John Deere Cake

I made a cake yesterday. Do you want the good news or the bad news first?

I think I'll tell you what didn't work first, then cheer myself with the good news.

Flop #1: The Cake
I had a recipe for Buttermilk White Cake that I had high hopes for because buttermilk makes all baked goods lovely and moist, right? Blech, it felt like cornbread in your mouth.

#2: The Frosting
I've made Swiss Meringue Buttercream before. Now THAT is frosting, in the cookbook alongside the recipe I've written a little note that says 'heaven on a cupcake'. And it is, but its also very light and delicate and so I've never tried to use it for decorating. So when I found Italian Meringue Buttercream, along with promises that it is more stable than the Swiss method, I was excited to try it. Things were going along swimmingly until the last step *cue ominous music*, adding the butter. It turned into butter soup. It was delicious soup but useless for icing a cake. I tried adding powdered sugar, hoping to thicken it enough to salvage the mess but after adding enough to make my teeth ache, it was still a loss. So I whipped up a batch of the old standby.

And landing somewhere in between yay and boo: reverse icing. I'll briefly explain: you ice a piece of parchment, assemble the cake on top, ice the sides and flip the whole thing over. Why would anyone try this insanity? Its supposed to give you an absolutely level top and a sharp edge, which it did. But the cake was frozen (easier to work with) when I started and once it started to warm up weird things happened. The top became, ah... not level. And air bubbles started to push out the frosting on the sides making big, ugly cake hernias. Hmm, yep, I should probably file that under flop.

Here is the cake before things started going downhill:

I am depressed, maybe it wasn't a good idea to start with the bad news.

So, what worked?

My diy Bake-Even strips! I just dampened some strips of towel and wrapped them around the pans before sliding them in the oven. The cakes came out nice and high but with no dome. Of course, afterward it occurred to me to Google it and I see that other folks are wrapping their lengths of wet towel in foil. Must try!

I'm also pretty pleased with my first frozen buttercream transfer. I'll briefly explain: print a mirror image of a graphic, tape wax paper over it, outline the design, fill in with thin frosting and freeze until it turns into a pancake you can flip over and place on the cake. I know mine has weird lines, but I'm learning. This was actually easier than I expected, you should try it too.

Or not, if cake decorating doesn't blow your skirt up.

Birthday Cake

I was undecided about posting photos of the cake I made. I was thinking those of you who don't have much experience with decorating will probably think this is a lovely cake. BUT the folks with a small amount of know-how will have passed me up and are probably enjoying a little laugh guffaw at my expense. In the end, I decided this is my space to share my creations, even the imperfect ones, so you can take your entertainment in either form (but please humor me if you comment).
So here is the big reveal:

*First, just let me say that there was not a weird color variation on the finished product. This is what happens if someone forgets to take a pic before writing the name of someone else's child on a cake that they intend to post online. Then the person, who is still learning GIMP, attempts to erase the name with a photo editing tool.*

1. The cake itself is a dressed up box mix using the WASC (White Almond Sour Cream) recipe from Cake Central. I have to say I'm just not a fan of almond flavoring, and while it was moist but not crumbly (the pitfalls of a lot of white cake recipes) I thought it a little overly sweet. It made a huge batch, enough for 2 13x9-inch pans. Strawberry Mousse filling.

3. I used the Buttercream Dream recipe from the same site and reduced the amount of sugar and so the amount of liquid used. Then I found it hard to get the right consistency; it was great for icing but needed tinkering before I could make a decent flower. Lots of learning on this cake.

4. Since I didn't have a pretty pan to put it all on, I tried my hand at making fondant (marshmallow fondant in this case) to cover an upside-down baking sheet. I know this stuff is far more popular than buttercream these days but I'm still not sure why.

4. The tiara was made with royal icing. Someone has kindly posted a tutorial for this on Cake Central, downloadable templates are also available there. That site is a fabulous place to go for inspiration. Here is a close-up of mine:

I know, it would have been a lot more impressive with a little bling (Luster Dust). But remember that I live in a veeery tiny town so bling is at least an hour from me.

meringue pie makes me nervous

I once had a cat named Willy. One day after having left a lemon meringue pie on the kitchen counter to cool, I walked in to find a third of it gone and Willy buried neck-deep in the remaining two-thirds. I let out a screech and he popped out wild eyed and covered in sticky meringue. I haven't had a cat since who showed a weakness for pastries, but I always get nervous that I'll find my pie has been wrecked by a feline.

So I'm sure by now word has gotten around about my witty and informative blog and I've attracted legions of followers. Maybe one of you super-cool people could tell me what I'm doing wrong with my meringue? This is a picture of the 4-egg meringue I made yesterday. Shouldn't it be, um, bigger? A little more voluminous?

fungus fun

We've been impatiently waiting for a good rain and last week the sky let loose. So this weekend found us in the woods hunting for little spots of orange under the trees. We found quite a few for this early in the year.

I didn't find the first one of the year (we always have a little contest) but this is the first one I found.

We still had a few left last night so I made pizza with chanterelles. Mmmm. It was out-of-this-world-yummy. I was a little worried that the fabulous taste of the mushrooms would be lost in the flavor mish-mash; but really it made a great pizza. Here is some of the leftover 3-cheese with mushroom variety.

lunch buns

Not much time for sewing yet today. But now the baby is taking her nap and I have time to show you what I have managed to accomplish: lunch buns. That sounds funny but its what we call them at our house. My husband likes them in his lunchbox and they're handy to have in the freezer for those mornings when you need to be out of the house NOW and you realize you haven't fed your babies yet. Here's how it works:

Dough is separated into sections and rolled into rounds. Add your favorite filling, today we are doing cheese, scrambled egg and bacon.

Fold the edges together, pinch to close and turn.

Bake the little guys until they are pretty and browned...mmm

Here is a view of the inside yumminess. Sorry its a little blurry, I didn't have the camera set to capture something moving at high speed. Also, the buns are not giant, that's a four-year-old hand grabbing a snack.
If you are interested in the recipe for the dough, shoot me an e-mail. I'm happy to share.