Chocolate Hazelnut Nutcracker Cake

This was a simple cake to make! I wish I would have put more chocolate in it but I ran out of chocolate and patience!
It was loved by my family at our annual holiday party so it was a success. I did feel the cake was a tad dry even though I put enough of the rum syrup on all 3 of the layers...you could definately taste that rum and I am not much of a rum person but I loved the chantilly creme...YUMMY! My auntie ended up taking most of it home since it was her bday the night before and she called me the following day saying the cake tasted it wonderful even more so than the day before. So I guess letting it sit for a day makes it more moist?

1st cake with The Cake Slice - Sweet Potato Cake

I was a tad apprehensive when I reviewed the ingredients and saw Cake Flour listed.
I made a cake at TWD that required cake flour and did not like the end result ..the spongy-ness texture of the cake just does nothing for me....although everyone else in my house raved about the cake. So I hoped for the best with this Sweet potato cake and began baking!!!
First bump in the road... I don't have 3 pans of any size...so I pulled out 2 of the 9" pans and one cheap 8" pan that I dug out from wayyyyy in the back of my cabinet.
They baked pretty quickly and all seemed well until I began assembling them...I put the 8" at the bottom...OOOOPS....and I didnt have thawed OJ concentrate only regular liquid OJ...although the jug did say it was made from concentrate...which I didnt think made a difference until the filling started ooozing out as I cut the cake!!!
All in all the taste was ok. Not a cake I will have at the top of my list to make over...but hey Im a Chocolate girl at heart...so Im a little biased!



Can't wait for the reveal of next month's selection!!! Until then Bake & be Happy!!!

I'm back...finally!

Well, I have been a bad, bad blogger! My last posting was back in September!! WOW!!!
Shame on me...but I have good reasons..er excuses!! Busy with work, busy with life and just plain ole lazy!

So, I have joined a new blog group The Cake Slice and I am excited!
The Cake Slice picks a book and for a year we bake the recipes out of it.
The good thing is its only once a month. Tuesdays with Dorie was wearing on me with the every Tuesday baking....sometime, alot of times life is in the fast lane for me and I cant stop everything to bake every single Tuesday....sometimes I have other orders going on and alot of times I dont have some ingredients that the recipe calls for....and trust me the last thing I want to do is go to the store in search of these ingredients...so I think this once a month baking will work out just fine with me!

I have had quite a bit of orders over the past month and one of them was for 45 cookies for Dia De Los Muertos. My friend Helene wanted that them for her Clothing Sale and she also ordered another 45 for Halloween. Here's my first 4 that I decorated

Chunky PB & Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters

Hello All!

I was so happy that Stefany from Proceed With Caution picked a cookie recipe this past week because these turned out DELICIOUS!!!!! I mean Im a sucker for anything chocolate and in my book if it has chocolate in it you cant possibly go wrong!!!

Anyway, I didnt blog or post any pics because my camera was on the fritz..or so i thought...and I kept forgetting to ask my dear ole hubby to look at the camera and fix it...when I finally did ask him, all that was needed was a new card..ooops..and by that time all the heathens in my house had devoured the cookies....so you will just have to take my word for it...they came out beautifully and tasted so good! I will definately be making these alot come the holidays!

I shall post tomorrow for this past weeks selection!
Happy baking!

MIA !!!

WOW!!! What is up with me??? I have been MIA from posting anything on my blog and havent attempted nary a recipe from TWD for several weeks......sorry all!!! I have been busy with alot of cookie orders and a few cake orders here and there. Next cake order I have is for a bridal shower that a friend in my business class requested. She said "make it a white cake w/fresh strawberries and lemon filling and decorate it pink and girly and I trust your judgement."
OK! So, I am mulling over a few ideas, its not due until Sept 21st, so I have ample time!!
As for cookie orders...I have been doing quite a few and am getting quite good at it! I have posted a few pics, tell me what you think!!! The lipstick/nailpolish pic is horrible, but what can I say....photography is not my forte!!! Gotta practice on the pics for sure!
So this weekend I am DEFINTELY baking for TWD!!! I miss those guys and my girl Prudence of Glass Slipper Cakery wrote me a line asking "Where in the heck are ya?"
So here I am!!!

Hair Style Themed Cupcakes

WOW! This weekend was BUSY BUSY with baking!!!

I had an order for 30 sugar cookies decorated in panties and bras for a bridal shower.

So, Friday right after work, I made my cookie dough, rolled it out, cut them and baked them.

I had this new glaze recipe I wanted to try that made the glaze really shiny...worked wonderfully! But I was up until 3:00am decorating those babies!!! Im a bit of a perfectionist

when it comes to decorating and I am also the type that ideas started brewing as I am in the moment, so I really got into it!! My feet and back paid for it in the end...but they turned out soooo cute!! OH and stupid me, FORGOT to take pics of all my hard work!!!

That order was picked up Saturday at 1:30pm.

In addition to the cookies I baked a birthday cake for my step father's bday...

Scooby Doo theme (YES he LOVES Scooby Doo!!)

So, I baked the cake Friday night and got up at 8:00am to decorate on Saturday morning because my mom wanted to have an early lunch at 11:30am.

So off I was to lunch and the Scooby Doo cake but I had to be back by 12:45pm to put the

cookies in their little individual bags and tie off with ribbons before the pick up time of 1:30pm.

WHEW!!!! I made both deadlines and after the cookies were picked up....I proceeded straight to

my bed for a MUCH NEEDED NAP!!! :)

I then woke up and proceeded to bake 45 cupcakes for an order that was being picked up

Sunday at 10:00am. This was for a hair stylists bday party..so she wanted a theme to fit the hair stylist. I initially started cutting out little hair dryers and scissors in fondant, but I didnt like the way the fondant looked so dull. So, I decided to do them in melted chocolate....YUMMY! Well, I did all of the chocolates Saturday night so they could set in the refridgerator overnight and then I woke up at 7:30am on Sunday and made chocolate buttercreme and vanilla buttercreme and started frosting away!!

They came out FANTASTIC and she loved them when she came to pick them up!!!

As soon as my order was picked up, off we went to a nice lunch in San Francisco with my hubby, mom, niece and auntie....GREAT way to end my busy weekend!!!

A BIG Cupcake!!!!

HAPPY FRIDAY!!!!!!

I was asked by one of my co-workers to bake a cake shaped as a big cupcake for her friend's bday. So, I borrowed my SIL's HUGE cupcake pan from Wilton's. Here is what I came up with.

She wanted a cake with chocolate frosting and basically told me to do whatever I wanted...though there isnt much creative process needed for this cake...I mean its not like I had to come up with a design or shape the cake myself. The hardest decision was what color the bottom "cupcake holder" I was going to choose...light pink won! I thought it would be a pretty contrast with the deep, rich chocolate....WHOOOOH I LOVE CHOCOLATE!!!!!

I decided to make a chocolate ganache frosting...my fave!!!!!

I infused some fresh vanilla bean in the batter. And then I added some little pink fondant flowers to make it a little cutesy but not too too cutesy.

Anyway it was a simple cake to make...but boy do my feet HURT from standing up all afternoon in the kitchen!!!

I am off to a Purse cake class on Saturday...can't wait for that! I will post the pick afterwards.