Projects

I made some gluten-free cupcakes for a friend or her 40th birthday. They turned out pretty and tasty!

This weekend's project was a Mickey Mouse cake. Someone asked me to make one in a few weeks for their son's 3rd birthday...so I thought I'd better practice first! I had a bit of trouble with the coloring. (In this picture it looks perfect, but in real life it looks like Mickey spent too much time in the tanning bed.) Not bad for my very first attempt at a shape cake. The recipe is a new one too...I'm trying to wait patiently for the boys to get up from their naps so I can try it. It's based on a Georgetown Cupcakes recipe. (It's the bakery from the TLC show DC Cupcakes.) It's chocolate cake with almond buttercream icing!

Wilton Class #3

We worked on flowers this week in class. Next week is the last of Level 1...then off to Level 2!

A friend asked me to make 60 cupcakes to donate to her son's school!

WOW!

So apparently people have heard that I like to bake and am willing to do it for other people! This cupcake is a practice cupcake for the cousin of friend whose son is graduating from HS. She wants 100 cupcakes and a 1/4 sheet cake that is gluten-free. The theme is Earth since it'll be Earth Day so we're going to make these cupcakes and put chocolate balls on top that are wrapped in globe foil. Then for the cake she wants legos. My friend "borrowed" the lego brick candy mold from the mom that wants the cake so I could make the candy legos to go around the outside of the cake. I hope it all turns out like it is in my head!

Another friend wants me to make a lego cake for her son's birthday next month. This was my attempt at a large lego brick...didn't turn out so well. So we're doing brightly colored cupcakes with lego candy on top. I am also currently making 60 cupcakes to donate to her son's school for this Friday!

I'm a little nervous about starting to bake for other people. I want to know that it's going to turn out well each time and I'm just not to that point. I'm still experimenting with recipes and types of icing (which I have down pretty well). Eventually I'd like to do mostly organic, but that's too expensive while I'm still in the experimental stage and giving away (or throwing away) 2/3 of my projects!

Hopefully this will be something that I continue to find fun and can also do for other people!

Color Mist

I found something called Color Mist that sprays color onto your cupcakes! Isn't it pretty??? I also used it to color some raw sugar red and sprinkled that on too!

Carrot Spice Muffins

The zucchini spice muffins disappeared so fast that I thought I'd try a different kind today. So I made the same basic recipe but added shredded carrots instead of shredded zucchini. 3 are already gone! Evan ate 2 large muffins and asked for more so I guess these are a hit too!

Wilton Class 2

I decorated this cake in class this week. It's a chocolate cake with Andies candies in it and the green icing is flavored with mint extract. I used a coloring page to trace the shamrock. The teacher also talked me into doing a zig zag border along the bottom. The cake was a little lopsided on top because I forgot to Pam the pan so it stuck, but the decoration kind of masked that problem. I think it was my best one/easiest one yet. I still like doing cupcakes better though, but maybe just because I like to eat cupcakes more than cake...same thing, I know but less messy!

Chocolate Mint Cupcakes

My last experiment was to attemt to make some cupcakes for St. Patrick's Day. These were made from a milk chocolate cake mix with Andies candies mixed in. Then topped with a mint buttercream icing that I added a little green food coloring to and then sprinkled some more Andies on top. They definitely hit the St. Patrick's Day theme although I felt they were a bit too minty for me. People said they liked them but I'm not sure if they're just being nice or they really liked them.

Last night's book cake was hit and with the icing in the middle it looked like a "real" cake! Back to class tomorrow night so we'll see what I can make tomorrow!

2nd Cake

So I wanted to practice icing more so I saved the other half of the last cake and made a cake for Book Club tonight. I did better with the top...not getting as many crumbs in, but I'm still having some trouble. The spatula keeps sticking and picking up the icing and cake on the edges. Maybe next time I'll try dipping the spatula in water to see if that helps. I printed out an outline of a book and traced that onto the cake. Writing the words was difficult. The #1 tip was soooo small that itmade it hard to know if the icing was even coming out...so I went over it in a bigger tip and that worked better.

The boys have eaten most of the zucchini spice muffins....guess those were a hit!

Zucchini Spice Muffins

The boys like to eat muffins for breakfast..and lunch! So after they polished off the pumpkin chocolate chip ones this morning I decided I had better get to baking. Connor thought so too. He sat at the table most of the time I was baking asking for his muffin. Anyway, these were a hit. Evan ate 10 of these little ones and I finally just had to tell him no more. I had some left over vanilla frosting so I topped them with that and sprinkled cinnamon on top. This made 24 regular plus 24 minis...I only fill about 1/2 way instead of 2/3...then I froze a dozen so we'd have some next week too!

Zucchini Spice Muffins

1 box spice cake mix
1 cup water
1/2 cup applesauce
3 eggs
2 shredded zucchinis
1/2 cup raisins ( I left these out because I don't like raisins!)

1. In a large bowl, combine cake mix , water, oil and eggs; beat on low speed for 30 seconds. Beat on medium for 2 min. Stir in zucchini and raisins. Fill 1/2 - 2/3 way.

2. Bake at 350 degrees for 18-22 min or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 min before removing cupcakes to wire racks to cool completely.

Servings: 24

Wilton Class 1

Wednesday night I started my first Wilton cake decorating class at Hobby Lobby. So today I thought I'd try the project I'm supposed to be able to do in class by next week. The cake came out rounded on top so I had to level it...pretty easy. Then I had to make the icing...not bad. Then I had to ice the cake...I kept getting crumbs in it. I definitely need to practice this a lot more. Then I had to wait for it to dry so I could smooth it...one spot wouldn't dry and kept sticking and caused lots of trouble. Then I had to make the cupcake on top..which is ok...needs a little work, but not bad for the first try. I ended up running out of icing so I used canned icing for the beading around the bottom...which I really struggled with. So all in all it was an ok job. I did manage to give it to a neighbor so I can work on the other one I made and still need to decorate for book club on Monday night!

Heath & Chocolate

So today I tried something new. I made chocolate cupcakes...kind of cheated with a box mix. Then I made homemade frosting..which was difficult to get the consistency right. Then I couldn't decide what looked best. 1) Sprinkle the heath bits on top 2) Dip the entire top in the heath bits or 3) Edge the cupcake in the heath I'm taking them to an event tonight so we'll see how they go over.

The chocolate peanut butter cupcakes were a hit though! I never got to make the ones that look like they have french fries on top. I'm still looking for the right vegetable knife that will make the pound cake look wavy like a fry.

AND...my cake decorating class starts tomorrow night so we'll see if I can improve on all this experimenting!