Butter Cakes vs Oil Cakes

Why does Penelope's Perfections use butter in all their cakes?  There are 2 reasons.  TASTE and STABILITY.

First of all, taste is a big deal to us here at Penelope's Perfections.  If a cake is made with butter, it's going to have a richer flavor than that of oils, shortenings, or margarine.  Butter has a way of making everything taste better.  It is also why we only use buttercream frosting to ice our cakes. 

Another reason we love to use butter in our cakes is because of how easy it is to work with when we are making wedding cakes.  Wedding cakes are layered, filled, and stacked which can create a significant amount of weight that a bottom tier of cake has to support.  Butter cakes have a compact texture and a small crumb which lends to being more stable for stacking other layers of cake on top.  A cake made with butter is firm when it is cold, just like butter.  Layering the cake is easy with butter because it doesn't fall apart when it is handled.

So what's the difference between butter, oil, shortening, and margarine in making cakes?  Growing up, we've all had store bought cake mixes that call for adding eggs and oil to make a cake.  Oil causes the cake to be tall, moist and light with a slightly coarse and open crumb.  Oil is lighter than butter and therefore the cake will have more height than a butter based cake.  Oil never solidifies when it is cold, so it will always leave an "oily" residue on the crumb that will be perceived as being "moist".  The taste of oil vs butter is going to fall short every time with butter being superior.  A butter cake will be shorter than an oil cake with a more compact crumb.  When margarine is used in making a cake, the results show that the cake is moist but not light, the crumb is coarse, and the cake is salty.  Shortening also makes a cake tall and light but the crumb is coarse, dry and crumbly.

Butter cakes not only provide great taste and stability, but they are moist as well.  The trick with butter cakes are that they have to be at room temperature before they can be served.  Unlike oil, butter has to be warmed to the right temperature.  If it is not at room temperature, the butter cake will give an appearance of being hard to cut, dense in texture, or even dry.  So be sure to let it sit out for 1-2 hours so it will be at just the right temperature to serve.












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Ideas for Decorating Valentine's Cookies

Love this technique with royal icing to decorate cookies!



 http://trending.sweetambs.com/videos/how-to-decorate-cookies-for-valentine-s-day






















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@Perfe1Penelopes  

Candied Hazelnuts

What can be better than a chocolate cake with rich chocolate buttercream filling and chocolate ganache icing?  Not much you say?  How about decorating the top of the cake with caramelized candied hazelnuts?  It is a work of art in itself!  It is as if the hazelnuts are defying gravity!  It isn't magic, but close to it!

If you attempt to make these delicious beauties, here are some helpful tips.

Things you will need:
8 long wooden skewers
8 hazelnuts, toasted and skin removed
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
cutting board
parchment paper

Toast the hazelnuts on a cookie sheet at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.  When they are slightly warm, place them in a towel and rub them together to remove the skin.  Once they are clean, put a wooden skewer into the side of each nut.

Next is the fun part, making caramel!  Cook sugar and water in a medium saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until sugar is dissolved.  Continue to cook, without stirring, until syrup comes to a boil, washing down the the sides of the pan with a wet pastry  brush to prevent crystals from forming.  (Crystallization is what happens when the sugar "crystallizes" on the side of the sauce pan.  The sugar needs to stay in the water suspension.  Using the water filled pastry brush to "wash" down the sugar crystals will save your caramel from being a grainy mess!).   Let the sugar mixture boil until the syrup turns light amber, about five minutes.  Remove from heat and let stand until slightly cooled, 4-6 minutes.

When the caramel is still warm, dip a skewered hazelnut into the syrup, coating completely and letting the excess syrup drip back into the pan.  When the dripping syrup becomes a thin string, secure the end of the skewer under a cutting board on the edge of a counter to drip onto a piece of parchment paper underneath.  Repeat with all hazelnuts.  Let them stand until the caramel has hardened, about five minutes.  Lastly, break the strings to about four inches.  Carefully remove skewers.

Tips:  Watch the caramel closely, it can crystallize quickly and or burn.  Sometimes adding a tablespoon of corn syrup will prevent crystallization.  Work quickly once your caramel is at a warm temperature!  It sets fast!  It can be reheated in the microwave for about 5-10 seconds if it gets to gooey.

Happy Caramelizing!!!












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Croquembouche....Oui! Oui!

Croquembouche

 

What a Centerpiece for any table!!  Croquembouche is not only a beautiful adornment for a Holiday gathering or a Wedding, but is amazingly delicious as well!  It can be a little intimidating at first to create on your own, but is well worth the effort for the incredible taste!


What is Croquembouche you ask?  It is a French Pastry used mostly in Weddings and is also known as Croque-en-bouche which means "crunch in the mouth".  The pastry puffs are known also as "choux" and are hollow and filled with vanilla cream or custard.  Typically they are held together by toffee or chocolate and then decorated with caramelized spun sugar. 

Tradition has it that the challenge in French Weddings was for these "pastry puffs" to be stacked as high as possible between the bride and groom and that they were to kiss each other without disturbing the tall cake tower.  If they achieved a kiss, the marriage was said to bring prosperity to them.  Imagine the disappointment if they brought the tower down! Traditionally, as well, the Croquembouche was to be hit by a sword, silver mallet or a champagne bottle as it was believed to be bad luck to use a knife.  In modern day, however, the bride and groom pose for a picture and the Croquembouche is then served to the guests.

Chocolate Croquembouche

Croqumbouche is not only served at Weddings but is great for any get together where a dessert or centerpiece is needed.  It is always a crowd pleaser and the center of attention!  Penelope's Perfections offers Croquembouche in miniature and regular size!

Traditional Croquembouche

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15 Hot Wedding Cake Trends

https://www.theknot.com/content/wedding-cake-trends


Penelope's Perfections Wedding Cakes / Newport Beach Wedding Cakes / Costa Mesa Wedding Cakes @Perfe1Penelopes

Halloween Cake and Cupcake Ideas

 It is almost HALLOWEEN again and is time to make some SCARY cakes and cupcakes!  Here are some of Penelope's Perfections favorite cakes, cupcakes and cake pop ideas.  They can be made easily with just about any cake recipe. 

 The ghost cake that Penelope's Perfections loves is a chocolate cake recipe with vanilla buttercream icing.  It is assembled with vanilla icing between the cake layers and is then iced with a #18 star piping tip vertically until the cake is covered on the sides.  Chill for 30 minutes.  Next, dark bittersweet chocolate ganache is poured on the top of the cake.  Be careful when pouring the ganache so it stays on top of the cake and does not run down the sides!  Chill again till ganache is firm.  Last, make the ghosts.  You can use a chocolate truffle that is smooth or a ball of vanilla fondant for the base of the ghost.  Roll out vanilla fondant somewhat thin and ruffle the edges with a ball tool.  Cover the truffle with the fondant and place the ghost on the cake!  The ghost eyes were piped with ganache.  The eyes can be buttercream or chocolate chips as well! 

These cute cake pop mummies are so easy and fun to make!  Any cake pop recipe will work.  Take the cake pop and dip it into melted white chocolate or white candy melts.  Let dry on cake pop stand or wax paper.  Next, using a small round piping tip, #2 , add some piped lines with the candy melts or white chocolate.  The eyes can be added with colored buttercream, piping gel, or ganache.


Here are a few more favorites for Halloween! 

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How to Add Gold to Buttercream Wedding Cakes

Art Deco Wedding Cake

As a Buttercream Wedding Cake baker, I get lots of requests to add gold and silver to make the wedding cakes shine!  Buttercream Wedding Cakes can be tricky, to say the least, when it comes to adding certain elements.  It does take some practice and patience to get the desired outcome...but besides, why should fondant cakes have all the fun?

Two main ways to achieve that sparkling and shimmering appearance of gold is to use luster dust and gold leaf.  Gold leaf is definitely the preferred choice because it is real, edible gold.  It comes in booklets on loose or transfer paper sheets.  The transfer paper is much easier to work with and can be applied easily to any tier of a buttercream cake.  The buttercream must have crusted and needs to be firm to the touch, so chill it well!  It is best to apply the gold leaf onto the cake tier before assembling the cake so that the base of the cake can be completely covered.  When applying the gold leaf, press lightly onto the icing and then remove the transfer paper.  Continue until the cake has been covered.  That easy!  Refrigerating the gold leafing on a buttercream cake really has no effect on the shine.  It will form condensation when removed from the refrigerator and back to room temperature, but it still looks great!

The other way to get a metallic gold or silver accent on a Wedding Cake is to use gold luster dusts.  There are approved edible metallic luster dusts that can be used.  Old Gold Luster Dust is a great choice.  It can be used dry or wet.  Use luster dust dry and brush it on fondant, white chocolate molds, etc.  If you want to color white sugar pearls gold,  use the luster dust plus vodka or lemon extract.  Simple!

Why not add sparkle to a Wedding Cake?








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