Summer remnants

With apologies to all those who have been waiting a looooong time to see their cakes here, I am attempting to get some of this summer's neglected items posted.

First - an anniversary cake to celebrate a very special milestone

Two layers of vanilla cake, filled with chocolate ganache, covered in chocolate buttercream to celebrate 50 years together.

Next, a birthday cake in the stripes and dots motif.

Two layers of chocolate chip cake, filled with chocolate fudge,

then covered in vanilla buttercream and fondant dots and stripes in brown and shades of blue - very striking for a 40th birthday.

And a cake for a birthday girl who loves arts and crafts.

Toppers included tools of the trade, such as gumpaste scissors,

an artist's palette with a brush and watercolor paints, plus a bottle of white glue, also gumpaste.

The sides of the cake, including the number 11, were covered in paint splatters, evidence of lots of creativity and hard work. Happy birthday, Shoshana!

Hope you are having a sweet week!

Dvora

Nitzan's Bat Mitzvah, Shabbat Edition

Returning to where we were several months ago, here is the second half of Nitzan's bat mitzvah - Shabbat. In addition to cookie platters and lemon macarons for dessert for the Shabbat meals, we provided the family and guests with lemon and chocolate mousse cups,

Chocolate cream filled chocolate cupcakes, topped with fondant basketball toppers,

vanilla cream filled vanilla cupcakes topped with buttercream rosettes,

and chocolate cake pops, drizzled with orange tinted white chocolate, to fit the floral/basketball theme.

It was a beautiful Shabbat, filled with family and friends, and wonderful memories for Nitzan and the whole family. We were privileged to be a small part of it! Mazal tov!

Dvora

Happy New Year!

It has been a while. Blogging has not afforded me the outlet it once did. But I am taking the blog back. And maybe, just maybe, I will post more often. But no promises. I very much want to avoid the pitfall that so many people fall into online, whether on social network sites, email groups, or blogs: Never forget that you can not control who does or does not read your work. Too many people seem to forget that their outlet is someone else's light reading.



So let's keep it light!



Yom tov here was great, despite the three day nature of the chag. We were fortunate enough to be invited out for the first four !!! meals. They were all really enjoyable, wonderful company, great food, a terrific way to start the year. Many thanks to our generous and thoughtful hosts. We hosted company for the last two meals (can't count seuda shlishit, because we were too full for anything more than a little challah and salad), and it was also great - we are so fortunate to have found such good friends here and to be able to spend chag with them. Davening was also very moving and meaningful for me, so it was a very good yom tov.

Baking wise, we had a LOT of orders for this Rosh Hashana, so many in fact, that I had no time to take pictures of any of the trays. I try to incorporate some of the simanim in the flavors, so the menu included honey sugar cookies, apple crumble bars, apple blondies, carrot cake sandwiches, and chocolate sandwich cookies filled with a pomegranate-raspberry-chocolate ganache. Not that anyone is going to say the "yehi ratzons" over the cookies, but the thought is there. Larger trays, 36 and 48 piece sizes, also had chewy chocolate chip cookies, because who doesn't like chocolate chip?! Every tray was topped with a decorated apple shaped sugar cookie, with "Shana Tova" written on it. Overall, very festive and fun, and well-received. We also did a bunch of custom sugar cookies, in various holiday designs. The actual cookies for RH were even cuter than the ones below, but for a small idea of what went out, here is a photo of samples from a couple of weeks before the chag.

May we be inscribed for a happy, healthy New Year!

Dvora

Nitzan's Bat Mitzvah, Part I

Sometimes you are lucky enough to have good neighbors. Sometimes you are even luckier, when those neighbors turn out to be good friends. We have been fortunate in that respect in every home we have lived in. And when you have a chance to show your appreciation for that good fortune, even better.

Our neighbor Nitzan recently celebrated her bat mitzvah. I had the privilege of preparing dessert for her Shabbat celebration, as well as the centerpieces for her party. The theme of the celebration? Uniquely perfect for Nitzan: flowers and basketballs.

Here is the story of the centerpieces:

In the construction phase - preparing all of the cookies on sticks, before adding detail. Hand detailed centers were added to the blue flowers and to purple ones as well, a perfect match for the paper goods.

Then we added detail to make it all perfect - the basketball cookies said Nitzan's name.
Tulip cookies on a stick rounded out the flowers.
Finally, we started to assemble the cookie bouquet centerpieces.

Nitzan's family finished assembly at the hall, adding the mylar shreds, and the cookie bouquet centerpieces were complete.

Next time, an array of Shabbat desserts. Mazal tov to Nitzan!

Dvora

Very Personal

One thing that is a lot of fun about catering jobs over Shabbat cookie platters is the opportunity to personalize. Color schemes are a common request - matching the desserts to the linens and/or paper goods and centerpieces. For Yoni and Meira's Sheva Brachot, the colors were purple and light green. Half of the cupcakes, chocolate or vanilla cake filled with chocolate cream and topped with rich chocolate buttercream, received flowers as their decorations. But to get even a bit more personal, for the other half of the cupcakes, filled with vanilla cream and topped with vanilla buttercream, we took decoration to the next level, with medallions with messages and designs to reflect the occasion. Hearts, large and small, and "Mazal Tov" and the names of the Chattan and Kallah adorned the cupcakes.
Mazal tov!! Wishing Meira and Yoni a lifetime of happiness.

Dvora

Dog days are on their way

It's getting hot. I mean really hot. Life is heating up, too. Shana graduated from high school! Then, three weeks later, she finished all her tests and actually completed high school. Hmm... Ayelet celebrated her fifteenth birthday, and later went to the wedding of one of her teachers - Dani and Shana had both enjoyed that experience in the States, but when they were much younger. Ayelet and her friends were old enough to be a real part of the celebration, dancing up a storm and singing with the kallah before the badeken. Dani finished the school year, and is now attending gemara "camp" until the end of the month. He is still in the throes of bar mitzvah partying, with many events still to come. And poor, poor Lola. She still has school for another day, and boy is she peeved about it. But come 11:45 tomorrow, she too will be done with the school year, and my nerves will be totally fried. And I am getting old. I will hit the big 4-0 shortly, but I am oddly okay with that. My life is in a good place, my family is in a good place; really no legitimate gripes. What I am not okay with? My eyes getting old, my hair getting old, my joints getting old. I am hoping for some real psychic rejuvenation this summer, and some time outside the kitchen, though not too much. But be careful what you wish for...

To celebrate Ayelet's birthday, Shana, who is becoming severely underpaid as my unpaid intern/indentured servant, was allowed to go crazy on cake decorating. The canvas? Vanilla cake with chocolate fudge filling and iced smooth in white vanilla buttercream.

And then Shana went to town with flowers in teal and mint, accented with yellow.

She used large sunflower/daisy cutters, and small blossoms.
She even did the funky style lettering on her own. We may have to open a branch in the big city next year, when she is living away from home!

Happy Birthday Ayelet - hope this year is as sweet as can be! And since the summer has begun, let's hope we can all keep our cool...

Imma (Dvora)

Sugar Cookies Make Everything More Fun

It's true; they really do. Proof?

For starters, this Rosh Chodesh treat platter is more fun with a Chodesh Tov message, on a sefer Torah in honor of the month of Sivan.
This anniversary platter is a celebration in sugar - decorated sugar cookies tell beloved parents how much their children care. The cookies underneath will get eaten, but I have a feeling (past experience) that the sugar cookies will be cherished for a long time to come.
All of these cookies were in the shape of a sefer Torah, to celebrate a chanukat habayit and hachnasat sefer Torah at a new shul in a nearby city. The linzer cookies, thin mint sandwiches, lemon curd sandwiches, and sugar cookie ganache sandwiches are all enhanced by the Torah shape, while the closed scroll sugar cookies feature a metallic gold keter Torah - a little bling for a good cause.

Dvora