Category Archives: Cakes

Hibiscus Tutorial – Le Torte di Toni Masterclass

Welcome back, this is the second episode of “Le Torte di Toni – Masterclass”.

In this video Toni Brancatisano and I will demonstrate how to make a lovely hibiscus in sugar florist paste. English subtitles will be added soon.

A little spoiler, a picture of the finished cake. Find more pictures of this cake in the Flowers page.

Hydrangea Tutorial – Le Torte di Toni Masterclass

Hello everybody, long time no see!

Someone kindly sent me a link to one of the two episodes of “Le Torte di Toni – Masterclass” I recorded a few years ago for Gambero Rosso TV.

Toni Brancatisano is the lovely host of the programme, we had a great time filming together.

In this episode, we made a multi-tiered cake with hydrangea flowers.

I hope you enjoy the tutorial, English subtitles should be available soon are available now. In the mean time, a picture is worth a thousand words…

Browse the Flowers page for more pictures.

Of Tuberoses, books and romantic cakes

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I couldn’t be more excited about the news I am going to share. Today is the launch day of the long-awaited book The Art of Sugarcraft (Amazon UKAmazon US), published by B.Dutton Publishing Ltd, which I had the great pleasure to contribute to.

Joining several first-class names of the industry to create this huge sugarcraft “bible” was an honour, and I was very flattered that my tuberose flowers were among the few images chosen for the press release as well as for other advertising of the book.

The Art of Sugarcraft AI Sheet

When B. Dutton Publishing contacted me for this project I was over the moon, they asked me to create sugar flowers that could pair well with a wedding cake.

My credo – when it comes to sugar flowers and sugarcraft – is all about neat style; I like to believe that if my cakes were poems they’d be haiku rather than baroque.

I immediately decided that I wanted something a bit different from typical wedding cakes, too often congested with a miscellany of different flowers.

I’d rather stick to a single variety and make it the leading character.

So I turned to Tuberoses.

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Undoubtedly romantic in appearance, their luscious white petals, so pleasingly rich, would be ideal for my purpose. The only thing I regretted about the sugar version was the lack of a real flower’s scent. The two-tiered cake on which the flowers are displayed is covered in two different shades of the tenderest green to provide a soft counterpoint.

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As usual, I took care of the photography as well. Photographing my sugar flowers provides the perfect finale to all my projects, big and small. It closes my creative circle.

Developing this project has been an utter joy and I hope it will inspire readers to have fun making sugar flowers and beautiful cakes and to unleash their creative potential.

I wish to thank Jennifer Kelly and Frankie New at B.Dutton Publishing. Thank you so much for your support.

Unfortunately I couldn’t manage to be present for the book launch at Squires Kitchen’s annual exhibition today. But I do hope you’ll be able to have a look at the book which is packed with information and ideas and is the ultimate text for both beginners and experienced cake decorators who wish to hone their skills and dive in 520 pages of pure sugarcraft fun!

Spring Breeze Cake

Spring Cake

Sweet colors and delicate flowers announcing Springtime and quite unusual for my flowers, not a single floristry wire involved in the creation of this cake!

This time I focused on colour and tenderness to conceive a design that could be very easy to recreate at home with basic equipment and little expertise and most of all, I wanted it to be super-pretty.

Spring Cake Closeup

The perfect cake to celebrate the coming of Spring if you don’t have too much time to spend on the decoration.

You can find step-by-step instructions to make the Spring Breeze cake in issue 120 of Cake & Sugarcraft Magazine.

Wishing you a lovely month of March,

Susanna x

Vintage Charm Cake

I will always remember last summer as the season of roses and hydrangeas. I love those flowers, especially when they are together. Their shapes and colours are the epitome of Nature’s beauty!

Starting from those thoughts, a few months ago I decided to design a cake featuring roses and hydrangeas. The simple idea became a project in the 2nd issue of Squires Kitchen’s Bake School Magazine. The article is a step-by-step guide to making flowers, cake and mini cakes.

SKMP must have thought the same about the magical match, because to my surprise the cake was used on the cover of Wedding Cakes magazine, issue 45!

It is a great honour for me. Seeing my work, and what was intended as a homage to Mother Nature, on the cover of a world-renowned magazine filled me with joy. When passion and hard work meet, sometimes something magic is born.

If you-like me-love roses and hydrageas, please join me on March 15th, 2013 and March 17th, 2013 at Squires Kitchen’s Exhibition in Farnham, Surrey. We’ll learn how to make blossom mini cakes. See you there, then!