YOU GUYS. We have another special VIDEO post today!
Or, if your work computer won't let you view video, keep scrolling for the written version.
Every cake is so wonderful, And suddenly...
it's hard to breathe.
Now and then, I get insecure From all the pain...
(Ow.)
I'm so ashamed.
I am beautiful,
No matter what they say.
Words can't bring me down.
I am beautiful in every single way. Yes, words can't bring me down, oh no.
So don't you bring me down today.
To all your friends, you're delirious. Ice cream cones... to make their horns...
Tryin' hard to make some sense of it. Wait, are those bugles? Is it a cow-duck with horns and a goatee?
Cause you are beautiful, no matter what they say. Words can't bring you down.
You are beautiful in every single way. Words can't bring you down. NoOooOoooOOOooo.... So don't you bring me down today.
No matter what we poo.
No matter what we bake.
And everywhere we go, The suananaaaIIOOOAAAAa NNOOOO NOO NOOooooOO ooooooooo
We are beautiful, no matter what they pay. Camo flower town.
NoooooooOoo.
We are beautiful in every single way. Words can't bring us down. No no no no no mmmm MMMM mm....
So don't you bring me down today.
OooooOOOOUgggnhh... MMmmmnOOOooAAH! Don't you bring me downtooaaaaayyyyyyyyaAAAAAHHHHH
AAAOooooOOhh...
So don't you bring me down..... ughhnnnn....
Today.
Zakes C., Maja, Liz D., Lesley M., DaAn D., Caroline M., Haley H., Geri B., Rachel S., Bob B., Sue S., & Amy B., awoooawoooeeeeoaaaahhhhow. No matter what they say.
Note from john: If you're wondering who's singing in the video, it's our friend Jennifer Dorsman. And yes, she really is that good. Makes you sick, doesn't it?
*****
P.S. Speaking of beauty, I've been slathering snail slime cream on my face for about two weeks now, and so far the best part is telling people about it. :D
I caved when my friend Lisa kept raving about this brand, plus it has over 7,000 5-star ratings on Amazon. They don't hurt the snails to make it, and the cream isn't TOO slimey, so for $20 it's a fun, kooky thing to try. Plus, c'mon, then you get to tell people you use snail cream... ON YOUR FACE.Best party intro evah.
The shiny "mirror cakes" of Olga Noskova have been going viral the past few weeks, and today I am jumping on that shiny, shiny bandwagon, you guys, because LOOKIE:
When I first saw this cake my jaw literally dropped. And that's coming from someone whose JOB is to look at the world's most beautiful cakes.
I thought I'd seen it all.
I WAS WRONG.
Check out this marbling:
And this funky-cool fluting:
Incredibly, Noskova's cakes even look as beautiful inside as they do out:
So how does she do it?
Here's a short video from Noskova's brand new Youtube channel to illustrate:
The "mirror glaze" is a poured on gelatin mixture, and is apparently an old French technique that just isn't used very often. (Although I bet it's about to get a LOT more popular. Ha!)
And while everyone is focusing on that incredible shine, it turns out Nokova has perfected another incredible cake texture:
A velvety matte speckle, which she achieves with a powered sprayer.
Both of her signature textures together:
This is cake art in every sense of the word, but as John pointed out to me, it's cake art that you still want to eat. Somehow Noskova has managed to make her cakes look as delicious as they are beautiful - and we all know that's no small task in the modern cake world.
Head over to Olga's Instagram for sooo much more (it wasn't easy to narrow down my favs!), and then watch her new Youtube channel for hopefully more instructional vids to come.
Happy Sunday, everyone!
*****
P.S. Need a cool gift for the person who has everything? Then how about a card that transforms into a bouquet:
"Ordinary bakers. Extraordinary feats of bad judgment."
[baker's silhouette speaking in disguised voice] "I guess I got a bit carried away with the chocolate drizzle -- you know, it's always a bit of a crap shoot..."
"I made my mother-in-law deliver it."
[whispered]
Confessions...
"...and then I found myself smashing a disco ball on top of it."
[small sob] "I figured the lights would blind anyone who got too close!"
[whispered]
Revelations...
"They loved skiing. Nothing says 'skiing' like giant plastic pickles and shredded Parmesan, right?" [hiccups]
"I didn't realize how bad it was 'til the bride threw it at me."
[whispered]
Disclosures...
"They said they wanted 'steampunk,' so I googled it. Gears, tentacles, balloons - I was all, 'Hey, I got this.'"
"And, boy, did I get it."
[sound of pages flipping] Uh... ah! [whispering]
Formal professions of guilt...
"So then I said, 'hey, you know what'd be cute? Camouflage butterflies."
"But the bride just didn't see it."
Next week... on Confessions of a Master Baker:
"So I figured, put the babies ON the carrots..."
[light behind figures fades to black]
Thanks to Jessica W., Michelle B., Melanie J., Stella P., & Natalie S. for the delicious divulgences.
*****
P.S. Quick Butterfly Chaser to remind you they CAN be super lovely:
They're double-sided and come with both magnets and stickers. Definitely browse the projects in the reviews, there are so many cool ideas - and the set is on sale right now for $9.99!
You ever see a cake and have one of those reactions like: "Ooooh, that's not good. I mean, it could be worse, I guess, but still, really not good. What was it for? ... A wedding?! OH THAT POOR BRIDE."
That's today's cakes.
They're all a bit sad...
A bit lumpy-bumpy...
A bit, "Oh. OH. Um, how... nice?"
When your wedding's "cupcake tower" looks like something you made during the slumber party for your 14th birthday:
Or when there's more wire in your wedding cake than the average 14-year-old's braces:
o.0
You know how in movies when the bad guy lets loose with a machine gun on a wall somewhere, leaving lines of bullet holes that the light shines through?
Imagine the gun shoots roses:
BAM.
(Yes, I know otherwise it's fine. JUST LET ME HAVE THIS.)
And finally, whatever you do, don't think about stretched skin.
Or parsley.
STOP IT.
Thanks to Carrie B., Deanna H., Jimena, Dawn D., Shannon, Britton E., Helen, & Pat J. for lifting our saggy, saggy spirits.
*****
P.S. Speaking of ways to prevent sagging (oh yeah, nailed that segue), this saved my butt during a long painting day recently, so I have a random product recommendation:
This is my new favorite belt, y'all. It basically turns anything with belt loops into an elastic waist. So comfy I forget it's on, slimline so it doesn't show under my t-shirts, and NO BELT BUCKLE to dig into my belly or unbuckle for bathroom breaks. Woohoo!
You know how stretch jeans are forever sliding down when you sit or bend, so you have to keep hitching them back up? No more! I wear this with all my jeans now. It's entirely elastic, so it moves and stretches with you, zero painful digging. I HIGHLY recommend for anyone well endowed with squish in the belly area.
"The Goldmans, everyone! Fifty years today! Aren't they adorable?
"Can't you SEEE-EEE-EE?!?"
[sliding to front of stage on knees]
"You're... ev'ry-thing I HOPED for!"
[grimacing in pain]
"You're
EVERYTHING
I neeeeeeeeee..."
"...eeEEED!"
[winking at waitress]
"You... are... so beautiful..."
"Toooo... meeeeEEEEE."
Thank you, Nia C., Krystal C., Karen R., Julie R., Alison V., and Joshua P. Thank you so much. No, really. Thank you. Really. You're too much. Thank you. Tip your waitress!
*****
P.S. I agree, you COULD do a better job yourself. So have you tried these new silicone "piping bulbs?"
Y'all. Go read the reviews; these things are apparently total game-changers. Easy to fill, clean, no more leaking piping bags, AND they fit all the Wilton metal tips we already have! I don't do much cake decorating these days, but I dopipe caulking for crafts, so I'm excited to try these out.
Quick note that post-by-email and comment-by-email is (sometimes?) failing silently without actually posting right now! I'm pretty sure this is related to last night's shenanigans and will be fixed once Mark can finish the full fix for it, which he's working on, but if you've posted or replied by email in the last 24 hours, fish it out of your sent folder to check if it posted!
EDIT: This should be fixed as of around 7AM EDT! We *believe* everything that was stuck in the plumbing has been sent along to your journal or the comment thread it was meant for; it's definitely not where it was stuck anymore, at least.
When your last name is Hammer, there's really just one way to nail a baby shower cake.
And that way...
...is NOT LIKE THIS.
Aw, crap.
Still, at least everyone can get a chuckle over sh*tty "hamer"s. Imagine being the only one at a baby shower to see something wrong with this cake topper - which, incidentally, ALSO involves nailing things:
o.0
Er, look, I realize my mind's in the gutter often enough to sprout legs and start scurrying, but seriously... HOW DID THE BAKER NOT SEE THIS?
Just pop one in your crisper drawer and the other in your fruit bowl, and these will absorb the ethylene gas that quickens ripening, so all your fruits and veg stay fresh longer. Seems like witchcraft, I know, but go check the thousands of rave reviews: apparently they really work!
Robby has managed to put in a temporary fix for the site errors and things failing to refresh or not showing up where they should! The permanent fix is going to need Mark's experience, and unfortunately -- seriously, this literally never fails -- Mark has been on an international flight all day, because of course he has. (Never. Fails. He and I are not allowed to both take vacation at once.)
The site will work just fine with the temporary fix in place, things just might be a little slow here and there. We'll keep you updated.
We're aware of site traffic issues and are working to fix them for the people who are having problems! (The tactics the damn bot traffic uses are endlessly shifting, and they're really good at looking like real traffic, sigh.)
It's Teacher Appreciation Month, my friends, so if you can read this, thank a teacher! (And if you can't read this, then... uh... wait. Never mind.)
Ahem.
Teachers, whether your subject is:
"Scienc"...
"managent" or "psycology"...
the "Holly Bible"...
or teaching kids their MBCs:
... you get an A+ with us.
Yes, teachers, you labor on through daily trials and temper tantrums, shaping our future generations, spreading knowledge, encouragement, and inspiration, and all for the vastly insufficient reward of that one shining, glorious phrase:
And while some of your students have already served their time:
"Class OFF, buster!"
And others have much, MUCH longer to go:
Please know that you are, without a doubt:
...the "Word's Greates."
And hey, we mean that.
Thanks to Chrissy W., Kristen C., Christy, Anony M., Amy S., Carolina D., Barbara O., & Paul V. for the teaching moment.
It's been a while since we've done a full code push rather than just hotfixes for bugs, so we are well overdue! Depending on availability, we're aiming to do one sometime soon; we'll let you know specifics once we've worked out good timing for everyone who needs to be available.
However! The reason it's been so long is we kept trying to get some of the stuff that's pending to "really finished" instead of just "mostly finished", and then we once again looked around and went "oh no, this is a really big code push with a lot of changes". Those make us nervous, because while we do a lot of testing ourselves, y'all are really creative in how you use the site and we inevitably find a bunch of edge cases when we let you loose on new code with your real-world data!
So, if folks have some spare time in the next few days, it would be a huge help if you could spend half an hour or so using the site the same way you normally do but with the "Site-Wide Canary" beta features flag turned on. Canary mode is a sort of "live testing" mode: it's your real data, but running the most up-to-date code.
Canary mode always does have a few glitches -- there may be missing text strings or errors about missing database properties, which is a limitation of how we run it. We don't need to know about those, but anything else weird that you run into, leave a comment with what you were trying to do and the error message you got.
I'll repeat that the "here be dragons" caution that's on the beta features page: some things may be broken, so don't use it for when you're doing something important. But a few more eyeballs on it before the push will help the push go more smoothly for everyone.
For folks who want to concentrate on what's changing, we haven't finished the second code tour of what's going to be in this push, but the ffirst one has a good chunk of what's going to be going live. (We'll get the second half done ASAP!)
There are no earlier entries to display. This page displays only the most recent 1000 entries posted within the last 14 days.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[syndicated profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/feed.png)
cakewrecks_feed Jun. 11th, 2026 01:00 pm)
![[staff profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user_staff.png){kind=small}
![[site community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/comm_staff.png){kind=small}
