Cake of the Living Dead.

My friend recently had a birthday, and I wanted to make him a cake – not just your everyday cake either. This is a friend I’ve known for quite some time, and who is fully aware of what I can do in the kitchen. So, I couldn’t just slap something together and call it his birthday cake – no – this cake needed to be….different. It also needed to be personal. I wanted it to be something that reflected my friend’s interests…something that he’d cherish always, and think back on for years to come. “Remember when you made me that awesome blah blah blah cake in 2013? Best. Cake. Ever.” Yeah, I wanted him to be able to say that. I wanted him to look at this cake and feel like he was looking in a confectionery mirror of his own life…

the baking dead.

Yep. It’s a zombie cake. Not only is there a zombie on top of the cake, but the cake itself is strawberry – so it’s like you’re taking a bite of mushy brains – just like a zombie would.

cake or brains?

My friend loved the cake, and I do believe it will be one he’ll always remember. After all, not many people can say they ate a zombie.

 

Shimmy, Shimmy, Coconut Cake (with Lemon Buttercream).

My Mom’s birthday recently passed (she share’s her special day with Abraham Lincoln, as a matter of fact), and of course I did what I do best, and baked her a birthday cake. Last summer, I had made a Lemon Coconut Cake that she was particularly fond of, and went as far as saying that I should make that cake for her. So…that’s just what i did. I used my recipe for the cake (you can find it here), but I did something a little different for the frosting this time. Instead of using lemon juice or real lemons, I used lemon extract. I know, it sounds like cheating; but if you had tasted this icing, you’d cheat too. It may have been my favorite icing to date, and I’m not even a big fan of lemon desserts! If you don’t believe me, try it for yourself – the recipe is at the end of this post You can thank me later.

baked birthday bliss.

Once I had iced the cake with the lemon buttercream and covered it with fresh coconut, I felt like something was still missing. It needed a topper. The cake I made last summer had a cherry on top – that looked great! But I didn’t have any cherries…so I began scanning the kitchen for something that could work. Being it was just before Valentine’s Day, I had a container of conversation hearts just sitting on the table. I scoured them all, in search of the perfect message for the top of my mom’s cake. And there it was: “For You.”  Because, that’s what is was, after all.

pure and simple.

My mom loved the cake, and just as I  had hoped, she sent me home with about a third of it. Don’t worry, I shared it with friends – only after eating a large piece myself, of course.

Anyway, as promised, here is the new Lemon Buttercream recipe. Enjoy!!

Lemon Buttercream (new and improved version!).

What you’ll need:

8 oz butter (room temperature)

4 oz shortening

1 lb 6 oz confectioner’s sugar

1 tsp lemon extract

1/2 oz water

What you’ll do:

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter, shortening, and sugar until light and fluffy, using the paddle attachment. Add the lemon extract and water, mix until shiny. If you want a thinner consistency, just add more water.

 

 

The Curious Incident of the Red, Red Velvets.

I have a funny story to share, and all you bakers our there will really appreciate this having, I’m sure, been there and done that at some point yourselves. The other night, I was making red velvet cupcakes for a dear friend’s birthday, as red velvet is her favorite. I planned on topping them with a sour cream buttercream I had made once before, that was uber delicious. So I got to work.

i hope i didn’t just give away the ending.

Everything was going along well – I’ve made red velvets from this recipe a handful of times, so I knew what results to expect. I started measuring, mixing, pouring, and beating. When all was said and done, I added the red food coloring and mixed well. At this point, I realized something was amiss. It looked very red – too red. This was a clown-nose red, as opposed to a deeper almost maroon red – the color red velvet batter should be. I tasted the batter, and it tasted good – a little sweeter than previous batches, but still a good batter. Did I use too much food coloring? No, the bottle is always the same size! Maybe there was something wrong with the food coloring and it was heavier on the dye. I convinced myself that must be it and lined the pans with cupcake papers. I grabbed my trusty scoop and was about to dip in for the first cupcake, when I paused, and contemplated the extreme redness one more time. “What would make the batter darker?” I silently questioned. Then, like a bolt of chocolate lightning from above, it hit me – I forgot to add the cocoa powder.

nearly lost you.

Hoping that it wasn’t too late, I quickly added the key missing ingredient, and tasted the batter again. This time, it looked and tasted like a red velvet should. The mystery of the red, red velvets was solved. I scooped, baked, iced, and served. And all was once again right with the world.

simply red.

 

Cake, Rattle, and Roll.

Cake rocks.

Especially when it’s in the shape of an electric guitar. I made this bad boy for a friend’s son’s 2nd birthday. It was one of those cakes that’s just so much fun to make and even more fun to eat. Plus it gave me another chance to use my new DSLR camera, which did not let me down.

Now I own a guitar-shaped pan, which I actually purchased over 10 years ago, before I was even really that into baking. The guitar cake was the first shaped cake I ever made. The first one was ok – I mean, it looked like a guitar, albeit a messy brown one. But it’s the thought that counts. Anyway, this time, I had a lot more confidence in the results. I started off with my best vanilla cake ever, and coated it with buttercream colored red.

stripped down.

I added a few details crafted out of fondant, strung it (with chocolate icing), and voila!  I believe it’s time for a cake solo.

Eddie Van Halen would be proud.

Anyway, If you or someone you know is looking to rock out on his or her birthday this year, don’t fret! This cake’s sure to set the tone and amp up any party. It even goes up to eleven.

 

Recipe Sunday: Reese’s Pieces Cookie Cake.

I used to eat Reese’s Pieces for lunch. Yep, that’s right – the same girl who now counts every calorie, reads the ingredients on everything, and runs 6 miles every other day, used to sit down at her desk at work for lunch with a bag of Reese’s Pieces and a smoothie/milk shake/other type of frothy fattening drink and eat half the bag. And I wondered why I felt sick all the time.

lunch of champions.

Anyway, I still love these little pieces of chocolate and peanut butter heaven, but I rarely eat them these days, since the major diet overhaul of 2010, which included a huge cutback on candy. But last week, I was out shopping, and there they were, just sitting there, as always, mixed in with all the other candy I never get to enjoy anymore…and before I knew what happened, I grabbed the bag, and threw it in the cart, and headed straight for the checkout before I could change my mind. The problem then became that I was eating them. And because I still count calories, it was torture - 51 Reese’s Pieces sounds like a lot, but it’s really hardly making a dent. I had to do something, quick. It was my friend’s birthday, and he loves cookies, so I was going to make him a cookie cake anyway, and as I assembled the ingredients on the table, there they were again, right in front of me. It was an “Aha!” moment – I’ll make a Reese’s Pieces Cookie Cake and decorate it with Peanut Butter Buttercream! so that’s exactly what I did.

And now, I’ll share the recipe with you.

reese’s make a birthday happier.

Reese’s Pieces Cookie Cake.

What you’ll need:

5 oz. shortening

8 oz.   sugar

.25 oz.  salt

3 oz. (about 2)  eggs

.25 oz.  vanilla

10 oz.  flour

.25 oz.  baking soda

7 oz. Reese’s Pieces

What you’ll do:

Preheat the oven to 350° F.  In a large bowl, cream together the shortening, sugar and salt. In a separate bowl, mix together the eggs and vanilla, and add to the shortening/sugar.  In another bowl, whisk together the flour and baking soda. Fold that mixture into the other ingredients until evenly mixed. Fold in the Reese’s Pieces. You will be very tempted to eat the dough – do so at your own risk. I have built up a tolerance for raw dough/batter over the years, so I enjoy it freely with no consequences. I’m still not sure if this is a good thing.

just when you thought cookie dough couldn’t get any better.

Spray a 10″ round cake pan. Take 2/3 of the dough, and press it evenly into the bottom of the cake pan. It should be about an inch high. Bake for 16-18 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Note that you still have 1/3 of unbaked dough – do with it what you wish! I’m saving it for another project, which I’ll post later this week!

I decorated it with a complimentary Peanut Butter Buttercream – the recipe of which you can find here, under a previous Recipe Sunday for White Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes.

 

Memories of Memorial Days Past.

As another Memorial Day weekend comes to a close, I reflect upon Memorial Day weekends past. For some reason, I’ve had a lot of very memorable Memorial Days (ha ha, get it?). It’s true though. More than any other holiday of the year, I can remember previous Memorial Days with great clarity – many of them including major life-changing events. I don’t know if it’s because at the beginning of every summer, I turn into a different  person, who we’ll call “Summer Jeanine,” or if warm weather just makes everyone a little crazier, myself included. Either way, there’s something about Memorial Day that seems to bring changes and good times.

Memorial Day has never let me down, and this year it even included a Yoda birthday cake for my nephew.

yo-yo-yo-yo-yoda…cake.

And even better, I got to present it to him in person, and see the look on his face when he first saw it. That’s the good stuff, folks.

So here’s one more Memorial Day for the books - a would-be bestseller, no doubt..

~~2012 Memorial Day memory: a joke, as told by my younger nephew:

“Why did the baby banana cry? Because his parents were zombies!”  I’ll remember it forever. 

 

Bowled Over.

I was asked by a friend to make bowling cupcakes this past weekend for a bowling party for her 6-year-old. She sent me this picture from the flickr album of a talented baker working under the moniker “hello naomi,” and asked if I could do something similar. I loved these, and couldn’t wait to try my hand at creating my own version of them, so I responded to the request with an exuberant “yes!” and the fun began.

She wanted chocolate, so chocolate is what she got, along with a layer of buttercream, and topped with fondant bowling accoutrements, such as…

…Bowling Balls…

have a ball.

…Bowling Pins…

pinned down.

….and Strikes.

very striking.

Throw them all together, and you’ve got a bowling party in a box (minus the ugly, smelly shoes).

game on.

 

One.

Today marks the one year anniversary of “Small Indulgences, the blog.” The very first post, made back on December 27, 2010, was “have your cakes and eat them too,” and one of the things I’ve learned throughout this past year was that this really can be acheived, if you put your mind to it. The blog has grown so much (while remaining “small”), and I’m thankful for everyone who played a part along the way, either encouraging me to keep writing in times when I felt like throwing in the spatula; providing me with interesting baking-related stories and anecdotes; inspiring me to bake, write, and be better; or for just being there for me when I needed them most. And a big thanks goes out in particular, to you, the readers, for giving me the opportunity to share my thoughts, stories, photos, dreams, dramas and everything in between with you. Without you, there wouldn’t be a blog to begin with. Here’s to many more years of Small Indulgences: may you all have your cake and eat it too.

PS: stay tuned for a blog birthday celebration complete with giveaway early next month! There’s gonna be cake involved….    

 

that’s one big cookie.

A couple of months ago, I was chatting with two friends about the phenomenon known as the “cookie cake.” I remember in the 90′s when I first started seeing them. I think there was a place in the mall that made them. It was what appeared to be a giant pizza-sized chocolate chip cookie, with whatever writing you wanted on top. I got one for my birthday in ’97. It was from my college roommates. They were awesome.

But anyway, my two friends and I were recently debating the cookie cake and how it fared among other cakes, and if it was even still around. I don’t remember seeing one in at least 10 years, but my friends both said that yes, it was still around, and one of these two even went as far as saying the cookie cake was her all time favorite cake. As I often do, I made a mental note of this, as this friend’s birthday was in the not-so-distant future, and I’ve never made a cookie cake before, so not only did it give me the perfect birthday gift idea, it also provided me with a new baking challenge. So I started doing some research.I looked up “giant cookie cake” and found a ton of recipes. The problem was, they all appeared to be just un-altered chocolate chip cookie recipes – I couldn’t see any common denominator that set them apart from any regular old cookie recipe I’ve come across. Even the baking temp was the same (375). So, if that was the case, I saw no reason why I couldn’t use my own personal Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe. So, that’s what I did.

it worked for them.

I dug out the biggest cake pan I have, which is a 12″. I made the cookie dough. I greased the pan, I spread the dough in the pan (I used all of it). It was spread about 1/2″ thick. One tidbit I did pick up in my research was to make sure the cookie cake wasn’t too thick – 1/2″ is about the thickest you should go, or the middle wont cook and the edges will burn.

there's not a glass of milk big enough.

Anyway, I baked it at 375, and I checked it at 7 minutes, like you would for normal cookies, but it was not close to being done. So, I checked it again, at 2 minute intervals. It finished at around 12 minutes. I let it cool for about 10 minutes, then the moment of truth: flipped the pan upside down and popped it out.

we've achieved cookie cake.

The next part was easy – I just made some simple buttercream, and decorated.

Mrs. Fields can bite my cookie cake.

So, my foray into the land of Cookie Cakes was a success! My friend loved hers, said it was better than the ones from the mall, and is now encouraging me to sell them. So sell them l shall. Now who’s buying?