Wednesday, April 13, 2011

MUPPETIZE WITH LAUREN KITCHENS


Last week, I had the pleasure of attending a 1-day Muppets class with the amazing and uber talented cake artist Lauren Kitchens of Fancy Cakes by Lauren. Lauren and her assistant Ashleigh travelled all the way from Dallas to Nicholas Lodge's cake studio in Norcross, Georgia. I too travelled from New York and I must say that every mile was worth the trip.


Lauren is one of the most fabulous, fun, generous and down to earth person I've met. To those who don't know her, she is a Food Network Gold Medalist and known for muppetizing the judges at the Sesame Street Cake Challenge. I've watched that episode so many times and it never fails to amuse me. She guided us through the construction of the internal structure of the muppets, gave us tips on handling the temperemental modeling chocolate and shared techniques on how to form the body parts. They made all the students - professional decorators or not- feel comfortable with what they are working with.


Here is the wonderful line-up of the muppets cake designs. Each one has its own personal touch as you could see the different facial features, expressions and accesories attached to the muppet. My cake stands on the far left and the photo below. It was such a wonderful experience to be in a room with people who have the same passion as I do. One minute everyone is chatting and the next minute, there is complete silence as we are all focusing on putting the details and the finishing touches on our muppets. I loved the fact that I was in my element.

2 comments:

Tracy Lynn Peterson said...

Hi,

Did Lauren mention in class how she adhered the modeling chocolate fur that she extruded through her kitchenaid onto her Elmo during the food network challenge?

Shirley Santos-Yanga said...

Hi Tracy! Since the body was made of rice krispies and it was sticky, we just slapped the modeling chocolate on it and textured it by using a veining tool. Hope this helps.

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