In Which We Have A Sleepover And Bake Cupcakes

Yesterday was my favorite day of the week. And I don't mean because Friday starts the weekend (for me, my weekends are whenever I get 2 days off from work, like last Tuesday & Wednesday). It was Bliss day!

A good, crazy, hectic time was held by all. I modeled some gumpaste and ate some cookies and was surrounded by the delicious smell of baked goods and buttercream. C'mon, what's not to love?!
Yesterday I worked on a spiral notebook cake with Meagan, another intern. We also iced cupcakes and made cookies and chocolate covered Oreos. Last week, we worked on the tractor trailer cake, and the week before that was the Post-It note retirement cake (check out Bliss' website for the pictures!)

Adam doesn't know how to use a flash!

Then I came home and planned an impromptu sleepover with my best friends and made cupcakes for a party tonight. The party is for our friend Vannida who is going to Stanford next year, so we're celebrating her awesome achievement! :) Cake mix was on sale at Publix! (Yes, I still use cake mix sometimes. So I'm not perfect and I might be occasionally lazy, but the cupcakes will still taste good.) And I picked up my paycheck. Ka-ching!

The cupcakes were chocolate with red & white buttercream-- swirled of course. And for some reason, it is still ridiculously difficult for me to put two different colored icings in the same pastry bag. But I'm working on.

And the gold stars at a nice touch, don't you think?

Icing Mustache!

Cassata

I have no idea what a Cassata torte is. Well, only kinda. It's some vanilla/rum/cannoli flavored cake of deliciousness, if the above picture and accompanying description are any indication. I found it while looking through Publix's Big Book of Cakes (or whatever it's called) trying to find the Caramel Pecan Crunch cake for a customer.

So I went home and Googled it. Apparently, it's Italian, and who doesn't love Italian food?! (Although the cannoli should've been a sign of the country of origin.) I also found a recipe. Not quite the same as the Publix version, but obviously they put their own spin on it. I'm not a fan of the almonds, but I do like the little cannolis on top. So I've definitely put Cassata cake on my to-do list. It looks pretty, it sounds unique, and I think it would be a fun recipe to try... ooooh, and how cool would it be in cupcake form?!

Ahh, the gears are turning. Time to turn on the oven! :)

Interdepartmental Trash Bag Stealing

Just one of the interesting tidbits I picked up from working at Publix. Hide your trash bags so no one steals them.

Obviously, that's not all I've learned from my first job. I am now a bread-slicing fiend, although a week ago, I was not. You might think it's easy if you've got an automatic bread slicer, but then you gotta put that sucker into a bag without all the pieces falling apart.

Oooh, and I decorated cupcakes! Aside from the occasional opportunity to write "Happy Birthday Kay" or "Happy Safe Driving" (for a customer's son who passed his driving test) on a cake, that's the only decorating this Decorator Apprentice (slash Bakery Clerk) has done.

So turns out I'm not doing much decorating. I sweep, I mop, I slice, I write, I take cake orders (definitely one of the more difficult aspects. Why do I always manage to screw something up?!), I run into table corners and cut my back on some sharp metal object while standing up too fast. Ouch.

But hopefully my apprenticing will continue throughout the summer, and hopefully I won't have to work 35 hours every week. I finally figured out why everyone says decorating is such a tough job. Unlike at a small bakery or cake studio, like Bliss, Publix has to take every single cake order a customer throws at them (unless they don't order a day in advance). And the decorators make them all the same day they get picked up, so on days when there are a lot of cakes, they gotta be there at 4 or 5 in the morning. Yikes!

That's one of the reasons I want to run my own place. I can hire someone else to do the dirty work (dishes, mopping, trash throwing-out), and make my own hours (if I want to stay up late the night before, instead of getting up early the next day, then gosh-darn-it, I will!), and decide who's cake I want to make, and who's cake I don't. No need to overbook!

But I suppose that everything I'm learning at Publix is helping me "find myself" a little more, and I really do like the job. Plus I can put some of that money I'm making aside (after I figure out this roth IRA business that my dad keeps talking about) for funding my own dream bakery. :)

P.S. I made a graduation cake last weekend, and I promised on Facebook that I would post pictures, so I haven't forgotten! Stay tuned!

Working Girl

Another exciting week has gone by. And what's more exciting to do on a Friday night than decorate a cake?

Go see Toy Story 3 probably, but I think cake decorating comes in a close second in the "fun and exciting" category.

I worked at Bliss today and yesterday and they were two of the busiest days ever. From coloring icing to decorating cupcakes to covering cakes in fondant (successfully! Yay! And with instruction from a very accomplished decorator) and modeling gumpaste, I think I did a little bit of everything.

I learned a lot this week too, like that Disco Dust is really pretty and Lace molds are a labor of love. I also learned that my feet really hurt at the end of the day but it's a small price to pay for getting to intern at my dream job.

Anyway, I've got orientation this weekend at Publix so I'll continue to stay busy. A month ago, I didn't have any jobs, but now I've got two! :) I'll try to post more interesting blog stuff in the future (Father's Day cake, anyone? How in the world am I supposed to top last year's cake?!) but I just wanted to give y'all a quick update so you know I haven't forgotten to write!

Simply Blissful

I am having quite an awesome summer.

First of all, my lack of blogging is due to a non-lack of everything else, such as brownies and jobs.

That's right, I'm off the job market. :) In the same week, I started my internship at Bliss, which is this really amazing bakery about half an hour from my house, and had a job interview at Publix. As far as Publix goes, I'm just waiting on the results of my background check & drug test before I can move forward with that.

But Bliss. Oh my gosh. I am having so much fun there! It's two days a week of cake & cupcake heaven. Everyone who works there (as well as the other interns) is so nice and so much fun to work with. I've done crumb coating and cupcake decorating (and baking) and cash registering and fondant creating. Well, I didn't actually make any fondant, I just colored some and make some cute little decorations.

I haven't covered a cake in fondant yet, although I did help. And I learned that Satin Ice is difficult to work with. I also did all the other fun intern stuff like washing dishes and sweeping and inventory-ing. ;) But it's still worth it.

So if you live in my area, you gotta stop by sometime and dry one of their delicious (and beautiful) creations!

And while I'm not working or hanging out with my friends or sleeping, I am still baking. Like those brownies. An imperfect, labor-intensive, yummy little dessert. The ganache was too soft but I couldn't freeze them because then the caramel was too hard. The turtle brownies were easier to cut when I froze them, and I just used a little heart-shaped cookie cutter to do it, and then put the melted caramel between the two little layers and doused them with semi-sweet chocolate.  :)