Happy Birthday Chris!

Joyeux Anniversaire!!

I've always loved the phrase Joyeux Anniversaire.  It sounds so pretty.  Well yesterday was Chris' 34th birthday.  I was really excited because my family has always done birthday dinners.  Birthdays have always been special and my sister even gets birthday week from her husband.  We get to choose our most favorite dinner and dessert ever and my mom would always make it.  I still remember the time when I was younger that I requested sloppy joe's specifically because my sister didn't like them and because she had requested tacos which I didn't like.  My brother-in-law asked for homemade chicken pot pie, which my mom had never made and it made her laugh but she still made it.  

Well, last night was supposed to be Chris' big birthday dinner but he had to go to class instead so it will have to be tonight.  He decided he would like sausage and peppers for dinner and my brownie surprise cupcakes.  These have always been his favorite.  They are regular brownies with Snickers in the middle.  I top them with buttercream frosting (this time tinted blue since that's his fave color).  I got this amazing recipe from Better Homes & Garden.  I hope you take the time to try them out.

Next up, St. Patrick's Day!  Any ideas anyone?  Let me know and until next time, keep baking!

New Take on Valentine's Day Bears

Happy belated Valentine's Day!  I got a great idea for my Valentine's Day treats this year from Bakerella.  She is best known for her cake pops and created the amazing book, Cake Pops.  I still have yet to buy it but it's on my list.  

They are actually very easy to make.  You bake any kind of cake in a 13x9 pan.  Once it has cooled down, cut it into 4 sections.  Take one section out, break it in half and rub together so that it crumbles up.  Repeat this until all of the cake is crumbled up.  Add 2 cups (1 tub) of frosting and mix together.

Shape into 1 1/2" balls and stick in the freezer for a little while to firm up.  Then shape into a peanut shape.  Take a large candy heart and press it into the cake to flatten out one side of the peanut shape.  See below for a picture of the cake.

Take the candy pop stick and dip it in the melted candy coating and stick about halfway into the cake.  Stick chocolate chips in for ears and a nose.  Then put in the refrigerator to firm up.  Melt the chocolate candy coating and dip the cake pops in straight down and straight back up.  Let the chocolate drip off the cake pop and put back in the refrigerator.  Once it has hardened, place the large candy heart on the stomach, two Hershey Kisses as legs, M&M's as arms, and use a black edible ink marker to draw the face, and wafer sprinkles for the pads on the feet.  They are as cute as can be!  Serve and enjoy!  No need to store them in the refrigerator.

Happy Valentine's Day!  Please let me know if you have any questions.  Until next time, keep baking!

Thanksgiving, Christmas, Baby Shoe Cake Topper

As you can probably guess, I am really bad about updating this blog with all of my pictures.  I don't know why I never thought to download the Blogger App for my DroidX, but I will now try that out and maybe I can get these pictures up faster.  I feel like I am rarely on my computer now that I have the Droid.  I don't have to wait for the laptop to turn on and load everything so I just go straight to my phone instead.  I hope you enjoy the latest treats.

These are the Thanksgiving cupcakes I made with my mom and sister.  They are chocolate cupcakes with a caramel frosting.  We used softened caramels for the turkeys, mini M&Ms, rolled out sugared Dots, and candy coated sunflower seeds.  Didn't my sister do a great job rolling out the Dots?  She is very proud of the part she did in these cupcakes.  We got the idea from Better Homes & Garden.

For Christmas Eve, we went to Chris' parents house and celebrated.  I was a lot of fun.  For Christmas Day, we went to my Aunt and Uncle's house in Connecticut.  I decided for the dessert, I would bring these Christmas Tree cupcakes.  I was so excited when I went to Michael's and saw the jingle bell light and star sprinkles.  They were just too perfect.  I made chocolate cupcakes with buttercream frosting.  I used mini cupcakes for the base of the trees and used cone cups to make the cone shape of the top of the tree.  I then used a star tip to put the frosting on.

 This is what the cupcake looked like under the frosting.  Most people thought they were all frosting, but not many people can handle that (I would've LOVED it.  Frosting is my fave part.).

For New Years, we went to our friends apartment.  My mom gave me the idea for this because her and my sister went to Cheesecake Factory a couple weeks earlier and saw they had a red velvet cheesecake.  My mission was to try to replicate it.  I have to work on my red dye because it didn't come out quite red enough.  I started with 1 9inch red velvet cake round and 1 9 inch cheesecake round(no graham cracker crumb crust). I split the cheese cake batter in two and made two separate ones and sliced the red velvet cake in half.  I layered buttercream frosting in between each layer.  It is a very rich cake!

One of my co-workers is pregnant and she asked me if I would make her edible baby shoes.  I had never done these before but figured they couldn't be too hard.  I started out with a practice pair and used fondant for the laces.  They dried really quickly and kept breaking so my final pair(shown) have string laces.  I can't wait to see pictures of the precious boy.  Everyone is thinking he will be born on Valentine's Day since her due date is the 12th.

Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions of things I should try.

Until next time....Enjoy and keep baking!

--Kaitlin

Titletown USA Celebration

Green Bay Packers are the Superbowl Champs!!!

It has been a great month.  I got to go to California for the first time and see LA.  I went for a childhood friend's wedding.  It was amazing!  And apparently they were having just mind blowing weather for the end of January.  I was ecstatic at how warm it was.  I got to put my feet in the Pacific Ocean and see the Hollywood Walk of Fame.  Then it was a competition for the best event of the weekend: Courtney and Darren's wedding or the Green Bay Packer/ Chicago Bears NFC Championship game.  Luckily, the bride's family are huge supporters of the Packers so we all went to a bar across the street from the hotel.  It was a crazy exciting game and the Packers won!  They are going to the Superbowl!  So this past weekend was the Superbowl and I was excited because I got the day off of work.  Below is the cake I made for the party we threw.  I went all out- our apartment and everything inside was all green and gold.  The cake is just a simple yellow cake dyed green and gold and the frosting was a tasty vanilla frosting.  Enjoy the pictures and please let me know if you have any questions.  Until next time, keep baking!

Kaitlin