The Journey of A Cake

This is a cake I made for my friend's birthday two weeks ago. I realized I had posted the photos on Facebook, but not on here. This is the story of one cake's epic journey, 5 hours by car, 1.5 hours by ferry, 1 hour by transit and up 3 flights of stairs to the Flat for Wayward Adults.

The Cake's Journey begins in the my refrigerator. Ready for the travels ahead.The Cake is then snugly secured in the trunk of my car for the first leg of it's Journey.The Cake prepares to board the "Spirit Of British Columbia"The Cake relaxes on the ferry boat and eagerly anticipates the journey ahead.The Cake waves hello to the passing ferry boat in the Gulf Islands.
The Cake is ready to do all of the touristy things that Victoria has to offer.
The Cake enjoys it's time on the wonderful Victoria public transit system.
The Cake reads (and signs) the guidelines for the Flat For Wayward Adults.

The Cake is ready for a PAR-TAY!

But, you might be wondering, how is the cake dressed for the party?
...with some fishies...

...and a crab or two......a lobster and a squid join in the fun...
...along with a sea turtle and a jellyfish.......an orca and an octopus....
...and a whole gang of other friendly sea critters!


I was really, really happy with how this cake turned out, decorating wise. I was also especially happy that it managed to survive the trip.

Because the friend I made it for is on a sugar-restricted diet, the cake itself was made from a sugarfree yellow cake box mix and the chocolate icing was also a store bought sugarfree icing. The decorations, however, were done with my regular icing. Personally, I can't stand the taste of Splenda, so I was pretty much unable to eat my own cake, but everyone who can't tell/doesn't mind the taste of Splenda thought that it was great!

Mario Cake: Take Two

So this cake was for my brother's birthday last week. So far I'd only ever made him one cake before, it was the first cake I decorated and it was kind of really lame.

I knew I had to do better this time. I had a few ideas, but then my Mom and I found him a copy of Super Mario 64 for his birthday. Then his girlfriend found him Mario Kart for N64. Then my grandmother bought him a Mario t-shirt. So I figured we should do a retro-mid-90s Mario Birthday. And I made him this cake.
Here it is with the game box in the background. And his copy of Mario Kart as well.
Oh, and the cake was chocolate, with chocolate icing, as usual. :)

Cheese Dip

This cheese dip is super easy and super tasty.

1/4 cup chopped celery
1/4 cup chopped green onion
1 (250 g) brick cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup sour cream
1 2/3 cup grated cheddar cheese (I usually use closer to 2 cups)
1 clove minced garlic

Throw all the ingredients together in a bowl and cream well.

This is pretty much a staple at any sort of social event my family hosts. And the recipe makes a lot, so there's enough to go around. :)

Graduation Cake

I made this cake yesterday for those from my church group who were graduating. There were 12 of them, so I made 12 peanut butter cup grad hats. I wasn't super thrilled with this picture, or the cake. But it was cute.

Also, this was the first cake that I did with my two newest cake-baking tools. First of all, I bought a 12"x17" cake pan, so that I could make large cakes in fewer batches. Which was super helpful! Also, I am so very thrilled that I also bought a bright red, beautiful KitchenAid Stand Mixer! It is lovely, and makes my life a lot easier as well!

Ordination Cake

This Sunday our church had an ordination ceremony/celebration for one of our pastors. So, of course, there was cake. :)

I wasn't super thrilled with how it turned out. It was supposed to look like a cloud with a beam of light shining out of it onto the little figurine of our pastor. But everyone just thought it looked like a funny looking mushroom. Also, I need to practice printing on the cake.

White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake

I love this cheesecake recipe. It is super tasty, although its a little tricky. And it uses just about every bowl/pot in the house.

1 cup chocolate cookie crumbs (I used Biscoff cookie crumbs)
3 tbsp sugar
1/4 cup butter

300 gr (ish) frozen raspberries
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp corn starch
1/2 cup water

2 cups white chocolate chips
1/2 cup half and half cream

3 pkgs (250 gr) cream cheese
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 325. Grease a 9-inch springform pan.

Melt butter. Mix with sugar and cookie crumbs. Press mixture into the bottom of the pan.

Combine raspberries, 2 tbsp sugar, corn starch and water in a medium pot. Bring to a boil and then continue boiling until thickened. Strain mixture through a mesh strainer to get out the seeds.

In a double boiler, or (carefully) in the microwave, melt chocolate chips together with half and half until smooth.

Beat together 1/2 cup sugar with cream cheese. When this is fluffy, start beating in the eggs one at a time. Blend in the vanilla and white chocolate mixture.

Pour about half the batter over top of the crust. Spoon a few tablespoons of the raspberry mixture over the cheese goo. Pour in the rest of the batter. Spoon another few tablespoons on top. Run the tip of a knife through the batter, just a little, to create a marbled effect.

Bake for 55-60 minutes, using whichever method you prefer to prevent cracks. Cool, then refrigerate at least 8 hours. Serve with white chocolate curls, fresh raspberries and remaining raspberry sauce.


This recipe was what really convinced me that I want a stand mixer. I beat the cream cheese and the sugar in our food processor, which made life so much easier than usual. However, when I added all the other ingredients it kind of overflowed the food processor. (Our food processor has a hole in the middle where the blade attaches, I filled it up too far and overflowed it through the middle) Which made me decide that I should get a real stand mixer.

Engineering the Cake

So every year our school celebrates Engineering Week. This is a week with social events like games nights and bowling, fun competitions, like (banned) soldering competitions and edible car races and charity events, like smashing cars. Also, during E-Week there tends to be a significant increase in the number of large items found hanging off of the local bridge. And at the end of the week there is a wrap up event to announce the winners. This year, they wanted cake at the wrap up event, and so I was asked if I would be willing to provide a pair of cakes for the event.


I'm really happy with how both of these turned out. They were a lot of work, but I really enjoyed it. Each of the cakes is made up of four of my regular 9x13 recipe of chocolate cake. And the icing is my standard chocolate butter cream. I used an excessive amount of red food colouring to get the colours right, and overall I was really happy with how it turned out!