Products You'll Love | My Sweet and Saucy

Archive for the ‘Products You'll Love’ Category

Christmas Time @ Sweet & Saucy Shop

Monday, December 7th, 2009

Well Christmas time has definitely arrived! As you can probably tell from the lack of blog posts we have been BUSY like little elves at the shop lately! Thanksgiving no sooner passed, then it was time for Christmas decor, so some of my sweet staff decided to come in the weekend after Thanksgiving and help me decorate the shop. I was also very lucky to get the chance to go with Carissa from JL Designs to the LA Flower Mart and pic up some decor. Here are some fun photos of us girls in action!

I have to thank photographer and friend, Kristin Eldridge, for taking most of these gorgeous photos! If you have a chance definitely stop by her website…she is an amazing children’s photographer and captures moments that you’ll remember forever!

I bought those fabulous wooden ornaments from one of my favorite stores, Blue Windows, which is on 2nd Street in Long Beach…if you are in the area definitely stop by!

Here are some photos I took of the arrangements and sugar cookie ornamants!

Of course we needed to get in the holiday spirit with a new Christmas inspired dessert, so this past week we introduced our new Chocolate Peppermint Cupcakes. They have a chocolate cupcake base, peppermint buttercream, and are topped of with peppermint bark. We also debuted our new Peppermint Brownie Cake Lollipops which are just as delightful tasting!

Another uber exciting announcement that I am so happy to write about it the new addition of Carissa’s amazing talent to my little shop. jldesigns-holiday collection logo 2 I knew when she told me of her new venture that I had to be a part of it somehow and miraculously it all worked out! Carissa will be selling her botanical pieces in my shop starting this Friday, so stop by and check them out! She will also be at the shop all day Monday to chit chat and go over her designs with you in person. Here is how she describes her new venture…

“well folks…

this has been on my mind for some time now…itching and nagging… this idea of creating high-end, botanical pieces that fit the JL DESIGNS vibe, but are also sustainable…i figured i have been putting this off long enough and that i should just pony up and launch a line already! ” So without further ado here they are…

732406402_063-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732404935_034-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732405449_045-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732405208_040-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732406013_056-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732403912_014-2009-12-04-jl-designs

732405350_043-2009-12-04-jl-designs

So I know what you are thinking…YOU HAVE TO HAVE ONE!!! Well even if you aren’t in SoCal, don’t worry she is actually selling them nationwide! Check out her site here!

Also if you are wondering who took Carissa’s lovely photos look no further than the talented husband and wife team of Gabriel Ryan Photographers…two of my personal favs!

Tags: cake lollipops long beach ca, chocolate peppermint cupcakes, christmas cupcakes long beach ca, christmas decorated sugar cookies, christmas gifts long beach ca, desserts long beach ca, gabriel ryan photography, jl designs, Melody Brandon Sweet & Saucy Shop, sustainable florals, sweet and saucy shop long beach ca
Posted in Christmas Ideas, Cookies, Cupcakes, Dessert Studio, Desserts, Products You'll Love | 9 Comments »

Featured on UtterlyEngaged!!!

Thursday, August 27th, 2009

Well, as most of you can tell from my lack of posts I am barely hanging onto my sanity! The shop is basically all I sleep, breathe, and eat these days! I knew it would be a lot of work, but let me say that it is really A LOT of work starting up a dessert studio! I am loving every second…well, maybe not every second (the late night dishes, lack of sleep, and nervous stomach aren’t too much fun), but overall I am really, really happy with how everything is going! I have so much to blog about, but before I try to do all of that I had to let everyone know about my absolute favorite online wedding magazine…Utterly Engaged! You must check it out…even if you are already married or not in the wedding time of your life, the magazine is filled with gorgeous photos, interesting people, and fun ideas. I was beyond excited when they asked if they could feature my new studio and had a blast when they came out for the photo shoot. I of course had to get my adorable nieces and handsome little brother in on the fun…they are my cutest advertisement! A big thanks to Eva Chiou, Lucia Dinh and Henny Setiadi, they are the talented ladies behind all the magic. I also can’t forget to thank Brandon Kidd who was the amazing photographer who shot all the photos…if you are in the Southern California area and need a photographer I definitely recommend checking him out. Well here is the link to the whole magazine and sneak peak at my feature! Utterly Engaged Magazine!

cover_aug_09_2l

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_1l21

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_1r2

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_2l1

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_2r1

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_3l1

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_3r1-1

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_4l

hg_08_sweetandsaucyshop_4r

And like I said there are tons of uber talented contributors so check them out!

contributors_july09_1

contributors_july09_2

Tags: bakery long beach ca, brandon kidd photographer, cupcakes long beach ca, decorated sugar cookies long beach, dessert studio long beach, melody brandon sweet and saucy shop, mini desserts long beach ca, sweet and saucy shop long beach ca, utterly engaged magazine, wedding cakes long beach ca
Posted in Cakes, Dessert Studio, Products You'll Love, Wedding Ideas | 12 Comments »

Sugar Flowers & Bridal Showers

Friday, March 27th, 2009

Well, as you know my sister and I are trying to learn how to make all sorts of sugar flowers. We have become quite obsessed with them and my credit card bill definitely proves it! I have only actually taken one class from Ron Ben-Israel on how to make sweet pea sugar flowers and the rest we have learned through books and watching videos from Nicholas Lodge. Sugar flowers are very tedious and require a lot of patience (and tools), but they are also one of the more artistic aspects of cake decorating. The cake was buttermilk cake with white chocolate mousse buttercream and fresh strawberries…yummy! We made it for a recent bridal shower and were very excited to put our sugar flower knowledge to the test and create a gorgeous cake for the bride-to-be!

We had such a great time making these peonies, berries, parrot tulips, and butterflies! Definitely let me know which one you liked the best!

Tags: bridal shower cakes, bridal shower cakes long beach ca, parrot tulip sugar flowers, peony sugar flowers, sugar butterflies, sugar flowers, sweet and saucy shop long beach ca, wedding cakes long beach ca
Posted in Bridal Shower Ideas, Cakes, Desserts, Products You'll Love, Wedding Ideas, sugar flowers | 52 Comments »

Lots of Goodies

Monday, March 16th, 2009

LIfe as usual is quite busy! I have so many random photos of different orders that I have recently done, so I thought I would just do a post and shove them all in here! They were all a lot of fun to do and I hope you enjoy the photos! Definitely give me your feedback if you have a chance…I love to hear your thoughts and opinions!

First off is a recent wedding that I did. They venue was the Marvimon in Los Angeles…definitely my favorite venue yet! If you are getting married in the Southern California area you have to check them out! The bride and groom were such a pleasure to work with and I absolutely loved their whole wedding look! The bride looked gorgeous (I am so bummed I didn’t get a photo of here in her adorable dress)! The cake was buttermillk cake with lemon cream filling and fresh raspberries. The cake was covered in vanilla buttercream and decorated with fresh flowers, black satin ribbon, and tiny white dots.

As you can see from the photo, the middle tier is twice the size of a normal tier. It is basically two separate cakes stacked on top of each other and dowelled in the middle. Then I just frosted it as one cake tier. It is cut the same way you would cut any other cake…you just cut the first cake and then take off the cardboard base and continue cutting the next cake.

For their favors they decided to go with cake ball lollipops. They choose buttermilk cake dipped in white chocolate and red velvet cake dipped in dark chocolate. We then bagged and tied all 115 bags and put their monogram on the front. I think these are such a great wedding favor and are quite tasty too!

These next treats were made for some of our corporate clients. We printed their logo on edible frosting sheets and then placed them on our delicious sugar cookies and also made matching cupcakes to go with them. For the cupcakes we placed the edible frosting sheet on a disc of fondant to give it stability.

This next cupcake was done for a friend of my sister’s. She threw her friend a graduation party and wanted some cupcakes for the celebration. I will be selling these fabulous liner’s along with many others on my website shortly! If you want to order some right away just leave me a comment and I can email you all the information.

This next cupcake is from a small birthday order that I did. I used a chocolate transfer sheet to get the fun design on top and then just colored the frosting and added some sugar sparkle to finish the look off.

This cake was made for one of my little brother’s friends. He had a rock climbing birthday party and his mom wanted to surprise him with a fun cake to go along with it! Here is a quick photo demo of how I did it.

And lastly, this final cake my sister and I made for an auction at my old high school. The cake was red velvet with cream cheese frosting and then I covered the cakes in white fondant. My sister made the gorgeous sugar flower and decorated the cake with black fondant lace.

Well, hope you enjoyed the random post of photos!

Tags: cake ball lollipops, chocolate transfer sheets, cupcakes long beach ca, edible frosting sheets, fondant covered cakes, fondant molds, kids birthday cakes long beach ca, logo cookies long beach ca, marvimon venue, rock climbing cake, special occasion cakes long beach ca, specialty sugar cookies, specialty sugar cookies long beach los angeles, sugar flowers, wedding cakes long beach ca, wedding cakes los angeles ca, wedding cakes orange county ca, wedding favors long beach ca
Posted in Baby Shower Ideas, Bridal Shower Ideas, Cakes, Children's Birthday Ideas, Cookies, Cupcakes, Desserts, Products You'll Love, Wedding Ideas, sugar flowers | 44 Comments »

Princess Birthday Cake & Barbie Desserts

Monday, March 9th, 2009

This weekend was such a whirlwind of events…weddings, auctions, baby showers, and bridal shows, but with the help of my family I SURVIVED! I actually have lots of things to blog about and am so happy I finally have spare minute to blog! I absolutely love when clients want to order a custom cake with all the details and so when I got the chance to make this cake for a precious girl turning one I couldn’t wait. The cake was a lot of work…well, more like the crown was A LOT of work, but afterwards is was definitely worth it!

Here is the step-by-step process of the cake! First I covered the three tiers in white, light pink, and deep pink. Then I used an impression mat to make the dot imprint and cross-hatch imprint. You just push the mat onto the fondant while it is still soft and then continue to follow the pattern around the cake.

I then used my pearl maker to make pearls to go around each cake layer.

Next I added a ribbon band and made two different bows for the tiers.

I used royal icing to pipe little hearts on the cross-hatch pattern and then painted them with silver luster dust.

I then added the bands and bows to the tiers and sprayed the whole cake with pearl luster dust.

Lastly I added my hand-made crown…which was very tedious by the way! I had many problems with it not drying and collapsing, but finally (with my prayers) it stayed up!

A few weeks back I also got the great opportunity to make cookies for Mattel! They were having a creative meeting for the upcoming 50th anniversary of Barbie and had me make cookies with their printed images on them and some cupcakes to go along with it. I had a blast making them and seeing all of their great ideas!

I would love to hear what you thought about the cake and cookies!

Tags: barbie cookies, barbie cupcakes, barbies 50th anniversary desserts, princess birthday cake, specialty cakes cookie long beach ca, tiara cake
Posted in Baby Shower Ideas, Cakes, Children's Birthday Ideas, Cookies, Cupcakes, Desserts, Products You'll Love | 64 Comments »

Valentine’s Cupcake Tutorial

Tuesday, February 10th, 2009

Sorry for all of you who were waiting for the cupcake tutorial…I know I have been slow to post lately, but I really am going to try to get a couple good posts in this week. Definitely check back in soon to see the post on all of my Valentine’s cookies that my sister and I made. Anyways, down to business…

To make cupcakes that have impressions on the fondant you need to either purchase impression mats/molds or scrapbooking stamps. You can find the impression mats/molds at Caljava International or Global Sugar Art. I purchase most of my scrapbooking stamps from the company Autumn Leaves which you can find at Target or Martha Stewart just came out with some good stamps which you can find at Michaels Craft Store.

So you need to roll your fondant or sugarpaste out to your desired thickness (1/8″-1/4″), rubbing a little Crisco on the fondant if it gets sticky or dry and then press it either into the mat or press the stamp onto the fondant. Once you have the pattern on the fondant, you can do many things with it…you can cut out individual shapes, cover your whole cupcakes with it, or use it as patterned ribbon on your cupcake. There is no limit to your creativity!

Just a hint: if you are making individual fondant cutouts to sit on top of your frosting don’t use cream cheese frosting since it has a property in it that makes the fondant melt. Also let your fondant accent dry a little before you put it on your frosting so it holds its shape and doesn’t bend. And lastly, if you are covering the whole cupcake with the fondant use it immediately after cutting out the circle shape since it will dry quickly and cause cracking.

To cover the whole cupcake, but still get a lot of good frosting in the cupcake, cut a hole in the center of the cupcake with either a pairing knife or apple corer and then fill it with the frosting. Then cover the top of the cupcake with a round layer of frosting, but making sure not to get too close to the edges since the fondant will squeeze it out of the sides once applied. When picking your circle cutter find one that is slightly large than the top of the cupcake so there is enough to completely cover the sides.

I also used another impression mold to make the buttons for the cupcakes. I got this at Caljava International too.

Here are some of the combined elements on the cupcakes.

To make the cupcake with the “XOX” I used letter cutters from Nicholas Lodge’s. For these particular cutters you have to roll the fondant or sugarpaste extremely thin, preferably through a pasta machine first before cutting out.