It's Doughnut Day!

Today is National Doughnut Day! At least two of your local doughnut shops are giving away free doughnuts today, and I had every intention of getting one. But, life gets in the way...

I was THIS close to making a 30 min trip to get one measly free doughnut when I remembered my latest bookstore bargain table find: Snack Cakes for Dummies. I'm no dummy, but it's a nifty little book, especially for $3.99. And just as I was headed out the door to snag my freebie, I remembered that this book had an entire chapter on doughnuts.

A totally impromptu experiment. I wanted to make Devil's Food Doughnuts, but....no cocoa powder (No idea how that happened. I always have cocoa powder on the shelf). So I turned the page, and there were buttermilk doughnuts. Luckily, they required the same amount of flour (I only had half of the amount needed of that. Note to self: go grocery shopping) that I had already measured out, and proceeded to make half a batch of buttermilk doughnut holes. Actually, sour cream doughnut holes, because I didn't have any buttermilk, and the 2% was expired.

Whipped up a batch of doughnut ...dough? batter? stuff? and fried it up (BTW, used up the last of the canola oil, too).

Some got tossed in powdered sugar, and for the rest, I whipped up an impromptu lemon glaze. I may not have flour or milk, but do actually have 6 lbs. of confectioner's sugar, and that is no exaggeration!


At first bite, I didn't feel too impressed. They definitely weren't Krispy Kreme, but they weren't the frosted bread of Dunkin' Donuts, either. Not too bad, as you can see by the nearly empty plate below:

Enjoy the doughnuts. I'm off to the grocery store.

Playing Catch Up

Sorry for not posting more regularly. The spring semester was busy, to say the least. Because we obviously had to eat, I made things, but somehow never got around to posting.

So, here's a quick "Semester in Review" of things I've made lately.

Birthday cake for a neighbor:



Barbecue chicken braid:

Homemade buttercream fondant on a cookie:

Deep dish pizza:

Trying out a new cake recipe as cupcakes:

Happy caking!

DANG, GINA!

Do you remember one of Martin Lawrence's catchphrases: "DANG, GINA!"? Well, after trying this Memphis Mud Pie reipe, that's all I could say. Especially since it came from Gina Neely of Down Hone with the Neely's. I'm so glad the semester is over...I haven't gotten to watch them in forever.

This pie has it all: Oreo crust, chocolate brownie like filling, nuts, whipped cream, and a scoop of ice cream made it even better! Enjoy!!!

Pita Pita Pita!

See those? Those are homemade pita pockets, fresh from the oven. I made them using a recipe from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. This has got to be my new favorite cookbook (or book). Everything tastes great. Though I wish they'd mentioned the use of vital wheat gluten in this book. I had to go digging in their second book, Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day, to grab that little nugget. I'll save that for another post.



I've been on a Mediterranean kick lately, and wanted to create the yumminess without the expense of going out. Artisan Bread and Cooking Light to the rescue. Homemade pita stuffed with spicy chicken shawarma, bhaba ghanouj and tabbouleh. I made the pita, The Artist made the chicken shawarma.

It's not cake, but it was good!

Happy Easter

No Easter treats for us this weekend, but I did make a quick red velvet cake for dear friends in town for a mini vacay!

We forgot to take pictures before it was cut!

Enjoy the day with your friends and family.

Baker's Bread Basket

Have you ever had the pleasure of eating a slice of fresh, home baked bread? Have you ever thought about making it yourself? Probably not...the measuring, sifting, kneading, rising, doubling, punching...that's a lot of work.

Well, that's all about to change. In Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day, a physician/home cook pairs up with a pastry chef to create a volume of easy peasy bread recipes that can be whipped up in five minutes, and stored in the fridge for two weeks. With minimal prep and only a little planning, you can have fresh baked bread!

I'd been waiting for this book from the library, and it became available just in time for Spring Break!

My first experiment was with the classic, simple, and straight forward Boule. We planned to have homemade pizza for dinner on Friday, and I thought this would be a good way to test the dough. Of course, I had to "test" it before pizza night. So, I grabbed a glob of dough, thinned it out, and threw it in a frying pan -- my version of flat bread.

IT WAS GOOD! Alright, we're on to something. Pizza time.



Oops. Don't try to be a professional baker at home unless you have professional tools. I tried to follow their directions and heat the heat the oven to 550, sprinkle cornmeal on the pizza stone (I used the back of a cookie sheet), then transfer the dough to the extremely hot pizza stone. Don't try this if you don't have a pizza peel, or your dough has holes in it.

My dough wrinkled as I was laying it out, and it became a funky, twisted branched dough blob. But, I baked it anyway, and it was great. It would have made the perfect pizza crust...chewy, crispy...Sigh. But never fear, dinner was still a few hours away, so I whipped up a batch of Olive Oil Dough. It sounded more pizza worthy, AND IT WAS!


I also made Buttermilk Cinnamon Raisin Bread. Maybe I'm too used to commercially produced bread, this looked like a loaf of ciabatta. Don't get me wrong. I looove ciabatta. But I was expecting a big fluffy loaf of bread.
However, don't let the outside fool ya. This bread was awesome -- way better than the dry, fluffy, mashable stuff from the grocery store.

Coming Soon!

Hi all,

Going away for the weekend, but when I come back, I've got plans...As it will be Spring Break, I'll have time to try some things: French toast cupcakes, 5 minute Artisan bread, cake balls, and cookies for a friend! STAY TUNED.....

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy V-day! I hope you got to spend today with the one you love. If you're unattached: love yourself, and live it up.

The Artist has got to be the BEST husband ever. We usually don't have a big whoop to do on Valentine's Day. We met on FEbruary 7th, so usually celebrate our love sometime in between. But this year we celebrated V-day on V-day, and he cooked for me! He does cook from time to time, but today, he went all out!

Teriyaki Chicken Wings....

Shrimp Kebabs....

Rib-eye Steaks....

Garlic Mashed Potatoes...

and Broccoli... (we needed something green)

And it was all absolutely delicious. Completely from scratch (he even roasted garlic). With no help from me. I was quite impressed.

But, what is Valentine's Day without a little bit of chocolate? Or a few strawberries? OK,...a lot of chocolate. And Nutella. And strawberries. And almonds.

I introduce to you my favorite new cake: Chocolate with Nutella Buttercream!!! (Sorry, red velvet) Coated in sliced almonds, and topped with the biggest strawberries I've ever seen (This is only a 6" round cake, BTW)




They were so big, I couldn't help but dip them in chocolate too!

Who Needs Flowers?

Happy Valentine's Day!!!


I just had to show off these super cute, super easy cookie creations! Yesterday, I had a cookie demo at Michael's. Valentine's cookies was the theme, and to drum up business for future classes, I decided to feature a cookie blossom. What, you ask, is a cookie blossom? Well, keep reading....

First, there are sugar cookies baked onto sticks...

Naked cookies aren't exactly blog worthy, sooo....we had to get all dressed up. CUTE.

Wrapped and ready to go...

Tucked into a cute V-Day bucket.

If you're in the Atlanta area and want to learn how to make these yourself, I will be holding a two session cookie blossom class in late March. Send an email (cakescapade@gmail.com) to get on the mailing list for more details.

Wow...it's been awhile

WOW. Well, a belated Happy New Year to everyone! I just realized today that I haven't posted in a while. I didn't realize that I hadn't posted since Thanksgiving. I haven't had a whole lot of time, but here a few photos to get you up to date:

Another shot of Thanksgiving's Red Vevlvet Cake, featuring a basketweave design on top.


And, making their debut appearance on my blog.....(drumroll, please).... COOKIES! Even better, CHRISTMAS Cookies. I made these for a Wilton Cookie Exchange Demo. My first time really doing color flow work, but I think they were quite cute. If you're into cute cookies, check out my new fave sweets blog: Bakeat350.

Here's another rendition of the Oreo Cookies and Cream Cake. This is the first cake (or first anything, actually) that I ever made for my inlaws. It was my contribution to the New Year's Eve festivities. After The Artist, his brother and his dad got to it, half was gone before anyone else even saw it! I also made a chocolate cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting to take to The Artist's Grandma's house for New Year's Day. She gave everyone a chance to get a slice. BUT, after a polite amount of time had passed, she hid what was left in the back of the fridge! Must have been good..hee hee.

That's it for now, but I'll be back soon. Valentine's cookies are in the oven as I type! Stay tuned.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Nope. No pictures of turkey over here. What I've got is better! RED VELVET CAKE!!!

Things are a little slow...

It's been awhile since I posted anything, which means it's been awhile since I've made anything worthy of a blog post. I'll be back soon! I promise!

Unless you want blogs on cooking. I HAVE been cooking, just not baking. How about lasagna? It's baked...

Aloha!

Not much to say about this cake...other than I LOVE the way it turned out.

For the finale cake of the Wilton Fondant and Gumpaste Course, I decided to break away from the book and do something different. Whenever I saw the fantasy flowers, I thought they were very tropical feeling, and used that as inspiration for the final cake. Let me know what you think.

Happy Birthday, Baby!

The Artist's birthday was this week, so of course, I baked him a cake. I came across a recipe a few weeks ago for a Cookies and Creme cake. I described it to him as a chocolate overload, and of course, the chocoholic that he is, he requested it. He even went so far as to ask for cream cheese frosting instead of chocolate on the outside. A bit extreme, but your birthday only comes once a year, right?

I was agreeable to making it because it's based on my usual chocolate cake recipe -- Hershey's Perfect Chocolate Cake. It really is perfect, and the recipe is so simple! For a twist, Oreo cookies are baked into each layer of cake. Then, the cake is filled with an absolutely delicious cookies and cream filling -- homemade whipped cream folded with Oreo crumbs. And, at the Artist's request, the whole thing was frosted in cream cheese frosting, topped with a hearty dollop of the cookies and cream filling, then garnished with more cookies and cookie crumbs.

Delish! The filling tasted just like cookies n' creme ice cream but without the brain freeze. My dear hubby LOVED it. I knew he would, because, it's CHOCOLATE!!!

(For future reference, I would leave out the cookies baked into the layers. They tasted a bit scorched.)

My first tiered cake

Yay! I've finished my first tiered cake and the third course in the Wilton series. The bottom tier was the salvaged brown sugar caramel cake, and the top tier was chocolate cake with Nutella buttercream frosting. YUM!

I was really pleased with the way the cake turned out. I especially like the blend of colors I chose for the fondant flowers. I didn't particularly care for the ruffle, but I knew that before I put it on there. I just didn't have time to think up anything better prior to class, so went with the book's project idea.

Boy, do I have a story to tell...

You may have already guessed that I like to tinker in the kitchen. I'm always on the hunt for new recipes, and on occasion, I make them up. What you may or may not know is that I am, have always been, and will always be a Southern Girl. There's nothing like sweet tea, southern hospitality, and the word "ya'll". That being said, there is a great food magazine called Taste of the South that publishes nothing but good, old-fashioned fattening recipes that remind me of my childhood. Each month, in one section, they publish several variations of the same recipe, the most recently intriguing issue being on caramel cake. Despite being southern, I've never had caramel cake, but the cover photo looked great, and cooked frostings are always interesting.
So, let me tell you about my attempt to make the Brown Sugar Cake with Cooked Caramel Frosting:

First of all, I was going to use this cake as the bottom tier of my cake for class. I also planned to pawn it off on my classmates so we didn't have to eat it all.
After a trip to the store to get brown sugar for the cake, and another to get butter for the frosting, I was all set. I baked the cake the night before and planned to frost the cake and cover it in fondant.

I should have known something was up when I had to keep running out to the store. I also should have known this frosting was problematic when I saw the magazine had added a step by step video tutorial for the frosting recipe -- that usually indicates it's kinda hard to do.

The recipe instructs you to caramelize sugar in a saucepan while bringing butter, sugar and evaporated milk to a boil in another pot. Both pans are to be whisked continuously, and should reach their magical moments of completion at the same time. This was the biggest indicator of potential problems, especially since we only have one whisk. I started whisking on my right and stirring/melting sugar on my left. Everything seemed to be going well. So, working quickly, as the directions said to do, I began putting the frosting on the cake, expecting it to turn into a solid mass at any minute. (I have another very easy cooked chocolate frosting that does just that.) It was really runny, but, I thought it was still pretty hot. I let it sit for a bit and stalactites of caramel are hanging from cake. At this point, the frosting does start to cool and thicken, but by no means is it "set". Not what I had in mind. Luckily, I had the forethought to place waxed paper under the cake. I finished glazing the cake and was not impressed. Lucky for me, I'd purchased a can of cream cheese frosting for back-up. After putting the cake in the fridge, the caramel had turned into a chewy, gooey, tasty consistency. Not "frosting", exactly, but it was on the cake. I thought the layer was pretty thin, so I did put the cream cheese frosting on top. Oh well, it was being covered in fondant anyway.

In case you were wondering, boiling baking soda and water completely and easily removes caramel and melted sugar from pots, pans, whisks, spoons, and anyting else you may be tempted to throw away.

While my frosting did not turn out, it did make a nice topping for microwave popcorn!

I'll post the results of the completed cake tomorrow.

Fondant!

For the month of August, I've been taking Wilton Course 3: Fondant and Tiered Cakes. I was excited to work with fondant, thinking about all of the amazing creations seen on shows like Ace of Cakes or Food Network Challenge.

Just in case you don't know, fondant is a sugar based clay (for lack of a better descriptor) used to cover cakes and give a nice clean finish. It can be rolled out flat, or molded into figures and flowers.

In the second week of cake class, we covered out first cake in fondant. The lesson was a square cake decorated to look like a present. Overall, for a first attempt, I think it turned out pretty good. There are a few details that I didn't have time to finish because the people in my class are amazingly slow! For tonight's class, the final lesson, I'm winging it and not going step by step with the class. I know already that they're going to come with cakes un-iced, or not covered in fondant and hold up the show. I did not prepare 50 fondant flowers ahead of time to not put them on the cake!

After all of the fuss the cake artists on TV make about non-cooperative fondant, I expected the worst. It wasn't that bad at all, except for smoothing the corners. And with patience, that too didn't turn out bad at all. If you've ever rolled out pie crust or played with Play-Do, you can do fondant.

Teaser: the finale cake is a "wedding" cake with fondant flowers cascading down the side.

Dummy Cakes

So obviously, I can't bake a cake every time I want to practice decorating. I decided I would purchase a couple of cake dummies to use whenever the mood strikes.

Cake dummies are basically styrofoam pieces cut to standard cake sizes. I have an 8" square, 8" round, and a 6" round.

Here are a few of my latest creations. I was particularly happy with the floral brush embroidery, and the feet on the baby shower cake (too cute!).

My Baking/Cooking To-Do List

I haven't baked anything except some pumpkin muffins since I finished the second Wilton course. I'm currently taking the third course, which has two cakes. Until then, I have been mentally compiling a list of treats to make when I have an occasion to make them....The Artist and I would be round balls of chocolate, otherwise.

Things I'd like to make:
Sweets
Cake Pops (ala Bakerella)
Mini Oreo Cheesecakes (ala Martha Stewart Cupcakes Book)
Chocolate Oreo Cake
Chocolate Quinoa Waffles
Super Hero/Comic book themed birthday cake for The Artist (may be replaced by the Chocolate Oreo Cake)

As the summer winds down this month, so too, do my cake classes. However, I'm always cooking up something or another, so I may highlight some favorite dinners as well.

Savories
Spicy Shrimp and Chorizo Skewers
Just about anything from TasteSpotting.com (This site is eyecandy for the stomach!)
Indian food
Spanakopita
Huli Huli Chicken

Basket Case...I mean Cake

On Tuesday, I finished Wilton Course II. The finale cake features a basket weave design and is overflowing with a lush bouquet of royal icing flowers.


The cake is 1-2-3-4 cake (with lemon extract instead of almond) featured on the back of the Swan's Down Cake Flour box, with Wilton's lemon filling, and lemon cream cheese frosting. I was getting tired of the sticky sweet Class Buttercream, so decided to try this recipe for Crusting Cream Cheese Frosting. Perfect!


The course II student kit comes with two oval pans for baking the final cake. The pans are quite small, which meant.....cupcakes!

The Artist couldn't wait to be my guinea pig and cupcake hand model. He definitely enjoyed the cake...I think he's been eating it for breakfast.

Cupcakes!

I love to tinker in the kitchen, but not with lots of tiny, individual items...like cupcakes, or even cookies. However, I was meeting up with an old friend for lunch, and thought it would be nice to bring her some cupcakes. And the day before we went out, my husband, The Artist, wanted a cupcake from Whole Foods. He said I made him want one with all my recent cake/cupcake blog reading. (Imagine, he blames his loving wife for his uncontrollable sweet tooth!) So, it was the perfect situation to kill two birds with one stone.

And, what made it even better was that I found a chocolate cake recipe (Midnight Chocolate Cake ala myrecipes.com) that only made one layer -- perfect for a dozen or so cupcakes. The recipe actually made a dozen plus a ramekins worth.

For The Artist, the ultimate chocoholic, I made half a dozen chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream. As you can see, it didn't take long for him to jump into the cupcakes.


For my friend, she got a half dozen variety pack. She was a guinea pig of sorts because I had a couple of frosting ideas I wanted to try out. She got 2 Blooming Bouquet cupcakes, 2 Cabbage Patch Kid cupcakes (because she's preggo), and 2 chocolate/chocolate cupcakes. The Cabbage Patch Kids need some work, but I have an idea to fix their faces for the next go round!!!



Cupcakes.....I think I like making them, after all. And I have to make more because I only got one!

Practice Makes Perfect...If You Have a Plan

Practice makes perfect. Or so I've been told. At any rate, I was itching to make a pretty cake with my new frosting skills. But, we really didn't need the cake around the house. I toyed with buying a cake dummy, but thought that would be a waste of frosting. I toyed with making cupcakes, but that would leave 18 indidual little cakes to be devoured.

.....So, I compromised by baking the cake in a loaf pan, and cutting it in half to make two separate mini cakes. Two canvases for the effort of one! Beyond that, I didn't have a decorating plan...and, it showed in my finished pieces.

The first cake, with the polka dot ribbon was supposed to be decorated with pink dots. However, I will definitely need some sort of stencil or marking guide to do this in the future. Since the dots weren't working, I switched to a pink ribbon type swirl, accented with dots.

Then, I wanted to practice my roses, but the rest of my tiny cake was a blank canvas. It would have made a cute individual birthday cake. But, alas, no birthdays, though "LOVE" is always in the air.

Lessons learned from this experiment:

1) Have a plan. Wandering all willy-nilly with the frosting is not going to work.

2) Frosting square cakes neatly is hard. (Will be looking for a YouTube video on the topic)

3) Make sure you have an abundance of frosting (see lesson 1).

4) Certain frosting consistencies are recommended for certain applications for a reason.

5) Using milk instead of water in a cake mix improves the cake mix taste and texture. Not as good as homemade, but better than straight box mix.

Wilton Course I Finale Cake

Tonight was the final session of the Wilton Course I. From my practice roses, I thought the cake was going to look homemade. But, that's what I get for trying to read ahead and make them without the teacher demonstrating. (That IS what I paid for, right?) So, after watching the demonstration, I saw exactly what I'd been doing wrong, and voila! Wonderful buttercream roses!

Here is the final cake:

Not that we were eating grocery store cakes before, but definitely not from this point on! I'm not ready to make wedding cakes or anything, but I think I can outdo the folks at the local grocery store.

Course 2 starts next week, and I'm definitely excited. I'm not sold on that finale cake design with the basket and the birds and what not, but excited none the less. See ya next week.