Happy Graduation!!

Ah June.  The month of June is also known as the "wedding season"--when there's a greater (if not the greatest) number of weddings occuring compared to other times of the year.  It is also the month when high school seniors take their first step to REAL adulthood--yes, graduation.

Graduation marks the official transition from being that "high school kid" to a full-fledged young adult. By this time, those who are planning on going to college/universities already know where they're going, and have a general idea of what they want to do--and hopefully, finally get to fulfill that "when-I-grow-up" dreams they had as children.

Two years ago, a family friend of ours had asked me to make a fancy dessert buffet for their second daughter's graduation.  Well, now their youngest is graduating and they asked me to do the same, just a bit smaller.

For the menu, she wanted to do something completely different from her sister's (of course!).  She opted for mini vanilla cupcakes, caramel brownies, tiramisu bites, and lemon meringue tartlets.
The vanilla cupcakes will look kinda plain, I thought...so I decided to hand make graduation themed decorations just for the cupcakes.

I wanted to devote my entire energy for this...so I requested three days off work.  I haven't taken a single vacation since I started working at the hotel, so they can't say no. :P

Here's how my three days went:
Day 1:
Make and bake the tart shells for the tartlets
Bake off the cupcakes
Bake off the brownies and make the caramel topping
Bake off the cake base for the tiramisu
Make the cake syrup for the tiramisu

Day 2:
Make the lemon curd, fill the tart shells, then freeze
Make the marshmallow fondant decorations for the cupcakes
Assemble the caramel brownies (i.e. put the topping on the brownies) and freeze
Make the mascarpone (I substituted cream cheese) mousse for the tiramisu, pipe it onto the base, then freeze

Day 3 (the day of):
Top the tarts with meringue
Make the buttercream and decorate cupcakes
Cut the frozen brownies and decorate
Cut the frozen tiramisu bites and finish with a chocolate coffee bean on each piece

This was my first time using marshmallow fondant, but the decorations turned out adorable!

Graduation caps and diploma fondant decorations.  The dark color of the caps was a bit tricky.  I ended up using a LOT of blue and some black coloring.

For the caramel brownies, I did a ganache drizzle and the graduation year on some.

For the tiramisu, I used the St. Honore tip to pipe out the mousse.  It created some cool "waves" of mousse.

To me, the scariest part of catering is...the dreaded transportation of the desserts.  Seriously, the desserts could be absolutely beautiful when made, then get totally wrecked during transportation.  Jarring motions, bumps, swerves, and everything in-between can wreak havoc on perfectly piped mousse.  Not to mention the warmer weather.
Fortunately, I managed to pack and transport everything without a whole lot of mishaps (well, a few of the tartlets got a little messed up, but not too badly).
The whole family came and helped me plate up the desserts amid all the ooh's and aah's.

Everyone loved them!  I was so glad that they loved it...and it was good for me too, since I got to practice with fondant and utilize the skills I acquired at work.