THE ULTIMATE COURSE IN CAKE DECORATING

Me and Chef Heny Sison

Labor of Love!!!

Stringwork/Overpiping Technique

I had a fun and challenging week as I took the Lambeth course at the Heny Sison Culinary School. For those who are not familiar with this technique, the Lambeth style is the ultimate course in cake decorating. As Chef Heny puts it, the Lambeth technique is considered the PhD of the cake decorating world. It covers intricate overpiping borders on royal icing and bevel layers of fondant covered cakes. The cake I made during class was labor-intensive since I had to make hundreds of tiny flowers made up of royal icing. It was a very loooooooooong week but worth it.

BUTTERFLIES & SWIRLS WEDDING CAKE

I made this 4-tier wedding cake for a pictorial web shoot. Thank God, these cakes were all dummies (styro) and the assembly of this cake was such a breeze. I was inspired to use apple green and brown hues and applied butterfly and swirl cut-outs.

I'M FINALLY HOME

It's really good to be back home! After 22 hours of airport stop-overs and back to back flights, I'm very happy to be with my family and friends in the Philippines. I took a week off to manage my jet lag and treated myself to spa and salon services. Now, I feel rejuvenated, I'm back to baking and spending a lot of time in the kitchen.

The very first project I did was a STRIPE & DOT Peony wedding cake. I love the hot orange and pink colors and I used these as my color palette. It's a very simple 2-tier wedding cake, with the ivory white fondant as the base and I just sculpted a big peony flower to accent the whole cake.

BAKING WITH THE MASTER

I can't begin to tell you how excited I am in meeting Chef Nick Malgieri. Chef Nick is one of America's best pastry chefs and he is the author of several notable baking books including The Modern Baker, Chocolate andPerfect Cake, How to Bake, among others. He is also the Director of the Pastry Program at The Institute of Culinary Education.

Overall, I was very impressed and pleased with Chef Nick's techniques. His method of instruction was very organized and hands-on. Each group was tasked to prepare the 5 chocolates cakes and he guided us throughout the recipes.

On the menu:

Chocolate Raspberry Cake

Chocolate Bourbon Cake

Hazelnut Cake

Individual Almond Chocolate Cake

Perfect Chocolate Roll

LOU'S BABY SHOWER

It was a fun-filled day as we got to see and celebrate with our friends, Lou & Tong the forthcoming arrival of Sebastian. Friends and family gathered in Livingston, NJ to spring the surprise for the unsuspecting mom to be. As Lou said, "this was not on my schedule!"

We were informed of the shower early this week and of course, I wanted to make something special for her. I made her a simple baby blue cake with a stroller cut out on top. I just added some floral accents at the side of the cake to make it more elegant & dainty.

SUGAR FLOWERS

I was introduced to the world of Cake Decorating 10 years ago and didn't care much about it. For me, it was one of those pastry courses that I should take and learn. Living here in New York and seeing beautiful places of inspiration like Central Park, Botanical Garden, etc. - I learned to appreciate the beauty of nature and I thought to myself that I can turn these flowers into works of art using sugar as my medium. So, here I am with a renewed sense of passion and appreciation for creating sugar art.

THE CANDY CLASS WITH NICOLE KAPLAN

Recently, I took a class with the renowned Pastry Chef Nicole Kaplan at the Institute of Culinary Education. She was named one of the Ten Best Pastry Chefs in America, and trained with best talents such as Pierre Herme, Alain Ducasse, Patrice Caillot and Frederic Bau. She was also the acclaimed pastry chef of Eleven Madison Park, Del Posto and the Plaza Hotel.

On the menu:

* Vanilla Shortbread
* Lemon Cream Cookie
* Cheesecake Brownies
* Triple Death by Chocolate
* Caramel Popcorn
* Chocolate "Oreo"
* Linzer Cookies
* Peanut Butter Cookie
* Buttercrunch aka Almond Roca
* Almond Chocolate Chip Biscotti
* Dark Chocolate Fudge