Creative Cakes
Contest Winners!
Awestruck. There’s no better way to describe the reaction of the Taste of Home
staff as we witnessed more than 4,000 entries flood in for our recent “Creative Cakes”
contest. Our judges were swept away by magical swirls of buttercream icing, fondant
in all its glory, cascading gumpaste flowers, sparkling candies and lots of luster dust!
We were so captivated by the cute, elegant and fun cakes that we added a third-
place prize to each category plus a host of runners-up.
Read about the winners here and on pages 16-17, then go to
www.tasteofhome.com
to see the runners-up. For even more cake-decorating fun, turn to page 66.
Shaped & Cutout Cake Winners
Jungle Cat
Second Place—Creativity is a close
friend of Karyn Ranzau, Louisville, Kentucky, whose spectacular lion cake immediately caught our
judges’ attention.
“My friends chose a jungle theme
for their son Josh’s seventh birthday,”
says Karyn.“Josh’s eyes lit up when
he saw his cake...he was overjoyed.
Soon, all the kids were gathered
around the big, scary lion.”
Luscious Luggage
First Place—Discovering a personal talent sometimes takes a
small leap of faith and lots of practice. That’s how Leslie Merritt,
Laguna Niguel, California, unearthed her passion for cake decorating. Leslie, who works full-time
at an investment firm, began her
new hobby 5 years ago.
“I’ve never taken a class or had
any training...just lots of practice
in the kitchen,” she says.
Family and friends took notice
of Leslie’s abilities and began asking her to decorate cakes for special occasions. Her luggage cake
received a double thumbs-up at a
friend’s wedding and a nod of approval from our judges. The cake,
which feeds over 300 people, took
Leslie 3 days to make.
“The couple wanted old leather
luggage with edible travel stickers,
so I created three suitcase cakes
and covered them with my homemade chocolate fondant.
“I added stitching and small
chocolate rivets (brushed with luster dust), and attached fondant
handles and buckles. I topped the
cake with a chocolate camera and
cruise ship, and I added edible orchids the day of the wedding.
“When my friends saw their
cake, they were ecstatic. They still
talk about it today,” Leslie says.
If you make your own, Karyn suggests giving yourself ample time, because there are plenty of star tips on
this cat! “It’s all about patience,” she
says.“If you mess up, you can always
scrape off the icing and start again.”
Go Yankees!
Third Place—“My nephews always
have an ‘Aunt Jodi’ cake for their
birthdays,” says architectural designer Jodi Latsha, Hightstown, New
Jersey. Her 3-D Yankee Stadium
cake easily made its way to the final
round of judging.
The lucky recipient of this sweet
cake was Jodi’s 11-year-old nephew,
Ryan, a huge Yankees fan.
“He thought the cake was very
cool, especially since he thought he
was getting a regular cake with just a
baseball field drawn on it,” says Jodi.
She spent 4 hours carving and
building the stadium, and another 12
hours decorating it.
“My personal tip is to use pre-col-
ored Wilton decorator icing tubes to
make the fans in the stadium. It saves
time and energy,” adds Jodi.
