Going on a Mission

My oldest nephew is going on a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and he is having a mission farewell party, and I offered to bring the cake!  He requested a raspberry cake.  Missionaries in the LDS church have to wear a white dress shirt and tie at all times, and a black name tag which identifies them as a missionary.  My nephew's invitation to his party was fashioned as a dress shirt and tie, so I thought it would be fun to create a sugar paste version to decorate his cake with!  The cake is raspberry cake filled with white chocolate raspberry mousse, and frosted with raspberry cream cheese frosting.  It is a raspberry lover's dream!

Here's the invitation with the sugar paste version.

I added a nametag, which the invitation did not have.

Recipe Testing

I had leftover homemade cranberry sauce from the Christmas Eve dinner, and I thought it would be yummy in a frosting on chocolate cake.  So, I tested it out:

I used American (powdered sugar) buttercream for these, because cranberries are so tart, I thought they could use a sweeter background than Swiss buttercream provides.  They were extremely delicious.  I loved the tart pop of the berry bits in the frosting!  I topped each with a glazed berry.

Christmas Eve!

Every year my husband's family has a Christmas Eve party.  This is a big deal, because there are 16 adults and 35 children in his family!  I almost always host it, because I am nuts that way, and actually enjoy making food and entertaining large amounts of people, but since I had just had surgery, my sister in law said she would do it this year.  I still made the cake, though, and a turkey as well!  For the cake, I polled some of the family members and they requested a coconut cake.  I made the cake in two sheet pans and then cut squares of 1 inch decreasing size.  I coated the outside in shredded coconut mixed with some festive holiday sprinkles, and topped it with some stars I made out of sugar paste.  It was very Christmas-y and delicious too!

I ended up with extra cake, frosting, and coconut/sprinkles, so I made cake balls for the first time.  "Bakerella," the original inventor of cake balls, makes hers by mixing cake scraps with frosting until it makes a sort of dough.  Then you form it into balls, dip it into dipping chocolate, and decorate it however you want.  I dipped mine into guittard premium white chocolate, and then rolled them into the coconut/sprinkles.  After the chocolate set up, they were just like an amazing coconut truffle!  The texture of the center was unbelievable, and the flavor was so good - I have to admit, I think these may be even better than the cake itself!

A Wedding for My Sister

My sister and her husband were married a couple of years ago, but they never did have a reception, and a lot of the family was unable to attend their ceremony.  So, since my sister and her husband had flown out to help me with my surgery recovery, I decided to throw her a reception and make them a cake!  Our grandfather is a retired minister, so he agreed to perform a vow renewal ceremony for them.  I made the wedding cake, and all the hors d'oeuvres for the reception - I baked and cooked from 7 am to 7 pm the day of the reception!  And then, I attended the reception, danced, and cleaned up afterward!  It was really fun, and my sister and her husband and all their guests had a wonderful time!

A few days before the ceremony, I made the flowers.  I did wild roses, calla lilies, little white "filler" flowers, leaves, and black twisties.  I also made a monogrammed topper for their cake.  The cake had alternating layers of chocolate cake and vanilla bean cake with chocolate Swiss buttercream between layers and vanilla bean buttercream outside.  My sister did not want fondant, as she does not like the taste of it.  It is trickier to do a buttercream finish, as you can't touch the sides at all when stacking the tiers as you can if you cover it with fondant.  In any case, it turned out beautiful and was extremely delicious!

Merry Christmas Neighbors!

Every year, I love to make treat plates and take them around to my neighbors!  This year I did 20 treat plates of two different kinds.

The first plate contains vanilla French macarons filled with dark chocolate ganache, milk chocolate almond toffee and a decorated sugar cookie.

 The second plate contains homemade mint hot cocoa mix, homemade marshmallows, and vanilla French macarons filled with vanilla bean Swiss buttercream.

 The marshmallows were fun to make - I had never made them before, but I've been seeing them a lot on other baking blogs.  They end up with a really amazing texture and flavor, and they melt in the hot cocoa really nicely!  Merry Christmas, neighbors!

Trachea Cake

I went to see my surgeon for a follow up scope to see how my trachea is healing.  It is looking really good, right on track, and I'm feeling great.  I made my surgeon a thank-you cake: a trachea complete with scalpel and blood!  It's a chocolate cake with raspberry buttercream and raspberry sauce with a sugar paste scalpel.  The surgeon loved it, and got a picture of me and him with the cake.  Everyone in the office was excited about it!

Gingerbread Fun

I had a cupcake order this week; my first order since the surgery.  I made gingerbread cupcakes filled with spiced apple filling and topped with vanilla bean cream cheese frosting.  I made some gingerbread cookie trees frosted with royal icing to go on top.  I had some leftover gingerbread cookie dough, too, so my kids and I decorated some gingerbread men!

Happy Birthday Sandi

It was my friend, Sandi's birthday this week, so I made her a mini chocolate cake with vanilla bean cream cheese frosting!  It's a delicious combination with the rich, moist dark chocolate cake and the tangy cream cheese frosting, full of lovely little vanilla bean specks!  I am recovering from my surgery nicely, so it was easier to make this cake than the last one!

Sweet Potato Cake

It was my stepdad's birthday this week, so I made him a sweet potato cake with toasted marshmallow filling and brown sugar cinnamon buttercream.  The cake had bits of crystallized ginger folded into the batter, and the filling was vanilla buttercream with real toasted marshmallows (toasted under the broiler) folded in, so you got crispy toasted marshmallow bits in every bite.  The cake was moist and spicy, the filling sweet, and the brown sugar cinnamon buttercream was just the right touch to finish it off!  I made royal icing pansies to go on top.  I was still very tired from my hospital stay, so the decorating job was not my best, as it wore me out to do it, but I was happy to be able to bake again!

Moon Pies

My sister came out to stay with me while I recovered from my surgery. She's been helping with the kids and housework, which is great!  She did the grocery shopping too, and bought a box of moon pies.  They are two cookies with marshmallow in the middle, dipped in "chocolate flavored coating."  I knew I could make a homemade version that would blow them out of the water!  I made round sugar cookies and melted marshmallows between them when the cookies were still hot from the oven.  When they were cooled and set, I dipped the cookies in melted chocolate.  They were extremely delicious!