My First Official Wedding Cake!!

While last week was full of a little nerves and stress, I am so thrilled to say that I made my first official wedding cake and it went off rather smoothly.  I was definately very proud seeing it all finished on the cake table during the reception.  Hours of hard work planning and preparing had paid off and I was thrilled that it was for a great friend and his beautiful new bride.

 Thanks Errin & Heather for trusting me with creating your wedding cake and helping with the photography.  Your day was beautiful and I hope it was more than you ever dreamed it could be.  Congrats again!!

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Cow Themed Birthday Cake

This past weekend was my nephews birthday.  I have a few wedding cakes coming up and I wanted to practice making tiered cakes and using fondant, so they lucked out and got a really big birthday cake!  Both boys love being on the farm, with the littlest one being a bit cow crazy, so the theme was not too hard to come up with.  Here are a few pictures of the end result.  The boys loved to see it, and the crowd thought it tasted pretty good too!

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Hockey Stick Cake!

Hockey is a very important part of our family, so it was only fitting to make our nephew a hockey stick cake for his 9th Birthday.  I baked a square cake and cut it into pieces to make it into a hockey stick.  It is covered with buttercream icing. Mmmm!



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Green Panda Bear

My newphew Kyle decided that he wanted a panda bear for his birthday party so I decided to make him a 3-D bear, as the kids always seem to love them.  His favourite colour is green, so we decided to make a green and white panda, instead of black and white.  For a special little touch, I put his initials on the paws...all of the kids noticed this detail right away- before the adults!

    

By doing the bear with these colours, I saw how easily the 3-D bear could be made into a Care Bear too!  I might need to try that this summer.

Check back in the coming days for more peanut butter treats.  I made some but they all got eaten before I took pictures so I will need to make another batch!  But trust me, they are delicious, and pretty easy too!

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Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

Peanut Butter Recipe #2: Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

I was first introduced to Peanut Butter Cup Cookies by my sister-in-law a few years back.  Since then I have found the following recipe online at allrecipes.com and I use it all the time.  I make these cookies at Christmas to share with family and friends and they are always a hit.

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk
40 miniature chocolate covered peanut butter cups, unwrapped

Directions

1.Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.  Sift together the flour, salt and baking soda; set aside.

2.Cream together the butter, sugar, peanut butter and brown sugar until fluffy. Beat in the egg, vanilla and milk.

3. Add the flour mixture; mix well.

4.Shape into 40 balls and place each into an ungreased mini muffin pan.
 

 

5.Bake at 375 degrees for about 8 minutes. Remove from oven and immediately press a mini peanut butter cup into each ball. Cool and carefully remove from pan.

A few changes I have made:

I usually make them in a regular size muffin pan. Of course, you will only get 20-30 cookies instead of 40. 

I used half a teaspoon vanilla extract and half a teaspoon almond extract last time and they turned out great.

ENJOY!



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Peanut Butter Goodness!

Peanut Butter.  Yum!  What more do I need to say?  I have several delicious recipes that I am going to share over the coming week that will make you love peanut butter too.  Please feel free to leave a comment with more delicious peanut butter recipes! mmm!

There is a super cute cupcake and candy store here in OKC called Pinkitzel.  I admit that I may have eaten a few delicious cupcakes from this lovely store, but I always think that I can make them too- and for alot cheaper!  Just the other day, one of my good friends got a craving for a Peanut Butter Cupcake after trying one from this store.  I convinced her to let me make her some (yes, it was REALLY hard to convince her of that- haha!) and set off to find a recipe.

I ended up making German Chocolate cupcakes (yes, from a box) with Peanut Butter Buttercream Icing.  Since I did Wilton cake decorating classes, I like to use their recipes since I know they will be good for decorating.  It is delicious and went great with the chocolate cupcakes. 

The following recipe yields about 3 cups of icing.  I halfed the recipe and had more than enough icing for 12 cupcakes and a small cake.  ENJOY!!

Wilton Peanut Butter Buttercream Icing

Ingredients:

•1/3 cup solid vegetable shortening
•1/3 cup butter
•3/4 cup peanut butter
•1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
•4 cups (approx. 1 lb.) confectioners' sugar, sifted
•4-6 tablespoons milk

Cream shortening and butter with electric mixer. Add peanut butter and vanilla.  Add sugar, one cup at a time, beating well. Next, add milk, one tablespoon at a time, and beat at medium speed until light and fluffy.

 Refrigerated in an airtight container, this icing can be stored 2 weeks. Re-whip before using.


For a little added touch of peanut butter goodness, I cut a Reese Peanut Butter Cup into several pieces and stuck it into the icing on top.

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Candy Cane Cookies.

I know that Christmas has come and gone but I still wanted to share these wonderful, delicious treats that I made.  I used a recipe from a Company's Coming cookbook that I got as a wedding gift.  It is from Most Loved Treats.  I did a quick google search and found it online, including other similar recipes with other variations, so if you are interested, you can check them out here.  The second recipe is the same one I used, by Company's Coming.

Once you have made the dough, they suggest seperating it into two pieces, and colouring one of them red.  As you can see, I decided to use green as well, so seperated the dough into three pieces.

It took me a few tries to get the right amount of dough to roll out nice, and I even twisted them wrong the first few times.  Not that it still didn't work, but when I finally figured it out, it was much easier.  My first few cookies were also huge.  It was easier to roll out with more dough, but trust me that you should stick to the suggested 1 tsp. of each colour.  Roll out each colour and then pinch the edges together. 

Next twist the two rolls several times, and then shape into a candy cane.  Don't over complicate it like I did.  To start I tried to keep the bottom of the cookie flat- don't!  Here is what your cookie will look like with one twist...then do a bunch more!

I made red and white candy canes, green and white candy canes, and red and green candy canes.  So many options and everyone loved them.  Mmmm!

Bake at 350 F for 10 mins, cool and enjoy!

I hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday and is enjoying the new year so far! 

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Merry Christmas Sprinkled With Love!

I was very excited to receive the Kitchenaid Professional 5+ 5 quart stand mixer in metalic chrome colour from my parents for Christmas.  What a great gift that will keep on giving!  I can't wait to use it and to share my creations with all of you!

Since it is rather big and quite heavy, I sadly had to leave it at home. :(  I can't wait for the summer when I get to go home and use this wonderful new gift.  Thanks Mom and Dad!!

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Smash Cake Fun

I just wanted to add a link to Fresh Photography and some cute pictures she took.  Shawna ordered a giant cupcake for one of her clients to smash...it was for a first birthday photo shoot.  Check out some of the fun here:

http://www.fresh-photography.ca/blog/?p=221

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Finnish Pancakes

I first got introduced to Finnish Pancakes when my husband was playing hockey in Manchester, NH and living with a Finnish couple.  I  loved to visit, especially when Meri made delicious Finnish Pancakes to eat while playing a game of Sequence.  I sadly lost Meri's recipe, but have since found a new one that I like as well.  Meri would always make a big, thinner pancake by pouring the batter onto a cookie sheet.  I have done this, as well as cooking them in a 9x13 cake pan, as I did this time.  Both work great. While searching online, I noticed that some people cook them in a frying pan on the stove too.

The following is the recipe that I have been using the last few years.  I am sure I found it online, but am having trouble relocating it so that I can add a link.  If I find it, I promise to link it to my blog!  Until then, here are the basic instructions.

Ingredients:
3 Tbsp. butter
3/4 Cup flour
3 eggs, beaten
2 Cups milk
3 Tbsp sugar
1/4 tsp. salt

First, place the butter in a 9x13 pan and place it in the oven while it preheats to 400 F. 
Meanwhile, beat eggs, add flour, milk, sugar and salt.  Beat well.  Pour batter into hot, melted butter.  Bake for 30 mins.  I usually poke it with a fork about 20 mins in.  ( If you use a cookie sheet make sure to do this more often).

Here is a picture of my baked Finnish pancake.  

I like to add whipped cream & strawberries and serve it as dessert!  Mmmm, sooo good!  You can serve it with other fruit, syrup, jams, or any other delicious combination you can think of!

The leftovers are good too.  Just warm them up in the microwave and they are just as good as when they come out of the oven.

Enjoy!

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