Thank you, neighbor!

I made this bread for my neighbor who helped me out in a pinch by tending my kids last minute. Pecan lemon bread. After being baked, the bread is soaked in a yummy lemon syrup. Amazing! Hello pretty bread!

All wrapped up, ready for delivery.

Here's the recipe, adapted from Taste of Home magazine:

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
1-3/4 cups sugar, divided
2 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sour cream
1 cup chopped pecans, toasted
1 tablespoon grated lemon peel
1/4 cup+2tbs lemon juice
Directions: In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and 1 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs; mix well. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt; add to creamed mixture alternately with sour cream. Fold in pecans and lemon peel. Transfer to a greased mini loaf pans. Bake at 350° for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. In a small saucepan, combine lemon juice and remaining sugar. Cook and stir over medium heat until sugar is dissolved. Pour over warm bread. Cool completely on a wire rack before removing from pan.

Mom's 60th

For my mom's 60th birthday, my dad ordered a cake. He wanted a family tree kind of cake--with all of her kids and grandchildren represented. My mom's birthday is really close to Christmas, so I opted not to do a tree design. I was afraid it might look too holiday-ish. So, we went topsy turvy and bright, fun colors. I made my parents, my siblings and all the grand kids out of royal icing a week in advance. I forgot my brother's goatee..Sorry Ben! This was my first "real" topsy turvy cake (aside from my bro's wedding..see previous post) and I had nightmares all night that it was going to fall before the morning, but it did great! I was pumpkin cake with cranberry buttercream on the bottom, and almond cake with peach buttercream on the top. (They are my mom's favorite) The hair on my mom's topper was brushed with platinum luster dust. It turned out a little more metallic than I planned.
This was a surprise. My parents returned home from a vacation on my mom's b-day and the kids were all there. I made soups (corn chowder and Mexican chicken) and my siblings brought salad and bread sticks. Yum!
My cute mom and her cake. She was so surprised when I brought up the cake from the basement. She wouldn't cut it, and when we finally did, she saved all the royal icing people (she kept them on a plate for about a month!)

I Love these extra long, slightly thicker candles from Tag!

Easy as Pie

A few weeks ago I had a bunch of fresh raspberries and blueberries that were begging to be turned into something yummy. But I was feeling lazy. So here's what I came up with. It was easy, delicious and beautiful.

A beautiful two layer berry pie!

Here's what I did:

Bake your favorite pie crust (luckily I had a homemade crust in my freezer ready to pop in the oven), let cool completely.

Mix together until smooth:

1 8 oz. package cream cheese (i use the 1/3 less fat kind)

1/3 c. sugar or splenda

1 tsp vanilla and a little almond extract (do not use imitation almond)

Once that is smooth, fold in about 2/3 of a small tub of frozen whipped topping (thawed, of course). Spread into bottom of pie shell until pie is half full. Use the extras to make layered parfaits in pretty cups.

For the fruit layer:

Make one box of raspberry Danish Dessert according to box directions. (this can be found in any supermarket's baking isle)Let cool slightly. Add a couple of generous handfuls each of fresh blueberries and fresh raspberries and fold them in. Pour gently on top of pie. (pour extras on top of the parfaits) Refrigerate several hours before serving. Enjoy!

Auction cake #2

Another cake I made for the church auction. I love making topsy turvy cakes... and I am getting much better at it (if I do say so myself). The first one I ever attempted was for my brother's wedding, and, well, it wasn't so great. We all thought it was awesome at the time, but now that I've figured out a much better way to do it I am embarrassed about the first one! I will not be posting pics of that one...If I'd only known then what I know now! This cake was a headache and a half. It took me about 17 hours total. I had my candy thermometer break without me realizing it, and I attempted two batches of my buttercream (which is extremely temperature dependant... and time consuming) before I figured it out.
Almond cake with fresh peach buttercream, and the top tier was coconut cake with coconut buttercream.
I hope the family who bought ti liked it, because I sure had fun making it (after I figured out the thermometer thing) and I love the way it turned out!

Oreo Cake

I made this cake for a fundraising auction at my church. It is an Oreo cake with a chocolate wrap. It had two layers of chocolate cake with one layer of vanilla cake in the middle. (so when you cut it, it would look like an Oreo) All with vanilla Italian Meringue buttercream with Oreos stirred in. Amazing. Like eating a milkshake on a cake. Thanks to my awesome friend Michelle for tipping me off on that one. It's become one of my most requested.

Piece of cake...

Literally. I made this cake for a lady at my church I used to visit. This picture is several years old, and is one of my first attempts at a whimsical cake.

It was pretty small, made from slices of a 6 inch cake. Enough to serve 3 or 4 people.

The cutest couple ever.

This cake was made for the cutest couple I have ever worked with (and that is saying something). She is from China and He is of Scottish descent. They were so cute together! He even flew to China to ask hr parents if he could marry their daughter. How can you not love that? She wore a traditional red Chinese wedding dress, and he wore a kilt... When they saw this cake, there were no other options. They were only worried what the groom's mom would say when they told her they chose a red cake.

The backside. This cake was loosely based on a design by Colette Peters.

Side view. I made all the fans with Royal icing. They took forever, but I loved the result.

Here we go. The front. (I need camera lessons) The red fan I designed to match the embroidery on the bride's dress. The top fan was made in nine separate pieces and dried, then glued together with more royal icing to make 3D pleats. I love the china berry(the green berries) and the yellow flower stuff is called Scottish or Irish something. It was so much fun to combine these two cultures. I love celebrations like that!

I am a goddess. Worship me.

My husband wanted to take a treat to the neighbor who has been helping him out with something, and I had overripe bananas in the kitchen. The stars had aligned. I had taught our girls about banana boats recently (you take a banana, slice out a wedge lengthwise and insert chocolate chips, marshmallows and peanut butter, wrap it all up in foil and toss it in the coals of a camp fire until it gets all warm and melty and gooey. Unwrap and eat. YUUUUUUMMMY! ) So, I decided to try and recreate this campfire confection as a cupcake. Pretty, aren't they? They tasted sooo good. Banana cake, chocolate ganache, peanut butter Italian meringue (I'm still perfecting the recipe for this--but it was amazing) all topped with mini marshmallows that I took my little blow torch to to toast them. Now we can feel like we're camping with out the bushwhacking and dirty fingernails. Sounds good to me!

Sweet Little Baby Shower

Okay, Shower #2. For my good friend who had twin girls. I was planning on having the shower before the arrival of said girls, but they came 8(!) weeks early and so we had to postpone. This was a dessert open house shower, with "Sweet little baby cakes" as a theme. So, naturally, we had cupcakes! Again, I didn't get a picture of the whole table (a shame, because it was soo cute!) but I got the cupcakes... We had four flavors to choose from...Sweet little coconut baby cakes (deja vu...?)

Sweet little Oreo baby cakes...

Sweet little vanilla baby cakes (My friend Emily made these)...

Sweet little butter pecan baby cakes.

I also made red velvet cake truffle pops. All served with milk and pink punch. We also had fruit with really yummy dip, thanks to Harmony:)

It was great to sit and chat with all my neighbors and friends. I hadn't laughed that hard in quite a while. I think shower week was a success!

Boy Baby Shower

Last week was "baby shower week". I threw two baby showers. The first one was a car themed shower for my sister-in-law who is having a boy. We had a great time eating and talking and laughing with family. I was so busy I didn't get to take a ton of pics, but here's what I've got. Since the shower was on the fourth of July, I had to make a fruit arrangement with red and blue sparklers:)
All the fun is in the details. I am a firm believer of this...
The menu was so fun! We had convertible sandwiches (they were topless...) All wheel pasta salad made with the baby wheel pastas. (thanks Ariana for that idea) A fruit arrangement (not fitting with the theme, but it was patriotic..) Lug nuts...they were patriotic, too! I made candied nuts by boiling 1.5 cups sugar with 3/4 c. sour cream to soft ball stage, remove from heat and add 2 tsp vanilla and 1 lb pecans. Stir until the pecans turn white and cool on waxed paper. Then I added dried blueberries and crasins to make it yummy and patriotic!

We also had Carburated cranberry lime drink and mango mousse (Thanks again, Ariana!)

We also had to have car cookies for favors. They had cinnamon frosting. Yum. We played a game and the prize was a car air freshener, of course! I had a blast, and I hope Misa did, too. I am so excited for her little guy to get here!

This pic belongs to the next post, but I can't get it to delete. Sorry.

Chocolate Wraps

When I wanted to try a new technique for a cake a few years ago, my husband decided he wanted to try it with me. He made the marbleized one, and mine is the polka dot one. He's pretty good isn't he?

To make a chocolate wrap you melt your chocolate and spread it on a piece of acetate cut to the size you want. Let it sit till it is firming up, but not hard. Then pick it up and wrap it around the cake and let harden completely. Then, peel away the acetate and you have a beautiful and easy cake! Of course,with the polka dot wrap, I had to try brown and white striped chocolate curls!

(I should have made way more than I did..)

Sorry I haven't been around for a while...I've done two baby showers in 5 days and attended a family reunion...It is busy summer time. Pics of the baby showers to come soon! They were both so fun.