Cake Delay!

Sorry for the delay in updates!

The first cake were going to look at is a halloween cake that I made for a good friend of the family. She brought me a a couple photos and came and helped make the spider! It turned out really well!

Close up of the spider web detail!

And of the spider! Isn't he cute with his big eyes?!

Anyway this was just a short post to say happy (very) belated halloween! I will be posting more frequently from now on so check back!

Berries and Cream Tarts!

This weekend, for an engagment tea party, I made my very first pastry dough. And then I needed to make the pastry dough into something... and mini tarts seemed like the perfect solution. Finally I needed to fill the tart shells with something, and nothing says summer better that berries and cream! This recipe was taken from the June 2010 issue of Marth Stewart Magazine.

First the Pastry: I was/am very intimitated by pastry and therefore decided to try a relitivly 'easy' pastry recipe. (It is very similar to the Martha Stewart recipe mentioned below) Its 100 grams of Sugar, 2oo grams of Butter, and 300 grams of flour. Easy right? You simply cream the butter and sugar together, then add the flour, kneeding in the excess flour by hand. This dough is molded into a ball, wrapped in saran (cling) wrap and placed in the fridge for at least 20 mins. (This is a good time to make the cream filling)

Cream Filling: The cream filling recipe can be found on MarthaStewart.com and she can explain it much better than I can!

Now its time to roll out the pastry dough and place it in your tart shells. ( I did/do not have tart shells, having never made them before so I simply 'pammed' a mini cupcake pan and used that instead, the end result isnt quite as pretty, but they still taste great!)

Looking good so far!!! (There is a slight rip in that corner, that I just noticed now, it baked out as the pastry puffs alittle during baking)

You let the filled shells chill in the fridge for at least an hour, or untill they are firm, and then bake them at 325 for 15 to 20 minuites, untill they are a light golden bown. Yum! After they are removed from the oven, allow them to chill ( At this point the party was less than an hour away and I still didnt have my hair done, so I sped up that process by placing the trays in the freezer for a few minuites.)

After the shells have cooled you VERY CAREFULLY remove the shells from the tray. These actually came out rather well, I only broke 1! Not to shabby!

Phew... T minus 30 mins to the party now, and I have 24, well 23 empty and oh so cute tart shells!
The shells were then filled with the cream/custart filling, (which tasted amazing!) and then topped with fresh berries.

They looked pretty cute and tasted awesome, just the right size for a tea party! They were finished just in time to head off to the party!

(And the best part was that I had alot of leftover filling and berries... thats a healthy breakfast right? )

Smores!

There is nothing better for a summer evening than toasting smores over the fire. Since there happens to be a fire ban on in my area smores on the stick were out of the question, but smore cupcakes? Yep those would satisfy my craving! The recipe is from the Martha Stewart website. (I adore martha's recipes, they always work perfectly!)

The first step is making the chocolate cake batter.

This batter tasted so good! I could hardly keep out of it!

Then, the graham crackers were crushed (a good way to relieve some stress of the work week!) and mixed with the butter and a quarter cup of sugar.

I was watching Julie and Julia while making these cupcakes, Julie proclaims her love for butter many times during the movie and I have to say that I agree with her!

A tablespoon of the graham cracker mixture was put in the cupcakes lines and pressed down with a small glass.

Next the chocolate was chopped and added to the bottom of the cups as well. I used bittersweet chocolate because my friends are always complaining that my cupcakes are too sweet. Personally I like sweet! But the bittersweet chocolate complimented the frosting very well.

The graham cracker/chocolate bits were baked for 5 minutes and then the cupcake batter was added. The remaining graham crackers and chocolate were sprinkled on top of the cupcakes before they are baked.

These even look good before they are baked! They baked in the oven at 350 for about 25 minutes.

While they were baking I started to make the marshmallow frosting! Yum. I love marshmallow frosting!

The frosting was fairly simple to make, the egg-whites and sugar were whisked away on the stove for 5 minutes. Then beat in the mixmaster for about 9 minutes, starting on low speed and slowing working up to high. And then the cupcakes were done!

Yum, they look so delicious! They are pretty enough without topping, but what kind of smores don't have marshmallows?

The topping looks amazing just in the bowl. I love the stark white whipped topping. It looks so fresh.

Its very similar to a meringue but it isn't baked. Its more of a marshmallow puff frosting. Come to think of it the marshmallow fluff you cant get would probably work just as well. I put the frosting in a piping bag with a large star tip. I then pipped the frosting onto the top of the cupcakes! While 'sampling' a large amount of the frosting.

Oh my god. These turned out looking so good. I love the little bit of graham cracker on the tops of the cupcakes. Yum. But no-one eats smores with a regular un-toasted marshmallow....

Mmm. Much better! I don't have a creme brulee torch so I used a barbeque lighter. It worked well but it took awhile. The cupcakes turned out just like Martha's. Yay! I love them they tasted great, weren't to sweet and had a nice layered look when you bit into them. Yum!

Here are a couple more Smore shots...