Waching daily Oct 29 2018

Hello.

Welcome to American Baker in Germany.

I'm Michelle and today we are making a steampunk hat cake.

I'm very excited about this because this is in honor of a good friend of mine.

And if you are not familiar with steampunk subculture, it's a subculture of the gothic

culture where people wear all black.

But it's just a tiny bit on the nerdy side in my opinion, where they like all things

mechanical, but not digital.

So, things with gears on it, pocket watches, top hats, basically fashions from the eighteenth

and nineteenth century.

And I think it's really cool looking.

It's not a subculture that I follow in particular, but I really, really love the way it looks.

And a friend of mine, I realized that she is very interested in it.

So, this is for you, Rachel!

And I really hope you enjoy what we do today because it was really, really fun for me to

do, and I hope that you enjoy it as well.

Let's get started!

I begin a few days before with some preparation work.

I roll out some yellow-orange fondant and using all of my round piping tips, I begin

cutting out some small circles using my largest round piping tip.

Then, using my small piping tip, I cut a hole out of the them to make tiny rings.

These will act as my grommets later on the laces I plan to make.

Then, I cut out some circles using my smallest circle cutter.

I use the back of a piping tip to make an impression in two and cut out a circle in

the third.

Then I use a round piping tip to cut out the centers of two and intermittent holes out

of the ring of the cog.

I cut slits into the outside with a knife and remove every second section to make it

look like a cog.

I clean up the edges with a knife.

The next cog I cut out halves of a round piping tip to make the teeth.

I cut out a few holes around the cog.

Then, using various different combinations of these techniques, I make several more cogs

of different sizes.

I also cut out a square belt buckle with tongue that I place on the buckle to look like it's

already buckled.

I roll out a piece of white fondant and cut out a circle, which I place on top of the

slightly larger circle of yellow-orange fondant to be a pocket watch.

I roll small logs of yellow-orange fondant and make the winding wheel of the pocket watch.

Then I cut the small logs into small lengths and curve them around to act as half of a

chain.

I let everything dry for two days and painted them with bronze colored edible paint.

I slowed down for the pocket watch and painted the face on with the bronze paint as well.

I cut a small circle out of cardboard and wrapped it in aluminum foil to act as a small

cake board.

Then, without sticking the first layer down, I stack the cake.

These are four inch layers of frozen chocolate chip cake, filled with chocolate ganache.

I debate for a moment if I want three or four layers of cake, but eventually decide on four.

Then I stick the cake board on top.

Using a steak knife, I begin carving the cake, but because it's frozen, it's really hard

to cut.

I decide to let it sit for a few minutes before trying to carve again.

It's at least possible to cut, but it's still quite difficult due to the chocolate

chips sticking together.

Sometimes they came out in chunks.

So, a word to the wise, if you're planning on carving a cake, I would suggest using a

flavor other than chocolate chip cake.

It's possible, but very difficult compared to other flavors.

I carved the cake in a taper down to the bottom.

Then I crumb coat the cake in chocolate ganache and chill the cake half an hour.

In the meantime, I get out a small, round plate to act as the brim of the hat.

I roll out some black fondant to cover it with and brush the plate with water to help

it stick down.

Then I smooth the fondant on the plate and trim it to size.

Then, to cover the bottom side of the brim, I roll out a log of black fondant and twist

it into a circle and roll it out from there.

Then I gently place it onto the bottom of my plate.

I gently wrap the bottom edge up to cover up all the white on the plate, and trim off

the excess fondant.

Then I get my cake back out of the fridge, stick a bit of ganache onto the top of the

cake board and place the plate upside down onto the cake.

Then I flipped the cake over and ganache the top of the hat cake.

I adjust the hat since it was leaning to one side.

I rolled out some black fondant and cut out a large circle to fit onto the top of the

hat.

Then I rolled out a large strip of black fondant,

trimming one edge to be straight,

and wrapped it around the cake.

I cut the excess off with a knife.

At this point, I noticed that the cake was a bit unstable, so I chilled it for fifteen

minutes in the fridge.

After it had chilled, it was easier to smooth.

I roll out a strip of black fondant,

cut a strip the same width as my belt buckle,

measured how long I needed with a fabric measuring tape, tapered one end, textured it with my

overstitch wheel and cut holes with the end of a piping tip.

Then I wrapped the belt around the base of my hat, overlapping so the tapered edge was

visible.

And glued the buckle onto the belt, tucking the tongue into one of the holes.

Then I rolled a long log of black fondant and used it to clean up the top of the hat

where there was a slight gap in the fondant.

I used my overstitch wheel to add texture to the log on the top as well as the brim

of the hat.

Then I cut two narrow strips out of black fondant and added several holes with a piping

tip.

I glued the first one directly over the seam in the black fondant and the second one maybe

two inches to the left, and trimmed them both to size.

I carefully glued the bronze grommets onto the holes.

using my clay extruder, I extruded a thin and narrow strip of black fondant

to act as laces.

I dabbed a bit of edible glue into the holes and placed the laces into opposite holes,

tucking in the stray edges with the handle of a paintbrush.

Next I placed the gears on random places on the side of the hat.

I placed the pocket watch on the top of the cake, and laid the watch chain along one side.

I touched up the bronze paint a bit on the chain and realized that the watch doesn't

have hands.

So, I painted a couple on with bronze paint as well.

I think this turned out really fun and lovely.

It really represents the steampunk culture and is rather whimsical.

I love the way the belt looks.

The laces are reminiscent of a girdle and the gears are just fun.

Because the cake was sitting on a plate, we didn't even need a cake board!

I really love this cake.

So beautiful!

When cutting the circle out of black fondant for the top, I originally cut one too small

and had to redo it.