Happy Pi day!!

Happy pi day everyone! 3.14. It's a great number. I honestly can't think of anything better. A day where the world celebrates math by eating baked desserts. It's everything I love wrapped up in one special day. I, unfortunately, had to work today and never got around to making any pie. Sad, I know. But, I do have a bunch of pictures of delicious pie I've made in the past that I've been meaning to share with y'all. So, in celebration of a very important number, enjoy all the pie you want.

 This is a fresh cream berry tart that I made. The filling was so tasty. It was the perfect blend of creamy and sweet without being too heavy. This was also when I learned that if you glaze your berries with apricot jam they shine beautifully.

 

 This tart is something that I am very proud of. It is a plum tart with a lemon shortbread crust. That's right. Lemon. It was the tastiest thing I have ever tried in my life. The lemon contrasted with the plums so beautifully. Funny story about this particular tart though. I made one for dinner one night and as I was carrying it into the dining room, the pie slid right off the stand I had it on. I watched in horror as my beautiful and delicious creation flipped perfectly in the air and landed upside down on the floor. There was no saving the tart. (see full story here.) I can laugh about it now, but at the time, I was so angry and upset with myself. No one at that dinner got to taste the perfection that is this recipe. Of course, I had to make it again another time, so I suppose it all turned out well in the end.

 

And here we have apple butter hand pies. I made the apple butter from scratch using five different types of apples. It was thick and tasty and I didn't even have to add extra sugar for it to be just the right amount of sweet. And then you add a wonderful flakey crust and you get the perfect little portable treat. Hand pies are wonderful to eat for breakfast on the go when you're running late. ;)

Princess Castle Cake

I'm super excited about this cake. It's pretty and it was ridiculously fun to do. The conclusion of this experience? I need to take a photography class so I can actually take decent pictures. For whatever reason, I think my cakes always look so much better in person than they do it pictures. And this is a shame. So, without further ado, here is the cake. (Keep in mind the comment about photography.)

This was it built and iced but not decorated. The towers are rice crispy treats. :)

 
 

Almost there...

 

Getting closer...

And closer...

And BAM! It's finished! :)

Just a few close-ups of the piped details. I have learned to love piping lately.

I love flowers and vines. They have to be one of my favorite things to pipe. I put them all over the cakes I do at work, so this was easy.

I personally like the back the best. I think it looks prettier than the front with the doors and windows. But that's just me.

 

 

 

PS. Here's a picture of the Avengers cupcakes I did a few days ago. Nothing too fancy so I didn't want to write a whole other post for them. So, because I'm lazy, you get them as a bonus of this post. You're welcome. You know you want one. ;)

 



 

Hello world. It's been a while. Sorry about that. I just want you all to know that I have been busy, and that's why I haven't updated. I'm still baking. A lot. And definitely decorating much more. I recently got a job decorating cakes at a local grocery store. I have learned so much more than I thought I could. I thought I already knew the ins and outs of decorating. How wrong I was. Now I can confidently say that I am as good at piping as I am at decorating with fondant. I couldn't say that a year ago.

Anyways, back to this lovely post and the reason I'm finally updating. I made a chocolate chiffon cake. This, http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Chocolate-Chiffon-Cake , is the recipe I based mine off of. I tweaked it to make it my own of course, but those are my secrets. ;)

It was fun to make and I love the taste of a chiffon cake. It is so light and fluffy. You could eat so much of it without realizing how much you've eaten. It's like the manna of the cake gods. Seriously. I topped mine with fresh strawberries and homemade whipped cream. It doesn't get ANY better than that.

Until next time all you wonderful people who have been so supportive. I will try to be better about updating, but no promises. I try not to make promises I might not keep. Happy baking! :)

Plum Tart

Today I made a plum tart. It was delicious. Unfortunately, no one else got to eat it. Right after I was finished taken pictures to show the world my beautiful work of art, I promptly dumped the tart on the floor. It was actually rather funny. I lifted the cake stand it was sitting on, saw it slide off and then because I had no time to react, watched as it flipped in the air and landed perfectly face down on the kitchen floor. I luckily had the piece I had cut for the photo and was able to try it. It really was delicious. I wish my whole family had been able to try it, but alas, I will just have to make it again.

Anyways, I had never made a plum tart before and I was not really sure what I wanted to do. After a little bit of searching, I found an idea that sounded wonderful. A lemon shortbread crust with a basic plum filling. Perfect. I love everything with lemon. It brings out so many flavors.

The crust was easy enough. You make it just like any shortbread crust. Flour, butter, sugar, salt and an egg yolk. The only thing I did differently this time was add about a teaspoon of lemon zest and about a teaspoon of vanilla extract. That's what made it so tasty.

The filling was simple enough too. You slice your plums fairly thin (but not too thin. If it's too thin, the plums will just fall apart and not look very pretty.) and toss them in sugar and cornstarch. I added a little lemon zest here too. I really wanted the lemon flavor to come out and compliment the plums. Then you let it sit and soak for a good hour. At least. After that you drain the juices into a sauce pan and cook it down until it is thick, like jelly.

After baking your crust you coat it with a layer of apricot preserves, then the plum juice jelly you made. Then you place your plum slices in a circular pattern. It's much easier than it looks. You just place them where ever there is room. Start from the outside and work in. Overlap the plums slightly so that they stack a little and make the tart a little thick. Then, you're ready to bake it. That's it. It was one of the simpler tarts I've ever made and the flavors were just divine.

The recipe I based mine off of can be found here:
http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/plum-tart-lemon-shortbread-crust.aspx

Check it out. Try it for yourself. It's worth it. Hopefully my next baking adventure will mean someone else actually gets to enjoy it with me. Best of luck with your cooking adventures!

I really do make cakes. I promise.

So, it's been a while. I'm sorry about that. I'm not going to go into lots of detail on these, but they are pictures I wanted to share. Some of them are fairly old and others are more recent. All of them are something random that I was working on. So, without further ado, here are my pictures:

This is my first attempt at a diaper cake. It was super fun, but it did fall apart super easy. I'll have to find a better way to hold it together.

This was a birthday cake for my roommate. Her favorite flowers are tulips. I love tulips, but they are a very hard flower to make look good on a cake. This is what I came up with. I think it is an acceptable way to include tulips. :)

This was for Halloween this year. Happy Halloween! This was my first cake made with my crucut machine. All I had were super girly patterns, so I decided I would go with gothic looking curtains and windows. I love the cricut machine, but I did have a hard time figuring out exactly how to get it to cut the fondant without stretching it. I'll have to play around with it a little more.

Hopefully you've enjoyed at least seeing some of my creations. I do have one more cake that I need to post. It's actually a wedding cake, so it should be a little more detailed of a post. It won't be near as long next time, I promise.

-Kelda

Angel Food Cake

I had heard from a lot of different people that angel food cake was one of the harder cakes to make. It sticks, it falls, it doesn't taste right. There were a myriad of reasons why buying angel food cake was the better options. And, me being who I am, didn't accept this. Buying is NEVER better. Nonetheless, I was nervous to try.

I had to get over it though. My boss asked me to make a cake for her son's birthday and all that he was able to eat because of specific health problems was angel food cake. So, I tried it. It went great! This was a few months ago, but since then I have made it again and was able to take pictures.

I don't know what I was worried about! It was a fairly simple cake. I'll post my recipe and then I'll show the final product. :)

Angel Food Cake Recipe:

1 3/4 cups sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup cake flour (This is important. Don't try using anything else.)
12 egg whites
1/3 cup water
1 tsp flavored extract (I've tried almond and vanilla. The next one I want to experiment with is lemon.)
1 1/2 tsp cream of tartar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
2. Put sugar in blender and blend for about two minutes until very fine.
3. Sift flour, half of the sugar, and salt together in a bowl.
4. Beat egg whites, water, extract, and cream of tartar in separate bowl until medium stiff peaks form. Add the half of sugar not with flour. Beat again so that peaks appear.
5. Sift a fine layer of flour mixture on top of eggs. Fold gently in until completely mixed.
6. Repeat step 5 until all the flour is incorporated into the batter.
7. Pour batter into an UN-GREASED tube or bundt pan.
8. Cook for about 45 and check with a wooden skewer. When inserted in the middle it should come out clean and just a little damp.
9. Cool upside down elevated (I used an old glass bottle for this part.) until the pan is cool to the touch.
10. Gentle scrap edges and remove cake. Eat and enjoy!

Strawberries
1 lb strawberries
1 lemon
1 1/2 cup sugar

Slice the strawberries. Juice the lemon into the bowl with the strawberries. Add sugar to desired taste. Let sit for a while. The sugar brings out the juices in the strawberries, so the longer you let it sit, the more sauce you will have.

Serve over angel food cake or shortcake.


And here's the picture of mine:

 
I will NEVER buy angel food cake again. This cake homemade is about a billion times better! It's moist, delicious and every other word you can use to describe good food. :)

Kakes with Kelda's new specialty!

I know, I know... It has been way too long. I have plenty of cakes that I did, but I've been neglecting updating this. Mainly because I've been neglecting taking pictures. I don't have a decent camera, so I always feel my pictures never really do justice. Once I get a few decent pictures, I promise, you'll see all the cakes that I've done. But for now, I have a new announcement!

It all starts with a normal boring Wednesday. My roommate Kenlynn and I were watching the travel channel (yes, we were really that bored). All of a sudden, Kenlynn comes running in the room, grabs her computer, and with much more excitement than I expected exclaimed, "I know what I can do! I'm going to make waffles from cake batter!'

Now, being the baking person that I am, I perked up. Cake batter? Waffles? Should those even be mixed? Well, it turns out that yes. Yes they should. Kenlynn quickly mixed up a box cake mix (Don't judge. Even I cut corners sometimes.) And we pulled out the waffle iron. We put the first scoop of batter in and weren't quite sure what to expect. See... we've had many a waffle making extravaganza, but cake batter just seemed strange. The first waffle wouldn't come out of the iron. It was too soft and crumbly. So, the second one we left in a little longer. This worked much better. It was the perfect balance of crispy waffle outside, and soft moist cake inside.

It was at this moment that I started wishing for raspberry syrup. And, although I didn't have any of that, I did have vanilla bean ice cream. I pulled it out and quickly decided that this was how waffle cakes must be eaten.  Then I remembered some cherry syrup I had in the fridge (not as tasty, and I certainly don't want to use it again, but it worked for the experiment).

Now, here comes the sad news. I took pictures. None of them do it justice. But, I will show you one. Please don't judge too harshly. They were much tastier looking in real life.

And now for the exciting part! This is going to be the house specialty when I open my bakery. Waffle cakes. I'm excited to try it out with different flavors of cake, ice cream, and syrups. And, to give credit where credit is due, the idea was Kenlynn's who heard from someone else that it was tasty. 

Again, sorry for the wait, and I promise to update with wedding cakes and party cakes soon.

-Kelda-