peach

It's peach season! Yay. I do enjoy a nice peach every now and then, if perfectly ripe. If not, then not. I love peach pie and I've never made it from scratch and peaches are very cheap right now. I decided to make a peach pie because my bro was visiting for a couple of days. Here is my peach pie. I was much more happy with the pie before it was baked. I'm not a huge fan of the final result of this pie.

Happy Birthday Mary

My Step Father's Mother's 80th birthday is on Sunday. I was chosen to make her the birthday cake. This is what I came up with.

All of the fondant used on this cake was homemade because store bought fondant is both expensive and not very tasty.

How do you make homemade fondant? And how much does it cost to make your own, as appose to buying it?

In order to make your own fondant, all you need is a bag of powdered sugar, a bag of mini marshmallows, some water and a tiny bit of shortening to knead your fondant on, to prevent sticking. So it costs about $3.00 to make your own fondant that tastes good. It costs about $9.00 to buy it and it tastes horrible.

You microwave your marshmallows with the water, about 3 tablespoons of water for about 50 seconds, mix, return to the microwave and microwave for another 50 seconds, cook until melted. Add about 3/4's of the bag of powdered sugar to the bowl and mix until everything has come together, then dump the the mixture onto a flat surface that has been covered with shortening and knead until the fondant is malleable, this could take awhile. This is why most people just cave in and buy it. Once your fondant is fondant, you can add your coloring (I mix in my color into the melted marshmallow and water, before the powdered sugar, if I'm making a cake with mostly that one color,but you have to be careful about adding enough food coloring, the powdered sugar will dull down the color. You can store fondant in the fridge for weeks just as long as it's covered tightly in plastic wrap.

I also made my own cake board, guess how much cake boards cost? About 10 bucks... just for the board! So I went to the dollar store and got 2 foam boards that you would buy for a school project. I traced 3 10 inch circles, 2 circles on one board and 1 on the other and cut my circles out with an exacto knife. I sprayed a layer of a glue adhesive on the circles and stacked them. While that was drying I cut a 12 inch circle out of some aluminum foil, I had to use 2 overlayed sheets in order for the 12 inch circle to fit. I then covered my 3 foam sheet layered circle, that had been sprayed with more adhesive with the foil. And there you have it, cake board.

I ended up covering the royal icing m with a line of fondant, this is the finished cake.

This was the cake before I added the frill.

This was the emblem before I covered the royal icing initial with fondant

New England

I just took a trip back home to New England and I was inspired to make some New England famous whoopie pies. I found a good recipe here. I've made this recipe several times since, and it's a giant hit.

buttermilk fudge cake

I had some buttermilk that I needed to use up, before it went bad and I've been going through baking withdrawals. I looked up recipes that included buttermilk and decided to go with this one, because I already had everything in the house to make it. This really is an idiot proof buttermilk fudge cake. I've never made such an easy cake in my life. And it's really really yummy! So fudgie. Like, it's real fudge, not an ammature chocolate icing, this frosting is in the big leagues of amazing chocolate fudge frosting. I salute you http://www.nancyskitchen.com/buttermilk-recipes/buttermilk-fudge-cake.html.

top of the pita TO YOU!

I saw this recipe on hungry-girl.com yesterday for a bbq pizza on a pita pocket, a whole wheat pita pocket. I used the last of my whole wheat pita pockets yesterday. So I decided to make my own pita pockets today, for the first time. They came out soooo good. I will never eat a store bought pita ever again.

"The best chocolate chip cookie recipe"

I was doing my cookie research as usual. I've probably tried about 50 chocolate chip cookie recipes.. all claiming to be the best. Not just any chocolate chip cookies, I try to find the best fat chewy cookie.. the best soft cookie, the best chewiest cookie, the best thin cookie. So this week I tried... New York Time's best chocolate chip cookie! The recipe calls for resting in the fridge for 24+ hrs. So I made the batter yesterday.. half dead. I've been super sick. I'm still sick today, but I was hoping that my taste buds would come back in time for the cookies... I'm sad to say, they haven't. I'm not really too sure how the cookies taste, but I'll keep you updated. They baked nicely though!

I found this picture hanging in an old family picture frame... my sister and I.. I don't know why my dress is so big.

renewing of vows

So my Mother and Step Father decided to renew their vows. I made the "wedding" cake.

cupcake cookies

Cupcake cookies, aren't they adorable? I made these for my neighbor's birthday party.

Winter house

I tried to make a gingerbread house for Xmas this year... things did not go as I wanted them to.. the royal icing I made, was terrible. So I wanted to try it out again, with a lighter dough and a good royal icing, I decided to make a little winter house.

Xmas time

All of us kids together on Christmas!

Most adorable grandparents that you have ever seen?

Mike, laying out at the pool on Christmas with the dogs.

Mike and Kenny.. twins!

Gotta love farmstands.

So, I had the most wonderful Christmas this year. My brother flew down from Boston. It was the first time all of us kids were together in years. I couldn't have asked for anything better for Xmas. The second day he was here, was our annual cookie cookoff.