Cake update!

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cake Update

8 months and a lot of cakes have happened.

lunch today

Tiered Cake

I took a workshop Saturday on building stacked and lifted tier cakes.  Lots of good info and techniques.  These babies have some weight so it takes engineering to get them up and keep them up!  After the lecture we had about two hours to assemble our own terrifying tower of cake.  After a frenzy of activity........ta da!

January 2013

Coconut 1-2-3-4 Cake with Seven Minute Frosting

The new year ushered in the onslought of garden catalogues. Covers showing perfect tomatoes, roses and other goodies now wink at me from every magazine basket in the house. Our January thaw was followed by the arctic express, which was the same pattern as last year. Most of my free time has been taken up with baking. Our family has several birthdays in January, I combined three for a big gala two weeks ago. Any excuse to bake a cake has become my motto. Added to that was a need to use a new display stand I had ordered last fall. So here we go:

Vanilla Butter Cake with Vanilla Swiss Buttercream and Dulce de Leche Filling

Chocolate Kahlua Mud cake with Chocolate Buttercream

 

there are tiny gold stars sprinkled on the chocolate roses

This was a fun little girl's birthday cake with really bold flowers and a pink princess frog with red lipstick and painted nails.

Add to this some Holiday Cakes and a lot of cake truffles.  Oh, and some pies.  Plus some cookies.  Maybe some candy.

February brings a new crop of birthdays, one requesting the Dulce de Leche filled cake.  That stuff, which is cooked sweetened condensed milk, should be declared a controlled substance cause I have no control around it!

 

Two cakes in two days

Had the opportunity to make a romantic anniversary cake as well as a birthday cake for a little girl. The anniversary cake started out with my super top secret white cake recipe then I added some triple sec, vanilla and almond to replicate the scent of orange blossoms. Romantic,right? I filled the three layers with vanilla bean buttercream and apricot fruit filling flavored with a little triple sec. Vanilla bean buttercream over everything. The recipient has a fondness for the blue sported by a certain local sports team (the Colts) and requested that be worked in to the decoration.

The second cake was a double layer banana cake with strawberry filling. Makes me think of my favorite Jello from kid hood. This cake was graced with the presence of Hello Kitty bringing a birthday cake to someone special. This cake recipe came from Edna De La Cruz of DesignMeACake.com.

Pantry challenge

Looking around my kitchen, pantry and freezer I find that we are in danger of collapse. After the disaster in May we did some major shifting of possessions, what was ours became property of the D.A.V. This enabled closet management which resulted in the second walk-in closet becoming food storage. Some summer canning and some bulk buying have filled it. The freezer is full and the kitchen pantry closet is full. Time to use this up. Food snobs and purists turn aside because what we are going to talk about is the stuff of our great grandmothers. Ad these meals will all be built upon each other, with leftovers repurposed not reheated. First dinner- sirloin steak, potatoes, cheese, milk, butter, flour,frozen green beans. Salt and pepper, nutmeg, garlic powder, onion powder. Results:grilled steak with cheeses scalloped potatoes and sautéed green beans. Leftovers- 1/2 lb of steak, half the potatoes, 1/2 c green beans. Saved. Second Dinner- frozen thawed bone in chicken breast, frozen asparagus, Hersey potatoes from previous night. Okay, the potatoes did get a reheat but they were so good who could resist? Chicken was baked with the frozen asparagus in a slow oven. Remove the chicken meat from the bone before serving and slice. Reserve half if the breasts are large. Also had a salad of sliced cucumber with vinegar and oil. Nice mimic between the potatoes and the cakes. Remains: some chicken, 1 1/2 c of potato casserole. Third dinner- remains of the steak, remains of the potatoes, an onion, one carrot, one celery stalk, chicken stock, condensed milk. This became cheesy steak and potato soup. Also whole wheat dinner rolls made in the bread machine. This soup was a ten! Remains for lunch. Fourth dinner- frozen salmon, soy sauce, maple syrup, remaining green beans, frozen broccoli blend and parchment paper. Salt, red pepper flakes and lemon pepper. The vegetables on the bottom, fish on top drizzled with the soy, maple and seasonings. Fold up and bake for thirty minutes. No leftovers. Day five- taco soup. frozen ground turkey, can of pintos, can of black beans, can of corn, can of diced tomatoes, can of Ro-tel box of chicken broth. Chili powder, cumin and ranch dressing mix. Portion remains for lunches. Day six- that chicken from day two. Frozen, thawed broccoli, cooked rice, canned, drained mushrooms, onion, flour, butter, milk and grated cheddar. Salt, pepper, onion and garlic powder, cayenne, dry mustard, nutmeg. Chicken broccoli casserole with rice in a cheese sauce. Day seven- this would be Saturday for me. The remains of the chicken broccoli casserole get put in the crockpot with a can or box of chicken broth. The goal is soup. Keep it warm and eat as desired. Anything left in the fridge gets used today in either a sandwich, omelet, quesidilla or something. The goal for the week was to reuse. I think we did it and I never heard any complaints about leftovers!

Some recent projects

Time has escaped my grasp!  The garden, with the exception of the swiss chard, has been put to bed for the winter.  That chard won't quit.  We did have a few berries from the relocated strawberries in September but the slugs have been horrid this year.

Lots of cakes and lots of baking.  These two were both for weddings, the smaller one was a bride and groom cake with several hundred cupcakes for the guests.  The second was a large tiered wedding cake for a rustic themed wedding.

small brides cake

large wedding cake

More to come!