Cakes to Dream On : A Master Class in Decorating

Rating:
Summary: If You Can't Stand the Heat.....
Review:
This book is absolutely mind-blowing.

I was not familiar with Ms Peters' work previously and after seeing this book was inspired to take a look at her earlier books. It was interesting to see how she has developed since "Colette's Cakes" -- her imaginative designs, her sense of color, her sense of whimsy -- even her writing, has grown with her talent.

This is, however, 'A Master Class in Decorating' as the title indicates. Although I think an attentive beginner could readily follow her instructions, as with anything, innate talent and experience will play a large part in the end result.

I imagine there will be those who will look at this book and think it is far too elaborate for the average person capabilties.

Well, if one never aspires to greater heights, one will always be.......average.

This is a book for inspiration.

Bravo!

Rating:
Summary: Another winner!
Review: I am a (very) amateur cake decorator. I have been using Ms. Peters' books to make cakes for about 5 years, now. I have always been impressed at how she is able to show you in her books exactly how to create one of her cakes. I feel very successful creating cakes that I never could without the help of these books. This latest is no exception. I will never rise to the level of Ms. Peters' artistry, but she gives me something to strive for. And whenever I attempt to recreate one of her cakes, I get raves (I just don't show them the photo of how the cake is SUPPOSED to look).
These books are so much fun, and I have learned a lot from them without ever having taken a class.


Rating:
Summary: buy the book
Review: I tried just her basic cake recipe in the back of the book, and it was to die for ,plus the chocolate mousse filling/ frosting my friends went crazy, and the fondant worked for me and I had never ever made a rolled fondant , I need more practice, but I was estatic that I got decent results . Most of the cakes are fantasy cakes ,but it is a great coffee table book that has real recipes that work . I think it is worth the price and I hate spending money

Rating:
Summary: a creative genius
Review: This is by far the best of Colette's books...she gives insight into the creative process she uses to design her spectacular cakes. The cakes are an inspiration to anyone who makes decorative cakes....Colette gives meticulous instructions and shares ALL her secrets ....Cakes To Dream On is just incredible!!!

Rating:
Summary: "Dream On" are the operative words
Review: While I concede that this book is stunning to look at, Colette Peters does not want you to learn how to make these cakes. The cake decorating instructions are vague and absurdly simplistic in the extreme; general discussion of technique (painting, molding, color-mixing) is either absent or useless in its brevity. Even some discussion of brands of food coloring or gum-paste would have been useful, as the success of these cakes utterly depends on the subtle color hues and graceful sculpturing of fondant and gum-paste. If you enjoy cake decorating, I suggest you get this book out of the library to appreciate the photos. But if you want to develop your skills, do not purchase this book. This is another narcissistic venture by Colette Peters.

Rating:
Summary: Great Cake Designs. Good Book for Professionals
Review: `Cakes to Dream On', subtitled `A Master Class in Decorating' by major American pastry artist and teacher, Colette Peters has the ambition to be an advanced class in multi-tiered cake decorating. This ambition is not to be taken lightly, as there is very little in this book for the amateur home / bake sale cook. This is not to say that the book is not chocked full of great ideas, if you already know a lot about how to work with royal icing, fondant, marzipan, and multi-layered cakes. I have made a two and three layered birthday cake in my day, but these creations are entirely out of my league.

The book consists of four general parts. The first part is the first chapter on `How to Make a Decorated Cake', which covers materials to use as the base of a multi-layered cake, who to reinforce the layers, and how to make crooked cakes on purpose. For those few of you out there who actually make tiered cakes, this is one of the more useful topics, although I confess much of it is pretty common sensical.

The second part of the book is the next eight (8) chapters, which are almost all alike in being simply collections of decorated cakes done by the author and her company with instructions on how to make these cakes and their decorations. The instructions assume the person making the cake has access to a lot of specialized tools, materials, and specialized training. One decorated cake chosen at random requires:

Fondant
Tracing Wheel
Gumpaste Ribbon Roses and Leaves
Royal Icing dots on wires (oh my)
Luster dust
Royal Icing
Gumpaste Pearls
Three foamboard circles
Foamboard base
Gumpaste curly hearts
Lemon Extract
Piping bag and #2 tip
Oval shaped dragees
Paintbrush

Descriptions of how to construct several of the cakes include printed templates for preparing some of the designs on the cake. I find these particularly unhelpful, as they require one to have an enlarging photocopier handy to enlarge the diagrams on heavy paper from which they can be cut and used as a template. Now I am certain that a commercial pastry shop would have such a copier, so this reinforces my impression that this book is really meant primarily as an idea source for other pastry professionals.

The third section is recipes for cakes and icings. One is likely to find as good or better recipes for these things in books by Maida Heatter, Nick Malgieri, or Rose Levy Beranbaum. If your primary interest is in baking birthday cakes or bakesale cakes, I strongly suggest you get Beranbaum's `The Cake Bible' (which happened to win best cookbook of the year from the IACP a few years back) instead of investing in this book which works much better as coffee table decoration than as a manual for cake baking. Beranbaum includes such things as candy and nut embellishments, food processor fondant, rolled fondant, chocolate fondant, pastillage, rose modeling paste, crystal flowers, as well as her extensive recipes for cake, fillings, and icings.

The fourth section has a title suggesting that now the `master class' in techniques really begins. This chapter includes short sections on which one could easily write a whole book, such as:

Mixing paste colors into Fondant
Painting with Powdered Colors
Airbrushing a cake
Fondant Decorations
Gumpaste Decorations
Piping Techniques
Run-in Sugar
Brush Embroidery
Making Edible Crystal Beads
Sugar Beads
Basic Techniques
- Dividing a Round Cake evenly for Decorating
- Sculpting a Cake
- Getting Cakes from Here to There
Quick Reference Guide to Tools and Ingredients

Without a doubt, Ms. Peters' cakes are knockouts and her photographs and techniques are chocked full of ideas for professionals. Jacques Torres and Ewald Notter are not going to endorse just anyone's book. It is just that her book is simply not very well organized to teach people with modest skills and objectives.

So, if your objective is to daydream or to open a professional decorated cake store, this book is for you. If you simply want to improve your cake baking and decorating skills a bit, get Beranbaum's book and an inexpensive pamphlet on cake decorating from Wilton at your nearest hobby mart.