American Chocolate Piano Cake~ My Children, My Inspiration

My children, Taufiq and late Nurfatihah, are my inspiration.

To me, each cake I bake means something special. Especially since the death of my little princess. The princess doll cake was inspired by Fatihah, whom I cannot and never will have the chance to bake a birthday cake each year (may Allah bless her soul). For this particular piano cake, it was inspired by my son, who recently likes to play the piano on my husband's tablet. He doesn't know any notes, nor does he plays it very well. Or to be honest, he doesn't play at all. All he does is crash/smash his fingers on the keyboard and sings 'I love you like a love song baby' by Selena Gomez on the microphone. *rolls eyes fondly*

It was a challenge trying to get smooth, sharp edges round the cake. There was not much problem when I slathered fresh cream in each corners, but it was a chore when I absent-mindedly poured lukewarm ganache on the cold frosted cake. In the end it resulted in quickly-set ganache and I had to make another batch to pour more smoothly over the old one.

Another thing, next time I'll try using Kit Kats for the black keys. Like a smartass, I piped the borders around the cakes without first making the imprints of the white keys. *tsked tsked*. Otherwise I would've have a smoother looking black-and-white keys and a more realistic-looking keyboard. Ah well, what's done is done.

Something I'll keep in mind for future use:

• When pouring ganache over a fresh cream cake, always make sure your cake is slightly below room temperature. This is to avoid your ganache from quickly setting when it hits the cold cream.
• Use 1 part chocolate and 1 part ganache. Too much chocolate and you'll end up with thick ganache that is good for piping but difficult to spread.
• Always do your homework first. A piano doesn't have 4 black keys.
• Most importantly, plan ahead.

In case you're wondering, I used the american chocolate cake recipe that I did a few weeks ago.

American chocolate piano cake

Before pouring the ganache, do crumb coat or you'll have specks of crumb cakes in your cream. I didn't do it but hey, I'm a pro  (yelah tu :P)