Baking a cake is impressive enough. But frosting it hits every sweet spot. Add a few swirls, and you’re giving the cake a personal touch and making it more fitting for any celebration. Elevate it further by turning your cake into a showstopping centerpiece with a few piping tricks from baking royalty.
The Maya Kitchen brings in Valeri Valeriano and Christina Ong, the popular Filipino founders and owners of the London-based Queen of Hearts Couture Cakes shop, for the special Dessert Dreams with the Queens of Buttercream workshop. The session includes a cake decorating demo using local and easy to find ingredients like MAYA products and a hands-on exercise where participants get expert guidance on frosting a cupcake.
Valeri and Christina’s sweet success started with a tiny oven (that can only bake six cupcakes at a time!) in their tiny kitchen in London in 2011 while taking odd jobs to survive. Since they had zero baking experience, they equipped themselves with YouTube videos, basic baking tools and improvised piping bags to give friends a unique handmade Mother’s Day gift. They made their first sunflower cupcake and unlocked a passion for baking and buttercream art.
Soon, Valeri and Christina started their own cake business and pioneered innovative techniques and intricate designs that won them medals in cake decorating competitions in London. Now known as Queens of Buttercream, they have since been invited to conduct workshops at jam-packed venues all around the world. They have also authored best-selling books The Contemporary Buttercream Bible (2014), 100 Buttercream Flowers (2015), Buttercream One-Tier Wonders (2016), and Buttercream Flowers for all Seasons (2018), which have been translated into different languages.
Despite the success and their busy calendar, Valeri and Christina still make time to travel to Manila at least once a year. Their passion for baking and sharing their knowledge have also led them to organize the first Cake Fiesta Manila, the first-ever ultimate cake show in the Philippines, in 2019. Supported by Maya, the event is considered as the biggest baking and cake decorating expo in the country, with a second run slated on November 13-15, 2020 at the SMX Convention Center Pasay.
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Learn great recipes at www.themayakitchen.com. If you want to take your baking and cooking skills up a notch check out Maya Kitchen’s course offerings at the website, e-mail contactus@themayakitchen.com, or visit The Maya Kitchen Culinary Center every Tuesday to Saturday at 8F Liberty Building, 835 A. Arnaiz Avenue (Pasay Road), Makati City or call 8892-1185 or 8892-5011 local 108 or +63929 679 6102.
