Auctioned Off

Last week, I had the opportunity to make a cake for a pie auction at my church.  Every year, this auction is held to raise money for short term missions trips taken by the middle school and high school students.  Though the name is officially "pie auction," they auction off cakes as well and I was asked to contribute one of my cakes.  I haven't done a lot of cakes lately, so when I saw that I had the weekend free, I jumped at the chance!  Being able to design and decorate a big cake while supporting a good cause was the best!

I wanted this cake to represent fall a little bit without being too obviously fall in color or design.  I have been really drawn to geometric designs on cakes for awhile and lately have wanted to experiment with wafer paper, which is really hot right now.  I took this opportunity to do both!  I brought in the geometric element with the hexagons on the middle tier, and the wafer paper with the flowers.

The colors were a little bit fall while avoiding the typical browns and reds.  I love the browns and reds of fall, but just didn't want that for this cake.  So, I chose a navy blue (so hard to color!), gray, turquoise and bright orange for a little accent.  I really love the way these colors turned out!  They coordinate so well together and the orange is the perfect pop of color throughout.

I loved working with the wafer paper!  This is obviously a fantasy flower and doesn't correspond at all to any real flower.  I simply cut the wafer paper just like I would regular paper, cutting five equal tear-drop shapes for each flower.  I then cut a slit in the pointed end of each piece and overlapped the edges ever so slightly, sticking them together with a drop of water, so that each petal would be cupped a little bit.  I then used water very lightly again to attach all of the petals together and topped the center with a small ball of the orange fondant.  Each flower was attached to the edge of the cake with another ball of fondant and some water.

I really love the way this cake turned out!  The clean lines and geometric design are just what I love in cake design right now.  It perfectly represents me and my personal cake style!

Underneath the pretty covering are three different types of cakes.  The bottom tier (8-inches around) was dark chocolate cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream and dark chocolate ganache.  The middle tier (a tall 6-inch round) was vanilla cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream and white chocolate ganache.  The top tier (4-inches) was chai-spiced cake with vanilla swiss meringue buttercream and cinnamon which chocolate ganache.  I think the top tier cake was my favorite.  We all tasted the scraps from that one (I had nearly a whole layer left over) and agreed that it was one of the best I've ever made.  Yum!  I hope whomever won this cake enjoyed all the yummy flavors too!

This has been one of the most fun and most satisfying cakes to make.  It really is one of my favorites!  I am happy to say that I think it also was able to bring in a good amount for the missions at church too!  A win for all!

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look!  What is your favorite style in cake design?  What flavor is your favorite?