Sweet Celebrations: The Art of Decorating Beautiful Cakes

I have been a cake designer for only a few years and have many books and recipes. The recipes and instructions in this book are amazing. The cakes are rated for difficutly and the first one I tried turned out great. She gives wonderful directions for the Italian Meringue Buttercream which can sometimes be difficult to make. All of the cake recipes I have tried are perfect. She gives a good variety of different types of cakes so that you have a lot of different examples to get ideas from. She has basic tiered cakes, including the very popular gift box type cakes. She also has round cakes, and many other sculpted cakes. There are also a lot of other pictures of cakes scattered throughout the book for inspiration. She gives great directions for making gum paste flowers and marzipan fruit. If I had to pick just one cake book to keep in my collection, this would be the one, hand down. I highly recommend this book.

I love Ms. Weinstock's cake and buttercream recipes. She provides recipes for yellow, white, chocolate, almond cakes..as well as many variations on her buttercream fillings and icings. They are the basis for a truly elegant (and tasty!) cake. Her cakes really are masterpieces... very inspiring. She provides color pictures, numerous sketches, and in-depth directions on how to create several of her cakes (wedding and other celebration cakes). I have some cake decorating experience under my belt, but believe that even novices could understand the author's instructions. I have found this book to be very inspiring and fun. I frequently consult it when I need to come up with a cake for a special occasion.

i loved sylvia's book. i love to make birthday cakes and special occasion cakes. when i saw this book, i had to have it. the pictures were amazing, such detail. the instructions, step by step with such explanations are so helpful to make everything come out right. i don't know what to do first. every baker, or artist, needs a copy.

I was given a copy of the book as a gift from a friend in the States. Mrs. Weinstock did my wedding cake and I was so thrilled that she finally wrote a book! The cake recipes were easy to follow, but most of all I really appreciated the diagrams for the sugar figures and flowers. It was an easy read and easy to follow. I think Mrs Weinstock is a true artist and culinary expert. Thank goodness it was not just another coffee table book of impossible cakes to make! Thank you, Sylvia!

I was VERY impressed with this book. If you have ever dreamed of baking a grand cake, then this is THE book to own. Sylvia Weinstock presents many different cake designs and recipes, even so far as to explain the best method for assembling them. The variety of cakes was impressive; this is the best book on cake design I have ever seen. The book features wonderful color photographs of every cake, very professionally done, which made it easy to see the end-result of the recipes. I was grateful for those photographs, which helped to select the appropriate designs I wanted to try. The photos are truly beautiful --- it is tempting to keep the book out upon the coffee table. When I tried some recipes, I was pleased with the results. The directions were easy to follow, written in a straightforward manner, and offered explanations along the way. For anyone interested in baking, both amateur or sophisticated bakers, this book offers many ideas and techniques to try. After seeing and hearing about magnificent cakes in magazines and on television, the book was great fun to read, to look at and to attempt those cakes on my own! Thank you, Sylvia!