CALAT Cake Carving Project - Car

The car above was the car that I completed in the lesson as well as supervising the students.

Sad to say that we have reached our last lesson of this term.  Our final project at CALAT was to carve a Madeira (Pound) cake into a small, what I call, bubble car.  This is a  cute nondescript vehicle which the student could colour or decorate in any way this car is suitable for both children and adults alike.  I taught the basic principles of using a template, carving cakes, crumb coating (ie covering the cake in buttercream) and then covering in fondant.  Although we had a very limited time only 2 hours, below are some pictures of how my students got on.  The cakes were were frozen before they were brought into the classroom to make it easier for the students to carve.  I think the students did very well, this again, is the first time that most of the students had ever carved cakes so their efforts were, in my view brilliant.
   

Students crumb coating (covering the cakes with buttercream)

An example of one of the cakes covered in buttercream.

Covering the carved cake in fondant.

Shaping the fondant over the carved cake

Putting windows on the car cake.

Various stages of decorating

Deep in concentration...

Smiling Student

Some of the final cars

The CALAT Sugarcraft Cake Decorating Family...However whose the bloke in the background lol?

Do me a favour...

I had bought some cookie cutters a few months ago and I must admit I am not a big fan, however, as I am a person who can never sit still for too long, my mind began to wander and I decided to have a go at making some wedding favours as well as tackling the cookie cutters. Firstly, I made some cookies and surprisingly they tasted really nice...and then I decided to decorate the left overs with sugarpaste (fondant)...The alternative to decorating the cookies is to use the run-out (flooding) technique.  This gives a smoother finish, but if you want texture then go for sugarpaste.

These are my first attempts and really?...I don't think they came out too bad.

 Perhaps next time I'll put on a little bit more detail

Bloomin' Marvellous

At SCOLA (Sutton College), students have just completed their sugar flower course.  The flowers to be completed were roses, rose leaves, carnations, pulled flowers, filler flowers and stargazer lilies.  The project lasted for 8 weeks and everyone had a great time putting their various projects together.  In the end students chose to make a small spray or presented their flowers in vases.  The result (as above) was simply gorgeous.

 Students hard at work putting together their creations...

Close up of Stargazer lily as submitted by student above

Breathtaking spray presented by the student above, hard to believe this was achieved in 8 weeks

Another colourful and breathtaking floral presentation by the student below.

As it was the final week of the course, I decided to treat the students by baking a death by chocolate marble cake with chocolate fudge outside and  vanilla buttercream inside (chocolate over kill!!!).  I asked one of my students to share the cake...As you can see she looked very happy indeed...I didn't have to ask her twice (lol...)   :-)

Croydon Adult Learners And Training (CALAT) College Project

My students were required to produce a vintage style cake with rolled roses, leaves, crimping, ribbon  insertion, stitching and lace patterns on the cake.  We worked on a square cake as this is somewhat harder to cover with sugar paste.  This was a highly technical piece and the students embraced the challenges.  


Below are the busy bees at work....

Student performing Ribbon Insertion technique

Team Work

The final finished pieces of work as submitted by the students...It was a long hard journey but we got there in the end.  Brilliantly done.

Close-up of Rolled Roses & Cross Stitch in royal icing.