Sunday 9 June 2013

Oh. My. Smurf-ness.

So word got out. I don't know how this happened. I blame the internet.

Apparently someone found out that I make cakes. Perhaps it was the photos. Or the recent promotion of my Facebook page. Or the fact that when people say "what you do with yourself?" my husband jumps in and says "indulges an obsession with baked goods, butter, and enough sugar that it represents the harvest of small Latin American countries."

But he's a jerk, so I ignore him :p

I've attempted to make Smurf cupcakes before (earlier this year for Neighbour day), and so already knew the areas I needed to improve on if I was to try those again. Like, I made notes and all. It's not an addiction. I can quit any time I want.

But this was an order. An order for Smurfs.
A cake. A mushroom house. Fondant. Papa.

I sketched the idea I'd had (for a cake & cupcakes set-up):

This is a representation of the Smurf Village in grass.
Husband says it looks like Gargamel finally set fire to it. 
I had visualised this again and again so that I knew exactly what I was going to do. It then came time to make it. The cake and mushroom house were fairly simple things to cover with fondant... For the mushroom house, I baked in a ramekin and a small glass mixing bowl:


Meanwhile, I had this crazy idea for the cupcakes! Smurf head cake pops attached to cupcakes! It was an idea so crazy it could work (and look great - I'd already imagined the success- until Husband said this went well with the "burning down the village" theme); I was taking a risk, though, as I had never made cake pops before (though have always been keen to start trying). I rolled out balls of white fondant at 15g each to make the hats. These were pretty easy (I did watch a YouTube tutorial however). Then used the cake pop tray upside down and covered with cling wrap, as their drying platform, so that they would still be the same shape:

Smurf Hats. Not albino nipples. Husband. 
So far, I had this:
Knock Knock. Who's There?
Gargamel.
Gargamel Who?
Gargamel set fire to your village.
Time to attempt the cake pops Smurf heads! As much as I wanted 30 of these, I am happy that I had managed 10 decent ones before the chocolate lost its smoothness (N.B. you need special colouring ingredients if you want to colour white chocolate! And lots of spare white chocolate melts)... The hats were attached, the eyed, noses, and ears were glued on, and these balls of chocolate and sugar goodness were now looking like those little blue make-believe creatures we all love. Well, the heads of them anyway:

Youuu... Ought-a beee... Decapitated.
But because I only had 10, I needed to quickly come up with Plan B for the rest of the cupcakes! So, using some dark green, white, & red fondant, a star cookie cutter, and fudge frosting, I created some mini mushroom houses, on patches of green 'grass'. Then with fudge frosting, I drew on their doors. It totally worked with the theme, though, because now there will be a Smurf village!

Switching back and forth from the cupcakes to the cake, I found myself wondering _____. ... That's not a mistype. I don't even know what I was wondering at this point. Was I wondering if I was a Martian princess sent here to bake until the world reached universal peace?

I threw the camera at Husband and said "make yourself useful, and make my Smurfs look amazing on film." Thirty seconds later, I could hear him near the table saying "you're a llama, you're a tiger, oh yeah, give me pouty, more pouty, NO! NO!" in a bad Austin Powers impersonation. Four children... I have four children. Not three and a husband.

"How the heck do I fit in there? My head's bigger than the door!"
The last things I needed to do was ice the cupcakes, attach the Smurfs & mushroom houses, and paint a birthday message on the top of the mushroom house that I'd later added white spots to.

My house had now exploded in a fine mist of flour, fondant colouring, rolling pins, and icing sugar. Husband wiped down the bench and the red colouring got all through the sponge. Then he answered the door when our neighbour knocked and told them he was just cleaning up all the blood... He's lucky I don't believe in divorce.

But 10 hours of obsession later, and we were ready for delivery.
Giant Smurf heads, and teeny tiny mushroom houses :)


See? It's grass. Not fire after all... Totally kept it PG. 
Here's a photo of the set-up from the party:

OK, so someone did light a fire next to the house... But it wasn't me. 
 La, la, lala, la la; Haaappy birthday Shaheer!

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