Changin it up!

I've realized my blog is more my love of baking, discovering that perfect recipe and of course making everything pretty, or 'lovely' and not just decorating cakes, so I thought I'd change the name to encompass more then just cakes.  So, for the thousands of readers that I have.....;) My new web address is: bakeitlovely.blogspot.com as well as my blog name. 



Couldn't do two posts in a row without a picture of some delicious treat.  These are chocolate cupcakes, cream cheese buttercream, topped with a peanut butter cookie. (All recipes have been posted.)

Tiramisu my way!

For my birthday I received, among other very awesome gifts, a very nice bottle of red wine (Black Stallion Cab from Napa Valley) from my sister and the pasta maker attachment for my Kitchen Aid from my boyfriend.  So of course I had to have a gourmet Italian night.  I made fresh fettuccine in a butter & basil sauce, prosciutto wrapped-mozzarella & spinach stuffed chicken, and sauteed brussel sprouts (I don't know how Italian that is but I love them), and for dessert- tiramisu!

Everything turned out amazing, I might have to start selling my pasta at the Local Farmer's Market.  The wine was delicious, I'm currently enjoying it as I write this, thanks again Camille!  But the reason for this post is of course the Tiramisu.  I had to make a few substitutions, because Kodiak is not the mecca of cooking supplies, but I think they may have made it even better!  The pics I took do it no justice, so I will not be posting, but trust me you have to try it.

This is for a small cake, you might want to double it.

Ingredients:
3 egg yolks
1 1/2 tbl sugar
8 ounces mascarpone
3/4 cup strong coffee/espresso chilled (I used Starbucks instant Italian espresso roast)
1 tea vanilla paste
About 2 tbl Kahlua
1-2 packages Pepperidge Farms Milano cookies (I only got one bag and I ran a bit short)
Cocoa powder to dust top

Beat yolks and sugar until thick and creamy, about 5 minutes
Add mascarpone, beat until smooth
Add 3/4 tbls coffee & the vanilla bean paste (I swear by this stuff, it is worth getting, especially for vanilla buttercream, makes such a difference)

In small shallow dish add Kahlua and remaining coffee.
Dip cookies a few seconds on each side then place in dish.  Not too long or they will fall apart!(This recipe is for a small cake, because I was just experimenting I used a small loaf pan, double recipe I would use a 9x13" pan)
Cover with 1/2 mascarpone mixture
Layer another layer of soaked cookies
Top with remaining Mascarpone mixture
Cover and chill for several hours, at least 3 hours.
Dust with cocoa powder and enjoy!

A Sweet 31 Party

I decided to host a small party with my favorite things:  sweets and champagne.  I made chocolate cupcakes with a beer buttercream (made with Deschutes dark IPA), chocolate covered strawberries, brownie bon bons, cookie pops, & my favorite peanut butter cookies topped with chocolate chunks. 

I invited a few friends, put on a pink dress, popped a few bottles of champagne and it was a sweet success!  Thanks to all that came over and celebrated with me, I wish I could have invited more people but unfortunately I have about a 4 person max occupancy in my teeny house!

My Son really liked my dessert themed birthday

The peanut butter cookie and chocolate cake recipe I posted already but the brownie bon bons are AWESOME and super easy:

You can make your own brownies, or buy a box mix, (if you decide to do the box option I highly recommend Ghiredelli's).  Make the brownies and let cool.

Scoop or cut out about a tablespoon worth of brownie, or larger/smaller depending on how big you want your bon bons.  Mold into a ball, brownies are so moist you don't need to add anything.  Just stay away from the edge pieces, they won't make a very smooth ball.  You'll have to think of other ways of disposing of those.....there's a slim (OK, maybe extremely likely) chance I ate mine.
Cover in chocolate.  For mine I melted semi-sweet chocolate chips with about 1 tablespoon of butter per bag of chips, and a little less then 1/4 cup heavy cream.  I wanted the chocolate to set up pretty good, so I didn't add as much cream and butter as I usually would for a ganache.

Set on waxed or parchment paper to dry, but while wet sprinkle with sprinkles, nuts, or whatever else you want to decorate with.  I did mine some with colored sprinkles, some with a chili/chocolate sugar, and some with a citrus sugar. 

Refrigerate until party then devour!

Happy Father's Day!

Guys don't generally like sweets or flowers, but you know what they do like...bacon!  So here's a flower I'm pretty sure any man would like to get for Father's Day.

Yup, bacon roses!

They smell great, taste great, and are pretty much the coolest thing ever!

Happy Father's Day to the best Dads I know!  Love you!

Here's how ya do it:

You need:

Package of bacon, I found the longest looking strips I could

Mini muffin pan, if you can find a disposable foil one I HIGHLY recommend getting it (easier for clean up and set up)

Fake roses

Pull off fake roses from stem

Drill hole in bottom of each cup (here's where the easier set up comes in with the disposable ones, you can just poke a hole with anything sharp and don't need to get out the power tools)

Wrap bacon around each cup, starting on the outside/widest part of the cup.  Use the cup as a mold, and just swirl the bacon around till you get to the middle.  Sorry if that's confusing.  When I found this idea online, ya that's right, sadly I did not come up with this awesome idea on my own, but the site that I found instructables.com said to roll the bacon up and place in muffin tin.  These turned out too tight almost like rose buds.  I found that if they where rolled looser and the edges almost folded out, they looked like real roses, so I used the muffin tin cup as a mold. 

I put my muffin tin over a cooling rack and put the cooling rack on a cookie sheet (lined with foil for easy clean up), that way the grease that dripped out the bottom would drain onto the cookie sheet and the bacon roses could drain and not just sit in the oil.  I would occasionally pick up the roses to help the draining process.

 Bake in oven until your house fills with smoke and can take it no longer (about 45 minutes)

I think a deep frier would come in very handy for this project, if you ever feel the need to mass produce.

Once cooled just stick on rose stems that you have taken fake roses off. 

Kodiak Cakes: A Hawaiian Baby Shower

Kodiak Cakes: A Hawaiian Baby Shower: "I finished a cake today made for a Hawaiian themed baby shower. I was asked to make a cake by the soon to be (and very excited first time) ..."

A Hawaiian Baby Shower

I finished a cake today made for a Hawaiian themed baby shower.  I was asked to make a cake by the soon to be (and very excited first time) grandparents.  They were throwing a huge Polynesian party complete with roasted pig and asked me to make something fabulous. 
I wanted to make her a cake that was simple, sweet and beautiful.  She gave me a picture of a Hawaiian themed wedding cake that she liked, and this is my version of it for a baby....

The baby is made out of fondant, the flowers gumpaste (I did not make these, I chose to take the short cut and buy them pre-made), my friend and I painted them after only a few trial and errors (thanks again Crystal my crafty friend:), the shells are chocolate and the sand is a graham cracker crust crushed up (yummy!)

I also made some mini cupcakes, some vanilla/lemon/carrot cake, vanilla pudding filled & topped with cream cheese frosting, then rolled in the graham cracker crumbs to again look like sand and topped with a little umbrella .

Congrats again to the Pickett family!  Thank you for letting me do you cake, this might be one of my new all time favs!