Pony Tails and Christmas Baking

This week I put Grace's hair in a pony tail for the first time. I mean a behind-the-head ponytail, not the top-of-the-head kind. She looked super cute, but wouldn't stand still for a picture. Too much to do!

Here she is walking, and you can kind of see it.
From the front. She's so cute with her little Zooey Deschanel bangs, don't you think?


As hard as I tried to get a still shot of Grace's ponytail, it just wasn't happening. So I decided to take a little video instead! Her new favorite thing is to say "Boo!" to everyone.


For comparison reasons, I dug out pictures of Lily's first ponytail. Lily was 19 months when these were taken, and Grace is currently 17 months old.
Cutie pie!

Friday and Saturday we spent occupied with Christmas baking. I love Christmas baking, but I don't need to eat all those goodies, so we usually make up little containers and bring them to our neighbors. Grace and Lily were both big helpers in the kitchen.

Don't worry, this was after I was finished making the dough. The whisk was more to occupy a girl than anything else. :)
I love helping my mama!
Lily and I making sugar cookies. Lily was very good at using the cookie cutters. That shirt is like camouflage, but I have to admit that my belly is such a size now that reaching very far across a counter can prove difficult.

Lily's Cake

So I am becoming more experienced with working with fondant. I learned a lot of lessons from my practice cake, and corrected some of the mistakes that I made last time. I made a few brand new ones, but I also made some improvements. Hurrah!

I'll tell you the story as I go through the pictures.

First, I baked two large round cakes and two small round cakes (I really wanted to say Short Round cakes), with one of each chocolate, and the other white. Lily really wanted white cake (don't ask me why) so we compromised and made it half and half.

Then I made the faux Costco cream cheese filling. I actually had the correct ingredients on hand this time (and I discovered Dream Whip!) and it turned out awesome! It's a fabulous consistency and it tastes wonderful. If you're thinking about doing a cream cheese filling for a cake, and just figured you'd do a cream cheese frosting, DON'T! It might turn out too sweet, and I highly recommend this filling. I'll share the recipe at the bottom. (Unless you're doing a carrot cake, then it's probably fine to use cream cheese frosting as the filling.)

Here are the cakes stacked with the filling. That blob of filling on top is to use as mortar to attach the top layer. I discovered without a doubt that brand name cake mixes taste better than the store brand. They are also more fluffy and soft and moist. Spring for the name brand cake mixes, folks.

And there are both layers all stuck together. BUT! It was at this point that I realized that I had to cover each layer with fondant separately. I shouldn't have stuck them together yet! ARGH!
Here is the butter cream frosting. When you make fondant, you have to put a layer of butter cream frosting on first so that the fondant has something to stick to. It's also nice so that you can peel off the icky fondant and still have frosting!
So here is the bottom layer with the butter cream frosting on it.
When I made the fondant, I had this decision moment early in the process. I'd known since I made the last cake that I would have to make this decision, but I was still being wishy washy about it when it came time to do it. See, when you color fondant, if you want more than one color, you have to make it all white and then mix the coloring in later, which takes a lot of kneading. (And I planned on making a purple cake, and then making different colored dots all over it.) OR you can just color it all the same color and have your Kitchen Aid do the work for you. But then you can only have one color, or you have to use that base color of fondant to make your other colors. I hemmed and hawed (is that how you spell it?) until the very last second and finally decided to just color the whole thing purple so that I wouldn't have to knead for hours and hours and hours. I also figured that gel food coloring just might be powerful enough to overcome the base purple color. So I colored the whole kit and caboodle purple. Then, when I'd covered the two layers, I took a few blobs of fondant and attempted to make them beautiful colors. I think I was really tired of it at that point, because I came up with an ugly mauve, puke green, and an ok-but-not-vibrant blue color. Meh. Good enough. I didn't love it, but I knew I'd made my bed and I'd have to sleep in it.
BUT THE NEXT DAY!!!

The next day, I started making the cookies to decorate the cake. I knew I'd either have to recreate my ugly dot colors, or having un-matching colors. But here's the deal. As soon as I made the following frosting colors, I knew that I was not going to tolerate those ugly dots. Who wants ugly muted colors when you can have such awesome vibrant colors!? These are the three bowls of cream cheese frosting that I used on the eating cookies.
See, look how gorgeous they are! I love the bright colored dinosaurs!
These are the decoration cookies (as opposed to the eating cookies). For these, I wanted a nice smooth looking frosting, so instead of using the yummy cream cheese frosting, I made a simple icing out of milk and powdered sugar. I used the icing to make nice smooth-looking decorative cookies for the cake, and then we ate the cookies with the yummy cream cheese frosting!
So anyway, back to my ugly dots. While I was making the sugar cookies, I had a stroke of genius (if I do say so, myself... and I do). I thought that instead of using fondant for the dots, I could use cookies! And hey, if it didn't work, I'd be no worse off. So I took little blobs of cookie dough, and set to dying them various bright colors. Once again, if you've never used Wilton gel food coloring, and have only used the little dropper bottles that you use for Easter eggs, you're really missing out. Gel food coloring is a-mazing. So anyway, the cookie dough looked really bright and beautiful, so I crossed my fingers that they would still be bright once baked.
And they were! So here's how you do it, in case anyone else out there ever has the urge to attach cookies to a fondant cake.

So after you dye your cookie dough and cut it out, stick it in the oven. About halfway through baking, or when the cookies are no longer shiny looking, open the oven and pull one cookie out of the oven and stick it straight onto the cake right where you want it. It should be cooked enough to end up looking like a cookie, but doughy enough that you can mold it to the shape of the cake. The heat of the cookie melts the fondant ever so slightly enough for it to stick tight, but not enough for it to slide or anything. So just hold your piping hot cookie tight to the cake in place for 30 seconds or so, or until you're confidant that it's suck. Then take your next dot straight out of the oven and stick it on. Whatever you do, don't take the whole pan of cookies out of the oven because by the time you get to the last cookies, they'll have cooled and hardened and will just crumble instead of molding to the cake. I think it's possible that I've come up with a new cake baking technique. Has anyone else ever stuck cookies to a cake?
The rest of the cookies pre-frosting.
The old ugly fondant dots. GOODBYE!
Lily tasted a cookie and gave it her stamp of approval.
Jim said that the kitchen looked to colorful not to take a picture of it. I say, the picture doesn't even do it justice.
The finished product! Notice that I also made colored-dough letter cookies to spell Lily's name, and iced them with contrasting icing colors. Oh, and I used kabob skewers to attach some of the cookies, and the ones on the bottom layer I just glued on there with extra cream cheese filling, which worked great.

To sum up, the grand total was:

4 cakes of two different flavors
cream cheese filling
purple butter cream frosting
purple fondant
ugly fondant dots
dinosaur shaped cookies
colored dot and letter cookies
cream cheese frosting in three different colors
decorative icing in three different colors

all equals ONE BIRTHDAY CAKE!!!


And here's what you've really been waiting for! This is the cream cheese filling that I made, and it's pretty close to what Costco makes. I got it off of a Wilton discussion forum, so I can't claim ownership. But if you have to write something on the recipe card, I'm not opposed to a title something like:

Alyson Klein's Wonderfully Delicious Cream Cheese Cake Filling

1 Pkg Jello Instant French Vanilla Pudding (small package, not large)
1 Envelope Dream Whip
1-1/2 cups light cream
4 oz Philadelphia Cream Cheese softened
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 tsp Knox unflavored gelatin
1/4 cup cold water

Pour powdered pudding and powdered Dream whip into medium bowl and add the light cream, blend on low speed with electric mixture until blended. Switch to high speed and beat 6 minutes scraping down sides occasionally with spatula. Add softened cream cheese and vanilla and beat another minute. Pour 1/4 cup water into small saucepan and sprinkle gelatin over it. Stir and the let stand for one minute. Heat gelatin mixture over medium heat until gelatin dissolves and mixture thins ad turns clear. DO NOT allow to boil. Remove pan from heat and set aside for a few minutes and allow mixture to cool off a bit. Don't let sit too long-it will begin to gel after about 10 mins. or so. Pour gelatin mixture into pudding mixture and beat thoroughly, scraping down sides of bowl for 1 minute. Cover tightly and refrigerate for at least 3 hours. When ready to fill cake mix with mixer until nice and creamy. If too thick add a little bit light cream until desired texture achieved. TIPS: recipe can be doubled-use a large bowl. Flavors develop when sitting over night. If cake you are filling is crumbly, pipe filling between layers and spread with knife dipped in hot water. (Recipe courtesy of Carol Chisholm.) Delicious, creamy, not too sweet and sturdy enough not to squish out from between layers. ENJOY!!!!!!

I Almost Quit

Lily's birthday is coming up, and since I'm trying a new technique for her cake this year, I decided to make a practice cake. I chose to make it this week because the Christian school at our church is having a fund raising auction tomorrow, and I figured if it turned out even remotely decent, I could auction it off and make a little money for the school.

For her birthday, Lily chose the theme of "dinosaurs". So I set out to find a cute and somewhat girly dinosaur cake. My friend, Tamara, actually found the winning design. It's a two layer fondant-covered cake with dinosaur shaped sugar cookies stuck to it for decoration. It's super cute. I figured for my practice cake, I would just practice the technique (fondant, filling, layering, sugar cookies, icing) and I would make a different theme.

I asked a couple of friends who have done cake decorating for advice on fondant. The advice I got was 1. Fondant tastes bad. 2. Don't do fondant. 3. IF you do fondant, do marshmallow fondant. 4. You have to ice it with butter cream anyway for the fondant to stick. I was dead set on doing fondant (hey it's a practice cake, I can change my mind if it's gross) so I went grocery shopping yesterday morning, and when I got home, I set to work.

I baked three large round cakes and two small round cakes, as well as an extra smaller round cake for a "taster" cake. (I mean, the point is to be able to taste it AND auction it off, which are kind of mutually exclusive. Thus, the taster cake.) I used a mix for the cakes (go ahead, judge me) so they all came out great.

For the filling, I wanted to make a cream cheese filling like they have in Costco sheet cakes. YUM! So I found a knock off recipe online, and went to work. BUT there was a problem. First, it said a "package" of vanilla pudding. Big or small? I chose big (probably the wrong choice). Then it called for Dream Whip, which I'd never heard of in my life, but after a quick Google search, I found out that I had NOTHING on hand to substitute for it. So I left it out. Then, it called for light cream, and I had only heavy cream. (Perhaps I should have read the ingredients before going grocery shopping?) So all these factors combined led to the thickest, most sticky, least spreadable filling you've ever seen. But it tasted delicious. So I used it.

Then I made the butter cream frosting layer to go between the cake and the fondant. From what I'd read, you're supposed to use a "crusting" butter cream. I had no idea if my recipe was "crusting" or not, so I looked online and found what was guaranteed to be a "crusting" butter cream frosting. But the recipe looked weird. It called for a cup of milk. What frosting uses a cup of milk? A few tablespoons at most, but I've never seen a frosting that used a cup of milk. I should have listened to my cooking instincts. The "frosting" was so watery that it could barely even be called an "icing." But I figured, "hey, I've never done this before, maybe this is what makes it nice and sticky..." so I drizzled and spread it on.

So then I made the fondant. It's pretty easy to make if you have a Kitchen Aid. You just melt a 1lb bag of marshmallows in the microwave with 2tbsp water, then you put it in your Kitchen Aid and add 2lb powdered sugar. But when it came time to work with the fondant, I almost quit. It was HARD and CRUMBLY. I thought, "this is never going to turn out!" and I kept crisco-ing and re-crisco-ing my hands and the counter, and kept adding little bits of water and kneading that rock-hard fondant. But finally I got it worked into a nice dough-like state. Hooray!

I decided to cover the small top layer first, and got the fondant all rolled out and plopped it on top. I'd watched a couple of Youtube videos on how to actually cover a cake with fondant, so I was pulling up and pressing in, and it was still tearing up top. Not only had I rolled it too thin (my bad) but that soupy nasty icing was just making it all wet and souping up at the bottom of the cake. I had to throw out a whole chunk of my fondant and start over.

I almost quit there. Would I have enough fondant? Could I scrape off enough icing soup to make it work? Would it still stick to the cake without butter cream? Should I bite the bullet and make some more (normal) butter cream? Bah!

I ended up just scraping off as much of the soup icing as I could, not making any new butter cream, rolling out the fondant much thicker, and starting over.

It worked perfectly the second time.

So I got the cakes all covered, and then it was time for the cookie portion of our show.

I made up a quick half batch of sugar cookies. I had dyed the fondant green so that it could be a St. Patrick's Day cake, and I went downstairs to get the right cookie cutter. I have this giant bucket of cookie cutters that has shapes for all holidays. All holidays, that is, except for St. Patrick's Day. Bah! I was literally ready to roll out the dough when I discovered that there was nary a shamrock cookie cutter in sight.

I almost quit.

Then I tried to free-hand a shamrock cookie, which looked horrible.

I almost quit again.

But then I decided to change the game plan, and I pulled out some flower cookie cutters and decided to go with a Spring themed cake.

So I made the cookies, baking them with kabob skewers stuck in them so that I could stick them into the cake. I also made some nice thin icing, which I colored pretty Spring colors. When the cookies came out, I iced them and stuck them in the cake. The ultra-sticky filling was the perfect "glue" to hold the bottom cookies in place.

And there I had it! My first fondant cake! Jim and I ate our tester cake last night, and it was pretty stinkin' yummy, fondant and all. I didn't have my regular camera out, but I did document some of the process with my iPhone.

My messy kitchen. No time to clean up with kids around, just work at a frenzied pace, hoping they'll stay happy. And by the way, both girls were absolute dreams yesterday. They played together in the living room, took a nap, and then Goo sat in her high chair in the kitchen and played "throw stuff off my tray" while Lily picked it back up for her. Then they shared a couple of snacks. It was amazing.
The first small layer covered with fondant.
The two layers!
The finished product! Doesn't it look happy and Spring-y?

The moral of the story is: DON'T QUIT! Even when everything goes wrong.

The Muffin Lady

Everyone needs a legacy. Throughout my life I've had several moments where I've wondered, "Hmmm... is this what I'm going to be known for forever?" The girl who always has gum. The soccer player. The biology geek. The girl who got a nose bleed in 5th grade, but didn't realize it, thus leaving a pool of blood on her desk during quiet time. What would my legacy be?

Well if you get to choose your own destiny, I'd like to be known as The Muffin Lady, thank you! In general I'd like to be known as a good cook and baker, but there are a couple of types of food where I absolutely hoard recipes, muffins being one of them. Over the years I've collected several delicious muffin recipes that sit in my recipe box, just waiting for company or a Ladies Tea or some other such occasion. I have Coconut Almond Muffins, Banana Nut Muffins, Coffee Cake Muffins, Pumpkin Muffins, Bran Muffins, and my latest delicious addition: Oatmeal Muffins.

See, I have this friend, Kathy, who has a few years on me and who has already established herself as a great cook and baker and in some circles may very well be known as The Muffin Lady. (I'm not trying to call her old, just experienced in the culinary arts.) She goes to our church and is in our Life group, her husband teaches classes, and her son is in the youth group, so there is no shortage of events for which Kathy is called on to bake something. Ladies Fall Fellowship, Sunday morning Bible class, Monday youth breakfast, or even just a super yummy sweet bread for the whole congregation to munch before worship starts. Kathy rarely shows up anywhere empty-handed, and what's in her hands is usually some delectable baked good. Often muffins.

So anyway, recently at some event I tasted the most amazing mini oatmeal muffins and I just knew that Kathy was the one who made them. So I asked her, and she was, and I told her how awesome they were. I mean, what is more plain than an oatmeal muffin? Nothing.... besides maybe plain oatmeal itself. But somehow the hearty taste of oatmeal made these muffins so fantastic... words can't describe. I just had to have the recipe. Luckily, Kathy is not a selfish person and the next time I saw her, what was in her hand was a recipe for oatmeal muffins. Laaaaaaa (that was the angels singing)

I haven't actually tried the recipe yet. But I have it safe and sound in my little recipe box, just waiting for the right occasion. Perhaps Wednesday will be the right occasion.

In the mean time, I would like to state for the record that I am not a selfish person and will even willingly share my very own Coconut Almond Muffin recipe. (I got it out of Taste of Home, so really what claim do I have on it anyway?)

Coconut Almond Muffins
Preheat oven to 375
Makes 6 muffins (since it only makes six, I like to double it)

1 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/4 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1/2 cup sour cream (plain or vanilla yogurt will work in a pinch)
1/4 cup butter, melted
1/4 tsp. almond extract
1/2 cup coconut flaked
1/4 cup mini chocolate chips
1/4 cup sliced almonds

In a bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. In another bowl, whisk the egg, sour cream, butter, and extract. Stir into dry ingredients until moistened. Fold in coconut and chocolate chips.
Fill greased muffin cups 2/3 full.
Sprinkle with almonds.
Bake at 375 for 18-20 in. or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool 5 minutes.


My other latest craze is soup recipes. Stay tuned for my latest fave: Root Vegetable with Sausage. YUM-O!!

P.S. I forgot to mention that yesterday was the first day of NaBloPoMo, so expect a blog every day this month.

I'm Just Here For More Food

I love Alton Brown. He may be my biggest celebrity crush... well, besides David Attenborough. And besides being addicted to Good Eats, I now have a window into his mind that I can carry around with me everywhere I go and read and reread. It's one of his cookbooks called "I'm Just Here for More Food" and it's wonderful! Dave and Anna (well, let's be honest, it was probably mostly Anna's doing) got it for me for my birthday and it just arrived. It's one of those cook books that you don't just flip to a recipe and throw the ingredients together; you actually read the book. This particular volume is all about baking (yay! Just in time for baking season!), and so it gives tons of information about ingredients and methods and hardware. In fact, you have to read 91 pages before you even come to a recipe. That is why I love Alton Brown so very much. He doesn't just tell you what ingredients are needed, he tells you all the hows and whys and whatnot. He appeals to the cook and the science nerd in me. I've been saying for years that if you're a bad cook, you'll make a worse scientist and vice versa. This is because when you get right down to it, cooking science are basically the same thing. It's not just what you put in there, but how, and when, and for how long etc. that makes both science and cooking work. I also like the cook books that America's Test Kitchen puts out for the same reason. They don't just give you a recipe for cake, they tell you what doesn't work in a cake recipe, and what does and why.

I also love Alton Brown because he makes me laugh. Here is an excerpt from page 9:

"A mad scientist attempting to make a marmot from scratch, may (in fact, probably will) slip up and create a horrible mutation that would break out of its cage and wreak havoc on the surrounding countryside. Chased by torch-bearing villagers, the marauding varmint would run home to the scientist, who would attempt to harbor his creation, which would repay him by biting his head off. It's a story as old as science itself.
"When attempting to create a muffin from scratch, odds are good that you will from time to time create a horrible mutation. Luckily, lacking a nervous system or even a bad attitude, the odds are good that this aberration will not try to eat your head. In fact, if you close your eyes and take a bite, you may find it to be perfectly serviceable food. I would implore you not to be satisfied. Edible is not good enough."

See? You just don't get that personal touch from Better Homes and Gardens, do you?

I will conclude by saying "Thank you, Dave, Anna, and Madison for my lovely birthday gift." And next time you see me, I will probably have a plate of muffins or a baguette for you to try.

Lily the Baker

Last week I made cookies for Jim to bring on the boat on his underway. Lily was fascinated by it and wouldn't leave me alone. So I pulled a chair up to the counter and let her watch. She enjoyed the process, and even more so when she realized that the final product was going to be COOKIES!

When Lily first got up to the counter, we went over the fact that you NEVER EVER touch the Kitchenaid (if you want to keep all your limbs.)
This is Lily pointing at the mixer saying, "No no no!"
I like baking cookies!
And this is when I spilled the sugar. I would like to blame Lily, but she had nothing to do with it. I just dropped the canister. It was kind of fun vacuuming it all up, though :)

No, I don't want to say "cookie!"


Lily getting her first little bite of cookie.