OUGD405. Typogateaux.

we recieved the typogateaux brief and from then had to consider what cake we might make, how we might make it, what letterform we might make it in and the design of that letterform.

i began by researching many different cakes in terms of aesthetics primarily. there are some people who can make some amazing cakes that are perfect in form and quality and probably taste fantastic aswell. 

we were allowed to do the brief as an individual or in a group. i decided to work with leo sims and make a cake between us. we considered a few different recipes that we had found but realised that neither of us were capable bakers and so we didn't want to jeopardise the quality of the cake because we couldn't bake. we both knew we wanted to make a sweet cake and so began there.

  

we began the development of our idea by considering the letter(s) we wanted to design the cake based on. i liked the idea of doing a letter 'x' because its square and so would be easier to fit in a cake. we wanted to include serifs on our design and thought that the structure of an 'x' might make the cake weaker in build up; it might collapse or what. i also thought about a few designs for an 's' but the same problems occurred and neither of us were keen, aesthetically, on using an 's'.

we went on to consider using the initials of our first names (L&J), a cliche maybe, we liked the way beak of the 'l' could be joined into the arm of the 'j' and considered some ways of achieving this. the main problems that occurred were; the counter created in the middle of the 'j' and 't' was either too big an amount of negative space or the weight of the letters had to be drastically increased. 

after some attempt at designing a letterform for our cake we decided that it was best to sort the base first and make our letter to scale it. we bought a million dollar shortbread base approx. 20X15cm. we then designed the Y around the base. i wanted to maintain simplicity, as before, but really like the addition of block serifs to give the character more formality and presentability. after drawing our the Y we cut it from the page as a stencil for the cake.

final Y template

we placed the template on the base and cut away the unwanted parts.

using a scalpol made the process a lot easier but the brittleness of the cake made some parts difficult still.

when we were happy with the base we added a layer of peanut butter to act as a sort of 'cement' for the next layer. we thought this would also offset the sweetness of the base somewhat.

after that we cut out some belgian sugar waffles using the same Y template. this bit proved difficult as the waffles were very delicate and easily crumbled. i think we got it pretty well matched though. 

from this second layer we ran a line of peanut butter round the edge of the Y in order to create a sort of 'trough' for the jam to then go in, we tried just putting the jam on but realised it would likely be squeezed out with the addition of other layers.

having filled the centre with jam we added another layer of belgian waffles which were then covered with another layer of peanut butter. after this we neatened up the sides by removing any run off from the inside and sealing everything up. we then began to decorate the top with smarties which i feel really topped the cake off.

having positioned the smarties we filled the remaining space with biscuit crumbs to create a stripy patter across the letter.

overall i was really happy with our efforts. we didn't even attempt to make a cake as neither of us have any baking skills and we didn't want to jeopardise the tastiness or the structural integrity (which i think we had spot on). if we had planned the design and making better we might have been able to follow a recipe but i think our cake was more original and suited to us. there was a fair bit of making still involved and so i think our creative demands were met. in terms of taste, i think we were really successful in making a tasty tasty cake. it was very sweet but tasted fantastic in my opinion. the general sweetness was offset by the peanut butter and the dryness offset by the jam and those two ingredients work fantastically together. aesthetically i think the cake was a success. it resembled the Y in surprising detail and the colouration and patterning of the smarties just tied it all together. although we didn't win the contest, and i wasn't expecting to, i think we worked really well towards making a cake designed to resemble a letter. we did get a lot of positive feedback about the taste quality of the cake and this made me feel proud.