Know any graveyard cake diggers?

Halloween is my favorite holiday for two reasons, the spooks and the treats. Why else? Now, as an adult as much as I would love to put on a costume and go trick'r treating, bringing home a pillow case full of candy that would be absolutely (totally awesome) against any kind of Halloween rules there are. Kids do have all the fun and it wont be until I have some kiddies of my own that I, or they will be able to go candy crazy!

For Halloween I made a spooky graveyard cake with sugar cookie headstones and iced sugar cookies. The graveyard cake is deliciously moist pumpkin cake with chocolate ganache frosting. Both, are very easy, I promise. I used this Martha Stewart recipe here. I was going to make my favorite sugar cookies anyways so I made the headstones with that recipe rather than the shortbread cookies offered. You can do either one though. The sugar cookies recipe is listed below.

This sugar cookie recipe will serve as your go-to sugar cookie recipe for any holiday cookie shapes you want to use. The recipe is from a friend of mine, she uses a cream cheese frosting that is absolutely delicious, so its best to spread a thin layer on if you want it to dry all of the way. Otherwise you can cover each layer with parchment paper to keep them pretty.  

Seasonal Sugar Cookies

from Kelley M.

time 12-18 min
yield Makes 2 batches for 1 frosting 

Ingredients
Cookies:
1/2 cup Butter
1 cup Sugar
1 Egg
1/2 tsp Vanilla
2 - 2 1/4 cup Flour
2 tsp Baking powder
1/2 tsp Salt

Frosting:
8 oz Cream Cheese, cold
1 stick Butter, room temp
1/8 tsp salt
3 3/4 cup confectioner's sugar
1/2 tsp Vanilla

directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 and line baking sheets with parchment.  
2. Cream butter and sugar.
3. Blend in egg and vanilla.
4. Sift and add flour (add additional 1/4 cup depending on consistency), baking powder and salt.
5. Roll into ball and chill.
6. Roll out to 1/8 inch thick and cut out shapes. Keep cool as you go.
7. Bake for 12-18 min until light golden and cool completely on rack before frosting.
8. To make the icing, mix all ingredients in mixer fitted with paddle attachment and separate into bowls and add coloring. 

Happy Halloweeeeeen! 

Going once, going twice, SOLD!

My company raised funds to donate for the American Heart Association Heart Walk and for the cause I donated two 6 inch cakes to our silent auction. The grand coconut cake sold for $20 and was devoured by my friend and her mother that are both controlled by two things in this word, coconut and their wild sweet tooth's. The dark chocolate raspberry cake sold for $25 and gobbled up by our lucky CEO.

I love baking for a cause and hope I have the option to do more of it in the future.

Dark Chocolate Raspberry Cake

Grand Coconut Cake

Very Merry Unbirthday to Me and You!

Yellow Cake with A Lot of Work Chocolate Frosting

For the past month or so I have been communicating back and forth with my Great Aunt Maureen, the one relative who, god bless her soul, has kept Grams' recipes and accompanied special stories all kept away in a safe place.

My Dad for years would talk about this yellow cake. This cake was for him major food nostalgia- just how Grams' sugar cookies are to me. Yes, I said a standard yellow cake. This cake fed a many birthday tummy.

I emailed Maureen for the recipe so I could replicate the efforts and see just how whimsical this cake was. This is what she emailed back.

Cream: shortening/butter and sugar
Beat in: eggs
Sift together: sifted cake flour, baking powder and salt
Stir into creamed mixture alternately with: milk and vanilla

Pretty basic right? and you are probably asking what I did...how much, how long and how hot? She emailed me back saying pretty much that before World War II most bakers would fold the egg whites in last which made for a lighter, higher cake. The cook time varied. Most old recipe books didn't list the time or temperature, they new their oven intimately. Gotta love those little nuggets of timeless information!

The cake was delicious! Light, fluffy and moist. Next time, with the additional information given I will use a 8x8 cake pan or use my mini cake pans to make a yellow layer cake with and bake it at 350 for 25-30 minutes.

To accompany this cake recipe was A Lot of Work Chocolate Frosting that is (suppose to be) just like chocolate fudge. Apparently I didn't work at it enough! I am very impatient when it comes to waiting to eat dessert and so are my friends. The chocolate needs to be made into a ganache and cooled so it's spreadable. I however, was fine with chocolate sauce and it seeped into the top layer of the cake and it was like chocolate heaven! Sorry the pic isn't that great.

Thank you Maureen!

Birthday Cake for Breakfast!

My Mom always said No to sweets before dinner with only one exception, the morning after our birthday. If our hearts desired we could devour a slice of birthday cake for breakfast BUT only the morning after our birthday. Cake can be just cake but to be birthday cake is an experience; blowing out the candles, getting cake all over the place and for me as a little girl reaching over to my sisters highchair to eat her cake as she is reaching for mine. Photo to be added shortly.

As an adult all I really want on my birthday is a big ol' cake to share with my friends and family, blowing out tons of candles and being allowed to pick up a huge piece of cake and eating it like pizza, of course in the most graceful way possible. The frosting, the cake all in one bite. No fork just cake and a cold glass of milk.

That's what I was thinking my big sister would like for her 32nd birthday so I made it for her. My bake-girl-friend Amber gave me a recipe for a chocolate raspberry layer cake with chocolate ganache and swore it is the richest cake she's ever made. So, I had too, I did and it was chocolaty perfection! Recipe to be added shortly.

My sister loved the cake and is still savoring it 6 days later. That's really the reason I do this, to show my love and to evoke that child in all of us. We all share memories with food whether it be birthday cake, that warm chocolate chip cookie, grandmas pound cake or apple pie during the holidays. Food Happiness!