Harry Potter Birthday Party

Instead of just showing a cake today, I thought I would share some photos from my older daughter's Harry Potter themed birthday party. In the past 2 years she's become quite a fan and really wanted a Harry Potter birthday. She's read all the books (we read the last one together) and seen all the movies, so we had a lot to work from in terms of ideas. I got a little too into it also and found myself using my free time making decorations and invitations for the party. It's not just that I printed the invitations - I HAD to find the real HP font. On a last minute whim, I thought about adding the feather. Now if only I had a reliable source for trained owls to deliver the invitations...

 Our front door for the day! Hooray for rolls of masking paper from the hardware store. And for my husband for spending the afternoon coloring in the brick pattern for Platform 9 3/4.

We turned the dining room into the Great Hall. I'm glad I started on these banner a few weeks in advance! The banners are made from Canson papers, while the logos are printed and cut out. My daughter's friend had a Hogwarts banner, so thankfully I didn't have to recreate it.

Witches, wizards and 7 years olds love candy! I turned the entry console into Honeydukes. I made up the labels for the frogs and jars in Adobe Illustrator. I did go a little overboard on the sweets - jelly beans, homemade chocolate frogs, cake, broomstick cookies in addition to having the kids decorate cookies and dip pretzel rods in chocolate to make wands. Did I mention the gummy spiders and brains at the potions lab?

I felt a little nutty collecting jars over the past 6 months, but it was worth it when it came time to make the potions lab. I found the labels online here. Most of the jars are filled with colored water while the "Wartcap Powder" is just old hot chocolate powder from last year.

This is a blog about cakes, after all, and I wouldn't want you to feel cheated. Here you go!

8 inch pumpkin cakes for the fall!

Yummy, spicy, nutty. And pumpkin-y! We are taking orders now for our latest 8" cake -to-go: organic pumpkin cake filled with homemade pecan praline cream cheese icing. If it smells like heaven in the bakery when we make them, you can only imagine how delicious they are to eat! 
The pumpkin cake would be a wonderful dessert to bring to a dinner party or school Halloween carnival cake walk. Or pre-order for your Thanksgiving meal!
These plump and moist pumpkin cakes will be available only until the day before Thanksgiving. The cake is $40 and is available for pick up Wednesday-Saturdays.

Mario Cake, Woodland Cake, Cowgirl Cake and Treasure Chest Cake

We've had a busy summer here making creative cakes for kids, big and little. When the weddings slow down, the kids' birthday cake business takes over. Here are just a sampling of some of the fun cakes from this summer:

 Cute cowgirl theme cake.

 

Mario! He's surrounded by mini cupcake icons.

Pirate chest filled with gold.

Super cute woodland theme cake with cuddly creatures.

Making a Yoda Cake

last month we made a Yoda cake as a surprise for a groom. Sometimes it gets hectic in the bakery, but I did manage to take some process photos. 

 Yoda's body. Looks like a formless lump! This part is all cake.

Yoda's head. In order to get as much detail as possible, I made the head out of rice cereal treats and carved it into the general shape. I then sculpted with white modeling chocolate. Once it dried over night, I covered it with fondant.

 Here's the final Yoda. His ears were by far the trickiest part! The hands and feet were also made from fondant. As with any complex cake, a lot of time is spent figuring out how to construct the cake and what media to use. 

New 8 inch cakes to go!

Due to popular demand, we are now offering 8 inch cakes to go with 48 hours notice. Bring one of these cakes to a dinner party or casual birthday celebration and spread the love! Our year-round flavors include chocolate cake with chocolate ganache, white cake with vanilla bean French buttercream and bourbon pecan praline, just to name a few. 
In addition to our regular flavors, we will be offering a seasonal special. This month's cake is  a whimsical July 4th celebration cake with red, white and blue layers of vanilla cake filled with Swiss buttercream and fresh raspberries and blueberries. 

To order, please call us at 512.419.1582 or send an email to info@cocopalomadesserts.com. The cakes are available for pick up Wednesdays-Saturdays. Here is a menu of our flavors and prices. Each cake serves about 12-16 people. The July 4th cake is available for pick up until July 3.

Romantic Ruffles and Flowers

This is just too pretty to not share! Romantic ruffles and a garden assortment of peonies, roses and hydrangeas are a lovely way to start the summer season. My assistants Lexi and Sara did an amazing job with the ruffles! We all chipped on on the flower production, handmaking all those lovely flowers. Here's a close up of some of the flowers.

I think I'm finally happy with my roses. When I first started out, I thought roses would be the easiest of the flowers to make, but I soon learned it's easy to make but not easy to make look natural.
Have a safe and fun Memorial Day weekend!

More Cakes for Kids: Fancy Nancy and Angry Birds

We always have fun making kids cakes here at the shop! It gives us the opportunity to get really creative and crafty. These 2 cakes are relatively recent - I just haven't been so good about blogging lately. The Fancy Nancy cake was for 2 sisters with close birthdays. My daughters love the Fancy Nancy books, so I was eager to make this cake and bring the character to life.
The Angry Birds cake could really be for anyone. It seems like people of all ages play the game. This particular cake was for a 4 yr old girl, but it could easily be for a 40 yr old guy. My youngest daughter wants it for her wedding cake. We'll see what she thinks in 25 years.

Macaron Wedding Cake

We had the opportunity to collaborate with one of my favorite bakeries in Austin - the adorable La Patisserie. The bride wanted an elegant wedding cake with a macaron tower, but she wasn't sure how else to incorporate the macarons to add character to the cake. La Patisserie made the macarons, and we designed, made, and assembled the cake. After I sent her a couple of sketches, she decided on the tower with additional macarons skirting the perimeter of the cake.
The flavors of the macarons and cake were also complementary. The cake was our popular almond amaretto strawberry while the macarons were a variety of berry, vanilla and white chocolate flavors.
The color isn't great on the photo, but it looked perfect against the dark gray wall of the W Hotel ballroom. I've never been able to get a good photo there, though. Maybe there's too much gray. In any case, the bride was thrilled when she saw the cake. I'm sure as the popularity of macarons takes off, we'll be making more cakes in different colors and styles.

Sweet Valentine's Day Cookies for Your Sweetie

We have these adorable and tasty Valentine's Day cookies for a limited time. To satisfy all tastes, we have a modern chevron design in dark brown and dark pink or a light pink lace-inspired design. They are huge, which makes them perfect for sharing (or saving a piece for later!). 
Each cookie is $5. Please call or email at info@cocopalomadesserts(dot)com us to place your order. We'll have them available for pick up at the bakery on Saturday, February 11 and Tuesday, February 14.

More than just cakes!

In addition to our fun and delicious cakes, we will be offering dessert bar options. As pastry chefs, we felt like non-cake desserts were missing in our otherwise sweet and charmed lives. Little did I know that dessert tables are all the rage now. These would be a wonderful addition to a wedding or the centerpiece of a bar/bat mitzvah or shower. For every occasion, I'm sure there is a way to fit a dessert table into the mix.

The above pictures are from a French-inspired dessert display. Strawberry mousse parfaits with lemon curd and strawberry gelee add a touch of bright flavor to the traditional French pastries set up of eclairs and madeleines.

Here we have a more rustic set up with whoopie pies, lemon meringue mini tartlets and mini bourbon pecan tartlets. The 3oz dessert glasses are filled with coconut cream cake.

A few other dessert cups we are offering are a green tea mousse with apricot gelee and a chocolate pudding s'mores. Everything is lovingly made from scratch here in the bakery! We've had tremendous fun in testing and sampling the recipes. I hope to have the menu finalized soon. Although we're not designing the tables, we can consult with you on ideas for themes and flavors. 
Some of the photos here were taken by GinnyB Photography.