Happy Birthday

It was my sister's birthday yesterday and for her cake she requested the oh so delicious oreo cheesecake cupcakes. This time with 100% of the cheesecake. I also added extra crushed oreo(They were on sale). The recipe says it makes 30 but I somehow got 42 out of it and they were a good size too. They're life was shorter lived then that of a fruit fly. Suffice to say that they are all gone.

In other news my giant cake was a hit. I stuck around the party until they cut the cake and they asked me to do the honors along side two local politicians and I'm pretty sure someone from the local newspaper took our picture. Would be cool to see. But back to the cake. Everyone told me how much they loved it and I was just glad it worked out. And I'm pretty certain I got a client out of it. Should be getting an order in two weeks. I'm loving this, just wish I had a bigger kitchen and better appliances. But who doesn't?

Next on my list will be my son's birthday tomorrow. We already had his birthday party last weekend where we had 'a very hungry caterpillar' theme I made plain vanilla cupcakes with thick vanilla buttercream from the primrose bakery cookbook. It was very good but really rich. Then I took several of them and sprinkled them with green and one red to make the caterpillar. But I have to make him something on his actual birthday. So maybe I'll make caramel cupcakes with a caramel buttercream. Oh wait I just got a brilliant idea, mocha caramel icing. Okay maybe not mocha for a two year old but its something to think about.

Cakes 'R' Us

Finally this week has come to an end. Sort of. In terms of my baking orders for this week, it's all done! I am typing this mostly one handed as I fend off my nearly two year old son, Fionn-pronounced Finn, from the keyboard as we watch Finding Nemo for the zillionth time. I have to find time to write any chance I get. Being a single mom, finding balance is a tad more complicated. But I'm not complaining.

I spent the day in hospital yesterday with my sister and nephew. My nephew had to have surgery to remove his tonsils, adenoids and have tubes put in his ears and having been there myself I was there for emotional support and to help her out. Dylan, my nephew is doing marvellously well for a 2 year old and he's still in the hospital but should be out sometime today if all is well. Kids are such troopers, and he is one tough little dude.

The dozen cupcakes for my friend turned out beautiful and I found these super cute cupcake liners that were red with white polka dots(I love polka dots!) so I decorated them with a white buttercream swirl and pipped some red dots all over.

So after getting home from hospital last night, putting Fionn to bed and having a small puppy training session from my neighbour, it was now time to decorate the giant cake. At 8pm I started making the buttercream in 2 one kilo batches and I was up until 1:30 am last night icing that bad boy. But it's done and they picked it up this morning and were very pleased.

I will head out to the anniversary party this afternoon to make sure it's a hit. I like to see people enjoying my cakes, don't you? The inside of the cake is half vanilla and half buttermilk chocolate, recipe taken from the Magnolia Bakery cook book which I got while ago and I love it. I'm planning on making their pumpkin cheese cake cupcakes with gingersnap crust for thanksgiving. It's my new tradition to make a new pumpkin desert every thanksgiving. Last year I made a Jamaican spice pumpkin pie which was sooo good. The difference was mainly that it had coconut milk, rum and a few extra spices in it but it made all the difference in the world and topped with some delicious whip cream(Starbucks style, since I make it exactly the same way- I use to work there and managed to grab an old whip cream maker before they threw it out since they hadjust received a shipment of new ones and this one is still in fine condition. Anyways all that to say that doe

sn't Starbucks have the best whip cream?).

I would like to take this evening to relax but I am babysitting my other sister's newborn baby girl, Zoe, while she and her fiance go to their good friend's wedding. I will be in close proximity and just a text away from calling mommy when baby girl wants a meal. My boobs are closed for business and are out of production, sorry baby girl.

Great friends & Chocolate cake

I have this great friend who is one of my best customers and all her love and support just warms my heart. I made her father's birthday cake several weeks ago and it got rave reviews from her whole family. It was a moist chocolate cake with a chocolate buttercream icing after which I added chocolate shavings all over and rosettes around the top. The happy birthday was written with pipping gelly.

This week is pretty busy with looking for employment in the baking field(hopefully), dealing with my son's asthma diagnosis(and he had his shots yesterday, poor kid), trying to focus more on my writing, and two orders for this week. The same friend as mentioned above needs a dozen cupcakes for Thursday and she's given me full artistic and flavour freedom and then I have a big cake order for 75 people needed for Saturday morning. It will be the biggest cake I've ever made and I will be making half of it vanilla and half of it chocolate and covered in a classic buttercream. It is for the 20th anniversary of Emilly Murphy Non-Profit Housing. Not sure my fridge is big enough to fit everything in it! So now its up to me to balance and organize my time and keep on schedule and everything will be fine! I hope.

Officially a baker?

So I recently finished my program at Algonquin college for Baking and Pastry Arts which is partly why I haven't updated in a while. School, an almost 2 year old and a new puppy will keep you very busy, as I have learned. But anyways so now that I am done I guess that makes me an official baker? As it is I'm looking for a baking gig but in the meantime I'm still doing a few cake orders on the side. I'm waiting on my business cards and I'm really excited to see how they turn out. I'd like to post a few pictures of things that I made during school, some good, some great and some not so good at all but hey it's all part of the learning process right? The first of which is the wedding cake I decorated. We used a dummy cake for the tiers, covered them with fondant and decorated using royal icing. I had fun with this and for my first wedding cake, I think it turned out more then okay.

Vegan Raspberry Scones anyone?

So I'm not entirely sure that they are vegan but I got the recipe from the cookbook 'Babycakes', from the vegan bakery in New York so I assume they are. I, on the other hand, am not vegan but I like to try out new things. And they are fabulous. I had to run to the grocery store with my son to find spelt flour, coconut oil and agave nectar, for which I didn't have in my pantry, and that was interesting. I had never heard of agave nectar before and therefor had no clue what I was looking for. I searched the jam isle, baking isle, juice isle and finally gave up and went back to the health food section to look around and then I found it right where I started! So at 10:30pm I started making these scones because I wanted to send some out to my brother in Calgary(my mom was flying out the next morning), so I wanted them ready for take off. I doubled the recipe because they only made 8 and I wanted enough to give to the rest of my family. they said to bake for 14 minutes, rotating half way, but I found that they were still too soft in the middle so I left them in for another couple of minutes. Next times I might leave them in a bit longer because they were still a bit soft but otherwise delicious!

I'm not sure if giving out the recipe would be some sort of copy write issue so for the time being I won't. But so far, the scones are the first recipe I try, this book is very good. Here's a link to their website if anyone is interested.

http://www.babycakesnyc.com/books.html

Peanut Butter Cupcakes with Buttercream icing

This past Wednesday the people in my college program put on a bake sale and I decided to make one-bowl chocolate cupcakes but then realized I didn't have enough cocoa powder so I had to take a look in my cupboards and take inventory of what I had. I had lots of peanut butter. So peanut butter cupcakes it was. And OH MY GOD they were awesome. They came out crispy on the outside and moist and tender inside. Soooo good. And to top those off I thought; "What goes best with peanut butter? CHOCOLATE!"

I made a chocolate buttercream from another cupcake recipe book I had and it turned out a perfect match. The buttercream was very light and fluffy but lots of butter. Like a heart attack in a bite.

And so they were a hit with the public AND my family. Although one of my nephews is not a cake person (what kind of one year old doesn't like cake?) and he refused it. You don't know what you're missing kid.

-F

Martha Stewart Cupcakes!

I recently purchased the new Martha Stewart cupcake book and I am slowly making my way through trying to make every cupcake in her book, in no particular order.

I started by making the Oreo cheesecake cupcake. It is super delicious. I only put in half of the asked amount of cream cheese(only because I didn't buy enough and didn't feel like going back out to get some) I felt that they turned out just fine except that they probably would have been a bit firmer had I had the whole amount of cream cheese in them. Besides just the name sounds delicious, Oreo cheesecake cupcakes! And it helps that there's an individual Oreo on the bottom of each cupcake as a sort of crust but it also makes it look very nice.

So I passed them around to some friends of mine to be tested and they were a big hit. A nice refreshing cupcake for the summer time. I would consider this cupcake to be a big success. And I've already had requests to make it again!

So Oreo cheesecake cupcakes, it's a good thing! ;)