RJ's Birthday & Fondant Cakes Part 1

After much prodding, RJ finally said that his only birthday wish is to blow out birthday candles. 


With this in mind, I decided to bake my first ever fondant cake for his birthday. During my crazy grocery day last Monday for his mom's arrival, I already bought the stuff I needed for the birthday cake and the fondant. When I shared my plan to my friend, he suggested baking at Fred's kitchen. Light bulb moment! Good idea friend! 

Fred is the owner of the newest yummy bakeshop in Gen. Gutierrez Street in San Juan, 12 Baskets. He's a very good friend of mine and he's a really good baker, so he's exactly the guy who can help me in my first fondant cake. If you want more information about 12 Baskets: click here and here. 


I arrived in 12 Baskets Bakeshop at 10AM on Thursday (Sept 9 - a day before RJ's bday) and we immediately got down to work. We brought down all the ingredients and the microwave I stole from our house (well, I asked permission so I didn't steal it! :P). I showed to Fred the recipes for the cake and the fondant and the picture of RJ we we're going to try to mold. Warning: we're not cake decorators at all! This is our first time in cake decorating. 

1st part of the day was dedicated to making the cake itself. I chose a No-Flour Chocolate Cake. Fred was iffy about my choice since he's not too sure how it will hold the fondant (I should listen to him more). We decided to proceed with this cake anyway since the ingredients I had were for this recipe. 

We started by greasing a springform pan (I didn't know what a springform pan was until Fred told me!) and dusting it with a little flour to prevent the cake from sticking. We later learned that it's also best to put wax paper for no flour cakes since they tend to stick to the pan. 

We also started to pre-heat the oven. Aren't his ovens so big? I love them! :)

We then took the amount of semi-sweet chocolate that we needed and mixed it together with sugar until it looked grainy. We actually wanted to melt the chocolate so that it would mix better but we decided to follow the recipe by the rule. 

We then separated the eggs since we needed the whites to add volume to the cake later on. 

We whisked the eggs until they reached the "ribbon stage". Fred taught me this term! We first did the whisking manually until we eventually reached for the electric mixer. Hahaha. We then folded this in with the chocolate mix.

We also mixed the egg whites until its peaks were in "stiff form". Sorry for the culinary terms, I'm just amazed that I learned these new terms in this baking session with Fred. Haha. 

We then folded the whites together with the chocolate mix. We were careful not to knock out all the air. SInce the chocolate mix was more dense than the egg whites, we mixed little egg whites first with the chocolate mix before actually folding all of the egg whites in with the chocolate. Fred surely is a big help, I wouldn't know these things. :P

We then popped them in the oven for about 45 minutes or more. We took them out to cool when the top felt firm. I just have to say, the lighting inside the oven is lovely. It makes the cake look dramatic. :)


So how did the cake turn out?

They actually turned out well. We were able to take out the first cake from the pan beautifully after much effort. Don't you think it looks exactly like the cake in the recipe book? :)

However, our 2nd cake got got stuck in the pan! "Use wax paper next time", we kept telling ourselves. The base of the 2nd cake was left on the springform pan. Ooops. :P We had a hollow 2nd cake. Oh well, good thing we had two cakes that would go on top of each other. :) 

We decided to make the most out of the situation and eat the cake "chips" left on the pan! YUM! It reminded me so much of my childhood when we would eat the leftover brownie mix whenever my mom and I would bake. 

I had a great morning with Fred! I think we did a good job especially since this is the first time we did this recipe. Probably next time we'll melt the chocolate instead and use wax paper. Also, i'll change the cake next time if I'm doing another fondant cake since this cake is a little too dense. It tastes delicious though! It's rich and creamy :)


Part 2 of the Fondant Birthday cake tomorrow! :) We made fondant from marshmallows! 

~It's the little sweet notes everyday that matter. :)~