Pirate Ship Birthday Cake

My in-laws decided it would just wouldn't be right for me to make my own birthday cake, so last weekend they had me bring up the awesome pirate ship cake mold I got as a wedding shower gift. Risa, my cousin-in-law who is amazingly talented with cakes, made this fantastic chocolate pirate cake to celebrate my birthday. It was pretty delicious and adorable, so here are the pictures:

Notice the mini cannons, complete with red hots?

Cupcake Craze

Of course cupcakes are here to stay. Who doesn't like cake? And with cupcakes, you can have them personalized and portable. You can sample many flavors. And, with some of the varieties listed at the end of this article, you can get a little crazy with them.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/wayoflife/03/23/cupcake.craze/index.html?hpt=C2

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough - Topped Cupcakes

Unfortunately, I cannot take credit for this awesome invention. It was forwarded to me by a friend a while back. I haven't made them recently, so I have no pictures to share, but they're pretty easy to imagine. Just picture a regular cupcake topped with cookie dough (also known as heaven). I'm going to include the "original" recipe here, but I also have a cookie dough recipe that does not require any eggs... so for those people concerned about eating raw eggs, see the recipe at the bottom of the post.

(Makes ~6 cupcakes)

Vanilla Cupcakes:
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter, soften
1 large egg
3/4 cup all purpose flour
~1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/3 cup milk
pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Beat together the butter, sugar, and vanilla. Add egg and beat until blended and creamy. Combine flour, baking soda, and salt in separate bowl. Gradually add mixtures together, alternately adding milk. Divide equally in 6 cupcake liners in muffin tray. Bake 20-25 minutes. Allow to cool completely.

Cookie Dough Topping (original):

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/4 packed brown sugar

1 tbls. sugar

1/3 beaten egg

1/4 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup chocolate chips

pinch of salt

Beat together butter, sugars, vanilla, and egg until creamy. Add flour and salt; once fully blended, add chocolate chips. Cover and chill 15 minutes. Divide and press flat, then add to cooled cupcakes.

Cookie Dough Topping (sans egg):

(Recipe from "Baking Up Cookies & Love," part of the "Christmas at Home with Mary & Martha" series)

1 cup butter, softened

1 1/2 cups brown sugar, packed

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups flour

1 tablespoon water

1 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Cream butter and brown sugar. Stir in remaining ingredients; mix well by hand. Press flat, refrigerate until firm.

*Please note: this recipe will yield 40 bite-size balls, so you will have tons left over after making the cupcakes! The good news is that it's created to be eaten raw, so after making enough flattened toppings for your cupcakes, roll the rest into bite-size balls, freeze until firm (about 30 minutes). These stay frozen well, but be sure to take them about about 5 minutes before serving so they can thaw. Just a word of caution: do not throw all the new balls into a ziploc bag, as this will cause them all to mush together. Freeze them separately initially, either on a cookie sheet or even in ice cube trays. Once frozen, they will be able to be put together without too much 'mushing'.

Enjoy!

Scrabble Cupcakes

In honor of the first official Fedchak Family Game Night, I combined my two favorite things: cupcakes, and Scrabble. However, since the ideas I had in my head don't come out quite like I imagine on cupcakes, I'll clearly have to host another game night to get more practice in. These cupcakes were vanilla cupcakes with dark chocolate frosting. The cupcake recipe was a tried-and-true recipe I'll be posting up soon. The dark chocolate recipe was my attempt to improvise a decent milk chocolate frosting into dark chocolate. Unfortunately, the recipe calls for a lot of milk, so the dark chocolate was hard to taste. I'm working on revising it and when I find a successful combination, I'll be sure to post it!

As for the frosting, I made a cupcake with the initial of each person attending game night, and then aligned them by couples (Rebecca & Tim, Sherry & David, Jenna & Jon, and then myself & D). Then I just played with my fun frosting tips to get more experience with them. The white frosting was a bit cold, so it was hard to work with. Next time, I'll make sure it's at room temp before before attempting any decorating!

Valentine's Day Cupcakes

I made these cupcakes on Valentine's Day for our staff retreat. I was experimenting with the new icing dye and icing tips I received as a wedding gift - as you can tell, I need a lot of practice! (I also can't figure out how to flip the pictures on here - sorry).

The cupcakes themselves are peanut-butter filled chocolate cupcakes. I got a recipe from Women's Day magazine, and was not very impressed (therefore I will not be posting it here!) I am hoping to try more peanut butter/chocolate cupcake combinations in the near future that will hopefully be more successful. These would receive a "C" grade. I even had to dump all of the frosting and make my own. I'll post the recipes for more successful cupcakes endeavors, but I did want to share the pictures. I look at these as a good "starting point" - so hopefully as I improve, I can look back and see how far I've come.:-)