Bryan's mom's birthday is tomorrow, but we decided to celebrate a little early and get together on Sunday. I knew I needed to bake something fun for her birthday, and when I saw this design on Betty Crocker's website, I was hooked. I was really scared, though, because I've never made a cake before. I have assisted and/or observed cake-making a handful of times, but I've never been in charge completing a cake from start to finish. (That's why I usually stick to cupcakes - cakes scare me!) Bryan and I both knew what a perfect design this would be for his mom, and he talked me into tackling the project with his help.
Baking the cake was pretty easy - no surprises there. I used the Wilton cake release on the pan, and I have to say, I was pretty impressed with how cleanly it came out of the pan. (I listened to Ginger and shook well before I squirted it in.) The cake release is so much less messier than flouring that I think I'll use it from now on. All you have to do is squirt a little bit in the middle of the pan and use a basting brush to spread it around evenly - no mess whatsoever!
Next, I printed a template from the internet and cut the flip flop shapes from the cooled cake. That part wasn't too difficult either. I put the cake in the freezer to let it firm up before icing. We were a little rushed for time, and I probably should have left it in the freezer longer than I did. It did firm up some, but it still was a little crumbly on the sides. We did get some crumbs in the icing, but luckily the icing color and the decorations helped to hide that.
If anyone has any good tips for icing a cake, I'm all ears! I didn't have too much trouble with the top, but getting the sides neat and making a clean line between the sides and the top were hard! I don't know if it's because the sides were only a little over an inch tall or what, but I had a lot of trouble getting the icing to stick to the side of the cake and to look neat. Even though I followed the recipe for thin icing, it was a bit thinner than I would have preferred - I won't add quite as much milk next time. I don't think it made too much of a difference on the cake itself, but the lines I piped (which I thought were supposed to be done with thin) didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped.
I wish I would have had the time (and courage!) to make the flip flop straps out of fondant. I used fruit roll-ups, like the directions said, but expected from experience that they wouldn't hold up too well. They lived up to their reputation - by the time we delivered the cake, the straps had fallen flat, but you could still tell what they were supposed to be.
Overall, the cake was cute but definitely had a homemade look to it. I definitely have some room to improve, but I'm pretty happy with my first attempt. The birthday girl seemed to enjoy it, so that made me happy!
In other news, I got to use a culinary torch for the first time! I mentioned that Ginger and I got together for a BFF baking day also. It was long overdue - I think our last one might have been right before Christmas, 2008! Ginger found a rocky road brownie cupcake recipe on the Paula Deen website, and it was super delicious. She covered most of the details on her facebook page, but they were fun, tasty, and something I'd definitely try again. Even better, we got to play with fire!
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