Sandhill Peach Pound Cake

Recently I bought the magazine Southern Cakes that Taste of the South put out. After flipping through it, I wanted to make probably more than half of the cakes. I settled on a Sandhill Peach Pound Cake because my mom likes peaches, and I ended up being surprised by how much I liked it. The flavor of the cake was great. I highly recommend it.

Chloe's 4th Birthday

My niece Chloe is all about Hello Kitty right now, so doing a Hello Kitty theme for her birthday party was an obvious choice. She also LOVES Pizza Hut, so that is where we had the party. I volunteered to make the cake and let her choose what she wanted, which meant I ended up buying the Wilton pan for Hello Kitty and using that.

It's not perfect, but I thought it turned out well. I frosted it last night and the black frosting bled onto the pink frosting a bit. That's frustrating but a learning moment.

The cake Chloe picked out was actually a two-tiered cake that used the Hello Kitty pan. I was going to do that but then remembered that in January I ordered personalized cupcake toppers from Etsy. Since I had bought them, I was going to use them. I ended up making 12 regular cupcakes to put the toppers in and 5 square cupcakes to frost and spell out Chloe's name. Chloe wanted her cake to be strawberry, so I just used a mix for the Hello Kitty part. For the cupcakes, I wanted to do something a little more special. I ended up making the Strawberry Cupcake recipe from Better Homes and Gardens which starts with a white cake mix and gets jazzed up from there. (Note: my grocery store did not have strawberries in syrup so I thawed a 16oz bag of whole strawberries, cut them in half, threw in several spoonfuls of sugar, then let it make its own syrup.) The cupcakes were yummy. Several people asked for the recipe. It is one that I would highly recommend.



Yes, there was a lot of cake at the party. Most of it was eaten though. Even if none of it had been, it would have been worth it to see how excited Chloe was.

Happy birthday, Chlo-Bear!

30 Before 30: #7 Take a Cake Decorating Class

I have been away for too long. In my absence, I completed the first course of the Wilton cake decorating method. My final cake for the course was this not-too-wonderful cake:

I started the temporary job I am working at the day of my last class so I was 45 minutes late. It meant that I was crunched for time. The design I had in my head did not make it onto the cake. I think it just reiterates what the teacher said in one class: you can fix almost any mistake if you give yourself enough time. The moral? A rush job does not a fantastic-looking cake make.

I have already shown the practice lion cake that I did. Here is the Hello Kitty cake that I did for the second class:

For some reason I only took a picture with my cell phone. Oh well. It's not perfect (the bow is messed up) but I thought it was pretty good.

For the third week of class, we made cupcakes and practiced various flowers. Here were my attempts:

In all honesty, I learned less than I thought I would in this course. One of my friends who has taken all four courses assures me that this is really just the basic course and you learn most of the really cool stuff in later courses. Of course, you can see from these pictures that I am still rockin' it like an amateur on all of these basic techniques, so I guess I shouldn't turn my nose up at what I learned. It just wasn't exactly what I was expecting. I am still excited about the second course, though. I begin next Monday learning beginning gum paste techniques. I will keep you posted. As for now, I am just excited that I get to check off something else from my list!





Go Lions! (My First Practice Cake)

Last Monday, I started a cake decorating class (which is on my 30 Before 30 list). We were given instructions to practice as much as we could making rosettes with the star tip. I was under the weather for most of the week and didn't feel like doing much of anything, so yesterday when I finally felt really well, I decided to make a practice cake and decorate it. I called my brother and asked him what image he thought I should use. He said a lion because the boys' team at my high school alma mater was playing for the state basketball championship (they lost but they were playing an Oklahoma City team...we are a tiny, rural place). I went for a very simple, very cartoon version of a lion since I had never decorated anything using a star tip. I thought it looked pretty decent considering it was my first time and all.

As for the cake decorating class, the first class was basically just getting organized, so I am waiting to see. I did learn one trick of the trade, though. To get a smooth icing surface, lay Viva paper towels (or parchment paper) on icing after icing has crusted (i.e., it's not sticky anymore) and smooth it down using your fingers or a flat surface. The teacher of my class used a fondant smoother and, since they were like 3 bucks at Wal-Mart, I followed suit. I am looking forward to getting good at this technique and having super-smooth icing surfaces.

That's all I got. Hope the time change wasn't too rough on you!

Crystal's Cake

A couple years ago, I started making my friend Crystal's birthday cake. It's a tradition I love (and hopefully she does, too). This year, I found the cake I was going to make in November. In its original form, it was a cake made to look like a Christmas present (and it was chocolate-mint flavored, which is yucky in my book). Last year I modified the cake I made to fit Crystal's tastes. I had planned to do that this year as well...and then I ran across this cake and had a moment of indecision. So I sent Crystal to my Pinterest cake board and she said she loved the look of the tuxedo cake but the snickerdoodle cake she saw sounded good. So, I had my solution: to make the snickerdoodle cake look like a present.

As you can see, the cake is quite large. This is how I did it: I made two batches of the snickerdoodle recipe using two 9x9 pans per batch (four layers total). I added a box of vanilla pudding to the cake recipe because the test cake I made was dry even though I baked it for less time than called for. I also doubled the frosting recipe. I know the icing doesn't look professional, but I keep forgetting to get an offset spatula. I think that would help. This was my first-ever time working with fondant, and I think it looks pretty good when you consider that. I made the bow without any kind of pattern or tutorial and, while it is simple, I was very pleased with the result.

Success? Well, I enjoyed making it and people seemed to enjoy eating it. It literally could have fed a small army.

Now I guess the only question is what I will do next year.

30 Before 30: #6 Cook Something With Yeast

I crossed the first thing off of my 30 Before 30 list, and unsurprisingly, it was an easy one. My story begins this past weekend when I went with some friends to one of the Mardi Gras parades that they have in Shreveport, LA. I took my two oldest nieces because my friends have daughters the same age. All and all there were 6 children to 4 adults. (Good thing they didn't realize they had us outnumbered.) It was quite a day of driving and waiting in the cold and sprinkling rain, but by the time the parade got to us, the rain had quit and we were ready for beads.

I was surprised by how much fun I had. The parade lasted about an hour but didn't feel that long at all. The floats were paced far enough apart that we had a little breathing room between each one. The girls all had an absolute blast! (As evidenced by Ms. Caroline, below.)

Anyway, the point in all this was that even though Mardi Gras is not particularly high on my radar as a holiday, I was in the mood to celebrate it. One of my other friends turned 40 last week, so I suggested having a Mardi Gras-themed celebration complete with a king cake (which I offered to make). On Monday, the party was postponed but I had already gotten all the stuff to make the cake, was in the mood to make it, and it had the added bonus of helping me cross something off my list. So, make it I did.

Now, by far, #6 was the item on my list that has gotten me the most ridiculed. "You've NEVER cooked with yeast?" No, I haven't. In fact, if I am reading a recipe that sounds awesome and realize that it calls for yeast, I move on. It's just one of those things that seems easy to mess up and kind of scary to try with no one there to offer guidance. Especially when the recipe has such "clear" directions like "Between 3-1/4 and 3-3/4 cups of flour." Sigh.

I soldiered on and started my king cake. I got the yeast dissolved and the flour and other dry ingredients added. Then came my first moment of panic. At this point, I had used 2 of the aforementioned cups of flour. The instructions told me to "Add additional flour until a soft dough forms. Dough will be sticky." Here was my pickle: With just the 2 cups of flour, the dough seemed soft and was sticky. How much more was I supposed to add? Gulp! So, I ended up adding to the minimum amount of flour that the recipe called for and then added a spoonful for good measure.

Is this right?! Panic!!!

The next instructions were to knead the dough for 6-8 minutes until "elastic." I set the timer on my oven for 7 minutes and called it a day when it went off, hoping against hope that it was elastic enough.

Elastic? Let's hope!



I let the dough rise, punched it down, rolled it out, added cinnamon-sugar, formed it into a crown shape, let it rise again, then baked it. All the while, I had a keen sense of nervousness. I don't like doing things without having a clear understanding of how to do them. But, the timer for the oven went off, I pulled the cake out, and lo and behold, it looked like a king cake and smelled like one, too.

Prettier than I expected!

At this point, I came to a realization. I did not have purple decorating sugar. When buying my supplies, I had forgotten to check my sugars. I made due with black sugar and just explained to everyone that I had forgotten. For the baby Jesus, I searched the toy section at my local Wal-Mart for something small enough to use and ended up buying a My Little Pony playset that had a tiny koala bear in it. My friend Michael ended up getting the piece with the "baby" in it. Hail, Michael! May you have good luck for the coming year!

The glaze ran everywhere.

I did it!

Now I don't know about you, but for the last several years I have given up drinking anything but water for Lent. I am hardcore about it, too, and don't count the weekends as free days (like you apparently can). I will not have anything but water between now and Easter. Let me tell you, it is difficult but rewarding. Any time I think about how much I want a coke or tea or really anything else (like when I had my blazing headache earlier), I really do think about how insignificant my sacrifice is when compared to giving your life for something you believe in. At the same time, I don't belittle my sacrifice either. It is difficult and it is an accomplishment when I make it to the end and can say I did it. So, on Tuesday as I contemplated the weeks ahead, I tried to decide what I wanted my last non-water drink for awhile to be. I opened my refrigerator and realized that I still had the rest of the Asti that my aunt bought to celebrate the end of the election last week. What remained amounted to a large glass, so I poured it, sat down with my slice of king cake, and celebrated. I crossed something off my list!

Cheers!

You Say It's Your Birthday...Beatles-Themed Party

My niece who will be seven next week requested a Beatles birthday party. My dad died in mid-2011 and he and Kyleigh were very close. He was very into The Beatles and got her into them as well. I remember that he used to sing "Dear Prudence" to her to wake her up when he took her to daycare. Of course he substituted Kyleigh for Prudence. Anyway, Kyleigh asked for a Beatles party this year, and I had a lot of fun complying as Daddy passed on his love for The Beatles to me as well. This is what I came up with:

Strawberry Fields
I crushed fudge-filled Oreos to make "dirt" and topped them with strawberries.

Apple Studios

I made cupcake microphones using ice cream cones and cupcake decorations. I now know that you should NOT make these ahead as they collapsed somewhat overnight. They still turned out pretty well. The kids especially loved them.

The cake

Kyleigh wanted a strawberry-flavored cake and wanted me to "draw all of the Beatles on it with icing." I know there are people out there who are that talented when it comes to cake decorating. I am not one of them so I made the Beatles logo out of sugar paper instead. She didn't mind at all. As I am very much an amateur when it comes to decorating, this was my first time using sugar paper. It was much harder to work with than I anticipated; however, I think it turned out pretty well.

Penny Lane

Connecting all this together was Penny Lane. Using poster tack to keep the pennies in place, I constructed a roadway of pennies. Because I am a little bit OCD, I made sure all of the pennies were facing up and in the same direction. It took a while to do but it is one of my favorite things I did.

Photo Backdrop

My brother recreated the cover for Help! as a backdrop for pictures. I originally was going to have him do Abbey Road but didn't remember the detail involved in that and waited until the night before the party to have him come over and work on it. He said he would draw the Abbey Road one if I wanted, but I took pity on him and did the Help! cover instead. I think he did a good job.

For the savory side of the meal, I served sub sandwiches and covered the table with a yellow table cloth. I even drew a frowning face on the mustard to make it mean Mr. Mustard.

For decorations, I replaced the paintings in my living room with Beatles posters and set out a photo that one of my friends took of Strawberry Fields in NYC. I put my record player out with my Abbey Road record in it. I played the White Album in the background throughout the party and "Birthday" when Kyleigh blew out her candles. It turned into one of the best moments of the party as all of the kids starting dancing gleefully.

When it was all said and done, I threw a party for 16 people for less than $100, food and all. It has been one of my favorite themes ever that I have worked on. I mark this party down as a success.