The Van Gogh Inspired Wedding Cake Revealed

The Van Gogh Inspired Wedding Cake Revealed

When we left off yesterday, we had some final details which, Joey and Vinny were not happy with concerning the cake design. Although the general design concept of the cake was approved, some of the details, in particular, the color and size of the flowers created some debate. The cake did not have the feel of the muse- The Van Gogh Cherry Blossom painting. When looking at the painting, shades of blue and white were intermingled with different sized flowers. The decision was made to have different size cherry blossoms and have the additional colors of blue and white as well as the yellow.

White and blue flowers were rushed delivered this morning just in time for Nick to start the decorating process.The branches are created by piping icing onto the cake, which has a great look against the pale blue background. The cherry blossoms are then placed on the cake. It took the decorating room two hours to finish the cake for Joey and Vinny's final approval.



Van Gogh Cherry Blossoms

The final verdict...Joey and Vinny were not happy with the bottom of the cake. Joey pulled up the Van Gogh painting and it was agreed more needed to be done. The cake was brought back to the decorating table. They are now on a time crunch to get this cake right! With two hours left until the cake had to be on the truck, the decorators got to work and added more flowers to the bottom of the cake. There was no room for error. An hour and a half later the final product was rolled into the refrigerator to chill before transport. Everyone was happy, even the customers that came through the bakery on a tour could not believe how beautiful the cake was. What do you think?

Congratulations to Grace and Kristian, the bride and groom... We hope they have a wonderful life together and a beautiful day! 

A Termini Bros Wedding Day Two...

Miguel filling the Chocolate Chip Pound Cake

     The big question yesterday was will the decorator's vision of the wedding cake be approved?  The answer is, YES! Everyone from Joey to Vinny, and most importantly the bride and groom agree that a lighter background is the best way for the branches and cherry blossoms to really pop.  So, what happened next? The baker's sprang into action!  The cake will have three tiers and each tier is a different flavor cake.  Robert, who bakes the cakes, got started.  He had to bake an 8" chocolate chip pound cake, a 12" red velvet cake and finally, a 16" chocolate layer cake.  When he finished, in came Miguel to fill and ice the cake with our buttercream icing. 

The smoothing process

     Where many bakers use Fondant to create cake design, Termini's does not because we want the best tasting cake possible.  This part of the process takes just as long as the decorating.  The reason for this is that the cake must be stabilized with wooden dowels to stop from any shifting and the buttercream icing must be as smooth as possible, along with all of the edges being sharp.  This can take Miguel a few times over to get it perfect.  All of this must be completed before the decorating team can get started on the cake design in the morning. 

     The wedding starts at 7:00 pm and the decorating will take at least two hours.  Since we prefer our wedding cakes to arrive three hours in advance, incase of any damages or issues, this means that they will need to begin decorating at noon.  Nick and John started preparation for the decorating today by laying out all of the yellow cherry blossom flowers that the bride and groom requested to match the Van Gogh painting.  This is when another issue arose, Joey and Vinny were not happy with the fact that all of the flowers were the same size and color.  After and hour of debate a decision was made.  Check in tomorrow to find out what decision was reached.

A Termini Bros Wedding...

The wedding season is here and no matter how small or big the wedding we all celebrate with cake!!  The idea then bloomed in our heads at Termini Bros; why not show our customers a wedding cake from start to finish?  So in this weeks blog we have a special treat for you, our bride, Grace and groom, Kristian have a special wedding cake in mind and the journey began with the first consultation back in January.  The couple met with Alyssa, our wedding consultant, about their ideas and vision for their wedding cake.  The next month, Alyssa met with our decorators Nick and John and explained the concept- a Van Gogh painting of cherry blossoms.  They talked about the idea and what the bakers need to bring this idea to fruition.  The decorating team first needs a picture of the painting, a swatch of the background color and the color of the cherry blossoms.  All of this is discussed months before the wedding and now that the week of the wedding is here, it's time for action and confirmation of the details.  Nick looked at the swatch the bride has provided for the background and believes it's too dark.  John came up with the idea to lighten the background so the branches and the cherry blossoms are highlighted.  Will the bride and groom agree with the decorator's vision of their special cake? Will they agree to the changes in the background color? This question needs to be brought to Joey and Vinny. Check back tomorrow to find out if the vision is approved...

Van Gogh Cherry Blossoms

National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day

Today is National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day, so we decided to focus on the ubiquitous American favorite as the topic of today’s blog post.  Chocolate Chip Cookies are a relatively recent invention, coming about in 1930 when Ruth Wakefield supposedly accidentally invented the cookie.  According to Nestlé, who purchased Wakefield’s recipe in exchange for a lifetime supply of chocolate, Wakefield was mixing up a batch of chocolate cookies when she realized that the baking chocolate she was used to using wasn’t stocked in her kitchen so she substituted chocolate bars that she cut into pieces.  Instead of melting into the batter like she expected, the chocolate chunks held their shape and a national favorite was born.

Ruth Wakefield, Inventor of the Chocolate Chip Cookie

George Boucher, a former employee of the Toll House Inn where Wakefield was a proprietor, claims a different story.  He insisted that Wakefield, an accomplished cook and baker must have known the melting properties of chocolate, so the Nestlé story had to be a fabrication.  He said that he saw the enormous stand mixer that Wakefield used to mix her dough cause massive vibrations in the shop on multiple occasions.  He theorized that the chocolate bars must’ve been on a shelf above the mixer, and the vibrations knocked them into the dough, where the mixer broke them into chunks that were mixed throughout.  He claims that Wakefield returned to the kitchen and saw the chocolate chip cookie dough and wanted to throw it out because of the chunks, but he persuaded her to try baking them anyway as a kitchen experiment.  The result was the first batch of Nestlé Tollhouse Cookies.

Eventually, due to some legal issues, Nestlé lost the rights to the “Tollhouse” trademark, but many still refer to the cookies as such.  Even today, if you pick up a bag of Nestlé chocolate chips, every single one will have some kind of variation of Wakefield’s “Toll House Cookie” recipe on the back.

From a 1940s era Nestle Bag

When Wakefield sold the rights of her recipe to Nestlé and the common person had access, Chocolate Chip Cookies became nearly synonymous with “American.”  People have become so fond of these cookies over the years that Massachusetts decided to instate Chocolate Chip Cookies as the Official State Cookie!  

Pennsylvania attempted to follow suit with two bills (Senate Bill 320 and House Bill 2479), but the Nazareth Sugar Cookie has been in the argument since the first bill was introduced in 1997.  It is still a matter of legal debate to this day!  

We can’t really judge people for getting so excited about these cookies, as they are one of our favorites to bake AND to eat.  In fact, ours are consistently a best-seller in the shop.  We have a hard time keeping up, but we love to make what you crave! 

From our family to yours,

Cheers!  (With a glass of milk and cookie in hand, of course)

Festa Della Mamma

Did you know that on La Festa Della Mamma (Mother’s Day, which is celebrated on the same day in Italy and the US) Italian phone companies record their highest volumes of the year?  Or that Mother’s Day falls third on the list of holidays for spending, right behind Christmas and Valentine’s Day?  Our Mom is one of the most important women in our lives, so we understand what all the fuss is about!

And yet with all of this hype, Mother’s Day is actually a relatively new holiday.  It wasn’t officially adopted in the US until 1914 and it wasn’t officially adopted in Italy until 1958.  We’re glad people finally got their acts together to celebrate Mom!!! 

Some trace the idea of Mother’s Day back to ancient Rome where the goddess Juno was celebrated yearly as the Goddess of Fertility.  She also had a month named after her (June) and to this day, many Italians believe that getting married in the month of June is good luck for a healthy marriage and for fertility.

Others trace the idea of Mother’s Day back to the Christian “Mothering Sunday” tradition whereby people would go and visit their “Mother” church— meaning the church where they were baptized—and decorate it with flowers and gifts.

The new iteration of Mother’s Day is special because of the apostrophe.  “Mother’s” is possessive.  All of a sudden we, as a society, were encouraged to celebrate our own Mother, not the Mother of mankind or the Church (although attending mass on Mother’s Day is still a very important tradition in Italy).  On this day, all around the world, children, fathers and husbands all get the opportunity to take care of the mothers in their lives.  They get the chance to tell the women in their lives who nurture and take care of the family “Thank you!”

However you celebrate this year, be sure to take a moment to call the special women in your life to remind them how important they are!!

From our family to yours,

Buona Festa Della Mamma!

The Origins of Limoncello

Our Limoncello pastry is quickly becoming a new fan favorite, which isn’t surprising considering the  tasty combination of layers of vanilla cake, light-as-air lemon mousse and Mr. Joe’s original Lemon Curd recipe.  As with everything we do, we thought it important to honor the history that brought about the inspiration to create this new addition to the Termini product line, and so delved into understanding the roots of Limoncello itself.

Termini Brothers Limoncello Pastry

The three towns of Sorrento, Amalfi and Capri, all in relatively close distance to one another, argue that their people were the inventors of the lemon-flavored liqueur.  History clearly shows that its existence has been known for at least 100 years, but some put it back much, much further.  Some legend has it that warriors would drink this beverage as a way to steel themselves against battle as far back as the invasion of the Saracens in the late 800s!

Sorrento Lemons overlooking the coast

The more recent history of Limoncello is also fraught with local lore, meaning we’ll likely never know the true origins of the beverage.  One group claims that Vincenza Canale of Capri created the liqueur as an inventive way to delight her customers into returning to the Inn she ran.  She would give it freely to customers after they had completed their meals, hoping that the warming effect of the liqueur would help them sleep more soundly.  The Capri camp has some serious backing, as Donna Canale’s son later opened a bar where the lemon flavored drink was a specialty and drew people from surrounding towns.  In 1988, his son Massimo Canale, Donna Canale’s grandson, was the first to patent the beverage and its name.  In fact, the Canale family still runs one of the most profitable producers of the drink: Limoncello de Capri.

Island of Capri

The other group claims that Maria Antonia Farace was a budding entrepreneur on the island of Azzura  who was looking for ways to improve her boarders’ experience.  Donna Farace was a proprietress of a boarding house that had a large orange and lemon tree garden, so she took it upon herself to create the drink that would keep sailors coming back to the island for more.

If you think the stories sound similar, it’s because they are.  Here is where my research led me to something even more interesting:  One of Donna Farace’s daughters actually married into the Canale family.  Her grandson, Salvatore Canale was the man who opened the popular bar in Capri and the father of Massimo Canale, the man to patent the beverage.  To this day, both families and their respective towns lay claim to the original recipe, and neither seems likely to budge anytime soon! 

Limoncello is one of Danny DeVito's favorite beverages...He actually helped to make the drink more widespread in the United States by talking about his love of the drink on a popular talk show!

While we don’t know the true origin of Limoncello, we thank our lucky stars that someone had the sense to come up with the now nearly ubiquitous beverage.  Its sweet, smooth and strong lemon flavor lacks any sourness or bitterness that can be found in some lemons, lemon juice or lemon rinds, and so lends itself to be used in cocktails, desserts or to be enjoyed in an icy cold glass all on its own.  And even though we cannot give you the recipe for our Limoncello pastry, we’re happy to pass along a link to create some of its eponymous beverage. (Click ­here to learn more!)

Homemade Limoncello

From our family to yours, Abbondanza!

Termini Brothers Bakery

Spumone is the Mother of All Dessert Invention, Apparently…

As the new line started popping up in the stores, the history of Neapolitan Ice Cream—the inspiration for our Neapolitan pastry—came into question.  Was it a truly Italian invention?  Did it harken from Naples, or somewhere else?  Who came up with the brilliant idea to put Chocolate, Vanilla and Strawberry ice creams together to make one phenomenal dessert?

Neapolitan Flavors in an Ice Cream Treat

While Neapolitan ice cream as we know it in America was not a traditional Italian dessert, it was an interpretation of another dessert known here as Spumoni (or spumone  in Italy) that was introduced to America around 1870 by Italian immigrants.  Spumone is a traditional dessert that originated in Naples, and consisted of a variety of flavors of gelato (typically cherry, chocolate and pistachio) that were shaped into a mold with layers of nuts and fruit separating the flavors.  This beautifully shaped dessert was then cut and served in thick slices.

Spumone

A majority of Ice Cream Shoppes in the US in the 19^th century were owned and operated by Italian Americans, who began to introduce this concoction.  However, over time, the owners of these Shoppes began to eliminate the nuts and fruit which were costly additions, and began to develop an American hybrid that would incorporate the three most popular flavors at the time: Chocolate, Strawberry and Vanilla.  Fans of ice cream began referring to this new dessert as “Neapolitan” because of its connection to the *real* Neapolitan dessert, Spumone.  Yet another popular “American” dessert that is said to have originated from spumone is the banana split.  In fact, one might argue that this is even closer to the original recipe because of the addition of fruit, nuts and whipped cream to the three flavors of ice cream!

Our Neapolitan Pastry is yet another riff on the original idea created in Naples long ago, but we think our forefathers would be quite proud.  Two layers of chocolate sponge cake are separated by a layer of strawberry mousse, then topped with Bavarian cream (a mixture of whipped cream and cream cheese), chocolate crumbles, and piped with chocolate ganache and another small dollop of the strawberry mousse.

Termini's Neapolitan Pastry

Like its predecessors, the layers are kept separate to ensure a beautiful presentation, but we personally think it tastes best when you take a bite with just a little of everything!  However you decide to tackle it, we hope you enjoy our interpretation of this classic Italian-American invention! 

All our best,

Termini Brothers Bakery