i only have eyes for you....

So, for my birthday a sweet friend got me an amazing book of Zombie cupcakes.  The cupcakes looked impressive, if a little daunting.  They called for supplies like gum paste, which I had never used before.  But her boyfriend wanted to make the bloody eyeball cupcakes for his co-workers, so I decided to give it a go. 

I started by baking brown sugar pound cake cupcakes, dyed pink, and while they were still warm, making thumbprints to function as eyesockets. 

Then we rolled dyed some white fondant a few different colours, rolled it out and then cut out circles to cover the sockets.

We mixed white fondant and gum paste and made eyeballs.  They didn't look like eyeballs, so much an as image from a junior high health class text book.....

We made more half and half and dyed it black to make eyebrows (well, it was going to be brown, but following the directions we added a drop of black  food colouring and it turned gray....and no one wants to eat grandpa's eyeballs, so we added more black).

Blue half and half was rolled out to make irises (punched out with the wide end of an icing tip), black half-and-half for the pupils (punched out with the smaller end):

With a red edible ink pen, we drew veins onto the eyeballs.  We mixed red food colouring and piping gel to make blood that we used to fill the eyesockets.

eat your heart out

my lovely friend julia came over this week and things got texty.  all hail the message cookie kit:

Eat your heart out......

Sugar cookie recipe: my mom's

Music: bootlegs from Springsteen's 2005 solo tour

Guest Baker: WHAT A HOOT!

Once upon a time my aunt and I were supposed to take a cake decorating course.  It was going to take our skills to the next level.  But we live in a hick town which, to quote my aunt, isn't worthy of a  Williams Sonoma.  And no one else signed up, so the course was cancelled.  But then I showed up at my aunt's house for a birthday dinner and this amazingness was waiting for me:

 I'm not sure there is anything left to learn......

 Such a big cake that we only managed to eat half of it. It was a sweet piece of ass.

 Also!  Not the first owl cake baked for me!  Birthday cake my mom made in 2009:

Um, my only attempt at making a bird cake. 

The beak is the best part.

Sometimes the apple falls a long way from the tree......

The Bundt-y Hunter: Episode Two

Ummmm, remember when some store tried to pass off a piece of crap as the Bavaria cake pan??  Well, I tracked down someone in Texas willing to send me the real deal at a totally reasonable price.  WINNING!

Totally, totally similar.....

It makes such beautiful cakes.  Lime & white chocolate bundt:

Strawberry lemonade bundt.  IN MINI TOO!

Triple Word Score

You know what is an awesome way to deliver messages, both sweet and sassy?  WITH CAKE.  And some people need you to really spell things out for them.    Which is why I was super excited to find a cake stencil kit complete with an alphabet set and a little sprinkle-shaker.

Icing sugar on chocolate cakes and cocoa on vanilla cakes is a really simple way to make a plain cake fancy without smothering it in icing.  Apparently some people don't like icing?  Strange.  But it can make for some pretty results.    At Christmas last year good ole Martha had some breathtaking cake stencils (photo taken on my not so breathtaking cell phone camera):

So, armed with my new stencil kit and my mom's "speedy chocolate snack cake" recipe (mix 1 1/2 cups of flour, 1 cup granulated sugar, 1/2 cup cocoa powder, 1 tsp baking soda & 1/2 tsp salt in a cake pan; add 1 cup water, 1/2 cup vegetable oil, 2 Tbsp white vinegar & 2 tsp vanilla; stir until well blended; and bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes) I decided to try some trade-marking:

Badass. 

Theory Trumps Practice...

Or maybe I just need more practice.....

Good idea: Instead of using flour to dust the cake pan, I will use cocoa, so my tasty pumpkin cake will look like it's chocolate and will have a delightful pumpkin surprise inside!

Results:  My undercooked pumpkin cake looked like it was mostly burned.  FAIL.

Marginally improved my cream cheese icing glaze:

The Bundt-y Hunter: Episode One

This winter I became obsessed with the Chrysanthemum Bundt pan by Nordic Ware.  It ceased production a few years ago, and no one in Canada was selling it.  I found a few American retailers who claimed they were selling it, and my sweet friend Meridith tried ordering it for me, but every time, the answer was the same - they didn't actually have it in stock and hadn't bothered to find out that Nordic Ware wasn't actually selling it any more.

I tried Ebay, but as much as I wanted the pan, I wasn't willing to pay what others were, and I kept getting outbid.  Eventually I found a knock-off silicone version and ordered it.  But I knew, in my heart of hearts, that it wasn't the same - not even in the same ballpark. 

I returned to Google, using every technique I could think of. And eventually I found a kitchen supply store in the South of England that had a website claiming to sell the Chrysanthemum cake pan.  I sent an email to confirm if it was actually available and then went to bed.  By the time I got up the next morning, I had 2 emails from Marsha at the store, letting me know they didn't have the pan in the store but that she was contacting Nordic Ware UK to confirm availability....and then a forward from Nordic Ware UK, which made it clear to me that the situation was URGENT:

• The Chrysanthemum pan is on the leaflet at the moment and at current sales levels we have about 6 months stock (240).  However after this stock is sold we will not be manufacturing any for the foreseeable future. Nordic Ware say they are 'resting' the design. 

 Two weeks later I received an update from Marsha, accompanied by a refund for the difference in the cost of shipping I was charged and what it actually cost.  It's like Marsha was a Fairy Cakemother:

Hi Rachel, IT'S HERE!!!!!   
The pans have just arrived.  I have taken out the beautiful Chrysanthemum and it is being packed for today's Royal Mail collection for Airmail to you.

This week both of the cake pans (original and knock-off) arrived.  And it was clear which was nicer, but it seemed like the only way to identify the best pan was through a cake-off.  I think the photos speak for themselves.

Knock-off

Original, sporting a Raspberry Chocolate Bundt cake recipe from Baking Bites.

  
On the next episode of Bundt-y Hunter, we are hot on the trail of the Bavaria pan....