2D
Hoot! Night Owl!
by Tessa Zeng @downside_heart · submitted Aug 12, 2010 · 2010 contest
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Description
Other 2/3 of Uber Baking Trio: Rita Patel & Corinna Pan!
SO, we all loved this design, but didn't want to interpret it too literally (e.g. coffee beans all over, rendering cake inedible). Thus, in a fit of conceptual brilliance, we decided to make a coffee FLAVORED cake, and cover it with tantalizing chocolate shavings to render that owlish texture!! As chocolate also includes caffeine, it was a match made in heaven, if we do say so ourselves.
(Yes, this cake LOOKS like the original, but even more orgasmic? It CONCEPTUALLY echoes the idea behind "Night Owl." Abstractly contented sighs all around...)
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Our Process:
The body of the cake is French Vanilla, courtesy of carefully selected boxes of Duncan Hines Moist. It was baked separately in two rectangular pans, then one sacrificed its beautious form to molding on top of the other.
Carving cake is much harder than it looks. Making curves was especially hard, but the triumphant tactic involved using liberal amounts of icing (no sleek fondant coating here!), and going very slowly to avoid pulling cake crumbs all over the place. Hard work, but rewarding! The precise, delineated shape of the owl was similarly achieved, though prior to icing application.
We also produced coffee buttercream from scratch, short of planting the espresso beans and milking the cow for butter ourselves. We coaxed tiny exquisite shavings from large Hershey's bars with a vegetable peeler, and sprinkled those on top.
Finally, those luminous eyes were constructed from white chocolate melted and molded in a cupcake tin. Remaining morsels carved perfectly into nubs that serve as the owl's beak/nose thing.
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Rita would like to add: "I also realized our combo of coffee and chocolate is just like a Mocha Coffee drink. And the owl's eyes are empty coffee cups. Coincidence!"
Corinna would like to express that the buttercream "left a rich, pronounced aftertaste on the palate" and also wishes for you, dear viewer, to "make note of the branch that the owl is perched on."
Please also realize this cake's extraordinary straddling of the categories!
We deemed it a 2.5D cake due to its sculptural process YET flattened appearance, a unique combination to be sure. After much thought, we figured the visual bias of viewers/judges was likely to plant our cake in 2D, thus the official submission, BUT this was a nuanced decision! (Much like everything else in life... Threadcakes is wise indeed to challenge us.)
-
How delicious was it? How delicious it was!!!!!! Yours truly (typing this) had not consumed such quantities of caffeine & sugar in more than a year - true story - hence the crazy story you just read. But truly- the cake was glorious.
SO, we all loved this design, but didn't want to interpret it too literally (e.g. coffee beans all over, rendering cake inedible). Thus, in a fit of conceptual brilliance, we decided to make a coffee FLAVORED cake, and cover it with tantalizing chocolate shavings to render that owlish texture!! As chocolate also includes caffeine, it was a match made in heaven, if we do say so ourselves.
(Yes, this cake LOOKS like the original, but even more orgasmic? It CONCEPTUALLY echoes the idea behind "Night Owl." Abstractly contented sighs all around...)
-
Our Process:
The body of the cake is French Vanilla, courtesy of carefully selected boxes of Duncan Hines Moist. It was baked separately in two rectangular pans, then one sacrificed its beautious form to molding on top of the other.
Carving cake is much harder than it looks. Making curves was especially hard, but the triumphant tactic involved using liberal amounts of icing (no sleek fondant coating here!), and going very slowly to avoid pulling cake crumbs all over the place. Hard work, but rewarding! The precise, delineated shape of the owl was similarly achieved, though prior to icing application.
We also produced coffee buttercream from scratch, short of planting the espresso beans and milking the cow for butter ourselves. We coaxed tiny exquisite shavings from large Hershey's bars with a vegetable peeler, and sprinkled those on top.
Finally, those luminous eyes were constructed from white chocolate melted and molded in a cupcake tin. Remaining morsels carved perfectly into nubs that serve as the owl's beak/nose thing.
-
Rita would like to add: "I also realized our combo of coffee and chocolate is just like a Mocha Coffee drink. And the owl's eyes are empty coffee cups. Coincidence!"
Corinna would like to express that the buttercream "left a rich, pronounced aftertaste on the palate" and also wishes for you, dear viewer, to "make note of the branch that the owl is perched on."
Please also realize this cake's extraordinary straddling of the categories!
We deemed it a 2.5D cake due to its sculptural process YET flattened appearance, a unique combination to be sure. After much thought, we figured the visual bias of viewers/judges was likely to plant our cake in 2D, thus the official submission, BUT this was a nuanced decision! (Much like everything else in life... Threadcakes is wise indeed to challenge us.)
-
How delicious was it? How delicious it was!!!!!! Yours truly (typing this) had not consumed such quantities of caffeine & sugar in more than a year - true story - hence the crazy story you just read. But truly- the cake was glorious.
Baker’s site: rethinkingstyle.com