Shadowcaster Cake

My nephew wanted the final boss from the video game Shadows Over Loathing for his birthday cake. We think it’s called the Shadowcaster. It’s a floating mouth and eyes that appear to be a portal to an abysmal dimension of insanity. And it’s drawn in a stick figure style because that’s the aesthetic of the game.

I made infinity mirrors in the shape of the eyes and mouth with twinkle LEDs. The back of the eyes are rice krispie treats. The back of the mouth is chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream icing and an outer coating of black dark chocolate ganache. The lips, teeth, irises, and eyelids are white modeling chocolate. The black lines are fondant.

Inside the cake is a baggie of fresh raspberry sauce connected to a tube that ran out between the bottom front teeth, so the mouth could drip blood onto your piece of cake. It was a fun effect, but then the tube clogged up, so next time I’ll want to use a bigger tube.

After we cut the cake, we played around with the LEDs, which also had lots of other fun colors and modes of flashing.

Cats Pillows

For Christmas, I got my niece and nephew heated pillows and made cases for them that are portraits of our two cats. Both pillows have one of the cats on each side. I tried to capture their characteristic expressions of scorn (orange cat) and befuddlement (black cat)

Holiday Candy 2024

This year’s candy: hot honey sunflower butter cups, orange ginger clove white chocolate ganache, cranberry sage walnut marzipan, licorice cardamom ganache with dried cherry, turmeric white pepper white chocolate ganache, coriander black pepper marshmallow with candied fennel seeds, lemon saffron marshmallow with smoked salt, bay leaf caramel ganache. and juniper berry ganache with candied lemon peel.

Nightmare King Grimm

It’s time for another Hollow Knight Halloween costume! This one is Nightmare King Grimm. The creepy grin is particularly disturbing.

Armoire Monster Cake

I made this cake for my sister’s 50th birthday party. It’s an armoire that is also a monster and also has other monsters emerging from its drawers.

The drawers and lid are cookies. The monsters are modeling chocolate. The handles and eyes are isomalt. The drool is piping gel. Its mouth is full of broken pieces of sesame brittle.

Arlecchino Plushie

I have played Genshin Impact exactly once and I was terrible at it, so I don’t actually get what this plushie means, but it was what my niece’s girlfriend asked for for her birthday, so I made it.

Huge thanks to Choly Knight, who has amazing free patterns, two of which I combined and adapted to create this. Then I immediately bought one of her books!

Fancy 18th Birthday Entremets

For their 18th birthday, instead of a cake, my niece requested a triple layer (dark chocolate, milk chocolate, white chocolate) mousse that I sometimes make, but fancy enough to celebrate such an important birthday. This is what I came up with.

Inside, there is almond genoise, dark chocolate marquise, milk chocolate mousse, and white chocolate mousse. The outside is mirror glaze, with colors inspired by Acheron, a new character in Honkai: Star Rail that my niece is excited about. The decorations are a caramel almond, a candied orange rind heart, and a gold leafed maraschino cherry.

I served them on a custom two-tier heart-shaped stand, designed to fit 18 entremets for 18 years. It looked nice, but I should have made it slightly less sloped because I got scared that they would slip off so I used double-stick tape to hold them in place.

Castle Bowser Cake

For his birthday, my nephew asked for Castle Bowser from Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

Most of the detail is modeling chocolate, with isomalt accents.

Inside, it’s chocolate cake with bright green mint icing.

Terastal Form Terapagos

This year for Christmas, my nephew asked for a stuffie terastal form Teragos, because he has been playing the Indigo Disk DLC for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet.

I’m quite pleased with how this one turned out, especially all the appliqués on the shell.

Holiday Candy 2023

This year’s candy included lapsang souchong ganache and caramel, wasabi marshmallow and ginger ganache, ras el hanout walnut marzipan, tequila marshmallow and jalapeños lime ganache, balsamic vinegar marshmallow and strawberry ganache, and pernod marshmallow and sage ganache.

Trobbio

This is my nephew dressed as Trobbio from Hollow Knight: Silksong. Hollow Knight: Silksong is notably not yet released, so this is a character he knows about only from the trailers. He also dressed as a character from Hollow Knight: Silksong in 2021, so you can tell how long he has been anxiously awaiting the release of this game!

Fundraiser Candy

I’m on the Board of Director of a fantastic little theater company called Teatro Visión. For our annual fundraiser this year, I made candies as a thank you to our donors. Flavors were habañero lime white chocolate ganache, coffee dark chocolate & hazelnut milk chocolate ganache, chipotle pecan brittle, and ube marshmallow with candied ginger on top.

The Phantom Planet cross stitch

This is a quote from The Phantom Planet, a delightful episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, which I made for my friend. The design is based on the poster from the movie. The best part is that I initially stitched it as “attentioin” and had to pick it out so I could spell “attention” correctly.

Koraidon Cake

Koraidon is a Pokémon from the new Pokémon Scarlet game. My nephew wanted him in his battle form for his birthday cake.

The cake is chocolate with chocolate ganache. The tire in his chest is chocolate cast in a donut mold, covered with gum paste. The feathers and horns are wafer paper. The eyes are isomalt with wafer paper pupils.

As usual, I made about four times as much cake as the occasion required, so we only got through the head at the party.

Sword of Khaine

For Christmas this year, my niece requested the Sword of Khaine from Total Warhammer. It’s made of poplar with Apoxy Sculpt details and EL wire embedded in resin.

Fidough

Fidough is a new Pokémon in Pokémon Scarlett and Violet. My nephew asked for a stuffie Fidough for Christmas.

It’s a pretty complicated shape. I think it turned out pretty well, but its head is so much bigger than the body that it keels over forward whenever you put it down.

Holiday Candy 2022

This year’s candy included anise black pepper marshmallows, coffee nutmeg marshmallows, spiced cinnamon ganache, paprika cinnamon toasted almond brittle, tarragon ganache with candied grapefruit peel, ginger caramel ganache, and coconut curry black sesame ganache.

Ceruledge

Ceruledge is a new Pokémon in Pokémon Violet. Since Violet didn’t release until November, this marks the second Halloween in a row for which my nephew has dressed as a character from an as-yet unreleased video game. Most of the armor is foam sheets. The swords are foam core so they would nice and light for him to carry.

Empress of Light

My niece went as the Empress of Light from Terraria for Halloween this year. We had to simplify the costume a bit because I didn’t have as much time to work on it as I would have liked, so it’s all store-bought clothes except for the crown and the wings. The wings are an aluminum frame lined with color-changing LEDs with nylons stretched over them.

Outrageous Pumpkins

Good news - I’m back on Food Network! This time, I’m carving pumpkins on Outrageous Pumpkins! I didn’t win, but I made it to the finale, I carved some very cool pumpkins, I got to work with a great production crew, and I met six other fantastic artists. So overall a fantastic experience!

I won the first challenge with my jack-o-lantern ghost story!

My nesting jack-o-lanterns got me through to the next episode!

Very happy with my zombie self-portrait.

The group haunted house challenge was a challenge, but we won our way through to the next episode.

My arachnophobia pumpkin with a spider eating someone’s eyeball.

The structure of my contortionist pumpkin get me through the the finale!

Pumpkin carving inspired by a toy.

My first time carving an Atlantic Giant! Pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey come to life and impaled the birthday kid.

Genuinely one of the most fun shows I’ve ever been involved in!