Cake Decorating: A Retrospective

I'm sure most people in my life know (but maybe not) I took a Wilton cake decorating class six months ago while I was still living at home.  People in my life also know (but maybe not) I love self-deprecation not because of poor self-esteem, but because of my hare-brained ideas/schemes and the things I get myself into, I cannot take myself seriously most days.

I will admit, I am the least crafty person I know.  I picked up crocheting for six months.  I have a blanket I started for P's youngest nephew (obviously not his real name...poor kid if it was) while his sister was still pregnant and he's now almost a year old.  Being in the 100th percentile (a slight exaggeration), this half finished blanket is now a hat.  I have creative ideas, but have zero dexterity.  I think I have an eye for what's beautiful but fail almost always at execution.

However, the entrepeneur spirit within me refused to be downtrodden. I decided to take a cake decorating class at the local Michael`s Arts and Crafts store.  I fantasized completing all three levels and getting so good at it, opening my own cake decorating company.

 The instructor was really knowledgeable but admitted herself that she uses cake mixes.  She told us in order for cake mixes to taste more homemade and decadent use melted butter for the oil and milk for the water and I have to say it does make a difference.

Trying to achieve the bright vibrant frosting colours I pictured in my head was the most difficult part of the class.  You know what else was difficult?  Sitting and listening to the Moms (who all knew each other) in my class talk about how their day was hectic, but came in with beautiful home made cookies and cakes to decorate and finished each class with a beautiful cake for their families.  My childless and unmarried self, with poor cake decorating skills shrivelled up inside just a wee bit.  My one friend was a twenty-year old girl who took the class because she worked at a big chain store bakery, but she honestly didn't need to because the girl had mad skills in cake decorating.  Our childless state forged a bond between us.  Well it did for me.  It probably didn't cross her mind.

Cake decorating materials are not cheap.  I did buy the Wilton kit, but I saved money elsewhere by trolling Craigslist and Ebay for other things.  Funny enough, I found an ad for someone who was selling Wilton cake decorating materials on Craigslist and contacted them.  She turned out to be my instructor who was selling the free stuff she got for being a Wilton I got my cake carrier from Ebay.  Everyone had the plastic carriers, but I loved the mustard yellow, vintage look of my cake carrier and the fact that it had "cake" written in script in the front that I had to have it.

Here is a sample of my cake decorating from the class:

This was the very first cake I made.  The first project was to make a cake using a stencil.  I did not want to make the cutesy children themed cakes most of the Moms wanted to make.  I was feeling edgy, so I wanted to do an homage to the song Oppa Gangnam Style.  Taking from the video's bright colors, I wanted to make it hot pink, but instead ended up with an anemic pink.  The black icing was the hardest to make despite starting off with chocolate frosting and it smeared everywhere.   Nobody understood my cake.  Showed my friend MW and she asked me why I wanted to make a Kim Jong Il cake.

Missed the third class due to illness, but once I was able to sit up, tried to do the flowers in the workbook.  This is a shaggy mum cupcake.  Click here to see what it should actually look like.  I say to P that mine looks like a worm infestation on a cupcake.

 

I then attempted a rose.  At this point, I threw a tantrum at my cake decorating inabilities and gave up.

 P, who built our shelving units, banquettes for our dining room, and an entertainment unit for J, decided to try his hand at making a rose.  I tried to stop him at first because I knew that he was going to defeat me and/or take over the whole activity as per usual.  This is his first and only attempt at cake decorating.  Looking at this beautiful, skillfully made rose, I contemplated never going to class again.  After much heated debate, I was convinced to go back.

My final cake.  Some improvement.  Most people wrote positive inspiring messages or the cliche "Happy Birthday".  Again, trying to be edgy, I wrote a phrase I seize every opportunity to use, even when it's not the right context. P gives me the slow clap when I tell him about the cake.

Overall, it was a fun class to take and took my mind off the stress of my job and the fact that P was out of town for the majority of the time for work.  I may take level 2 someday, but my dreams of a cake decorating business has gone out the window.  Unless you're wanting an edgy, awkward silence inducing cake, then feel free to contact me. 

Spring is here!

The sunny weather today was a nice relief from the miserable rain we get on the West Coast.  It's even nicer that it happened on the weekend.  The sun is a friendly reminder of the fruits and vegetables we'll start to see in the supermarket and farmer's market in the coming months, making our heavy on the comfort and not so kind on the waist meals a little more healthier.

Sundays are usually lazy for me.  Found this ecard:




True dat (yes, I have not given up talking like this despite my age).

Spent most of the morning researching what I will be bringing to P's family's Easter dinner.  Polish people know how to do Easter dinner up so I'm looking forward to it.  I've decided on a Polish dessert and am researching on how I can change it up a wee bit to take it to the next level.

P decides to make breakfast in bed (which is actually lunch in bed because we lazed around and watched TV until mid-morning).  P has recently discovered an instant noodle soup called Mama instant noodles.  His favorite flavour is artificial pork...yikes!  Sounds mega disgusting, but judge lest ye be judged.  Who amongst us has not eaten instant noodles in our college days to save money or as a naughty treat?  So P makes me "Mama soup" which involves half the packet of flavour powder due to the high sodium, adding sliced mushrooms, and cracking an egg into the hot broth to cook.  We slurp instant noodles in bed while watching P's favorite show on repeat.

I go out to get a spot of sunshine and return home inspired by it.  Spring meals shed the starchiness and heaviness of winter meals and instead favour lightness and uber fruits and vegetables.  Asparagus was on special at the store and I picked some up.  Frozen fruit was also on special so although it's spring time, not every fruit has yet showed up.  I stocked up on frozen berry mixes and raspberries.

Spring is here! menu: 
Toasted Sesame Ginger Salmon with jasmine rice
Roasted asparagus and mini sweet peppers (just roasted with olive oil, salt and pepper)
Raspberry Breakfast Bars

(Italicized so it looks like I hand wrote the menu out adding that extra touch of class)

Got the recipe for the salmon from Bitchin' Kitchen and the raspberry bars from Smitten Kitchen, two excellent blogs full of recipes.  

Wanted to take a pic of the salmon, but as soon as I said the salmon was ready, P ran to the oven and started dishing himself the salmon, thus destroying its beauty.  P was mad hungry after doing homework all day. 

 P and I constantly disagree on proteins being sweet.  Filipinos are used to their meats being savoury and sweet, but P is not.  I knew going in that he was going to critique the use of honey and brown sugar, but I charged on.  The recipe calls for the glaze to be put on after the salmon has cooked, but I tripled the recipe for the glaze and brushed it on twice during the last few minutes of cooking to have a thick layer of glaze.  Be careful to keep an eye on it because the sugary glaze can burn quick.  Next time, I may add chili flakes, sriracha, or more cracked black pepper to the salmon to balance out the sweet.

The RBB (tired of typing out the whole thing) is as breakfasty as oatmeal cookies, but I would not turn my nose up if these came to me for breakfast, especially if it was breakfast in bed on a lazy Sunday.  The bright color of the berries woke up my eyeballs from duldrums of seeing only greyness all winter.  For frozen berries, they tasted so good and the lemon juice only enhanced the raspberry taste.
  

Honey Bear photo bombs the RBB's

You don't even want to know how messy my kitchen was after this.  Blah!  I pretended that the mess didn't exist and settled in with one of the bars in bed to watch The Walking Dead.  .

Only thing I don't like about lazy Sundays are they lead to Manic Mondays.  Sigh!

New Dream: Open a Polish Deli

P is Polish and like any good Polish common law wife, I ordered myself a Polish cookbook.  I had fantasies of making him some good ol' Polish home cooking.  I even bought my really good friend Dude (obviously not her real name), who is real life married to a Polish gentleman, the same cookbook and we giggled like school girls that we were going to make recipes out of it.  I've yet to try making anything in it.  There has been discussion about a pierogi making day with P's Babcia (Grandma), but P threatened that I better not add anything "fancy" like herbs.  Even I know better than that.  Babcia's pierogi's are simply flavoured (they don't need "fancy" things) fluffy, tender, and all around tasty.  She's ruined store bought frozen orange filling pierogi's for me.

But, I digress.  While stuck in a traffic jam one day after a stressful day at work and on my way to the gym, I noticed a Polish deli to my left.  I diverged and parked.  Most of the products on the shelf were familiar.  But my focus was on sausages.  I love me some Polish sausage (that's what she said!).

While waiting for the Polish customers and the owner to finish gossiping, I took a little peek of the back room.  I saw big salami's and coils of sausages hanging.  I saw what looked like to be a big smoker.  But, what surprised me is there was a handsome elderly gentleman sitting on the stool trimming and cutting up pork pieces and throwing them into a bucket.  Being used to the sterile look of the deli at the big chain grocery store where their deli meats are shipped in, I was not expecting the Polish deli to butcher and make their own products on site.

This did it for me and I stared at this old man like a total creeper for a good five minutes.  I quickly put in my order when it came to my turn (two traditional sausages and one double smoked sausage...I am probably messing up my description of them) and phoned P upon exiting.  I had a new goal in life: to open a Polish deli.  Call it crazy, but I find it romantic to run a family owned business based on your heritage and to artfully craft your product from start to finish. 

After telling P of my dream, he didn't scoff, but actually took me seriously and and threw in his two cents.  My sister in law J finds it amusing that my Filipino self wants to open a Polish deli.  It is strange, but I am legitimately serious.  So serious that I have signed up for a bacon/sausage making class at Save-on Meats in Vancouver.  That's for another post.

Taken from the Wikipedia article on Kielbasa.  Didn't even think about taking a picture of my Kielbasa finds.  Tried the skinny and brown sausages.

P and I devoured the sausage and I had to go to another local Polish deli for more sausages the day after.  Not as good as the sausage at the previous deli, but alright.  I used them in a corn potato chowder in the crockpot that I made minutes before I had to leave for work.

My first attempt at a recipe (adapted from another recipe my sister gave me):

2 14 oz cans of cream of corn 
6 cups chicken stock (cheat and use the one in the tetrapack...let's not kid ourselves.  I don't make my own chicken stock.  Who has time?)
3-4 potatoes chopped into cubes (I left the skin on because I was pressed for time)
2 or 3 bay leaves (being pressed for time, I didn't think of herb combinations I could put in, but I bet you thyme would be good as well.  Maybe some chipotle powder to make it spicy)
2 kielbasa sausage cubed (not to be snob, but go to a Polish deli in your community and buy legit kielbasa, not the crappy big brand kind unless that's what you like)
1 can of evaporated milk
salt and pepper (I didn't put salt b/c the Kielbasa is salty as is)
green onion for sprinkling (optional)

Seriously dump everything but the evaporated milk of it into a crockpot.  Being rushed, I didn't even stir it.  Put it on high for four hours.  Check if the potatoes are done.  If they are, put in the can of evaporated milk.  Let it simmer on high for another 1/2 hour to an hour.

This served me and P dinner plus lunch leftovers.  Not very Polish, but I'll get to the cookbook someday.

Introduction...like any good essay would have

Decided to start a blog because people say they find my Facebook statuses amusing and I'm up to a whooping 61 followers on Pinterest (I'm actually shocked).  More than anything, I'd like to record my musings for posterity sake and as a way to de-stress at the end of the day.

Everyone knows I heart food to the nth degree.  My love for food started at a young age even though I was picky as hell, but I would daydream I was Julia Child and spent my Saturdays watching Frugal Gourmet on KCTS 9.  To this day, I still have my recipe cards from childhood where I carefully copied out recipes in cook books I borrowed from the library in a fine line sharpie pen.

I moved out with my boyfriend of a bazillion years P last December into a tiny apartment.  Strange thing (at least some people may consider it strange) is that I moved out with him at the fresh age of 31.  Up until that point, I lived at home with my parents.  Being Filipino, given the economy, and also living in one of the most expensive cities to live in, it made sense.  I never had a chance to really express myself culinarily (is this even a word?) because my mom mostly did the cooking and given her intense need for a spotless kitchen and my penchant for disorganized cooking experiments, I did not cook often.  But when I did, it was usually a success.

I have a tiny kitchen, but hope to create big flavour (corny!).  And because it's my own kitchen, I'll make a mess of creativity and maybe just maybe, I'll let that mess sit.  I work full time and try to cook after work 4 of the 7 days of the week.  Love the weekend and want to start devoting the weekend to trying new recipes...maybe make my own (gah scary!).  This blog keeps track of my food adventures (successes and failures) and sometimes when I have some extra money, eating out on a budget.  Maybe I'll throw in a funny anecdote here and there but I'm not making any promises.

Hope you enjoy!