Wedding Cake

Tis the season of weddings!

This weekend I was very fortunate to be able to contribute to the celebration of S & J‘s special day.

S had a good idea of what she wanted: classic styling, vanilla buttercream, chocolate cake, quilted pattern, and of course her wedding color of purple.

I really loved how this cake turned out! The cake topper that S provided me with really tied everything together nicely. Unfortunately, my camera didn’t really capture the color of the ribbon properly (It’s purple, not navy) but you still get a good view of the cake.

A big congratulations to S & J!

To check out some of the other weddings I’ve done please click here.

Peanut Butter Cup Crunch Brownie Bars

If there is one constant I see in baking, it’s that a good brownie will always be a hit. These delicious squares of chocolate goodness are always the superstar of any sweet plate or a welcome offering. There are so many brownie recipes out there and so many variations, the possibilities are really limitless.

At a recent soiree with my boyfriend’s cousins, I decided to try a brownie that incorporated one of his cousin’s favorite ingredients: peanut butter.

I had originally seen this recipe on Brown Eyed Baker and it definitely got my mouth watering! What’s not to love? Brownie, peanut butter, chocolate chips, AND peanut butter cups? Sign me up!

Now the recipe calls for whatever brownie base you prefer and then basically layer everything else on top. Doesn’t get any simpler then that!

They turned out well and were thoroughly enjoyed by all. The only comment I have is about the peanut butter cups: I didn’t really find that they added anything. Obviously, they’re there to add peanut butter taste but why not just use peanut butter itself? I didn’t find the squares had an overly ‘peanut buttery’ taste so I think regular PB would have helped. Also, the brownie recipe I chose was not fudgey enough (Contrary to how dense they look in these pictures!!). I’d probably aim for a denser/fudgier recipe next time. Although these brownies were good my quest for the best peanut butter brownie continues on!

Red Velvet Throwndown

I’ll come right out and say it: I am a cake mix snob. Having being raised in a household where everything was baked from scratch and store bought baked goods were rare: cake mix never made an appearance.

What’s with the sudden confession you wonder? Well recently in my area, a new cupcake store opened. The cupcake craze never really hit Montreal to the level that it did in the rest of North America. When I was living in Toronto, it was quite common to see cute cupcake boutiques throughout the city. Every review I ever read of Montreal cupcake places were always mixed and never really inspired me to go out of my way to sample them. But this time, I bought into the hype and decided to try it. My primary intention was to do a review and maybe even some reconnaissance for my own future aspirations. So, after our visit, I returned to work and opened the box with my two cupcakes with anticipation. My first indication that something was ‘off’ was the color of the red velvet. Red velvet is known to be a deep red color, this cupcake was distinctly pink. I put this aside and took a bite. As I chewed, a realization hit me: this was definitely cake mix. I came to the same conclusion after sampling the chocolate cupcake as well.

I’ll be honest, I felt let down. When paying 2.75$ a cupcake, I expect a product that’s worth that much. When I splurge on baked goods I want to be happy with my purchases. In this case, I definitely wasn’t.

Can you tell which is which?

So, in the spirit of the competitiveness of super bowl weekend, I decided to have a cupcake throw down. I would make a batch of cake mix red velvet cupcakes and one from scratch. The purpose was to see if my family could pick out which of the two were homemade and which were not. An immediate issue was that red velvet cake mix is not readily available in Canada. Luckily, a co-worker was going down to the States and was able to get a box for me. For the first time ever, I went into the mix section of my grocery store and searched for cream cheese icing in a can. I have to admit, I was crossing my fingers that no one would see me carrying it. I was treating it more like a bomb then a container of icing!

So, as the color had been the first alarm bell when eating my original bought cupcakes, the color of the mix immediately stood out. The batter came together very red, which immediately proved that this was not the mix that the shop had been using. I had no problem matching the mix to my homemade batch which was helpful. I iced mine in a cream cheese icing from scratch and the stage was set.

Now, before I let you know what the results were: let’s discuss the usage of mixes in the baking industry. It actually is quite a normal practice. Your local bakery may be using mixes and you wouldn’t even know. They’re much more cost and time effective then buying the ingredients and the labor for putting it all together. I found some interesting articles about this debate that you can read here.

Also, as I had to remind myself: if cake mixes didn’t taste good, people wouldn’t use them. Many people may have been raised with this as the norm and this is what they think of when they think of baking. Plus, a mix will ensure a more consistent product then when you are making something from scratch. I don’t think that cake mixes taste bad, I can just identify when they are being used. The Ghirardelli brownie mix available at Costco makes a pretty awesome brownie that I won’t turn down if offered! A friend of mine had a family tradition of making cherry chip cupcake mix for her birthday every year and they were quite good. Another plus? One of the major differences I noticed when using a mix was the efficiency in time. It only took me 5 minutes to put together the mix versus 30 minutes for my home made ones.

Which ones are made with mix?

So, drumroll please: my whole family picked out the ones made from mix right away as the one they didn’t like. To be honest, I was surprised. I thought I would have atleast some people preferring the mix. The difference came down to the mix ones being oilier, not tasting as good, and the icing leaving a ‘greasy’ mouth feel.

Now, this was a small experiment of 7 people. After the research I had done I was ready to let my first negative thoughts go. Mixes are part of industry practice and socially accepted, so why should I hold it against this place? Plus, I wasn’t able to exactly replicate the cupcake that I had bought due to the color difference of my mix version.

The thing that would stop me from going back to this place was apparent after I visited their website. They advertise that they bake everything from fresh ingredients. What it comes down to for me is: using mixes is one thing but false advertising is another. 2.75$ to be mislead that a product is made from fresh ingredients is a little bit too much for me to swallow.

What are your thoughts on cake mix? Do you have a favorite?

Birthday Cake

Anyone who follows this blog knows that I am not really enamored with making sculpted cakes. There are other aspects of baking that I enjoy much more then making a sculpted cake: classic baking has always had a greater appeal.

All of this to say, when presented with a challenge I don’t often say no. Take the above cake for example. I’m sure your first thought was ‘cool’, shortly followed by ‘What’s on top?’ It is quite a random assortment of cake toppers but I really enjoyed making them.

My brother is currently doing his PhD in food sciences. For his supervisors birthday he wanted to have a cake that represented each item he and his colleagues were currently experimenting with. So you get: banana, apple, tomatoes, carrots, radishes, and an egg.

Several of his colleagues abstain from eating eggs which presented a challenge for the actual cake. I did some research online and was surprised to see several sites claimed that the absence of eggs made no difference: as long as you replaced the missing moisture with water. This is what I did and there was a definite difference in the rise of the chocolate cake. But I was told that during consumption, texture wise, it was still very good. Next time I would probably go and buy an egg substitute instead of taking my chances!

I finished it was a classic chocolate buttercream decorated by the fruit and vegetable shapes. The toppers themselves are made out of marzipan that I dyed by hand (Yes, I was walking around with pink hands the day after: all part of the trade!).

This cake was a lot of fun to make and almost made me think I enjoy intricate cakes. Almost:).