Laissez les bon temps rouler!

Or in English…”Let the good times roll!”

It is times like these that I really miss Pensacola (Florida).  Today is Fat Tuesday.  If you live anywhere other than Louisiana, Florida, Alabama, or Mississippi, this might mean a few beads and some masks.  However, if you are a true southerner, Mardi Gras season is a lifestyle.  The New Orleans’ influence spread throughout the south and it is not unusual for people to take a day or week off of work to celebrate.  Beads, beer, bushwhackers, beignets, and more are found in abundance at parties, on the streets, at masquerade balls, in parades, schools, and workplaces.  Mardi Gras is a time for everyone to celebrate life and happiness and for many, the preparation for Lent.  Fat Tuesday is a day of serious indulgence before Ash Wednesday.

You cannot throw a Mardi Gras party without the ultimate Fat Tuesday centerpiece…the King Cake.  This cake is a Danish creation rolled up jelly roll style and filled with cinnamon, raisins, and more.

The tradition is that each person takes a piece of cake hoping to find the plastic baby inside (I think my cake was cut perfectly…the baby reaching out for someone to pull it from the cake!).  Whomever finds the plastic baby in their piece is crowned King or Queen for the day.  They are also supposedly obligated to host the Mardi Gras party the next year and supply the King Cake.

You can order your cake from an authentic bakery in New Orleans or elsewhere in the south.  They are shipped all over the nation around Mardi Gras.  OR you can make your own!  It really is not difficult, though it does involve yeast and rising time.  I found an excellent recipe here at allrecipes.com.

Instead of doing all the proofing, rising, and kneading on my own, I stuck the ingredients in my bread machine.  For most machines you start with the liquids first (I did use warm milk and softened the butter in the microwave).  Then you put all the dry ingredients in and make a well in the top of the mound of flour.  This is where you put the yeast (no proofing and letting it bubble in with the sugar, etc.).  When using a machine you do not want to let the yeast and liquids mix (I also keep it away from the salt) until the heat is spreading through the dough.

You see though, I only have a 1.5 pound bread machine.  The most dry ingredients (I think all combined) you are supposed to put in the machine is 4 cups.  The recipe calls for 5.5 cups of just flour.  Guess what happens when you don’t follow directions?

Oops!  Hee hee, silly me!  Really though, I would probably do it the same way again, even though my dough tried to escape from the machine!  It was still a time saver and still rose perfectly fine.

After the first rising you roll the dough out into a rectangle and sprinkle the crumb mixture evenly over the rectangle.  Then roll it up jellyroll style beginning on a long side, pinching the seam firmly together.

Repeat the process with the second half of dough and place on a piece of parchment paper on a large cookie sheet, forming a ring.  Again, press the two ends together on each side of the ring, firmly sealing the ring.  Here is the ring after cutting slits in it, and again after the second rising.

HOW DO I LET MY BREAD RAISE???  Thank you for asking!  I preheat my oven to 175 degrees and then turn it off!  Crack the oven door open with a wooden spoon and after it has had about 5 minutes to air out, put the dough in the oven.  This should provide the perfect temperature for the next hour or so to allow your bread to rise.

After it has fully risen, bake it in the preheated oven, cut a small hole in the bottom and stick the baby inside and drizzle the topping over it.  I let my cake rise for a LONG time.  This caused two problems.  One, I should have baked it for about 5 minutes less (possibly even shorter).  The outside was SO tough.  But the inside was still great and it tasted wonderful.  Two, I had to quadruple, yes, quadruple the icing recipe so I would have enough to cover the cake.

Make sure everyone knows there is a baby in the cake before they start eating!  These days with choking precautions, etc, a lot of people will simply put the babies on top as decorations.

Decorate it with some beads and Mardi Gras colorfulness and you are ready to party with the best of them!  So here is my ode to Pensacola Mardi Gras…I’m with you even if only in spirit.

Tags: King Cake, mardi gras, Marissa

Marissa vs. Chocolate

Do you ever have those days?  You know, the ones that you wake up totally unaware of how terrible it is going to be?!?!  I certainly do and this day was no exception.  The day proved to bring on a serious match for me. 

In one corner, 5 inches tall and weighing in at 5 pounds, born from a serious love for all things chocolate, the infamous Chocolate Bomb cake.  His opponent, 5’10”, blankety blank blank pounds, brunette, known to her friends as Betty “the Beat” Crocker…Marissa.  The battle began in the early hours of the afternoon.  Marissa started out with a quick mix, tossing all the ingredients she had at the Bomb.  After throwing in some serious heat (350 degrees to be exact), the Bomb took a shot back and came out swinging and burning.  Marissa went at him again, pouring in a whole other round of flour power, beaten eggs and some pudding to make him extra gushy.  She came out ahead after this one and the two proceeded on to the next round.  The Bomb resisted the gooiness of the ganache and went all grainy on Marissa…creating the necessity for ANOTHER repeat.  He was trying to slowly wear her down and stomp all over her gusto and glory.  Marissa, “the Beat,” wasn’t through yet.  Oh no.  She melted the Bomb’s ganache the second time like the Wicked Witch of the West.  She covered the Bomb with a right, then a left, then a solid pass around the top of him.  It looked like there was no hope left and he was done for.  Finally defeated by the super mom.  But wait.  What’s this?  Marissa is getting into the car to leave and what does the Bomb pull out in the final minutes of the match???  That’s right!  He slides to the right and INTO the wall of the ring, smooshing his ooey gooey frosting all over the ropes!  His beautiful icing detail work all a mess!  Marissa has been conquered!!!  She falls to the ground as the crowd is yelling “boos” and “oos.”  She cries back, hands over her eyes “Not right now kids!  Leave Mommy alone!!!!”

That was at 6:32.  The cake was supposed to be in my friend’s hands at 6:30.  I ran into the house, scraped off the damaged buttercream, whipped up a new batch and re-iced the details.  I managed to get it over to her house by 7:00 after threatening my son’s life if he were to tilt, drop or squish that cake.  Well, not really, but I’m sure HE felt that way!

I have made this cake a MILLION times.  It is by far my favorite, and popular with everyone else who has tried it.  I am certainly no master baker, but I am proud of my Chocolate Bomb.  I guess we ALL have our off days. 

Tags: Baking, Cake Decorating

Super Bowl Cake

Are you ready for some football??? Okay, so the game is really over and the Packers won already.  However, my big task of the day was creating a Super Bowl cake for a party and I wanted to share it before I got into bed tonight.  The party was for some die-hard Steelers fans.  Hopefully, they’ll atill be friendly people tomorrow after the loss!  It was a close, good game and fun was had by all, so I would definitely deem it a success!  Here is the Super Bowl cake I made.  I basically copied a cake I found on the internet related to Super Bowl 2009.  I made very few changes to work with what I had and this was the result:

I was pretty darn happy with the result and so were the people hosting the party.  No fancy flavors here…just one layer of chocolate and one layer of vanilla (11 x 15).  The icing is all fondant except for the black and white lettering.  This took four cake mixes, two batches of fondant and three batches of buttercream icing.  A LOT of sugar to deal with today!!! 

Maybe next time Steelers!

Tags: buttercream, cake, football, Marissa, marshmallow fondant, super bowl

Marissa’s Mudslide

I broke my foot.  I think.  If not, I definitely sprained it.  Well, it may just be horrendously bruised.  Whatever the case, it HURTS!  Surely some crazy lady down in Florida who has broken both feet on separate occasions in the last six months, sent her no good, super voodoo bad luck up to me in Virginia and I am in some serious pain.  I’m not naming any names or anything, but thanks Jennifer!

I am supposed to be running a 14K in 9 days.  I have my first ever marathon scheduled in less than 7 weeks.  ARGH!!!  The doc’s visit is this afternoon, so I am on pins and needles to hear what he has to say about my poor little foot.  What am I going to do with myself now that I can’t run my 40 + miles this week?  Bake!  Hey, if I’m going to sit around and do nothing, I am going to make sure those are some GOOD calories I am earning!  Of course, during my first whole day of “taking it easy,” I cleaned the kitchen, went to the library, Wal-mart, and the Dollar Tree, took care of my dogs and my two kids, and baked a cake!  I know, I know, I know.  I don’t want to hear about it.  Especially from you Mom!!!  I am being careful and keeping the weight off of it as much as possible.  Unfortunately, life does not stop with a hurt foot, especially when the hubby is out to sea.  See!!!  It is true, EVERYTHING needs fixing as soon as they LEAVE!!! ;o)

I am trying to look on the bright side of the situation and use this as an opportunity to catch up on the things I usually don’t take the time to sit and do: knitting, internet searching, and cake inspiration hunting to name a few. 

Today’s inspiration came from a lovely liquor sitting on the shelf of my bar…Bailey’s Irish Cream.  I wanted to create a recipe on my own completely from scratch that held all the terrific tastes of a classic Bailey’s drink – the Mudslide.  There are a few things I will do differently next time, but I was so excited to hit the nail on the head the first time!!!  It was delicious and a perfect treat to sit and talk over with a friend and a couple of mugs of hot cocoa.  Just look at the marbling in that cake!!!  It was even prettier to cut into!  I marbled a chocolate cake recipe (next time I will add the Kahlua to actually make it a mudslide) and an Irish Cream cake to create the amazing flavors in this dessert.  Each bite was so good it most certainly must have been bad!!!

I think I am going to have to keep the recipe for myself, but I still wanted to share in my excitement and the cake came out so gosh darn pretty, I just had to post it!  I went searching for mudslide cake recipes so I would have SOMETHING to share with you and came across this one.  It is very different from mine, but probably worth trying if you really want a go at it on your own (though it should be noted that they posted that the cake turned out dry by some peoples’ account).

Valentine’s Box of Chocolate Cupcakes

Don’t know what to get your Valentine for that special day this year?  Instead of the typical stuffed bear and box of chocolates why don’t you try this box of Valentine cupcakes?  It was super fun to make and a great excuse to play with all the different designing techniques involved when it comes to icing.  I had most of the materials on hand but did buy a few things like the chocolate hearts and the sugared jelly cherry hearts.

This, of course was very dangerous because every cherry heart that was not put on a cupcake was put in my mouth.  Ugh…so much for today’s calorie counting!!!  A few items I used to decorate: red hots, chocolate covered sunflower seeds in purple, chocolate hearts filled with caramel, and the m&m’s to fill the box. 

The cupcakes in this box are mint chocolate chip with mint icing and snickerdoodles with buttercream icing.  Since I knew I would be putting the time into the decorating, I took the “box shortcut” (as seen in the recipes below).  Of course, any flavors would be great.  If I were making several of these at one time I would make all sorts of flavors so there would be an assortment like a true box of chocolates.  Next time, I will also probably stick with four or five designs for the tops of the cupcakes and just repeat them over and over.  My inspiration for this came from the Hello Cupcake Blog.  I am very happy with the results and I think I did a pretty good job recreating it.  What a great, different idea for your important someone!

Mint Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

• 1 box triple chocolate fudge cake mix and all ingredients box mix requires
• 1 teaspoon mint extract
• 11/2 cups chocolate chips

Follow recipe as given on box but add in extract and chocolate chips.  Bake as directed on box

Mint Buttercream

• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon mint extract
• 4 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted
• 2 – 3 tablespoons milk

Cream butter and shortening until smooth.  Mix in extracts and confectioners’ sugar.  Add milk until you have reached desired spreading/piping consistency.

Snickerdoodle Cupcakes

• 1 box yellow cake mix (I used butter recipe) and all ingredients box mix requires
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon

Follow recipe as given on box but add in cinnamon.

Buttercream

• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted
• 2 – 3 tablespoons milk

Which one is your favorite cupcake in the picture???

and Hoosier Homemade Cupcake Tuesday!

Tags: chocolate, Cupcake, decorating, dessert, gift, Marissa, valentine's day

JoAnna Banana Cake

*UPDATE!*  First and foremost, this cake has been aptly renamed JoAnna Banana Cake after my wonderful MIL who came up with the idea.  Secondly…OH. MY. GOSH. This cake was F-A-B-U-L-O-U-S.  I brought it to a neighbor’s for a New Years Eve party and I am pretty sure I saw eyes rolling back into some people’s head in ecstasy.  I know, paints quite a picture, hmm?  When I posted this I had only tried some extra cake with some extra peanut butter frosting.  Putting it all together in the cake with the layers of peanut butter frosting and the chocolate on top made this one of the most remarkable cakes I have ever eaten in my life.  The cooking style of the banana cake made it incredibly moist and a terrific choice to mix with the peanut butter and chocolate tastes.  I can claim no credit for this because if it weren’t for JoAnna Banana it never would have happened!

Original post:

After a conversation with my mother-in-law the other day, my husband and I decided I just had to try to create this cake.  My MIL had whipped up a quick lunch for herself the other day – slices of banana bread with peanut butter on top.  She told my husband about it and they joked how if you stuck them together and dipped them in chocolate it would be the perfect meal.  So, well, WHY NOT???  The challenge was on.  I went searching for a few banana cake recipes but none of them were exactly what I wanted.  I found one that was close enough and put my own spin on it.  I added a few ingredients like chocolate chips and pudding mix and changed a few other things like sour cream instead of buttermilk.

To fill the cake I used a peanut butter buttercream recipe that I ADORE and my ever faithful chocolate ganache to top it off!!!  Peanut butter sandwich dipped in chocolate!  I only wish my MIL was here to taste it.  I am sure she would LOVE it.

Banana Peanut Butter Chocolate Sandwich Cake.  I know the name is a mouthful, but you should try the cake!  It really is a party in your mouth.  Very rich with the crazy combination of bold flavors, but I don’t feel like it is too much.  All three, the chocolate, banana, and peanut butter hold their own in this cake and combined make it EXPLOSIVE!  That, of course, makes it perfect to bring to the new years celebration we are attending tomorrow.

Thanks for the idea J!  It’s awesome!  (Pics to come later).

Tags: Bananas, cake, chocolate, Marissa, peanut butter

PREGGERS!!!

What a FUN new cake I made today!!!  A friend in the neighborhood is pregnant with her second child…a boy.  Gee, imagine that…me with a pregnant friend!  She has an older son, but there are several years between the two children and she and her husband are starting fresh with all the fun goods and excitement with baby number two!  Today is her baby shower and my wonderful friend who is throwing it, enlisted my services to make a baby shower cake.  We looked in books and magazines and just couldn’t really decide what to do.  Our friend, J, is not doing the uber baby theme for the little guy.  No pastels, no ducks, no choo choos.  Though I would be the exact same way, it also made it a little hard to choose a cake!

My friend spoke to J’s sister and after they did some searching online they decided on this pregnant belly cake.  I have to admit, at first I didn’t think it would be something down J’s alley, but sis knows best!  As I started working on it, my first thoughts were “Oh, I don’t know that this is going to come out as pretty as the pictures they found!”  As you can see in step one with the chocolate belly and yellow boobs, it wasn’t exactly the shining example of a beautiful cake shape.  But lo…I trudged on and continued to the next few steps.

I was very proud of my awesome buttercream crumb layer and proceeded to make my usual marshmallow fondant.  I died it with plenty of Wilton Teal food coloring and draped it over the figure.

“Okay, maybe this won’t be so bad after all.”

I trimmed the edges and added a little bit of detail before dealing with the brown fondant.  I have recently discovered that making brown fondant, and any brown icing for that matter, is not an easy task.  Basically, if you want a dark brown, you need to add chocolate to the mix.  The brown icing coloring is just not enough to do the job.  Some recommend melting chocolate and kneading it in to your fondant.  Others say to add cocoa powder.  I chose the former and boy was it messy!  I’ll try the latter next time, just to be able to compare easy of mixing.  I used the chocolate to create the trim on the pregnant cake’s bustline, as well as to add some accents to the dress.

I. AM. SO. HAPPY. with the way this turned out as you can see at the top of the page.  It if weren’t 1:20 in the morning right now, I would be sending pictures of it over my phone to everyone I know!  I cannot wait to bring it to the party tomorrow and I hope everyone loves it…especially J!

Linking up to:

Tags: baby shower, cake, fondant, Marissa, marshmallow fondant, pregnant, pregnant belly cake

Little Princess Birthday Cake

Finally the time has rolled around this year that not only did I get to make another fun cake, but it was for my very own little girl!  Little K turned 5 this year and was DYING to have a big party with all of her friends.  Her birthday is in the middle of the summer and everyone was on vacation at one time or another, so we decided to wait and celebrate right before school started.  We are so blessed with the amazing friends we have who pitched in to help set up, celebrate, and clean up!  Especially with my hubby gone!  The party was princess themed and it was the perfect opportunity for me to get to doll up a cake.  There were over 40 people at the party when you include the kids and the parents (I told you we are blessed!) so I went big with a 3 tiered cake. 

I covered the cake in pink rolled marshmallow fondanton two layers (both chocolate) and white in the middle (yellow cake).  The stars and stripes cut outs and the balls along the bottom were also fondant.  The “bling” around the bottom of the top two layers is rock candy.  I searched everywhere until I remembered the best place to buy something like rock candy is Cracker Barrel!  I also put some “bling” in the middle of each star on the cake.  Last but not least, the crown.  I tried to make a fondant crown and it was actually quite cute!  Unfortunately, as soon as I tried to move it from the wax paper I had it drying on, it broke :(.  This was definitely a foreseeable problem, so I had a back up plan and simply placed a tiara on top of the cake.  It probably ended up looking a lot cuter!!

So, there you go!  A cute little princess cake.  I was very please with the results, and apparently everone else was too because it was almost gone!  Okay, so I might have been cutting the pieces a little big, but not that big. 

Oh, and thank you to all of the friends who stayed behind and helped me jump my car after my battery was dead!  You’re the best!

Happy Birthday Baby!!!

Tags: birthday, cake, Marissa, marshmallow fondant, party, princess

Anniversary Cupcakes…Completed!

Yay!  The day is here!  The cupcakes for my friend are done and they were a big hit at her anniversary party!  Today I am going to show you the process of putting them together.  This was a super fun project and I cannot wait to try more new things with cupcakes!  I definitely stretched the limit with how many different things you can do to one cupcake, but I think they still looked cute!  I little busy, but still funky and fun.  I was so happy to be able to make these for J on her special day.

First I iced the refrigerated cupcakes (super chocolate with chips recipe…YUM!) with the basic buttercream icing recipe.  One batch was enough to cover all of the cupcakes and still have enough to color pink and put the dollop on the top.  After I put the white icing on, I dipped the top of the cupcake into white sugar sprinkles.  Just make sure to put enough of the sprinkles in a bowl and dip the cupcake top in before the icing hardens.

Next I placed the pink icing I colored into a piping bag with a decorative tip.  Anything with a larger opening will do.  I made a quick pink swirl on the top of each cupcake.  It is so tempting to just swipe those right off with your finger and eat them!

After I put the “cherry on top” I CAREFULLY placed a candy heart in the middle of each cake, gently pushing the long bottom into the cake like a pick.  These are incredibly fragile, so be gentle!

I then put each of the “D and J” fondant pieces on each cupcake, making sure it didn’t over crowd the candy hearts too much! 

Last, but most certainly not least, came the homemade cupcake wrappers!  How FUN!  These were such a blast to make and I think they came out so cute!  I placed them in a white cake box (with a cardboard piece in the bottom) for transport.  The only thing that I really had to learn with this project: make sure your cupcakes aren’t too tall when they are finished!  The hearts were already pushing on the top of the box and then when I had to slam on the breaks on my way to dinner….at least 1/3 of the heart pieces broke.  The great heartbreak of 2010.  So sad…but the ones that were still together were still awesome.

Happy Anniversary D and J!!!

Tags: anniversary, buttercream, Cupcake Toppers, Cupcakes, Hearts, icing, sprinkles

Anniversary Cupcake Toppers

To continue with my posts about the cupcakes I am working on for J for her anniversary, tonight is a quick one about the toppers I am making.  I have decided I am going to take this opportunity to try a whole lot of different things that I haven’t done yet.  So far, I have made the cupcake wrappers and a candy heart topper.  Tonight is an additional topper, made out of rolled fondant.  I only needed a small amount of fonday so I decided I didn’t want to make my own.  I went ahead and bought the Wilton rolled fondant from the store and was incredibly disappointed.  That is the first time, to my knowledge I have actually tried pre-made fondant.  No wonder everyone always complains about the way fondant tastes!  I will stick with my marhsmallow fondant!  It is SO worth the effort!  In any case, since I was only making little toppers I still used the rolled fondant.

I rolled the fondant out on a surface sprinkled with cornstarch.  I then cut the fondant into the appropriate sized pieces using a pizza cutter (best way to cut the fondant in my opinion).  I used some of my (clean) rubber stamps to stamp the initials D and J for the lovely married couple of 7 years!  I wish I had an ampersand stamp to put in the middle, but didn’t, so I used a star.

After I cut and stamped the pieces I laid them on a water bottle covered in a piece of parchment paper so they pieces would dry out in the curved shape I wanted.  From beginning to end this only took about 20 – 30 minutes.

Tags: Cupcake Toppers, Cupcakes, decorating, fondant