Operation Sugar in the news in Kamo

Kiwicakes as many of you know is based in Kamo. And our lovely Kamo Connect ran a story recently on Operation Sugar (for which Kiwicakes is an official sponsor).

Gorgeous Cover girl Sophie had a stunning cake made for her from local cake maker Lisa Hansen from The Whole Cake & Caboodle.

Minette Hanekom was the photographer for Sophie's party. Sophie's mum said "To be able to be part of the party without having to stop and take photos, it was great"

If you'd like to know more about Operation Sugar, to organise a cake for a child that has a life threatening illness, or requires frequent hospilisation. Or if you'd like to volunteer as a cake maker, click here

Bronchiectasis Foundation launch here in Northland 7th April 2015

Yesterday was a very special day here in Northland with the launch of the Bronchiectasis Foundation the Culmination of a dream of Esther Jordan-Muriwai. Yesterday would have been Esther's 25 birthday. Sadly she passed away 10 months earlier. Family, friends, health professionals, dignitaries and the Governor General, Lieutenant General Sir Jerry Mateparae acknowledged her courage and determination during the launch event.

Katie pictured above also has Bronchiectasis. You may remember Katie from December 2013 when I made her 10th birthday cake for Operation Sugar. (you may also have seen her in Countdown supermarket ads, the local paper and other Bronchiectasis awareness campaigns)

Earlier this year the Whangarei Cake Guild had the pleasure of meeting Esther's parents Camron and Ana. They came along to one of our monthly meetings and told us Esther's story of bravery and perseverance living with this terrible illness. I had tears in my eyes listening to Esther's story and immediately my mind went to my young friend Katie, as she battles with Bronchiectasis every day. Esther's parents asked if as a club we'd be prepared to create a cake for the launch of Esther's dream the Bronchiectasis Foundation. Of course as a club we all wanted to help. The stunning cake you see is a group effort from many members. I was proud to get involved, in fact I was bursting at the seams to help. Kiwicakes donated the cake supplies needed to make this cake. Every member had a different job. Mine was to cover and emboss the cake board (using an impression mat). The Whangarei Cake guild was represented at the event yesterday by Anne & Megan, who both contributed to making the wonderful cake (Megan baking & covering, Anne was one of the rose makers and cake transporter - many other members helped to produce this stunning cake).

You can read more about this wonderful event and Esther's dream here in a Northern advocate newspaper story
You can watch the story on Seven Sharp TV Show here and see the lovely Katie being interviewed and on Maori TV here
If you want to know more about Bronchiectasis you can check out the Northland support group facebook page here 
Photos used with permission - Lisa Reed.

Our Operation Sugar challenge

Thanks to Sarah &; Mike & the GoBake team we we were nominated for the "Operation Sugar pie in the face challenge" to fundraise for Operation Sugar Ltd.
And of course we were able to each make a nomination too. I nominated Ashley from Cuppacakes, Karina nominates Lisa Hansen from The Whole Cake & Caboodle and Laura nominates Kim Donker from Cake Tin Love.
Thanks to Ashley from Cuppacakes for making the cupcakes which were smashed in our faces - I could smell cream cheese frosting all day long, right in front of my nose!

My Operation Sugar cake for Katie

Many of you will know Kiwicakes is a sponsor of Operation Sugar, which provides free birthday cakes for seriously ill children in NZ. I'm also personally registered as a volunteer baker - and I finally got my first assignment: a mermaid themed cake for Katie turning 10. Katie has Bronchiectasis.

Katie's mum Lisa tells me her daughter is very keen on publicising Bronchiectasis (see the support page on facebook here) to raise awareness for her condition. Specials thanks to Lisa and Katie for the lovely photos. 

Katie was also happy to be photographed for the Northern Advocate newspaper, the story appeared on Saturday 7th December. You can read the story here

Katie requested chocolate flavours for the whole cake. I made the bottom tier with milk chocolate ganache, to suit the children coming to her party, and the middle tier with dark chocolate ganache for the adults.

The cake sizes were a 13 inch diameter round base stacked with a 10 inch diameter hexagon. the supports are 9 inch wilton hidden pillars topper with an 8 inch round separator plate. On top of this rests an 8 inch diameter hemisphere cake.

Nearly all of the decorations were made with Chocit chocolate modelling paste. I love the never ending working time of this product. Two days after I made the mermaid, I was still able to adjust the angle of her tail (which I would not have been able to do with fondant or gumpaste).

The Chocit modelling paste comes in a wide variety of colours. I was able to mix colours together, to achieve other great shades. Some examples of my colour mixing are: the mermaids hair is yellow & white mixed together, the tail is blue & green in equal parts, the lime green used extensively on the cake is green and yellow mixed 3:1, the stingray is a tiny pinch of black added to white and the coral supports are surround with pink mixed with ivory.

The little stingrays tail I didn't model, I simply pulled the Chocit, stretching and breaking it to the length required.

The marbled shells were made by twisting together ropes of pale yellow and pink Chocit, then pressing it into silicone seashell moulds.

Just keep twisting until the stripes get tighter and tighter. This process was also used on the shells that are around the pink pillars in centre of cake (at hexagon level).

The shells on the cake board are all made from solid chocolate. The kina shells are made using these moulds and white candy melts, to which I added a few green candy melts (making the resulting green much paler than green candy melts straight from the bag). They are dusted with Rainbow Dust Pearl crushed pine lustre dust. The pink shells are made using white candy melts, dusted with pink lustre.

The paua shells are made with these moulds and blue candy melts (see here for a tutorial on how to make paua my way). The scallop shells are made with this mould, with a pearl gumball added to the centre. They are dusted with Rainbow Dust Starlight comet white.

The cake board was 20 inches in diameter. I covered it with baby blue Satin Ice fondant, which I embossed using this impression mat of waves and dots. Katie's name is cut out of purple gumpaste using the FMM Funky Tappit set.

This fish on this tier were made using this mould and the heart bubbles were created by taking some white hearts from this sprinkles blend and attaching them with some edible glue

I used the same fish mould (used in the earlier photo above) to attach to the coral pillars. The coral was created by taking uneven lengths of Chocit and wrapping around the pillar, starting at the top, overlapping each one down the length of the pillar.

The pearl drape was made using a bead mould and white Chocit, dusted with Rainbow Dust starlight comet white lustre. The individual little pearls are Kiwicakes own brand sugar pearls

The mermaid's tail colour was made mixing blue & green Chocit together.

The fondant covering for the two bottom tiers was marbled using the marbling technique from here. The colours used are blue & baby blue Satin Ice fondant. The top hemisphere tier was marbled with baby blue and pastel green Satin Ice.

I hope you've enjoyed the story of my Operation Sugar cake. Perhaps you'll consider signing up as a volunteer with Operation Sugar. You can check out all the wonderful cakes people have made on Operation Sugar's facebook page.

Rachel Jenkinson from Operation Sugar is NEXT Woman of the year nominee

I can hardly contain myself, I have the most exciting news to announce. Rachel Jenkinson from Operation Sugar is a finalist with NEXT magazine for "NEXT Woman of the year".

Earlier this year I nominated Rachel for this award. I spent quite some time preparing a detailed application for everything Rachel does behind the scenes for Operation Sugar. This was an eye opener for me, as she does a lot more than any of us could imagine. I had great fun collating all of the wonderful press clippings about Operation Sugar that have appeared in newspapers, as well as on radio & TV across New Zealand.

It's been hard to keep the secret for the last month, until NEXT magazine came out today. Rachel is one of 5 nominees in the Community category and joins 24 other wonderful New Zealand women. 

The winner will be announced at a gala event in October at the Orakei Bay function centre. I'm extremely proud to be accompanying Rachel, along with her sister Tracey to the event as her date. 

Rachel and I have spent each afternoon for weeks messaging the odd thought for what we'll do while she is in Auckland (Rachel is from Balclutha, so her trip to Auckland will be her first time visiting). I think all of the ideas Rachel and I have come up with so far will require a year to do, so we'll have to work on narrowing our list down.

Rachel has received a snazzy invite for dinner and we've organised our glad rags

I am really looking forward to the awards evening. I was a nominee in the business category of the Inaugural "NEXT Woman of the year" in 2010 (you can read about my involvement here & here & also here). It was a humbling experience for me to be surrounded by such high achieving woman. I am thrilled to be accompanying Rachel in recognition of her amazing achievements with Operation Sugar. I'll be bringing you updates of our Auckland jaunts, as well as bringing you details of the awards night next month.

Please head on over to Operation Sugars Facebook page and leave a note of congratulations for Rachel here.

You can find out more about Operation Sugar here. If you are in a position to give a little, to help with the running of Operation Sugar, you can make a donation of any amount here. And Operation Sugar is always looking for more volunteer bakers & photographers too - check out their website. 

Our Second Operation Scholarship cake

This lovely cake made for Brad (who is a twin) was the second cake Kiwicakes granted a supplies scholarship for. Stephanie Kavanagh from Kavanagh Cakes I included the baseball candles, as a little surprise for stephanie, I love how she put one on a wire and has the figures looking at it in flight. 

Bradley (on right of pic) is undergoing treatment for a brain tumour. The wonderful Stephanie (in the middle) from Kavanagh Cakes made this awesome softball themed cake for Brad to share with his twin brother Adam (on the left) on their 14th birthday!

I love some of the special details Stephanie did, such as the red stitching on the lettering

I think Stephanie made an amazing cake, if you'd like to know more about Operation Sugar and the Kiwicake's scholarships for cake supplies, click on the tab above in this blog

Our first Operation Sugar Scholarship cake

This gorgeous cake was made by Rebecca in Matamata for Kaiya who was turning 5. Beautiful Kaiya has had to cope with cystic fibrosis, diabetes & distal intestinal obstruction syndrome. However, as you can see by this picture that hasn’t dampened her infectious smile!

Rebecca was the first person to receive an Operation Sugar scholarship cake supplies grant from Kiwicakes. I think she did a great job. For more info on Operation Sugar scholarships, click on the Operation Sugar tab above in this blog.