It's TurCake Time!

Friday, Novemeber 26th 2010.

Hi everyone!

So, if I am here typing away of course that means that I am not part of the mob that's our there shopping since 4 am! Did I want to? well, part of me did... I mean you get to do this only once a year and if you do your homework you can buy a lot of your biggest christmas' puirchases at bargain prices... but there was also another part of me that wasn't too much into going... I had the "pleasure" of experiencing black Friday before and it was no fun running to find the item you want and going through the pushing and shoving only to find out that you just missed the last one that was on stock... so I guess I am better off here at home.. besides Natie woke up with a stuffy nose and I have a 8 week old puppy that if I am not paying attention to him, he thinks my living room rug is a nice green grassy invitation for poopy... : )

Well... on to what this is about..... Turkey... oh wait... I mean Cake... well... no no... let's make it TurCake!! yeah that's the ticket.

Let me tell you a little bit about how this cake came to reality:
Last year while I was browsing one of my favorite cakester sites I came upon a thread that has some written direction on how to make a roasted/basted turkey cake... and only a picture of the end result (I am a very visual person, so I need lots of pictures and/or video in order to "get" what if being typed), so as I read the thread... I said to myself that there was NO WAY I would ever be able to do this cake... not unless there was a pictorial or tutorial out there to help me... so I bookm,arked the site and went on my way.

Well this year... my MIL decided that she wanted to have Thanksgiving at her house ( we usually do Thanksgiving at our home) sorry if I sound mean... but I was like YESSSssSSssSSss! very happy that I wasn't going to have all the food to make... do my christmas decorations (they are usually up by this time) [BUT... for some reason, they are still not selling the trees yet... we buy a real tree every year and I know for a fact that by this time I already have it up and ready] and I was also relieved that I wasn't going to have a fill house lol... so I of course offered to bring the dessert... so I asked DH... whatcha think I should make? he says to me: CUPCAKES!!! he wanted Chai Spice Cupcakes with Apple Maple filling and Cinnamon Infused Buttercream which I do admit sounds super YummY... but the artist in me wanted to be creative.... well I still gave the cupcakes a chance and posted a poll on fb... and the results where 50/50 cupcakes to cake...

Well I go back to that bookmark that i have, and read and re-read once... twice... still thinking there is no way I can do this...
I go to you tube and search for it... and I find one but again it seems that it's mostly talk with pictues of the end result... but when the video seems to be over she states that she took lots of progression pictures for future refrence... (thanks Laura!!) so I look at her pics and the one thing that i notice was that she didn't use other cakes as aa guide to make hers... she had all these pictues of real roasted turkeys laying around her table...so I put my big girl pants on and decided to just DO IT!

I googled roasted tukeys and got some nice pictures and close ups and fron all sides... so on I went... this picture was my first inspiration:





HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA... I'm KIDDING!!! I thought this was too funny

For real now.... this is what I used as my main guide to carve my turcake:





I baked a 9X11 sheet cake, an 8 in. 1/2 round pyrex and 4 (4 in. small round pyrex). I didn't want to make a huge turcake because our family that's still in Philly is very small so there was no need to make something that would with just a 1/4 of it eaten.

I made lots of icing because I wanted the turcake to be only in buttercream... NO FONDANT... (you know.. you if can make carved cake with just buttercream.... you are officially and true mastermaster cakester! hehehe)

So... I took the sheet cake and the large pyrex and torted them and added my yummy simple syrup and took the small rounds and shaped the legs and wings (for the leg ends... I used ice cream cones filled with buttercream). I then looked at the above picture and started to carve...
It's funny cause for carving I usually count of DH to help me because he has that natural talent that I simply have to work hard to learn when he can just look at a shape and duplicate it with no problem... well he kept looking at what I was doing but wouldn't say anything... he didn't even say that it was looking like a turkey or anything remotely close to that.. but I kept on... after I kinda had the shape I wanted I went ahead and dirty iced it... Look:



I thought I was on the right track, but Dh wasn't too optimistic... here is another pic:




At this point now that I look at it... looks more like a chicken lol, another shot:

Here is from the top view.. and I think it's looking more turkeyISH lol

Well... after I was kinda happy with the shape... I gave it like 20 minutes for the dirty icing the crumb... then I came back with my paper method and started to shape and texture the whole bird... as I was doing that... I was seeing a turkey and I was jumping and screaming and YESSSing myself and saying I KNEW I COULD DO IT!! (all this was internally of course lol)

When DH saw how if was looking after I smooth and textured the bird... he was ALL SMILES and actually said: "WOW Babe I think this gonna work out after all" I always tell him that he should never doubt me cause I always come through, but of course MEN! ( joke! )

Well smoothed and textured it actually looked like a raw turkey it was hillarious lol... I could not get the grin off my face... here is the picture:

You see the texture? looks like the marks that are left when you pluck the feathers hehehehe...

Well after that... I took like an hour break because I was super scared to add the color, I didn't want to make a mess of it and have all that work get ruined all because I didn't add the color right...

I come back on a mission lol... I used some light corn syrup, some vodka, some brown airbrush color and some orange airbrush color... mix it all it.... and on I went...

First layer... didn't look too good, you could still see the white buttercream (this is when I realized it would have worked out better if I had colored the buttercream in a brownish orangie color, but there is no crying over spilled milk) well not looking too good.. but I put the fan on high.. let all the vodka evaporate and the color dry...

Second layer of color... looking better... I felt it needed some more orange so I altered the mixture... let the second coat dry and did the third coat with the added orange in it... and VOILA!! (did I spell that right???) It was like M_A_G_I_C_!

DH comes in and he is just in AWE! he can't believe how real it looks...so we let it dry really good... then I take some of the scrap pieces of cake and cut them to look like stuffing... I get DH to buy some curly fresh looking lettuce and after it dries I start adding the lettuce all around the turcake and then all the stuffing... and here is the end result!

My dear friends... I am shocked that I was able to pull this off at the last minute with no planning like i usually do.... I loooove how good it came out... and I sent a picture to my cousin and she was like... U DID THE TURLEY?!! when I told her it was a cake... she couldn't believe it lol

My brother said it looked too real.... the response was very good and uplifting... so here are some pictures (well LOTS of pictures lol) of the TurCake from every angle hehehehe....

This is one of my boys.... he couldn't wait to DIG IN lol

Admit it... it looks real!! u wanna eat it!!

MMmmmMMMMmm Fresh out of the oven...

Here is DH doing the honor and carving the TurCake....

Everyone had "dibs" ont he legs lol

Leftovers..... u think we can make a turkey sandwich out of this? HAHAHAHA

Well, I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed the journey from start to finish... This will NOT be my last TurCake for sure... I loved making it... loved how it came out... loved all the reactions and all in all it was one of the highlights of my 2010 Thanksgiving memories...

Bye Ya'll until my next adventure!