A Birthday Pie?!

Birthdays are always a special occasion and for my family, its celebrated with a specially done homemade cake that lends a personal touch to the occasion! It used to be my mum's responsibility to make the cake but she's now passed things on to me so I'm in-charge of carrying on the tradition! A month before a birthday, the birthday person is asked nicely/interrogated/grilled by me until he/she comes up with a favourite flavour and any other special requests.

August is when my sister gets a year older and this time she wanted something else entirely - a birthday pie! I had no idea if a birthday was celebrated anywhere else in the world with a pie but she was adamant about it and so a pie it was going to be!

She specifically wanted a peach pie complete with a lattice top and I have to say I was dreading to start working on it. I've never really had much success in working with sweet pie dough; it's always too crumbly and cracks when I'm rolling it out. I can never seem to achieve that "drape rolled dough over rolling pin and unfurl it over the pie dish" thing that you always see on the telly.

This time was no different unfortunately. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong...maybe the butter isn't cold enough, maybe I'm over working the dough, maybe I'm adding too much water, maybe, maybe, maybe...sigh.

Somehow, the pie bottom was rolled out and placed into the dish and the lattice was carefully arranged over the top of the pie. I couldn't manage to do the traditional lattice design as the dough was just too soft to weave. It wasn't a very neat looking lattice in short...

My mum also had plans for a small cake that she was waiting for the opportune moment to try and it would be perfect for the occasion - The Handbag Cake!

I was skeptical at first as to how the overall look would be like but I must say I was extremely impressed! Intricate and precise piping work all over meant that alot of effort and planning went into the cake although it look particularly complicated. Shows that my mum still has it in her!

I was extremely glad everything turned out well in the end and my sister was happy she got what she wanted! Happy birthday Sis!

Probably should have taken that picture with the candle lighted though...

After taking on the "Thousand Roses" and Ruffle cakes, I yearned for another cake to challenge me both technically and mentally. That's not to say the other cakes I've attempted were walks in the park, but both of those cakes - specifically - took lots of time, energy, patience and certainly lots of effort to complete. 

And truth be told, it made me feel good when I feasted my eyes upon the completed works. It made me feel alive..as ridiculous as that sounds!

So when my Mum showed me a YouTube video of the Ombre Cake being done, I knew that one day, I will just have to undertake the challenge! After months of putting it off, I realised it was now or never and just went for it!

My friend had requested for a small cake of any flavour and decoration and I decided that this was the opportune moment to make the Ombre. At least it wouldn't go to waste sitting in my fridge! I watched the video a couple more times, took a deep breath and finally got down to doing it.

I had prepared a double recipe quantity of the Swiss Meringue Buttercream before hand and decided to split the whole thing into three equal batches and tint them in graduating shades of red like in the video. Well two of those portions were tinted, while one remained its original shade of pale ivory. After looking at pictures of the Ombre cake, I realised that graduating shade of colour for the dots of cream were best, instead of using a combination of totally different colours.

The cake itself was a regular strawberry sponge that was a deep shade of pink (friend was nice enough to send me a picture heh!). This was sliced into three rounds and filled with strawberry jam and softly whipped cream. After a light crumb coat and 15 minutes in the fridge, the cake was ready for the Ombre makeover!

One by one, the dots of the three colours went on, got smudged on one side to create the "tail" and the process was repeated. Four long hours later, it was finally done! Thankfully, it went without any hitches or hiccups and the cream held up well in the afternoon heat that was baking the house. It wasn't perfect but nonetheless, I was over the moon!

Definitely my best creation to date!