Big Bad Wolf Cake

Mr. T's birthday was right on the heels of our coming back from a family vacation and just a few days before Halloween. It was a crazy time around our house and so I just wanted to do something small, low key and just family to celebrate his turning the big 2. At almost the last minute we decided to call see if some family friends wanted to join in the fun and so that put the pressure on to do a cake. Now if you read this blog you will notice for one that theres not alot a posting going on but also in the few post I do have  that we have kind of a family tradition of trying to do great cakes. I have to preface that by saying it's not that we are great bakers or cake makers but that we have cake envy and always want to try and do something new and challening. My husband and I collaborate and always make the cake thing happen and by some miracle we are always smiling and happy with the results, even if some times they are less than perfect. This year was a bit of a challenge in that since the last cake efforts we have discovered that we as a family have gluten issues. The kids and I were tested and things have not been the same around here when it comes to sweet baked treats. For this cake I used the chocolate gluten free mix from King Arthur, to my surprise is was very good. Moist, tender with good chocolate flavor and none of the grit you get in alot of store bought GF mixes. For the icing I used Martha Stewarts recipe chocolate ganache - it was the first time I had made a ganache. It is now my go to for quick chocolate icing. So easy and it looked so professional. I can't take full credit for the design, I was hard pressed to do a big bad wolf cake from scratch and I was inspired by a cake I spied online wolf cake inspiration. 

Birthday Boy

Hard to believe that my little guy just turned one. Brings tears to my eyes just thinking about how quickly this past year has flown by. I'm reminiscing now about all the precious moments and sweet infant glances that I wish I could have bottled up to relive again and again. I'm always in such quandary about whether I should be capturing (i.e with a camera) or be mindfully living the moment. I go back and forth and most of the times I think I choose to just let the experience be what is it and then just lament later that I didn't get the shots. I guess I am sorting venting here because I really didn't get the best pictures of the big guys birthday. Lighting was bad, he had a big poop in his diaper that I didn't know about and it was the end of a very very busy day so I guess I should be glad I got what I did. It really was a special day. Dad played hookie, Theo's buddies at little gym all sang to him, we had lunch out after an outing at the toy store (where he scored big time) and finished it day off with a cake I made in the nick of time the night before. I have a funny story about this cake that I won't go into but Dad and I were in tears laughing at 1:30am and will never forget this ONE.

First Cake

Been racking my brain thinking about options for Tess upcoming birthday. We usually spend & celebrate the summer date away. We will be out of town again this year but daddy is requesting that we do a small playdate party at home for her close buddies. I'm a little concerned about having two parties... are we setting ourselves up for trouble next year when her birthday rolls around again. I can already hear it... Tess gets TWO parties. What ever we do I will have to try and top the cupcakes from last year and the octopus cake from her first birthday... I take it as a personal challenge. I wanted to post the cake from her big 1 because that's were the "topping" the cake challenge began. Matt and I had NEVER made cake from scratch before but we have watched plenty of food network cake shows and were thinking, "we could try that". We had a few obstacles to overcome, we had to cook the cake in the vacation kitchen and had to track down quality fondant on a small limited provisions island all the while dealing with an active 1 year old- thank god for grandparents.

The first cake went into the garbage, burnt. My mother-in-law slipped my hubby a tranquilizer in his diet coke to calm him down and we had food coloring everywhere. Alas, the cake turned out great so proud of our first attempt and best of all Tess was just enchanted with her Octocake.We called her Toothy.

Cake specifics - we used an egg shaped mold, fonderific fondant and gel food coloring. For the cake we used Martha Stewarts recipe for yellow cake with buttercream icing. There was lemon curd between the layers and we topped it with crushed graham crackers to get that sandy look.

Health Nut Cookie

Chocolate cookies are a particular weakness of mine and my all time favorite recipe is from Tate's bake shop in the Hamptons. Goop posted the recipe awhile back and since then it is my go to recipe for the perfect chocolate chip cookies. Here is that link if you are in the mood for the best cc cookie http://goop.com/newsletter/38/. I am always on the lookout for healthy alternatives to the foods I crave so when I saw the recipe for lentil cookies on the Cooking Channel's Spice Goddess I was intrigued and thought I would give them a try. I love the idea of a cookie that includes high protein,healthy fats and whole wheat. I modified the recipe a bit so that I could make them more of a breakfast cookie or healthy snack cookie. I'm calling my version a Health Nut Cookie. Here is the original recipe from the cooking channel http://www.cookingchanneltv.com/recipes/bals-lentil-cookies-recipe/index.html. For my modification I only used 1/4 cup of almonds and added 3/4 cup of walnuts (I'm a walnut fan). I also cut the sugar by 1/4. The final cookie was light and nutty - next time I might add a pinch of cardamon to give them a little more spice. You can't argue with a healthy cookie that actually tastes good.