UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Ugh, just lost a year's worth of posts.  Working on fixing it...

Be back soon.

¡Cinco de cupcake!

We celebrated Cinco de Mayo in class on Friday.  The students brought in different foods and asked me to bring in cupcakes of course.  So I set out to come up with some kind of Mexican dessert I could translate into a cupcake.  I went with the obvious and did a trial run of a tres leches cupcake with dulce de leche buttercream.  It actually tasted really good but because of the soggy consistency I just couldn't see them not turning completely disgusting by 6th and 7th period (which was when we were having our party).  So I thought about a churro as inspiration.  I ended up making what I called a cinnamon churro crunch cupcake.  

I made a basic yellow cake and divided the batter into three bowls.  I left one plain and dyed the other two red and green so I would have the colors of the Mexican flag.  I put a teaspoon of cinnamon each in the red and green batters.  

I wandered into a little local Mexican grocery for some churro-ish (yes I just made up that word) inspiration.  I asked the guy working there what would be good to put into a cake that would make it taste like a cinnamon churro and he showed me a box of cinnamon wafer cookies.  I bought them and tasted them and they were really good!  I crushed up a bunch to use in the cupcakes.  In one cupcake batch I put the crumbs on the bottom of the batter in the cupcake liner.  In the other batch I put them on top of the batter before baking.  Both were really good but the one on top was better b/c it came out crunchy.  (Well, it was crunchy until the next morning when I went to frost them.  By then, the "crunch" was the same consistency as the cake but still tasted really good!)

I got out all of my red, green and white sprinkles to decorate.  I got a box of 100 Mexican flag picks on eBay for $4 and free shipping!  I REALLY love eBay.  I can not stop buying stuff off of it.

Yum!  Each cupcake had lots of layers.  I kinda smooshed the icing when cutting this one in half for a photo, but I think it still looks really neat.

I told the students that I was blogging this recipe and I wanted them in this entry.  They are all super kids!  

Get 'em all sugared up then send them to 8th hour!  



The recipe:

BHG yellow cake
Ingredients

• 2 1/2
  cups all-purpose flour
• 2 1/2
  teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2
  teaspoon salt
• 2/3
  cup butter
• 1 3/4
  cups sugar
• 1 1/2
  teaspoons vanilla
• 2
  eggs
• 1 1/4
  cups milk
  
  

  
  

  directions

  
  

  Grease and lightly flour two 8x1-1/2-inch or 9x1-1/2-inch round baking pans or grease one 13x9x2-inch baking pan; set pan(s) aside. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside.

  
  

  In a large mixing bowl beat butter or margarine with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add sugar and vanilla; beat until well combined. Add eggs, one at a time, beating 1 minute after each. Add dry mixture and milk alternately to beaten mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just till combined. Pour batter into the prepared pan(s).

  Bake in a 375 degree F oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until a wooden toothpick comes out clean. Cool layer cakes in pans on wire racks for 10 minutes. Remove layer cakes from pans. Cool thoroughly on racks. Or, place 13x9-inch cake in pan on a wire rack; cool thoroughly. Frost with desired frosting. Makes 12 servings.

  Variation Yellow Cupcakes:To make cupcakes, grease and lightly flour thirty 2-1/2-inch muffin cups or line with paper baking cups. Prepare cake as directed in Step 2. Fill each cup half full. Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in center of a cupcake comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack. Makes 30 cupcakes.

New Entries Coming Soon!!!

Oh my goodness I haven't blogged in forever!  I *have* been baking and cooking up a storm since my last entry, taking photos of all the steps in the process of all the amazing things I have made.  These photos and recipes are all saved in a file in my hard drive... and that's where they have been sitting over the last year. :o(
I got a wonderful job at the junior highschool in town working with some great kids last August and just haven't had the time to sit down and work on my blog.  So that's why my weekdays are busy.  And now that my kids are both in school where there are a lot of sports and actitives, weekends are full of "kid stuff" and family, etc. so I haven't had weekends to work on it either.  I plan on hitting it hard-core next month (May 2012) and getting it all caught up!  See you soon.

Phyllis

Toothpick Cake for Reid's birthday

Ok, so my husband's family makes this cake they call "toothpick cake."  It's kind of famous within their family.  Reid's grandmother came up with it.  It's a boxed mix chocolate cake with a homemade cooked caramel icing.  It really is quite fabulous.  The reason it's called toothpick cake is because she couldn't keep the gooey icing from sliding off the cake and taking the top layer with it.  So she stuck toothpicks in it to hold it all together.  Reid's mom also makes the family toothpick cake.  Growing up, they had no air conditioning in their house and with Reid's birthday in July, she literally had to sit in the fridge with the door open to frost it so it didn't melt off as she was doing it.   Reid loved this cake as a kid because it was fun to him to pick out the toothpicks.  Ah, the things that little kids find amusing!  As an adult he still loves it because it tastes so good.

So anyhoo, one of the first birthdays we spent as a married couple Reid asked me if I would make him toothpick cake.  So I called his mom to get the recipe.  I immediately saw the problem- they made the caramel icing with margerine instead of butter.  No wonder it was so runny!  So I made my first batch with butter and it was a solid (pun totally intended) success.  I have made this for him every year since wtih an exception here and there, like the year I started getting so many requests for my oreo cake.  He had to have an oreo cake that year.  But we are back to basics once again and all is well in Birthdaycakeland.

But you know me- I can't make the dreaded BOXED MIX CAKE that he grew up with.  I have a from-scratch cake that I now make.  And this cake has a story too.  Last year my daughter brought home a book from the school library called The Bake Shop Ghost.  It's about a ghost that lived in a bakery and wanted a chocolate cake.  Tallulah asked me if we could make a chocolate cake from scratch.  Heck yeah we can!

Cake inspiration #1: Reid's grandmother (Nana).  Can you see her buried under those great-grandchildren?


Cake inspiration #2



First the cake...

Get out your ingredients.



Spray and line your pans with parchment.


Melt your chocolate and butter over a very low heat.  Make sure you use good-quality chocolate.  The recipe states that you can use bittersweet or semi sweet.  I just LOVE that dark chocolate flavor.  I recommend Ghirardelli 60% chocolate chips.  They are fab.  If you prefer it a bit sweeter, then use semi sweet.


Mix your dry ingredients in your mixer.


Beat your eggs like they owe you money.  Not really- just beat them lightly.



Once your chocolate looks like this, it's done.  It shouldn't even be really hot, just a little warm.  If it's too hot, let it cool a bit or you'll end up with scrambled eggs in your batter.


Mix water, vanilla and eggs together then pour into dry ingredients.


Wisk it all together.


Pour into prepared pans.


While the cake bakes, watch your husband and kids play the new Mario sports video game he got for his birthday.  Serioulsy, I don't know who is more obsessed with the Wii- Reid or the kids!!!


Looks done to me!!!



Caramel icing



Melt butter in a small saucepan.  Add brown sugar and milk.  Boil gently while stirring.



Let sugar mixture cool for 10 minutes.   Look at how dark and yummy it looks!



Blend into powdered sugar.



Beat until smooth.



Trim the rounded part off the top of one cake and lay it cut side down.  I always put waxed paper down on the cake plate so I don't slop all over it.



Spread frosting on bottom layer.




Put top layer on, flat side down (don't trim this one unless you prefer a perfectly smooth, flat top).  Frost the sides.  Just spackle it on.  This frosting gets firm quickly.  Well, not FIRM.  It's... I don't even know how to describe it.  It's still creamy even when it's dry but it just sets up really fast.  It's magical.


Glop on the top layer.  Try not to drool.  The smell of the warm buttery caramel is still in the air and right under your nose.


It's impossible to make this a pretty cake unless you can work very fast.  To me it makes no difference.  At least not with this cake.  The flavor makes up for the non-smoothness.



When you discover your candle supply is low, dig into your daughter's leftover candles.  Hubby won't mind as long as THIS cake is under them.



Birthday person gets to choose their cake plate first.  Then everyone else gets to pick.



Make a wish!



Plain vanilla ice cream is the perfect match for this sweet, rich, dense cake.



I didn't think to make perfect, clean slices for photos.  But just look at it's chocolately goodness staring at you!!!!!  I swear it is moist and awesome.  My horrible camera flash washes everything out.



Yes, yesterday it was all about Reid.  But now that nonsense is over, let's get back to ME.




The men of Winterfell approve of this entry.










Caramel Icing

2/3 c. butter
1 c. brown sugar (dark looks best but light works just as well)
1/2 c. milk
1 pound powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Melt butter in pan.
Add sugar and milk, bring to boil.
Stir constantly while boiling gently for 5 minutes.
Cool for 10 minutes.
Blend in powdered sugar and vanilla.  Beat until smooth.

Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes made w/ White Velvet Cake

White velvet is becoming my most-requested cake/cupcake recipe.  Even though I didn't create the recipe, I probably shouldn't share it... but who am I kidding?  You know you'd rather ask me to bring this to your party than make it yourself!  ;)
In addition to the corndog cookies I mentioned in an earlier post, I also brought cupcakes to our block party.  BUT, just like I couldn't "just" bring cookies, I had to make them look like something else.  I also wanted to bring cupcakes that looked like something else.  And just like the corndog cookie, I got this idea from somewhere in the internet world.  I had downloaded the photos to my desktop but didn't save the link.  So not my original idea but I can't credit the one to came up with it because I don't know who it was.

I can't believe I'm sharing these photos because this was kind of a Cupcake Fail.  It was so fucking hot in my kitchen (despite the fact that the rest of the house was a comfortable 72 degrees) and the buttercream icing kept melting.  I'd stick it in the freezer for a few minutes but then it would get too hard to pipe out so I'd have to set it out, then it would start to melt again.  Ugh.  THEN, I noticed when I was decorating that some of the cucake bottoms were burned.  Just the bottoms.  I never would have noticed if I hadn't put a dot of icing on the bottom to "glue" them to the cake board.  The rest of the cupcake was totally fine.  Tops were not dry (ok maybe a teeny bit dry) and didn't taste burnt.  I'm guessing one of my cupcake pans was touching the side of the oven.  (Note to all of you: this is why you aren't supposed to let your pans touch the side of the oven).

But I spent so much time on these damn cupcakes THERE WAS NO WAY I WASN'T BRINGING THEM!!!!!!!!!!  Deal with it!!!!!!!  Ah so much cupcake rage going on here...  Did I mention that we had to get up at 5am this same morning to drive all the way out to Munster for my daughter's swim meet????  Then drive aaaaaaall the way back home so I could put all this together?
Ok, enough excuses.  Let's get to the photos and recipe.

Bake your cupcakes and let them cool.  You could use your favorite flavor of cupcakes for this idea.  I chose the white velvet because I thought it would look better with a white base.

I made a buttercream icing and divided it into 3 bowls.  I tinted two of them to look like strawberry and mint choc chip.












By now they're all melting and gloppy.  The green was really too melty.  But eh, still kind of cute.  At this point, I just threw frosting on the rest of the cupcakes without decorating.

Corndog Cookies

Nothing says summer fun food like a corndog!   Even if it's a fake corndog.  Last night for our annual summer block party, I made some corndog cookies on a stick.   I used my favorite sugar cookie recipe.  I never used to like sugar cookies.  Despite their name, they are usually kind of bitter and they just don't taste good unless you put a ton of gloppy icing on them.  Not that I don't love gloppy icing, but if you NEED gloppy icing to eat something, it's probably not worth eating.  The texture of these is fabulous too.  They're soft-ish cookies unlike the normal crisp and tasteless sugar cookie.  AND, they do not spread when you bake them!  If you make a star or Christmas tree shape, they don't bake into these weird, round Patrick Starfish shapes.  So this recpie is also perfect for cutouts for holiday cookies.

After you make the dough you can roll it out then cut it into your favorite shapes.  I didn't have a cutter for this kind of cookie so I took a corndog out of the freezer, set it down on a piece of cardboard and traced it.  I cut that out and used it as a template.  I set it on top of the rolled out dough, used a sharp knife to cut it out and placed them on a cookie sheet.  I slid popsicle sticks into them then baked for about 8 minutes.  I made them on the thick side so it took a few extra minutes.


See that grey thing in the lower right corner- that's my corndog template.   High-tech, eh?

Bake until juuuuuuust a smidgen golden around the edges.  Don't overbake or you'll get a nasty crisp cookie.



Decorate using a "cookie decorating" icing so you get that shiny look.  You could used canned or a regular buttercream but you won't get the same look.  I tried a decorating recipe years ago that had that Wilton dried egg white meringue (sp?) stuff and it was awful.  So I shied away from ever using decorating icing but then found this kind of icing recipe recently.  It uses cornsyrup and powdered sugar.  And that's what makes it shiny and tasty too!  Very easy to make, very easy to work with.  There are a ton of these recipes out there.  I like this one because it doesn't use almond extract.  I got it from a girl on a LJ baking community that I'm in.


I found the paper hot dog holders at Kroger last week on clearance in the summer/picnic section.  I think I got them for like $1/package.

My taste-testers loved them!  They were a hit at the party too.

Don't even let Tanner's face fool you.  He got a cookie too.  He was just mad that he ate his before I even had a chance to pick up my camera.



The Best Ever Sugar Cookie Recipe

3 Cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 c. white sugar
1 c. butter
1 egg, lightly beaten
3 tbsp cream (I never have cream except around the holidays so I usually sub. skim milk for this)
1 tsp vanilla (which means 1 tbsp for me but I ALWAYS use lots of extra)

1. Preheat oven to 400

2. Over large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, salt and sugar. (NOTE: I did this the first time I made these cookies.  Later I broke my sifter so the next time I made them I just used a whisk to blend the dry ingredients together and the cookies came out the exact same texture so the sifting is entirely up to you).

3. Cut in butter and blend with pastry blender OR pulse in food processor until mixture resembles cornmeal.  Stir in egg, cream and vanilla.  Blend well.  Dough may be chilled if it is sticky.

4. On floured surface, roll out dough to desired thickness.  Cut into shapes and transfer to cookie sheet.

5. Bake for 6-8 minutes or until just barely golden around the edges.


Sugar cookie decorating icing

1 c. powdered sugar
1 tbsp milk
1 drop lemon juice
1 tbsp light corn syrup

Combine powdered sugar corn syrup, milk and lemon juice in a bowl.
Divide the icing into different bowls and add your gel coloring (don't use the liquid food coloring drops).
You can make it a bit thicker for outlining by tossing in a bit more powdered sugar or make it thinner for filling in larger areas inside the outlies by adding more milk- BUT just a drop at a time.  This gets thin very easily.