Gumpaste Croc Shoe

Gumpaste Shoe

Thought of trying my hands on gumpaste /fondant.  My first try on shoe.  

Oreo Cake Pops

Since I had some leftover cake cut up from the cake car that I made previously, I thought what could be a better way than make some cake pops out of it.  The bottom is chocolate candy melt, cake balls are quick mix sponge cake and topped with white candy melts and sprinkled with crumbled oreo's.

Soft moist cake coated with candy melts :)

Car Cake / Quick Mix Sponge Cake

This is my first carved cake. I made this for my son who turned 10. Its was fun to actually make this but there are few flaws that I would fix if I am going to make it again. My son was excited to see this car.  The Car is made out of chocolate and sponge cake.  Covered with swiss buttercream and fondant.  Wheels made of rice krispies and fondant.  Dirt is crushed oreo cookies with some chocolate pebbles.

Quick Mix Sponge Cake

Source:  Best Ever Cake Decorating

As how the name is called, this cake is super fast to put together and hold well when it is used for carving or for tiers.  I made this cake well in advance and refrigerated it, then on the day took it out, frosted and put the roll on fondant on it.

Ingredients

1 cup self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup softened butter
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs

Method

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease, flour and line a 9 by 13 loaf pan with greaseproof paper.  
• Sift the flour and baking powder into a bowl. Add the butter, sugar and eggs.
• Beat with a electric mixer or handheld mixer for about 3 minutes. The mixture should be pale in color and slightly glossy.
• Spoon the batter into the prepared pan then smooth the top.  Bake for about 20 - 30 minutes. Check for doneness by inserting a toothpick.  Let it cool in a pan for about 10 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack.

Confetti Book Cupcake

Recently I went to the library and borrowed couple of cookbooks and saw this wonderful yet simple straight to the point cake recipe.  As usual, I always like to try recipe's to see if they actually tastes as good as they look.  This chocolate cake recipe is just as moist and delicious like the Hersheys chocolate cake.  The cupcake was moist even after a day at room temperature. I made 2 different version; one is chocolate and another is Vanilla.  Both are equally delightful.  It can be baked and torted as cake.

Source:  Confetti Cakes

Chocolate Cake ( 3 9inch pan, half sheet ( 13 x 18) or 24 cupcakes
Ingredients

2 2/3 cup     Flour
1 1/4 cup     Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
2 tbsp          Baking powder
2 tsp            Baking soda
1 tsp            Salt
1 cup           Sour cream or Yogurt
1 tsp            Vanilla
1 tsp            Almond Extract
1 cup           unsalted butter
1 1/2 cup     Sugar
2                  Eggs
1 1/4 cup     Strong Coffee

Method

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line the cupcake pan with baking liners.
• In a large bowl, sift all the dry ingredients and set aside.
• In a separate bowl, beat the butter and sugar till light and smooth.  Add eggs one at a time. Beating well after each addition.  Mix in a clean bowl, sour cream, vanilla and almond extract.
• Alternately add the flour and sour cream to the butter mixture in two batches. Scrape down the bowl after each addition.  Gradually pour the coffee in, scrape down the bowl and beat until thoroughly combined.
• Divide the batter between the cake pan or muffin tin and bake for about 25 minutes for the cupcakes and check with a toothpick or until they spring back when touched lightly.
• Allow the cakes to cool before frosting.

Ingredients For vanilla Cake ( Makes 24 cupcakes, 3 9inch cake pan)

2 cups                              Cake flour
1 3/4 cup plus 1 1/2 tsp    All purpose flour
2 1/4 tsp                           Baking powder
1 cup                                Unsalted butter
2 cups                              Sugar
3/4 tsp                              Salt
1 tbsp                               Vanilla
1 cup                                Egg whites or pasteurized egg whites in liquid form
1 1/2 cup                          Milk

Method

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper or if using the muffin tin, line with liners.
• In a large bowl, sift together the dry ingredients and set aside.
• In a bowl, combine the butter and sugar and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy.  Add the salt and vanilla.
• Gradually add the egg whites, scraping often and beat till all is combined.
• Alternately add the flour mixture and milk to the butter mixture in two batches and beat until thoroughly combined.  Divide the batter between the cupcakes or the cake pan evenly.  Bake accordingly.
• Let the cake cool before frosting.

Fudge Stripe Cookie

This is a super easy cookie to put together.  This is almost like the keebler cookie but I am getting there on my deco. The decorations arent as pretty but the cookie sure is yummy. As I was mixing the dough up, I kept looking at the recipe thinking that I might has missed out something because it was really easy and all it took was just mix it into a dough.

Ingredients

3 3/4 ounce all purpose flour, sifted
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 ounces corn syrup
1 1/2 ounce clarified butter, unsalted ( to make clarified butter, simply melt butter and remove foam on top and measure)
1/2 ounce vanilla extract
additional flour for dusting
8 ounce chocolate, tempered or melted

Method

• Preheat the oven to 350°F and have two parchment lined sheet pans at the ready. Using a hand or stand mixer, combine the flour, soda, corn syrup, clarified butter, and vanilla. Mix until a smooth dough forms. Use your hands to lightly knead the dough into a ball. Wrap with plastic and refrigerate for about 10 minutes.
• On a lightly floured surface, use a rolling pin to roll the dough to 1/4" thickness. Run an offset spatula or thin knife between the dough and the counter, to ensure it doesn't stick in any places.
• Dock the dough all over with a fork to mimic the design stamped onto real Fudge Stripe Cookies.
• Use a 3" cutter to stamp out as many cookies as you can, transferring them to the cookie sheet. Use the smallest round cutter you have (or a plastic coupling from a pastry bag) to cut a hole from the center of each cookie. Gather up these holes along with the remaining cookie scraps, knead together, re roll, dock and cut again.
• Bake the cookies approximately 12 minutes, or until just lightly browned all over. Cool thoroughly.
• Gather the cookies into a stack. Throw away the used parchment and cover each cookie sheet with a fresh piece of parchment paper.
• Decorate the cookies: Temper the chocolate (or simply melt) and transfer to a small bowl.
• Drop the cookies into the chocolate one at a time, polka dotted side up. Using your fingers, gingerly lift the cookies back out and transfer each to the clean parchment. If may notice a thin film of chocolate covering the hole in the center; you can lightly blow on it to break the film, or touch it lightly with a toothpick to do the same.
• Once all of the cookies have been coated in chocolate on one side, transfer the remaining chocolate to a small pastry bag fitted with a small, plan tip. You may also use a plastic baggie with a hole poked in one corner.
• In either case, drizzle each cookie with five wide stripes.
• If you're using tempered chocolate, it will set up on its own in a few minutes. If you're using melted chocolate, transfer the cookies to the fridge for about 5 minutes to solidify the chocolate.
• In either case, after the chocolate sets, peel the cookies off the parchment and store in an airtight container. Cookies coated in untempered chocolate must be stored in the refrigerator.

Birthday Cake

Made a 21st Birthday cake for a friend.  She requested for a zebra print and hot pink bow.  Cake is chocolate cake from Hershey's Moist chocolate cake and frosted with buttercream.

Just for an info...this is my ever first tiered cake.  I was shaking like a dog when I put both the tiers together supported by some straws.  All in all....I am glad to get this over with :)

Lemon Blueberry Cupcake

Lemon blueberry cupcake is a favorite of my daughter's.  After many attempts of making a perfect lemon based cupcake, I came across this special one and it worked really nice with frozen blueberries with lemon buttercream frosting.

Source: Annie's Eats, All recipes

Ingredients

3/4 cup plus 2 tbsp. all-purpose flour, divided
3/4 cup cake flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
8 tbsp. unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar
Zest of 1 lemon
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 tbsp. lemon juice
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp. milk, at room temperature
1 cup frozen or fresh blueberries

Frosting

1 stick butter
8 ounces cream cheese
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar or less

Method

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line cupcake tins with 16 paper liners.
• Mix the flour, soda and salt together in a bowl. Set aside. Add the butter and sugar to a mixing bowl and cream until light and fluffy. Add the eggs 1 at a time and mix thoroughly. Add the vanilla and lemon zest and mix to combine. Add the dry mixture in 3 parts alternating with the milk, ending with dry mixture. Stir the  blueberries with the remainder flour and stir slowly into the batter. Fill the prepared tins two-thirds full and bake 16 to 20 minutes. Cool.

For the frosting: Cream the butter and cream cheese until smooth. Add the vanilla, lemon zest and juice and blend until combined. Add the powdered sugar gradually until combined.

Cheesecake

This cheesecake recipe was given to me by a friend and its so easy and simple to put together.  I baked this cake in a regular 8inch baking pan lined with parchment paper and greased really well.

Ingredients

For Crust

15 graham cracker crushed
3 tbsp butter, melted
1 tbsp sugar

For the Cheesecake



15 graham crackers, crushed
2 tablespoons butter, melted

3 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese
1  cups white sugar
3/4 cup milk
3 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon vanilla extract ( I used Bailey's Irish Cream)
2 tbsp all-purpose flour

Method

• Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Grease a 9 inch springform pan. ( I used a 8 inch round pan lined with parchment paper and greased well on the sides).
• In a medium bowl, mix graham cracker crumbs with melted butter. Press onto bottom of pan.
• In a large bowl, mix cream cheese with sugar until smooth. Blend in milk, and then mix in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in sour cream, vanilla and flour until smooth. Pour filling into prepared crust. Put the cake pan in a pan which is bigger than the cake pan and fill with hot water.
• Bake in preheated oven for 1 to 1 1/2 hour. Turn the oven off, and let cake cool in oven with the door open slightly for 2 hours; this prevents cracking. Chill in refrigerator until serving.