Cake and DEFENSE!!

It's that time of year when graduating grad students become anxious and work like crazy. Yes, it's time for defense! What I mean by defense here is the final presentation for grad students in which they defend their thesis research. After countless hours of preparation and practice, my boyfriend and labmate passed their defense presentations this week. What can heal a tired soul better than cake? None! So, I baked cakes for them to replenish their blood sugar and well.. just to celebrate. For my boyfriend, I made his absolute favorite cake: fruity cream cake. Basically, it's two layers of genoise cake with creme chiboust and fruits in between. I used only strawberries because that's what I had in the fridge, but you can use any fruits you want. The cake was airy, creamy, fruity, vanilla-ey.. In short, it's c'est magnifique if I dare to say so myself :)

I attempted to draw the square graduation hat with chocolate buttercream, but it turned out looking like an old telephone. Oh well, taste is more important :p

As for my labmate, I had to make a cake that did not need refrigeration, did not need any dishes to eat it, was sturdy enough so that it wouldn't fall apart during transport (me walking to my lab), but still tasted good. Solution: cupcakes! I used the same genoise batter for the cupcakes and they rose beautifully creating little domes upon baking. I then topped them with apricot cream cheese frosting and decorated them with some sugar pearls. Yummmm, love those cupcakes :)