Exciting Updates!!!

Hello All........ 

We have a couple of exciting updates to share with you. 

First off our vanilla is coming along great!  It smells so rich & yummy..can't wait to use it!!!  The color is such a beautiful amber color too - every time I look at it I get hungry for caramel!  Secondly we got our bakery project launched on Kickstarter tonight!!!  If you're not familiar with Kickstarter it's a very amazing grassroots fundraising site.  You can put just about any kind of project on there & get pledges from friends & family to help you reach your goal, ours being to open a bakery by Spring 2012.  You don't pay people back, but offer rewards for certain pledges.  I hope we get to send out boxes & boxes of delicious cookies & brownies!!!  Thank you everyone for your wonderful love & support - the bakery is dedicated to every last one of you!

Here's the vanilla after three weeks

Elmo & Snickerdoodles & Peppermint Oh My!

Christmas is only a little over a week away....can't hardly believe it!  Hope everyone is having fun getting ready for their holiday celebration.  Our nieces & nephew are heading to California this Christmas :0( but they're going to Disneyland too :0) so I'm excited for them, I LOVE Disneyland!!!


I got to do some Elmo cupcakes and cake pops for a 2 year olds birthday.  Never made either before but they all turned out really cute!  Now let me vent about cake pops for a minute, they're a pain to make!  We didn't use a special pan or anything.  Remember, we do things old school.  You have to get the ratio of cake crumbs to frosting just right.  Too much cake they crumble.  Too much frosting they're a sticky wet mess.  Then we learned don't dip them unless they're frozen or the weight of the chocolate will tear them right off the sticks.  But you have to work quick because they thaw fast.  What??????  Too many rules for something so sweet!  Luckily you can dip them in sprinkles, coconut, crushed nuts or candies or cookies - whatever your sweet tooth dictates, this will hide the lumpyness.  But really who cares if they don't look perfect?  Pretty doesn't mean good & good doesn't mean pretty.  This applies to people too but we'll save that convo for another time....and blog ;0)  I have pictures of the Elmo cupcakes but didn't take pictures of the cake pops, no reminder of the irritation.  But God bless my sister Edie, she had the patience to deal with coating them & did a fantastic job!


We also did some Snickerdoodle cupcakes and Peppermint cupcakes for our friend Jill to give out at work.  The Snickerdoodle ones taste just like the cookie, if the cookie also had a delicious cinnamon buttercream frosting.  The peppermint were yummy too - the frosting has such a clean minty taste it makes you want to kiss someone!  Good thing this time of year has lots of opportunity for kissing with all the Mistletoe!  Peppermint cupcakes....the reason for a kissing season!


Enjoy the pictures!!

It's Elmo!!!

Snickerdoodle....we even made the candies on top

Peppermint.....we didn't make these candies.  Wha..wha...whaaaaa.....

Vanilla Update

Hello all......  Here is a picture of our homemade Vanilla after just five days.  It's so cool to be able to see the progress from a bottle of Vodka to some pretty snazzy Vanilla we're going to get to use.  And the best part is WE MADE IT!!! 

Some of you may ask why such a fancy brand of Vodka, why not the cheap stuff?  My favorite tattoo shop in North Hollywood - Graffiti Palace -  had a sign hanging up that read "Good tattoos aren't cheap & cheap tattoos aren't good", same is true for baking.  No, you don't have to spend a lot to create a good product but we chose Tito's for two reasons 1) they're local & our goal is to support as many local Joe's as we can by buying as many local products as possible and 2) they just have an amazing Vodka so of course we're going to use it!  I'm pretty flexible with some brands I'll use depending on cost but there are a few that I will not negotiate on, Hershey's & Tito's being a couple of them.  Use what you're comfortable with & trust and you'll have a consistently good product every time.

Have a great Tuesday everyone!  Talk to you soon & stay baked!

UT Event 12.2.11

We had a blast at the UT event for the Information Department.  We made Lemon Cookies, New England Cookies (because Old England Cookies would be gross lol) and a chocolate cake with gnash, toffee and beer buttercream.  All are oh so good!

Home Made Vanilla After 2 Days

This is just after 2 days!  The color is already looking amazing!