Jumbo Cupcake!

You have seen my minis, my cupcake pops and bites and my regular size cuppies, but I can make Jumbo ones too! Here is one. It's hard to tell in the photo, but they are about one and a half times as big as a regular cupcake. This one is lemon poppyseed with white chocolate cream cheese buttercream. It is, of course, filled with vanilla buttercream. (It's so big, it was just screaming for filling :)

I had to come back and add to this post..my sweet older son took a look at this jumbo cupcake on the stand, apparently noticing it's larger size, and said, "Wow, is that real?" LOL.

My New Cupcake Apron!

Isn't it adorable?! My sweet hubby bought it for me on our Sonoma wine tour for our friends' wedding reception celebration this past Saturday. It is just so cute that I don't want to mess it up! But I will, since I bake nearly every day. Now I have a whole new fun fashion dimension to my baking. Very cool! Thanks, babe!

Malted Milk Cupcakes

These are some yummy malted milk cupcakes topped with malted milk buttercream and a malted milk ball! The cake is delicious and has milk chocolate bits throughout. YUMMY! I made them for an order and also to bring to my sweet cousin and her lovely family this weekend.

Birthday Cupcake Bites

Here are some of the "cupcake pops" made into cupcake bites :) I made these for a couple dear friends' birthdays. Just wanted to share some different ways to package and color these yummy little bites.

Begonias

Hi Sweet Readers! I am so happy with the way these sweet cupcakes turned out and I couldn't wait to show you! I tried a new frosting method for this order for my friend Val and it worked! It was more time consuming and gave my hand quite a workout, but I think the results were worth it. I topped them off with some pearl dragees and they looked like pretty variegated flowers. I am glad I gave something new a try!

Thanks for checking in!

Red Velvet Cupcakes with White Chocolate Cream Cheese Buttercream

I made these pretty little things for an order this week and was so happy with the way they turned out. The cake was rich and moist, with a light and delicate crumb. I filled them with vanilla buttercream to compliment the specks of dark chocolate interwoven with the red velvet cake. I melted some white chocolate to add to the cream cheese buttercream and shaved some white chocolate curls for the top. Thanks for coming to check them out!

Martha's Blog and My dessert!

Hi Everyone! Just had to post this to show you my dessert tonight. I just love leftover cupcake ingredients :) I had a creme brulee cuppie frozen from some I had made for my sweet hubby. It's even in a heart shaped cupcake liner. I thought, "yum, what can we do with that?" Sooo, I looked in the fridge, took out the leftover caramel, chocolate ganache, brown sugar cream cheese buttercream and voila! A beautiful and delicious dessert. Well, not so pretty, really, but way delish! I don't always make the dessert I am going to eat pretty, especially when I want to pile on the yummies. As you can see from the inside, I enjoyed myself far too much. I had to take a picture just to show you what some of the insides of my cupcakes look like...and to make you want one! :)

I also wanted to mention that Martha Stewart has a blog for all you who like to craft, cook, eat and create. Very fun! Check it out if you get a chance. You might be inspired to make a cookie or cupcake of the week. Or, you might be tempted to call me and order some!

Here is the link to Martha's Blog:

http://www.themarthablog.com/

My Favorite Cookie of the Week So Far

As I mentioned earlier, I am going to post some of the previous cookies of the week periodically. I hope you don't mind! :) I think this was our first cookie of the week and it was my favorite so far! These are Chocolate Malt Sandwiches and they are FABULOUS! This was my younger son's choice. Both boys have a way of picking complicated recipes with many ingredients. But these were so different and soooo tasty! They have some interesting ingredients like malted milk powder and creme fraiche. You want to eat more than one until you think about it and you are actually eating two cookies and lots of good (e.g. fattening) stuff in the middle. Oh well!

Because she has it posted on her website and I don't actually have to type it out, here is the recipe if you want to give it a go. I encourage you to do so. You will NOT be dissapointed!

Ingredients for Chocolate Malt Sandwiches (from Martha Stewart Cookies)

Makes about 1 1/2 dozen

• FOR THE COOKIES
• 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
• 1/4 cup plain malted milk powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 3/4 cups sugar
• 1 large egg
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup creme fraiche
• 3 tablespoons hot water
• FOR THE FILLING
• 10 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
• 1 cup plain malted milk powder
• 3 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
• 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons half-and-half
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Make cookies: Sift together flour, cocoa powder, malted milk powder, baking soda, and salt. With an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy. Mix in egg, creme fraiche, and hot water. Reduce speed to low; mix in flour mixture.
2. Space tablespoon-size balls of dough 3 1/2 inches apart on parchment paper-lined baking sheets. Bake until flat and just firm, 10 to 12 minutes. Let cool on parchment on wire racks.
3. Making filling: Melt chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simming water, stirring. Let cool. With an electric mixer, beat malted milk powder and cream cheese on medium speed until smooth. Gradually mix in half-and-half, chocolate mixture, and vanilla. Refrigerate, covered, until thick, about 30 minutes. Mix on high speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes.
4. Assemble cookies: Spread a heaping tablespoon filling on the bottom of one cookie. Sandwich with another cookie. Repeat. Cookies can be refrigerated between layers of parchment in airtight containers at room temperature up to 3 days.

Cookie Of The Week #27 - Lime Meltaways

Hi Everyone! Here is the cookie of the week, my choice. These are our 27th cookie of the week, and all but one have been out of the Martha Stewart Cookie book. It's a great book. These are crisp and clean and tangy. I actually had my eye on these before my sweet hubby picked last week's key lime bars. At least we still had limes around!

I am working on two different batches of cupcakes with two different frostings right now. Also, another yummy and pretty goodie...I hope I get the time to get them all done!

Have a great day, sweet readers!

R2D2's Pup Cakes!

I just couldn't resist putting this on here! This is sweet R2D2 and his "pupcakes"(it looks like he's waiting for the OK to go for it). See, EVERYONE LOVES CUPCAKES!! My brother Rick sent me this photo of one of R2's favorite treats from his favorite store. I do recall coming across a recipe for special canine cupcakes. He'll have to get his owners on board with that one! :)

Happy Birthday Cupcake and Cupcake Card

I made the cupcake, card and cupcake box for a friend's birthday. Just a little token to tell her that she is special. Happy Birthday, Maria!

A Little Bit of A Lot

This cupcake has a little bit of everything! I was inspired, again, by Carrie and adapted her recipe for this delicious cupcake for an order last week. The cupcake is layered with banana brown sugar and dark chocolate cake. It is filled with peanut butter caramel buttercream and a piece of a Reese's peanut butter cup. To top it off, it is layered first with a dark chocolate ganache, and then a dreamy blend of the peanut butter caramel buttercream and a brown sugar cream cheese buttercream. Finally, it's drizzled with the dark chocolate ganache and a slice of Snickers candy bar. Yup. Rich and delicious. Just incredible. I was very pleased to hear that the recipients enjoyed it as much as I did.

Have a great day and a super week, sweet readers!

Pop!

Here are some more cupcake pops that I made up for a gift order. Fun, huh!

Bicycle Cupcakes!

I made these fun cupcakes today for my friend and neighbor, John. His birthday is Monday and his lovely wife and dear friend of mine, Nancy, requested a special batch to share with his family. These cuppies are a bit eclectic in flavoring, but it all comes together and tastes fabulous (according to my hubby who had to sample one :) They are a Guinness dark chocolate cupcake filled with caramel and an Oreo surprise. I topped them with Oreo brown sugar cream cheese buttercream and some fun blue sprinkles. One of John's passions is cycling and he is darn good at it, so I wanted to honor that and created these fun candy bicycles! I wanted them to be royal blue, his favorite color, but alas, the blue on the package was not the blue it turned out to be. I am still very happy with them and frankly, thrilled that I was able to create them!

I hope you have a very happy birthday, John!

Red and White Cupcake Pops

I made these for my dear friend Debbie's order. She is the party queen! She has many parties and does such a wonderful job with everything. You would not believe what a great hostess she is - so guest oriented. Anyhow, she is having a "bunco bbq" this weekend and requested these. I am really happy with how they turned out and how they are displayed. Luckily, she was happy, too. Have fun, Debbie!!

How do my cupcakes survive the minivan treks??

With this wonderful invention called the "Cupcake Courier". Love it! Holds steady up to 36 cupcakes - even ones with lots of frosting :) It's a must have. But is one enough? They also have them in pink and yellow..hmmm....

Disclaimer: It is not perfect! After catering to my son's pleading to go over the "raised crosswalk" (i.e. speed table) at a tad quicker speed than it calls for, I had a few of the cupcakes land on their side :( I was heading to prayer group though, and the gals were A-OK with the messy frosting :)

An Edible Bouquet of Cupcake Pops!

This is a bouquet of cupcake pops that a friend ordered for her former coworkers. She is now retired (yeah for you, Pennie!) and wanted to send them over a special treat. I made the little cupcake gift tag with her personalized message on the back. They were delighted to receive the edible bouquet as it was something different and delicious. These are very rich and moist and, though they are small, pack a huge punch of flavor and delight. Gotta try one :)

As always, thanks for checking in!

Key Lime Bars - Not a Cupcake and Not so Key! This is the Cookie of the Week!

Hi Sweet Readers! What you are seeing is not a cupcake! :) They are actually key lime bars which are the "cookie of the week".

What is the "cookie of the week", you ask? This is the story. I don't only make cupcakes because I am a sweet fanatic. I like most every kind of sweet and I love to bake! My family cheers me on and so I kindly oblige. Some months ago, I purchased "Martha Stewart Cookies". This is a fabulous cookie cookbook full of wonderful full color photos for each of the 175 cookies found within. Sooooo, I decided, and my family agreed, that we would have a cookie of the week from there on out. I would do my best to make one of the cookies in the book once a week. We rotate through our family for who gets to choose and we try to keep it a secret until it's "unveiling". (the secret part rarely happens :) It's been pretty consistent and these bars were our 26th cookie! I did skip a week or two, and once made a cookie from another great baking book, but other than that, it's been fun experimenting and enjoying.

I'm thinking it might be fun to show you some of the cookies we have done. Some have been incredibly delicious, others so so. I keep notes in the cookbook. I took pictures, too, so perhaps someday Martha might have me on her show...hee hee. No, just for fun and documentation. I am a scrapbooker, after all.

Oh, and why are these key lime bars not "key"? Because the recipe called for key limes (23 of them!!) and I could not find them (to be honest, I really didn't look). Good thing for me. It actually only took 9 regular limes and so I had to juice a whole lot less! These are really good, though. The crust is probably my favorite part - graham crackers, sugar and butter. The lime is tangy yet sweet and so refreshing. They were a big hit with this week's chooser, my dear hubby. They were not my prettiest cookie, but they sure passed the taste test!

Next week is my choice! Yeah!

We will miss you, Mrs. I!

A sweet, sweet woman and an integral part of my younger son's school is no longer there. Mrs. I (Sherri, hence the S on the cupcakes) left last week after a great couple of years. We will miss her dearly. These cupcakes were the sweet dreamsicle ones with a fondant S on each one to celebrate Sherri.

Baby Cupcakes and Homemade onesies

Don't know about your neighborhood, but it seems that there are many babies being born in ours lately! It's so much fun seeing the families grow and it brings back sweet memories of the days my boys were tiny.

I am also anticipating the arrival of a new niece or nephew in October! I can't wait! So I have been busy making some little onesies and burp cloths with some special little baby images on them. They are stamped and ironed on (one thing I do not do is sew). Pretty darn cute. Almost makes me want another just to dress them up in one. But now back to reality...

These were for a sweet little baby girl a couple doors down. Of course I also had to make cupcakes to welcome the little one! They were actually for the other members of the family :) Now the cul de sac score is boys: 5, girls: 2.

Welcome new neighbors with cupcakes, of course!

We had some new neighbors move in over the weekend, so I made up this box of cupcakes to greet them with today. The orange are the dreamsicle cupcakes and the chocolate are my chocolate surprise with a chocolate and vanilla bean frosting swirl. Unfortunately, after knocking with eager anticipation at the door of our new neighbors, the boys and I were greeted only by their barking dog on the other side of the door. We love dogs, but were dissapointed they weren't home. So the cupcakes came home with us. Hopefully we can catch them tomorrow before we are tempted to eat the cupcakes ourselves! :)

Have a great week, sweet readers!

This may make you hungry! Peanut butter cup cupcakes and cake!

I couldn't resist making this cake after I saw the recipe. The cake is actually a 6 inch round and so there was plenty of batter left over to make some delicious cupcakes. Thanks, bakerella, for passing on the yummy recipe!

Dreamy Cupcakes!

Remember having Dreamsicle ice cream pops as a kid? The ice cream layer with the orange popsicle surrounding it made such a creamy treat! Well, this is THAT in cupcake form! The cupcake is orange flavored - real orange juice and zest mixed in the batter - and filled with delicious vanilla bean buttercream. Can you see the wonderful specs of fresh vanilla bean in the photo? Yum! The frosting is a mix of orange (ala Tang :) buttercream and the vanilla bean buttercream that fills this tasty treat. It really tastes like a Dreamsicle popsicle (just not as cold and such a more "adult" option :) Kudos to Carrie again for a great recipe to play with! I topped these beauties with some homemade edible candy magnolia flowers.

Have a wonderful day, sweet readers!

An Apple a day...cupcakes!

At the request of my son's teacher, I made these "apple cupcakes" for the class. The kids behaved well and earned a special treat. Yeah for them! The cupcake was a yummy moist vanilla buttermilk treat with vanilla frosting, a pretzel and spearmint leaf.

Of special note is the small amount of frosting on top of the cupcake. I thought it best for a class of 21 kiddos (and the teacher's sanity). As you may have noticed my normal frosting is piled much higher - as that is the way I enjoy it! So, when placing orders or letting me know what your request is, you can rest assured that you will be blessed with lots and lots of frosting. Of course, if you prefer more cuppie than frosting, I can do that, too!

Have a special day sweet readers!

A Special Treat

Good Morning! I wanted to share some more of the single cupcake boxes that I make. They are a fun way of giving someone a special treat of their very own special cupcake. I can pretty much make them in any color or pattern you want. The top circle has a sturdy protective clear film that shows the cuppie off and I can add a personal note on tags like the one shown or similar. As always, please email me for pricing until I can figure out how to get the pricing up on my sidebar. :)

Debbie's Request

Good Afternoon, Everyone! The title of today's post is "Debbie's Request" because my dear friend Debbie requested that I show some pictures of these carrot and flower cupcakes. I make the totally edible candy toppings myself and can do just about anything to top a cake. It's very fun and creative! The ones above are carrot cupcakes with vanilla bean cream cheese frosting. I had fun with these and am looking forward to that scary holiday coming up to do some fun candy toppers!

These were some freehanded flowers I did atop some very moist chestnut cream cuppies (one of hubby's favorites).
I made these flower tops for brownies I gave as a thank you gift. I had fun with the packaging on these.


These candy toppers were made for my sweet niece's birthday cuppies. My cousin Krista made the yummy cuppies and I brought the flowers for the flower themed bday.

I made these chocolate musical notes for my nephew's bday. He turned just three and is such a musician already! Again, Krista made her famous cuppies and I topped them. We make a good team, don't you think?