Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Long Island Wedding Blog Features Our Cakes

Claudia Copquin, former editor of Newsday's Long Island Weddings, wrote a great feature about Pastry Girl Cakes on her blog getting married on long island today. We're honored to be recognized by someone like Claudia, an accomplished wedding authority with over ten years of experience in the biz. Her blog is the best resource out there for Long Island brides.

Check out our feature and the rest of her site for more wedding inspiration.

Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Blog Feature - Spring/Summer Cakes

This morning we were featured in a post on Weddings Fresh, a blog aimed at bringing all the latest wedding trends to sophisticated brides. Dani writes the blog, and is a professional wedding coordinator who offers a variety of packages to help plan the big day! Thanks Dani!

Check us out!

Monday, December 28, 2009

Free Anniversary Tier for 2010 Brides

Pastry Girl Cakes is now offering a free anniversary tier for all of our 2010 couples. One popular wedding tradition has been for couples to save the top tier of their wedding cake and freeze it until their one year anniversary.

As a pastry chef, I can tell you that even the most moist and delicious cake will not be so tasty after one year in your freezer.

Now, every couple that orders their wedding cake from Pastry Girl Cakes will be entitled to a replica of their top tier made with fresh cake and filling (at no extra charge)!


Sunday, December 27, 2009

Budgeting Tips for Brides and Their Cakes!

Even with the economy picking back up, everyone is looking for a way to save wherever they can. This is even more true for engaged couples who find their wedding expenses adding up. Here are a few money saving tips for the sweetest part of the reception: the cake!


FAKE IT
Get a smaller tiered cake (or dummy cake) for the reception and ask your baker to make sheet cakes that your caterer can cut and serve to guests

KEEP IT SIMPLE
Cakes from magazines are usually very expensive because they are so ornate. The less decoration on your cake, the less the cake will cost.

ALTERNATIVE DESSERTS
Get a cupcake tower with a smaller cake for the cake cutting.

REAL FLOWERS
Decorate your cake with real flowers instead of sugar flowers – some florists will throw in free decorative cake flowers as part of your package.

FAMILY HEIRLOOMS
Ask your baker to include a sparkly heirloom like a brooch onto the cake that won’t cost as much as time consuming sugar decorations.

Check back tomorrow for a special money saving offer for Pastry Girl Cakes' 2010 brides!

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Donut Pudding!

This weekend the Northeast experienced our first big snowstorm of the season. Snowed in and craving something sweet, I decided to make bread pudding for breakfast. Flipping through one of my favorite bakebooks - Jill O'Connor's Sticky, Chewy, Messy Gooey - I was inspired to to replace bread with donuts - thus Donut Pudding was born! I channeled my inner Semi-Homemade and just used some packaged Entenmann's donuts. (I was off the clock!)

The result was a dessert so sweet and filling, and just delicious. Perfect for a snowy day and elastic pants.

Here are some pictures and the recipe I used for the mixture to pour over the donuts. This recipe comes from one of my favorite Food Network ladies, Miss Paula Deen.

Ingredients
2 cups granulated sugar
5 large beaten eggs
2 cups milk
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3 cups cubed Italian bread, allow to stale overnight in a bowl (I used donuts)
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, softened


Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 13 by 9 by 2-inch pan.
2. Mix together granulated sugar, eggs, and milk in a bowl; add vanilla. Pour over cubed bread and let sit for 10 minutes.
3. In another bowl, mix and crumble together brown sugar, butter, and pecans.
4. Pour bread mixture into prepared pan. Sprinkle brown sugar mixture over the top and bake for 35 to 45 minutes, or until set. Remove from oven.







Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Cupcake Tower


I made this cupcake tower for my favorite delivery service, Worldwide Courier, along with a basket of chocolate chip brownies for a meeting over at their office on Long Island. The cupcakes are carrot and red velvet with cream cheese frosting. I decorated the carrot cupcakes with gold dust and the red velvets with silver.
The dessert towers are a beautiful way to display cupcakes for any occasion and are becoming increasingly popular for weddings. If you still want a traditional cake cutting we can make a small tier for the top of the tower.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Free Tasting - Crate & Barrel!

Calling all engaged couples! Crate & Barrel is kicking off their 2010 wedding registry parties and offering expert advice on all things domestic. Pastry Girl Cakes will be offering free samples at Crate & Barrel's Soho location on February 2 from 6pm-8pm and February 21 from 9am-11am. We will be bringing delicious bite-sized samples of our most popular flavors and answering all your pastry related wedding questions. Come check us and other wedding vendors out, eat free cupcakes or just say hi!


Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Baby Carriage Cake

I made this old fashioned baby carriage cake for an office baby shower. The hood, handle and wheels are made from sugar, and I accessorized the carriage with a lime green sugar blanket. The cake is vanilla with chocolate buttercream.





Friday, December 4, 2009

Bass Guitar Cake

We made this replica of a bass guitar to scale (4 feet long!!) for a "Sour 16." The birthday boy's mom ordered this cake modeled after her musician son's own bass.


The design on the body of the bass is hand painted and the strap, tuners, knobs and bridge are made from sugar. The neck is hand painted to give a realistic wood grain effect and the strings are piped with royal icing. The flavor is red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Holiday Pastries

The gift giving season is here and the best gifts are the ones that can be eaten! Whether you need cupcakes for your family party, or cookies for a corporate gift, Pastry Girl Cakes wants to help you celebrate. Call or email us today to place your holiday order.








Monday, November 30, 2009

Corporate Cupcakes

It's a busy week here - the start of office holiday parties and a big birthday cake for the end of the week! These are cupcakes we did for an office party at Worldwide Courier. We used a printer that takes edible ink (food color) to print out the logo and attached it to a fondant circle. The cupcakes are red velvet with cream cheese frosting.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Cupcake Gallery

We are happy to announce that our cupcake gallery is officially up on our site! Our cupcakes are baked in all of our delicious flavors and can be custom decorated to suit any event. They are perfect for kids parties, holidays, and a cupcake tower is a creative alternative to a traditional wedding cake. Next, we're working on getting the cookie gallery up!


Saturday, November 21, 2009

Fall Wedding Cupcakes


We made 200 chocolate chip cupcakes with vanilla buttercream for a cupcake tower to serve as the couple's wedding cake for tonight. We made 400(!) sugar leaves to match the couple's fall theme.

Bridal Shower Cupcakes


These festive party streamer cupcakes were for an office bridal shower. The bride's coworkers ordered classic vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream. They requested blue and brown accents to reflect the colors of the bridal party. Of course the party streamers are edible! Check back for our final cupcake order this week - fall themed wedding cupcakes.

Birthday Cupcakes


These are cupcakes we did for a 3 year old boy's birthday. The cupcakes are red velvet with vanilla buttercream and the 3s were made out of sugar.

New York Cake Convention

The NY Cake Convention is going to be January 2-5th at 401 Seventh Avenue (at 33rd St. - on the 18th floor) and Pastry Girl Cakes is planning to be there for at least one of those days. I'm looking forward to seeing such cake decorating rock stars as Elisa Strauss from Confetti Cakes, Anne Heap from Pink Cake Box and one of my instructors from culinary school, Toba Garrett.

There will be demos, classes and competitions, and it promises to be very educational. It's hard to decide what to attend because so many of the things being offered seem interesting. However, the cost of all the events will definitely help us limit! Check out the website to register for the event. Hope to see you there!

Free Tasting at J. Crew!

Pastry Girl Cakes will be at J. Crew's new bridal location at 99 Prince Street in Soho on Saturday, January 23rd. We'll be handing out free samples and will be available to answer any of your questions. The time is TBD, but we will update our blog and website when we have more information.


Here are some pictures of the last event we did. This was at Crate & Barrel's Wedding Registry Event in Soho. Normally, I just wear my chef coat for tastings but this event was in the evening and was organized to be like a dinner party so I went fancy! The staff at Crate & Barrel designed a beautiful display with candles and graciously let us showcase our pastries on their cake stands.

Guests sampled our rich chocolate cake with classic vanilla buttercream, our southern red velvet cake with sweet cream cheese frosting and also our hint-of-lemon cake paired with refreshing lemon buttercream. We will be doing more Crate & Barrel events in 2010 and will keep you posted on those dates.








Pastry Girl Cakes' First Blog Post!

Even though we have our website up and running and our Facebook fan page to post the latest details, I thought it would be nice to have a space where I could include more information about our pastries.
This latest cake was for an 85th birthday and included all of the birthday girl’s favorite pastimes: knitting, drinking a cup of tea and eating her peppermints. This cake was especially fun because it really represented the recipient and we were able to focus on the small details like painting a delicate china pattern and including her name on the teabag.

The cake was rich chocolate and the filling was dark chocolate ganache and raspberry preserves. The basket, balls of yarn and teacup were all made of cake and the yarn, teabag and saucer were made out of sugar. I made the yarn using Makin's Professional Ultimate Clay Extruder. The gun is really easy to use and comes with 20 discs.

This week we have a few cupcake orders and look forward to sharing the finished product!