Week 36 :: Cowgirl Cake!

I made this cake and matching cupcakes for a cowgirl themed birthday party this week.  LOVE the finished product:

To make the brim stand up, I made supports our of cardboard, lined them with a paper towel, and left them in place until the cake dried completely and VOILA!  They stayed in place.

A couple tricks about carving shaped cakes:

• Frozen cakes are easier to carve.  You can stack your cake layers (up to 3), filling the layers in between with buttercream icing and freeze a few hours up to 2 months.  Just make sure to cover and make air tight.  The high fat content of buttercream freezes well and keeps the cake moist.
• If you make a small mistake cutting, don't worry.  Use extra buttercream to get the shape you want.  If it is a bigger mistake.  Mix extra cake crumbs with buttercream into a thick moldable paste and fill in the area to get the shape you need.  Dirty ice over the area with buttercream as usual.
• If you make little cuts at a time, you most likely won't mess up.

This occasion also called for matching cupcakes, and here they are:

Happy Baking!

Week 35 :: American Apple Pie

So I'm a little off on my weeks and will catch up soon, but today required a special post.

Nashville Fire Department Station 10 set up a memorial with 343 flags in honor of the NY firefighters of 9/11.  The flags were meticulously placed, with a board honoring all who perished.  The Nashville firefighters were so kind and appreciative of people stopping, when we are the ones that need to show appreciation.

How do I show appreciation?  You guessed it--by baking.  In this case an apple pie.

Grandma Ople's Apple Pie
allrecipes.com

Prep time :: 30 minutes

Bake time :: 50 minutes- 1 hour

::Ingredients::

• 1/2 cup butter
• 3 Tbsp. flour
• 1/2 cups white sugar
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup water
• 7-8 apples of choice, peeled, cored, and sliced
• 2 unbaked 9" pie shells

::Directions::

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. Place one unbaked pie shell in baking dish.  Place apples in unbaked pie shell mounding slightly in the middle like so:
   
   

   

   
   
3. Top apples with lattice-work crust.
4. Melt butter in sauce pan, add flour and thicken.  Add sugars and water, bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes.  Pour mixture over pie slowly like so: 
   
   

   

   
   Bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes.  Lower  temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 35 to 45 minutes more.
   
   Happy Baking! 

Week 34 :: Happy Birthday Betsy!

So I have a bit of catching up to do!  A two week trip to Europe has put me a bit behind, but more about that later...

This week was yet another important birthday!  Betsy was my very first friend when I moved to Nashville and drug me all over town meeting great new friends (including last week's Jill!).  Well, the crazy cougar turned 30 20 this year and celebrated on a pontoon boat!  She requested chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese icing and here they are.  The fondant decorations are beach balls, turtles, suns and flips flops.  If you try this, make SURE you have a big enough cooler and lots of ice!

Happy baking!

Week 33 :: Happy Birthday Jill!

Happy Birthday Jill!

A friend of mine had a big birthday this year and this was the cake (and matching cupcakes).

The cake is chocolate with a peanut butter buttercream (yum! yum! yum!).  Here is the recipe I came up with:

Peanut Butter Buttercream
::Ingredients::

• 2 1/2 cups peanut butter
• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1 stick Crisco
• 2 lbs. powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup +/- milk or cream

::Directions::

1. Mix together butter and Crisco until creamy, add peanut butter and mix well.
2. Add powdered sugar a little at a time, alternating with milk until you reach desired consistency.

Note ::  If you have a kitchenaid, you can dump the sugar in all at once and let mix on medium speed for a couple minutes, add milk gradually.

Happy Baking!



Week 32 :: Drama Queen Cake!

This cake was made for my preceptor's birthday.  Simple, but I love it.  I mixed white fondant with stabilizing powder to make it more of a gumpaste quality to make the tiara.  Other than that, a straight forward German chocolate with caramel-pecan filling!

Happy baking!

Week 31 :: Cupcakes, cupcakes and more cupcakes!

So over the past couple of weeks I have made several sets of cakes and cupcakes.  I just love cupcakes--they are quick, pretty, and easy to eat.  Cakes--not easy to cut once you've spent 78865 hours decorating it.  I have never felt like they do on Cake Boss--I don't make a cake and then as soon as I get there say "who wants some cake!!"  No, in fact, it is often painful to cut a cake.  So, I began making matching cupcakes.  The first set was for a sweet friend--her father's retirement party.  The pictures below make more sense when I tell you he owned a garage door business.

Close-up of the car bumper and plate:

Matching cupcakes!

Wanna know a super easy way to fill all 24 cupcake lines is <1 minute.  Here it is: the no-drip-super-awesome-cupcake-filler (thanks, Mom, once again for an awesome find!).  Such a breeze.  I don't even think I can remember how I filled cupcakes before.  Seriously.  This tool has certainly made my top-10 tools for bakers.  Get it.

On to more cupcakes I have made this week--red velvet with cream cheese frosting, chocolate-chocolate, and birthday cake with buttercream.  This buttercream recipes makes the perfect amount for 24-generously-iced cupcakes.

 
Happy baking!

Week 30 :: M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E

Well a big happy birthday to little Maria!

I made this cake for a little one's very first birthday--a big fan of Mickey Mouse.  This was a white cake with caramel pecan filling.  No new recipes but here are a couple more tips:

• When I make a cake with a unique shape, I cut the supporting cardboard to shape before cutting the cake, then cut the cake, a little at a time, to fit the cardboard support
• I put a small straw through the back of the cake after I cover it in fondant to prevent any bubbles in the fondant

Happy baking!