Cbocolate, chocolate, chocolate!

Imagine my eagerness to meet a client's challenge!

Tired of "Death by Chocolate" cakes- I was asked to make a chocolate cake that I would love to eat. Hmmm, moist dark chocolate cake with sour cream, melted chocolate and cocoa. Dark chocolate ganache with a blend of 60% cocoa bittersweet chocolate and semi sweet with a touch of espresso, vanilla extract and Godiva liqueur. Dark chocolate mousse ( because who does not love whipped cream!?) with the same blend of chocolates. Yet this was not the "classic" chocolate mousse...whipped cream folded with dark chocolate custard.

Egg yolks cooked with light cream and whole milk, poured over the chocolate blend, then gently folded into the whipped cream, YUM!!!

Layers of cake with raspberry puree, ganache, mousse...that's my idea of the perfect chocolate cake! AND with the leftover ganache? Truffles, of course, rolled into Ghiradelli cocoa, till I can order more Perignotti cocoa...

Delightful, tasty, heavenly. I would like to make individual cakes the next time around, though I do love to see the tall slice filled with all those scrumptious layers!

Still baking...

My husband's birthday is on Christmas Eve. We try very hard to keep it separate from the Holidays, and this year it just seemed to merge into all the activities. My in laws asked if JujyCakes would bake his cake this year!

The birthday cake is usually a spice cake, and in keeping with the theme made this!
It's a 8 inch by 6 layer cocoa spice cake with pecan creme filling and brown sugar meringue buttercream with DeRuyter dark chocolate sprinkles and Eclat Reserve blend mendiants.
I tweaked a recipe and added Ghiradelli cocoa, cinnamon, ginger and a smidgen of nutmeg. The cake is moist and has a good crumb texture, and since I love spiced hot chocolate, thought the chocolate would be a great addition to all the cake flavors.

Oh, those mendiants! Eclat Chocolates in one of my favorite chocolatiers, that is close to home. It is artisanal chocolate at its best.

"I love the story behind mendiants: the word means "beggar" in French, and is related to mendicants -  religious orders that relied on charity, or begging, for income. Mendicant orders originated in Europe in the Middle Ages; it is from there that the classic image grew of the poor friar who has given away all his earthly possessions and lives off the charity of the faithful. The original chocolate mendiants had as their toppings four fruits and nuts meant to symbolize the colors of the robes of the four major mendicant orders of the Roman Catholic Church: almonds (Carmelites), hazelnuts (Augustins), dried figs (Franciscans), and raisins (Dominicans).
Further fascinating information: those four fruits and nuts are part of the 13 Desserts of Christmas, part of the Christmas tradition in Provence. At the end of the big Christmas dinner, thirteen sweets representing Christ and his 12 apostles, are served to finish off the meal. Honestly, 13 Desserts sounds a lot more appealing than the 12 Days of Christmas! The thirteen sweets can vary but usually include the four aforementioned fruits and nuts, dates, nougat, and more recently, a Yule log. (It's delightful the delicious information you dig up while doing research for a book on candy!)"

( thank you, Anita Chu @ http://dessertfirst.typepad.com ) 

Holiday Bake a palooza time!

WOW! I woke up on Wednesday morning at 5am and went to bed on Thursday at 3am. I was elbows deep in flour, all kinds of flour, chocolate and lemons...I had baking elves who assisted in cutting marshmallows, zesting and juicing lemons and keeping up with all the dishes- so I could keep going with all the production. Thank you to the elves!


I "upgraded" the 2 layer cake orders from 4 layers to 6 layers with a moist lemon cream cheese pound cake with Meyer lemon curd and lemon meringue buttercream. Since they were "blank" canvas, I colored the butter cookie dough and made holly leaves, and used raspberries. I love lemons and raspberries together. 

Also made dozens of cupcakes, carrot, chocolate, golden, coconut, brownies and several fillings, pecan, coconut rum, lemon curd! It takes longer to make all the components then the final assembly AND there is a limited amount of what you can do in advance. There are several cupcake bakeries that are making the "blanks" in advance, putting them in the freezer and pulling them out to frost right before the delivery date! AARGH, that is not baking to order! and I question the "freshness" and texture of the cakes.

Everything was picked up by 11am today, and now it's time for napping and relaxing,
then it's time to do some last minute gift wrapping of stocking stuffers and waiting for Santa!
Hope that everyone's Holiday is filled with magic, joy, hugs and something sweet.
Happy Christmas!

SNOW, I want to wash my face and hands in SNOW!

Well, well, well...

Take a look at what happened here yesterday! It just kept on snowing and who knows when it ended but WOWIE, we now have a white Christmas this year!

Just wanted to share the scenery, and I'm off and back to baking- the oven is beeping at me, so TTFN.

I've been busy...

What a week this has been!

I had an unplanned trip to the ER, after 8 hours of testing- was asked what plans I had for the weekend, and was wisked upstairs to the OR for an emergency appendectomy.
Getting back into the swing of things has been challenging. Had an interview this week, and baking up a storm for the 3 cakes that you see, those were due on Wednesday. More baking for Thursday, since Thursday was a full day with a funeral and then Friday- working all day in a nearby studio and having FUN!

My spirit is willing, my body, well, that's another story. Here's to more rapid healing! Hard to believe that Christmas is 13 days from now. So much to do and limited time!

I promise to be better about writing, sorry for the stretch of time.
More baking adventures coming soon!!!

Generation 2 for Holiday Tree Cupcakes, yes, please.

Okay, welcome to G2 of the Holiday Tree cupcakes. I was not really happy with G1, it was too plain, not enough whimsy and design. The cake got a bit more Grand Marnier and orange extract. The cake is now filled with Grand Marnier custard with a bit of orange zest + the meringue buttercream has Godiva liqueur. I used a larger tip for piping so the mound looks cleaner and more controlled but overly so. The biggest change was in the cookie, added swags with royal icing + a yellow star as the topper. I think they look better and taste great, DELISH, as my husband said as he scarfed his up as a late night snack. 

What do you think?

Thanks again to Cupcakes Take the Cake!

Many thanks again to the folks at Cupcakes Take the Cake for spotlighting my baking again. Imagine my surprise to see all the uploaded photos of all my "projects" that I was working on yesterday! It's crunch time for me to get a "tweaked" Holiday menu out to all my friends and followers, since Holiday entertaining is in the air for all of us in less than 3 weeks for Christmas (let alone any Open House parties with good cheer and good food!)

Take a look, I promise you won't gain any pounds from looking, though a friend of mine would love to have some "smell-a- vision" with every posted goodie...can you imagine???!?!

http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/2009/12/tis-season-for-holiday-cupcakes.html

Turkey at School

The 24 turkeys made it safely to school and had no casualties. ( Their necks were breaking as I was trying to gently coax them in to their boxes AND had to do emergency surgery!)

Good reports that the kids loved them and there are pictures of them trying to "scare" their turkeys and devouring them. For the security and privacy of the children, those photos can not be published.

It does my heart good to help with the kids. No child should be hungry at school and while these treats are a meager offering- their tummies won't growl for one afternoon so they can concentrate on getting excited about learning new things and new ways to look at things. It's amazing to hear stories about their PoV- remember when you were 7 years old and how you viewed the your world? 

 

My next baking day for them is right before Christmas; I wonder what fun things I can come up with for them!

Cakes, too!

So here's the beauty I was working on last night for this morning's delivery. There are some who think I am only doing cupcakes BUT yes, I enjoy making cakes as well! 
Provided they don't involve fondant ( just not my favorite), since I think the whole thing needs to be deliciously edible. Provided it doesn't need to look like a cookie cutter of an earlier generation. As long as all the ingredients are there, and the whole things tastes great...I like that it can be a creative outlet for me...on how and what I pipe and how I decorate the whole thing- since I like to think that each cake is a gift to you.

What did your family have for Thanksgiving?

Happy after Thanksgiving to all and to all- I hope you had good desserts! Several of you have asked what did your family have for dessert after the fabulous turkey dinner? After baking on Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday...I have to admit that I don't have recipes that only bake a dozen at a time...my recipes are usually 18-24 per batch. My family reaped the benefits of the extra "blanks", seen here.

From the left you see, dark chocolate cake filled with raspberry puree, topped with chocolate silk frosting. Pumpkin cake with pecan creme filling, topped with vanilla cream cheese frosting- some with chopped pecans, some with a leaf shaped sables cookies. There are a few coconut cake with rum custard with a coco vanilla meringue buttercream, as well as brown sugar pound cake filled with chocolate custard with Godiva liqueur, topped with vanilla meringue buttercream and Dutch chocolate sprinkles. There are carrot cupcakes with pecan creme filling, topped with vanilla cream cheese frosting AND pumpkin cakes fllled with chocolate custard, topped with coconut meringue buttercream with toasted coconut. 

They were loved by all and quickly devoured, and some made it in care packages on to go paper plates.

I have a week to breathe and then it's time to think about December! Stay tuned for those Holiday ideas for the JujyCakes Holiday menu!

How much do I love these...sables!

I REALLY, REALLY LOVE a wonderful butter cookie! There is nothing more delicious than butter, sugar, flour and a bit of salt. I have tried nearly everyone's recipe for butter cookies or sable. I tried the recipe in Paris Sweets and countless others. BUT I recently acquired PASTRY by Michel Roux over the summer and was intrigued by his recipe and technique. The technique is as if you were making pasta. Your fingers literally learn about the texture and feel as the fingertips gently, yet firmly massage the butter into the flour/ sugar mixture.

I have always done the "sanding" in my food processor, but I think from now on I will do the sabler by hand. It's a wonderful tactile experience.

It's time to snack on a few extras that aren't needed for a recipe...yum.

A reason to be Thankful

A friend of mine has been searching for a lost greyhound that was rescued by a lovely 70 w/o woman. With the temperatures in the mid 30's the last few evenings, Greyhound friends have been setting "live" traps in an effort to find the 13 y/o dog. The group of rescuers are worried that they may find the dog too late since the area includes a huge 6 lane highway. I hope that the rescue goes well and that the dog will be found soon- it's been a week so far.

On another note, another friend who recently had major surgery is healing and getting stronger everyday! She is now completely cancer free! THAT Is something to be very thankful for! 

YUMMY, warm Apple Cranberry Tart goodness

Wow, it's 13 days till Thanksgiving! Here's close up of an Apple Cranberry frangipane tart...it's still warm, and I'm not sure if I want to brulee the apples or leave the beautiful contrast of the Gala apple skins and flesh with the cranberries. It's cloudy here today, so I'm still getting the hang of the tungsten lighting and metered flash that my brother was so kind enough to leave with me to practice.

I am so grateful for all the orders I have coming up for the holiday. I have 5 orders due on Tues and 5 orders due on Weds before the holiday so far. All JujyCakes friends have menus and know that the deadline for goodies is Thursday , the 19th- since my production schedule is limited. There is only one of me! Though I was thinking that I could prep weighing all the ingredients per recipe at least in the dry parts.

Anyhow, one day of rest till 3 orders for Sunday, that need to be delivered to Jersey City, NJ. It's a special favor to a friend and business acquaintance who spent 3 weeks with me in Morocco so many years ago. I'm really looking forward to seeing her and catching up.

Keep dry in this Nor'easter...can you imagine if it was all SNOW???

Here turkey, turkey, turkey...

Thanks again to Rachel, Nichelle, Stacie et al at Cupcakes Take the Cake for the spot light of my turkey cupcakes!!! It is so exciting to see my work shared with others who share the creative passion in baking.

Please take a look at what everyone else is doing in the cupcake world. http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/2009/11/5-turkey-cupcakes-for-thanksgiving.html

Happy Fall!!!

PS. Please send good karma, thoughts and prayers to my close friend who had major surgery and is now cancer FREE! She loves cupcakes and all things chocolate, too!

what do you call a "group" of turkeys?

 

 

 You call them a "rafter"!   These are dark chocolate cake topped with a vanilla/ brown sugar meringue buttercream, toasted coconut and handpainted pate sablee cookies. I used gel food coloring with vodka ( not the Grey Goose!) to paint feathers on the tail cookies and used royal icing for the eyes and the wattles. The wattles dripped appropriately, so each and every turkey has their own personality!

I thought the vodka was a great, unusual paint mixer. The vodka evaporates quickly so the cookie surface doesn't get soggy. Some turkeys have a nice fan of feathers- I'll need to work with the proportions so I can have the consistency of tempura or gouache.

Now, I'm thinking what else can I do...sheep, turkeys, what's next?

Thinking of the hOlidays

I was thinking about what to do for the Holidays...

More carrots and more cakes

I wonder why I keep making being requested to make carrot cakes. There are so many variations out there, that one could find a good one in a bakery, a "gourmet" supermarket...at this point I think I've made 2 layers, 3 layers, 4 layers and 6 layer cakes.
Is it the homemade pecan creme filling?  I could eat it out of the bowl with a spoon and it's good warmed up on ice cream :-)
Is it the cream cheese frosting?  Mine is butter, sugar, cream cheese with your choice of vanilla, cinnamon, orange, lemon, maple- maybe that's it!
In stores and bakeries, you don't get to ask if special requests can be considered.

On my way to better pictures!

OK! My brother kindly and gently told me that I could be taking better pictures for everything that I am trying to publish. I am the first to admit that photography is not something I'm good at. I am good at visuals, but I'm the kind of person that is touchy, feel-y...so staging and propping to take a picture? Not so much...

One would have thought since our Dad was a professional photographer and graphic artist, that some of this talent would have come thru our genes. I may have gotten some of the graphics genes; my brother Matt has the graphic and photography genes.

We (he) spent hours setting up the lights and set, and took over 70+ pics on my Canon A2000IS and on his Nikon D90. His Nikon is a gem, and maybe one day,( IF I get better at this) I could consider something more. BUT since I am a novice at best, we found all the right settings for me to recreate better pictures like the ones you see- that were taken with my Canon. They're not retouched yet, but they are a world better than everything I have going so far.  HEY, I'm new at this!!!

I took copious notes, and have to be on the search for better props that will highlight the baking. I am looking more closely at the work of great food blogger sites like, Food Gawker, Matt Bites, Smitten Kitchen...

so...stay tuned and thanks for your patience- I promise that there will be better pictures real soon!!!

YUMMY!

This was a dreamy cake to put together for a friend. Golden coconut cake with 1.5 cups of coconut milk, homemade coconut pastry cream, raspberry puree with a touch of lime. The coconut was light, so I topped it with vanilla meringue butter cream with toasted coconut and fresh berries. I think I'll switch this up a bit more and do a key lime curd- like raspberry lime rickeys. OR more coconut rum- I don't think I'll go for the pineapple-not particularly fond of pina colada.

More baking thoughts- making this into cupcakes, yet raspberries are really expensive to decorate with and puree. Re-doing lemon squares into pomegranate squares?
and more sculpting...

I'm tired today after helping my "friends"

 

I donated some goodies to help some friends with the annual Fall fundraiser at West Chester Friends School. I got carried away and in typical "over- achiever" fashion, made a lot and made some mistakes along the way since I was "getting" tired. I made chiffon cakes but I must have overbeaten the batter since those "exploded" in the pan and texture was borderline "sponge". I made a batch of dulce de leche brownies and completed them frosting and all BUT when I tasted them...I forgot the sugar!!! ARRGH, wasted 2 pounds of butter and nearly a pound of chocolate. FINALLY got into the groove and made pumpkin chiffon cupcakes (24), re did the brownies (24), brown sugar pound cupcakes (24), carrot cake, 36 butter cookies (cutouts, no less), 13 sheep heads and 25 pairs of eyeballs from gum paste and royal icing. AND to top it all off, since there was a "cakewalk" today, made a 3 layer carrot cake with all the trimmings!!!

YEAH, I don't know what I was thinking! Stayed up till 2:30 am, working on my brochure and line list, only to have left that at home when I was making the delivery.

YEAH- that's what I get from drinking decaf on Friday, what was I thinking!!!

Anyhow...maybe it's a good thing the weather is so "wintry", so I will hunker down and stay put!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=162357&id=807147500&l=5a00f07de6

Thank you, Cupcakes Take the Cake!

Take a look:
http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/2009/10/spotlight-on-jujycakes.html

I am so thrilled that Rachel et al at Cupcakes take the Cake wanted to spotlight what I have been doing! It's a huge compliment to be included in their blog along with all the other fabulous cupcake bakers out there! One day soon, I will have my own bakery.
If Duff can start his business out of his apartment...then there's always hope for my JujyCakes! Right?!

It's Fall, but the hibiscus are still blooming...

Isn't this bloom wonderful? Hard to believe that this beauty was soaking up the sun at the Bethany Beach! 

It was a great weekend Oct 3/4 at the beach. Great weather for bike riding, exploring and naps on the beach. We were there for the Harvest Moon and it was the biggest, full moon we ever saw. It sat on the horizon and rose above the ocean. The moonlight was amazing. 

 

per Wikipedia In times past this feature of these autumn moons was said to help farmers working to bring in their crops (or, in the case of the Hunter's Moon, hunters tracking their prey)UGH. They could continue being productive by moonlight even after the sun had set. Hence the name Harvest Moon.

 

 

Sheepish, aren't they?

Hi, back from a mini break in Bethany Beach, DE. Much needed for my husband and me, since this year has been such a roller coaster ride. It was the first time in years that I did not feel the need to communicate...well, it makes a difference since I still am searching for that next "job" or should I say passion?!

The day we left, I had 2 orders to fill. A carrot cake and a 1/4 sheet cake for a baby shower. They are expecting a boy and thank you, Martha Stewart- came up with this for the cake. I didn't have the patience to pipe a lambs head so I played with some marzipan and made little faces. I think that they look a bit more like puppies, but I think I'll work on my sculpting skills and play some more. I don't think I'll ever put some of those crazy things on cakes like I've seen, and much prefer the "cute" factor.

Sheep, lambs, who knows what else can be placed on a cake...

It's leftover night

After the Gaga birthday cake, I had all this left over frosting and I hate to waste it all, especially when there is premium butter, cocoa and Ghiradelli chocolate involved. There I am rifling thru all my cookbooks and oh, a cupcake I have never baked...Peanut butter cupcake! Mind you the PB is hard as a rock in the fridge, since it's natural and so is the butter, and the eggs are really cold. I read that you are able to bring the eggs to room temp pretty fast by putting them in a bowl of really warm water for about 10 minutes. The recipe said I would get 30 cupcakes, not sure how...is that like loaves and fishes?...
I only came up with 23. *sigh*

I went thru the "black and white" butter cream (it's vanilla meringue butter cream with chocolate syrup), then the vanilla butter cream and then the dark chocolate butter cream. I didn't want to do another complete bag set up so just filled the nearly empty bag up. I loved the effect of the one you see pictured here, and won't be able to recreate it for, say a batch of 24, but you can see the progression of what was happening in the pastry bag.

My lucky "guinea pig" friends at Scott Honda had these for breakfast this morning. Hope they enjoyed chocolate and peanut butter with their cups of coffee. Not too bad of a start on a Monday morning, don't you think?

Birthday Cakes, anyone?

Who knew that when I took the latest order that I would be writing with icing? This is a 6 layer dark chocolate cake filled with vanilla pastry cream and raspberry jam, covered with vanilla meringue buttercream and B&W meringue buttercream. Or that's what I call it since it was a light handed addition of dark chocolate syrup (thank you, Ina Garten) for color. I LOVE an all white cake, but thought that the outside should somehow reveal the surprise inside?

Anyhow, then there's the writing. I have been a calligrapher for years and love pen and ink. This was something new and completely different. I made a dark chocolate buttercream and loved the contrast in colors. I even practiced my lettering on 2 large sheets of parchment paper after tracing a circle on it. I thought, omg, if my writing was too big and did not fit the top of the cake. There are no erasers or starting all over- it was a one shot and that's it.

My husband reminded me that I had to move me or the cake to a better spot to have the best angle to write. I chose to leave the cake where it was AND perched myself on my kitchen stool "above" the cake. As it was, one of the "p" closed up and had to wait an hour for the thing to harden up in the fridge, so I could surgically removed it with a paring knife and icing palette knife. (Oh, said husband said I should always have toothpicks around to help with the extraction process or unclogging the round tips since they get clogged IF the icing is too thick...seriously with a pound+ butter , that buttercream should flow like thick olive oil!)  so there it is...letters are still a bit wobbly, but all in all not too bad for the 1st time out.  
And I think I will do more practising, since I love to write in Chancery cursive, instead of modifying roundhand...I'll try to remember to post these adventures later on....

Remember I have the hardest time trying to remember to take pictures :-)

PS. I don't know who "Gaga" is...it's not Lady Gaga, for sure.

In a hole

I have been in a "hole" in the last 9 days. The house we are living in needed some tender loving care for a water leak, a surprise repair, a new appliance. Things needed some attention and all is good again.

Baking is still at the forefront for me. Helping friends with baking and baking for friends. I had an order on Saturday morning that was started at 9pm on Friday night that kept me going till 2am on Saturday morning. BUT don't they look pretty...the order was for 36 and I made 40 yummy, delicious treats.

I made "healthy" muffins for a friend who teaches 2nd grade. There are kids who are still coming to school hungry due to family circumstances. Share Our Strength is currently running their campaign that no child should be hungry! I agree, no kid should ever be hungry. It's hard enough being a kid, and how can you study at school when your tummy is growling that it is empty.

Thank goodness, it's Saturday!

It's been a busy week. I had my car serviced for it's 15K scheduled maintenance, only to be asked if I have a price for the "kaab el ghzal"- the gazelle horn dessert cookies that I made for a friend who is celebrating/observing Ramadan. Of course, I stumbled over my words, not knowing what that would be.

On the day that I first tried the recipe, the kitchen was hot as hell, the dough was so tender, that I could barely assemble 3 cookies and had to return the dough to the fridge to with every try. I think I got 32 cookies that day over hours of working with the dough, and the paste. They were delicious, tho- light, buttery, sweet with a taste of orange flower water. It reminded me of my times in Morocco with Moustapha Sebbeh and Barbara Eigen, so many years ago.

Anyhow, feeling up to a challenge. I went home to find that I did not have enough orange flower water to complete the recipe. Panicked, I started searching on line and racking my brain- on where did I find the stuff in the first place. I called around all the usual places, and finally found a plethora at The Fresh Market in Glen Mills. I bought 6 of A.Monteux brand and Nielsen-Massey. BTW- they are very different. The A.Monteux is flowery, perfumery and light. The NM is full of alcohol, then the notes of the bitter orange. Hmm, extracts/ flavorings is very much like perfumery...

The kitchen gods must have been with me on Thursday! I zipped thru the recipe, the dough worked like a charm ( with some tweeking) and produced 36 beautiful cookies. All the same shape, size, great consistency in design and presentation (if I say so, myself) AND of course, I forgot to take a picture! I had 2 anxious buyers for them as soon as I called my husband, and they were delivered right at the cusp of sundown.

Cereal as a topping?

 

here they are! an homage to the recipe in MSCupcakes...vanilla chiffon cake filled with dark chocolate custard, topped with vanilla meringue buttercream with multi nonpareils, Fruity Pebbles and a cutout butter cookie! Happy Sweet 16!

Here are some of them...

Rich chocolate brownie filled with dulce de leche, topped with brown sugar meringue buttercream dusted with cocoa

• Dark chocolate cake filled with pecan coconut creme, topped with dark chocolate silk frosting

• Dark chocolate cake filled with dark chocolate peanut butter mousse, topped with chocolate meringue buttercream with Dutch chocolate sprinkles

• Dark chocolate cake filled with raspberry spoon fruit, topped with vanilla buttercream and raspberry

Carrot Cake # ?

*sigh* wow, Friday really kicked my butt. I baked and assembled 7 different kinds of cupcakes and baked this 4 layer 8" carrot cake that was headed to West Chester University for the President and VPs. Heard that they loved it all, which did my heart good.

Every carrot cake looks different and I should take pictures of every one that leaves me. Right now, I'm having fun playing with the tips and pastry bags IF the frosting cooperates. I find that I have to frost, fridge, frost, fridge, till the whole thing gets done. I have the AC cranked up SO my poor husband is sitting on the sofa wrapped in on of our wool throws wondering when I'll be done. Soon? He just shoots me one of "those" looks.  I just can't get the kitchen cool enough or maybe because I'm just not working fast enough with the crumb coats, the final frost and decos. I'm hoping that in time ( and if the frosting would be the "perfect" consistency) that my proficiency will be much better.

More tools and living in the forest

Today, we found out that the garage has had small snakes in it. Not sure what kind, thank goodness they were dead and dried up BUT the thought of them being in the garage makes me unhappy. Of course, my husband chimes in with the pest control tech to remind me that there are Eastern Diamondback Rattlers probably in our backyard! I will be screaming with no sound coming out of my mouth if I ever cross paths with those things. I also found out that the deer will eat grapes and green beans today. They pick up their heads to listen to you, but don't really care if you are 8' away tossing food at them. They need those cartoon bubbles above their heads..."oh, look, it's that crazy lady trying to sneak up on us", " oh, now what is she throwing at us?" "you give us grapes, and now you're tossing us veggies, what's up with that?" The joys of living on a mountain.

I picked up "Rose's Heavenly Cakes" today at B&N. It's a wonderful book and I love how Rose talks to you in the book giving you all her helpful hints. So today, I took the plunge and ordered a food scale in an effort and "leap of faith" of weighing all the baking ingredients instead of scoop and leveling. According to Rose, once I try it- I will never go back again. I hope so- the scale weighs as little as 1 gram to 6,000 grams and is coming from OK by the end of the week. Oh, good- one more thing to have on the counters, AND one more thing as a "business" expense.

I hope all my efforts are not in vain. I would really love for my little bakery business to take off and fly. It would be so wonderful, and I would be so happy.

I wanted to work with a buttercream, or a frosting just with butter, milk and powdered sugar. I baked up a batch of Devils Food cakes from the Magnolia Bakery cookbook, and tweaked a "buttercream" frosting recipe. A good friend of mine, who knows that I LOVE chocolate gave me a bar of Belgian dark chocolate with cassis (black currant). The flavor and aroma is chocolatey and very berry, in a good way.

I filled these with the "SuperFruit" from Trader Joes, that has Morello cherry, blueberry and pomegranate in it plus some chocolate sprinkles for good measure.

Then I made just "plain" ones, no filling and I thought I would frost them by hand. The buttercream was soft though not melting and did not give me the swirly definition I was looking for.

Please bear with me as I get used to blogging and how this formatting works. I have a composition in my head as I try to put this together. I hope I will learn more about this as this will be a journey in something new. Thank you in advance for your patience as I work this all out...it could be really funny as stumble through or really pathetic! C'est la vie, n'est-ce pas?

I don't always remember to take pictures along the way or when the finished items leave the house for the orders. This hit or miss is not helping me compile the menu/brochure that people are asking for.

Here are some of my production pictures of lemon buttermilk cake. This recipe made a alot of cakes, standard, jumbos, minis...



 

and trying to get used to my point and shoot digital camera has been an interesting journey. My husband keeps reminding me that I should "really" read the manual so my pics won't be blurry...so sorry for that :-)