Pointless Baker

Easter Treats

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 21:01:00 +0000

Every year since I can remember, my family has made an easter bunny cake for the holiday. It was usually two round cakes, one cut in half for the ears. We would decorate it with all sorts of candy to make it look like a bunny. I'm sure there are others out there that have the same tradition.

As time has progressed and my sister, Sam, and I have started to become better bakers we have wanted to branch out a bit from the classic cake. Last year we used a bunny formed cupcake mold. That didn't go so well, I think the pan was lubricated enough and the cake sticked.

This year, I initially wanted to make this cake:

But my sister has other plans that are equally cute and delicious. Bakerella, is an amazing baker whose blog I religious follow. You must check out her site for all the fun and creative things she can do to cake. Her signature recipe is cupcake pops, and she recently reinvented the cake pops into easter pops. Aren't they cute?

Since my mother probably won't be happy without some sort of easter bunny cake. Sam and I are going to make easter bunny cupcakes from the Bakerella site as well.

Stay tuned after easter when you will get to see our version of Bakerella's treats.

The Final Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 22:00:00 +0000

Sorry readers. I can't seem to locate my camera so I've been procrastinating on the post on my last cake decorating class. Luckily, my parents took a picture of the cake when I gave it to them.

The peanut butter buttercream icing turned out great! I modified the buttercream icing from the Wilton course to create the peanut butter version.

My roses turned out beautifully. They could have been a little bit better but I think my icing consistency was too thin. I think I need to work on the "less is more" motto when it comes to decorating. I seem to put all that I learned into one cake. I still think it looks good though. Now the next class is fondant, which starts next week. My friend Christin and I already signed up for the course and now I need to figure out the other supplies I need to buy. Hopefully this hobby will start to pay for itself when my friend and I turn it into a business. Cake anyone?

Cupcakes for St. Patty's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:30:00 +0000

Nothing says St. Patrick's Day like Guinness, Bailey's and Jameson. So I put them together in a cupcake, an irish car bomb cupcake.

Look how nicely those cupcakes baked up. They were the perfect cupcake mounds and they had Guinness in them.

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes

I found the recipe for both the cupcakes & icing at The Mixing Bowl.

FOR THE CUPCAKES:
1 cup Guinness
1 stick, plus 1 tbsp unsalted butter
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
2 cups dark brown sugar
3/4 cup sour cream
2 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp baking soda

FOR THE CUPCAKES:

1. Preheat the oven to 350; line a muffin tin with cupcake liners.
2. Combine the Guiness and the butter, chopped into 1-inch chunks, in a large sauce pan, and heat to melt the butter.
3. Remove from heat, and whisk in the cocoa and sugar.
4. In a bowl, whisk the sour cream and the eggs and vanilla, then add to the beer mixture.
5. Sift together the flour and baking soda, and fold in the batter. (Note: I didn't sift, I don't sift well. Is that a problem?)
6. Pour into muffin molds and bake for 25 minutes, or until inserted cake tester comes out clean. Let stand 10 minutes, remove from muffin tin, and cool completely on a rack.

FOR THE FROSTING:

1 stick of unsalted butter, room temperature
3 cups confectioners' sugar
Bailey's Irish Cream
Jameson Irish Whiskey

FOR THE FROSTING:

1. Put the stick of room-temperature butter in a large mixing bowl and bet at medium-high speed for a few minutes.
2. Add a few short glugs of Bailey's and a tiny bit of Jameson, and mix at low speed.
3. Gradually spoon confectioners' sugar into the bowl, mixing on low speed

Enjoy!

The Second (Cup)Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:28:00 +0000

One of my favorite memories as a kid was the cookie monster cupcakes we had at my 5th or 6th birthday party. So when we had to create cupcakes for this week's assignment, I knew I wanted to attempt to recreate them. What I remember most of the icing. There was SO much icing.

Well my attempt was pretty good. I think it looks more like any other monster but my instructor knew what it was suppose to be. I forgot to look at picture before i went so I couldn't remember what the mouth was suppose to look like.

I also practiced my roses this week. It is very complicated to make a beautiful rose. The moving of both hands, while tilting the bag, and applying the correct pressure is just very confusing. I feel like I am getting better, but I still don't quite have it. Practice makes perfect, right?

The bottom cupcake is the new flower we learned. It was actually harder then it looks. The icing kept coming up when I lifted the tip.

I only have one more class left. I am baking a chocolate cake with peanut butter icing this week. We are learning how to make a bow and another flower to put on our final cake.

April will be all about the fondant and gum paste. I can't wait for this class! Fondant is the icing that is on most wedding cakes and a lot of people think it doesn't taste good. BUT it makes the cakes look pretty!

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:27:00 +0000

Thank you to everyone that commented about my apron choice. It was very hard to decide because I do love both of them and they are each a little bit different. However, I had to go with the one I have dreamed about for awhile:

I will probably be looking into buying the other one eventually as well. You can also use a second apron in case a guest baker shows up (or if your outfit would look cuter with the other one).

Note: Once I start to generate more users to my blog, I hope to gain some sponsors and start giveaways. Wouldn't this be the perfect time to say I was giving one of these away. Alas I don't have any sponsors yet so I can't do any giveaways. Sorry readers. Hopefully soon, tell yours friends to check out my site to generate more hits for me. Thanks!

The First Cake

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:23:00 +0000

Let's talk about my cake. Although I will eventually need to make rockin' good homemade cake, I cheated and made it from a box. I am concentrating on decorating after all.

I bought the big daddy of decorating tool kits:

and an 8 x 3 inch round pan:

I have to get used to this pan since it takes much longer to fully bake cakes. Around the bottom of my pan I put Wilton's Bake Even Strips. It is suppose to create evenly leveled, moist cakes that don't crack on the top.

OH I forgot to mention, that I had accidently took off a giant piece of my cake when I torted it. Luckily, I was able to fix it with a big glob of icing.

After the cake cooled I need to level the cake using a cake leveler. I then torted and filled my cake with icing and chocolate mousse.

Let's talk about the icing now. Wilton's buttercream icing is better than the other store bought cans because it becomes a little bit hard as it sets. My instructor recommended a "crumb coat" first by just applying a small amount of icing all over the cake.

After about an hour, you can start putting the rest of the icing on. The instructor also provided a good tip about quickly dipping the spatula into hot water in order to create a smooth layer of icing. I think I did a pretty decent job of applying super smooth icing after about 30 minutes of re-smoothing every inch of my cake.

Smooth!

The post of my finished cake will be up soon. I can't wait to show you my finished work! Isn't the anticipation killing you?

Vote for Jessie Steele Apron

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:20:00 +0000

I need your help! I want to buy a Jessie Steele apron so I can look cute as I bake and decorate my cakes. I am having a hard time deciding which one to order though.

Please leave a comment for either the black apron or the red polka apron. Thanks!

Black & White Apron Red Pink Polka Dot Apron

(Voting has ended, thanks for the help!)

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:17:00 +0000

I found my new hobby! My friend Christin, from ohitislove, and I started the month long, 4 class Wilton Cake Decorating course on Thursday night. The first class was pretty much an overview of the course, what we will be doing and what we need in order to complete the course.

There are 3 different levels for the Wilton classes and then an additional gum paste class. If I seriously want to take all three courses then I need to buy lots of supplies. I am hoping that this might turn into a part-time gig. I would LOVE to create cakes for birthdays, weddings, or other events some day.

Since I do think that I am going to continue to pursue this avenue I decided that I need to buy more than just the course 1 student kit.

The student kit includes these items: Flower Nail #7, Tip Brush, 2 Standard Couplers, Decorator Brush, Tips #3, 12, 16, 21, 104, 67 and 2D, Small Spatula, Practice Board Set, 2 Featherweight Decorating Bags and 1 Disposable Decorating Bag.

However, a fellow classmate told us that it is a better deal to spend a little more money to buy the 50 set tool caddy that includes everything needed in course 1 and more. After doing some research (and creating a spreadsheet to compare the equipment), I think I decided to buy the 101 set tool caddy that includes more then I will ever need. I think I will have to buy some more things for course 2 and 3 but at least I will have options with the more expensive caddy.

So my homework assignment for this week is to make a cake and ice it. Our instructor showed us how to make the icing and put it on the cake so that it didn't leave crumbs. She must have made mentioned about buying and using the meringue powder at least 20 times. If somebody forgets that important step in the icing process then they weren't paying attention at all. I am going to work on making the cake on Tuesday and icing it. Now I just need to decide whether I should spend the time to bake a homemade cake or just buy the box cake. I'll post pictures of my beautiful cake after I bake and ice it.

I'm super excited to get started. I am glad I decided to do this, it seems like it will be a fun challenge.

Welcome to the new blog!

noreply@blogger.com (Ashley) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:11:00 +0000

Welcome to my new blogspace. Wordpress was not working right for me and blogger seemed like it would be more user friendly for me. I am going to try to keep this space for more my baking adventures. I may throw in a random story now and again. Hopefully, I can figure out how to make two different pages in the same blog, like pioneerwomen does. We'll see how that goes.

I am in the process of migrating my old posts over to the new blog. Stay tuned!