollars later I can finally say that i'm satisfied with the recipe, and i'm sure you will be too!

After one year of intense self searching I decided to put myself back in the driver's seat of my destiny. The bakery "concept" is no longer a concept and is quickly becoming reality. I've added a "dream board" to my bedroom to showcase all of my personal advancements toward making the bakery a reality. It started with just the business cards and some paint swatches and has quickly morphed into a board with recipes, excel spreadsheets, and concept idea's. I wake up and look at it every morning as a reminder of what I want out of life.

As I finish this blog, I find myself in tears thinking of how far i've come and how hard I had to pull myself out of some of the roughest years of my life. I'm on the road to success and no one can stop me.

What's in a name..

2012-05-12T20:23:00.004-07:00

The past few months of my life have shaken me to my core and I feel that it's time to get back on track and move on. I miss working on the bakery concept, but I have been stuck at this blockade for quite some time now. I figured that I could keep trying to put off the naming process, but that now seems to have come to a block as well. I suppose you can only put something off for so long before you have to stop and just DO IT.

I've been considering a few names for the bakery.. "Romo's Bakery" is among my top choices, but due to the fact that I don't carry the "Romo" last name my sister things it's a bad idea to use it. I've also been eyeing the name "The Vanilla Bean" and "The Red Velvet Bakery". Both of the names would work wonders for a bakery, but in the end are they really catchy enough to keep people thinking about it? Last but definitely not least on my list of names is a throwback to my great grandfather who I am basing the concept on. The name is "The Holbrook Bakery." Plain and simple.. in a town of 5,000 who really needs to know if your place is a bakery or not, most people will go there based on word of mouth anyway.

Deny the power of red?

I have always wanted to give my bakery a really catchy one word name.. but that's easier said than done. "Sprinkles" is a great name for a bakery, too bad the actual bakery "Sprinkles" is crap and a half. So lets look into another name.. I love love LOVE the color, "Red" and I plan to use it throughout my bakery. Why not give the bakery an awesome name like "Red"? I suppose it's not as descriptive as most bakery names should be, but it's catchy.

I would love to hear your input on the names.. please for god sake HELP ME FIGURE IT OUT!

Romo's Bakery: The concept, The Legacy

2012-03-21T21:47:00.001-07:00

For as long as I could remember I have always wanted to work for myself. To be successful in life and to make a good living has been my dream, well that and to carry on the family legacy.

Legacy, you ask? Lets do a small history lesson on my family.. it's easier to look at the tree below

My great grandfather Joseph (Joe) Romo opened a bakery called "Hollbrook Bakery" and kept it running for over 20 years before retiring. His bakery used to sell all kinds of fresh donuts, pastries, breads, and pies.. all made from scratch! The man did well for himself and his family. He passed the bakery to my grandfather E.M. Romo who in turn changed it to Romo's Cafe which it remains today, however it is now in the hands of my Aunt Phyllis and her family. Owning a business has been all I know and all i've wanted to do for quite some time. I want to follow in the footsteps of my great grandfather Joe Romo. Though I never got to meet him, I want to make him proud.

This past year my grandfather passed away and I was lucky enough to be handed down my great grandfather's (Joe Romo) recipe book. When I saw it for the first time I got chills down my spine and the hair on my arms stood on end. Opening the book was intense, it was frail and falling apart the more I touched it. Thus making the it difficult to copy down the ever important recipes.

Next Chapter: The concept goes to paper

To begin the work on making this concept bakery a reality is going to be a considerable amount of work.. I don't want to give away the whole story right off the bat, so your just going to have to stay tuned ;)

Death becomes the icing..

2011-11-03T21:35:00.004-07:00

So it's been a while since i've last posted about anything.. well it's been an interesting rollercoaster ride at work lately. Everything from Thomas the train to the evil dead cakes to cupcakes.. I have had so much work to do in the past few weeks that it's made me quite tired and also partially lost my "want" to be a decorator.

I love cakes but sometimes it's just too much work with no "Thank you's" or "that looks awesome!" Well I take that back.. there are some "thank you's" but for every one of them there is always some asshole who will complain. I have had quite a few of those lately! You would almost think that I don't understand my clientele by the few complaints i've had in the past two weeks. I had a lady that wanted her money back for a full sheet cake because it didn't have the "wow factor" that she was looking for. SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN THIS TO ME!

This is the cake the customer complained about

If you were watching Michelangelo scupt an amazing statue, would you walk up to him and say that you think it's hideous and that it doesn't have enough pizaz? If you put yourself in those shoes you will understand how I felt.

For every one person that hates the cake, there are at least 4 others that rave about it!

Customer 1:

Customer 2:

Customer 3:

Customer 4:

To that one customer I say that she's rude and cheap.. I will never make a cake for her again if she comes into my store. GOOD RIDDANCE!

The inevitable

2011-10-15T17:52:00.003-07:00

Tidbit's of Maryland keep flowing back into my life. I just heard from a dear friend of mine that another compliment came to the shop today from a previous customer that loved my wedding cake!

So not much has happened this week besides the inevitable... something that I told you all that I would shoot the first person that asked me to do this. That's right.. someone made me write a paragraph on a cake today! Since I didn't take the cake order I wasn't able to refuse the amount of text, so instead I yelled at the person who took the cake order.

This is just a simple drawing... lol. The text on the cake was something relating to a group of people saying goodbye to their German foreign exchange students. The cake itself was pretty good though, a white cake with strawberries and banana's inside with whipped cream icing.

More stuff to come next week! Halloween is right around the corner and so are my two halloween creepy cakes :D Keep an eye out... haha pun intended

The cake walk...

2011-10-06T19:24:00.004-07:00

Continuation...

So the walk went really well, the cake turned out awesome. k thx bye.. lol just kidding.

The walk did go really well though. 105 Albertsons' store managers walked the store to see all the new goodies for the future remodel of their stores.

For the past two weeks there have been six bakery technicians wandering around using up all my cake and icing, then turning around and blaming me for not having enough supplies... how lame is that. You would think that if they used up 14 cases of cake and over 250 pounds of icing that I would have superior cake backup available. This is not the case my friend.. The techs created character cakes for halloween, thanksgiving, and christmas.. meanwhile not making any of the cakes that actually do sell. Speaking of those seasonal character cakes.. NONE OF THEM SOLD! They all coded out this morning :( Anyways, I don't want to harp on the bad of these past two weeks.. so lets switch to the good.

The store looks great now that it's finally done, and the walk was amazing. Done deal, lets move on!

The cake was the part that you really came here for... Last week I told you of a story where a customer came in wanting a world made out of candy. I told that customer to bring me in as much candy as possible to fit onto this cake. I also told her that I would start with a half sheet and continue to shape the cake from there. With a little help from joey (co-decorator) on ideas to put into this world, we decided to have an awesome chocolate river and a small whip cream bridge that connected the two sides of the cake together. Oh and I forgot to mention that the customer was so excited when she saw the cake that she almost burst into tears of happiness. That feeling of accomplishment never gets old :)

Enough with the talk of the cake, enjoy the pictures!!

What are your thoughts on the cake? let me know in the comments section!

Nothing really amazing coming up this weekend.. I'll take pictures anyways. Have a great week

4 minutes to save the world!

2011-09-28T18:05:00.000-07:00

So I started work at Albertsons' this past thursday.. there's nothing better then being thrown right into the deep end head first.

Currently my store is going through a full scale remodel. Everything from the walls, to the floors, to the cake case! Meanwhile the entire store is a mess, in the bakery we are trying to transition from the summer schematic to the fall schematic. A transition like that is no easy task.. everything from the colors, to the flavors of cake have to change. Going back to my first sentence of being thrown into the deep end head first, I have been working to get the bakery up to fall schematic before the head honcho's decide to walk the store.

Oh and by the way.. the walk is happening THIS THURSDAY!

So... again... thrown in, head first. < insert sigh face here > lol

Customer order shaped cakes seemed to be on the menu during my first week back with Albertsons. I had a request to make "Thomas the train","A world out of candy", and lastly a Motor-home cake. I really have my hands full this week between trying to change over the cake case and also make these wierd designs.

A favorite of mine is the new variety of triple layer cakes like the Rocky Road, Triple Chocolate Decadence, and the White Forest cake. Most of the new cakes focus on the revenge of whip cream, but thankfully it's not all bad. These triple layer cakes focus primarily on mixed layers of chocolate and white cake. Flavor and cost wise it's a great idea.. not to mention that the cakes actually look really nice.

For my first week back I have been finding it difficult to ramp up my speed and lower my quality in production. It's harder than most people think to go from making grocery store cakes to wedding cakes and back to grocery store cakes. It's been like a rollercoaster trying to go up to the slow speed and high quality of what a wedding cake should be. Then back down to working fast and low quality at a grocery store. Either way I think I have found a happy medium where I am able to push cakes out at an alarming rate of 8 minutes for a 1/4 sheet, 10 for a 1/2 sheet, and 4 minutes for a double layer cake.

Stay tuned this next week for the continuation of this weeks events!

The cakes go marching one by one hurrah!

2011-09-15T20:58:00.002-07:00

Back To ARIZONA!

Last year around thing time I was posting my goodbye to this blog hoping that I wouldn't have had to end it on such a sore note. I kept trying to invent new ways for me to talk about creating wedding cakes, but one can only do so much with icing and 20 hours per week.

In June of 2010 I decided that I was tired of not being with the one I love, so I put the effort in and got a job at a catering establishment in Maryland as their full time cake decorator. Little did I know that it wasn't exactly full time.. I guess working at Albertsons kept me spoiled thinking that hours were just made out of thin air. I stayed busy from July (when I arrived in Maryland) through the holiday season, but just as January 2nd hit.. my hours dropped from 45-50 per week to 10 . My ability to be creative with cakes had gone to almost a standstill and for that reason I had to stop posting to my blog.

I wasn't making character cakes anymore, I didn't have any fun stories to write about with interesting cakes, and lastly I didn't have any horror stories of customers that wanted me to write on a cake: "Happy Birthday Johnnie, Caren, Kacie, Lauren, Mary, & Frank" on an 8" double layer.

On the upside I was able to experiment with flavors that I had not played with before. For example: Kahlua caramel buttercream icing, Oreo cream filling, orange flavored cake, raspberry mousse, peanut butter mousse, and so many more. What was even better was that these new flavors I introduced began selling like hot cakes! I had so much more appreciation for other cake decorators for experimenting like I was. I began to love my job even more than when I first started.

Fast forward four months to Graduation (the start of the busy season).. I had done so much for my place of work like revamp certain pricing structures, adding many new flavors of filling and icings, introduce incentive offers on wedding cakes, and purchase new supplies to replace outdated ones. I felt like I had taken the initiative to make the cake section "mine". I was in control and I knew my numbers well. The busy season started off with a bang at graduation.. I had 32 cakes that week and only myself to decorate them. Not only was I doing the decorating, but also baking, having meetings with couples, and delivering the cakes. I kept myself busy during this time period pushing about 50+ hours per week.

Fast forward another six weeks and 3 back to back weeks of overnight shifts, I was burned. I wouldn't continue at this place and be able to keep my sanity. On my last week of overnight shifts I had a nervous breakdown in the middle of the night. At that time I realized that working this hard was too much for one person, and I decided that I couldn't continue to be abused at work for what I do. I gave my notice the following monday.

I cried..

I cried because I was sad that I put so much work into my cakes. I loved what I did there. I don't regret one minute of my time because it made me a better cake decorator in the end. I know now that one person cannot be the baker, decorator, consultant, and delivery driver.
I cried because I felt that I had grown friendships with my brides and grooms that walked through the door. I felt that leaving them was almost as if I was betraying their trust.
I cried because I was going to miss the friends that I made while there, Monique, Shirley Mae, Jacinta, Vanessa, Mike, Bobby, Marlin, and Lilly.

Troubled waters...

2010-10-19T18:39:00.000-07:00

and so the sun began to set...

Things haven't been going quite as well as I had hoped with my new job. Creativity and hours are at an all time low.. People just don't seem to want to spend money on cake :(

On average i've been getting about 25-35 hours per week and it's been putting a considerable amount of stress my life. If any of you know of any jobs in the Annapolis area that will pick up a part time employee, do let me know!!

Meanwhile back at blogger, I will try to keep you all updated with the cakes that I do find fun and entertaining.

Take Care.

Sincerely,

Aaron

DISASTER STRIKES!

2010-10-04T06:05:00.000-07:00

It's a fine morning here in Annapolis, Maryland... i'm sitting at "Ahh Coffee" enjoying a Key West Latte. This morning I feel like telling you a story. A story of a cake disaster..

It all started this previous saturday, October 2nd.. The day was beautiful, the breeze was calm, and the temperature was just right. The morning started off just like any other day before it. I headed into work at 8am absolutely sure that I was going to have a lot of time to finish my cake. After all two of my four wedding cake orders were already completed, all that was left was the octagon shaped cakes.

Fast forward to around noon.. the first octagon wedding cake was finished and ready to go, all I had left was to deliver. So I started on my way to the Naval Academy Officer's Club still thinking that I had more than enough time for the additional deliveries. All went well with the first octagon cake, all except that the cake started to crack around the border! I had no tools available, so the best I could do was cover up the cracks with rose petals. All in all it didn't look bad.. I would say it was a good first attempt at making the octagon cake.

I arrived back at the shop just in time to grab the second octagon cake, finish the detail icing on the top of the cake, and head out. I began driving through the bump and curve ridden roads of Annapolis, as cautious as possible. When I decided to make a left hand turn onto west street, I thought that 15 miles an hour was slow enough to ensure that the cake wouldn't move.. I heard no sound indicating that there was a problem, but I felt the urge to stop and check. After pulling into an Exxon gas station, I opened the back of my car and my jaw just dropped!

The cake board slid to the right, when the cake board stopped moving, the cake itself began sliding off the board followed by each individual tier! The cake stopped moving when it hit the side of my car leaving a nice icing footprint all over the place.

I called for immediate support, and sure enough Eric (my boss) showed up 15 minutes later with repair supplies. Meanwhile i'm getting phone calls from Jacintha at the shop asking where the wedding cake was, that the customer's are asking about it. I began driving to the event even more cautious than previous.. I know that the cake was already destroyed, but I couldn't risk the product being gone completely. I arrived to the event 40 minutes late with a cake that needed serious repairs.

Using my bag of supplies I began to piece back together the three tier octagon cake. After fifteen minutes of smoothing and making a new border this cake was ready for final detail. Just as I was cutting up some flowers for the top, the wedding coordinator reached across my cake to grab the scissors and ended up taking off a large section of icing from the only remaining "good side" of the cake! Instead of my jaw just dropping, I began to back away almost ready to cry.

The wedding coordinator looked at me, knowing that I was incredibly upset, and she gave the idea that we should just cover it up with flowers. I pulled myself together and finished the floral design that now included a rope of flowers leading up the side.

The octagon disaster...

This wedding cake disaster set off a domino effect... one cake after another became increasingly late. I delivered my final wedding cake at 4:45pm, 45 minutes past it's delivery time. After explaining why I was late, the customer shook her head and said "Thank god it wasn't my cake!"

My final cake delivery... a beautiful finish to the day

Video's, Recipes, and Cake's oh my!

2010-09-06T05:57:00.000-07:00

Some new stuff is in the works still... although i'm not sure exactly when i'm going to start them. I guess it would have been easier just to say that i'm going to start making video's. Who knows exactly when it's all gonna start to work together.

In the past couple of weeks since I last blogged it has been incredibly slow at the shop.. well kind of. We attended an event called "Annapalooza" where Palate Pleasers was one of six food vendors. We offered good food at the regular markup prices at an event... Sadly we walked away with a lot of food that hadn't been used. On the dessert side of the event we had only two varieties of cupcakes, chocolate and carrot, and only three choices of icing.

Overpriced, or possibly just a lack of hungry people kept them from buying a lot of our 1,000 cupcakes. By the time people did finally start to get hungry it was so late in the evening that there just wasn't enough time to push the remaining 800. Oh well, we still had a great time... saw some really amazing local bands that I never knew existed. When I say local band, i'm not talking about high school kids who want to try and make it big.. but real bands that are trying to make a name for themselves.

On a final note, I just want to put it out there that i'm finding it hard to meet a specific goal for blogging on select days.. so i'm just gonna blog when I have something to write about. Otherwise it feels like a homework assignment from a teacher.

Have a great labor day weekend, be safe!

100 pounds of pure fat

2010-08-18T19:27:00.000-07:00

Two words: Buttercream Icing...

Traditional white buttercream icing

As i've mentioned in my most recent blog... I have a really busy week ahead of me with five wedding cakes, two shop orders, as well as shop display cakes. From what I have counted I have a total of 25 ordered cakes, but a total of over 30 takes that will be completed by the end of the week. Naturally you've got to have something to cover the cake in!

This week I spent eight and a half hours making icing for all the cakes due this week! Just under 150 pounds of pure fat and confectioners sugar.. Now when I mention the weight it's a combination of our two icings, traditional buttercream, and Italian buttercream. Between the two icings there are 42 pounds of butter!

Imagine eating two slices of cake and what it would do to your hips.

Oh well, that wicked amount of fat keeps me in a job. So do yourself and a cake decorator a favor, and go buy some cupcakes or a single serve cake slice. You won't regret it ;)

Stay tuned on Saturday for the finished product from my hard week at work! Till then.. have a great week

Kahlua.. a sweet success

2010-08-15T09:44:00.001-07:00

As a follow up to wednesday's blog, I had told you about my experimental cakes that I was going to make. Both cakes sold within 12 hours of their creation.. Definitely a success in my book, especially for being a dessert cake.

The chocolate turtle cake consisted of me having to make Kahlua caramel which was one of the main ingredients besides the chocolate cake. Now just a little background into my caramel making history.. I haven't made caramel since culinary school and I wasn't exactly sure how to make it. So I did what any new age culinary connoisseur would do and I google'd it. I found some great tutorial videos on how to make sure the caramel would remain a sauce and not turn into a brick.

I first started with a half cup of butter and two cups of brown sugar, let the two come to a boil in a sauce pot. After boiling for 1 minute I added a half cup of Kahlua and allowed the mixture to cook for an additional 30 seconds before adding one cup of heavy cream. Ta-da! Kahlua Caramel.... mmm yummy

Add some of that Kahlua caramel to the buttercream and you have a sweet success story. Four layers of chocolate cake filled with three layers of Kahlua caramel buttercream, topped with ganache icing and garnished with pecans chocolate shavings and drizzled with Kahlua caramel sauce.

Chocolate Turtle Cake with Kahlua Caramel Buttercream

Here is another sweet success of the week.. a beautiful 60th birthday chocolate cake filled with alternating layers of chocolate buttercream and white buttercream. Decorated to be similar to a Japanese cherry tree.

Japanese cherry trees

Have a great week everyone.. this week is going to be a wild ride. I have 6 wedding cakes, for a total tier count of 19 not including shop orders, or shop cakes.

Wish me luck!

Have your cake and get drunk too!

2010-08-11T20:34:00.000-07:00

This week I am planning to experiment with some new cake flavor combinations! I have three flavors in mind that I am dying to try out, the flavors are coconut cake with fresh peach filling and coconut buttercream icing, a chocolate turtle cake with Kahlua caramel buttercream, and last but not least citrus cupcakes with fresh nectarine compote and buttercream icing.

Just an example of the Coconut peach cake I want to make

After this past weekend's peach festival here in Annapolis I have really been feeling the need to play around with different flavors. Really just trying to branch out from the normal basic cake flavors. Some of my long time readers know that I have been yearning to play around since I first started with Albertson's two years ago. Now two years later I finally have free reign to make what I want!

An example of the chocolate turtle cake with Kahlua caramel buttercream filling

When Aaron plays with cake flavors.. the customer wins!

I shall report back on Saturday evening with my cake details :D stay turned!! Have a great week and i'll see you then