Birthday Treat!

Banana Caramel Cream Cupcakes


Well it was my friend's birthday, and surprise surprise......I wanted to give her some baked goodies!  But I wanted to try a new recipe!  So I new that my friend liked banana bread, so I went on the hunt for a banana flavored cupcake recipe, when I came across this banana caramel cream cupcake recipe that looked delicious.  I always knew that chocolate chips were a great addition to banana bread, but just wait till you taste a little bit of banana, chocolate, and caramel......divine......well at least I thought so!

Here is the recipe.....I found it on bakers royale blog!  Which is a fantastic baking blog and has many more recipes that I want to try!

Banana Cupcake 
8 tablespoons butter, softened
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar, firmly packed
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon  baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon allspice
2/3 cups mashed bananas
1/3 cup sour cream
3 tablespoon milk
Instructions:
1. Beat butter, sugar and eggs on medium speed (adjust up to high for hand mixers) until light and fluffy.
2. Sift and stir in dry ingredients with a wooden spoon. Set aside.
3. Whisk bananas, sour cream and milk until incorporated.
4. Fold banana mixture into remaining ingredients until incorporated.
5. Fill cupcake hole 2/3 and smooth out top with the back of a spoon.
6. Bake at 350 F for 20 minutes.
7.  Cool completely on rack before assembling.  Remove baking cups from cake.

Filling and Frosting
1 ½ cups caramel sauce  (store bought or see my homemade version here)

20 Kraft caramel squares & 3 tablespoons heavy whipping cream

INSTRUCTIONS
1. Place caramel squares and cream in a sauce pan and melt over low heat for approximately 7-8 minutes.

2. Caramel sauce is ready when it is free of any solids. 

½ cup heavy cream, whipped 

2 medium bananas (medium ripened), sliced

1/3 cup chocolate chips

Instructions:
1. Fold 3 tablespoons of caramel into cream. Set aside.
2. Cut cupcakes horizontally into thirds.
3. Reassemble cake with remaining caramel sauce and bananas.
4. Cover tops of cupcakes with caramel cream.
5. Place chocolate chips on top!

Baby Shower Cakes

Well you can't have a baby shower without having cake right?  So a couple weeks before doing this cake, I saw this tutorial in a cake magazine for this little baby giraffe and I loved the idea.  So when this cake was ordered I immediately wanted to incorporate the giraffe into the cake! I was very happy with how the little giraffe turned out, he is so cute!  This cake was for a friend, Danielle, to celebrate her first born, Simon!

So I have been seeing these baby bum diaper cakes everywhere, and I think they are just adorable!  So when I had another baby shower cake ordered, I jumped at the chance to try this new idea!  So I had to experiment with the babies bum a little bit to get the exact shape of the bum I wanted.  But in the end I was very happy with how it turned out!  Then I simply finished it off with a chocolate buttercream and basketweave around the outside.
Thanks so much Wendy for asking me to do the cake!

The basketweave again!  It looks hard, but honestly it is quite simple, and I love the look it gives!  It is also a nice option if your customer doesn't want the whole cake to be covered in fondant.  This cake was for a little baby girl named Willow.  So I added the tree branches to resemble the name, and then fondant pink baby feet on top!

Summer time!!!

 Well its summer, and its raspberry season!  One of my favorite times of year, and one of my favorite fresh local treats!  This cake was for my friend's mother-in-law's birthday.  My friend, Carrie, named this cake "Raspberry delight!"  It is a white/vanilla cake with a raspberry whipped cream filling, and a vanilla pudding/whipped cream frosting, topped with fresh raspberries!  This kind of frosting is one of my absolute favorites, and is a nice change from your traditional buttercream.  It is very light and fluffy!

Cupcakes, cupcakes, and more cupcakes!!!

 Cupcakes are becoming more popular than ever!!!  Here are just a few pictures of the latest cupcakes I have done.

 Strawberries are now in season, so I made fresh strawberry cupcakes with strawberry whipped cream frosting!  Along with a variety of other flavours....red velvet, vanilla with chocolate buttercream, and chocolate with caramel!

 Oh yes, these cupcakes have little mini fondant pacifiers/soothers on them.  I thought it was the perfect touch for a baby shower.

So for these last cupcakes I tried a brand new coconut cupcake recipe, and it was a definite success.  Lets just say, they have A LOT of butter, but they are delicious and have just the perfect of amount of coconut!

Latest Wedding Cakes

 This lovely red rose cake was for a wedding anniversary party! It was my first time working with tiers that were slightly raised, because I had to fit the roses in between each layer.  It definitely is trickier and little bit of a balancing act, but it all worked out in the end.
The red roses were all fresh, and I used about 5 dozen.  But I love the look that the red roses gave to the cake.  They definitely completed the look and made it stand out with bold colour.
This is one of my favorite cakes.  Its very simple, but stunning at the same time.  Thanks so much Karen for asking me to make the cake!

Now this next cake was for my dear friend Jennifer's wedding.  The top and bottom layer I used a stitching tool and pearl sugar beads, and then the middle layer was just a free hand design that accents the ribbon on the top and bottom layer.  I absolutely love the design on the ribbon, and surprisingly I got it at Michaels.
There was a few different requests from the bride, groom, and others in terms of the cake flavour, so we decided to do three different flavours.  The bottom layer was chocolate, the middle was red velvet, and the top was gluten free vanilla.  So hopefully everything was satisfied:)
The final touches to the cake were the hot pink dogwood flowers, which were made out of gumpaste and fondant.  They didn't curl up as much as I wanted them too.  A good tip I learnt is that the thinner you roll the gumpaste/fondant flower the more they resemble a real flower and the right shape and curl to them.
Thanks so much Jenn for asking me to do the cake!!!!!!

Sugar Cookies for Jill!

Well these special wedding cake sugar cookies were shipped all the way to Memphis, TN for my dear friend Jill.  She was having an engagement party that sadly I could not be there for, due to the millions of miles in between us.  So I couldn't exactly send a cake or cupcakes in the mail, so the next best thing were sugar cookies.

I wasn't too sure on how the cookies would look once they finally arrived, but I bubble wrapped them like crazy so there was no way they were breaking or sliding around.  And good news, they all arrive safely, a few little bumps and bruises to some of them but overall the delivery was a success.

Can't wait till for wedding in September!  Hope you enjoyed the cookies JB!

 Well this cake was for my Dad's birthday!  I wanted to experiment with a new recipe.  The best time is always with family.  So this cake is called a hummingbird cake.  It slightly resembles a carrot cake but it contains bananas, pineapple, and pecans.  It is very moist and paired with cream cheese icing.  And the verdict from the family was great!  It does have a strong banana taste (not so much pineapple) but overall I would say this recipe was a success.  Another one to add to the list!  If you want the recipe it is from The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook.  And here are two more pictures of my latest work, I guess sports was the theme!!!!

Who doesn't love polka dots???

Well I definitely had fun making this baby shower cake, and loved the final result of it.  The cake inside is chocolate, with a chocolate fudge pudding filling, and a vanilla buttercream frosting.  Then of course, perfected with the outer layer being fondant.  The polka dots were quite easy to make, and the clothes line and little girls clothes are all made out of fondant.  I have to thank Audrey, my friend who asked me to make the cake, for that great clothes line idea.  I absolutely love that idea, and you could also do boys clothes as well, if the baby shower was for a boy.  Then I thought I would finish off the cake with a fondant border around the bottom all tied together with a bow in the centre.  Bows may look hard to make, but believe me they are extremely easy and there are so many videos on youtube that can walk you through the process.

Thanks Audrey for asking me to make the cake!

Birthday Party/Baby Shower

Well lets juts say that covering a square cake in fondant is much harder than it looks.  Getting those perfectly square corners may look easy but they are very deceiving.  Although this cake still turned out well, I would say it was not perfect.  But I am very much a perfectionist when it comes to my cakes, so I am hardly ever completely satisfied.  But anyways, in the end this birthday present cake was so cute and the corners were definitely better than my last square cake.  I guess I will just have to resort to practice, practice, practice!

Thanks Jane for asking me to do the cake!