The Big Question

On the day of the my son’s prom, about 3 hours before he was to leave for his friend’s house for the pre-prom picture-taking and festivities, he asked me if we had any brownie mix in the house.  I was happy to say that we did.  I always try to keep Costco’s Ghirardelli Triple Chocolate Brownie Mix on hand for just these types of emergencies.  I assumed that he was supposed to bring some food to the party.

Brownie baked in Wilton heart-shaped cake pan.

No, he needed to ask his date to the prom!  These days, a boy can’t just ask a girl to the dance like we did in our day.  No,  he must demonstrate he truly desires her company by putting time and effort into posing the question.  For instance, he might compose a song to sing to her.  Or he might paint a clever banner to pose the question.  Maybe he gets his buddies or her girlfriends to assist in a creative ruse to surprise the young lady with his proposal.

Yes, my son was going to the prom, and his date had been no question as they have been together for quite some time.  I guess she didn’t want to get shorted the ritual of being asked to the dance.  So here was my son on the day of the prom, asking if he can make some brownies just hours before the dance!

Letters covered with powdered sugar.

Well, we worked together on the idea.  He thought about trying to cut out the brownies in the shape of PROM, or stacking them in some way.  I suggested the heart pan.  He liked that idea.  Then he said maybe we can decorate with powdered sugar.  I wanted to write some words on the heart.  He wasn’t too crazy about the idea, but he said okay when I told him I wanted to decorate so I could put it on my blog.

I lined the cake pan with parchment paper so that the brownie would be easy to get out of the pan in one piece.  I let the brownie cool before running a knife around the sides and flipping it out of the pan.  I peeled off the parchment paper and  had a nice flat surface for decorating.  I printed out the “got milk?” logo from the internet and cut out the letters, modifying a few to get all the letters I needed (g ->p, m->r).  After arranging them on the surface of the brownies, I sifted powdered sugar over them.  The hardest part was taking the letters off the top.  I didn’t have a pair of tweezers, so I had to carefully lift with the end of a thin spatula and grab the paper.  I didn’t do so well, so I had to do a little touch up.

Ready to go!

Anyways, not too bad for a spur of the moment project.  I hope his girl liked it!

Red Velvet Coconut Macaroons

I wanted to get in a post before March is over.  I’ve just been so busy, and I was sick with that awful bug that everyone is getting where you are really sick for a week, and then recovering with a cough for another three weeks, and then get a relapse.  Anyways, I actually made these most delicious and pretty Red Velvet Macaroons around St. Valentine’s Day.  I had eaten some store-bought red velvet coconut macaroons at a friend’s house and thought these were so delicious, I came home and looked for a recipe on the web.

Thank you to Greg’s Kitchen for the recipe!  A few modifications. For one, I used shredded, not flaked coconut, because that’s what I had on hand. And then of course I wasn’t able to pipe the macaroons through a piping tip…although I did try!  The coconut just got stuck in the tip.  So I ended up using a tablespoon cookie scoop.  The special touch is the drizzled the melted white chocolate over the cooled macaroons. The more the better! I also dipped the bottom of some of the macaroons in white chocolate.  That made the bottoms look prettier and the ratio of white chocolate to macaroon was much higher…like frosting, but without hiding all the pretty red coconut!  The white chocolate is a nice compliment to the red velvet, like the cream cheese frosting is for red velvet cake.

The bottom line is that the macaroons are not hard to make, and they were a hit with the ladies who were my tasters.  I think most of them had more than one! I also gave some to one of my coworkers whose 10-year old son said, “They are sooooooooooo good!  Anything you make I like!  It made me change my mind about coconut.  I used to not like coconut, but now I love it just because of your macaroons!”

I will definitely be making Red Velvet Coconut Macaroons again. I would like to try a cross between this recipe and the chocolate macaroons I made for my Christmas cookies, or maybe a gluten-free version as the recipe doesn’t ask for a lot of wheat flour.  Happy baking!

Christmas Cookie Platters 2012

Christmas cookies plates for gifts

The last few years, I’ve baked cookies to give my coworkers at Christmas.  I like to include a variety of cookies – different flavors, shapes, and colors.  These are the cookies I included in my cookie platter this year.

Gingerbread - This year I decided I wanted to make gingerbread girls and boys.  I had a gift tag cookie cutter and thought that would be fun to decorate, too.  To see the recipe, tips and tricks for making gingerbread, see The Gingerbread House Centerpiece.

Chocolate Macadamia Macaroons – made with coconut, macadamia nuts, cocoa powder, egg whites, and sugar. After they’re bake and cooled, I dipped the bottoms in dark chocolate.  This was a new recipe this year and my favorite!  I got the recipe from Taste of Home.

Reese’s Peanut Butter Chocolate Krispie Treats – Another bar cookie, fast and easy to make and if you like peanut butter and chocolate, you’ll love these!  I had some at a friends house and begged for the recipe.  I also found it online at Recipe Snobs.

Russian Tea Cakes – also known as Snowballs or Mexican Wedding Cakes – a classic at Christmas time.  Buttery with chopped nuts and coated with powdered sugar.  Recipe courtesy of Betty Crocker.  Anything covered with powdered sugar is always a pretty addition to a Christmas cookie plate.

Dutch Butter Cakes – These are buttery, not too sweet, with just a hint of almond.  They are baked in a pan and cut into squares.  My friend Dutch Indonesian friend Ilse would make these for us as gifts each Christmas, and I think of her every time I make them.  You can make a lot in a short amount of time.  The cakes freeze well so it’s great to be able to make them ahead of time.  Here’s a copy of the recipe from the church cookbook.

Ilse’s Dutch Butter Cake Recipe

If I had more time, I would have made a few more varieties of cookies, like classic shortbread, thumbprint jam cookies, and macadamia cranberry cookies.  Well, there’s always next year!

Gluten Free Red Velvet Cake

Gluten Free Fall Birthday Cake

This year for our family Thanksgiving meal, my sister-in-law requested a birthday cake celebrating the fall birthdays: her mom and sister’s birthdays and my son’s birthday.  Since my sister-in-law and her daughter are gluten- intolerant, I ventured into the world of gluten-free baking.

Leveled cake layer

I have eaten a few gluten-free baked goods in the past.  They are usually dense and rather dry.  Then I went to “Sensitive Sweets,”  a gluten-free and nut-free bakery in Fountain Valley, California.  Oh, my!  Their cakes and breads are delicious, and so pretty, too!  So I know that it is possible to make good gluten-free baked goods.

I searched on the internet for recipes.  I settled on a gluten-free red velvet cake.  The picture and reviews were what sold me…the cake had the texture of a “normal” cake and the reviews said that everyone liked the cake and couldn’t even tell that it was gluten-free!  To substitute for wheat flour, the recipe asked for brown rice flour, sorghum flour, tapioca starch, and xanthum gum.  I figured that so many substitutes must help to approximate wheat flour!  You can find the recipe at Gluten Free Cooking School.

Putting together the cake layers

As you can see, the texture of the cake looks like a cake from a box mix.  It’s has a fairly coarse texture with large air pockets.  So far so good.

Then I tasted some of the cake crumbs when I leveled the cake.  Hmmmm, kind of gritty, a little chewy and healthy tasting. Also a little oily.  Note to self:  use butter next time for sure.  My husband said the cake tasted like oatmeal, and my daughter said it reminded her of some breakfast bars.  Definitely anyone who has eaten a basic cake could tell it was gluten-free!  Oh well.  As it was already Thanksgiving morning, I didn’t have time to make another cake, so I continued on.  I hoped the cream cheese frosting would help with the overall cake eating experience.

After I tasted the cake, I decided to use a different frosting recipe, one that was less sweet and had a stronger and more tangy cream cheese flavor.  This is the recipe from the America’s Test Kitchen. Basically, it asks for twice the cream cheese (two 8-ounce blocks of cream cheese) and half the sugar (2 cups or 8 ounces) compared to the Gluten Free Cooking School Recipe. Just to let you know the other ingredients, they are 10 tablespoons of butter, 1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla, and 1/4 teaspoon salt.

Cream cheese leaves in fall colors

Speaking of cream cheese frosting, I think it’s hard to do much piping using cream cheese frosting because it’s so soft.  I decided to go with very simple decoration, using fall-colored cream cheese candies in the shape of leaves.  You can find the recipe in my previous post.

Me and the Birthday Girls

When the cake was served after the Thanksgiving meal, the overall experience wasn’t too bad.  The cream cheese frosting did compliment  the red velvet cake nicely.

Even though I was disappointed with the results, I was really happy that my niece, who is gluten-intolerant, really liked the cake.  My next goal is to try some other gluten-free recipes and see if I can make a better tasting gluten-free cake. It will be a challenge!

My niece enjoying the gluten-free birthday cake

Kristi’s Cakes

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

My 6-1/2 year-old niece, Kristi, got a little girls baking kit for Christmas.  She was waiting for me to come over to decorate with her.  Last weekend, we finally had a chance to make the cakes together.

Everything in the kit was a miniature of the equipment that I use!  Mini rolling pin, mini cake pans, mini fondant cutters, mini turntable, mini rolling mat…and we are talking tiny! I brought all of my fondant tools and colorings so we could have a lot of choices of what we wanted to do.

The cake “pans” were filled with a couple of tablespoons of cake batter and were “baked” in the microwave in just 30 seconds!

We ended up making a few other small cakes…I used 4-inch  and 6-inch round pans.  They seemed so big compared to the mini cakes!

The fun part was decorating the cakes.  I asked Kristi what color she wanted to make the cakes and of course she chose…pink and purple!  I taught her how to mix the coloring into the white fondant.  We used gloves to keep from staining our hands.

Next she rolled out the fondant, and then she covered the cakes and stacked them.  She chose the star and flower shaped cutters, and carefully attached the shapes to her cakes with a little bit of water.  She chose the shiny bead candies and gently pushed them into the center of the flowers.

For the top of the cake, she mixed the pink and purple together and cut out her initials: KN.  The final touch was bright pink gel to edge the cake.  Very pretty!

After the tiny cake was done so quickly, Kristi was ready to decorate a second cake.  She decided to make a Halloween cake.  Using light orange, white and chocolate fondant swirled together, created a very sophisticated marbled pattern.  Then she shaped a ghost out of white fondant.  She drew eyes, a mouth, and a Halloween banner with edible food markers.  She made cute little jack-o’-lanterns out of orange and green fondant, and drew the faces on with a food marker.  The jack-o’-lanterns were attached to the cake with a little bit of water, and the cake was complete.

I was quite impressed with her creative artistry!

Safari Animal Rice Krispie Treats

Animal Rice Krispies

We had a baby shower for my coworker.  She is expecting her second baby boy, and her theme is safari animals.  When we were planning, someone suggested decorated Rice Krispies.

Making Rice Krispies in 9×13 pan

I had never thought about making these, but thought they sounded yummy!  My daughter, Allison, was still home from college for the summer, and we had fun making these together.

First Allison made two 9×13 pans of Rice Krispie treats according to the Kellogg Original Treats recipe.  I had found a set of cookie cutters which included a lion’s head, an elephant’s head, and a monkey’s head.  Allison cut out the shapes while I was melting the candy melts.

Cookie cutters were used to cut out animal shapes.

After she cut out as many shapes as she could from one pan, she tried pressing the leftovers together to make a few more shapes.  They weren’t quite as nice, but they were okay.  After the shapes were dipped in candy, I don’t think anyone could tell they were formed from scraps.  Allison made 20 shapes in all.  She could have made a few more out of the leftover scraps if we needed to, but since I only needed 18, we didn’t bother.

Lion heads dipped in yellow.

I melted about 8 ounces of candy melts in small plastic bowls (30 seconds in the microwave on half power, stir, then repeat as needed until the candy is melted and smooth).  We dipped one side of the animal shape into the melted candy to coat one side.  We used a small spoon to help smooth the candy if there were any places that didn’t get coated.  We set these on wax-paper lined cookie sheets, and placed them in the freezer for a few minutes to harden.

Pastry bag and bottles for decorating with candy melts

I poured each color of melted candy into a disposable plastic pasty bag or a small plastic bottle fitted with a decorating tip. When the candy coating had hardened, we added the details like eyes, nose, mouth, ears, and tusks.  I used a small spoon to add the monkey’s light brown muzzle and ears.

The treats set overnight and I packaged them in the morning.  Since the shower was going to be an outdoors luncheon, I packed them into an insulated bag with a cold pack.  That kept them nice and cool until we passed them out as party favors at the end of the shower.  They were a hit!  A number of people asked for two so they could take them home for their kids!

Packaged monkey treat coordinated with paper plate design

Just Velvet Cupcakes

Just Velvet Cupcakes

The inspiration!

My niece Kristi turned six this year.  She loves all things little girls love:  the color pink, anything that sparkles, dresses with skirts that swirl, Hello Kitty, ballet dancing and romance (she’s already picked out the boy she’s going to marry from her many suitors!). For her birthday, I made cupcakes.  My inspiration came from the wrapping paper on her gift.

I had made the most delicious Red Velvet Cake, and wanted to try making the recipe without the red dye.   According to some folklore, the red color of red velvet cakes

Red Velvet Cupcakes without the red dye.

originated because the combination of the cocoa powder with vinegar causes a reddish color, and later dye was added to enhance it.  As you can see, in my case the cocoa powder and vinegar did not result in any suggestion of red, not even a hint of pink!  The cupcakes had a light brown color, more like the color of a spice cake

Since Kristi and her brother don’t like cream cheese frosting, I used the Whipped Vanilla Buttercream suggested by Sarah Magid to go along with her Red Velvet Love Cake.  This buttercream uses flour cooked in milk as a thickener.  The milk and flour mixture is added to the creamed butter and sugar.  I made the buttercream the night before, stored it overnight in the refrigerator, and then whipped it up again in the morning before piping it onto the cupcakes.  It is a nice light and creamy frosting.  Sarah compares the flavor to whipped cream.  I do like the taste better than the traditional buttercream…so yummy!  However, it is limited for decorating because it is very soft.  It wouldn’t be able to hold it’s shape for using fancy tips or making flowers.

Decorating was fun!  I piped half of the cupcakes with the buttercream just as it was and then tinted half of the buttercream pink (of course!).  I used different sprinkles and royal icing flowers from different projects.  Every cupcake was uniquely decorated.  I even topped one cupcake with a fondant pokeball from the Tepig Cake.

Just Velvet Cupcakes with Whipped Vanilla Buttercream

What do you think?  Would this make some nice wrapping paper?

Oooh! Yummy!

By the way, the non-red velvet cupcakes were good, but they just weren’t as extremely delicious as the Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting.  I’m not sure if it was because they were cupcakes rather than a cake, or the tang of the cream cheese frosting really brings out the flavor, or maybe the red dye does really make a difference!  In her book, Sarah recounts a time she tinted this Vanilla Whipped Buttercream a pale yellow.  After the party, the hostess called to ask about the yellow frosting, even though she had tasted it numerous times before! I guess our eyes are connected to our taste buds!

Red Velvet Birthday Cake and Cream Cheese Candies

Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Hearts

This week was my coworker Janet’s birthday.  I wanted to make a special birthday cake for her.  She is a hardworking mom who lives in a house full of boys – two sons and her husband.   She had requested a red velvet cake, so I decided to try the red velvet love cake from Sarah Magrid’s “Organic and Chic” cake book.

Cakes cooling

The cakes turned out beautifully.  The texture was so nice – even, substantial, not too dense – the color just beautiful, and the taste…so delicious!

I just love the way that cream cheese frosting compliments the flavor of red velvet cake.  However, I’ve found that cream cheese frosting is very soft.  I can’t decorate with it like I do with buttercream because it just doesn’t hold its shape.  (Someday I will have to find a recipe for a frosting that acts like buttercream and has a cream cheese taste.)  I did want to add some special decoration to the cake, so these red cream cheese candy hearts were the perfect addition to hint of the luscious red velvet cake inside!

Red cream cheese heart

Cream cheese candies are quick and easy to make.  They can be colored and/or flavored, and made into fun shapes.  Here’s how to make them:

Cream Cheese Candy for Molds

Mix 3 ounces cream cheese, 2 tablespoons butter, and 1 pound powdered sugar.  Add  flavorings and/or food coloring as desired.  Roll into balls and coat with granulated sugar by rolling in a small bowl of sugar.  Press gently into candy mold and tap onto sugared wax paper.  Let set out at room temperature for one day or store in the refrigerator.

Heart shaped candy mold

I think I might make this cake next for Valentine’s Day!

Quick and Easy No-Bake Mini Cones

Mini cones, picture courtesy of Hailey Rohde

The last Friday night of each month, I gather with a group of crafters.  We each bring whatever we are working on.   It’s a great way to get some of those UFO’s (UnFinished Objects) moving along and also be inspired by the creative projects that others are working on.  We also like to have some fun munchies.

One of the women in our group, Hailey, is expecting a baby girl next month, so I decided to make something pink and fun.  I didn’t have much time as I made this decision on Thursday night and would be working the next day, so I put together these  no-bake mini ice cream cones.

These are really quick and easy to make.  I think I spent longer writing this post than I did making the cones!  I purchased the little mini-cones at the cake supply shop.  First I melted the chocolate.   I used Nestle’s white baking chips because that’s what I had on hand, and added a few red candy melts to add the pink color.  Melt 30 seconds on high, stir, and repeat until the chocolate is melted and smooth.

TIP: Melt chocolate in plastic container in the microwave.
A plastic container won’t get hot. If you use a glass or ceramic container, the container will get hot from the  melted candy making difficult (and possibly dangerous!) to handle.  This is a very useful tip from Bakerella of Cake Pops fame.  She uses shallow bowls for dipping cake pops.  I have a plastic one-quart measuring cup that is microwave safe. I like it because the handle makes it easy to maneuver. 

I stuffed each cone with a regular size marshmallow.  I made sure the marshmallow is really tucked firmly into the cone so it won’t fall out when it’s dipped in the melted chocolate.  I submerge the marshmallow and the top of the cone into the chocolate, twist slightly and lift the cone out of the chocolate.  I twirled slowly to keep the chocolate from forming drips, and then added the sprinkles.  You could add the “cherry” at this point.  My cherries were an afterthought, so I used a little more pink chocolate to attach them later.  I had just bought a package of pretzel M&Ms to try and they turned out to be perfect cherry for these cones!

For the chocolate topping, I melted some more chocolate chips and spooned it onto the “ice cream.”  A cherry on top and they were complete!

Mommy-to-be Hailey holding mini cone

By the way, I found out that Hailey doesn’t like pink!  She did eat a mini cone, though, and took the awesome picture for me.  You can see more of her work on her blog: http://haileyanna.wordpress.com/photography/

Nyan Cat Cake

Happy Birthday, Roger!

Nyan Cat

One of the fun things about having a daughter is that she enjoys many of the same things that I do!  This post is about the Nyan Cat Birthday cake that my daughter, Allison, made this weekend.  She did all the decorating.  I just made a few technical suggestions along the way.

Allison said that she wanted to make a Nyan Cat birthday cake for her friend Roger. I didn’t know what Nyan Cat was.  I didn’t even know what an internet meme was.  I had to read about Nyan Cat on Wikipedia and check out the Nyan Cat video @ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4.

Piping the outline of Nyan Cat

After Allison showed me Nyan Cat and we checked out a few pictures of Nyan Cat cakes on the web, and I suggested she go with buttercream frosting and use M&Ms for the rainbow.  Buttercream because it can be colored to the intense colors we wanted, and M&Ms to add texture and interest.  An added benefit was that meant there were five fewer colors of frosting we would have to color and put into piping bags.  I hate washing frosting out of the bags!

Adding mini M&Ms

Finally, the surprise inside was that the cake was rainbow-colored!  This was just a white cake, but the batter is divided into six portions, each one colored one color of the rainbow.  They are poured into the pan one on top of the other and baked.

Surprise rainbow inside!

I’m so proud of my sweet and talented daughter!

Allison and her Nyan Cat Cake