MY FIRST OMBRE ROSETTE CAKE!

Almost 2 years ago a friend had received a Volunteer Match email telling of For Goodness Cakes, a non-profit based in Santa Monica, California, who matches volunteer bakers with foster children and underprivileged youth having birthdays! The volunteers would bake in their home, decorate these cakes and deliver them to the foster agencies. How sweet! Maria though it was perfect for me and she was right; I waited for the next volunteer orientation close to me and once I attended, I could start choosing cakes and baking!

My background wasn't in cake decorating, it was very far from it! I had baked with my mom and grandma all of my life but really just winged the decor. My mom was very creative and passed that skill on to me and so I did pretty well but really didn't know what I was doing. I bought some gel food colors, some tips and bags and started practicing cake and buttercream recipes and tinting frosting. I loved the pretty ombre and rosette cakes I was finding all over Pinterest. I watched a few YouTube videos and researched into the nights. For those wanting to learn rosettes, it's super easy! You'll be hooked. You'll want to rosette all of your walls!

I had baked a chocolate cake to practice on, and let me tell you it wasn't pretty!  The layers stuck to the pan, but once I frosted it in white buttercream and used a bench scraper to straighten the sides, you really couldn't tell.  I added a row of each shade and used the scraper again and had the "ombre" effect.  I went for it and piped some rosettes on the top, sprinkled some candy pearls and gave it to a friend's sweet daughter, Bella.

From her smile, I marked it down as a success!