Happy Birthday! Secrects Revealed

Well, it has been weeks since I have posted anything....seems like I go through stages like that. BUT, I have been working on a lot of things. Today I have a very special treat for you! One of my favorite people had her 18th birthday, and I was asked and given freedom to create a custom flavor and cupcake tower for her. Tex is a very unique girl and I wanted her cake to reflect that. So the super secret flavor I was testing at Valentines can now be revealed: Tex's Chocolate Passion. It's chocolate cake with passion tea ganache and marshmallow butter cream frosting. I had to take the pictures with my phone so they aren't the best, but hopefully you can get a glimpse of what the cakes looked like. The decorations are handmade out of candy clay (my new favorite alternative to fondant!)

New Cupcake Flavors

First up, possibly a new fav. Chocolate Pie. My 2nd favorite dessert, but not just any 'ole chocolate pie will do. My Grandmother's is the only pie for me, or DeeDee as everyone calls her. This cupcake is in her honor. Butter Cake stuffed with DeeDee's chocolate pie and topped with toasted meringue. The test group called them excellent.

Next, Maple Bacon. My sister LOVES sweet and salty and loves syrup on her sausage or bacon. It literally tastes like pancakes and bacon. It's maple, brown sugar and chopped bacon in the cake and then it's topped with Brown sugar and maple butter cream and a piece of crispy bacon. They are rich and can be eaten any time of the day. Not for your average cupcake eater.

Valentine 2009 is fine!

This is my favorite of the whole holiday.....given from someone far far away to someone they love very much. Next up, Easter? Father's Day? Birthdays? Happy Friday? Who knows....holla at me if you have a unique flavor you would like to eat in cupcake form!

Shh.....it's a secret

I'm working on a new cupcake flavor for a VERY special person. I can't tell you who yet. But, I thought I would give it a test drive for valentine's day. I can't even tell you what's in it because that would give it away who it was for. But it's got chocolate, exotic flavors and ooey, gooey goodness. And I'm still working out the kinks. The frosting completely migrated off the top...

Another Valentine

Very berry cake with Vanilla-Vanilla Buttercream....and of course some girly pink zig zags.

With a Cherry On Top

My cousin/best friend Britt is very fond of no bake cheesecake, and I like it pretty well myself. In her honor we have created cherry cheesecake cupcakes, and they might be my new fav. It's butter cake topped with cheesecake frosting and cherry pie...I'm gonna need another one right now!

Peanutbutter Valentine

I don't know if I've told many stories lately, but every one of my cupcakes is based on someone either I know and love or someone that someone else knows and loves. Peanut butter and chocolate is one of my all time favorite combos. Much like our friend Sarah: the perfect combination of sweet and sassy.... AND just so happens to L-O-V-E peanut butter cups. So, for her valentine that's just what she got: Peanut butter cup-cupcakes! They have moist chocolate cake with salty peanut butter frosting, then are dipped in chocolate and topped with a PB cup.

Hot Pink Valentine!

These are going to a very special friend of mine. They are also the Vanilla-Berry cupcakes but with crazy pink and turquoise frosting. Forgive me for getting a little crazy. And I needed to be a little creative?

2009 Valentine (So Far)

Yay! the first ones of Valentines....have I mentioned lately that I love Valentines Day? These first ones were for a special order that were shipped. My very first shipment of Cupcakes, hopefully they will arrive in one piece and taste just as lovely as they did at home. (Even though I couldn't find fresh raspberries anywhere and had to settle for raspberry yogurt and extract.)

These were made specifically to match the special someone's favorite things, so I give you Vanilla-Berry. Here are the Raspberry Cupcakes getting their tummies full of Raspberry jam.

Then they were topped with Very Vanilla cream cheese frosting and rolled in purple sparkly sugar.

Next the special message was added.

Then the very important stabilizing lollypops and box to keep them from shifting around in the shipping.

And this pic, just because I like it.

A view of the insides....

Baking GALS

This week I joined a group called Baking GALS (Give A Little Support). They put together packages of homemade baked goods to send to our troops. I have been looking for something like this for awhile now and I'm so excited to be a part of it! This morning I got up and baked dozens of cookies, packaged them up and shipped them out. I just hope that they get there in one piece. Since it's so close to Valentines Day, I decided to make the cookies valentine-y. Get ready because next week is my favorite baking week of the whole year!!

Meat Cake, A.K.A. Man Birthday

Ok, so this one is for my friend and co-worker Kent. He doesn't really eat sugar and he loves meat. This year for his birthday I decided to make him a meat cake. It's basically a three layer meat loaf with mashed potatoes for the frosting. It was a lot of fun and I make it in a cupcake version too! I don't have a picture of it cut open, but if I can get one, I'll post it later. As you can see, I've been busy over the past week. AND, Valentines' Day is coming up. I won't be doing a mass delivery this year, but if you want a special cupcake for your loved one, just contact me and I'd be happy to sweeten their day with a few cupcakes!

Sweet 16 Cupcakes

My little cousin also recently had a birthday and she is one of the sweetest girls around. And just like my sister, she doesn't really like chocolate. I know, there should be some sort of law about not liking chocolate, but it also allows me to be creative. And this is the kind of project I have been wanting to work on for awhile. Her colors for her party were hot pink, orange and lime green. So, I created a signature cupcake and stand just for her big day! I love doing that! "Libby's Rainbow Sherbet" cupcake will definitely make the flavor list. It's Lime, Strawberry and Orange cake made with fresh limes, strawberries and orange swirled together then finished with Very Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting. Her cakes were also topped with brightly colored monograms.

My Sister's Birthday!

My middle sister just turned 30 on Friday and we wanted to make sure to have a party that reflected her personality completely! She is a classy cowgirl, think leather and lace or pearls and wood. Tough as nails and delicate as a flower. For her birthday I wanted to do a special dessert table just for her. Her best friend, came over early and helped me set up and our older sister helped by baking her out-of-sight snicker doodles! Also on the menu I made: lemon mousse fluffed on top of a white chocolate dipped gingersnap and topped with a fresh blackberry, peach champagne cake with hand piped swiss dots, fruit kabobs with dip, bacon cheese phyllo cups, lemony shrimp and passion tea. Some of her favorite things.

New Cupcake

I was not happy with how this one turned out, but everyone else enjoyed it. I had this great vision of a Egg Nog cupcake that would be the star of my Christmas flavors, but it didn't make the cut for me. It wasn't Noggy enough, but I have some ideas of how to make it much better, including a little nog pastry cream in the middle! Mmmm....maybe we'll have Christmas in March.

Not Cupcakes

Awhile back I got asked to do cookies for a baby shower as a party favor. They turned out pretty cute! Now, most of you probably don't know that I make cookies too, I just don't do it often because I LOVE to eat them and that's just not good for me. I can stop at one cupcake but cookies (especially chocolate chip) I can not resist.

Christmas Craft Show Cupcakes

That's right, I did a craft show.....and it was so much fun! Top 6 things I enjoyed at the Craft Show:
6. Being asked 800 times if the cupcakes were edible or just candles.

5. People's eyes light up when I asked if they wanted a free sample.

4. The baked potato I had for lunch.

3. Guy in the booth next to us who proposed after eating a cupcake.

2. Meeting so many fun and creative people/people watching all day!

1. Spending the day laughing with Lindee and Jen. You girls are awesome and so crafty.

Busy, Busy, Busy

I have been baking like nobody's business. I hope to update my blog for the next week about all the things we did over the holidays. I've got to get me a good camera that I can haul around and take pictures of everything I'm making...Someday. Anyway, back to today's post. I had the honor of making my dear friends Ashley and Chris' wedding cupcakes. They had Chocolate with Cream cheese frosting and Vanilla filled with strawberry and topped with cream cheese. I learned a lot about baking in someone else's oven in west Texas and that I CAN get 350 cupcakes done! My sister was my right hand gal and there is no way I could have done it without her!

New Cupcakes

Lemon Berry- Lemony cake with Blueberry buttercream

Rootbeer Float (a.k.a. The Wes)- Rootbeer cake with Fluffy vanilla cream frosting. Tastes like the real thing.

I miss the blogging world and eventually I will post all the things I've been working on!

The Diamond Years

I am very blessed to have both sets of grandparents still living and happily married. I even have cutesy names for them: Meemaw & Peepaw and Dee Dee & PaPa. This past month we celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary; back to back weekends. The 60th year is considered to be the Diamond anniversary and I'm pretty sure I know why. Diamond comes from the Greek word for invincible, they are one of the hardest materials on the planet, they make excellent abrasives and when polished will shine. Marriage is hard and often abrasive. Most people may think that abrasive is bad, but not always. Some of the best marriages I have witnessed are characterized by the couples ability to "sharpen" one another, A.K.A.: they challenge one another and cause rough edges to be sanded away. Marriage is full of joy, love and respect. When a husband loves his wife as Christ loves the church and a wife respects her husband as the head of their home, they shine with a light that is reflective of Christ's love for us. My grandparents have lived this out in front of me, things have very rarely been easy but their relationships have shown just how deep the Fathers love is for us. So, it's fitting that this is the Diamond year. I was honored that my grandparents asked me to use my gifts to celebrate their anniversaries. I'm not fond of doing large stacked cakes (and these are my first to ever do), but in this case, it was a joy!

7 layers of chocolate cake and Oreo mousse covered in chocolate ganache.

7 layers of Vanilla cake with blackberry preserve filling covered in buttercream.

3 layers of Vanilla cake with strawberry cheesecake filling, covered in buttercream.

No, I'm not a slacker

I'm sure most of you think that I haven't been blogging because I haven't had anything to blog about. But actually it's completely the opposite. My job is crazy during the summer and I travel a lot so I don't have a lot of time to bake, but this year I baked nearly as much as I do in the Fall. I just didn't sleep at all. Here are just a few pictures from the summer baking adventures.

A dinosaur Cake for my friends 19th birthday! She loves Dinosaurs. And Orange Creamsicle cupcakes, orange cake with vanilla and orange swirl frosting! My new favorite.



A lepoard cupcake tower for my lovely room mates birthday. It was really fun to make the tower and customize it to her specific tastes. The cupcakes were red velvet with cream cheese frosting and handmade spots.



I hosted my own birthday party, a pink picnic! It was really fun, we ate chicken salad, fresh fruit and cupcake cones and drank my favorite Passionfruit Tea from Starbucks! And we watched a favorite movie of mine (The Goonies), in the park. Everyone kept coming by and asking what "event" was going on. We just told them to join in the fun. Isn't summer grand....I'll be posting more soon!