Tomorrow night on Top Chef, Gail Simmons has a special surprise for the Chef'testants. She's throwing her girlfriend a bridal shower and they are cooking!
Creating a menu around the old maxim:
Something old, something new Something borrowed, something blue And a silver sixpence in her shoe.
... should be no trouble for the teams (Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue ... where's Sixpence?).
The only problem is, some of them don't look too excited to be Gail Simmons' personal chefs. Isn't this supposed to be a competition, not a service?
The episode airs tomorrow night, Wednesday, December 10th, at 10/9c on Bravo with guest judge Dana Cowin, Editor-in-Chief of Food & Wine Magazine.
Who wants to invite me to a wedding with this cake? Please? I want it! I admit - it might be a little more pricey than the cake you were thinking of getting, but it's healthier. Surely sticking pieces of sushi in each other's faces is more romantic than frosting. Although, if you really wanted some frosting, perhaps you could add a green wasabi frosting. I'd be OK with that.
If you need some help with it, you should know that the picture came from the wedding of Jef and Jin Yoon and the cake maker has shared the recipe on her website. Now, you've got no excuses. It's sushi time!
In August of last year, I became the luckiest guy in the world when Christine Nylin accepted my proposal for marriage. Being the dork I am, I set out to make up a cocktail symbolizing the event. I named it The Union, which not only highlights the joining of two into one, but also happens to be the name of the restaurant where I tend bar.
That cocktail has gotten a lot of play recently, the recipe popping up on different web sites, magazines and recipe collections. And now, it has another moment in the sun, for on a spectacularly beautiful August 3rd in Seattle, I became even luckier the luckiest guy in the world when Christine became my wife.
In that spirit, I offer up our recipe to share with you. Check it out after the jump.
Tuxedo and matching wedding dress strawberries are always an elegant touch at a wedding. They are also pricey. I never really considered what it would take to make them at home until I came across a post on the subject at My Sweet and Saucy.
It turns out that they are fairly easy to make. My Sweet and Saucy has a step-by-step guide with pictures to walk you through the process. If you are hosting a wedding, you may want to check it out. Better yet, get a friend to check it out and make them for you!
She puts them in little bags and gives them away as favors. I've also seen them on a dessert table and served at the reception.
Have I mentioned how much of a geek I am? Well, just in case I haven't, now you know. I just love it when two of my passions cross over each other, especially when the results are this great!
Check out the post on Gizmodo for the whole story, but this is a wedding cake for, you guessed it, a Star Wars wedding. It's hard to tell how much of it is edible, exactly, but some of the details are amazing. The chef who made this cake used camera lens with a blue bulb behind it for R2's sensor for added realism. Have you ever seen a geek-y cake this awesome? I'd love to hear about it!
When it comes to wedding cakes, my primary requirement is that it taste good. So many wedding cakes turn out to be dry and tasteless, more like eating paste than dessert. But it seems that for many, the primary requirement for the wedding cake is that it must be carefully sculpted and attractive, taste be damned. However, I think that Texas bride Chidi Ogbuta may have taken her wedding cake a bit too far. For her September 22nd, 2007 wedding, she had a cake made in her own wedding day image. Will this be the new trend in wedding desserts? (For those of you who are really curious, there are more pictures in the article).
Millions of women love cream puffs and a good number of them wouldn't mind having a croquembouche - tower of cream puffs - at their wedding. Very few would actually want to be a croquembouche. Ukrainian pastry chef Valentyn Shtefano made his wife's wedding dress entirely out of cream puffs and caramelized sugar. It took over 2 months to make and used 1,500 puffs. Despite the fact that it appears to be heavy, the dress weighed only 20 pounds. Shtefano is a well-know figure in his town due to the elaborate desserts that he makes "in a place where cake is often layers of heavy cream, wafers and nuts or poppy seeds - more something to eat than to look at." His creations, like the dress, are both.
This is an interesting alternative to a regular punch bowl for parties. The Cocktail Fountain has a pump in the bottom bowl that forces the liquid - alcoholic or nonalcoholic - up to the top in a continuous stream. Thanks to some holes in the bottom of each upper level, the liquid streams down in a waterfall effect, allowing guests to fill their cups from a spout without fussing with a soup ladle in a standard punch bowl. On top of its serving abilities, the base of the fountain is illuminated, so the unit could actually turn into a beautiful centerpiece if you are serving clear drinks (an illuminated White Russian probably wouldn't have the same effect).
The fountain holds 4.7L of liquid and comes with eight cups, all of which hook conveniently over the edge of the lowest bowl.
Combine it with a chocolate fountain and I suspect that your party will turn into an event that people will be talking about for the months, if not longer.
I don't recall the 2nd amendment being written into the standard set of wedding vows, but then again, I'm also not from Texas, where this cake was prominently featured at a real wedding this past weekend. The gun was carved from a chocolate cake layer and stacked on top of the chocolate cake base, then decorated with rich frosting. The base is actually the shape of a target from the IPSC, a group that supports sport shooting and marksmanship.
Perhaps it's a less-than-common choice for a wedding cake, but all things considered, it's great that people are taking these celebratory cakes in new and unusual directions. After all, there is no reason why you have to have a plain white cake with flowers when you can have wedding cupcakes, snack food towers or anything that you (and your new spouse) really enjoy.
I am nowhere near getting married, but if I could somehow get cupcakes for a wedding delivered here from Australia, I might consider it.
These gorgeous cupcakes are made by Kylie Lambert for her bakery Le Cupcake...in Sydney Australia! I am sure the cupcake itself tastes great (it looks like vanilla), but it is the soft, subtle blue, and the detail of what is on top that got me. I suspect that Kylie pressed some sort of lace into fondant to create the look. Her other cupcakes are similar, some with the same lace impressions, others that are simply frosted, but have beautiful sugar decorations. I love the butterfly.
She doesn't have a website, but this photo, along with photos of all her cupcake artistry, is on Flickr.
Wedding cakes are always some of the most elaborate creations in the cake world, the perfect compliments to some of the most celebrated days. Wedding cakes can run into the hundreds and thousands of dollars, but few are as impressive as the cakes of celebrities. Used to being in the spotlight, what better way to highlight their wedding day than with a stunning cake? The Wedding Sutra has a photo gallery of many celebrity wedding cakes, and while the designs cover both the unique and the traditional, all are stunning. Above, you can see Mariska Hargitay's seven-foot-tall six-tiered chocolate and vanilla cake (left) and Leann Rimes' Chocolate Strawberry Cake, decorated with 35 dozen red roses (right). Getting inspired? If so, hopefully it's with ideas for your own cake and not for ways to gate-crash one of these weddings.
The classic wedge shape of a pie server and its rectangular counterpart, the cake server, rarely change much in appearance from model to model and brand to brand. Like many kitchen tools, they are designed for function and not to have a stylish edge. For anyone interested in fashion, this fact makes servers boring because the designs of almost every other piece of cookware and tableware, including plates, measuring cups and appliances, change from year to year, if not season to season like designer apparel does. Those fashion-conscious individuals, who want to serve their cake and eat it too, will love the Shoe/Handbag Server Set. The sliver plated pieces are shaped like a high-heeled shoe and a handbag, giving a version fashionable look to a functional tool.
No, this isn't just a meat cake because it has a T-bone steak in the icing. This is actually three layers of meatloaf and ketchup glaze frosted with mashed potatoes. So far, it's the only thing posted at BlackWidowBakery.com. The meat cake's creator says it was made for the wedding of friend who wanted "A guy's cake. Like..made out of meat." The meatloaf recipe looks pretty standard, as does the glaze. The mashed potatoes came from flakes, however, to ensure a smooth frosting. The results were "delicious" according to the baker. I wonder what the groom thought.
Sure, the easiest thing to do is write a check. The second easiest thing to do is place your order online with the happy couple's registry at Macy's/Bloomingdale's/Dillard's/Crate & Barrel/Williams-Sonoma. It's probably easy on the couple, too, since they can *ahem* return all that stuff for cash to pay for the wedding.
However, the Chicago Tribune has an excellent idea for a memorable wedding gift - a case of wine for the happy couple that is entirely hand picked by you, or perhaps with the help of a wine expert. A mixed case will allow the couple to learn together what they like while enjoying it. If the newlyweds are also new to wine, you could include some helpful information along with each bottle. Each time they crack open a bottle, they'll remember you. The article has some suggestions for wines, and I may use this very idea for the many weddings I will be attending this summer.
I love/hate the pastel candy-coated Jordan almonds as much as the next wedding guest (is there anyone else out there who thinks those almonds are somehow preserved and can last 20 years?), but I'm always impressed when a bride and groom can come up with something a little more creative and whimsical.
Instead of individual wedding favors at each guest's place at the table, a recent wedding had set up a "candy bar" with 5-gallon jars of different candies like caramels and saltwater taffy in the wedding colors (pink and brown). Guests were given empty bags with the couples' names on it and were given freedom to take as much or as little as they wanted.
We can change the way we make eggs -- scrambled, poached, fried -- but what about changing the eggs themselves? Mix up your scrambling routine with quail eggs.
In August of last year, I became the luckiest guy in the world when Christine Nylin accepted my proposal for marriage. Being the dork I am, I set out to make up a cocktail symbolizing the event. I named it The Union, which not only highlights the joining of two into one, but also happens to be the name of the restaurant where I tend bar.
The classic wedge shape of a pie server and its rectangular counterpart, the cake server, rarely change much in appearance from model to model and brand to brand. Like many kitchen tools, they are designed for function and not to have a stylish edge. For anyone interested in fashion, this fact makes servers boring because the designs of almost every other piece of cookware and tableware, including plates, measuring cups and appliances, change from year to year, if not season to season like designer apparel does. Those fashion-conscious individuals, who want to serve their cake and eat it too, will love the 
Sure, the easiest thing to do is write a check. The second easiest thing to do is place your order online with the happy couple's registry at Macy's/Bloomingdale's/Dillard's/Crate & Barrel/Williams-Sonoma. It's probably easy on the couple, too, since they can *ahem* return all that stuff for cash to pay for the wedding.
Second Helping of Slashfood - June 19
Competitive-Eating Contest to Pit Humans Against Elephants
The Backyard Boom - The Hungry Bride
