S'more Cupcakes

I've been wanting to make this Martha Stewart rendition of S'more cupcakes for a long time! This past Saturday seemed like the perfect opportunity as the Northeast endured the worst rainstorm I've seen in a while; remnants of hurricane Hannah. Saturday slowly presented itself as the perfect storm (no pun intended) for baking all day! The NY Mets were postponed due to the rain, my Miami Hurricanes didn't play until 8pm, and I physically couldn't leave my house for fear of drowning in my driveway. So, my mom, the dogs, and myself set out on a little baking adventure. These S'more cupcakes were the first of three recipes we baked (more posts to come).  

I'm such a sucker for anything topped off with meringue.  I can literally spoon this delicious, fluffy, cloud-like goodness right into my mouth! Top that off with a crunchy baked graham cracker bottom and chocolate cake filled with chopped chocolate chunks and I'm good to go. These were really delicious. If you are into S'mores then I definitely recommend you make these. The recipe is a tad bit involved as it requires baking the bottom crust first then filling with batter and baking again but it is well worth it. The marshmallow meringue is to die for. 

I used my mini kitchen blow torch for the tops, however, half-way through this process I was out of butane. I ended up using a BBQ lighter for the rest and that's why some look a little burnt...but, who doesn't like s'mores with a little extra browning? I know I do!

Cupcake and Marshmallow Merengue recipe found here.

Project Birthday Cake Finale!

Pastel Flowers-Check.

Rainbow-Check.

3 tiers-Check.

Chocolate and Vanilla Buttercream-Check.

"Happy Birthday" slogan-Check.

Well, I did it! After an entire week of hard work it finally paid off! Little by little I pieced everything together last night to create a pastel masterpiece! The assembly of this cake took about 5 hours yesterday. Each tier is filled with chocolate buttercream while being iced with vanilla buttercream. The biggest and bottom tier is 3 layers and the middle and top tier are each 2 layers.  I was most nervous about the stacking of this cake which was my first experience. I was worried that I wouldn't center it properly thus creating smudges all throughout the cake, however, it was a huge success! I piped pink flowers around the bases of each tier and, using royal icing as a glue, "pasted" the pastel flowers to the middle and top tier. 

I piped "Happy Birthday Mickey J." along the bottom tier and finished off the top of the cake with a rainbow which I totally free-handed!  Shown here:

I'm really excited to present this cake to the birthday girl! I hope she enjoys it as much as I enjoyed creating it!

Elegant Cupcakes

My cousin and her husband own a Cafe in Brooklyn and are going to sell my cupcakes exclusively! I've very excited about this! I wanted to start off simple by making vanilla cupcakes with interchanging chocolate and vanilla buttercream. I love the way the chocolate cupcakes look; so elegant! I sprinkled a little purple sprinkles on the vanilla cuppies. I hope these go over well! Enjoy!!!

Project Birthday Cake Part I

I took on a seriously overwhelming, but so far satisfying project as a challenge to myself and a test to my culinary skills! I plan to take y'all with me step by step. The project is to create a 3 tiered birthday cake for an 8 year old girl that include the pastel colors of yellow, pink, blue, and green. She wants flowers all over the cake as well as a rainbow on the top and chocolate buttercream as the filling. Her father insisted the cake be "busy" with decorations. I began this project last night and the cake is "due" tomorrow. I have such a crazy week this week that I really need to get going! I will assemble the cake later this week!

I will have the following prepared:

• Billy's Vanilla Vanilla cake recipe separated into 3 cake rounds; 10X3 inch, 8 inch, and 6 inch fully baked, cooled, inverted, wrapped tightly and frozen--ready to be iced and decorated
• Pastel colored fondant flowers with royal icing centers
• 4 batches of Billy's Vanilla buttercream (which came out to an absurd amount)
• 4 batches of Billy's Chocolate buttercream

Fondant flower cut outs--before veining and cupping

Detailed fondant flowers with royal icing centers

Fondant flowers drying on formers

Next up was the buttercream. I've seriously never seen so much buttercream in my entire life! I just wanted to dive into it. The vanilla will be used to frost the top and outside of the 3 cakes and the chocolate will be used as the filling between the layers.

Tub of Chocolate buttercream

Chocolate and Vanilla tubs of buttercream

Tomorrow I will be assembling the stacked cakes, frosting, decorating, and making the cake "busy". Stay tuned for final pictures tomorrow!

TWD: Chunky Peanut Butter & Chocolate Chipsters

Stefany of Proceed With Caution chose this week's TWD recipe: Chunky Peanut Butter & Chocolate Chipsters.  The title alone had me salivating! I was excited to finally see a cookie recipe selected for both this week and next! I considered this recipe your basic oatmeal peanut butter chocolate chip recipe with a bit of a twist. The recipe called for the addition of cinnamon and freshly grated ginger and while I was at it I added some nutmeg for kicks. These spices resulted in a delicious burst of flavor combined with the peanut butter and oats. I'm not sure exactly how these cookies were supposed to come out, but mine came out crunchy, buttery and super sweet. They were delicious! Check out the TWD blogroll to see all the other yummy cookies.