Decorate the cake with burnt sugar

Dust the top of the cake liberally with confectioners’ sugar. Heat a metal skewer until almost red hot on the stove top of a gas stove or in the flame of a propane kitchen torch and then burn lines or a crisscross pattern in the sugar as shown.

• To create a wavy effect drag a serrated knife over the surface of the cake while moving it from side to side.

  

• Decorate the sides of cakes with ground nuts or cake crumbs as shown here.

  

• Pipe around the edge of the cake, lifting and pulling back on the bag at regular intervals to create a wave-like effect.

  

• Encircle the cake with a strip of foil to keep the mirror mixture in place. Pour the liquid over the cake and allow to set.

  

• Set mirror.

  

• Pipe rosettes around the cake.

  

• Place a blueberry in the center of each rosette.

  

• Cake finished with a strip of ladyfingers.

  

• Spread melted chocolate over a strip of acetate.

  

• Wait until the chocolate looses its sheen and takes on a matte appearance.

  

• Wrap the strip around the cake.

  

• Peel off the acetate.