Friday, March 28, 2008

An Easter Birthday

My MIL's birthday happened to fall on Easter this year. It's the first time this has happened in her lifetime and won't happen again for another 200+ years. We invited them for Easter dinner. We grilled a lamb roast on the rottiserie that turned out excellent. We marinated it in olive oil, garlic and fresh rosemary overnight and then used a spice rub on it. We put together the spice mixture from 14 different spices. Here's the rub recipe we used:

Raz el Hanout
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 teaspoons ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground coriander
2 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons ground cardamom
1 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon mace
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
3 tsp tumeric
2 tsp nutmeg

We served the lamb with a shiraz wine/honey /lamb dripping reduction along with couscous, grilled asparagus with sea salt and a green salad. We didn't get any pictures of our meal because we were too busy plating it and trying to eat it while it was warm.

Now I'll get to the SWEET part of the meal- the cake. I saw this cake done on a local tv show and deicded it sounded light & fresh. And can you believe I had to go to 3 different stores to find an Angel Food Cake mix? (Thanks Harmon's for finally coming through for me!)

Key Lime Coconut Angel Food Cake
Ingredients:
1 round angel food cake
1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk
1/3 cup lime juice (preferably Key lime)
1 teaspoon grated lime zest
1 container (12 ounces) Cool Whip
1 cup flaked coconut
Key limes and strawberries for garnish
Method:
Cut cake hortizontally into 3 rounds. In a separate bowl, beat milk, lime juice, and lime zest with a whisk until smooth. Add cool whip, only to combine.
Spread 1/3 of cool whip mixture in between the first and second layers, and an additional 1/3 in between the second and third layers. Use the remaining mixture to "frost" the entire outside of the cake. Sprinkle with coconut. Garnish with cut limes and strawberries. Makes 12-16 servings.

Here's how it turned out. I was a little disappointed with the taste. Not bad, just not as scrumptious as I was hoping for. It looked pretty good though.




A yummy piece of art

I volunteered to bring a cake to a church function in March. I thought it was the perfect chance to make a 3 tiered cake covered in fondant- something I've been wanting to do for a long time. There's no way my family could eat a 3 layer cake! The process started out difficult since I had so many ideas I wanted to try! First I had to narrow down what I was going to do. Not just how the outside of the cake looked, but what flavors I was going to use inside. Here's what I decided: white fondant with black swirls and roses on top for some color. The bottom layer was chocolate cake with pistachio filling. The middle layer was a sour cream white almond cake with strawberry and buttercream filling. The top layer was sour cream white almond cake with chocolate hazelnut filling. Each flavor got rave reviews and depended on the person's taste which one they liked best. The recipe for the sour cream white almond cake I got from Recipe Zaar and it was one of the best cakes I've made. The texture wasn't fly-away-light like you get from a mix. It had a great texture and flavor! Here's the link if you want to try it. http://www.recipezaar.com/69630

This was only my second attempt at working with fondant. I used the easy MMF recipe again. (recipe at: http://www.cakecentral.com/cake_recipe-1949-2-Marshmallow-Fondant-MMF.html) I took a few pictures as I was putting the cake together. I still need to work on leveling but it didn't turn out too bad.


Here's a picture of it stacked with the fondant.

Now I just needed to add the scrolls, ribbon and roses. I was going to use an impression mat to help guide me on my scrolls, but it didn't work out too well so I used a toothpick and free-handed my scrolls before I piped them on with royal icing. I added a ribbon around the base of each layer to match the roses. Then I just stuck the roses in the top and I was done. I took me about 5 hours just to put the cakes together and decorate them. I had made the frosting, fondant, cakes and fillings previously so I'm not sure how long total it took me. Not a quick project but it was fun to do and see the end result. They used the cakes as center pieces on the tables. What do you think?




CUPCAKES!

Here's some tasty cupcakes I made. They're carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. Yum! I've decided cupcakes are so cute and "individual". ;) They almost have their own personality.

Happy Birthday!



Here's a cake I made for a Japanese girl's birthday who lived with us. It's the first time I've tried any kind of fondant. I found a recipe online for a marshmallow fondant (mmf) that was really easy and cheap. I guess it turned out okay for a first try. Now I need to practice leveling and getting the cakes smooth. I looked for edible pearls for the top but I couldn't find any at short notice so I just used plastic pearls.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

BitterSweet Indulgences

I wanted a blog to share my interests in baking, cake decorating, desserts and anything sweet! It doesn't hurt if it's chocolate!