Cupcake Bake Sale for Team In Training

My mother-in-law is training to run a 1/2 marathon with Team In Training, an organization that supports the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Mike's mom is running to support her sister-in-law, who was recently diagnosed with Leukemia, and her great-uncle who passed away from Leukemia in the last year. Mike's mom held a huge garage sale this past weekend where they received donations from the community. Along with the garage sale, she asked me if I could bake some cupcakes for a bake sale to raise money on that same day. Having a very close friend diagnosed with Leukemia back while we were in college and an uncle diagnosed with Lymphoma, I was happy to do some baking for this amazing foundation.

The garage sale was a huge success as, I heard, so were the cupcakes! If you would like to donate to this wonderful organization please visit Kathy's Team in Training website by clicking on the link. I am so glad that I could help raise some money with my cupcakes!

Wake up with a Coffee Cupcake!

My very good friend Natalie has a daughter, Alyssa, who loves coffee! For Alyssa's 18th birthday I wanted to make her coffee cookies, but instead wound up making a cupcake instead :) (guess you could say it was an awesome mistake). These cupcakes are made with real coffee and they have a really nice and light flavor. I guess you could say they are a little more dense in texture, compared to your average cupcake, but they still retain a lightness when you eat them. When I first made them, I gave a piece to my husband and some of our friends to see if they could figure out the taste and what their reactions would be. At first my husband could't guess the flavor, but once I told him, he immediately found it. Our friend Mark really seemed to enjoy them as he ended up keeping some of the sample pieces for a snack to eat later. When our friend Folmer (a.k.a.) David sampled the piece, he suggested that alone, without frosting, the cupcake would make a good morning breakfast muffin. I gave Kevin a piece with some chocolate ganache and he said it was tasty and really like the fudgy chocolate ganache. Who would have guessed that what was supposed to be a cookie would turn out to be a versatile cupcake.

To add the dessert quality to this cupcake I used the chocolate ganache frosting I had made for my chocolate flour-less cupcake. This actually complimented the cupcake quite well, with the bitterness from the coffee (though, I think it could even use more coffee flavor) and the sweetness of the chocolate. I gave Alyssa these coffee cupcakes with the ganache frosting. Natalie, who cannot eat chocolate suggested that I make a caramel frosting for the next batch I make so she can eat one :). Sounds like I have a new project!

Happy 18th Birthday Alyssa!

Happy Birthday Barrie!

Barrie is an office turtle and she turned 5!

I was asked to make two dozen turtle cupcakes to honor the office pet at the Emmons Company

The request was to make the cupcakes similar to the ones I made for Jack's birthday, but instead of a white cake, I was asked to make a chocolate cake, and since Barrie is a girl, I decided to put little licorice bows on her head.

The cake is made from a mixture of cocoa, flour, butter, baking powder & soda, and milk. For the sand I used crushed graham crackers and for the turtle shells I used a mini cupcake pan.

These cupcakes are so fun to make! Hope Barrie enjoyed her birthday!

The Sunshine In My Kitchen!

Let me begin by letting you know this is not one of my typical dessert blogs. I love to talk about my son and how he inspires me. What is better than having a little bit if that inspiration in my kitchen.

I found this wall decal and I thought it would be great over the stove, where I like to spend my time baking. It is the saying, of this wall art, that brings so much more meaning to my life. Since Shane's passing, the sunshine always reminds me of my baby boy looking down over me. Let me explain: The day before Shane was born, it was overcast and cloudy; I had spent the majority of that day at the doctor's office and hospital because they had to monitor my blood pressure. They had informed me that the baby would probably be early and I prayed that he wouldn't come on that day because it was such an ugly, gloomy day. The next day, the doctor decided to induce me and I was so happy to be in a room that was full of beautiful sunrays. Gloomy days always make me sad and nervous as they are always soo gloomy, and since the idea of labor scared me so much, I just don't think I could mentally handle having a baby on a yucky day. Luckily Shane was born on a beautiful sunny day and he was even more beautiful than I could have ever imagined.

The sunshine has never meant more to me than now. Shane passed away in the middle of the night, but on the day of his memorial service, the sunshined so bright and beautifully, I remember it being one of the nicest days we had had. Shane makes me such a proud mom and he is the inspiration in my life. He inspires me to live for my dreams and creating desserts is all part of these aspirations I have. I've said it before, that with desserts come happiness and with happiness comes laughter. What is a better saying for my kitchen, where I create desserts than "Laughter Sparkles Like Sunshine". Desserts create happiness-> happiness=laughter, and it all sparkles like rays of sunshine, which is always my handsome boy looking over us.

Sunshine, or I like to think of it as: My SunSHANE!

A Chocolate Peanut Butter Gfree Gooey Goodness

We are going over to our friends’ house tonight for dinner and I asked her if I could bring a dessert. She said she voted for the peanut butter banana split cupcake on my poll, but since that poll hasn't closed yet, I thought I would try to make a chocolaty peanut buttery dessert for her anyways. I really enjoy flour-less cake, it is always so rich and moist and fluffy. I know desserts aren't the most health conscious, however, eliminating the flour is just one less thing our bodies have to worry about.

For this recipe I made 2 different types of ganache. I made a peanut butter ganache and a chocolate ganache. Ganache is defined as a cream base mixed with chocolate. For this cupcake I thought I would make a rich filling to ooze from the middle of the cake made out of peanut butter. Because I wanted it to be an oozy filling, I mixed peanut butter and cream with a touch of powdered sugar for sweetness. For the cupcake's topping, I made a chocolate ganache and put that in the refrigerator to solidify. Typically ganache is used in it's liquid fashion for it's melty chocolaty gooeyness (you like that? haha) and often times served warm, but since this is for a dinner at our friends’ house, I wanted it to harden a bit and act as a rich chocolate frosting. I placed both ganaches in the fridge to cool. The chocolate ganache solidified more than the peanut butter, which is exactly what I wanted to achieve.

For the flour-less cake, I used a double boiler to melt down a stick of butter and a half cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips. Once that was melted down, I added 3 eggs (beaten), sugar, cocoa and vanilla. A flour-less cake batter differs from your typical flour cake, as it’s texture is more “rubbery” than “liquidy”. I filled the cupcake pans about half way and placed them in the oven at 300 for 25 minutes. The cupcakes rose quite a bit, but once they cooled they went down; next time I will add more batter to each cupcake.

After the cupcakes cooled for 10 minutes, I filled each center with the peanut butter ganache. Because flour-less cake is less dense, you can see the cake rise as the filling is being pumped in. I placed these directly in the refrigerator to help cool the cupcakes more.

After the cupcakes cooled completely, I used a#22 frosting tip to frost the top of each cupcake. Next time I will definitely use a bigger tip as it did not create the thickness I wanted and some of the chocolate chips (which didn't melt down entirely) clogged the tip at times (had to use warm water to de-clog).

I sampled the cupcakes and OMG! they were so rich and yummy! These cupcakes are definitely meant to be eaten with a spoon, as the inside is very gooey. Hopefully our friends will enjoy these rich treats tonight! :)

Opening Day Donuts

I bought this really cute mini donut pan from my friend Kim who sells Avon. Can you believe Avon sells baking stuff? AwesomeNESS! (If you want Avon ladies, I will give you her info) Anyways, our friends and their son are coming over for the game tonight and I thought I would test out the mini donut dish. So here are some pictures of the first batch I have made. These are just chocolate cake donuts. I used a mix I got from Christmas (don't worry it is still good). There are 3 diffferent types of chocolate cake donut: the first is simply rolled in powdered sugar, the second are just left plain, and the third one is dipped in a white powdered sugar frosting (I like to use this frosting for sugar cookies because it is light and coats easily)and I drizzled them with blue powdered sugar frosting, as it is opening day for the DODGERS! No orange in this household! Go BLUE!

For the powdered sugar recipe, all I use is powdered sugar, milk and vanilla (all pretty much to taste and consistency desired :) ). Oh and p.s. if you don't want the white powder to show through (like in the frosting donuts) just keep mixing the frosting until there are no visible sugar clumps. I just didn't take my time here :)

Cookies for Halle

For my friend Heidi’s baby shower, I thought I would make her favorite pregnancy treat, white chocolate & macadamia nut cookies for favors. For these cookies, I used both granulated sugar and brown sugar to sweeten these treats. I then chopped white chocolate chips to add more sweetness to the batter. Since macadamia nuts are so big, I crushed them down so that the cookie would have a softer texture.

For the decorations I just made simple flowers using an icing tip (I will add the number of the tip later) and royal icing, so the flowers would not get smashed easily.

The cookies came out a little flatter than I expected, but I almost feel like it was for a better cookie. They were very sweet and Heidi said she really enjoyed them, which meant Halle was one happy girl, and that is all that mattered right? :)

Diaper Cake

OK , so I know this blog is dedicated to my edible desserts but I had to post some pictures from the Diaper Cake I made for one of my best friend’s baby shower. This cake is made out of 100 baby diapers. Happy changing Heidi!

Max Brenner Is My Idol

Have you ever been to the Forum Shops in Las Vegas? If you go, you need to check out Max Brenner's Restaurant in the Caesar's Palace Forum Shops. OMG! He is a genius! A couple of weeks ago, we went to Vegas to celebrate my sister-in-law's 21st birthday. Since she was celebrating her 21st in Vegas, there was no need for a cake...just shots :)

Anyways, while were were there, Katia, Jay and I went to Max Brenner's for lunch. While Katia and Jay ate actual lunch, I snacked on a chocolatini made of peanut butter liqueur, chocolate, a coffee flavors (SO DELISH!) and chocolate eggrolls made of peanuts, chocolate ganache, and bananas rolled and fried in a spring roll wrapper. (I saw these egg rolls featured on the food network and on the show they were made with strawberries, which I think might have been better, since banana is quite overpowering, but really a chocolate eggroll? Who's going to fault Max Brenner for such creativity?)

This man is truly a genius. He creates the most abstract desserts and drinks, it is amazing! He has the restaurant that I strive to have one day! Hopefully, I can fulfill this dream sometime in my future!

Max Brenner created a dessert pizza. With this pizza he uses regular pizza dough, pre-cooked almost fully, and topped with a base mixture of dark chocolate and white chocolate chunks (which will melt down) topped with mini marshmallows. That goes into the oven for 5 minutes at 400 degrees, then is topped again with candied hazelnuts and drizzled with peanut butter! In his restaurant, he offers his guests a syringe of chocolate ganache for those chocoloate lovers out there.

There were no specific directions for creating this dessert but I took the information from the food network (Kid in a Candy Store) and created what I thought was this dessert pizza. I used a simple dough made of flour, salt, water and baking powder (next time I will use an actual recipe, as this was just blan if eaten alone) I used milk chocolate and peanut butter chips (instead of white chocolate, didn't have it), I used mini marshmallows and baked it until there was a nice browning of the marhsmallows. (Have you ever seen marshmallows cook in the oven? They get really big and fluffly as they get hot.) I candied the crushed hazelnuts in a brown sugar and water syrup and stuck them in the freezer for a quick shock. Once the pizza was out of the oven I sprinkled the hazelnuts on the top and took melted peanut butter and drizzled it all over.

Let me tell you this dessert makes for 6 generous slices. It is such a sweet dessert, even for me, that I gave 2 pieces to our neightbors who said they enjoyed this sweet treat. This dessert would be great for a dinner party!

Baby Girl Baptism Cake

After Jack's Birthday Party I was asked to create a cake for a baby girl's baptism. Actually, it was for 2 baby girls.

The order was for a butter cake with a lemon custard filling and butter cream frosting. The only specific requests given for the decorations were for 2 baby angels.

In order to create the angels, I melted down Airheads and molded the bodies. The pictures I captured are not great quality, but the babies both have what should appear to be pink diapers. For their eyes I used a toothpick and food dye for one, and small blue pieces of and Airhead for the other. The angel babies both have a nose and ears molded from Airheads, though the camera does not really show it. The two baby angels have thin wings made out of royal icing and are sitting on fluffly white clouds also made out of royal icing. It was important for these babies to not move, especially the wings, and also for the clouds to keep shape, so royal icing was the perfect choice. For those of you not familar with royal icing, this icing is quick drying and dries hard. It is important that you work quickly with this frosting if you don't want to end up with clogged frosting tips. Also, you should use parchment paper over wax paper to create your decorations on. You can save these decorations in an air tight container for quite sometime for future decorating purposes.

The cake is decorated with pink and purple plumeria flowers, also made out of royal icing. I think I went a little overboard with the flowers, but again, you live and learn right?

The cake is piped with buttercream frosting dyed with food coloring. The writing is also done with buttercream.

For the custard filling, I used a jello custard pudding mix, I really just followed the box instruction as I have never made a custard and really didn't want to screw that up. Though I have to note, if you put the custard in the refrigerator right after being heated on the stove it coagulates, which can pose as a problem when trying to spread it between layers of cake.

I hope they enjoyed this cake :)