Cupcake Demo

My good friends Chris and Clare are getting married this fall! They might possibly be one of the cutest couples in the world. So cute in fact that I agreed to make the cupcakes for their wedding. After discussing design, colors, and flavors, I came up with many different options for them to choose from. My apologies for the image quality, all I had was my cell phone! Can you guess which one they chose? (You will have to wait until the wedding to see!) What is your favorite?



The icing is vanilla bean butter cream. I dyed some of it apple green and dark turquoise using gel dye. The decorations are gum paste roses and rolled and dyed fondant, cutout and stamped with an "S" for Short! Dusting glitter powder was the final touch!

And luckily for my coworkers, I had extra icing and cakes, so I made some cupcakes to celebrate summer:

Classic Oatmeal Cookies

Knowing that Father's Day was coming, and that this year the stars alligned and I actually got to see my father in the flesh, I set out ahead of time to find the perfect, classic oatmeal cookie to bake him. Why? Because they are one of my dad's favorite (he is also a fan of plain spritz cookies and girl scout shortbreads...see a theme here?)
I finally found what I was looking for on the good ol' allrecipes.com, this one submitted by Nancy Fridirici.

Here is the recipe:

Ingredients

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups old-fashioned oats
• 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

1. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter, sugar and brown sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt; add to creamed mixture. Stir in oats and chocolate chips.
2. Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls 2 in. apart onto ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 degrees F for 11-12 minutes. Cool on wire racks.

Now, for my dad being a fan of the plainest and crunchiest you can get it, I omitted the chips from his and added a few minutes to the timer!! I would call them a success....deliciously crunchy on the outside, but still chewy on the inside. And somehow the oatmeal tricks you into thinking it is healthy!! ;)

Welcome!

I finally finished it. (for now)

Introducing my very new baking blog!

I decided that my baking projects and experiments finally deserved their own blog! Especially now that I am dabbling in baking "for hire."
Hope this can be a fun place for sharing, displaying, and reviewing!

Enjoy!