Cake Competition....Bronze Medal Baby...

Our class had the option of participating in the Ben E Keith culinary salon/pastry competition this past week. Several of us decided to take the plunge and enter cakes for the competition. As we have not even touched on the part of the syllabus yet in class...we went into this completely blind. At times, I must admit, I wanted to kick our cake into orbit and head for the nearest happy hour. However, we persisted and had amazing results. Of the 5 cakes entered by our team, we brought home 4 medals-- two silver and two bronze. I worked on my cake with my friend/externship buddy Tracey earning a bronze medal. Hooray-- a notch for the ol' resume! Some pictures of the event and our cakes.....

For all that work.....a medal!

The original "plan" for our Mardi Gras cake....note: it's ROUND and covered with fondant.

The round cake takes shape.

Covered in buttercream to adhere the rolled fondant ...

After three attempts....the cake was successfully covered in fondant!

Decorations made of pastillage awaiting coloring.

Fast forward and we are done! While the cake fell off the plate during the 3 hour transport to Conroe, I think the judges could see the hard work that went into such a tedious design.

Another classmate's cake

Alice in Wonderland...another classmate's cake.

Farm cake....another classmate's cake.

Beautiful roses on another classmate's cake.

There were many other entries of all types- sugar, chocolate, plates desserts, etc. here are a few pictures from the salon:

Giant chocolate sculpture

Our medal winning team that worked so hard (and chef Todd!).