Baking Part 2

So after my mediocre attempt at recreating Bakerella's cake balls, I decided to go for something a little more my speed.

I have long been eyeing a giant cupcake pan that Wilton carries. And my fabulous Mom - shout out Catty! - got with the Easter bunny and got me the pan for Easter.

Not sure what my new found obsession with cupcakes is, but I am rolling with it...

As you can see from the picture - half of the pan is much more shallow and less dense than the other side. And from reading on a couple of website I found out that the way to remedy that is by putting the shallow side in a pan of shallow water. Martha Stewart watch out.


My first attempt was a chocolate cake with butter cream frosting and then I made another cake a week later that was yellow cake with chocolate frosting. All of the websites said that you should use a box and a half of cake mix, but I poopooed that idea and just divided the one box between each side. What are you supposed to do with the other half of the cake mix? So silly.


Before you put the cake mix in you should spray the pan heavily with pam...I decided not to lightly flour as some suggested because I hate having flour on the outside of my cakes - especially as I wasn't planning to frost the bottom. The cake rises quite a bit after cooking as you can see above but came out of the pan flawlessly. After leveling the two pieces and placing them together with the help of a little frosting I then used the rest of the frosting for the top of the cupcake. I then used a variety of regular sprinkles and large candy bits to decorate. You can also use jelly beans or red hots, etc.

I was pleasantly surprised by my results! A great giant cupcake that tasted as great as it looked. And for those keeping track, both my coworkers and I enjoyed the final product.

Bad Blogger and Baking Part 1

Not that anyone reads this but my mother, but I inadvertently took a hiatus from blogging. So here we go, some catch up...

I have never been much at cooking. Partially because I am just not a fan, I think it takes longer to cook than clean up and thus is a waste of my time, and partially because I just like to eat out. That said, I have always enjoyed baking. I used to make cookies pretty much every weekend. So after my Mom drew my attention to the Bakerella I decided that I should give it a go.

If you have never seen Bakerella's work, I highly encourage you to do so. She is amazing and creates what is the perfect meld between art and baking. Check her out: bakerella.

So after researching her website and reading her instructions on how to make "easy cake balls" I decided that my college educated self could manage to pull it off. As you can see from the pictures, I did pull it off, but it wasn't the prettiest effort. To make the balls you make a cake - I chose red velvet - and mix it with frosting - I chose cream cheese. And then you form balls and refrigerate. I actually put mine in the freezer as I am super impatient. Then you melt chocolate and put it in your candy mold and quickly shove a cake ball in each mold. Once that has cooled you coat your ball in another color of chocolate - I picked pink - and decorate.





Not sure I will be trying this again in the near future - it was quite the effort and super messy for an amateur like me. That, and melting chocolate to get the perfect consistency was A LOT more difficult than I could have imagined. On another note, although I didn't care for the finished product, my office mates enjoyed them quite a bit.