Baking with Blondie

FAQ

 

Frequently Asked Questions:

Hi dear friends! I often receive questions about my methods, how I bake, store, stack, and decorate my cakes…  you name it. I try my best to take the time to answer as many as I can in my emails, DMs, messages, comments, etc, but to be totally honest, the question load is wonderfully overwhelming, and I would be answering questions for days at a time if I tried to keep up!

I’m so happy you guys want me to help build your cake confidence, and want to make sure you have me as a dependable resource when it comes to your cake needs.

To help with this, every Friday morning, I take a half hour on my Instagram page (on my Insta-Stories) and personally answer as many of your cake questions as possible. To see my past Q&A’s click on my “highlights” on my IG page, or click on my IG-TV for a full recap on my Instagram page, as well. I love connecting with you, and have felt this an effective way to do so. 🙂

Here’s a list of my most frequently asked questions below, and I will add to them as more questions come in, and as I have time to answer them! In the meantime, I will still do my best to reply to your comments on Instagram on my posts, too. Thanks!

_______________________

What are the best cake-decorating essentials?

  • Although it is very possible to decorate a cake without these tools, why the heck not? They make the process much, much, much easier. If I could pick my top 5, they would be: Cake Turntable, Cake Scraper, Offset Icing Spatula, Flat Cake Knife, and Cake Boards. I have a full list of my favorites here.

What advice do you have for first-time bakers? 

  • Seriously just JUMP RIGHT IN! Go for it. Find a cake style that makes your heart sing, jump into that kitchen, and try it out. The more practice you have, the better you’ll become. Also, like I said on my Q&A a while back, don’t play the comparison game. You will see these flawless cakes with perfect drips and sharp edges… then look back on your own.. guys, don’t do this. Be inspired by them, but don’t let it crush you. Let it drive you. Focus on your cake journey, practice lots, and don’t forget to have joy in the process.

What is your favorite cake? 

  • This is SO HARD, you guys. I fall in love with different cakes all the time, so I feel like it’s always changing. However, I love anything peanut butter chocolate, s’mores, or anything with brown butter, dark chocolate, or salted caramel.

Can I come to your cake class? 

How are you so skinny? Who eats all these cakes?

  • I make a ton of cake throughout the week. But I also don’t sit around eating every piece of them, haha. I usually save a slice or two for my family, then give them away to friends and extended family. I also am standing all day, try to work out somewhat regularly, and make sure I’m filling my body with a good balance of healthy food otherwise. Balance is key, but then again, balance is different for everyone. Do what works best for you.

Why do you use cake mixes in your recipes? I thought from-scratch recipesmmakes the best looking/tasting cakes?

  • I use cake mixes in my cake recipes, but not in the way you’d traditionally think. A regular cake mix recipe requires three basic ingredients (usually water, eggs, and oil). Mine are doctored cake mix recipes, which means I’m using a combination of egg whites, sour cream, buttermilk, real vanilla, extracts, seasonings, emulsions, vegetable oil or melted butter, and whole ingredients and other flavors that pertain to my cake (fresh fruits, freeze dried fruits, canned pumpkin, for example). Doesn’t sound so basic anymore, eh? That’s because it’s seriously a game-changer in your cake-baking game, my friends! A lot of professional high-end and well-known bakeries use cake mixes. I’ve also had so. many. terrible from scratch recipes, and have had so many followers email and message me about how baking from a doctored cake mix has totally changed their cake game! I wanted to create recipes that taste amazing, are easy to throw together in your kitchen, as well as come out perfectly every single time, no matter your skill level, and I believe my original recipes do just that. I bake from doctored cake mixes, not because I can’t bake from scratch (because I certainly can), but because it makes the baking process attainable for all bakers, beginners and professionals. It’s basically a pre-measured bag of dry ingredients, haha! I’ve also done several blind taste tests with my doctored cake mix recipes vs. popular scratch recipes and guess what? Mine came out on top every. single. time. WHAAAA? I don’t say this to brag, but to show how taste & texture are not sacrificed for a second in my doctored cake mix recipes. It’s priority, and although I support every baker to bake in whatever way works for them without discrimination or negative stigma, I feel like sharing recipes that include cake mixes has really gotten me some flack. On the flip side, hundreds of emails flood in each week about how the doctored cake mix method has been a lifesaver, and they’ll never go back to scratch. You do you, friends! If you like scratch, go for it. If you like doctored cake mixes, go for it. Do you, do you, do you.

I see you’re a Mom, how you have time to bake?

  • I space out the process. I usually bake one day, then frost the next. I also do it when my kids are in school, taking a nap, have gone to sleep for the night, or before they wake up. Also, I’ll turn on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse for 25-30 minutes and FROST AS FAST AS I CAN, haha. Also, just as you schedule out time to do anything else you want to be a priority, schedule out your baking time. Be efficient with your time while doing so. I

How do  you make your chocolate drips?

  • I love doing chocolate ganache drips of the sides of my cakes. There are two ingredients – heavy cream and chocolate. There’s a different ratio of heavy cream to chocolate, depending on what type of chocolate you’re using.
    • For milk chocolate ganache, you’ll need a 1:1 ratio for milk chocolate chips to heavy cream.
    • For dark or white chocolate, you’ll need about 3-4 Tablespoons of heavy cream per 1/2 cup dark chocolate melts.
    • For chocolate candy melts (such as Wilton colored melts), I do the same ratio as I do for dark chocolate.

How do you get such a white melt? Mine comes out yellow!

  • I use Wilton “Very White” candy melts instead of white chocolate chips.

Difference between an extract and emulsion?

  • Extracts are alcohol-based, emulsions are water-based. If you have a pure extract, you can use much less of it. If you have an emulsion, you can usually get away with using more of it. Both are great additions to buttercreams and cakes. Taste as you go, start with a little, and go from there.

How do you add florals to cakes?

  • It depends on the floral – first, make sure your florals are safe. Some are toxic. What I usually do is trim them to be about 1-2 inches short, rinse them, wrap the stems in plastic wrap and floral tape, then I won’t them to the cake until delivery or cake pickup.

How do you make your cakes flat?

  • They totally come out that way! Try one of my recipes, and you’ll see. 🙂

How do you store your cake layers until you bake them?

  • I always bake and freeze my cakes before frosting them. Here’s how.

How can I order a cake from you?

Why do you do mostly 6″ cakes?

  • I love making cakes, and can never have enough of it. That said, a 6″ 3-layer cake is plenty for 8 people, really, and sometimes the 8″ cakes are a bit harder to frost for beginners anyway.

How do you slice off the cake board off the top of your cakes? Mine sticks!

  • Cold, cold, cold. You must make sure your cake has had enough time to chill with that cardboard round on top before you slice it off with a hot knife.

How did you grow your Instagram following so quickly?

  • I actually have had an account since Instagram barely started! It didn’t take off until I switches to cakes, really. I food blogged for years, and liked it, but didn’t LOVE it. I’m not saying switching to cakes will grow you to 100K followers overnight, but I found something I feel really excited and passionate about, and I think it shows in the original photos I put out, my own photography, the messages I share, and the community I’ve built around Baking with Blondie. People can tell if you are real, humble, and if you honestly genuinely are sharing content with them based on what you love – Not what you’re trying to sell. That said, here are some tips:
    • Don’t obsess over numbers, and don’t EVER BUY THEM. Good grief. It’s all about real engagement! You want real people interacting with you. Not bots, or fake likes, or fake followers. Who cares if someone has more followers than you. Check out their engagement – how many people do they respond to in their comments? Are they genuinely conversing with their followers? Are they answering questions, addressing concerns, making it fun, and all of this for the sake of what they love? Or are they using their followers to sell something that’s totally unrelated to their niche? I feel like I grew because I stuck to cake, and not veering to cars, clothing, house, makeup, hair, whatever for personal gain. I hope this has brought greater VALUE to my Instagram account. You know I will never use you to sell something that is not Baking with Blondie related.
    • Post original content. Don’t be one of those “pinterest board” collage accounts if you’re an original caker. If you do share content of others, tag them and especially put their name in the first line of your caption. They did all the hard work, proper attribution is a must. 
    • Don’t play the comparison game. Who cares if so-and-so is doing whatever. You are in charge of you! What they are doing takes nothing away from what you’re doing.
    • Videos are great. I don’t believe in posting only videos, but they do help with engagement, that’s for sure.
    • Be REAL. Be YOU. People can smell arrogance, over-confidence, or a sales pitch from a mile away. I share fun things, but also more religious self-awareness posts on Mondays after keeping Sundays quiet for religious purposes. I respect my family and not post about them without their permission, usually not at all.
    • Have fun! Ask questions! Engage, engage, engage!
    • Ask yourself- What is this post for? Just a pretty picture? How are you improving their lives with this post? What is the real message? What are you doing to make their cakes better, or lives better?
    • Don’t sweat the trolls or negative comments. Delete them and move on. People are so unkind on the internet, and I know in my heart they wouldn’t say those nasty things if they knew me or were in my presence while saying those things. Remember that, and don’t let your cake world be poisoned by their bitterness.
    • You don’t have to be on all the time. I know influencers who have their phones in their faces all day. Ahh! Just share a few quality things here and there that you think would be helpful to your audience.
    • Build it and they will come. Really. Just keep going. Post regularly & consistently. People will notice your pattern and expect to see your posts around a certain time. You can schedule out your posts on apps, etc.
    • Hashtags work. They really do. Hashtag within your niche.

Where did you learn to bake and do cakes?

  • I’ve always loved baking, but within the past few years have totally taken in the cake world. I attended a cake demo class, but ended up not learning really anything I didn’t know already (this doesn’t mean you can’t learn from cake classes. Heck, I teach them all the time and people send me their perfect cakes afterward! I just didn’t learn anything ground-breaking from this particular class, is all). I’ve since then continued to self-teach myself the ways of cake decorating, and also making sure I’m learning as much as I can from others, tutorials, etc. I feel like you can be self-taught all you want, but it’s important to take the time to nurture your craft and learn as much as you can about it inside and outside of the kitchen. 

 

When does your cookbook come out? I want to pre-order it ASAP! 

  • Cake Confidence is set for release in Spring 2019. I will make sure to share when the preorder is available as soon as I get the green light from my publisher. 

 

How much should I charge for my cakes?

  • There isn’t really a blanket answer for this one. It depends on so many different factors. The way I price out my cakes has to do with the TIME it takes to make the cake (pay yourself whatever hourly rate you feel like is worth your time), INGREDIENTS (down to every last bit of everything), EQUIPMENT (it takes money to power your mixer, lights, ovens, etc), SUPPLIES (cake decorating equipment isn’t cheap), EXPERTISE (how hard is this cake, how time-consuming, how busy are you, what brand have you developed, etc), and LOCATION (a cake in Utah isn’t the same as a cake in NYC – just like cost of living and rent in both places, etc) And go from there. Remember, you are not a grocery store bakery, and the client should understand your worth.

 

You say your recipes are original, how did you come up with them?

  • Doctoring up cake mixes is no new thing, but when I create my own original recipes it is literally me in my kitchen with a notepad and my baking ingredients. Batch after batch, and cake after cake, the recipes come together based on my taste alone, as well as the opinions of my taste-testers. I’ve had some of them really bomb, and many that have developed beautifully and eventually have become everyone’s go-to when it comes to baking in their own kitchens.  There is so much joy in recipe creation, and it really helps you put your heart and soul into the recipe.

 

Tell us about your photography! 

  • My number 1 advice about cake photography is to always do your own photography while shooting your cakes. Using someone else will not improve your own skill. Yes, you will look back on your own photography later and see how much you’ve grown and changed with time, but it will be worth it. Your first few cakes weren’t perfect, neither will your first few photos! Keep at it. Shoot everything you make, even if it didn’t work out – just like you can learn something from every cake you make, you can learn something from every photo shoot you do. Don’t let someone else do that growth for you. Your brand. Your cakes. Your photography.
  • Light, light, light. That said, I always go for natural light. I have two huge back windows facing east in the back of my house, and I’ve learned when is the best time to shoot without shadows and really good light. I use a lot of white boards for light bounce/balance, and backgrounds from Amazon, Craft Stores, and wherever else I can find them for cheap.
  • Equipment: I used a point-and-shoot for so many years. I still went for it anyway. I was praised for my photography and had to laugh because everyone assumed I was using a DSLR, or an expensive lense. HAH! Nope. A few years ago, I was gifted my friend Natalie’s DSLR EOS REbel T2i, and added on my 50MM lense for a Christmas present and Fotasy ES-68II end.
  • I use Lightroom, PicMonkey, and sometimes just regular Windows Photo Editor (yep) to edit my photos. Some don’t even need editing after I’ve shot them. I’m very particular about the light as is, and not having to edit them a ton to get the look I want.

 

How do you get the best buttercream?

  • I make a ton of American Buttercream, so these tips pertain to that type of buttercream.
  • Buttercream is all about consistency, the ingredients you use to make it, and the process of whipping it up to the right texture.
  • If your buttercream is too thin add more powdered sugar (to taste, of course).
  • If your buttercream is too thick, add in a touch more heavy cream.
  • If your buttercream isn’t light and fluffy, whip it up on a high speed for 2 minutes at most, then turn the mixer to low speed for 30 seconds, or hand stir with a wooden spoon to beat out any air bubbles. 
  • If your buttercream is too warm, place it in the fridge. You want to start off with butter that’s almost cold, but still warm enough you can make a small finger indent if you press into it. 
  • If your buttercream is too sweet, start building your buttercream with more butter, extracts, or heavy cream as your base, then you’ll need less powdered sugar at the end. 
  • If your buttercream is separating, you added too much liquids or extracts, or acidic ingredients to it. 
  • If your buttercream isn’t pipable, you didn’t add enough powdered sugar to have a thick consistency. 

 

Why don’t you post photos of your husband and boys?

  • I respect their privacy. They are my whole world, and not posting about them doesn’t mean I care less about them. I do, however share stories about them associated with my cake recipes, but I don’t usually include my boy’s names, etc. I don’t want random strangers talking to them, finding out where they go to school, finding where they practice basketball when I’m not there, etc. They didn’t ask for their lives to be on the public internet, and I respect the heck out of that.

 

What other cake-makers inspire you?

Subscribe Now

get new posts via email:

©2024 Baking with Blondie. Design by Purr.