Flowers

My first attempt at making flowers on a cake was a success!. I first started with the pink flowers and used softer buttercream frosting. My sterling roses are made much better with stiffer decorator icing. They turned out so beautifully!!

Lucy Anna O'Brien Cookies & Jack William O'Brien Cookies

Our niece was born today. Lucy Anna O'Brien was born around 3:00pm September 16, 2010.  She was 6 lbs 3.5 oz and 18 inches long. I made sugar cookies and decorated them as baby buggies for the family. Congratulations Joanna & Patrick O'Brien and Jack O'Brien who now has a little sister!

I also made cookies and decorated them with butter cream icing. Andrea, my step-daughter had suggested the cookie cutters.

L'Shanah Tovah

At Rosh Hashana, you eat apples and honey for a sweet new year. I decided to make an apple crisp. I started with Granny Smith apples because I like the tartness. The crumble or crisp consisted of lemon juice, shortening, flour and sugar. I think I had added to much lemon juice because it didn't crisp up enough.. it was just a bit too much like an apple sauce.. rather than a crisp.. but it tasted SO good.  

Happy 41st Birthday

My husband's birthday was this week and he wanted a yellow cake with chocolate filling and butter cream frosting.  So that is what I did. I baked a two layer round yellow cake and made one batch of butter cream frosting. I added butter flavoring and clear vanilla extract to the recipe and it was subtle but good.

So, as you can see from the above pictures, I wrote Happy 41st Birthday in Green. It wasn't solid green though. I striped my decorator bag with green and then added about a 1/2 cup of icing. It took a bit of time for the green to show.. but eventually, the effect was apparent.

Chris wanted a filling instead of icing for his cake. He is a choco-holic! I added a chocolate pudding middle and it was delicious. He loved it. I wonder what it would have tasted like if the cake and and filling were cold.

Work Function

One of my colleagues was promoted and I was asked to bring in a cake. The girl that sits next to me asked me to make a lemon cake with lemon frosting.  I thought that I might be a bit too much lemon so I made yellow cake with lemon buttercream.  I squeezed fresh lemon juice and added lemon zest to my recipe of homemade buttercream.

It was hard for me to taste how much lemon was in my buttercream, but I got raving reviews!

Brownies

I offered to make brownies for our Labor Day 2010 picnic at my in-laws. I am always the one who is commissioned to make sweets. This year was brownies! I don't know about you.. but I LOVE the ends on the brownie.. I want the N shaped pan so that every piece has a good brownie edge.

Who doesn't like milk with their brownies?

 So, this time I used a mix, I prefer Jiffy. I sometimes doctor the recipe up. There is nothing wrong with using a mix.. the ingredients are perfectly measured!

Fondant For Gretchen

My friend Gretchen turned 35 this year and I was commissioned (ok I offerred) to make her birthday cake. So, thought this would be a good time to try fondant. I wanted to make her a cake in the shape of a present equipped with a bow. I bought pre-made colored fondant and rolled it into strips to look like the ribbon and shaped the bow. That part of it, however, didn't stand up and wouldn't dry out enough to hold its shape. Instead, I had to cut out shapes and create a different look.

I layered the fondant cutouts in the center to create a bow effect without the loops. In order to make the fondant stick to the other pieces, I had to wet my finger and paint the water on the back. My finger was pink, yellow and purple.

Gretchen wanted a chocolate cake with buttercream frosting. It was delicious!!

And then there were 8.. Years that is

My step-daughter, Andrea,  turned 8 on August 24th and she was having her first "kids" party. I, of course, asked her what kind of cake she wanted and she immediately told me a Hannah Montanah cake.. then changed her mind and said.. Taylor Swift. She had changed her mind a few more times between her favorite singers. I convinced her to have a rockstar cake and it would encompass all singers. I made a two layer, one chocolate, one yellow, cake and frosted it with buttercream. Her favorite colors are pink and purple so she got a pink and purple guitar cake.  It was so fun!! I added a laminated picture of Hannah Montanah and one of Taylor Swift. She loved it... and it was delicious.

The gutar tuners were chocolate kisses.

Everyone Loves a wedding

My husband's cousin asked me to make a cake for her wedding. She had a smaller traditional wedding cake and in addition, family members made cakes and sweets for her sweet table. She asked me to make something with fruit. I found a yellow cake recipe on Allrecipes called David's Yellow Cake Recipe. I had to change a couple of things because I didn't have cake flour. I used all purpose flour instead minus two tablespoons for every cup of flour I used. I know that sounds silly.. but I called my grandmother about it and she was the one who suggested it (removing the tablespoons of flour that is). I knew I wanted to use strawberries and I also had to make sure that the cake didn't melt or get too hot because I didn't want it to spoil. I decided to make cream cheese frosting because heat wasn't going to be an issue (no need to give the guests food poisoning).

 I wanted to use the fresh strawberries for a filling but I also wanted the frosting there too. So, I first took a handful of cut strawberries through the food processor and added them with the juice to a bit of my frosting. The problem was my frosting now became soup. I decided to try again and drain the liquid from my strawberries. PERFECT!!  It was delicious and a beautiful cake. I cut slivers of strawberries to make them look like hearts and outlined the cake.

Jack is one

Our nephew Jack turned 1 on July 17th, 2010. My sister-in-law, Joanna, asked me to make a cake in the shape of a car. This was going to be the cake he ate and she wanted a yellow cake and buttercream frosting. Well.. I really like Wilton's recipe for  buttercream frosting. I wanted to make sure it was colorful and cute. Tasting good was also important of course.

The frosting was very sweet and delicious! The other kids at the party couldn't keep their fingers out of Jack's cake either. I think Jack was very happy with his cake when he went head first trying to eat the frosting.

Jack's cousin Kaya eating blue frosting (I think she thought she was sneaky)

Superbowl 2010

So, one of my first attempt at decorating cakes was during the 2009-2010 seasons Superbowl, Colts v. Saints.We had my husband's amazing chili and my crazy cake. My frosting lines were crazy thick and squiggly and very uneven. I did however  have my mother's very old football players to add to the fun.

So if you only know a little about football,  you would know that the Colts team colors are blue and white and the Saints are gold and black. But at the superbowl  the color of the NFC is blue and the AFC is red.. and the winner from each division play at the superbowl... Hope I taught you something today.