Project of the Week: Valentine's Pizza Cake

Let me be a little sappy for a bit here...

I am blessed to be with the sweetest man I have ever met. I have been dating Will for over 2 years now, and I fall more in love with him day by day. He is my very best friend, and I couldn't imagine life without him!

For Valentine's day, I decided to make him a cake! GO FIGURE! ;) Well, if it weren't for him, I wouldn't have fell in love with cake decorating! He bought me a Wilton giant cupcake pan that started my new hobby! I wanted to be creative this Valentine's day so I figured I might as well make him a cake since he has been there for all the other cakes I have made! My Will LOVES pizza so I decided that he should most definitely have a pizza cake!

A pizza cake needs a pizza box, right? So I went to the closest pizza place, a new Little Caeser's in the Hammond Aire Shopping Center. After I explained my situation, the manager gave me a box for free! He said it would be good advertising! What he didn't know is that we think Little Caeser's Pizza is kind of gross, and I was planning to paint the box white! I may have to go buy a pizza anyways to thank them for their kindness! You should too!

Little Caesars Pizza

9634 Airline Hwy
Suite 1a
Baton Rouge, LA 70815

(225) 923-3376

I painted the box white, cut out some hearts and made my own "Emily Hut" logo for the box!

I didn't make a cake from scratch for Will. I know the cake my man loves the most.....

I made two 9" cakes. I filled one with more batter than the other. The smaller cake I used for cake paste. It's something I learned on a cake show recently! You'll see what it's for!

Then I made some fondant in a "crust" color, then lined my cake board with it.

Then I placed my larger 9" round cake on top of the fondant and covered it with butter cream.

Now time for the cake paste. I didn't want the crust of my pizza to be too flat on the sides. I wanted more of a rounded, crust look. Cake paste, a combination of cake and butter cream, allows you to sculpt on your cake. I applied it to the sides of the 9" cake to help make the crust. I then covered it all with butter cream and folded the fondant over to make the crust.

For the sauce, I used strawberry cake filling that I purchased from Party Time (delicious!). For the cheese, I used coconut. For pepperonis, I made red heart shapes out of fondant. I wanted it to be a Valentine's themed pizza!

Will and I had a fantastic Valentine's day weekend! Friday, we had a little getaway to New Orleans. We watched the King's Speech at the Theatres at Canal Place (they serve food while you watch the movie!). We hung out at the piano bar at Pat O'Briens on Bourbon. Stayed in a French Quarter hotel. We woke up and went to the Riverwalk mall and ate at Drago's for lunch. Then home we went to relax the rest of the weekend! Sunday night we were getting a little impatient with our Valentine's day gifts for each other. We wanted to wait till it was actually Valentine's day, but we gave in and exchanged gifts that night. I walked into the kitchen to find a big octopus balloon, a kitty cat card that was so "us,"  and a gift certificate to take a leisure class at the Louisiana Culinary Institute! What a WONDERFUL surprise it was! I have been looking at their classes often in hopes that they would offer a cake baking class like they did last year (but I didn't get to go to). There isn't a class like that available yet, but when it is I am signing up! Will did a wonderful job! Oh, and he also got me some tulips that came in before we went to New Orleans. You are too good to me, boy!

Our usual weekend conversation...
usually about food though!

Then it was my turn to give him his surprise! Not only did I give him the cake, but I also made him a  Valentine card and bought him a Steelers flag... though he is still too sad after the Superbowl loss to hang the flag anytime soon!

I told Will after this I was going to take a cake making break for a while... just so I can work more on other projects, like painting, etc. But then he reminded me that I am currently taking a fondant cake decorating class. :) So y'all may be seeing more cake after all!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Valentine's day!

My heart

♥ Emily

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Project of the Week: Cake Pops

So last week was my friend Kala's birthday. I thought I would make her something... but I wanted to do something besides a cake. I have seen Cake Pops all over the web lately. Although they seemed like a complete waste of time to me, I decided to give them a try. Kala LOVES tennis so I decided I should make tennis ball cake pops. As you can see, they don't look like tennis balls at all! When I dipped the balls in candy melts, the candy didn't dry smooth at all. So instead I decided to drizzle them with pink tinted royal icing and called it a day. So no, I will never attempt to make cake pops again. REAL cake is way better! :)

I needed something to place the pops in. I decided that I would decorate a clay pot for her with a tennis ball and her name. This way she could keep the pot after she was done with the pops!

I used acrylic paint

White layer first. I did about 5 coats.

Purple layer

Pink Layer

Start of tennis ball

Added dots

Added her name

Finished tennis ball

Added styrofoam to help hold up the pops

Decorative "grass"

I made peanut butter cake pops for Kala because she loves peanut butter! I got the recipe from Wilton's website. I certainly didn't like making them, but they did taste pretty good in the end. We have the leftovers in the freezer which make a tasty little snack. :)

Cut up the Reese's cups

The cake

Mix crumbled cake, Reese's and peanut butter in a bowl

Mix with hands

Measure out ball to get a constant size

Sticks and candy melts for Pops.
I happen to find candy melts in the exact color I wanted!

Making these were frustrating. Not only did the candy melt not cover the balls smoothly, but many of the balls crumbled after putting the stick in them. Made a mess!

Drying

Pink Royal icing

So it can out pretty cute, but I don't think I will be attempting them again!

I know, I know. I created something edible again! I will attempt to create something non perishable one of these days. I can't help it... cakes are fun! :)

♥ Emily

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