Now that's nice

Have you ever seen that bumper sticker that says " Mean people suck"? I feel there should be a counterpart sticker that says "Nice people rock"! It seems we're always so focused on the negative in the world...which celebrity is headed for rehab, how bad is the economy today, that jerk just cut me off, etc., etc., etc. I'm a believer that negativity breeds negativity, you get back from the universe what you put out there. That being said I wanted to share a little bit of nice with you, maybe it will make you smile and in turn you will be nice to someone else. Lord knows the world could use a little bit of nice right about now!

Okay so first, about a month or so ago my Aunt Becky surprised me with a little package. She sent me some cookie cutters and silicone cakelett pans. There was no reason to send them other then she saw them, thought of me and bought them for me...how nice right! As a way to say thank you I decided I wanted to do more then the traditional card, so I made her some sugar cookies with one of the cutters she sent.

I can't decide if I think they look more like sunflowers,

or

Black Eyed Susans.

What do you think?

I hope that they reached her in good condition and brought a smile to her face!

Okay, next nice thing: last weekend I received a totally random email from a gentleman in CA who had seen the Mickey Mouse cupcake tower I made. He one, described it as a "masterpiece" and two, wanted to know how much I would charge for something similar if not the exact same thing. How flattering is that!!? I unfortunately, had to tell him I don't ship; but I was sure to tell him Thank you. I told him "baking is my passion and it brings me great joy to know that what I do makes other people happy." and that's the truth!

And last but not least my hubby asked me this week to makes some cupcakes for the ladies in his office. Things have been pretty hectic there lately and he thought it would be a good way to end the week. Nice right? He left the "what to make" decision up to me, and an easy decision it was. I decided to make my version of a Rocky Road cupcake. I call it "Malfunction Junction". Those of you from Tampa know exactly what Malfunction Junction is, for the rest of you...let's just say it's a section of I-275 that sucks beyond suckage. They just seemed appropriate for the occasion...the perfect way to end a rocky week!! For my Malfunction-Junction I start with a devil's food cupcake, I ice it with a marshmallow buttercream and then top it with toasted walnuts, coconut and a drizzle of chocolate. For the ladies I made them pink...and I just love them!

Pretty little things aren't they?

Marshmallow Buttercream

1 stick unsalted butter - room temp

1 cup marshmallow fluff

1 cup powdered sugar

4-6 tbsp. heavy whipping cream ( you could use milk, I happened to have cream so I used it)

Beat all ingredients until light and fluffy. Add as much cream as you need to reach the consistency you would like.

Go play nice.

xoxo

N.

A Busy Week...

It's been a long and busy baking week for me. I had 5 dozen custom decorated sugar cookies for Friday and a birthday cake for Saturday. I doesn't seem like that much when you type it, but anyone who's ever made this variety of sugar cookie knows, they are a labor of love. You have to make , roll, cut, chill and bake the dough. Then you have to cool, outline and fill the cookies. And then finally after they have been left to dry for hours, (yes, hours. They take hours for the royal icing to completely dry) you can do what is my favorite part...decorate them. It's decorating them to be special for an event or occasion that makes them worth the time and effort. I mean an iced cookie as an iced cookie, but when they're unique to you and/or your event they're...well...special.

This particular order was for a baby shower. They asked for pink, lavender and yellow cookies, with Lily on them. I just love babies, and the mom-to-be is a first timer which is awesome so I was super excited about making these. The colors were really pretty and the sprinkled sugar added just a little bit of sparkle.

I did some with just a letter "L"

and for the first time I used fondant, in the form of tiny flowers.

Here they are on pink on a black background. I'm never quit sure how to take a picture of cookies. So I tried a bunch of different stuff.

And here they are all bagged up and ready to go.

My tips for making sugar cookies is to roll and cut the dough when it's warm. I roll mine between sheets of wax paper. Chill it, then remove scraps and bake the cookies. I outline mine with a medium consistency royal icing and then flood them using thin icing in a squeeze bottle. I outline them again once they're dry and then decorate . They are best kept in the refrigerator and can be stored in the freezer. You can find a good recipe for sugar cookies and royal icing at Fancy Flours

Hope you like.

N.

Catching Up...

These past few feeks have been busy for me. First there were cupcakes for a friends birthday. Vanilla buttercake with chocolate buttercream and an iced sugar cookie, and in my new boxes!!! LOVE them (the boxes and the cupcakes).

Then there was this Mickey Mouse cupcake tower for a little boys 2nd birthday. I got to use my new custom built cupcake tower for this one, LOVE it!!

All that was immediatly followed by one of my all time favorite events the Little Everglades Steeplechase. I not only got to go and enjoy the event but I provided cupcakes for two tailgates ( I only got pictures of one). Thanks to Fancy Flours for having the perfect and cutest little cake topper for this event.

Devil's food with cashew buttercream and devil's food with mint buttercream

Me!

And last but not least I did this Super Mario Cake for one of my favorite little guys 5th birthday! the original Nintendo was the first gaming system I ever had and I can vividly remember the Christmas that I got it and how my cousins and I stayed up all night playing. We literally played until out thumbs hurt! The little guy thought his cake was pretty cool and that made me feel pretty cool as well!

I hope you like them!

Friday Fun

On Friday I hosted a play date at my house for my daughter and 10 of her friends. Since she didn't get to help me with the cookies I did for the baby shower I decided to host her very own cookie decorating party. I made the cookies and had the icing in little zip locks for the kids to use. I'm not sure what I did wrong but my cookies didn't come out quite right. They spread (just a little) which is not supposed to happen. I'm thinking it was caused by one of three things...

1. I didn't let the eggs come to room temp.
2. I beat to much air into the dough.
3. I didn't let the dough chill enough.



Whatever the reason, it didn't really matter, the cookies were fine for a party for 3 year olds! I also decided to try out a different icing recipe (Wilton's poured cookie icing) that didn't call for meringue powder so I used the kids cookies as Ginny pigs so to say. I did not like the icing as much as the recipe I generally use. It was fine for piping edges and filling in but you could not do any detail work with it. Here are the cookies I decorated after the kids were gone. I like the shininess of the icing but like I said you can't do any detail work with it.





Since play dates are as much about the mama's as they are about the kids I wanted to make something for us to enjoy. Being fall (even if it was like 85 degrees today with 200% humidity) I choose a cranberry-pumpkin bread with a cranberry-pecan streusel on top. The recipe calls for you to drizzle a simple icing on top after they've baked but I never got around to doing it and IMO they didn't need it. I decided to make the recipe as muffins rather than as a loaf..easier to serve and prettier presentation wise (again IMO).



Cranberry-Pumpkin Mini Loaves
By Publix (my local grocery store)


2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 tsp. finely shredded orange peel
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1 cup canned pumpkin
1/3 cup cooking oil
1/3 cup milk
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup cranberries, coarsely chopped
1 recipe Cranberry Streusel Topping
1 cup powdered sugar
1 to 2 Tbsp. milk



Cranberry-Pecan Streusel


3/4 cup coarsely chopped cranberries
1/2 cup coarsely chopped pecans
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground ginger



Stir well to combine.

Prepare your muffin pan (or 6 mini loaf pans as the recipe calls for) and set aside. In a large bowl combine flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, orange peel, salt and ginger. make a well in the center and set aside.

In a medium bowl combine pumpkin, oil, milk and eggs. Add all at once to the dry ingredients. Stir just until moistened. Fold in the cranberries and pecans. Using an ice-cream scoop, spoon the batter into the muffin pan (or spoon evenly into loaf pans). Sprinkle streusel over batter.

Bake at 350 degrees for 15-18 minutes (35-40 minutes for loaf pans) or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire rack for 10 minutes. Remove from pans and cool completely. Just before serving combine the 1 cup of powdered sugar and milk, then drizzle over the tops.

Notes: As you can probably see in the picture I didn't use very many cranberries in the streusel. I didn't measure what I did use but it was probably only about 1/4 - 1/3 cup. And I used Sun Maid Cranberries (the kind you find by the raisins) NOT fresh or frozen cranberries. And as mentioned before I didn't put the icing on top.

No Fail Sugar Cookies

By Fancy Flours

6 cups flour

3 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

2 cups sugar

2 tsp. vanilla

2 cups butter

2 eggs

Make sure all ingredients are at room temperature. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy (about 5 minutes). Add eggs, and flavoring (you can also use almond). Mix dry ingredients in separate bowl and add a little at a time to butter mixture. Mix well.

Put a handful of the dough between two pieces of parchment paper (or wax paper) and roll to desired thickness. Repeat with the remaining dough. Put the rolled dough, including the parchment paper, on a cookie sheet and refrigerate for 10 minutes or longer. Your dough will be ready to cut and bake with no added flour! Repeat with scraps after cutting cookies.

NOTES: If you have not yet discovered Fancy Flours, I highly recommend you check them out. They have the most wonderful products, they even have a catalog you can receive for FREE, that is filled with ideas. I just love it!

Poured Cookie Icing

By Wilton

1 cup powdered sugar

2 tsp. milk

2 tsp. light corn syrup

Place sugar and milk in bowl. Stir until mixed thoroughly. Add corn syrup and mix well. For filling in areas use thinned icing (add small amounts of corn syrup until desired consistency is reached).

Cookies, Cookies and more Cookies

This past weekend I had my first paying baking job!! I was enlisted to make sugar cookies for a baby shower; 100 cookies to be placed in bags as favors and another 30 in the baby's name to be displayed on a tray. The shower was on Sunday, I started baking on Thursday morning and in true Nicole fashion there were some speed bumps along the way...

First Speed Bump: On Wednesday night I decided I would measure out my flour and other ingredients to save me a few steps in the morning. Upon pulling out my bucket of flour I came to the realization that I had been so excited about the fantastic sale on butter at Publix that I totally forgot to check how much flour I had (it was $2 per lb!!!) and from the looks of it I didn't think I'd have enough. This time I lucked out and had almost exactly the 18 cups I needed. Breathing a sigh of relief I headed to bed to get a good nights sleep since the next day was to be a busy baking day!

Second Speed Bump - So much for that good night's sleep. I woke up at 3 AM not because I was anxious to get started but because I had to puke! Great I'm thinking, now I have the flu and I'm supposed to make 12 dozen cookies AND hand decorate them. Thankfully I was only sick once, however, after that one time I lay in bed for the remainder of the night panicking about whether I would feel well enough in the morning to bake and worried about contaminating the cookies.

Third Speed Bump - Thursday morning comes quicker then I wanted. Tired and starving but to afraid to eat in case I really do have the flu I help my little one get ready for pre-school and get her dropped off. I race back home, sterilize my kitchen (in case of the flu) and get baking. I started by preparing the dough, rolling it and then placing it in the fridge to chill. At 11:45 I raced back to pick the little one up and then made a quick stop at Publix for more flour and sugar just in case I needed it ( I also got Sprite to help settle my tummy). As soon as I get home I start baking the cookies...it is at this point I realize I'm in for a really looooooong day. You see I only have 2 cookie pans and these are big cookies I'm making so I could only fit 8 on a pan. Do the math 12 dozen divided by 8 is 18...18 times 10 minutes of baking is 3 hours. Now three hours doesn't sound so bad except I had to wait for the pans to cool before I could place the next batch on them and then there was the cutting of the dough, re-rolling the scraps, re-chilling and cutting again, and again, and again. This combined with the constant interruptions from my 3 1/2 year old made for a very inefficient day. Thankfully my mom stopped by and offered to take the nugget home for the evening. At 10 pm I had all the cookies baked, cooled and put away for the night. I headed to bed and crashed as soon as I my head hit the pillow. Here are most of the cookies waiting to be put away (they're stacked so you can't see all 144)

Friday morning, I popped out of bed, headed straight for the coffee pot and got right down to making icing for the cookies. And here is the next dumb thing I did. I knew I was going to need several batches of icing and I also knew I was going to need 4 colors. Now, you'd think I'd just make a batch of each color...yeah, so not what I did. Instead, I made one batch, separated it into 4 bowls and then made my three colors (the 4th color was white). So once that was gone, I had to make another batch and then make the colors again. Well anyone, whose colored icing knows it's damned near impossible to match the colors (unless your super anal and count how much food coloring you use in each batch...which I don't do). So I caused myself some considerable delays by doing it this way. I did manage to get all of the cookies outlined and filled by the end of the day. So on Saturday I would just have the final decorating and bagging to do. (here's a pic of getting ready to outline)

Saturday morning I get up and again get right down to business. I get the cookies out of the fridge and discover I've made another error. I was up so late the night before icing the cookies, some didn't have enough time to dry completely and when I covered them, the foil stuck to the icing and ruined the lovely smooth finish you want in this sort of cookie. GREAT! It was only about 10 that needed to be fixed, so I simply smoothed the icing as best I could using my handy paintbrush ( a must have when doing decorated cookies of this nature) and then re-iced them to cover the flaws. Those few still didn't look as good as I would have liked but they were still nice enough to present and hey out of 12 dozen if only 10 got screwed up that's pretty good! I worked on the cookies until almost midnight; I had to get done by then so I could watch Sarah Palin on SNL!!

Sunday morning all I had left to do was bag them and put them in the basket for the party, which I was also attending. Me and the cookies were all ready to go by 12:30 leaving me just enough time to snap a few photos..

All in all this project was a success. I completed it on time, the customer was very happy with the finished product and I got paid!! There are of course things I would do differently (like perhaps trying to be a bit more organized) but there is always next time. And my hope is that the more I do this the less my nerves will get all twisted up. I felt such a huge weight lifted off me once I had finished; I put a lot of pressure on myself and worry constantly about whether what I do is good enough. I suppose this sort of pressure is good...it ensures that I always strive to do better than the last time.