[Suzanne]

The cakes you did for your employer were "works for hire." Meaning that she owned the actual cake, not its image. But (and I'm no lawyer) it's not unusual to keep a portfolio of examples of the work you have done. You probably can't do the exact same design for someone else, but you can show what you did to give potential clients an idea of what you're capable of doing. If you make it clear in your portfolio (online or hard copy) that these are merely examples, and that you would create something similar but not identical, you probably should be all right.

I signed nondisclosure agreements with both a previous employer and a former client. It has been very easy to live with that. There are many ways to describe what you did/made without giving out the precise, detailed information. Fwiw, you can only patent a complete procedure. And I think you cannot copyright an individual recipe. Does that help?