lifelalife

Wonder Woman Cake

2011-06-16T23:14:00.000-07:00

It really should be called, the impossible cake. For some reason, my fondant decided to hate me the weekend I was making this.

I make my own marshmallow fondant not only because it is much more inexpensive than the store bought kind, but also because I think it tastes quite good [as long as it's not heavily colored]. Anyway, I had to make both the red and blue batches twice because the first time around they were just not working out. It was the weirdest thing, they were super sticky but dry at the same time. When I put it over the cake it just crumbled on me. Who knows, it was weird!

I had some mishaps along the way but over all it wasn't the hardest thing to do and I was very pleased with the end result. It's mostly a compilation of all the WW cakes you can find on Flickr.

The top tier is a chocolate and vanilla marble cake with cream cheese frosting and the bottom is a lemon cake with raspberry cream cheese frosting. The cake was for my friend's mom's birthday, and from what she told me it was a total hit. At the end of the day, that's what makes it worth it :)

PS: The lovely people at Geek Crafts did a post on my cake, check it out!

This Is Why I'm Fat!

2011-06-10T00:59:00.000-07:00

I love Oreos but I've never been a big fan of the filling. So basically I just like the cracker cookie part. A few months ago I came up with a brilliant idea, I scraped the filling out and smeared some Nutella. I sandwiched the cookie back up and froze it. You can imagine how freaking good that was.

Then I came up with this fat idea and I could not get it out of my head. I was like how good would an Oreo be with Nutella and marshmallow fluff dipped in chocolate. Don't ask how I come up with such things because I don't even know!

So here they are, my fantasy come to life. I decided last minute to top them off with some fleur de sel and that was just perfect to balance the sweetness overload.

This is my first time eating/using marshmallow fluff, EVER! I don't know how I have lived so long without it...

I recommend using a piping bag and a round tip for the fluff to cut out the mess and stickiness.

Ready to be frozen and dipped in chocolate!

Pretend I took pictures of me dipping them in chocolate and covering them with salt...

No shame!

I have the sweetest tooth out of anyone I know. Seriously, it's sickening, I could probably just eat straight tablespoons of sugar. With that being said, honestly one of these babies is enough. They call for a one cookie to one gallon of milk ratio. Even with the salt they are super sweet, so a little bit goes a long way.

I hope some other fatty out there tries them out. Let me know if you do!

Salted Chocolate Nutella & Fluff Oreos (that's a mouthful, no pun intended!)

Oreos
Nutella
Marshmallow Creme/Fluff
Semi sweet chocolate chips
fleur de sel (optional)

-Split Oreos and scrape out the filling
-Using a piping bag and a round tip (I just used a Wilton coupler with no tip) pipe about a tablespoon of marshmallow creme onto one cookie
-Use a spatula to spread the other half with Nutella
-Sandwich cookies and freeze them for at least 10 minutes, you can freeze them solid if you'd like
-Melt chocolate chips and dip frozen cookies, sprinkle with fleur de sel while chocolate is still wet
-Freeze again until chocolate sets, ENJOY!

So Yummy I Could Die

2010-05-29T22:53:00.000-07:00

Today I bring THE BEST CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES EVER. Just hands down, no fuss about it. The BEST. I have been on the search for holy grail recipes for every cupcake flavor and I had yet to find the perfect one for chocolate until now. I love Hershey's "Perfectly" Chocolate Cake but it doesn't really work well for cupcakes. This recipe is just... I have no words for it. Amazing!

I used a recipe from Cake on the Brain. I found it by googling "best chocolate cupcake recipe". I can't believe I hadn't done this before! Click here to check it out.

There were two things that drew me in to the recipe. First off, it calls for cocoa powder and bittersweet chocolate. I don't know why this just seemed to me like it would make it more rich or decadent. Who knows! Also, unlike most cake/cupcake recipes this one used sour cream instead of milk which in my opinion is always better especially with chocolate. Alright enough yapper, why don't you just drool over the pictures?

HOLY COW!!!

***Okay, I had to take a break and grab one with a glass of milk after seeing this picture :P

No comment...

Okay I have to confess... I did make a change to the recipe. I hope you don't want to slap me. Personally I hate when I read recipe reviews and people rant and rave about them and then they yap about all the changes they made to it to make it perfect.

So I've had blue agave nectar sitting in my pantry for a few months now. Every time I bake I tell myself I'm going to use it and then I get scared like what if it turns out gross and end up not doing it. Today I was like who cares and just went for it and it worked [at least for this recipe]. I used Wholesome Sweetness Organic Blue Agave which is like $7-$9 at Costco, can't really remember.

I would love to enlighten you guys on the ins and outs of agave but I don't really know much about it myself. I do know that it claims to be 25% sweeter than sugar which means you can use less. It also has a low glycemic index. What that means is that the body takes longer to metabolize the sugar from the agave and that way it doesn't spike blood sugar levels. Apparently this is good for the body but I'm no doctor so take it for what it's worth. You can go to Wholesome Sweetness' website and read more about it.

As far as baking goes, they say you can substitute it with sugar in baking 1:1 but since it is sweeter, using it 3:4 would work. Because it is liquid, they also suggest that you reduce any liquid needed in the recipe by one third. The recipe below has been modified by me.

Best Chocolate Cupcakes Ever

adapted from: Cake on the Brain, yields ≈12 cupcakes

• 1 stick of butter [half cup/8 tbsp]

• 1/2 cup Hershey's Cocoa Powder

• 2 oz Nestle Toll House Semisweet Chocolate Morsels

• 2 large room temperature eggs

• 3/4 agave nectar

• 1/2 tsp kosher salt

• 3/4 cups all purpose flour

• 3/4 tsp baking powder

• 1/2 tsp baking soda

• 1/3 cup sour cream

*Preheat oven to 325º

1. Add butter, cocoa powder, and chocolate chips to a microwave safe bowl and microwave it in 20 second intervals until everything is melted and you get a smooth chocolate sauce.

2. While the chocolate is cooling, sift the flour, baking soda and baking powder.

3. In the bowl of a stand mixer, ass eggs along with the agave and salt. After these are incorporated, add the chocolate mixture.

4. With the mixer on low, add half of the flour mix. Once the flour is absorbed into the liquid, add the sour cream.

5. Stop the mixer and fold in the last half of the flour.

6. Spoon evenly into 12 lined cupcake cups

7. Bake for 20-22 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean

8. Cool completely before eating

9. For the frosting I made half a batch of Best Frosting Recipe and added in 1/3 cup of creamy peanut butter.

22

2010-04-23T23:51:00.000-07:00

I present to you my first "wedding cake". I put it in quotations because I didn't actually make it for anyone's wedding. Today is my parent's 22 year wedding anniversary and my mom wanted me to make her a mini wedding cake to celebrate. I seriously loved every minute of doing this!

Eeep!!! I really do love it. Is there a better combo than white and baby pink for a cake?

I have tried everything under sun to glue fondant decorations on fondant and it's always such a hassle. Water takes forever to hold, corn syrup is a sticky mess, and I don't think I ever got simple syrup right. I read that alcohol is the best thing to use so I poured myself a shot of tequila and had a little party. HA HA! Just kidding! I poured out a little bit of tequila and it was seriously magic. It glues almost instantly and holds really well.

It took me about six hours to make the cake, frosting, fondant, cool, torte, fill, frost, cool, cover, and decorate. I was surprised at how much it didn't hurt to cut it.

My mom's wannabe macro shot. She's so precious!

For the cake I used a yellow butter mix but spiced things up with extra eggs, pudding, sour cream the works. It was a nice dense consistency and yummy but I think the pudding gave it a weird fake taste. Here are the recipes I used for everything else and changes I made:

Fondant Recipe from Whatscookingamerica.com - Peggy Weaver is a wealth of information. I love reading her recipes, tips, and tricks over and over. I made the recipe to the T and it came out perfect. It is SO much more delicious than Wilton and ridiculously cheap. I usually buy a 24 oz box of Wilton Fondant for $6, this recipe made 47 oz and cost me about $3. That's basically double the amount for half the price. Do I hear "Cha-Ching!"?

Buttercream Recipe from Wilton - I doubled the recipe but ended up with about 2 cups of left overs. I was about a cup shy of using the whole 2lbs of powdered sugar. I also had to add more liquid than called for because this recipe is usually on the thicker side and I needed spreading consistency.

Best Frosting Recipe from Tasty Kitchen/Pioneer Woman - I've made this frosting before and it really was the best frosting ever. I don't know if this is even proper filling material but I used it anyway and it was scrumptious. I did the recipe exactly the same but i also added about 4 oz of cream cheese because seriously what's cake without cream cheese somewhere in it, right?

You Better Work!

2010-04-14T22:43:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! So this is by far one of the funniest thing's I've ever done in my life. I'm beyond obsessed with RuPaul's Drag Race and when my cousin visited over spring break, I got her hooked on it. . We were going back and forth all week quoting the show so it was only fair that I make her a RuPaul cake for her upcoming birthday. It started off as a joke but then I was like no I HAVE to do it. I had no idea how to go about it then I remembered reading about a technique where you trace a drawing in buttercream, freeze it, then transfer it onto a cake. Here's an awesome link with pictures and step by step instructions. I made Wilton's classic buttercream and dyed everything myself EXCEPT for the black, I used their ready made tubes. If you've ever tried to dye your own black frosting you know it literally tastes like ass [excuse my language but seriously, I have no other word for it, not that I've ever tasted ass]. Anyway I happened to stumble on this cartoony picture of Rupaul that was perfect for my project.

It was really very easy to do. My ONLY problem was that the buttercream was a little thicker than I think it should've been so it was hard to get rid of air bubbles. My biggest problem was that I didn't make enough blue frosting. This is a half sheet cake and my batch of frosting was for a two layer 9 inch cake but whatever.

This is the buttercream on the glass before I transfered it on to the cake. It was hard to get a picture because of the frost. It looks nothing like RuPaul but it's the thought that counts right?

Ahh, la piece de resistance! I honestly can't look at this cake without laughing.

TWINSIES!

Bloody Valentine - Blood Orange Shortbread Cookies

2010-02-11T22:44:00.000-08:00

As some of you may or may not know, I'm not a very creative person. Sure I can copy something I've seen to the "T", but I rarely come up with my own ideas. Except for this recipe! It's nothing new or clever it's just a twist on a favorite of mine.

We got a bunch of blood oranges over the weekend and I was thinking of making something with them for VDay. Something about them being bloody red seems to scream Valentine's to me, don't ask. So that's how I came up with my Blood Orange Shortbread Cookies. Thankfully I took step by step pictures. I personally love seeing them on blogs but hate taking them because it takes me forever to shoot, edit, upload, etc.

This is what I love about shortbread cookies, just a few simple ingredients that make a fantastic dessert. Because you don't need many ingredients, you want to use the best you can find. Grade AA butter, good quality vanilla, fresh oranges, you get the picture :) Aside from that you will also need powdered sugar, all purpose flour, and kosher salt.

I know this looks like a lot of butter, that's because it is, I'm not even gonna lie. Don't be scared and cream this baby for a few minutes, make sure it's room temperature.

While the butter is going, zest enough blood oranges to get about a tablespoon of zest. These were teeny tiny ones, perhaps two inches in diameter so I used about 3. Add the powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt to the butter.

Once those are mixed, add the zest.

Squeeze the oranges you zested, you want about two tablespoons of juice.

The juice gives the butter a pretty pink hue. Sadly it's not very noticeable once you add the flour, which is the next step. Mix just until incorporated, don't over beat it. Then wrap and chill the dough for at least 2 hours, I made this 4 days in advance.

Now you want to preheat your oven to 350º. Flour your surface and roll out the cookie dough to about 1/4". If you want a perfectly even cookie, use wooden dowels to help lift the roller off the surface. Since it's the same thickness through, your dough will be evenly thick.

Line a cookie sheet with parchment and arrange your cookies. These hardly spread at all so you can put them close together. Chill them 15-30 minutes before baking them. Baking times strongly vary, if you like a white barely cooked cookie do 8-10 minutes, if you want it cooked through bake it for 15-17 minutes.

Now is the time to make the icing, which is just powdered sugar and blood orange juice. The consistency should be slightly runny, perhaps a 3-4 second ribbon.

You can use a spoon to decorate the cookies but I think it's best to throw the icing into a zip baggie, it's much neater and easier to clean up.

MMMMMM!!!!!! Sooooo good!!! They literally melt in your mouth. Alright so once they're done, cool them completely on a rack and try not to eat them while they're hot :P

And now the fun begins!!! You don't have to use this icing, you can do anything you want really. Use crystals, sprinkles, anything, go crazy!

Seriously, how cute??? Not to toot my own horn but I think they're adorable. Here are some of my faves:

I threw some chocolate on a couple of them, OH MAN! Orange + Chocolate = HEAVEN

Anyway I hope you guys liked these and if you're dying to make them, here's the recipe. Enjoy!

Blood Orange Shortbread Cookies
Yields: 4 dozen two inch cookies

• 4 cups all purpose flour
• 2 cups of butter, softened
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon blood orange zest
• 1 tablespoon blood orange juice
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt

1. Cream butter until soft and fluffy, about 3 minutes
2. Add sugar, vanilla, and salt
3. Zest and juice the oranges and add the ingredients to the mix.
4. Add flour and mix just until incorporated. Knead dough with hands, wrap and chill at least 2 hours
5. Once dough is chilled, preheat oven to 350º, roll out dough to about 1/4"
6. Cut and place on cookie sheet that has been lined with parchment paper
7. Chill for 15-30 minutes
8. Bake until desired brownness, 8-15 minutes
9. Remove from cookie sheet and cool completely on racks
10. Decorate and enjoy

For the icing mix 1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar and 2-3 tbsp of juice

Heart Marshmallows

2010-01-31T00:56:00.000-08:00

I made these heart marshmallows today for my aunt who's birthday is on Tuesday. She lives in Mexico and my mom is always sending her pictures of all the things I make. She loves desserts so for her birthday my mom wanted me to make her chocolate covered marshmallows. That didn't quite turn out but I still tried to make it work. I used Deb's recipe from Smitten Kitchen which is the only recipe I've ever tried and I am never using any other one. It's super easy and seriously FUN! The best part is that they're also perfect every time and SO much better than store bought ones. I can't see myself ever buying them again.

One thing I love about making things from scratch is how you can customize them and make them your own. For example for this recipe you can add food coloring, extracts, nuts, dried fruit, ANYTHING! As cliche as it sounds, the sky's the limit :P Since it's close to Valentine's Day, I made the marshmallow pink and cut it into little hearts but again, you can do any color or shape you want.

If these pictures don't make you want to run out and make them, then you're crazy!

So you put water and gelatin in a stand mixer bowl and while it thickens, you boil sugar and corn syrup until it reaches 240º. Yes, I know, I hate recipes that call for thermometers too but this one is worth it. So go out and get one, you won't regret it! And it doesn't have to be fancy either, the one I got is bulky and ugly but it was only $4. Alright so back to the matter at hand, once the sugar boils pour it into the bowl and slowly stir it until the gelatin dissolves. Then turn the mixer on medium and whip it good!

This is what it looks like after a minute. Now is a good time to add food coloring since it's not thickened yet and it can blend evenly into the marshmallow. For the pink hearts I added five drops of regular red food coloring for a pale pink hue. You need to add a little more than you usually would because as the marshmallow get's whipped, the color gets lighter.

Turn it up to the highest speed and whip it for another 5 minutes. This is after three minutes.

This is what it looks like after 6 minutes. HOW FREAKIN COOL IS THIS!?!?!

Mmm!!! Fluffy and sweet and perfect!

Now you add two whipped egg whites and whatever flavorings you want. The recipe calls for a tablespoon of vanilla.

While the marshmallow is whipping, spray a 9X13" pan with Pam and dust it with powdered sugar so the marshmallow doesn't stick. Then pour in the fluff and refrigerate it for at least 3 hrs. When you take them out just cut them into cubes and coat them in powdered sugar and you're done! Or...

You can cut them into shapes like I did! Just make sure you dip your cutter in powdered sugar otherwise they'll stick to it.

Like I said, dipping them in chocolate didn't really work. The chocolate was too thick and warm and the marshmallows were too soft and they started to melt with the heat of the chocolate and it was just a mess. Instead I lined them on a cookie sheet and drizzled chocolate on top of them.

The drizzling was still a little tricky because the chocolate just didn't want to be runny!

Ta-da!

They taste good with the chocolate and all but I love how cute and simple they look without it :D

Super Kawaii!!!

2010-01-07T13:28:00.001-08:00

Just wanted to show you guys these super cute cupcakes I made last night just for fun. I used a yellow cupcake mix and some of the left over frosting from my Hello Kitty cake as well as left over fondant for the toppers.

Happy BDay to Me!

2010-01-05T12:48:00.000-08:00

Yesss I'm finally 21 today :D I usually think it's a little sad/weird when people make their own cake but this year I ended up making my own haha. The only reason is that I really reeeeeally wanted a Hello Kitty cake and it would be fun to make something just for myself without worrying if other people were going to like it. So here it is, just a regular white cake mix and Wilton fondant. I traced HK's face onto some white fondant and just cut it with a paring knife, it was much easier than I thought. Other than that I just used circle cutters and shaped them, oh an also flower shapes of course.

I made two layers but ended up only using one. I had some of the left over cake with the cream cheese frosting I made and it tasted delish so I can't wait to eat it mwahah.

It's Xmas Every Day!!!

2009-12-12T23:53:00.000-08:00

Did anyone ever watch that on ABC Family??? It was kind of a sad movie. Anyway I just wanted to share some cookies for the holidays. I've made about 20 dozen of these in the past two week and it feels like my arm is going to fall off but the end result is so worth it!!! They're a basic sugar cookie recipe but the hard kind of sugar cookies not the soft kind and then with the icing, they're extra delish :D

The first couple dozen I made were mint green, baby blue, and white. Then my mom's friend wanted them in pink and I loved the look so I did pink ones with turquoise icing and I'm so happy with them

There were some misses but also a lot of hits

My absolute faves!!!

Here is the recipe if any of you guys are interested. I got it from Joy of Baking but quadrupled it and added a bit more salt. If you want the original recipe click here.

Christmas Sugar Cookies
Yields: 10 dozen 2" circle cookies
or about 8 dozen 3" cookies

•7 cups all purpose flour
•2 tsp baking powder
•3/4 tsp salt
•1 lb [4 sticks, 2 cups] butter, room temp
•3 cups sugar
•4 eggs, room temp
•4 tsp vanilla extract

Directions
1. Sift dry ingredients and line cookie sheets with parchment
2. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes
3. Add eggs one by one and then vanilla
4. Add dry ingredients and make sure to incorporate everything very well***
5. divide dough into four sections, and those sections into two for a total of eight even chunks of dough. Wrap them individually or put up to four of them in a gallon sized freezer ziploc and chill in freezer for about 30 min.
6. Preheat oven to 350˚
7. Once chilled, roll out cookie dough to 3/16"-1/4" depending on how thick you want them.
8. Place on cookies on sheet one inch apart form each other and chill another 10 minutes before baking
9. Bake anywhere from 13-23 minutes. I like my cookies nice and toasty, some people like them more pale so it's up to everyone's personal tastes.
10. Chill and enjoy!

... or you can frost them with royal icing! If you're not making massive amounts of cookies, I would half or even quarter the recipe but the amount is perfect for this amount of cookies.

***I highly recommend using a stand mixer for this amount of dough. I have a 5qt KitchenAid mixer and this project was a little much for it. Everything got mixed but at times the dough wanted to come out of the bowl so I literally had to push the dough back down to keep it from spilling. Once I mixed it on Low/Med for about 3 minutes, I dumped it all on the counter and quickly kneaded everything together because there was no way the mixer was going to be able to mix it completely and I'm not even sure if it's possible with a hand mixer.

Lion Cupcakes

2009-11-10T20:08:00.000-08:00

I'm so sad I've been MIA for a while. I have to say I've kind of put baking on the back burner since I started school and also since my nail polish obsession has taken over my life! But now that the holiday season is starting and I'm almost done with school [5 more weeks!] I'm definitely going to get back to it.

I made these cuppies for my brother's girlfriend's mom who was throwing a baby shower. He told her about me and showed her pictures of what I've done and she asked me if I could make her two dozen but I ended up making three. I'm also making cupcakes for my brother's girlfriend for her birthday this weekend so I'll post them once they're done :D

Here they are in all of their glory! The brown ones are vanilla with chocolate buttercream, the lion cupcakes are chocolate with chocolate, and the white ones are red velvet with cream cheese frosting. The faces and blue dots were made with Wilton fondant.

These little faces were so freakin easy I just had to look around for the right sized circles. Here is what I used:
•for the mane I used Wilton's 3" flower cookie cutter
•the face is a 2.25" circle
•the ears are about .5" circle from Wilton's 3 pack circle cutters for fondant
•for the eyes and nose I used Wilton's piping tip #12 as a cutter [roughly 1/4"]
•the mouth circles I used the other end of the tip which is about 3/4"

For these I made the swirl using Wilton's tip #12 and used 1/2" dots to decorate them.

This is my failed attempt at the 1M swirl :P I swear I'm never going to get it right! Actually I used the 1B tip for these which is the drop flower one but still. So everyone loved them and I felt pretty proud but when I saw them posted on Cupcakes Take the Cake I almost fell back on my chair! I love that website and to see my cupcakes posted on there totally made my life! If anyone is interested in the recipes I'll post them for you guys :D

It's the simple things...

2009-09-24T01:46:00.001-07:00

One of my uncles works at a restaurant at a golf club and sometimes he brings us desserts from there. Usually chocolate chip cookies or cheesecake squares, and on special occasions he brings the most delicious biscuits I've ever tasted. They are so flaky and buttery it's ridiculous. Warmed and drowned in honey is how I like devouring! Ever since the last time he brought them, I decided I needed to find the perfect biscuit recipe for when I need my fix. These are the first biscuits I've made and I think it's safe to say I don't have to search further. I love this recipe for three reasons: it's insanely easy, delicious, and did I say EASY? It literally took me half an hour to make these from start to finish. I can't rant and rave about this enough, just see for yourself!

Besides cold ingredients, I read that the trick to flaky biscuits is folding the dough a couple of times to create layers.

Tri-fold 2-3 times to creat those layers

Halfway through baking

Perfect Biscuits - yields about a dozen 2.5" biscuits
[This recipe is basically a compilation of a couple dozen recipes I read online but tweaked to my likings]

•3 cups flour
•1/2 tsp baking soda
•4 tsp baking powder
•1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
•1/4 cup granulated sugar [you can add as little as a Tbsp, just sweeten to taste]
•1 cup butter [very cold and cut into small cubes]
•1 1/2 cups buttermilk [cold]*

Preheat oven to 450º
1. Add dry ingredients to a bowl and mix together with hands, a fork, whisk, etc
2. Cut the cold butter into the dry ingredients using a pastry cutter or forks until the chunks of butter are the size of peas
3. Mix in the milk and lightly knead it into the dough with your hands. At this point, the dough should be fluffy, wet, and sticky.
4. Dust your work surface very generously with flour so that the dough doesn't stick. Flour the top and roll it out to about a half inch thickness. Fold the flour into thirds and roll the dough out again. Repeat this up to two more times.
5. Cut your dough into biscuits [I used a 2.5" circle cutter] and place biscuits on a parchment lined cookie sheet. Bake for 15-20 minutes, rotating the cookie sheet halfway through. I have a pretty accurate oven and it took me about 15 minutes but they could've definitely stayed in there longer and browned a little bit.
6. Take leftover dough and re-roll it, working it as little as possible

*I NEVER have buttermilk on hand so I always end up making my own. To make your own buttermilk just add two tablespoons of lemon juice or vinegar to a little less than a cup of milk and let it sit at least five minutes. I always do this and my recipes turn out fine and you can adjust the measurements to make more/less.

More Mexican Goodies!

2009-09-16T12:31:00.000-07:00

So in addition to the cupcakes, I also made these shortbread cookies and chocolate covered strawberries :D

I got the idea from a Woman's World magazine although their original theme was 4th of July. Here are some highlights of what I did.

Cupcakes:
•The cupcakes were a boxed white mix with home made buttercream icing
•I made the flags out of fondant and the "eagle" out of chocolate bark. I printed out a sheet with a bunch of little flags and put a piece of parchment over it and with a toothpick I gave it the rough shape. As you can see it's really just a blob of chocolate :P
•to give the buttercream that color swirl, I took a little brush and did strokes of red and green color on the inside of the bag before adding the white frosting, this way when I piped it, it came out in a colorful swirl.

Cookie:
•I used the shortbread cookie recipe from Joy of Baking
•I made sure the dough was as cold as possible to make it easy to cut into rectangles
•When rolling out the dough, make it a little thicker than usual so you can put the stick in and make sure they're secure
•Put the stick in before baking

Strawberries:
•I bought some oil based food coloring so I can dye chocolate any color I want without it breaking, this is how I got the green color. The food coloring also comes in handy when you can't find a specific color that you're looking for

VIVA MEXICO!!!

2009-09-15T23:51:00.001-07:00

. . .more tomorrow :D

I graduated!

2009-08-13T01:48:00.000-07:00

No, sadly not from college [I WISH!]. I'm talking about the Wilton cake decorating class! I signed up some time in July and today was the last session of course 1. Funny story, I signed up probably two or three weeks in advance and as the date was drawing near I kept getting more and more excited. Well, it's the day of the first class and I'm so giddy all day because of how much I'm looking forward to it. It was also my brother's first year anniversary with his girlfriend and he wanted to make her a special dinner and I helped out a little bit. He was making french bread from scratch but it didn't turn out the way it was supposed to. I started teasing him saying, "Didn't you take a culinary class in high school?"
Then, I was like hmm culinary class rings a bell... and my eyes open wide and I realize it rang a bell because I was supposed to be at my DECORATING class!!! So I turn to the clock and it's 7:58. In the wise words of Dane Cook: "Just enough to time to do NOTING!"
I panicked and then I realized all was not lost. I called up Michael's and got to talk to the teacher and she told me she'd leave the Course 1 book there for me and I would have to have all the necessary materials by next class. Luckily there was no hands on action otherwise I would've been very jealous, it was all demonstrations. ANYWHO! I did make it to the next class and every one after that haha. So here are the creations that I made while taking the course.

The first cake was vanilla cake with blueberry and strawberry filling with vanilla buttercream. We had an option to bring a round cake to make a rainbow design or make a bear and I passed on the bear because honestly I think those are so tacky!

This day was so hectic [I haychu]. I didn't even go to school but I still woke up at around 1:30pm which is about the time I'd be home by anyway. I hadn't prepared anytning the night before and figured that 4 hours would be plenty enough time to do everything I needed to do. Well I was completely wrong. It was all my fault because I hadn't even LOOKED at the book where it said all the stuff I had to bring in. I actually sent my mom in an hour before class so she could buy piping bags and some other tips for me. I eventually made it and my cake looked pretty decent. I didn't bring additional bowls to mix in the color [I was planning on doing it there instead of at home so I could get there on time] that's why they're all wonky. It should've been red, yellow, green, and purple but that ended up not working out. Regardless I still learned the star technique pretty well although what I really cared about was how to do the roses, mwahaha!

My second cake was my favorite, presentation wise. These were the first roses I'd ever done, EVER! The consistency of my frosting wasn't the greatest that's why the edges of the flowers are rough looking but I thought that gave them a cool look.

The actual cake was chocolate with orange flavored buttercream.

I really loved the drop flowers but they turned out weird when I did them on the sides because I was basically at a 0º angle so it was kind of awkward.

My cousins came in this week to visit form Mexico and they got a taste. Man, I've never seen children look so apathetic about eating cake! Creeps...

The third one was the best one flavor wise. It was a red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. I rebelled and didn't use buttercream because to me red velvet HAS to be frosted with cream cheese otherwise it's just WEIRD! One time I made red velvet cupcakes with an almond buttercream frosting and it was so gross.

Anyway, because of this my frosting was very soft and hard to completely smooth out. Also the cream cheese makes the frosting a little translucent and then with the darkness of the actual cake, it's hard to cover the red completely unless you use have a mile high pile of frosting on the outside.

Despite these minor things, I think the cake turned out pretty ok. I was set out on doing the grapevine cake but in class we started practicing roses again and some turned out really well and I didn't want to get rid of them so I put some on the cake anyway. I literally could not wait to get home and eat it! Red velvet is my absolute favorite cake ever. I have tried like three different recipes and they've never turned out the way I imagine red velvet should taste. But this one was right on the money. It tasted just like these cupcakes I get in a little shop in the Gaslamp. It wasn't that big of a hit with everyone at home though because it was a little on the sweet side, mostly because of the frosting.

So if you're considering taking this cake decorating class, I'd like to point out a few pros/cons/tips that I wish I had known before making my decision:

Pros:
•The class is relatively inexpensive especially if you get it with some promotion like I did. It was 50% off the regular price PLUS you could use a $10 off coupon that they had at the front so I only ended up paying $12ish dollars instead of $45
•You can learn a lot just by reading through the course book alone and then practice in class which is better than going solo at home

Cons:
•This is seriously BASIC stuff. I guess I knew that going in to the class but I didn't realize just how basic it was. Like leveling and torting a cake, crumb coating it, frosting it. Not to toot my own horn but all of this stuff I've learned fairly easily on my own so it gets kind of slow having to go over easy stuff like writing or making shells and things like that.
•Although the price of the class may be cheap, materials are NOT. I spent a good amount of money on ingredients and additional things that didn't come with the course one kit, even with the 10% student discount and the 40% coupons.

Tips:
•Speaking of things to bring to class, don't freak out like me and literally bring every single thing. Some of the stuff they ask for is ridiculous [for example a full sized bath towel. I'm guessing this is so you can make a mess on your own space but our tables were covered in paper anyway so this wasn't necessary AT ALL] and other small stuff. I don't know how much parchment paper I wasted by bringing in these parchment triangles they asked for and then once I got home they were all crumpled at the bottom of my bag because I didn't even use them.
•Back to the course kit, if you do any baking at all, check what comes in the kit and see if you have any of it. It was only $16ish with the 40% off coupon but I honestly only needed the practice board and a few piping tips. It has really stupid stuff like a stand to put your book on and brushes to clean the tips and things like that.
•If you are serious about your baking, invest in a turn table and a cake carrier not just for the class but for future cakes.
•Buy extra couplers and bring in water and powdered sugar just in case you don't have the frosting consistencies right.
•Also about the frosting, to make life easier, I bought the Wilton buttercream mixes for decorating in class. For the actual cake I made sure it was made from scratch and tasted good but since class was just going to be practice, it's much easier and cheaper to buy the mix. You'll also most likely have a ton of frosting left so just save it for the following week and that saves even more time, money, and effort.

I know it seems like I'm ragging on the class but it really wasn't bad. I think it was mostly because I knew a lot of the stuff we went over and I feel like they try to scam you by making you get unnecessary things. Regardless of how much I learned, I would have to take this no matter what if I want to do future Wilton courses [which I do] so I'm glad I got it out of the way. Overall, I'm glad I took it. If you want to take this class strictly for leisure then go ahead! It's definitely worth it to have fun and learn something new.

PS - Here are the links to the cake recipes:
Butter vanilla, from Joy of Baking
Chocolate cake, from Hershey's
Red velvet, from Food Network/Sara Moulton/Cakeman Raven/take your pick

♫ Under the sea, under the sea ♪

2009-08-09T21:46:00.000-07:00

Here are some cupcakes I made for my cousin's Little Mermaid themed birthday. Half of them were fondant decorations and the other half were candy mold figurines [this was the first time I had made candy]. My fondant cupcakes were heavily influenced [and by influenced I mean copied ;)] by ConsumedbyCake's Under the Sea Cupcakes. The octopus was just too cute and from that I got the idea for the little crabs and sea shells. Since I'm a total noob I didn't even think about making any of the Disney characters because I didn't want to be the butt of all jokes at the party so I just went for a sea motif.

These are the candy topped cupcakes. I was really bummed because I thought the candies were going to be the size they were on the packaging but really they were like three times bigger and kind of took up the entire cupcake. But I spent a pretty penny on the molds, melts, and special food colorings so I figured I might as well use them.

I loved how they looked mixed in the with the fondant ones though!

Here is the little octopus topping which I am in love with! I'm no fondant expert [this is only my third-ish time working with it] but both times I've done figurines I've found that sticking pieces together is really hard! I thought you could just do it with water but that makes it slippery and not sticky at all. Anyway for the eyes I came up with this solution:

Roll up a piece of black fondant into a ball then gently roll one side into a point like so. Kind of looks like a miniature avocado :P

Then poke a deep and wide hole wherever you want the eye to go and just push the pointy end in. This way I didn't have to use any sort of "glue".

For the tentacles I used the same approach, I made the bottom sort of hollow and just pushed in the eight pieces and used my nails poke the pieces and secure them. It sounds really convoluted but it's super simple.

The crab was the easiest and almost everyone's favorite!

The seashells where my favorite for sure because they were the most fun to make. Like I said I don't have much experience with fondant so I had to get creative since I don't have any tools to work with it other than the little rolling pin with the rings.

Roll out the fondant to 1/8" [this is where the rings come in handy] and cut a symmetric flower. [I used the Wilton mini cutters]

Then with a toothpick, make little dents in three of the petals and smooth them out so it looks like six scallops instead of three.

With a knife, score all six petals.

Then cut the bottom petals and the sides that haven't been scored. For the little fishies I used the tulip and scalloped heart cutter from the same Wilton set but I didn't get pictures of the process.

Who would've thought that a dozen cupcakes weren't going to be enough for a party of 20 people??? We ended up having to get a storebought cake last minute so that everyone could have a little bit of dessert. I'm kind of glad since I was nervous about my cupcakes being the center of attention.

3 in 1 Cupcakes

2009-06-02T18:24:00.000-07:00

I have been using the Joy of Baking recipe for vanilla cupcakes/frosting for a while now and I've always wanted to try making new flavors with the same recipe. All I can say is, SUCCESS!!! It was so easy and simple and the best part is that I got three completely different flavors, and I am SO EXCITED to share!

First off is the classic vanilla on vanilla which is my all time favorite cupcake combo. Although I always enjoy trying new flavors, I'm kind of a purist when it comes to cupcakes. A good ol' white cupcake is simply the best! I made the entire recipe for the buttercream and put little dollops of frosting. For the topping I tinted sugar with food coloring. I got this tip from a Youtube video and it worked better than I expected. I used the neon colors and did one drop of green and two drops of blue with a half cup of regular granulated sugar.

Once I filled the cupcake pan with a dozen vanilla cupcakes, I split the remaining batter between two bowls and that's when the fun started! In one bowl, I stirred in half of a mashed banana. With the remaining buttercream, I added cream cheese to my liking, about 3 oz.

With the last of the batter, I added the zest of half of a lemon and about 3 Tbs of lemon juice. For the frosting, I mashed 10 raspberries through a strain so that I only got the pulp and no seeds. I added this to the remaining cream cheese frosting and that's what gave it the cute pink hue.

Now I'm dying to try other ideas, like adding a little bit of cocoa powder to the batter and orange zest to the frosting. So there you have it, three different cupcakes from one easy recipe!

love life.

'GaGa'Cakes!

2009-05-29T17:43:00.000-07:00

So today is a break from the ush [my slang word for "usual"]. I don't know about you but to me Lady GaGa = AMAZING! In my eyes, she can do no wrong. Anyway yesterday was the 'premiere' of her music video for Paparazzi which is my favorite song off her album. I saw it on PerezHilton.com and he hyped it up hardcore so I thought it was going to be epic but to be honest I didn't get the point of it. Regardless, it was still a cool video with awesome costumes, make up, scenery, etc. But of course, the BEST part of it where these cupcakes!

Seriously! How cool are those? All blinged out and with the Gs on it in some old skool font. It totally looks like something that could be in a Gwen Stefani video [another awesome artist!] And it gets better, for me, because blue & white are my high school colors :D just thought I'd share this with everyone!

love life.

Midnight Munchies

2009-05-25T01:30:00.001-07:00

Hey everyone. So yes it's 1:30 in the am and I'm up and running, not really but I'm still awake! I'm kind of an insomniac... I can never fall asleep before midnight or willingly wake up before noon! It's a vicious sleeping cycle but right now I'm kind of just dealing with it. Anyway I made these cupcakes a loooong time ago and had been meaning to post about them but one thing led to another and now I'm finally getting around to it. They're strawberry cupcakes made with REAL strawberries and strawberry yogurt so they aren't lacking in the flavor department! They were good then and I could really go for one right about now :P
But since I can't, I'll just have to reminisce...

I got the recipe form Cooking With Amy and I can say it's probably the best I've had. I think the secret is the yogurt, it makes for a really moist cupcake. The only downside [which was totally my fault] is that I used canned frosting [which I rarely do] because I didn't have any more strawberries and to be honest, I was just too lazy to make my own. Whenever I make them again I think I'll make the strawberry frosting but also a lemony buttercream. I think that would go very well with the strawberry flavors.

love life.

I'm freeeeeeeeeeeeee

2009-05-19T01:37:00.000-07:00

...freeeeee faaalling!!!!!!!

I'M DONE WITH SCHOOL!!!!!!

And this calls for a celebration :D
What better way than with cupcakes right? I made these today using my favorite vanilla recipe which can be found at the Joy of Baking website. I made it to a T except for the vanilla I actually added two tablespoons PLUS a vanilla pod but that's just me. I also always do the frosting to a T and it comes out perfectly. My only qualm is that it literally crusts within a half an hour so I can't ever really make it ahead without it getting crusty. But this time it wasn't a problem since I devoured immediately ;)

So not only am I done with school but I'm free of worries. I thought I hadn't done too well on my Calculus final which was a big deal because even if you have an A in the class, if you fail the final you fail the course. It's school policies so I couldn't really yell at my teacher although I never would because he's such a sweetheart. Anyway I passed and all is well in the universe. So enough yapper here are the pics. And now that I'm out of school I'll DEFINITELY be posting more often. Happy baking everyone!!!

oh P.S. I added a little bit of cocoa powder to some of the frosting to make it chocolatey

love life.

PINK!

2009-03-17T17:34:00.000-07:00

So the girls just left from our afternoon soiree. It sounds fancier than it all really was :P I made pasta with shrimp, mushrooms, and steamed veggies that was super delicious but we all know the stars were the desserts: Orange Shortbread Cookies, Classic Nestle Chocolate-chip Cookies, and Funfetti cupcakes! I felt like Sandra Lee setting up the "table scape" and by table scape I mean some fabric that I had in my stash. I went to the Dollar Tree last night hoping to find cute little nick-knacks [I have NO idea if that's how you spell it] but everything was so ugly! They didn't even have pink party plates/cups/cutlery so I had to settle with mix-matched colors. Overall I was still very pleased with the end result. We had a great time and this almost makes me want to have kids just so I can throw them birthday parties :D

This is the "table scape"

I got that super cute gift bag at target!

Everyone kept commenting on the frosting looking like a flower and I don't even know how that happened. I thought I'd switch things up and pipe from the inside out and that's what I got.

I did random fondant butterflies and decorated them with pink sprinkles

These are the shortbread cookies.

The designs were heavily inspired by Flickr user danrcitananda. You all seriously need to check out her henna cake! As you can see my cookies look sad compared to her amazing work!

Cupcakes are the new birthday cakes! Surprisingly I fit all twenty candles on there.

Make a wish :)

love life.

Fleur de lis, paisleys, and swirls. It's a party!

2009-03-16T17:13:00.001-07:00

Today is my BFFAEAEAE's* birthday and I made these cupcakes for her. I incorporated a few of her favorite patterns: fleur de lis, paisley, and swirls. The blue was supposed to be more teal but I got carried away with the coloring and the shitty lighting in my kitchen doesn't help. Tomorrow I'm having her and two close friends come over for lunch and dessert to celebrate properly since they have school all day today. Hopefully I'll be posting pictures of that tomorrow night. For now, here are the funfetti cupcakes with buttercream** frosting and fondant.

* Best friend forever and ever and ever and ever ...
** I quartered the recipe and it was more than enough for 24 cupcakes

love life.

I use "love" way too much... plus some Almond Biscotti

2009-02-24T18:55:00.000-08:00

I just had my computer search the word "love" on my page and I used it [also "loved/beloved"] over twenty times! I don't know what to think of that. Oh god! Imagine if I searched "like", that would be like every other word. Ahh! There I go again! Oh well...

The whole purpose of this was to share these DELECTABLE biscotti I made a few weeks ago. I saw the recipe on Everyday Italian and I tried it the next day. I had made Giada's Parmesan Biscuits a couple of days earlier and I really liked the texture the corn meal gave them so this pretty much sent me on a corn meal kick.

These biscotti were really a joy to make. The recipe is super simple and the results are really delicious and fancy looking. My favorite part about them is that there is no butter/oil/fat in the recipe and the batter doesnt stick to anything which makes cleaning up a breeze. My aunt came over the day I made them and she was amazed at my "skills". I kept trying to tell her that they were like RIDICULOUSY easy to make and they only reason they looked semi fancy was just because of the chocolate. I swear you could dip/drizzle chocolate on shoes and they'd look appetizing!

How beautiful are these eggs? I love eggs from free range farms because they always come in the most adorable shades, and they're also so tiny! I compared them to my regular grocery store eggs an they're about 2/3 of the size.

The star of the show

Adding the zest and the almonds

After you bake the dough once, take it out, cut it, and bake it again. When they cool completely you are ready to dip!

Make sure to line your surface with plastic wrap or wax/parchment paper so that the chocolate doesn't stick to it. Then, place the biscotti in the freezer for a few minutes so that the chocolate can set.

Enjoy!!!

I decided that if I don't make any changes in the recipe, then I'm just going to post a link instead of typing it out because I'm lazy :P
So here it is, Almond Biscotti.

love life.

I love babies! [...sort of]

2009-02-23T20:19:00.001-08:00

This past weekend we celebrated my little cousin's birthday and I was asked to make these emergency ladybug cupcakes. Everything is store bought [cake mix, frosting, fondant] because they were a last minute thing but I would've loved to have made everything from scratch. It was my very first time using fondant and it wasn't nearly as scary as I thought it would be. I have to admit I felt like I was on a FootNetwork Challenge since I was on a serious time crunch. I ended up making these babies from start to finish in a little more than two hours. I wish I had taken a picture of the mess I left in the kitchen! Anyway here are the cuppies in all their fondant-y glory, and a picture of my little Ella just because she's way too cute :-*

I got a 10X10 box and I thought since cupcakes are technically 2.5" in diameter that I could fit 16 of them perfectly but I sadly realized that wasn't going to be possible. So I fit the ones I could.

The little bugger :P

I didn't have time to do all the little dots on the wings so I did a simple heart sprinkle on their booty.

Here's little Ella [I love how my uncle is giving her a cupcake! We're getting them while they're still young hah!]

Cutie!!!

love life.

Something sweet, something... SALTY???

2009-02-20T00:21:00.000-08:00

A couple of months ago, I subscribed to Chow's daily recipe e-mail. I haven't taken down actual numbers but it feels like 80% of the recipes I get e-mailed are either meat dishes or alcoholic drinks, neither of which are much used to me. So you can see why I jumped for joy when I saw not only a cupcake recipe, but a recipe that I could definitely do... or so I thought!

I mean it was pretty simple, a cute sounding vanilla bean cupcake recipe and a not so daunting salted caramel frosting. The cake part was easy and the cuppies came out with a perfect dome top. Now for the frosting... I've been meaning to buy a candy thermometer FOR-E-VER but I have just not gotten around to it so the fact that the recipe didn't call for one was a plus. But sadly, I somehow managed to eff it up. I wish I could say I had no idea what happened but I know exactly why. See, I only had half & half, not heavy cream AND I asked my mom if she though it'd make a difference. She assured me that it was not a problem, even went as far as saying that you can still make caramel with just plain whole milk! Well, once I made the caramel and it came out completely wrong, I realized that that was not the case at all. I should've Googled it before making the frosting but oh well, I DIDN'T!

Either way, it was a very scrumptious treat. I did the recipe exactly the same except for the cream, of course, and also the salt. I didn't have kosher on hand, only table salt [which is much finer] so I added half of what it called for. Otherwise it would've been too salty.

And now for the pics of the process and link to the recipe at the bottom. The pictures are a mess, I didn't get all the steps, sor!

Slicing the bean. Can I just say, I freakin LOVE cutting and scraping vanilla beans?!?! Too much fun :P

So when I saw the preview of this picture on my camera I was like "YES!!! Awesome macro shot of the seeds!", then I get them on my computer and it's like this blurry mess...

Mmm!!! Vanilla sugar!

Ready to face their doom.

While the cupcakes where baking I started on the caramel. This is what it looked like after about 3 minutes.

After 5...

After 7 minutes I added in the half and half and it all went downhill.

Cute! Supah cute!

And here they are frosted :D

Regardless of my troubles, they were VERY yummy!

Oh, and here's the link to the recipe: http://www.chow.com/recipes/12129

-Karen

P.S. If you guys haven't already, get your asses to a Target asap!!! They have all the left over V-Day stuff on sale for 75% off. I got four of those stripped plates for $3 and this huge thing of Wilton V-Day sprinkles for $1.50, originally $6!

love life.

A break from baking...

2009-02-19T16:04:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone! I've been feeling very grody lately, mostly because I've been stuffing myself with not so good for me food. As much as I adore sweets, there's no hiding that they don't love me back the same way :P Anyway I'm not going to get too crazy about this because this recipe isn't that great either. It just doesn't involve pounds of butter, which is good enough for me. My dad brought some blood oranges and lemons yesterday so I decided to make a "pink" lemonade. I really don't know what the difference is between regular and pink lemonades that they sell. I bet it's the same but one has food coloring. So I guess you can call mine "naturally pink" lemonade, maybe? Sadly, I didn't take any measurements of anything except for the sugar. Although I can guestimate pretty well. The lemons and the orange were SUPER juicy, they yielded about 1/4 cup each, and I used about 10. And the jar is 1 1/2 quarts, so about 3 1/2 cups of water. I added the sugar tablespoon by tablespoon because I didn't want to make it too sweet. I hate super sweet lemonade to where it's not even sour anymore. This one will definitely still make you pucker.

When I was in junior high, my dad got laid off and for a while he sold succulents at our local farmer's market. I remember every Sunday he'd come home with bagfuls of delicious organic groceries that he either traded plants for, or bought himself. My absolute favorite thing was fresh blood orange juice. The taste of that juice almost made me want to cry. It was perfectly tart yet sweet, and incredibly fresh and full of pulp which is what I love most about citrus drinks. The whole point of this story is to let blood oranges know that they hold a very close and dear spot in my foodie heart :)

Fast forward! So here I juiced the blood orange in my beloved flower juicer. This also has a back story.
DISCLAIMER: I love my cooking tools. They all have a special story and I adore them all and I would die if anything happened to them. I don't know if this is normal but to me they're like my children haha!
Alright had to clear that up. So, I can't even begin to express how freaking cute and adorable anthropologie is. Seriously, every time I'm in that store, I squeal at every thing, especially the cooking stuff. One of my best friends and I went to visit the store and were checking out the clearance section.
ANOTHER SIDE NOTE: anthro may be a ridiculously expensive store but their clearance is even more crazy.
I had been checking out this juicer online for quite some time. But at $24, it was just one of those things that you dreamed about but would only be able to admire from afar. So you can imagine my delight when I not only see it in the clearance section, but I see it for $1.99!!! I was in disbelief so we actually went to the front and asked the cashier. Soooo yes, I am in LOVE with this juicer. It's so amazingly beautiful and the fact that it was practically free makes it that much more special.

Ummm, I don't know why I just wasted your life yapping about a porcelain juicer but I did. I'm sorry, I promise I won't do that again...

Maybe

So back to the recipe. Just juice one blood orange and add it to a 1.5 quart jar that can be shut very tightly.

Pretend I took pictures of me juicing ten big lemons and adding 10 tablespoons of sugar and filling the jar up to the top with water. Sorry!!! I got carried away juicing and I didn't feel like washing my hands just to take pictures. So after you add everything to the jar, make sure you close it tightly and shake it vigorously until the sugar dissolves.

If you want to, add ice to chill it out and serve. And most importantly, enjoy!!!

"Naturally Pink" Lemonade
•2 1/2 cups of fresh lemon juice [about 10 large lemons]
•1/4 cup of fresh blood orange juice [about 1 medium sized blood orange]
•1/2 cup + 2 T of granulated sugar [10 tablespoons]
•3 1/2 cups of filtered water
•ice, optional

1. Add blood orange, and lemon juice, and sugar into a jar
2. Shake until the sugar is completely dissolved
3. Add water and shake again
4. If you want to, add ice, otherwise just serve and enjoy!!!

P.S. How freakin' AMAZING do these look??? I LOVE THEM!

love life.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day!!!

2009-02-15T09:37:00.000-08:00

Wow!!! School has been insane this semester. I really didn't think school would interfere with my baking/blogging/LIVING but it definitely has. Now that I'm all settled and into the groove of things, I'm hoping to be able to write on here more often.

Anyway! I made this for V-Day. They're loosely based on Bakerella's V-Day cake since I didn't make a cake and the balls are Oreo truffles and not cake balls. My friends LOVED them! I looked all over for a recipe, and they almost all consisted of mix a packet of Oreos with an 8oz packet of cream cheese. There are tons of variations, like adding basically any flavor extract you want to give it a different flavor. Here's the entire recipe [not the one I necessarily used but a classic Oreo truffle recipe]: Recipezaar Oreo Truffles. And now for a pictorial of the process after I had already made the "dough".

I took small chunks of the dough [straight out of the freezer] and "kneaded" them in between two pieces of plastic wrap. I did this because the process can get a little messy and I hate having dirty hands. The colder the dough, the easier it is to cut using a cookie cutter and the less it'll stick to you. The cutter I used is from Wilton.

Once you get the whole board covered, pop them in the freezer. Again, the key is to keep these babies cold.

In the meantime, I melted some chocolate bark. I recommend melting it in a narrow cup, that way you are able to "dunk" the truffles into the chocolate. This makes it much easier than having to roll the truffle around in half inch deep chocolate.

I tried various techniques for dipping; using a fork, chopsticks, my fingers, etc. I found the best way is to stick a toothpick in the crack at the top of the heart. Once I dipped it all the way, I would twist the toothpick between my fingers so that the excess chocolate would fall off.

To achieve a smooth back, I would lightly drag the truffle over the edge of the cup so it gave it an even finish.

Once I could touch the truffle without leaving a mark, I would gently twist off the toothpick. As you can see, it leaves a hole but with the sprinkles, you really can't see it at all. For the truffles that I left plain, I took some bark and filled the hole in with a toothpick.

Speaking of sprinkles, now's your chance to add them. I used these V-Day themed ones. Make sure you add them while the chocolate is still wet on the truffle. If they're really cold, this might be a problem as the chocolate starts setting pretty quickly. This happened to a few of them so I'd smear some chocolate with my finger and quickly add the sprinkles.

From here technically you're done. BUT if you want to gift these then you can find some nice containers and mini paper cups for a cute presentation. I found these tins at the Dollar Tree for, you guessed it, A DOLLAR! :P And I thought the V-Day themed cups were just too cute for words.

And here's the final product.

Yum yum!

love life.

I love Ina Garten

2009-01-17T18:03:00.001-08:00

I've been a fan of Ina Garten ever since her show, Barefoot Contessa, premiered on the Food Network. I have to say that at first the sound of the name grossed me out as images of people cooking with their feet clogged my mind. Anyway now I love her and her extravagant ways. It cracks me up how she stresses the 'a' in "quality" whenever she recommends people use high quality ingredients. That's one of the main reasons why I rarely use her recipes, I feel that my ingredients aren't up to par. HAHA just kidding! I was feeling adventurous the other day and decided to make coffee cake since I'd never made it before. I Googled the recipe and hers was one of the first recipes that came up, I was sold. So I gathered all of my highest quaaaaality ingredients and got to working.

I'm always missing an ingredient, without fail! This time it was cake flour. But never fear, there's almost ALWAYS a substitute for something that you're missing. In this case adding some cornstarch solved my problem. I added four tablespoons to the bottom of my measuring cup and filled the rest with good ol' all purpose flour.

Side note: IS ANYONE ELSE THIS MESSY??? My mom was being a guest photographer since I only have two hands, and she decided it'd be funny to take a picture of my mess. It was sort of shocking! And I realized I make this mess or worse every time but I'm almost sure I'm not alone :P
Sour cream is the main attraction in this deeeelicious recipe.

I sifted the dry ingredients into a bowl and then sifted them again into the mixing bowl for extra fluffiness and minimal lumps.

My "photographer" aka my mom forgot to take pictures of me making the streusel. And I forgot to save some streusel for the top. Who cares!!! That's the beauty of baking for yourself... no one will care/notice the mistakes. I was sort of surprised that over the top Ina skimped so much on the streusel. Next time I will definitely double the streusel.

While the coffee cake was baking I worked on a glaze. I wanted to stay in the sour cream motif so I looked up a couple of sour cream glaze recipes. They all varied but it came down to warming up equal parts sugar and sour cream and adding a bit of baking soda. I added a vanilla bean for some sweet flavor. I kept taking huge whiffs of the glaze simmering away in the pan. It smelled divine. So far so good huh?

Here is where it all went down hill... sort of.

The delicious browned top was deceitful. I wiggled it a little and the sides were loose, making me believe I had buttered and floured the pan well. Then... I flipped it onto the platter:

Somehow the inner part of the coffee cake got stuck to the pan. I was a little bummed but mostly confused since I prepared that pan like never before. Playing investigator, I went back to my pictures to see if I could find what went amiss...

And I found it! I totally ignored the left part of the ring :'(

Oh well, I got some pretty cool pictures of the streusel layer. This picture makes me laugh. I took too long to take the picture and the steam fogged up the lens.

Ah, there we go. Doesn't that look yummy???

And here is a slice of coffee cake with the luscious sour cream and vanilla glaze.

Sour Cream Coffee Cake
by Ina Garten

batter
· 1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter at room temperature
· 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
· 3 large eggs at room temperature
· 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
· 1 1/4 cups sour cream
· 2 1/2 cups cake flour (click here for a substitute)
· 2 teaspoons baking powder
· 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
· 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

streusel
·1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
·1/2 cup all-purpose flour
·1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
·1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
·3 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
· 1/2 cup sliced almonds
note: if you love your streusel, I would recommend doubling the recipe

glaze
· 2/3 cup of sour cream
· 2/3 cup of sugar
· 1/2 tsp baking soda
· vanilla pod [optional]

1. Preheat oven to 350°
2. Sift dry ingredients into a bowl and set aside, also prepare your bundt or tube pan
3. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy [this step is a must], about 5 minutes
4. Slowly add eggs one at a time, then vanilla and sour cream
5. Stop the mixer and sift the dry ingredients into bowl, yes you must sift twice
6. With the mixer on low, mix until the flour is just incorporated
7. Turn the mixer off and fold the batter with a spatula to evenly mix all the ingredients
8. Prepare the streusel by placing all the ingredients into a bowl and mixing it with your hands. Do a "pinching" motion so the butter stays chunky
9. Spread half of the batter into the pan, and add about 3/4 of the streusel. Finish off the batter and top it with the remaining streusel
10. Bake for about 50-60 minutes
11. While the cake is baking, cook the sugar, sour cream, and baking soda in a small sauce pan until the sugar dissolves. Once it's smooth, take it off the heat. Cut a vanilla pod in half and let the flavor steep into the glaze until you are ready to serve your cake.
12. Once cake is done, let it cool for about 10 minutes then remove it form the pan and let it cook an additional 30 minutes
13. Slice and drizzle with glaze

So if you haven't realized by now this recipe was a hit with me. I think the cake flour really makes a difference because the coffee cake is just so fluffy and airy but at the same time dense and rich in flavor. The streusel par was AMAZING! As I mentioned before, I'm going to double the amount next time and do two layers instead of one. Finally, the glaze was fantastic in so many ways. First off I think the sour cream and the baking soda have some sort of reaction because the glaze is bubbly and airy and very runny, not like sour cream at all. Then the vanilla adds beautiful and delicate flavor. Much better than your average powdered sugar glaze. All in all I loved this recipe and can't wait to make it again!

love life.

Bleh-ndies

2009-01-15T17:09:00.000-08:00

You know those days when you're just feeling like, bleh? Everything's just whatever? Nothing is boring you but nothing is exciting you? That's exactly how I'm feeling today. I signed up for classes this morning and that was uneventful since all of them still had seats open so I didn't have to stress about that. I guess I sort of am stressing about money for books/buspass... Either way I'm still feeling bleh. That's why I'm posting this blondie recipe because they tasted exactly like how I feel right now. I made them last week because I was craving something thick and heavy for dessert but they just didn't do anything for me. I think it's because I didn't use corn syrup, nuts, or any chocolate/peanut butter/butterscotch chips. Or maybe the fact that I didn't brown the butter AT ALL! Who knows, anyway if you're feeling bleh and want a dessert to join you, this is the recipe for you :P

Bled-ndies:
adapted from this website

·1 cup all-purpose flour
·1/4 teaspoon baking powder
·1/4 teaspoon baking soda
·1/2 teaspoon salt
·8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
·2/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar
·1/4 cup granulated sugar
·1 egg plus 1 egg yolk
·1 Tbsp vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 350°
2. Line an 8 inch brownie pan with foil and spray with non-stick spray. [The original recipe called for a metal pan, I'm guessing to make the edges crispier but I'm not sure]
3. Sift all dry ingredients together and set aside.
4. Mix butter and brown sugar together, then add eggs & vanilla [and any nuts or chips you might be adding]
5. Fold in the dry ingredients and then scrape batter into the brownie pan.
6. Bake 25-30 minutes, then cool and cut into bars
yields about 12 bars

Now don't get me wrong, these babies were still yummy, just nothing special :-/

love life.

What Recession? - Wonder[Cinnamon]Rolls

2009-01-09T20:53:00.000-08:00

My dad has been unemployed for about a month and a half and we haven't REALLY gone grocery shopping for what feels like forever! Somehow we're still getting buy surprisingly comfortably so I shouldn't complain. I mean today we ate like kings! My dad made fettuccine pasta in a creamy clam sauce with mussels on top and fresh parmigiano reggiano cheese AND a french baguette. We stocked up on cheese and pasta last month so now we've got some for a good while. Anyway the point is we only have like six eggs left and I love them for breakfast AND I wanted a quick dessert that didn't require eggs. I was craving cinnamon rolls hardcore but A] I don't know what forces are against me in the universe but I have yet to master yeast. Last time I made cinnamon rolls with yeast I felt like I was eating sugar coated rocks, and B] most recipes call for eggs. So after some not so extensive searching I found a good looking recipe that solved both problems. Like always I made some tweaks but the original one can be found here. I found that the recipe used too much flour and not enough milk or shortening so I beefed that up a bit and added more sugar and butter because I'm a fatty!

The dough was very simple to make thanks to the pastry cutter I just got for my birthday. I think that was reason "C" as to why I picked this recipe :P

Mix just until everything is moist

Yes I just gave myself a manicure earlier haha. My mom always complains about how my nails are chipped when she takes pictures of me baking. This was a very interactive recipe so my mom had to be the photographer. I hate how she's always all up in my business instead of stepping back so you can see the big picture, literally...

I have a non-stick KitchenAid roller and I'm anti non-stick but I really think this makes a difference. I find that wood rollers have too many nooks and grooves and makes the dough stick to it more. I also love using our granite counter because it keeps the dough and the shortening cool.

The simple yet delicious filling.

Rolling was AMAZINGLY easy, the dough didn't stick at all. I think I should've rolled it a little tighter though.

Ahh using the pastry cutter!!! It was really fun because it's like a knife but not really :P I actually would like knives more if they had a handle at the top. It's so much more comfortable.

Ready to go in the oven.

Hot 'N' Ready

I don't fuss with preparing the cream cheese, I spread it right out of the package.

Oooey and gooey but most importantly, REALLY GOOD!

I like to call them "Recession Cinnamon Rolls"
dough:
· 3 cups self rising flour [sifted three times]
· 1/3 cup of vegetable shortening
·1 cup milk [plus more for getting the consistency right

filling:
· 2/3 cup regular sugar
· 2/3 cup brown sugar [lightly packed]
·1/2 cup butter
· 2 tablespoons cinnamon

topping [optional]:
· cream cheese

1. Preheat oven to 375°
2. Cut shortening into flour using pastry cutter [or two forks] until it's the size of lentils or other small grain/legume
3. Add the milk and knead until all the dry ingredients are absorbed
4. Place dough on a flouered surface and knead lightly to incorporate all the ingredients. Dough should be sticky but not wet. [mine was still sort of dry so I added more milk slowly]
5. Roll out dough roughly to a 20X15 inch rectangle
6. Take butter and spread it all over the dough leaving a small border [about an inch]
7. Mix sugars and cinnamon in a bowl and then spoon it evenly all over the dough leaving the same amount of border.
8. Roll the shorter side of the roll towards you evenly all the way across, it should be roughly 20 inches long.
9. Cut roll in half and in half again and cut each quarter into 5 pieces, you will end up with 20 - 1 inch rolls
10. Place into a buttered 9x13 inch pan and bake for 20-25 minutes
11. Remove and let cool for about 5 minutes. Spread cream cheese over top and eat it while still warm.

Overall these little bites of heaven were amazing! I'm DEFINITELY going to be making them more often, especially in the fall/winter. I'm going to try to add more shortening to the dough and use less flour. I'm also going to see what combination of baking powder and soda I can add to make them a little fluffier.

love life.

I have the best friends and family :) [plus Key Lime Pie]

2009-01-06T22:51:00.000-08:00

So yesterday was my 20th birthday and I can honestly say it was one of, if not, THE best ever! My best friend, Vanessa, had planned for us to go to CeramiCafe and decorate an item. She bought me a teapot, she got a simple toothbrush/pencil cup, and Betty chose a piggy bank. I painted the entire teapot a pretty teal and did a paisley design on it but we all have to wait until Saturday when they're fired and ready. Needless to say I can't freakin wait!!!

Anyway then there was some confusion about the eating schedule but we ended up getting Costco pizza and cake [MY ABSOLUTE FAVORITE] and just eating at home which was fine with everyone. Then before the cake I got to open my presents which I was not expecting. My heart stopped when I saw my brother walk in with a bag from Crate & Barrel and another form Anthropologie since those are my two FAVORITE STORES OF ALL TIME [I went to Williams-Sonoma today for the first time and that's definitely up there with them]. So from C&B I got the following:

·a pastry cutter
·a pastry scraper
·a pan scraper
·and a spatula WITH A CUPCAKE ON IT!!!

I'm in love with that spatula I can't wait to use it!!! And from Anthropologie, my mom got me the set of spoons I already had since she participated in breaking one of the spoons in my old set :P If you look closely, you'll notice there's TWO 1/2 tsp and no 1/4 tsp. I went today to exchange it and I accidentally got one that had a chipped spoon so I have to go tomorrow yet again! But nothing will stop me from getting my paws on those! :P

[Side note: I'm a devoted Britney Spears fan and I told my parents all I wanted for Xmas/Bday was a ticket to her concert in LA which they agreed to but I still ended up getting an iHome for Xmas which was amazing because I wasn't expecting anything and I REALLY wasn't expecting anything for my bday]

SO, since I'm in such a good birthday mood I decided to post another recipe to celebrate. This is a classic key lime pie I made specifically for my dad for new years. I've been baking for years and that's how long my poor dad has been asking me to make him a lemon or key lime pie. This is the first time I've done it because I HATE key lime pie. I hate any fruity dessert actually except for when desserts have a hint of orange or lemon like lemon poppy seed muffins. But in the spirit of giving, I made him this pie even though I personally wasn't going to be enjoying it [or so I thought]. I made a few tweaks but you can find the original recipe here.

Classic Key Lime Pie
crust:
·16 graham cracker squares [8 crackers if they come in rectangles]
·1/4 cup sugar
·3/4 cup butter

1. Preheat oven to 350°
2. Crush cookies to a fine dust
3. Add sugar and melted butter
4. Press to bottom and sides of a 9 inch pie pan
5. Bake for 10 minutes, then remove and cool

filling:
·4 large egg yolks
·one 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
· 1/2 cup of fresh squeezed key lime juice [this took a little over a pound of key limes]
·1/2 tsp lime zest [optional]

1. Squeeze enough key limes to yield a half cup of juice, set aside
[I recommend you pour the juice through a sieve to get rid of the pulp and any other funky chunks]
2. Beat egg yolks for about five minutes until they get lighter in color. Once you're done beating you will notice will start to get bigger in volume.
3. Fold in the condensed milk and lemon juice
4. Grate some lime zest into the mixture
5. Pour into baked crust
6. Cook in oven for about 10 minutes
7. Remove from oven and cool completely
8. Refrigerate it until completely set, preferably overnight

So I don't know what happened but the crust was surprisingly hard. We actually ate the pie with our hands rather than a utensil. Something tells me it was me cutting back on the butter but who knows. I have to say it was really good and easy [except for having to squeeze a million tiny key limes!] and I'd probably try it again. And in an effort to save back on paper and ink and MONEY but most importantly because I'm lazy, I look at the recipes right off of my laptop :P I don't recommend you do this unless you are ok with constantly dusting flour and other shenanigans off your screen. AND I'm going to sound like a broken record but I hate the flash on my new camera. All these pictures were taken at around four in the afternoon yet some are light and some are dark, I don't know why! It really bugs me but oh well...

love life.

Vanilla Vanilla Vanilla Cake

2009-01-04T17:23:00.001-08:00

I hate how vanilla gets this reputation of being boring, bland, or just plain unexciting. To me vanilla at its purest is one of the most delicate and complex flavors and also one of my favorite. For Christmas I got SEVEN different types of vanilla beans and I've kind of been using them like crazy. I've already started marinating some in alcohol to make my own vanilla extract and I've also put some pods in sugar and can you believe it's barely been a little over a week and the sugar is already perfumed with the sweet scent of vanilla?!?! So I decided to incorporate all those three into one delicious cake. I used Bakerella's yellow cake recipe yet again [I'm kind of in love with it] but made a few tweaks. I always half the recipe because hers makes three 8 inch layer cakes which I find is too much for a regular day [I also use this recipe for cupcakes and it yields about 15]. I also cut back 1/4 cup of sugar if I'm going to be frosting it otherwise it's too sweet for my taste. I've been wanting to incorporate cocoa powder into it and see if I can turn it into the perfect chocolate recipe. Anyway enough blabber, here is the recipe and some pictures. I just got a new camera and it's really hard to get decent pictures with the flash. I have to use a hot light while taking the picture. Don't ask how I manage to do that because I have NO idea :P

Here is my tweaked recipe:
·1/2 cup of butter, room temperature
·1 cup of vanilla sugar
·2 eggs, room temperature
·1 tsp pure vanilla extract
·seeds of one entire vanilla bean
·1 1/2 cups all purpose flour**
·3/4 tsp baking powder**
·pinch of salt**
·1/2 cup of milk [I use 2%]

**The original recipe calls for self rising flour so if you have it, omit the baking powder and salt

1. Preheat oven to 350˚
2. Sift dry ingredients and set aside
3. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, this usually takes about 5 minutes on my stand mixer
4. Add eggs one at a time
5. Add vanilla extract and vanilla bean
6. Slowly incorporate dry ingredients into the wet mix
7. Finally, add milk to mix
8. Pour batter into a floured and buttered 9X2" pan
9. Bake for 25-30 minutes
10. Remove cake and cool

Beautiful vanilla seeds :D

So delicious it only needs dusting of powdered sugar

Have a slice ;)

love life.

Spring cleaning...

2009-01-04T14:30:00.000-08:00

Alright I know it's not even close to spring but I live in San Diego so technically it's summer/spring like every day :P Hah! That reminds me of the time my friend who had just moved from Canada asked me how we know what season we're in since it's always sunny [for the most part...]

ANYWAY! Back to the matter at hand. One of my unofficial New Years resolutions is to clean out and organize my baking area in the kitchen. It sounded good at the time but once I actually got into it, it turned out to be not so fun. So far I've just cleaned and labeled a couple of cans BUT I really liked how the ended up looking so now I'm all excited about cleaning out again.

So hopefully I'll be posting more pictures of my organizing, OR post a dish... who knows, stay tuned!

love life.

Favorites to round the year out

2008-12-31T00:02:00.000-08:00

Well now that 2008 is coming to an end, I thought I'd do my version of Oprah's faves :P

Since I've loved kitchen gadgets before I even knew what they were for, it was hard to narrow my list down to five [I arbitrarily chose this number because it seemed like not too much not too little, and it's also kind of my favorite number]. These are things that I use mostly for baking although some come in handy at all times in the kitchen. I hope you guys enjoy!

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First off are what I like to call my "Giada spoons" and yes I do mean my not so secret girl crush Giada DeLaurentiis from the Food Network. I'm a sucker for any glass/stone/porcelain kitchenware so it's easy to see why I HAD to have these spoons the moment I saw them. It took me a while but I did my research and found that they were from anthropologie, which by the way can I SAY has the most beautiful dainty and lacy and super girly things for the kitchen? Giada's husband is some top dog for the company and I bet she gets a lot of things from there. Lucky girl! I know it's a little intimidating having porcelain spoons but they're really not that delicate. I know the fact that two of them are broken totally makes me lose my credibility but long story short I dropped them from a very high altitude and it was totally my fault. Plus my theory is that if you buy something fragile it will last you longer because you'll be more careful with it. These little spoons are proof because I've never had a full set of measuring spoons for longer than a few months...

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Next is my beloved Microplane that I adore mostly because it makes me feel like a pro :P and secondly because it really IS handy. I always thought I could do without zest if a recipe called it and man was I wrong. My best friend gave me this for Christmas last year and my eyes [aka MY TASTEBUDS] have been introduced to a whole new world. It's amazing the amount of flavor zest can give a dish and a Microplane makes it very easy to zest any citrus. I also love it for grating parm and chocolate, it makes the highest fluffiest mounds of cheese or whatever it is I'm grating.

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Not much to say about silicone spatulas because they're pretty self explanatory. They make mixing and folding and scraping so much easier. I don't know what I'd do without them, plus, their fruity colors are hard to resist!

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My glass measuring cup is probably the least trendiest or glamorous of all my kitchen tools but I think it's the one I have the most emotional connection to. I know the average Jane or Joe reading this thinks I'm a freak but all kitchen tool lovers know what I mean [I hope!]. Like I said earlier I love fragile tools and this simple glass cup is so beautiful to me. It is exactly eight ounces and it's always stored in my flour bucket. I bought it a little less than a year ago at a salvation army for fifty cents. I love it because it's just a simple cup! No fancy designs, no markings, no intricacy. It's a cup in it's simplest form, what's not to love. I also love that it's clear and I can see any air bubbles and I can eyeball half and quarter cups because again, I can actually SEE the flour inside. I don't know what I'd do without this beauty...
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This list wouldn't be complete without my KitchenAid, Miranda. Yes, I named her, sue me! I got her two years ago and it's safe to say my life will never be the same. I look at my old beat up hand mixer and pity the old KitchenAid-less me. I could keep you all night ranting about my love for it but it still wouldn't be enough. I say you go out and buy one, or do it like me and ask Santa for it :P

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Well there you have it! My favorites for 2008 and hopefully 2009 will bring more tools and even more baking! Happy New Year everyone!

xox,
Karen

love life.

What better gifts than cupcakes?

2008-12-29T18:01:00.000-08:00

A good friend of mine, Betty, and I are cupcake obsessed freaks! It's probably one of the biggest things we have in common. A couple of weeks ago we Checked out a place in Downtown near the Gaslamp Quarter called Heavenly Cupcake and the name fits it completely. We tried their house special orange cupcake with chocolate chips in it and a chocolate ganache type frosting. Then the classic red velvet, a chocolate cupcake with mint frosting, and the most delicious pumpkin cupcake with cream cheese frosting. Up until that day, my favorite cupcake flavor had been vanilla on vanilla but now pumpkin is a close second. So for Christmas I decided to make Betty pumpkin AND vanilla cupcakes and they both turned out pretty delicious if I do say so myself :P

I got the pumpkin recipe from All Recipes and it was a very simple recipe. After reading all the reviews, I decided to add more pumpkin than the recipe required and they turned out super moist. The vanilla recipe was from Bakerella, she calls it moist yellow cake but I like to call it vanilla. It really is moist and delicious. Both recipes gave me perfect dome tops on the cupcakes, it was wonderful. I wish I had captured their naked perfectness before I added the frosting.

yay me!

2008-12-29T17:02:00.000-08:00

So I finally figured out how to work this stupid blogger thing. I had one before but it was such a hassle logging on because of the different google accounts and whatnot. My purpose of this blog is to talk about my cooking/baking/cupcaking adventures and everything else that comes along with it :D