Peanut Butter and Chocolate cookies

Peanut butter and chocolate make up the Double Trouble cookie. 

 

Proposal Cupcake

A customer made an order for a cupcake to place an engagement ring on for his proposal. She said Yes.

Chuggington Train Cake

Koko the Chuggington Train for a two-year old's birthday!

Thanksgiving Apple Pie

Nothing beats homemade apple pie for Thanksgiving!

A Bowling Birthday

A bowling cake made from homemade fondant for a 6th Birthday.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes

Our Double Trouble Cupcake
Peanut butter and chocolate= perfect combination

Peanut butter frosting recipe:
1/2 cup butter (room temperature)
1 cup creamy peanut butter
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
Reeses' peanut butter cups (optional)

1. Beat butter and peanut butter in large bowl, until it is light and fluffy.
2. Beat in 2 cups of the powdered sugar.
3. Mix in half of the whipping cream.
4. Beat in the remaining 2 cups of powdered sugar.
5. Add more cream if necessary to reach the right consistency.

Note: Be careful not to over-beat the peanut butter and butter mixture.  It's tempting to keep beating to achieve a smooth consistency, but you will need to add some powdered sugar to reach the consistency that you're looking for. It is important that the butter is at room temperature.

This recipe is good for 1 dozen cupcakes, or a double layer 9-inch cake.
We doubled the recipe for 2 dozen cupcakes and it was really creamy and delicious!

Happy Halloween!

Spice Cupcakes and Pumpkin Cupcakes with a white creamy frosting.  The figures were made from homemade fondant. They were scary good.

Boozy Mini Cupcakes

Make work a little more interesting and delicious!

Chocolate cupcake with whiskey buttercream (on left)

Lemon cupcake with Raspberry Chambord frosting (on right)

Moccachino cupcake for people who cannot hold their liquor (behind)

World Series 2012- SF Giants

We made it to the World Series, so let's eat cake! The Baseball Hat replica cake is an 8-inch four layer Spice cake. We found that making two cakes, splitting both, and frosting the four layers makes a good sized cake for a hat. We wanted the cake to be a realistic size.  Covering an 8-inch cake is not too difficult, however, covering a larger cake such as the jersey cake is a little more tricky and requires two people. For the Jersey replica cake, we made a double layer 13x9 Chocolate cake. We made an extra cake so we could cut out the sleeves. We made fondant and rolled it out smooth. We always make our fondant; store-bought fondant does not taste very good and making your own is more cost-effective. To see our fondant recipe, check out our Cat Cake post on October 15th. We placed one large piece of fondant to cover half of the cake, and another to cover the other half. This made it easier working with two pieces rather than one large piece that can easily rip. Also, we think it made a cool look as though it is a button-up jersey. Let's Go Giants!!

Pumpkin Patch Birthday

We made pumpkin cupcakes for a 1st Birthday.  Two flavors: chocolate cupcakes with a chocolate ganache and pumpkin chocolate chip cupcakes. The grass was made with a white creamy buttercream and the pumpkins were made from homemade fondant. Happy Pumpkin Picking!

Halloween Candy Cake

What could be better than loading chocolate cake with an awesome variety of candy bars? Ana and I cannot think of anything better. Chocolate cake with a chocolate buttercream and topped off with Kit Kat bars, Reese's cups, and Reese's Pieces.

Chocolate Chip Mini Cheesecakes

My favorite dessert are mini cheesecakes; no competition. They're always delicious.  I've been using the Betty Crocker Company Cheesecake recipe (you can find it in the 70's Betty Crocker cookbook) for years and it's never failed.  I modified the recipe slightly so that it works for mini cheesecakes.  The original recipe calls for a fruit glaze.  I personally like a whip topping. 

Company Cheesecake 
Base: 
1 1/4 c graham cracker crumbs (or 1 1/4 cup finely crushed whole wheat flake cereal), 
2 T sugar, 
3 T margarine or butter melted 

Filling: 
2 pk (8 oz) plus 1 pk (3 oz) cream cheese softened, 
1 c sugar, 
2 t gated lemon peel, 
1/4 t vanilla, 
3 eggs 

Directions: 
1) Heat oven to 300. Mix cracker crumbs 2 tablespoons sugar and the butter. Press in bottom of 9 inch springform pan. Bake 5 minutes: cool. 
2) Heat oven to 350. Beat cream cheese in large mixer bowl. Add 1 cup sugar gradually, beating until fluffy. Add lemon peel and vanilla. Beat in 1 egg at a time. Pour over crumb mixture. 
3) Bake until center is firm, about 1 hour. Cool to room temperature. Refrigerate at least 3 hours but no longer than 10 days. Loosen edge of each mini cheesecake with knife before removing side of pan. 20 mini cheesecake servings.

We added about half a bag of mini chocolate chips to the batter to yield amazing chocolate chip mini cheesecakes. 

Let's go Giants!

Let's make it to the 2012 World Series!

Cat Cake

For cat lovers:
A chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream. The cat was made with homemade fondant.

Fondant recipe:

3 cups of mini marshmallows

1/2 oz. white baking chocolate

1 tbsp butter (cut up)

1 1/2 tsp milk

1 tsp clear vanilla

3 cups powdered sugar

1. Combine marshmallows, white chocolate, butter, and milk in microwave-safe bowl.

2. Microwave on high power for one minute, stirring occasionally.

3. Stir vanilla into marshmallow mixture. Add 1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar.

4. Stir with wooden spoon until the mixture becomes sticky.

5. Sift some of the remaining 1/2 pound  of sugar onto a smooth work surface and add as much of the remaining sugar as the mixture will take.

6. Knead the fondant, adding a little more sugar if necessary, to form a smooth pliable mass. Rub the vegetable shortening on your thumbs and knead it into the fondant. 

7. Wrap the fondant in plastic wrap and place it in a tightly sealed container to prevent it from drying out. If the fondant dries out it can be revived by microwaving it for a few seconds and kneading it back to life.

Swimmer Cupcakes

Swimathon cupcakes for an annual benefit for pediatric patients in honor of Korrine Croghan.  

Beer Cupcakes

Perfect dessert for Oktoberfest and game day.  Blue Moon Cupcakes. Vanilla cupcakes infused with Blue Moon Belgian Wheat Ale with a beer jelly filling and topped with a frothy white frosting.  Because of the beer and the jelly filling, the cake was so moist. Delicious. We used Miss Make's Frothy White Frosting:

Frothy White Frosting

2 egg whites, room temperature

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp orange juice

1 c sugar

1/4 tsp cream of tartar

1/3 c water

Vanilla Bean Latte Cupcakes

A vanilla cupcake with espresso cream filling and a vanilla espresso buttercream. This cupcake is for Starbucks' addicts.

Nacho Libre Cake

Nacho Libre is one of the funniest movies ever.  If you have not seen it, go see it.  A chocolate cake with a creamy white chocolate buttercream and topped off with Nacho.
"Don't you want a little taste of the glory? See what it tastes like?"

Caramel, Lemon and Whiskey

For a 40th milestone birthday we made caramel, lemon and whiskey cupcakes!
The Caramel cupcake consists of a chocolate cake with a caramel filling, caramel frosting, and homemade caramel topping.  The Whiskey cupcake consists of a chocolate cake with a whiskey chocolate filling and whiskey buttercream (my favorite!).  The Lemon cupcake consists of a lemon cake with a lemon curd filling, light whip cream topping, and lemon peel topping.

A 1st Birthday

 The cutest little Portuguese girl just turned one so we made her butterfly and flower cupcakes.  All little kids like chocolate, right? A chocolate cupcake with a chocolate ganache filling and creamy white buttercream.  Decorations are made from homemade fondant of course.

Neapolitan, Triple Chocolate, Rolo, and Heath Toffee

Note: when making multiple flavors of cupcake, there is the likelihood that you will end up eating one of each. We made four types of cupcakes for a party: Neapolitan, Rolo, Triple Chocolate, and Heath Toffee cupcakes. The Neapolitan cupcakes consisted of a marble cake with fresh strawberry frosting. We topped them off with a strawberry and chocolate pretzel.  The Triple Chocolate cupcake is for serious chocolate lovers. It consists of a chocolate cake with a chocolate ganache, chocolate frosting, and topped with a chocolate pretzel.  The Heath Toffee mini cupcakes are a vanilla cake with Heath Toffee bits, chocolate frosting, and Ghiradelli milk chocolate candy.

Rolo Cupcakes
A chocolate cupcake with a baked Rolo center, caramel frosting, chocolate ganache and Rolo topping.

• Chocolate cake
  1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup milk
• 
  

Caramel frosting

4 sticks unsalted butter
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup caramel syrup
1 1/2 pounds confectioners’ sugar

Chocolate ganache
4 oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped into very small pieces
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons honey 
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
2 teaspoons vanilla

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Rolo Cupcakes

A chocolate cupcake with a rolo inside, chocolate ganache, and caramel frosting.  We didn't think there was enough chocolate so there's a rolo on top.

Shark Cake

It may have been slightly cruel to make this cake for a person who loves sharks but has an ironic fear of the ocean. A funfetti cake from scratch with a white buttercream frosting.  The ocean creatures are made from homemade fondant.

Josh being circled by sharks