Hamm takes the cake ... on TV show

"Hi, Saratoga!"

Shannon Hamm, principal at Saratoga Elementary School in Morris, made sure to give her students and her own five children a shout out when she made her first TV appearance on "Windy City Live" Wednesday morning.

Hamm and two other women were guests on "Windy City Live's" Nov. 16 episode with Buddy Valastro, TLC's Cake Boss. Hamm, Sarah Mills from Aurora, Ill., and Cecilia Gonzalez from Park Forest, Ill., each brought a cake they made at home to be judged by Valastro.

Hamm's cake was a dedication to all of her kids.

"I don't just have five kids," she said. "I have 805."

The cake she made for "Windy City Live" was a two-tier, white and red cake with "Saratoga School" painted on the front. Molded and placed around the cake were her children and a few students holding various school-related items, such as a book or a laptop. One girl was even holding a basketball.

The Saratoga cake took Hamm about 10 hours to complete Monday and Tuesday nights. After receiving the call Monday to be a part of the show, Hamm baked the cake and made the fondant right away.

"Homemade fondant just tastes better," she said. "When you buy it from the stores, nobody wants to eat it."

If time allows, Hamm bakes her cakes from scratch as well. If she is in a pinch for time, she uses mixes.

Her preparation continued Tuesday night when she decorated the cake and molded the people with her brother, Eric Gunty, from 5:30 p.m. until midnight.

Valastro loved the detail on Hamm's cake. He liked seeing that the books placed around the base had words on the pages and he said she did an amazing job on the sculptures.

Valastro chose Mills' 3-D turkey cake as the mini-competition winner, but Hamm's kindergarten students were most impressed with her cake.

Kindergartner Mariah Diaz said her favorite part of the cake was the computers.

"I want Mrs. Hamm to make my birthday cake," she said. "It was awesome."

Diaz said she wants to be a baker when she grows up.

Hamm has been making cakes for about three years. She started after her and her husband got married and needed to buy their children birthday cakes. She said store-bought cakes were too expensive, and too generic.

"So I thought, 'I'll try it,'" she said. So she made her son a guitar cake.

From there, she started watching and learning from the Cake Boss and was able to take one cake class at Michaels. She has been making cakes ever since. She has made retirement cakes, baby shower cakes, birthday cakes, graduation cakes and more.

She doesn't charge her family members for cakes, but she does charge other customers.

When she told the other guests on the show that she would have sold her Saratoga cake for $50, they told her that was an incredibly low price. They would have sold that cake for $150 to $200.

"I would never pay that much for a cake," Hamm said. But she does think she will bump up her prices a little bit because of how much time she spends on them.

"It's hard to see one of my cakes go because of how much time I put into them," she said.

Valastro said he used to have that feeling, too, but it goes away the more he bakes. He likes when people enjoy the way his cake looks and tastes.

After the show, Hamm was given two tickets to see Valastro's show at the Rosemont Theater the same night.

According to Diaz's classmate, Carter Laudeman, Hamm can expect a congratulations from him when she returns to school.