4 Dozen Cupcakes and a 60th Birthday Cake!

Whewie, was this week a busy one!  Just moved into a new apartment, went camping with a team from the middle school, and had a BBQ with my own team.  Oh yes, and I also had to make over four dozen cupcakes and a gluten-free 60th birthday cake.

So, this is what my Wednesday started out as (following 1 trip to the store to find gluten-free flour and 1 more, different trip to the store to find strawberries and good butter for buttercream).

You've already seen the chocolate chip cookie dough-filled cupcakes before, but after my students heard about them, I think I would've been run out of town if I didn't show up with them.  "You must bring the cupcakes, Ms. Kovaliv."  "Did you remember to make the cupcakes Ms. Kovaliv?"  "I have to talk to you about cupcakes.  [Enter brief anticipatory pause.]  You're bringing them, right?"  Well, I had no choice.  So, I made 53 cupcakes.  This, after another trip to the store, because I needed 7 cups of powdered sugar, and lo and behold, I only had about 2.  Oh, and vanilla.  I'd run out of vanilla.  (3 store trips, thus far.)

Then, when that was all done, I tried my hand at my first ever gluten-free cake.  My dad keeps telling me that I shouldn't "experiment" when I'm baking on a deadline.  But, I haven't learned my lesson, and I had a minor panic attack when my strawberry gluten-free cakes turned out of the pan like this:

Yes.  That's approximately 3/4" high.  Some cake to celebrate a fabulous 60th birthday, eh?  So, store trip number 4 to buy more gluten-free flour mix.  I usually am a little Martha Stewart in my use of store-bought mixes (i.e. I am admittedly unnecessarily snobbish about my desire to make things from scratch), but when it comes to gluten-free, I trust those mixes more than myself.

Hooray!  A much more acceptable cake structure.  Time to frost and decorate!  But no!  I've run out of eggs!  Store trip #5, ladies and gentlemen.

But here it is!  An entirely gluten-free strawberry and vanilla cake with lemon buttercream frosting and a dark chocolate butterfly to top it all off.

Carnival Cupcake Contest!

So, to raise money for the 8th grade trip to Boston, the middle school held a carnival with a fire truck pull, pie-the-teacher-in-the-face, and other fun little games.  They also had a cupcake contest!  I hemmed and hawed about entering, but then felt really guilty for not contributing.  So in the final hour (because really, when else does baking happen?) the night before the contest, I decided I had the ingredients on hand to make french toast cupcakes with maple buttercream frosting!  

Revel in this little bit of heaven!  There's a crumble layer baked right in with the cupcake, and some cinnamon-sugar sprinkled on top of the frosting to add a little pizzazz!  Thanks to Shelby for the adorable gingham wrappers as they totally sealed the deal on these gems.

There were so many fabulous cupcakes at the carnival that day!  Kids and parents alike entered some delightful looking beauties.  It was a day full of sunshine, smiles, and heavy heavy firetrucks (well, apparently only for the "Intern" team... that truck seemed light as a feather watching other teams pull it!).  Now we're that much closer to Boston!

Dungeons and Dragons!!

So, thanks to grad school, my cake-making has been on a long hiatus.  This week, however, I came out of it to make a cake for a teacher from school!  It's her husband's 40th birthday, and when I asked if she had anything in mind for the cake, I got this: "He's really into Dungeons and Dragons."  ...  this is a no-judgement zone, people.

This is the first cake for which I ever had to do RESEARCH!  My students were instrumental in helping me figure it out, and I learned that a) there are dragons in the game, and b) that 20-sided dice are instrumental, downright crucial for the game.  And thus, this, my re-entry to the cake-making world, was born.

The cake was a simple vanilla with a swiss buttercream frosting.  And my GOODNESS does quality butter make a difference!  Mmm mmm MMM!

Happy 2D20, Adam!

Local Blueberry Cheesecake!

One of my closest friends came up to visit me for what was a perfect Vermont summer weekend.  Blue skies and blue berries were the theme on Saturday, and what a delicious theme it was!  We celebrated the fruits of our berry-picking labor with a cheesecake (my first ever!) covered in sweet blueberry topping and garnished with freshly picked pineapple mint from my garden!  Most of the ingredients in the cheesecake were even from Vermont. We could hardly wait for it to finish setting...

A Sweet Watermelon Treat!

The Fourth of July is one of my favorite holidays.  It is a time to celebrate our country and the things that are the most meaningful to us: friends, family, and of course, fireworks.  The days are long and warm and carefree as you can make them!  It is a time to remember those who have made this country a great one, politics aside, from soldiers to farmers to teachers to... bakers.  :)

I was so happy to get to come home for the Amherst 4th of July parade!  "It never rains on the Amherst 4th of July parade!"  I was even more excited to get to go to my good friend's house for an Independence Day Extravaganza!!  It was a great start to my marathon of fireworks, not to mention all of the delicious food they had!  I thought I'd contribute a little something festive myself, and decided upon these, what I must admit are, quite adorable cookies!

Shortbread Watermelon Cookies! Complete with chocolate chip "seeds" and a white chocolate and green sprinkles "rind"!

Adding a little American flare!

Good enough to take a bite out of!  (Though I promise I didn't!)

Sparkling Wine Cupcakes!

For my 25th birthday, I had lots of people say, "I hope you aren't making your own cake!"  But, I didn't see the problem there, because I love making cake!  That, and using friends as guinea pigs for new recipes, like Sparkling Wine Cupcakes!  The frosting was incredibly light and fluffy and delightful, but I need to learn how to fold egg whites into cake batter...the cupcakes were a little dense, but still flavorful.

Photo Credit: Dana!

And, with the help from Joe, my mom sent me some lovely tulips!  It was nice to get to share my birthday with some close friends! :)

St. Patty's Day Cupcakes

Last New Year's, I found a recipe for Irish Car Bomb cupcakes and thought it would be only appropriate to make some for St. Patrick's Day!  These are supposed to have a whiskey ganache in the center, but I didn't have the ingredients, so I just left that out... but you wouldn't know that from the pictures, would you??  They are Guinness chocolate cupcakes and Bailey's Irish Creme frosting.  Little bit of Irish heaven right here.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Brie!

My adorable niece turned 2 on March 10.  To quote the little love, "March 10's my birthday. I be 2!"  Her Mom and Dad asked me if I could make an owl cake, or cupcakes, for her party, and I was so excited!  I had so many ideas, it was hard to pinpoint just one! 

The cupcakes were vanilla cake, recipe from the back of the King Arthur Cake Flour box, which might be my new favorite vanilla cake.  And the frosting was the swiss buttercream with which I have fallen completely in love!

I still don't love the idea of using fondant, since I don't care for its taste, but have tried my hand at melting chocolate.  It's not a universal switch, but it can be pretty useful!  For the idea of the owl cupcake display, I wanted the owls to be elevated above the letters.  I had seen a post on a blog seen on tastespotting.com a while back about making cupcake stands from chocolate, so I thought I would try to make "tree" stands to hold the owls.

 And it worked!  I fell in love with the goofy little free-form owls.

So when the big birthday party came, I set up the display.  I was pretty happy with the fact that the thought I dreamed up actually came together!

Happy Valentine's Day 2010!

So I decided to try my hand at sugar flowers this Valentine's Day.  Here's what I came up with:

April Fools!  Oh wait... it's a little early for that (but it sure felt like April today)!  No, these are just the beautiful flowers Joe had delivered to my work.  Aww.


For real, though, nobody's gonna lay a finger on Joe's Butterfinger-themed Valentine!  So, one of Joe's favorite candies is Butterfinger, so I thought I would make him some Butterfinger cupcakes for Valentine's Day!  My concern was how to keep that characteristic Butterfinger "crunch" in a baked dessert.  So, I decided to make some Butterfinger cookie dough balls and put them in the center of chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting.  By freezing the dough balls before hand, I hoped that they wouldn't soften up the Butterfinger pieces on the inside.  Fortunately, I was right!  I made far too many Butterfinger-cookie dough balls, though, so Joe got a few cupcakes and a bunch more Butterfinger truffle balls.

I know you can't see the "truffle" filling, but it's in there.  My peanut butter frosting didn't work out the way I intended it to, but I think it turned out pretty well!  Those are also little Butterfinger hearts on the top.  Aww.

Happy Valentine's Day Eve!

I've been wanting to try lava cakes for a while now.  Warm, gooey chocolate oozing out of a soft cakey shell...it would rouse even the most lackluster of a person, inciting pure bliss with every fork-full.

So, what better time to try it out than tonight, making a Valentine's Eve treat for my fabulous roommates to show just how fabulous they are?!  Topped with some freshly made vanilla bean whipped cream and fresh (ish) strawberries, I must say, this one turned out pretty well.  

  

 It was gooey, and oozy, and cakey.

Happy Valentine's Day, indeed!