Everything is Broken!

 Looks like my Grandpa's backyard...

Everything in the bakery department is broken in some way. Everything we have is old as sin and falling apart. We have three proofers and only one works fully. The other one struggles on, pittering about like the proofer-that-could. For the uniniciated, a proof is like a sauna for dough. It just makes the dough rise faster. Normally, bread is allowed to proof over night, but in this day and age we use proofers. They're easier, cleaner, and faster than the old fashion method. Or it would be if they did not have these episodes. And if you don't wash them regularly BOY can they rank up a stink. Trust me. I have burned nose hairs inhaling that stench.

Then there is a the bread slicer. This particular piece of human ingenuity is probably my biggest peeve as far as defaulting equipment. You see, the bread slicer is essentially a lever controlled arm that pushed a loaf of Italian bread into a wall of moving serrated blades. It's a really old model compared to the more modern designs, most of which are designed so that a two year old can safely operate it. Ours? You need to wear a chain mail glove JUST to handle the bread into it just in case your fingers get too close and those scary blades decide they would very might like to bite you. And don't think you're safe because you have that glove on either! I turned it on once and one of the rusty blades FLEW OFF and hit my arm. Luckily the dull side hit so I wasnot cut, but still. Scary shit, man. I have cut myself only once on the slicer though and is was bad enough to wish horrible things on that shitty piece of pooh. It's noisy too! Imagine pieces of rusty metal and gears shaking and squealing at a decibel just barely below your level of tolerance.

We also have a pizza oven which no longer works so now it's just a giant $10,000 egg timer and storage unit.

Our main oven operates as such: the oven racks have tacks on top where you push them onto another track in the oven hooks to a rotating dais. It lifts the rack and spins so the bread is cooked evenly from all sides and you don't have to rotate it manually. Our oven sucks. It's old, the steaming function barely works, and it likes to stop spinning at random times so when the timer goes off and you go to pull the rack out, you have bread that's burnt on one side and raw on the other. Our oven acts like someone with Alzheimer's. All of a sudden it'll forget what it's doing and the heat will stop or it will stop spinning. I would LOVE to kick the freaking window in.

And for the love of god will you people be more careful with the airbrush gun? Those needles are expensive and I'm sick of spending ten minutes EVERY DAY trying to straighten the bent needle tip out.

Our store is a the farthest out from most of the other locations, we're a good hour's drive from the next store so we're always the last for everything. New equipment mostly. Except audits. We always seem to be the first in line for those. Those higher ups just can't wait o tell us how shitty a job we're doing with the complete lack of resources they provide us with.

New Rules

I came into work this morning to find a cake order that made me rage. It was for a lady who had been calling about a cake for almost a month now, asking what kind of decorations we could do. Originally, she wanted to see if we did the edible images, she had a logo she wanted on the cake. We don't have the printer for it. I told her to bring the logo in and if it was simple enough, I could do it in icing. She assured me it was a simple logo.

She apparently came in while I was off that day and placed the order with my coworker who now mostly works in the Deli, but helps out in the Bakery. The cake order I received was a 1/2 chocolate cake with white buttercream icing, two complex logos, and an American flag (wavy). Oh! And checkered pattern around the sides.

This is not cake boss. I do not have the resources for a cake like this! I cannot spend an hour drawing checkers on a cake! And those logos? HOW THE HELL CAN YOU SAY THOSE ARE SIMPLE?! Varied layers of color at a slant with intermingled lines! And a red circle with TINY TINY TINY writing. I would never have taken this order. Had I taken the order, I would have told the lady I could manage ONE of the logos at most. I tried both phone numbers she gave us and no one answered either. 

The best part is not only did my coworker take this monstrosity of an order, but she undercharged the customer. By $12. When I free hand draw, I charge a kit price which is $6. THREE pictures is $18 extra so her price SHOULD have been $52.99. But it was $40.99.

I was PISSED, but I went ahead and did the cake as best I could. I wish I was in the frame of mind to take a picture of it, but I was so annoyed that my coworker would take this order I kind of blacked out from rage.

When the customer picked the cake up she was visibly disappointed about the lack of checkered patterns, but I told her that we don't do decorations on the sides because they have a tendency to fall off. I refuse to do them. Plus it's Halloween. I go through black icing like it's sugar free pastries at a Diabetes convention.

She was nice and courteous but then whined to everyone up front about how much she hated her cake. My boss refused to give it to her for free. If she wanted it, she would pay full price. We don't play that "whine and cry and get a free cake" game anymore. People started abusing it and would come in every few weeks and pull that shit. You're not a child in need of a pacifier. If you don't want the cake, we'll hold onto it and serve it out for samples.

So we have two new rules:

1) When taking a cake order, take it as if you were the one who would have to do it. I know I can do some neat stuff with icing, but I'm not Kary Vincent.





2) All complex orders MUST be approved by either the Bakery manager or myself.

Recipe - Chocolate Lemon Tart

  This is not a picture of my tart. I just needed a photo representation of what you should expect to see. My tart looks just like it though...

I am taking a vacation up to visit relatives in Michigan, many of which I have never met. We are also finally placing my late Grandfather's ashes on his family plot, next to his parents and siblings. So it's half funeral half impromptu family reunion. So I decided to bake a tart to bring with me.

For the pastry you will need:

2 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup sugar
1 1/2 sticks of unsalted butter - chilled and cubed
1 tbsp cold whipping cream
1 large egg yolk
a tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla

Place dry ingrediants into food processor and blend. Then place half of your chilled butter cubes into the food processor and pulse until you no longer see hunks of butter. Add the last half and pulse until your mixture resembles a coarse meal.

Add the wet ingredients and pulse until you see moist clumps starting to appear. Pour the mixture onto a clean work surface (preferably a cold marble counter top) and form the dough into a ball. Wrap it in plastic wrap and set in fridge to rest for at least one hour.

Preheat your oven to 375 F. I recommend using a tart pan for this recipe, one with a detachable bottom for you to pop the tart out with. Pull your dough from the fridge and allow to warm up just a bit so it's easier for you to work with. Roll your dough out and fill your tart pan, pressing it down into the groves of the edges. Try not to work the dough too much or it will melt the butter and make your crust tough. If you feel like you may have overworked it, pop it into the freezer for five minutes before putting it directly into the oven.

Watch your tart. Start it out on 20 minutes and bake further in 5 minute intervals. Things like the weather, your oven, and altitudes effect baking so keep a close eye on your tart shell. You want a lightly brown crisp shell. If it appears white, it's not done.

Chocolate Lemon Ganache:

12 oz semi-sweet chocolate. Chips or finely chopped. (Use quality chocolate and you will be rewarded.)
3/4 whipping cream
1 small lemon

Zest your lemon into a bowl and set aside. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice from one half into another bowl.

Set your cream in a  sauce pan over high heat. When you start to see the cream bubble, take off the heat, and pour in your chocolate and with a wire whisk, stir until you get a cohesive mixture. You should not see any clumps of chocolate and it should be thick and viscus, not watery. Add your lemon zest and juice of half a lemon and stir to combine.

With your cool pie shell, carefully pour in your chocolate lemon ganache and place in fridge to set. 

If you want to get fancy, sprinkle some powdered sugar on top and garnish with candied lemon peel and a sprig of mint.

Rye Bread and Feelings of Entitlement

I hope that those of you who read this blog are nice to people in menial labor jobs such as fast food and retail. Or at least are aware of how you speak to those of us who work in these fields.  Because I have had to deal with some REALLY stuck up people before...

The old phrase "The Customer is Always Right" is a good business saying but if you have ever read the Not Always Right blog, http://notalwaysright.com/ you will know that some customers are just plain RUDE.

I was approached by a customer who appeared very irritated one day. When I asked her if I could help her, she asked why it was we weren't baking any rye bread anymore. I told her I had a loaf of seedless rye I just baked but she waved it away and replied that she wanted seeded rye bread. She also said she had been coming in for three days looking for it and we have been out every time. Well, out of all the bread we carry the Seeded Rye Bread sells the worst. 98% we throw away so it's not a bread loaf we have a lot of out at any given time as we do the Sourdough, Pumpernickel, or Wheat. I told her this and she just gave me this very haughty and unimpressed look. 

Like this...

I do not appreciate this ever present attitude people take with me. People look at me as though I don't know how to do my job. I am young, sure. But this is also a field I care for deeply. I know more about your precocious Rye bread than you do. So stuff the attitude lady. I'm trying to HELP you. But that's not the issue at hand is it? You're pissed that I didn't have the thing you wanted and instead of ASKING me how you could get some rye bread, you were trying to take control of the conversation and TELL me. As if I was the hired help. That's what you see when you look at me. A servant who fucked up and you would gladly fire me if you had the ability to do so. Well, the feeling is mutual. I would gladly curse you out if it wouldn't cost me my job. 

I understand the frustration of coming in and not seeing the bread you want, however, I am a huge proponent of treating others with respect. Even more so since I started working in retail.

If you treat me with respect as one human to another, I am more than willing to help you any way I can. However, I am not your servant and the moment you start treating me as such is the moment you will find yourself talking to a brick wall. I wouldn't give you the time of day after that.  

Meringue

 Let's talk meringue.

The French must be secret pyromaniacs, they take a blow torch to everything!

Meringue is defined as whipped egg whites with sugar. It is a building block of pastry and something EVERYONE should know. It's the equivalent of knowing how to boil water. Basics. And like many things, people have different names for them. Is it a submarine roll or a hoagie? That kind of thing.

I want this shirt!

Well, I recently came across such a disparity at work the other day when I was placing some strawberry shortcakes on a stand near the Produce department. A customer walked by and praised the cakes, asking me if that was Seven Minute Icing.

What?

I'd never heard of Seven Minute Icing before. I told her it was Whipped Icing and she asked me to repeat myself and that she was having trouble understanding me. (I'm from California and people ask me to repeat things all the time because of my 'accent').  Finally I told her it was Cool Whip. She then asked me if I knew what SMI was and I told her I'd never heard of it before. She then gasped and called another customer over and said "She's never heard of Seven Minute Icing!"
 

I asked her what it was, because I'm studying pastry and want to know. She said it was egg whites, sugar, vanilla, corn syrup and such cooked over a double boiler.

"Oh! It's Italian meringue! I know what that is."

"No, it's not a meringue..."

"But it's beaten egg whites with sugar?"

"Yes, but it's not a meringue."

"..."

Proof:

Recipe for 7 minute icing (Courtesy of Allrecipes.com):

• 2 egg whites
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 1/3 cup cold water
• 1 1/2 teaspoons light corn syrup
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. Put egg whites, sugar, water and syrup in top of double boiler. Beat until mixed well. Place over rapidly boiling water. Beat constantly with electric beater while it cooks for 7 minutes or until it will stand in peaks when beater is raised. Remove from heat. Add vanilla. Beat. Fills and frosts 2 layer cake, 8 or 9 inch.

Italian Meringue recipe (courtesy of Ochef.com):

Ingredients:
 

For the Egg Whites:
 
2/3 cup egg whites (4 to 5 whites)
A pinch of salt
1/4 tsp cream of tartar

For the Sugar Syrup:
 
1-1/3 cups sugar
1/2 cup water

Instructions:

Beat the egg whites at slow speed until the foam throughout, add the salt and cream of tartar, gradually increase the speed to fast, and beat to soft peaks. Turn the machine to slow as you complete the sugar syrup.
Bring the sugar and water to the simmer, swirl the pan to dissolve the sugar completely, cover tightly and boil to the soft-ball stage (234°F to 240°F; 112°C to 116°C on a candy thermometer).

Beating the egg whites at moderately slow speed, dribble into them the boiling syrup — trying to avoid the wires of the whip. Increase speed to moderately fast and beat until cool and the egg whites form stiff, shining, upstanding peaks. The meringue is now ready to use as your recipe direct




To me, Seven Minute Icing it nothing more than an 'Americanization' of Italian Meringue, much the same way Baker's Buttercream is the 'Americanized' French Buttercream.

Speaking of buttercream, if you want to make Italian Meringue buttercream, just make the Italian Meringue and add butter.

You're Doing it Wrong!

Dummy Cakes are aptly named  and if only you the idiocy that seems to surround them. First off, a dummy cake is a piece of foam done up to look like a cake. They are like the bilboards for cake decorators. Let's say you just opened your first cake shop and want to showcase your speshul skillz to the average passerby. You would grab yourself some precut dummy cakes and decorate them as if they were cake. You can stack them, carve them, whatever you like! They're brilliant little things and I love them!

However, there are some rules one should follow when attempting to make a dummy cake.

Do not use buttercream icing. For the love of God and baby kittens use your not-so-common sense and THINK! When I see dummy cakes made with buttercream I die a little inside. Also, if you see one in your local cake shop you would be well advised to look for sweets elsewhere. Royal icing is not hard to make and it's something every decorator should KNOW how to make. You are supposed to use royal icing on dummy cakes, it's that simple.

Why is that you ask?

It dries hard like cement and once it is dried, your dummy cake will stay nice and pretty for much longer. The colors won't photo-degrade, the icing won't mold, you can keep it clean, and most importantly you won't have conspicuously child sized finger prints all over your advertising. Also, if you live in a hot and humid area like me, the icing won't melt.

All in all, it's just a smart thing to do.

At work, the store director asked us to make a few dummy cakes up and I told my boss flat out you need to use royal icing if you want that thing to survive. So it seems as though I will be making the dummy cakes up at home, which I don't mind. It'll be great practice working with royal icing anyway. However, there was a bit of a coincidence the other day as we recieved a call from a lady who is openning either a cake shop or a catering business and wanted us to make her some dummy cakes.

My first reaction when my boss told me this was "Yay more dummy cakes!" but then the logical part of my brain said "Hey, hold on a minute..."

This lady is starting a cake business and wants US to make HER showcase dummy cakes to show HER customers what SHE can do...but it won't be HER work they're seeing but OURS.

So we had a laugh at the WTFOMGBBQ of it and should the lady ever contact us again in regards to said dummy cakes, we will have to politely decline her request...
 


 

A Lesson in Cakery

Anyone who has attempted to make a cake will tell you that it is harder than it looks. Your Mom and Grandma made it look so easy didn't they? Well, now it's your turn. You could go down to the local Wal-Mart and pick up one of their mass produced, plastic covered hallmark card cakes, or make one yourself!

A cake decorator must be an artist and an engineer. One without the other gets you featured on Cake Wrecks. 

The most important rule about the art of Cakery is support. SUPPORT! SUPPORT! SUPPORT! Even a small single layer cake can collapse on itself if it's not torted properly. I know because I have had this happen to me. I was shocked too...  

Mmm...yummy. 

One thing you will find out very quickly about decorating cakes is that there are LOTS of ways to do one thing. People are always experimenting with technique. There's a wrong way and many right ways. For instance there's at least five ways that I know of just to ICE a cake in buttercream icing. However, it must be said that it is vital to learn the BASICS before jumping out into the abyss. 

Don't be like that girl in my first cake decorating class who decided she was going to be a speshul snowflake and not follow our instructors advice and follow the lesson plan, and instead make whatever cake she wanted and NOT what we were doing. AKA learning how to use the tips to achieve effects and how to control pipping with a bag...Needless to say her final cake was no where up to par with what the rest of us made. 

It is also important to know the weather of your area and learn to accomodate your cakes to it. Higher altitudes, humidity, they will all effect everything from how your cake bakes to how thick or thin your buttercream should be and even if that fondant will STAY on that cake. 

Humidity kills cakes. Remember that. 

The artistry of cakes holds its route in the royal courts of European noblemen and kings.  

I have a color fetish with gold/yellow and blue. It's freaking SEXY!

Many of the old school pipping and scroll work are throw backs to baroque architecture and the crown moldings common in the gilded palaces of Europe. It is very common to see architecture themed cakes, even if it is not obvious. Because remember what I said: Cakery is half engineering.

Victorian era decorations are very common as well.

You can buy molds or patterns for cakes such as these. But for the most part, I would experiment. Practice pipping scroll work on a sheet of wax paper. Play with fondant molds and gum paste. 

The most important thing we sometimes forget (especially for those of us who make a living off of cakes) is that we do this not because of some obligation, but because we enjoy it. 

So don't forget to make it fun or else what's the point?

All American Wedding

I'll be honest and say I've never understood the appeal of getting married on a major holiday. I mean, really, is there anything more cheesey? Purposing on a major holiday is cute, but get getting married? Ehhh....

<german accent>Dats joost veird.</german accent> 

We had two wedding cake orders for July 4th. Because we don't have small sizes of the traditional round tiers, the ones we do have feed like 100+ people, both customers opted for stacked sheet cakes. Which is a bit red neck doncha think?

One wanted white roses and immediately I felt my annoyance pulsate. White frosting roses...I hate white frosting roses. Not because of the white (which I do kind of hate), but because our white buttercream is not made to make roses with. It's an icing meant to be easily spread onto a cake, so it's thin. And this icing makes shitty roses. Red, Purple, blue, orange, and pink are the icings meant to make roses out of. It's a thicker icing so the roses won't melt. And they wanted a red heart with their names on the top. D'aw, look at the lack of creativity in their design!

The second cake wanted the bride and grooms name on the long side of the second tier. Problem: There's literally 1 1/2 inches of room to not just write the names, but also put the borders. Needless to say it was not up to my standards and I felt bad about it.  I expect them complain...

Out of all the days you could choose to hold your wedding, why the Fourth of July? You do realize you're essentially screwing up all your future Anniversaries right? You marry on a holiday - any holiday - and every time you want to go out for your anniversary, all the nice restaurants will be booked, everywhere will be full, and you'll have to settle for Red Lobster or Olive Garden. Or worse, McDonalds.

Scratch that, you can never get into an Olive Garden anywhere near a holiday. Ever. It's insane. I know, because I've tried.

Lists

Things I like about my job:

1. I get to be creative.
2. Seeing people smile when they pick up their cakes.
3. The smell of the Bakery -OH GOD THE SMELLS!
4. People who will only buy doughnuts when I make them -Queen of Doughnuts here.


Things I hate about my job:

1. I have to be creative. "You draw really well! Can you draw -insert radically complicated image here- on a cake for me? And I need it at four!"
2. Seeing people smile as they pick up their cake...until the front end manager comes back a little while later with the cake saying "They said it was ugly and didn't want it."
3.The smell of the Bakery...which after a while I  cannot distinguish one smell from the other. "What is that heavenly smell?" "Uh...well, we just took out some pies and the Cinnamon rolls are cooking and..." "No no no, it smells like...well, it smells like...well it smells good! What is it?" "Uhhh..."
4.People who will only buy doughnuts when I make them - which averages about once a week. No one buys doughnuts and we toss a good 60% of them. 

Fruits of Labor

These are some recent fruits of my labor...

This is why we can't have nice things!

Believe it or not, I do in fact love my job. Anxiety attacks and nervous breakdowns aside... The people who work there are nice and I really like decorating cakes. And a lot of the customers are REALLY nice. I've gotten a $20 tip before.

 Money, money, money, money, money...MONEY!

But there are some things that peeve me.

Like people who tear off the markdown stickers from their products to try and attach them to other, more fresh, products. (And the fact the cashiers don't seem to notice it).

Or how people in a hurry will spend all of five seconds looking over the cake case, choose a cake, have me write on it, and leave only to come back a little while later saying they had chosen the wrong flavor of cake. FFFFFFFFFUUUUUU-

Or how people will take a donut from the self serve donut case, bite into it, and realize they had grabbed the wrong flavor Bismark and end up leaving it stashed somewhere to mold.

Or people who think they're sneaky by opening a package of fudge to take ONE square and leave the obviously meddled with package on our counter as if it belongs there...(You'd lose faith in humanity to know how much fudge we've had to dispose of because of this behavior...)

And the ever present irritation of never seeming to have the right combination of cake flavor, icing type, and decoration for walk in customers. It really does pay to call ahead.

And this is why we can't have nice things...

Not So Common Curtesy

We have all encountered people who are utterly oblivious to those around them and are generally frowned upon by society. We call them rude. 

And as I am in the business of a glorified servant, I find myself on the reviving end of many of these peoples' actions. The most common manifestation of this is the "I need it NAO" effect. When a customer wants something such as a cake or specific desert, it is generally considered a good idea to call ahead. However, we also get the browsing crowd who just walk in without any idea of what they want.

EX.

A rather large lady riding an electric cart was browsing through our parfaits and asked if we had any Strawberry. I informed her we were currently sold out. She asked me how long it would take for me to make one. Because of the manner in which we make parfaits - you can't just make one, but have to make several at a time - it takes generally close to an half hour or more to make them. In a very snide and offronted tone of voice, she snipped "Well, I'm not waiting that long!"

I did not mean to offend you lady but if you want Strawberry cake so badly we do carry Strawberry bars. We are not set up in a way that we can operate like a fast food restaurant, so PA-ARDON ME! This is a Bakery, NOT BURGER KING.

Another way in which people express their sense of self importance is through samples. It has become a rule at the bakery that we do not leave samples overnight because it has been promoting theft. We leave a box of cookies out for samples over night and we come into the department to see that box empty - as expected - but also to find three other boxes have been ripped open and cookies taken. So we take them down. People coming in as I am leaving ask "Where are the samples?" And I explain they're taken down at night. I had one such encounter with a person who asked "Well, what's from stopping me from just waiting till you're gone and opening a box up?"

"Security cameras?"

Also there was one lady who saw me put out fresh samples and asked "Are these free?" And I said "Yes." She walked off with six cookies. FFFFFFFFFFFFF-

But by far the worst was last Friday before Fathers Day. I had a stack of orders to do and have three people come into the store to pick up cakes they had orders for the next day. They all thought they could "...just come and pick it up early."


FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!!

Coincidentally, that was the very day I have a nervous break down. In front of customers no less!

I hope they feel really bad.

As hard as describing cornbread...

Have you ever stumbled upon a situation where you were required to explain in simple terms what something was? Now, with you being who you are, you know very well what said thing is and immediately think to yourself "HA! You poor fool, not knowing what that simple thing is! Your ignorance tickles my fancy in the most inappropriate way! Hardy-har-har!"

Just as you open your mouth to begin on your passive aggressive lecture to show this pitiful person just pitifully stupid they are, you pause...and realize you lack the proper vocabulary or thought process to adequately explain the object and instead you end up sounding like a doofus.

Rambling on with half eaten sentences and malformed thoughts peppered with many a  "...um", "...huh", and the occasional "Wait, wait, let me rephrase that..."

Congratulations my young Padawan, you just tried to describe cornbread!

 Mmmm...corny goodness...

While at work the other day, I was approached by a regular customer who hails from that bizarre and fanciful place known as France. Y'know, the place where they eat snails, smoke, drink wine, and are general assholes. Now, it must said in defense of my French Lady, she is quite nice. But she does have a habit of...well...being snarky. But that's not exclusively French so I don't count it.

Anyway, she came across a table with her beloved French bread. After gushing over the still warm loaves, she noticed our small pans of ready to eat cornbread.

Lady: What is this, cake?

Me: It's actually cornbread.

Lady: What is cornbread? It looks like cake.

Me: It's called cornbread, but...

 ...some people make corn muffins which are kind of like muffins, but...

 ...cornbread isn't a cake. Well...it's kind of a cake. There are sometimes called corn cakes, but...

...they're not really... It's not a dessert food....

Lady: It's sweet?

Me: Well, our cornbread is sweet but you can make cornbread that isn't sweet. We make some with jalapenos and cheese too.

Lady: Jalapenos and cheese on a cake?

Me: It's very popular around here.

Lady: It's a lunch or dinner food?

Me: Yeah, mostly a dinner thing though. You serve it with butter like a roll.

Lady: Oh! Like a roll! I understand. Is it good?

Me: I think so. Personally, I like the sweet cornbread.

Lady: But it isn't sweet like cake, right?

The World Ends Tomorrow!

Does that mean I won't have to do that blasted petifore order for tomorrow?!

The company I work for does petifores but I've never done them before and today I seemed to have lost the job aid (AKA instructions) on how to do them. I had read them before and knew the gist of it...or at least I thought I did. Cut the cake into even pieces, melt white icing, cover cake with icing, allow time to set, and decorate!

There!

Easy!

Right?

WRONG!

Let us suffice it to say that I failed spectacularly and with all the nimble grace of a Chimpanzee with Parkinson's. The cake was too soft, the icing too thin, it didn't coat evenly, it looked like someone had spilled baby lotion on a cupcake...I could go on.

Of course in retrospect I suppose it didn't help that my brain was fried from the amount of last minute orders we had. Including a last minute wedding cake.

Yeah.

You read that right. A last minute wedding cake.

Oh yeah, because last minute weddings always have a happily ever after...

Ignoring the fact that our particular location requires a week notice to get the appropriate sized cakes in store, they needed a cake. So we dollied up a sheet cake to look like a wedding cake. And of course they would choose one of the most DETAILED designs to put on it.  Basically, pipping like that really requires a low table and a stool. I have neither at work so I just sat on my knees for a good fifteen minutes pipping swag and small blue flowers all over a half sheet cake. It's the cake equivalent of shoving DD's into AA cup sized cups. There's going to be some...overflow.


But on the note of it being the end of the world tomorrow:

We're supposed to get a new hire tomorrow, another cake decorator. She had a cake business for 20 years. And on her first day the world's gonna end? I finally get some compentant help and the world goes on and ends?

God, that makes the ending to the Sopranos look well thought out. I hope there's a decent soundtrack at least...



 

The fear...they can smell it...

...and it smells like cake.

After the last few weeks - with the tornadoes, boss having to take time off for a death in the family as well as her much deserved vacation - I was due for a few days off myself. And boy did I enjoy the hell out of them. Two days straight! WOOT! Those of you in school, listen to me: treasure your weekends. Because when you leave school, your weekends belong to the Man. And he's a greedy sunnav-a-betch.

 The Boss wants an apple turnover...NAO!

Anyway. I come back from my two days of rest to essentially an empty department. Why? Because the order wasn't sent right and we only got a 1/8 of what we needed.

And as we try to fill the department with the meager products we DO have and CAN turn out, I am virtually flooded with calls and walk-in's, all of them wanting cake...NAO! Only three our of the ten or so people who needed cake were pre-ordering. Everyone else wanted the cake that day. They came in like a herd of rampaging horses!

 i needz caek NAO!

This is my biggest peeve. If you need a cake, you need to pre-order. It's common curtesy! I don't have time to suddenly do that many cakes on top of EVERYTHING else I have to do. And did I mention they don't allow overtime at me work? You have overtime? You have to leave early. Which means you have the same amount of work - if not more - to do but with less time.

Joy.

So apparently Lady Luck doesn't despise me because they all wanted chocolate cake with buttercream icing...which is essentially all we have until Friday.

In any case, if you read this and ever find yourself in the position of ordering a cake...PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS CUTE AND FLUFFY!!! ORDER YOUR CAKE IN ADVANCE!!!!!!

And to make sure my demands are met, I am having my Mexican Gang of Ducklings hold this kitten hostage. Any slip ups and you're gonna get a bald kitty.

Like this:

oh gawd wai?

You have been warned.

The Bread Whisperer

The Bakery Manager is currently on vacation, leaving just two of us bakery associates to fend for ourselves. And after the past few weeks being how they've been** and then having to run the bakery with only two people, I can say I am worn out. But as luck would have it, the Bakery Gods smiled on us! The last two days, bread technicians (what a silly title) from our dough supplier have been by to help us bake bread.

Tuesday was the first day they showed up but I was off that day (my first day off in nearly two weeks because of the violent storms) so my coworker was lucky enough to have someone help her on a day that would have otherwise left her to defend the Bakery all by herself. Today was my turn to work with the bread master. He showed up early because he had to leave at twelve for another store, but he had most of the bread started and a few loaves finished.

I saw the bread he had made and - knowing what bread we produce - I couldn't believe they were the same product. They were...beautiful! He explained that between the humidity of our proofers being WAY off - AKA nonexistent - and the steamer feature in our oven being worn out -AKA old as shit - our bread was too dry and wasn't browning properly, leading us to over proofing and over baking our breads. He showed us a few tricks involving squirt bottles and throwing a jug of water onto hot metal plates to get the desired effect - golden brown, delicious bread. I was geeking over the hoagie rolls.

I seriously contemplating hugging the guy, he's a genius and whatever they're paying him isn't enough.

No bakers were molested in the making of this comic...

**Footnote: On Wed April 27th, a violent storm cell ripped through Alabama and a record breaking 305 tornadoes formed in  24 hour period - one of them being confirmed to be an F-5 which tore through downtown Tuscaloosa - and left hundreds dead, thousands injured, and hundred missing.

Most of the counties around me are in shambles and there are towns that no longer exist. We were without power for almost three days. I came in Friday after the storm to help the store in any way I could and spent the next 12 days trying to get the Bakery back up and running and trying to keep food, charcoal, water, and ice for those without power. 

They have a Kit for that...

As mentioned in my previous entry, the staple of a Bakery's arsenal is the cake kit. Pre-designed cake sets that come with decoration instructions - down to the # of the appropriate tips to use - and toys! Little Jimmy's 11th birthday party wouldn't be complete without a mandetory cake topped with his favorite Power Ranger!

Do kids even like Power Rangers anymore? How does anyone under age the age of 20 remember Tommy, the Green ranger? Or that the Yellow Ranger was originally supposed to be a guy? I guess early '90s TV executives didn't consider yellow a gender neutral color. Besides, Beetleborgs was WAY cooler than PR. Battle armored teens AND a magical ghost that looked like the love child of Elvis and Jay Leno! 

 OMG WANT!

In any case, most cake decorators will be well versed in the art of cake kits. And how much of a pain they can be. The major manufacturer of cake kits is DecoPac ©.  

 

The Toys-R-Us for cake decorators.

They create a wide variety of decorations from cupcake pics, sprinkles, baking supplies, to cake sets. For weddings, birthdays, baby showers ect...

But at our store, we can only get kits that corporate approves of. Which boils down to the simple fact that "There are a lot of kits people want that we can't get! And the ones we can get are outdated and badly designed!"

Instead of the modern Mickey Mouse cake seen here:

Weeeeeeee!

We are stuck with this bizarre mess of a cake design:

 There's a joke about Disney and an evil corporate money machine somewhere in this cake...

Seriously though, where are we supposed to fit "Happy Birthday" on that thing? Not to mention the fact that random blobby rings of various colors make for poor design. I think the '80s threw up on your cake Timmy, sorry.

And check out the Minnie Mouse cake!

Yes, my lovelies. Buy! Buy until you've spent all of your husband's money!

But out of all the cake kits I have come across, the worst designed must be awarded to the Dora The Explorer Rosie Posie set. 

 Just like meaningless sex, no one makes eye contact...

I sometimes wonder what the hell those three are up to in this set. Are they conspiring? Planning a bank heist? Either way, Diego looks like he's the look out.

Although it appears DecoPac is hopping onto the super hero bandwagon as well. With noticeable lack of enthusiasm...

How...patriotic?

 This cake makes me cry...

As someone who just saw Thor today, I can honestly say this cake is a horribly poor representation of Thor's awesomeness. Even MegaMind got a design with decent air brush work!

Ooohh...sparkly!

 And there is also the fact that our supplier of cake kits are always discontinuing the most popular kits without explanation or reason! And we also just got a new catalog with new kits and designs as well as some gorgeous designs for Mothers Day...two days AFTER the fact.