That one weekend where I ate way too much cake.

And then wrote a blog post with a much too long title.

Oh well.

This past weekend, Graham took a few days off and we headed back to Charlotte. He didn't get to go with me two weeks ago, and Friday was his birthday, so we went home to celebrate.

I baked some banana split cupcakes a few weeks ago, but I didn't love the way they turned out. So, I tweaked the recipe, & used the guests at his party as my guinea pigs. These were a HUGE success. 

He requested a strawberry cake for his birthday, so I made that as well. He teased me about the four layers, and the homemade jam filling. I know he would have been happy with a cake baked in a 9x13 pan and iced... but, I had to get creative somehow! 

As if that wasn't enough cake, my friend Kelly & I attended the Sweet Tooth Festival on Sunday. 

Thanks to the power of social media, I found out about this AWESOME event. Tickets were $30, the proceeds went to RAIN (an organization that provides support services to HIV+ individuals in the Charlotte area), and you got sample all kinds of delicious stuff from local bakeries and sweet shops. We left with a bakery box full of all kinds of delicious items.

Most of what we sampled was absolutely wonderful. I had only heard of two of the vendors that were participating; Cupcrazed (a winner of Food Network's Cupcake Wars) & Got What it Cakes, my new favorite Charlotte bakery, so I was excited to try some new places. Here my favorites of everything I got to sample. 

This little bit of deliciousness was called "Gone Wild" from Sweet Elations. It had peanut butter and coconut (which reminds me of my beloved Earth Balance peanut butter) and was so good! 

These brownie bliss bites from My Sweet Celebration were so good. This one had toffee and caramel, and I would have loved about five more. 

Royal Oats Granola was there with something a little healthier. Their blueberry lemon granola was the best granola I've ever had. 

 My favorite treat of the day was this lemon bundt cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes (and how cute is that name!). The cake was so moist, had tons of flavor, and the perfect amount of lemon. 

I'm not a 100% sure, but I'm pretty sure this amazing chocolate mousse cake (with a rum soaked cherry =)) was from Neet's Sweets (if it wasn't, please correct me). The cake was delicious, but what's even better is what the shop does for women who are victims of sexual trafficking and exploitation. 

The Secret Chocolatier was giving out amazing truffles and chocolates. I had a chocolate sea salt butter toffee and a violet truffle. Both were amazing, but the toffee absolutely knocked my socks off. 

I'm honestly not a huge peanut butter fan, but this slice of chocolate cake with a PB filling from Got What It Cakes was wonderful. And they were definitely the most generous with their serving size =)

The Sweet Tooth Festival is an annual event, so if you're in the Charlotte area you should check it out. The money raised goes to a great cause, it's a great way to learn about awesome local businesses, and you leave with a box full of cake. =)

Our Wedding: The Cake

The second in a yet to be determined series of posts about our wedding. This one is about my favorite aspect of the whole event: my our cake.

Photo by JJ Horton Photography

I knew exactly what I wanted my cake to look like, but thanks to Cake Wrecks, I was terrified about finding a baker. I looked at a few people. Some were out of my price range, and others took three weeks to return my call (note to any wedding professional who may read this: DON'T DO THAT.). When I was browsing the Knot one night, I came across Cake Lady Jill. She had excellent reviews, had been featured on Style Me Pretty, and has been named one of the best wedding vendors in NC by the Knot members for the past two years. I assumed she would be out of our price range, but her prices are very reasonable.

Photo by JJ Horton Photography

After looking at her work, I knew she could handle my whimsical cake, so I took a chance and went ahead and booked her before being able to sample her cakes (a BIG downfall of planning an out of town wedding). But when I was home in October for my bridal shower, my mom and I met with her to do a tasting, and I was absolutely blown away. First, she is a ball of energy and has the most fun personality ever. She had pretty big sized pieces of each of her cake flavors, all of her fillings and frosting flavors laid out as well. She assembled pieces for both of us with her flavor recommendations.

It was very, very hard to choose. I wasn't a huge fan of the almond cake (it tasted like marzipan) but everything else was delicious. ESPECIALLY the lemon cake. Oh my goodness. That was the flavor we picked for the biggest tier. It was lemon cake, filled with fresh strawberries and lemon curd for the first layer and cream cheese frosting for the second layer. It was covered in Italian meringue buttercream and then covered in fondant.

Photo by JJ Horton Photography

Our top layer was even more delicious. It was a simple vanilla cake filled with raspberry jam, lemon curd and a layer of fresh raspberries. It was one of the best cakes and flavor combinations I've ever tasted (I've now started mixing lemon curd and raspberry jam at home and topping vanilla ice cream with it).

The middle layer was my least favorite. It was chocolate cake filled with raspberry buttercream and fresh raspberries. It wasn't my favorite, but it was still very good. I'm just not a big fan of chocolate cake unless they are seriously mounded with a creamy buttercream frosting. But Jill told me that every wedding she does, people always ask which layer is the chocolate one, and mom recommended I do at least one chocolate layer as well.

Photo by JJ Horton Photography

Jill was a pleasure to work with. When I met with her and showed her what I had in mind, we talked colors and design and she emailed me three sketches of cake designs based on what we had discussed. I didn't love one of them, so I emailed her and she promptly sent me another one (which ended up being the one). On the way of the wedding she arrived to set up while we were out doing pictures and set the cake up quickly. Our friends who were at our venue were seriously impressed at such a small woman just hoisting the cake up above her shoulders considering how much it weighed.

I absolutely can not recommend Jill enough. Anyone getting married in the greater Charlotte area should definitely schedule a consultation with her ASAP.

Visions of Cake Wrecks dancing in my head...

January 3, 2010: I discover Cake Wrecks. Yes, I remember the exact date. Graham was about to leave to go back to Arkansas. We were in Borders and looking at the humorous books and I (because as my hips will tell you, am drawn to anything with the word "cake" in the title) pick up Cake Wrecks.

Side note: Unfamiliar with Cake Wrecks? Buy. The. Book. Right. This. Moment. It is laugh out loud funny. We were laughing so hard in Borders it was difficult to breathe.

Anyways. Cake Wrecks is a collection of absolutely horrible, tacky, ridiculous cakes that are made by professional bakers. Some of the cakes are technically good, but the customer has horrible taste. Some of the cakes make you literally *facepalm*

This one is my all time favorite.

Well, initially when Graham and I were planning a casual wedding, I wanted to make cupcakes for it myself. However, this thing is getting fancier and fancier by the day. And as a lover of all things cake related, I just can't pass up my one chance to have a fancy, elaborate, beautiful, creative cake.

But back to the topic of my fear of what a professional wedding cake could turn out like. Look at this one.



Source


A customer wanted this cake. She took the image to a baker. She even brought in the brown ribbon that she wanted use. Want to imagine what her actual cake ended up looking like?

Ready?


Source


I. Would. Absolutely. Die. I mean, I'm hoping she didn't just call a baker out of the phone book and go with it. I'm hoping she went to a tasting, looked at the persons pictures, etc. Basically all the things you SHOULD do when you're spending a lot of money on a cake. Based on how many of these types of "wrecks" you can find on Cake Wrecks, I have a feeling she did. So... what do I do? How in the world do I ensure that I don't end up with a mess on my big day? I'm worried enough that people won't come, since we're having it on a Friday. I'm worried enough that the freaking USAF is going to screw with my plans yet again. I really don't have time time or energy to worry this much about a cake. But I can't help it. Not to mention the cake I want is a little more complex... It's not just roud or square tiers with some tastefully positioned flowers or ribbon...

Can you even begin to imagine the catastrophe that I could end up with?

Maybe I better bake a hundred or so cupcakes just in case...

Lemon-Coconut Pound Cake

Recipe courtesy of Bakin' & Eggs and Southern Living

I'm not typically a fan of pound cakes. They're not that impressive visually and they don't have a mound of fluffy, delicious, creamy frosting. But I was craving something sweet and had everything for this recipe on hand, so when I saw it on Jen's blog, I had to make it.

This was absolutely fantastic and smelled heavenly. It took an hour to bake and I was dying. Once it was out of the oven, I let it cool for all of five minutes before I cut myself a slice. And it tasted as good as it smelled. I might stop by the store tomorrow and get some strawberries and make a topping for it, but it is fantastic on it's own.

Lemon-Coconut Pound Cake
Ingredients

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter (1 stick), softened
• 1 1/3 cups granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup Greek yogurt (her recipe called for plain, all I had was vanilla so I used that)
• Zest of one lemon
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/2 cup sweetened flaked coconut 

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour a 9 x 5 loaf pan. Stir together flour, salt, and baking soda and set aside.
2. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or using a hand mixer, beat butter at medium speed until creamy, about 2-3 minutes. Slowly add sugar, beating until fluffy and lightened in color. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until blended after each addition.
3. Alternate adding flour mixture and yogurt to butter mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Beat at low speed just until blended after each addition. Stir in lemon zest, lemon juice and 1/2 cup coconut. Pour batter into a greased and floured 9- x 5-inch loaf pan.
4. Bake for 1 hour and 5 minutes to 1 hour or until a long wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack for 10 to 15 minutes and then remove from pan to wire rack, and cool completely (about 1 hour).

Yield: 8 servings

(Mine didn't rise up as well as hers or Southern Living's did, not sure why. But it was super delish all the same.)

Buddy was very, very intrigued.

These cakes are amazing!!!

CUTEST. CAKES. EVER!

I saw these on Cake Wrecks and absolutely fell in love. Sooooo cute =)

Another AMAZING cake!

The woman who made that cake isn't even a professional. She does this as a HOBBY.

Wow.

I was killing time today browsing Cake Wrecks (SO funny! I was nearly in tears I was laughing so hard) and I saw the most perfect cake ever!


It's from Lisa's Creative Cakes in Texas and if I ever get married, I want a cake exactly like it! I think it's perfect. It's fun & whimsical and exactly what I would want my wedding to be like.