60th Birthday Cake: Day Of The Dead!

Inside this pristinely white and smooth covered cake is a very yummy dark chocolate cake with a hint of spicy cinnamon, filled with dark chocolate ganache and chocolate buttercream... oh, I wish I could see the inside again. It's like you're a little house builder, creating the structure first, filling it all in, making it sound. Then covering it with fancy tile or wallpaper. But underneath there's a nice little foundation. A delicious little foundation even, that took womanpower to create. That's one of the cool things about cakes!

For Trixie's mom's 60th birthday, they were celebrating at a Mexican restaurant, and also celebrating memories of their recent trip to Mexico together. So I made the Coco Cake version of a Day Of The Dead cake! Bright colours, lots of little flowers, rosettes and leaves, and a cute little skull. Not very scary,eh? I didn't want to scare myself...

Happy 60th Birthday Trixie's mom!!!

To The Batmobile!

This was a total blast to make, and a real family affair. Chris turns 30-- so for this special event, his sweet mother, who lives in New Zealand, emailed me to request some very chocolatey cupcakes for her son, who is a Batman aficianado! I met Chris's wife too, who it turns out, has a baby due in August! So my heart melted for this cute and cool family who sought out Coco Cake Cupcakes to make some super special cupcakes for an obviously special guy.

I enlisted a very special guy myself to help me with this project: my husband Rich! Rich was in charge of creating and remolding a Batman logo shape out of one of my large collection of cookie cutters, which I believe he made on his lunch break while watching the Rockford Files. Thank you honey!!

Bright colours and a retro cartoon throwback was my theme for this Batman project; the Batman logos and blue and yellow lettered cupcakes are made from fondant; I also cut out and made flags from an old Batman logo. The cupcakes themselves were Callebaut chocolate ganache FILLED chocolate cupcakes, with chocolate buttercream. YUM!

Happy 30th Birthday Chris!

Little Minis For Little Children

My other work, Arts Umbrella, hired me to make mini cupcakes for our year-end art show for all the children's work at the Buschlen Mowatt Gallery here in Vancouver. I forgot my silly little camera when going to the gallery but I am hoping my friend Tara will send me a few pics so I can post them. Here are the mini cupcakes though! Chocolate and vanilla, with colorful buttercreams and sprinkles for the kids!

Adorable June Wedding

For a beautiful June wedding at the Rowing Club in Vancouver's Stanley Park, I made 140 cupcakes and 70 mini cupcakes, to make a lovely assortment of pretty little cakes! Vanilla cupcakes with subtly flavoured matcha green tea buttercream; dark chocolate cupcakes with lavender colored vanilla buttercream, and perfect little Lemon Love confections with an ice-cream-swirl of lemon creamcheese frosting and fresh lemon zest!

Upon delivery, the sun had just crept up from behind grey clouds and it was looking like it would be a perfectly gorgeous day for a wedding. Hooray! It was also Father's Day, and I made my super-awesome dad (known as Gerry Sung, the guy in the Hawaiian shirt), some homemade almond butter, toasted coconut and dried cherry granola. I was going to make cherry chocolate chip cookies half-dipped in chocolate, but then I decided granola might be the healthier choice... sorry dad!!!! :)

PS, so what do you think of my trusty little Sony Cybershot from days gone by? It will have to do while I wait upon my crazy exciting new lens for my digital SLR! It's a cute camera which I call "Little Silver." Keep up that tiny little work, Little Silver...

I'm Baaaaack!

No, it isn't Chucky from Child's Play. It's me, your old pal Lyndsay, of Coco Cake Cupcakes!!! I am sorry I haven't posted for a while... I just returned from a super fun trip!! My hubby and I went to Berlin and Amsterdam, visiting some beautiful friends and family, and eating as much crazy food as possible. I had lots of ice cream, which you will find featured on my food blog in the coming days... but not ONE cupcake!! There's definitely room for more cupcakes in Berlin or Amsterdam!! I missed you all, my camera is still busted but I have my trusty little Sony Cybershot, so there will still be photos. I am going to pick up a new lens early next week I hope, so Coco Cake blog will be back in action.

Hope you are all well!!

xo

Golf 'N Stuff

When I was a kid I was OBSESSED with the movie The Karate Kid. Loved it, loved it. My dad dubbed it for me on VHS and I remember watching it over and over... I knew every line. Yep!! When I graduated from grade 7, my treat was going to see The Karate Kid Part II at Oakridge Mall with my mom and grandpa. You know when Daniel and Mr.Miyagi go to Okinawa? That's the one. And Daniel meets a hot Japanese lady and falls in love, but must battle her suitor to the death! I bought the collector's magazine from the movie. I guess I had a little crush on old Ralph Macchio, heh heh. In the first Karate Kid movie, "Golf N Stuff" is the teen amusement center that Daniel and Ali go to on their magical date... I really thought high school was going to be like that. Lester's Family Fun Center on Kingsway in Burnaby, B.C. didn't quite cut it.

ANYHOO... I made 150 golf themed cupcakes, each in their own cute little cupcake box, for a charity golf tournament that my very hardworking mom organized through her golf club! So far they have raised over $11,000 for a local neighborhood house here in Vancouver. Pretty cool. My sis Leanne made the cute tags. These crazy cupcakes drove me to the brink of insanity but of course it was well worth it because they turned out really cute! I even cut out and glued each little flag out of Origami paper, (though Rich helped me with a few!) while watching a rather sad movie: I've Loved You So Long. Man, Kristin Scott Thomas is a wonderful actress.

A terrible thing happened while I was trying to document the "making of" 150 golf themed cupcakes. My camera strap got stuck to a chair while I went to grab it, and the camera tumbled out of my hands onto our hardwood floor. So, I really really hope my camera can be fixed!!!

Red & Blue Party Flags!

These are cute--! And, because I taste-test all of my Coco Cake output (heh heh) I can also say they turned out rather deliciously!!! I think this may have to do with a little special accoutrement called Belgian chocolate sprinkles, also known as "Chocolate Vermicelli." These are so pretty and so much more delicious than the typical waxy Supermarket chocolate sprinkles-- these are made completely from dark chocolate, and they really do melt in your mouth.

One of my mom's oldest friends, Auntie Deni, ordered 4 dozen cupcakes for her son's graduation from SFU. SFU's colour themes are red and blue, so I made 24 party flags in these colours and plunked them in their puffy, swirled vanilla buttercream tops. The chocolate cupcakes were also baked in an assortment of red and blue liners for extra cuteness and colour combinationability. New word by Coco Cake!

xo