Bridal Shower for Soon-To-Be Wife, Merry!

I was so happy when I heard that Merry, one of my close friends and certainly one of my first friends in the US, got engaged to her boyfriend, Jefry. Merry has always been that boyish kinda girl, which is cool. I still remember the time when all of us with her brother and sister and my twin sister (did I tell you that I have a twin?), would hang out together after school and we'd go to a bubble tea places, cheap Chinese restaurants and all. We don't do that (at least not that much) anymore since we've all grown up now, but we would still go way back.

So, imagine how excited I was when I heard this, so excited that I started thinking about her bridal shower immediately (and wedding cake too but that's for later), which kinda made me the default to coordinate it. I wanted to make it look as nice and as pretty as it can get. I kinda enjoy all the planning for events like this, I've always been the kind of person who loves spreadsheet, timetable, and everything, I love to see visually how things would flow and such. So, there I was planning, budgeting (the hardest part), arranging the bridal shower on a giant spreadsheet that contains everything you can possibly imagine, from very detail budgeting and pricing, menu, person who's in charge, favor, table setting, centerpiece, guest list, you name it, it's all there.

The original plan was to have an outdoor garden lunch but unfortunately, we found out earlier in the week that it would rain that weekend, bummer! So, the plan has to be changed to an indoor lunch. It also happen that in the same week as the bridal shower, I "had" to go on a last-minute vacation to Hawaii, which left me only two days to decide what cake I would make, the decoration, what favor, buy ingredients, gifts, and finalizing everything else. Oh yes, it was hectic, not a pretty situation, but thankfully there are always friends who are willing to help.

note: above photos are courtesy of nana

It was raining and a bit windy, but it didn't stop us from gearing up for the party. We had a wonderful decorating, thanks to Irene, the master of all creativity. The color theme for this shower is white, green and brown. The wedding itself is gonna be in bright purple and silver but we wanted the shower to have different color scheme. I think white, green, and brown has a warmth feeling to it, especially in the Fall season. We also had a very satisfying pasta lunch made by Merry's aunt. It was a bit sad when we had to tear down the decoration when the time of renting the place was up, it was too pretty. Merry looked wonderful that day, she had a trial make-up session with her salon for her wedding, so it was the perfect timing!

I made a traditional Indonesian cake, also known as "Lapis Surabaya" or "Spiku", as seen here, and brownie for the favor. I don't have a picture of the brownie inside the box as we had no more time, but I was determined to make it again, this time all dressed up with the ice cream and sauce! I'll post the recipe then as I had quite a number of people requesting the recipe for the brownie after the shower.

passion fruit drink

So there Merry, I wish you a wonderful beginning for your journey ahead, so sad that you will have to move after getting married, but hey, LA is not that far anyway :), we'll go visit :). Congratulations and big hug for you!

The Long-Awaited Baby Shower Party

This is what occupied my mind mostly for the last 2 months, and it's where all my energy and time went to for the last 2-3 weeks, it's this baby shower.

This time, it was for my own brother and sister-in-law, they've been trying for a while and they've finally been blessed with soon-to-be baby girl. It was only appropriate if I want to throw them the perfect baby shower for their first one. That is why the planning was happening for a whole 2 months from the decoration, food, facility, place, guest, theme, etc. to make everything perfect (or so I hope). My sister-in-law, J, has a very cheerful and bright personality, she likes all things colorful, so it was a no-brainer either that the theme is green-yellow-orange color and Spring, that includes butterflies, bees, flowers.

The party was at one of our friends, D's house. He has a wonderful house with pool area, which is nice so that people can also hang out in the backyard. I was trying to make everything perfect from the food to the decoration, and fortunately we're surrounded by talented friends to make an under-budget party looks like a really well-done one! Thanks to Irene for being in charge of the whole decoration, she's a gem. She knows how to take a party to another level. With hanging paper pom-poms, grass, flowers, she made the event completely gorgeous, beyond my expectations! Special thanks to Cika too for all the printing labels and tags, it's more than fabulous!! Thanks to Nana for helping me made the figurines for the cake :). For everybody who helped with the food, crafts, favors, they're super talented people.

After deciding on the food, and the other details, I can finally concentrate on the desserts. Since this blog is mainly about baking, I'll concentrate more on the dessert part :). Dessert table was a must at this party, it's not even an option as we know how much Joan loves desserts. Heck, I try to have dessert table at every party I'm organizing :). I'm no dessert table expert, I'm just starting and I can't say that the previous dessert tables I made were perfect because let's be honest, they weren't. I tried to pick desserts that fit the theme, which involves some yellow, green, and orange colors. Mango, pistachio, passion fruit are the main flavors for this, I was thinking about lemon but the mother-to-be is not really a fan of the sour stuff. The choice of the dessert changed daily, mostly because some of the ingredients I needed wasn't available at that time.

So here's the menu of the dessert table:
- Mini chocolate cupcakes with mango and pistachio buttercream
- Candy-coated marshmallow lollipops
- Mango cheesecake on a brownie base
- Passion fruit pudding in petite glasses
- Green tea cookies
- Mango macarons
- Pistachio macarons
- Passion fruit macarons
- 2-tiered cake (mascarpone cheesecake and raspberry jelly filling for the top tier, and mocha praline cake for the bottom tier)
- almond meringue cookies (by our friend, Sukma)

Favor:
- Spring chicken cakepops (inspired by this wonderful creation by bakerella, made with chocolate cake, buttercream, and rum flavoring)

Drinks:
- Water with mint and lime slices
- Mango punch

Entree (no pictures):
- Indonesian wedding salad
- Chicken satay
- Spicy tofu with lemongrass, jalapeno, and tomatillo
- Indonesian chicken curry
- Fried noodle
- Meatball Soup

It wasn't all smooth sailing making this happened, time is the enemy as predicted and this time, the hot weather added to the list. It was super hot that particular week and my AC wasn't working. All the frosting are soft and became a gooey mess, the macarons are not all perfect due to the humid weather, the candy coating on the marshmallow doesn't set, the cakepops kept falling off due to the frosting not set, everything that can go wrong, went wrong. It was frustrating especially since I had to make the wedding anniversary cake at the same time too. I took Friday off of work so that I can work in the kitchen. I basically stood in the kitchen from 10am-11pm non-stop for two straight days plus late nights here and there, and even that still wasn't enough time.

For the dessert table, I wanted to have some dimension, which is why I used some boxes and covered them with yellow tablecloth for the jars, the cake, and the marshmallow pops. Unfortunately, we didn't have three jars of the same size for the macarons so we had to make do with one smaller one. I did put the small one in the middle but it was completely covered by the cake in front of it, so I had to switch the position.

Despite all the problems that happened, I was actually surprised myself that everything came together nicely. It was nice having an outdoor and indoor party so that people doesn't have to cramped up in a room, which can be a problem when there are about 70 people (including kids) walking around. The breeze from the backyard was also nice and the kids are playing around the pool. Thanks to all the friends who helped making this party happened. The food were superb, the decor was super nice, and as far as the dessert, I think everybody enjoyed it. And the most important thing is that D and J (my brother and sis-in-law) were surely happy and we wish them the best for the upcoming bundle of joy. I hope this shower can send them off nicely to be a good parent-to-be.

After this party, I was determined not to bake for a month! But I guess I can't stay off the kitchen for too long. Regardless of every problem we encountered in making this happens, I totally enjoy it and can't wait for the next special occasion to make a better one.

Hello!

Spring-Inspired Birthday Cake for Two!

Yes, I am still on a Spring fever just in case you're wondering :). It was only natural when two people had their birthday on the same exact day, one is my brother, and the other one is one of my friends, S, I immediately thought of a Spring cake! The gorgeous weather we've had for 2 weeks (it's back to rain and cold now) is also worth a celebration in a form of a cake.

The birthday fell on last Wednesday, and yes they both were born at the same day, which is an advantage for me really so that I don't have to make two cakes :). Well honestly, the Spring theme wasn't the first that came in my mind at first. It was so hard finding a design that fits both guy and girl, I wanted something natural and since I was so in the mood of the warm weather, I decided to once again go for the Spring theme! It is a bit weird that I used to dislike green color, one of the least favorite color, but now it is definitely one of my favorites. Same thing with polkadot, I used to hate it so much (yes, hate) but now I think they're really cute and I'm loving them! It's interesting how preference change by age :).

Anyways, I probably didn't do a really good job covering the cake with fondant, especially the top tier. My excuse? well, it was on weekday, it was late at night and I was super tired, bla bla bla.... but bottom line is, I didn't do a good job with the covering :(. The butterfly was made from royal icing that I've already had (make my life a lot easier) and so was the bee. It is a very very simple design, but I love it! The finished cake looks somewhat girly still, probably it's because of the pink flowers, but I don't mind (and I hope the birthday boy didn't either :D)

We brought the cake to the restaurant and it is so sad to think that the cake was destroyed (read:cut) in a matter of minutes after 6-8 hours of work, but I guess that's the way it works, unless I want to preserve it forever :). This is gonna be a short post since I'm exhausted with too many events at the moment. It is exciting and exhausting at the same time.

You know what, come to think of it, I made a similar birthday cake for them last year here. It was a cherry blossom theme which was so much inspired by the Spring weather. I guess I'm that predictable, huh? and they will just have to live with Spring cake every year then :). I mean who would not be excited to finally wear sandals and shorts outside? Certainly not me :). I will post the picture of them both later here, they looked almost like a twin :)

Hachiko Turns 2!!!

Who's Hachiko? It's the name of my brother's dog. Yes, a dog. Remember this post? She turns two last Tuesday!! which is 14 years old in human years. You might wonder, what's the huss and fuss about a dog's birthday? well, truth be told, so do I :D. They said last year (my brother and my SIL) that this is ONLY for her first birthday and that's it, no more celebration after that, but guess what? I guess they can't help it :). It's probably another excuse for us to have a fun gathering in a weekday, and a cake of course!!! Hachiko is a really sweet dog, she's really cute, smart, curious, and she likes to pretend to be brave :), no wonder we love him so much.

Can't you tell that I'm in a spring mood lately? The lemon tart, the pink cake, and this yellow-green cake! I am definitely excited for Spring to come! Although we still haven't had the perfect spring weather yet, but we're starting to see more sunshine, the day is noticeably longer, daylight saving time begin next week . I picked the yellow and green theme on purpose too, for spring theme! I also thought it would make the cake looks brighter and more cute :). I think this design would be great for little kids' birthday too with probably a little kid figurine as well.

I was planning on making a simple cake, nothing complicated since again, this is for a dog, it falls on Tuesday, I only have Monday early morning and night after work to make it. At first, fondant seems to be impossible considering the time, but last weekend, a bunch of us girls were trying our hands on making Hachi figurine, while the guys are watching a movie in the living room (what a bunch of slackers :D). So, after all the time spent making the figurine, it was only appropriate to make a fondant cake, a 6" round probably, but then I thought it won't be enough to feed about 15 people. So, change of plan, I made 8" sponge base and the buttercream on Monday morning and trying to get off work as early as I can in the evening and start assembling, fill and frost, fondant, etc until it finished at midnight. It is a big cake, and probably too much for a dog (size and decoration-wise), but why not as well make it better if we can do it with a little extra effort, right?

We had lots of fun enjoying Hachi's cake, and a really yummy meal made by our beloved friends. Special thanks to Nana, Marlene, and Annette, Della, and Irene for helping out with the hachi figurine, alf-looking and bear-looking dog figurines. And no, the sheep and the mummy figurines don't belong in this cake guys, that would be for some other cake in the future :). We also watched movie "Hachiko-a dog story", a very sad story about a faithful dog, that's where my brother's dog's name came from. The DVD came out yesterday, the same exact day on Hachi's birthday! What a nice coincidence! Most of the girls were tearing up watching the movie, the guys were probably just pretending to be strong and make excuses to go to the restroom and go upstairs :D.

Hachiko and the proud parents

Surprise!!!