Issues with wedding cakes..

Ok so one of the fellow gals at cakecentral.com had an awesome question. How to crumb coat a cake and how :)
It is super easy! Once you have let both or all your cake layers cool you fill your cake and cover it completely in a thin layer of icing it will have lots of crumbs all over it (hence the name crumb coating) then place in the refrigerator for 30 min to an hour and give it a final coat with your choice of frosting.

Crumb coating is very beneficial exspecially when you have a very moist cake or for example a chocolate cake that needs to be frosted in vanilla icing, giving it a very clean look and easier to cover with fondant too!

Another question that popped up was how much is your work really worth? I tend to stay away from charging per hour since it is pretty hard to keep track of time when you are trying to work on a cake. Per person is the best way that can not change very much and you are sure to make a progit and charge a fair amount to your customers :)

If you're in a pinch and have no sugar for frosting...

I remembered running out of sugar last week when making chocolate frosting and yet found I had lots o condensed milk.So here is a recipe for a Sugarless Chocolate Frosting (sorta)
1 square unsweetened chocolate
2/3 cup (1/2 can ) condensed milk
1/4 tsp salt
1tsp Vanilla
Melt the chocolate in a bowl over hot water bath.Stir 2/3 cup of condensed milk and salt.Stir and cook over boiling water ( don't let the water hit the bottom of bowl) until thick, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla then stir in 1/2 tablespoon water and beat.Add a few drops of hot water if too thick :)

For those of you who are bi lingual in Spanish I created a really rich sugarless recipe now at the Splenda website you can get at :
www.splendaenespanol.com/recipe_detail.jhtml?id=splendaenespanol/recipes/library/pastel_con_Pudin_de.inc

Once I get a chance I will definitely translate it soon!!

I dreaded the idea of making a Three Milk Cake (Tres Leches Cake)...

This cake is traditional in Latin America and Mexico essentially a Genoise (Sponge) cake and really easy to mess up especially if it is raining like it was. This is a tedious cake because like any sponge cake you have to whip ahhhh egg whites yes egg whites and like I mentioned before if it's raining they don't whip very well...

Anyway the cake is baked and soaked in three milks : Evaporated Condensed Heavy Cream I personally add a 1/2 cup of milk to diluted some so it's not so sweet! So I look in my pantry and no flour! I really didn't feel like going to the store just for a bag of flour so I looked around and found a pancake mix.

I decided to improvise and use that instead ;0) the result?
This awesome light buttery cake recipe:

2 Cups Pancake Mix ( I happen to have AJ)
1/2 Cup of sugar (if you wanted sweeter add an addt'l 1/2 cup)
3/4 Vegetable oil 1 cup Whole Milk ( Skim for the health conscious)
1 1/2 teaspoon Vanilla or 1 Vanilla Bean
4 Large Eggs

That's it! Mix all the ingredients, let it rest for 5 minutes while your oven pre-heats to 350 degrees. Pour into two- 8 inch pans and bake for 20 to 25 minutes depending on your ovens temperament (we all know our ovens have those days) If you went for the less sweeter a good chocolate frosting works if the sweeter version was your choice whip cream or mousse and berries is awesome!!!

Have Fun sharing tasting and baking !!