"One Direction"

A cake ordered by my friend, Sarah for her daughter's 11th birthday celebration. Sarah's only daughter, Alysha, is the biggest fan of One Direction. Hence, the 1D theme cake requested by her. Its actually a fairly simple cake to execute. I designed the cake with these theme colours of red, black, white and silver. I made a two tier cake, with the first tier made to look like a platform for the upper tier. I had chosen a few 1D images and had them printed into a film strip and placed this strip around the upper tier cake.

 

The main item I had on the cake was an edible cut out of the One Direction boys popping out of the top tier cake. I also added a few stars as an added decoration on the cake. The cake is all vanilla bean flavoured with vanilla buttercream and coated with white chocolate. Happy Belated Birthday, Alysha!



The One D boys popping out of the cake



The many images of One D, which I have arranged into a film reel 





The overall view of the 1D cake
 

This was my last cake before I took a hiatus from baking and making cakes. Am currently on a month break and hope to return to my cakes in March 2014. I had to undergo a minor carpal tunnel release surgery for my right hand two weeks ago and am currently resting my hand. I hope the surgery will solve all the numbness that I have been expereiencing in the last few months. Wish me a speedy recovery ya!!

I look forward to a great 2014 and I hope this year will be kind to me :)

Take care peeps!!

xoxo
Elinna
Pink Ellies

"English Roses"

This cake order came as a surprise to me as out of the blue, my friend from Jakarta, Azah sent me a BBM text to request an engagement cake for her sister. Azah rarely sent texts to anybody, so it was quite shocking to get a message from her.

 

She wanted an English themed cake and actually sent me a photo of how the cake should look like. Her sister wanted me to copy the cake exactly like the photo. Truthfully, am not too keen in copying another person's work. I actually look at other cake photos to get some ideas on how my cake should be. Since this was a request made by my customer, I had no choice but to follow the sample cake photo. Which I did, but only up to certain details. The rest I added my own touch to it and I was actually quite happy with how the cake turned out.

 

The cake had so many roses on it that I was worried how the cake would turned out. Its not a very big cake, mind you. Its about 7" in diameter and 3" in height but the cake had 2 big sized roses, 6 medium sixed roses, 5 small sized roses, 10 hydrageas and 10 blossoms! That's quite a sum for such a small cake. On top of the flowers, Azah wanted the sides all around the cake to be decorated with lace patterns made with a mix of fondant and royal icing.



The whole view of the engagement cake

The sides of the cake made to look like lace

 

A close-up at the flower arrangement on the cake



Another view of my cake

I am so glad to hear that your sister loves the cake, Azah! Congratulations to her on her recent engagement and it was great meeting up with you that day. It has been a long time since we've caught up!!



It was a sweet and short catch-up!!

 

 

 

"A Cake for Tok Andak"

I haven't been making cakes for a while now.  My last cake before this one was the owl birthday cake I did for my niece, Iman. January was a very hectic month for me as my kids start their new school year and I am still without help!

 

As far as I can say, am so glad that January is over and February is here. The kids are finally settled in their new school year routine and my life will be back to normal when my maid eventually comes back on the 10th of February.

I actually did squeeze in 2 cakes in January. The first cake I made was on the last weekend of January at the request of  my dad. He wanted me to make a simple cake for his uncle, Andak (Tan Sri Rozhan bin Kuntom) or known to us as Tok Andak for his birthday celebration to be held on the next Sunday, the 26th of January 2014. Tok Andak is very sickly now and his son (my dad's cousin) wanted to commemorate his birthday with having all of his father's close relatives over for a birthday lunch. As a token for the occassion, my dad thought a cake would be a nice gesture. Something personal from him and our family.

 

So, with very short notice and no game plan, I whipped up this very simple cake. I made a lemon cake with vanilla buttercream. When my dad asked me how much did he owe me for the cake, I was horrified!! Of course, the cake was free!! A small contribution from Pink Ellies!!!

 

The simple cake made to look like a gift box

The tag on the cake

Another view of the cake

I was quite happy with the cake despite starting to bake the cake at 5 pm on Saturday, I still managed to finish the cake by 11 am the next morning in time for delivery to my parents' home.

 

 

"Going into 2014 - Final Curtain for 2013"

Happy New Year 2014 to all my blog readers!!

It has been a very busy start to year 2014 and yes, am still MAIDLESS!! My maid is currently on a 3 months leave and she has gone back to Indonesia. So, despite my promise to her that I would not overtire myself by making cakes on my own, I actually managed to complete 5 orders since she left in early November 2013. So, am feeling quite proud of my achievement that I actually managed to fit a full time office job, housework, my family and my cakes in the last 2 months or so. I still have another month to go before my life is back to being completely normal!!

 

The end of 2013 also marked my last year in the 3 series. I turned 39 on 27th December and I had a good time catching up with my cousin, Amy on my birthday. Plus my hubby also treated me to a wonderful Japanese dinner and my besties came to my house to surprise me with a mini birthday celebration on New Year's Day. All in all, I had a great ending to my 30's and even though I don't look forward to the big 40, I hope to remain young always at heart.

 

The beginning of 2014 also marks new beginnings for my kids. My eldest is now in secondary and my youngest is now in upper primary. I am getting OLD!! I do feel my age everytime I'm done with housework. The ache and pains are more pronounced now than it was 5 years ago!!! Hahaha...

Back to my cakes, I had two last orders at the end of December. The first one, which I haved named, "By the Beach", is ordered by my college mate, Patricia or as we fondly call her Pat, for her son, Rohan's 2nd birthday celebration. She ordered a Rob the Robot theme cake, refer to my blog entry Last Order for December 2012, last year for Rohan's 1st birthday. For 2013, the theme of the cake was a beach holiday theme with the cake having a sand castle and surrounded by all beach/sea themed items. I actually made the sand castle out of cake and had the whole palm tree beach effect on the cake. I also added elements such as fishes all around the cake to show the underwater effect. I had handpainted each of the underwater element with edible colouring. That was the best part in making the cake! I forgot how much I used to love painting.

Overall view of the cake complete with the beach sand and a palm tree too!!



The sand castle and beach stuff

The fishes and turtle

The blue fish

The cake is a dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate ganche frosting. Happy Belated 2nd Birthday, Rohan!! Thanks again for the order and support, Patricia!!

My second cake order was from my cousin, Liza or fondly called Liz  for her daughter, Iman's 11th birthday. I call this cake, "Hoo Hoo Says The Owl". Its an owl cake but not a real owl! I copied the owl from the photo of Iman's stuffed owl toy sent to me by her mom!

This cake was quite fun to make and I loved the overall effect of the cake. Liz left everything to me and I added my own elements into the owl cake. I even textured the body of the owl to have the hair or fur effect on the cake. I started the cake by baking a basic 9" square cake, which I then shaped into the owl based on the photo sent to me.

The cake is again chocolate with dark chocolate ganache, a popular flavour with the kids.

Iman's stuffed toy owl made into a sugar treat!

Aerial view of the cake with the starry night background

Its just plain adorable

The side view with the owl perching on a tree branch with leaves and flowers!!

Thanks again for the order Liz!! Happy Belated Birthday, Iman!! We're both Capricorns!! Hurray to us as our birthdays are at the end of the year when everyone is going to turn older by celebrating their next birthday already but we've just only celebrated our birthdays!!

Happy New Year 2014 again and may this year be kinder to us Tigers and not to mention bring more prosperity to Pink Ellies Novelty Cakes too!! May I also be more creative in the coming year and produce more beautiful cakes!!!

Thanks for reading my blog in 2013 and I hope you will continue doing so in the years to come :)

xoxo
Elinna Bahrin
Pink Ellies Novelty Cakes

"Colour Me Pink"

An order by my Auntie Lina's friend, Pn Alya for her daughter, Hani's 13th birthday celebration. The request was a simple square 12' x 12' chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream decorated with pink flowers, and 68 red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and topped with fondant lettering decoration. The letterings made words that are Hani's favourite things, i.e. Minecraft, One Direction, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, skating, guitar and so on.

 

Even though it sounded simple enough, making this order was a pretty tall one for me. For one thing, I had no assistant and the other thing was the order was due on a week day. I work full time on a week day. That leaves me only the evenings to make and complete this cake before collection. I actually slept at 3 am on Thursday night and the cake collection was set at 11 am on Friday. One thing I learn while making this order was never bite more than you can chew!!! I was so overwhelmed that I felt like drowning trying to meet the deadline. Fortunately for me, I managed to finish the cake and was quite happy with the results.

 

The problem with this order was the red velvet cupcakes. The first batch didn't turn out to my standards, so I decided to do a second batch. So, that took time especially when I'm a one woman show for the time being. I still want to attain a certain level of perfection for my cakes. I don't want to use the excuse of no help as the reason why my cake standards have gone down. With this cake, I hope I've managed to achieve the correct standards for my client.

Thank goodness the chocolate cake turned out well and was ready to be frosted. I also wanted the cupcakes to be unique as the design was just letterings. Therefore, I used different letterings and colours to make it look more fun and hip.

Although it was tiring, I actually enjoyed looking at the pink flowers on the cake as I assembled the cake. As for the cupcakes, Hannah gave me a hand and I was glad the time spent with her. So, it all balanced out in the end. I only have another order to go for the year and I will stop making cakes for a while until my maid comes back early February. Its rest time for me!

 

This is the aerial view of the cake

The pink flowers are so sweet

I used 3 different shades of pink to have more effect on the cake

The cupcakes - Minecraft, One Direction & YouTube

YouTube (cont), Instagram & Facebook

Thanks Auntie Lina for recommending me to your friend. I hoped she and her family enjoyed the cake.

"The Librarian"

I made this cake at the request of my cousin, Anis, who wanted to surprise her mom. Her mom is fondly known to us as Auntie Yan and she is one of my mom's closest sister. I love her just like my mom! So, despite the fact that I'm maidless and have tons of housework to do, I still made time to bake and make this cake for my aunt. It was an honour to have been given this responsibility.

 

My aunt wrote a boigraphy of my late my grandfather, Dato' Ahmad bin Mohd Yunus, for our family. She wanted to have a book launch commemorating this occassion. She had the biography printed and distributed to all her siblings and she wanted the whole family to be at the event. Anis thought that it was a great idea to have a surprise birthday cake for her as her birthday was the very next day.

 

My late grandfather's biography. Kudos to my Auntie Yan for a job well done!

The theme of the cake is simple, She wanted to have books as my Auntie Yan was a librarian and spent most of her working life surrounded by books. I thought the idea was brilliant and set out to design the cake. I had envisioned in my mind to have the boigraphy as one of the books. Unfortunately, Anis couldn't get me a good image of the book cover. So, instead I opted for their family photo and made the book look like an album.

 

The cake was a 2 tiered stacked cakes depicting two books and I made the bottom tier an orange cake and the top tier a chocolate cake. This cake was an interesting cake to make and I'm amazed that I managed to finish the cake on time and without help too! Well, except for the cleaning up part. Hannah did a good job helping me tidy up the kitchen.

 

The whole view of the cake

The top book/album with the Hazers' family photo

View of the book pages

Side view showing of the books

The biography cover in a frame depicting her achievement

My aunt was really surprised when they took the cake out!! Good job to Anis for this wonderful surprise for her mom! To my Auntie Yan, Happy 61st Birthday and I hope you will have many, many more years filled with love, happiness, prosperity and of course, good health!!

 

Love,

Elin

 

 

"Lilac"

This is my first cake entry after a month hiatus. Truthfully, I haven't been feeling well and have been having severe pain at my neck & shoulder area. Due to this, I was advised by my orthopedic specialist to undergo at least 12 weeks of physiotherapy. So, I have been going for these physio sessions for the last 1 1/2 months since October. I was also advised by my physiotherapist to take it easy and put a brake on making cakes for at least 4 weeks. Hence, the silence!!

 

Since I've been feeling a bit better, I decided to make a "hantaran" cake for my good friend, Elona (from my Jakarta days), whose brother got hitched last Saturday, 30th November 2013. Elona is such an easy client as she didn't make any demands for the cake. Her only two requests were to have a lace themed cake and the theme colour must be lilac and cream. The rest are all in my hands.

 

Oh ya, did I also mention that my maid has left for holidays for 3 months since November 9th. So, I have been maidless for the last month, therefore, no cake orders until my kids are on holidays. My maid is actually my assistant when I am making my cakes. So, with her gone, I'm a one woman show. That's also one of the reasons why I am not really taking orders for the months of November to January 2014.

 

However, Elona's case is different as I have promised her since last September that I would make her the cake and a promise is a promise! I would not renege on it. Suprisingly, the process was quite smooth sailing and I managed to complete my cake within the time limit and Elo's mom was very happy with the cake. I made a vanilla bean cake with a vanilla bean white chocolate ganche. I was actually quite happy with how the cake turned out.

 

Lilac lace cake with its embellishments

The top centre of the cake. I added a few pearls and crystal beads

The side of the cake

Aerial view of the cake

Thanks again for the order Elo and thank you for putting your trust on my creativity!! Congratulations to your brother and may they have a wonderful life together!!

I already have a few orders lined-up for December. Wish me luck peeps and I do hope I am able to cope and produce good cakes for my clients!!

Have a great weekend!!!

xoxo
Elinna Bahrin