Who's Dora?

I was contacted to make a Dora the Explorer cake from a friend of a friend of a friend and my first question was, "Who's Dora?". I started getting a little anxious since I know nothing about children and am not tuned in to kid nation. My only real Dora frame of reference is from a Kevin Smith Q&A special...don't ask. So off to the internet to be introduced to Dora (whom I discovered has an incredibly similar hairstyle as I did circa 1990) and Boots the monkey. The internet as well, has a vast array of incredible Dora cakes that are way beyond my limited expertise, cakes shaped like Dora's face, Dora Land, jungles and parks and whatnot. In my opinion cutting into the face of my favorite childhood tv character and then eating a section of her cheek and eyeball, seemed a bit too cannibalistic so I opted to go in a different artistic direction. A mini two tiered vanilla cake with oreo buttercream, decorated in bright, fun colors that reminded me of playdough. My solution in avoiding the painstaking process of creating a Dora face out of fondant was to turn to my boyfriend who just happens to work in a print shop and get him to make me custom cake toppers. All in all it turned out to be a fun experience and I learned something as well, as it turns out I do still have an inner child.

A 2 for 1 cupcake

I found this recipe for a great, little, tasty coffee doughnut cupcake. The recipe is pretty basic, although there was some eyebrow raising at the suggestion of coffee grounds, but threw them in anyways just for kicks and surprisingly it turned out great. The recipe called for whipped cream, but that lasts for about five minutes and not so stable for transporting. I've become a little obsessed with cinnamon lately so came up with a cinnamon buttercream that is pretty yummy to use instead. Now the best part is the mini doughnut. Really the cupcake just acts as a holding device for said doughnut, a means to transport it from the table to your mouth. Tiny little doughnuts cut out and deep fried then rolled in a cinnamon sugar. The only thing I learned is that you can't leave them out overnight as they tend to loose their moisture fairly quickly (that means they dry out and get hard), but really why leave out doughnut cupcakes when they are just begging to be eaten?.

summer wedding cakes

This summer I decorated a bunch of cakes used as the centerpieces for my friend's wedding. The first one took forever, but after I clued in and came up with a game plan I whipped off the rest in no time and had so much fun. I had complete creative freedom, just stuck with the wedding colours, black, white and yellow (although at some point I ran out of ideas and needed a new colour so threw purple into the mix). If you check out the slide show you can see the rest of them, I think there were nine or ten in total. They were all little six inch cakes, so cute and the perfect amount of cake for each table, although I think we might have stolen another cake off of another table at one point, can't quite remember...

perfect summer cupcake

I love, love, love it when I get an order and am told to make whatever I want. I get to play around and have so much fun. For a recent order I added a new addition to my cupcake family, cherry lime! It's a simple cherry recipe with lime buttercream, but the two flavors pair nicely and it tastes like cherry limeade so is perfect for summer time. I love using lime zest in frosting because you get this great burst of freshness when you take the first bite. I have to say, the topper is obviously not homemade, but I thought it was playful, plus those candies always smell really good. The only problem is that I've become a very efficient baker and where as I used to have tons of extras left over, I ended up with only one... that I had to share with my official taste tester. Next time I make these puppies I know to accidentally make too many.

cinco de mayo challenge

So I had a special cupcake request for a cinco de mayo cupcake specifically based on a Lindt chocolate bar, chocolate cherry chili. I'd never heard of this flavour combo, but it sounded good and after a couple chocolate bars I was hooked. Now, how to turn the chocolate bar into a cupcake?...

First, there are a ton of chocolate chili recipes that call for ancho or pequin chili powder both of which I and apparently every Regina grocery store have never heard of before. Second, was I the only person who didn't realize that "chili powder" is actually a combination of spices and shouldn't be confused with "powdered chili"?. Completely fed up with grocery stores I decided just to go ahead and make my own powdered chili. Bought a bunch of chili peppers, roasted, and ground up in my handy multi purpose coffee grinder and found myself with a very potent powder acquiring only minor injuries along the way. For example, after the first couple times checking on the roasting chili peppers I learned not to breath while opening the oven door unless I wanted to come away with runny eyes, a stuffed nose and a coughing fit. Also, next time will take precautions to prevent burning thumbs and forefingers received while cutting raw peppers.

Now I added my hazardous powder to my chocolate batter and the result was a crazy hot cupcake that burned your lips and tongue, although the chocolate was so good it was hard not to eat more, but way too intense. The second attempt came out much better, milder and way more edible. I bought some fresh cherries and made a filling to fill the hollowed chocolate chili cupcakes and topped with red, green and white chocolate for a bit of a festive feeling.
Done and done.

The toppings!

It's been almost a month since my last post and I have bright new shiny additions to my little cupcake family. Lately it's been all about the toppings, adding a little something extra to give a plain jane a sort of Henry Higgins once over into a showy over the top center of attention... if you're into that sort of thing. So new in town are double decked out leaves, white chocolate and dark chocolate paired behind a teeny sugar cookie like a pair of good and evil angel wings. I find that they go very nicely with the neapolitan cupcake and strawberry buttercream frosting. To make the leaves you paint melted chocolate onto fresh mint leaves, let it dry and then very carefully pull the mint leaf off with a pair of tweezers. The trick is to have cold hands as the chocolate tends to melt easily which leaves (haha) you with a bunch of broken leaves you are forced to feed to your boyfriend.

The second topping I've been going bananas for are the butterfly cookies. I believe the cookie is called a tuile and I refrain from saying it outloud because I don't know how to pronounce it. It is a very thin, lightweight, crisp cookie and you can do all sorts of things with it. To make them you need a very thin mold ( I cut out the butterfly shape from a plastic lid) and the batter needs to be chilled as well as the cookie sheet otherwise the batter won't spread evenly over the mold, it's so touchy. The important step is not to walk away from the oven because they bake in 2-3 minutes and if you go check your e-mail you end up with burnt butterfly outlines on your cookie sheet and spend forever scrubbing it off... These also go well with any cupcake and tend to take on the flavor of the frosting, but you can flavor and color the batter as well. I have some ideas for more designs which I'm hoping to try soon.

vanilla and chocolate and strawberries, oh my...

A new flavor sensation, the Neapolitan Cupcake. A layering of chocolate, strawberry and vanilla cupcake with buttercream frosting and topped with a tiny sugar cookie and chocolate mint leaf. I taste tested the cupcake for the first time and was surprised to find that it actually tastes quite similar to the ice cream, a little taste of all three flavors at once, sooo good. Yes, it's pretty and pink and extremely girly so I believe the only proper way for it to be consumed is with pinky finger extended which shouldn't stop you because we should all partake in high society snacking once in a while.

The second cupcake pictured below is for anyone who loves Subway cookies, it is a White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cupcake. Seriously, it tastes exactly like the Subway cookie, very soft and chewy. It is topped with white chocolate ganache and a piece of macadamia nut praline, except technically I think praline is usually crushed, but I'm not one to argue because it tastes the same anyways.

so many cupcakes

This past Sunday Cakeburger showed up at the flea market fundraiser for Haiti with roughly eighty mini cupcakes. Now, my original plan was to bake and decorate all eighty on Saturday, sleep in the next day and show up bright eyed and bushy tailed on Sunday...However, due to staying out way past ones bedtime to see a certain band play Friday night resulted in a minor glitch in aforementioned plan, ahem. Nevertheless I managed to bake all cupcakes Saturday thanks to the aid of little naps and kitchen timers, made all toppers (chocolate covered strawberries, ganache filled raspberries and chocolate flowers) and frosted about half the cupcakes before I threw in the towel. Sunday I was triumphant and finished the cupcakes, boxed and labeled them all just in the nick of time, albeit leaving behind a rather unfortunate and forlorn looking kitchen.

So at the end of it all I had managed to make five varieties with three new kinds. There was the tried and true chocolate chai with a chai cream cheese frosting topped with a chocolate flower, almond hazelnut with chocolate ganache topped with a toasted hazelnut dipped in caramel. The new flavors were: chocolate raspberry with raspberry buttercream topped with a ganache filled raspberry and caramel, strawberry with a white chocolate strawberry buttercream topped with chocolate covered strawberries and a rootbeer cupcake with a rootbeer buttercream and crushed rootbeer candy.

not quite a cupcake...

So I've discovered a new cupcake sensation, although not technically a cupcake I've christened them "mini cupcake truffles" so they qualify by definition. This is my first attempt for valentine's day made with red velvet cake and covered in dark and white chocolate. Of course I have more in store for the future considering the combination possibilities are endless. Be advised, they are addictive.

drugstores are my new best friend

When in need of flavor inspiration where better to go than your friendly neighborhood Shoppers Drugmart. Seriously the self cleansing isle reads like a recipe book and is loaded with flavor sensations, apple and pear shampoo, vanilla and brown sugar hand soap, mango and pomegranate body wash and my particular favorite, white peach and ginger shampoo/conditioner. Sounds good, so presto change-o presenting a new cupcake, white peach and ginger with caramel buttercream icing topped with a ginger peach filled wonton.

I blame it on my mother

I grew up in a house filled with the heart warming aromas of baking breads, cinnamon buns, cakes and pastries. My mother was a stay at home mom and besides raising us and babysitting she also baked. Our house was hands down the favorite after school destination, all our greedy little hands grabbing at the cooling sticky buns dripping with cream cheese icing. She made a name for herself in our tiny little town and people began ordering everything from breads to wedding cakes. I remember her letting us decorate our own little cakes at the table while she worked on her big cakes at the kitchen counter and so the seed was planted. I guess looking back it's not all surprising that twenty years or so later I have to admit I am an addict. Yes, I am completely and quite thoroughly addicted to all things cupcake. Sure, at times I get distracted with some other form of baking (for instance I went through a ridiculous, over the top biscotti phase during Christmas), but I always get pulled back into cupcake land with some new idea I can't wait to try.

Which brings us to my new adventure, CakeBurger. The name. Well, we were trying to think of something oh so clever and started thinking about wine labels like eagle hawk and our favorite spin off, horse donkey and somehow out of that came cake burger. To make it a little more legit you can see in the slide show that there is actually a cupcake burger. There is a menu of my favorite cupcakes and frostings so far and I am free to take orders at cakeburger@gmail.com if you are in the Regina area. I recommend the chocolate espresso.