Boofy Cakes

My very good friend Miss Amy from California introduced me to these wonderful buttery rolls last November. They’re Buttered Rosemary Rolls. I made them for the very  first time for our Thanksgiving dinner. Everyone fell in love with them! I then made over 50 of them for my family for our Christmas Eve party, and again today for my brother’s birthday. They’re so addicting, you can’t just eat one! Amy found this wonderful recipe in The Pioneer Woman’s blog.  You can click on the link and read her recipe, or you can keep reading and learn my twist on this amazingly simple recipe!

You can either make your dough from scratch, or you can use raw frozen dough. I like using Rhodes frozen dough as the Pioneer Woman suggests. They come in nifty zip top bags, so you can just make as many as you need and then save the rest for another time. But trust me, after your first taste you might want to consider making them all next time! You can find Rhodes rolls in the frozen dough section of most grocery stores.

Now, the Pioneer Woman baked her rolls in an iron skillet. I for one, do not have an iron skillet. If you don’t have an iron skillet, you could make 12 rolls in a 9×13 pan. But, being a Pampered Chef consultant, I have my fair share of awesome stoneware! I’ve made these rolls in the round baker, the rectangle bar pan, and my personal favorite, the stoneware muffin pan! 

Raw Clover Leaf Rolls in Pampered Chef Stoneware Muffin Pan

First, you need to let your dough defrost. The instructions are on the package, but letting them defrost and rise can take 3-5 hours. If you microwave the balls of dough on a plate, covered for about 15 seconds, then turn over and microwave another 15 seconds it will help speed them up to being ready 1-2 hours. I then put them in my pan, brush them with some melted butter, and cover with a clean towel or plastic wrap. Now it’s time to let them rise. Your rolls will rise best in a warm humid place, or just do your best to keep them away from a draft. I made mine into clover leaf rolls. It’s really easy to get this fancy look. After you defrost your dough in the microwave, cut the ball into 3 pieces, roll them back into balls and place in your pan. Easy!

Once your rolls have doubled in size, brush them with more melted butter and sprinkle with coarse sea salt and fresh chopped rosemary. Bake them 15-20 minutes at 400 degrees or until they are golden on top. Like so:

While they’re still hot, sprinkle them one last time with melted butter. I hope you’re really hungry, and I hope you’ve made enough because you’re going to want seconds, and thirds, and….

Happy Birthday Brian! Today is my brother’s birthday! I always love making my brother birthday cakes because he has such a wide variety of odd interests that make for fun cakes! I typically ask him what kind of cake he wants, or I take suggestions from my other brother. But this year I came up with the cake all on my own! I recreated the Monster Book of Monsters from Harry Potter! I had so much fun making it! It is German chocolate cake with Peanut Butter Buttercream filling. I iced it in regular white buttercream. For the leather cover, I used Chocolate Clay.

To make Chocolate Clay, you microwave 10 ounces of chocolate chips stirring ever 20 seconds until it is melted smooth. Then stir in 1/3 Cup of corn syrup. I line a cookie sheet with wax paper or parchment paper and spread the chocolate over it to cool. It must sit for a couple of hours, then it will become pliable. you can use it to make chocolate decorations such as roses for your cakes. For the book I just spread my chocolate clay over the sheet pan making sure it was the right dimensions to cover my cake.

Before covering the cake, I used a log shape of fondant on the top for where the eyes would go. Once covered in the chocolate clay, this area would be popped up. When my chocolate clay became pliable, I draped it over my cake covering the “spine” of the book and the top cover. Using a pizza cutter I cut off extra clay where the cake met the board. Then I used kitchen scissors I cut the edge to look like the jagged edge of the book!

I used fondant to create the mouth and teeth and dusted them with a terracotta dust to give it an old dirty look. I finished off the bottom border of the book with more strips of chocolate clay that I cut jagged with the scissors. On the top I wrote The Monster Book of Monsters with a paint brush. To make the gold paint, I used edible gold luster dust and mixed it with a tiny bit of vodka. You can substitute the vodka with lemon extract or anything edible with a high alcohol content. This will ensure that the paint dries quickly and doesn’t soak into the chocolate or fondant making it sticky. I prefer vodka because it is tasteless.

Take a look at my Monster Book of Monsters and let me know what you think!

So my wonderful friend Amy from California sent me this marvelous package for Christmas from Lavender Hollow Farm. Before I even opened the box I could smell it’s wonderfulness. In the package were some lovely lavender bath salts, hand cream, lavender scone mix and a piece of lavender chocolate! YES, lavender chocolate! I’m sad to say that I received this generous gift before Christmas and it took me until the second of February to unwrap this fragrant treat. I’ve never had anything flavored lavender before other than tea. Which I’m  also embarrassed to say that I haven’t baked the lavender scones yet, but I’m really excited to try it! I’m saving them for one of those cold rainy days, so I can just wake up, bake up the lovely scones and enjoy with a cup of tea in the pajamas. I wonder if it’s going to rain tomorrow? Hmmmmm…..

Now, to really enjoy a delicious piece of lavender chocolate, you really need to enjoy lavender. Now, I’m not talking about the vanilla lavender candle I have on the shelf, I’m talking real lavender. Fresh lavender. And oh boy do I. But it’s not meant for everyone, like my boyfriend for example. He sits down next to me while I’m typing this blog and savoring a bite of my chocolate, and  he took one sniff of me and walked away. At least I don’t have to worry about sharing with him!

From the moment I unwrapped the pretty wrapper, I knew it was special. The smell was delicate and at the same time it just filled the room. It was then that I discovered that my puppy Miss Lola enjoys the scent of lavender too! She trotted over to the end table next to me and nearly swiped my chocolate! Sorry Miss Lola! No chocolate for puppies! 

THANKS AMY!

This past weekend we celebrated my cousin’s birthday! He is really into the Call of Duty video games and he wanted me to make him a Call of Duty cake! Last year I made him an Army themed cake that was camouflage with army men on it. So this year I wanted to make something more specifically Call of Duty.

I took this opportunity to try out a new recipe for a fondant substitute. I love the way fondant looks, but my family doesn’t care too much for the taste. I found this recipe online for Marshmallow Creme Fondant. I decided to try it out! Unfortunately it didn’t work out quite as well as I had hoped. It was a pain to make, incredibly sticky to roll out, and it tore while I tried covering my cake.

See? I had to patch the sagging torn fondant and it looked terrible. This fondant never really set or stiffened like normal fondant, so it continued to pull, sag and bubble. ARG! And I was so excited to try this new recipe! I should have known it sounded too good to be true. Luckily, the cake looked good enough, but I won’t be trying this one again.

I turned the cake around so that the damaged side was on the back. I used some regular fondant that I had left over from a previous cake to make the logo and name plate. To make the decorations I printed out the Call of Duty logo and cut it out of paper. Then I dyed my fondant a light grey and rolled it out. I placed my template on the fondant and used a small sharp knife to cut around the logo. Once I had the logo cut out, I used a soft brush to cover it in a fine metallic powder called luster dust. This gave it a metallic look. I buy soft make up brushes to cover large areas with powder. Then I used a small brush that I purchased from the painting supplies to dust a black powder to shade the top and bottom of the logo. These dusts and powders can be ordered online from cake decorating websites. They’re cheap and they last a long time since it doesn’t take much. Then I outlined the logo with a black food coloring marker. Wilton makes markers that are filled with food coloring that you can purchase at many craft stores. You can use these to draw on fondant, cookies, etc. Then I just placed it on to the cake! I was really happy with how the logo turned out that it made up for all the trouble I had covering the cake with the Marshmallow Creme Fondant.

This year was the second annual Chili Cook Off at the church! Being the weekend before the Super bowl, it was all football themed! I was really excited to enter my vegetarian chili again this year. Last year I placed 4th out of 13 chilis. I was rather surprised and flattered that my meatless chili did so well. Unfortunately this year I didn’t  place that high but all of the chilis came really close with the same amount of votes. 

Just like last year they had a bake sale at the cook off. Only this year, instead of benefiting the local firefighters, the bake sale was for the church’s youth group. The bakery where I worked donated all of their leftovers to the bake sale again this year. I stopped by the bakery before the cook off to pack up the sweets to deliver to the church. I donated a chocolate football cake covered in fudge that I made special for the occasion. I was excited to see that it sold fast!

Football cake

I used the Wilton football cake pan to make this cake. Most of the Wilton pans are designed to use just one cake mix. If you’re using a scratch recipe, it may need to be adjusted for this size pan. Make sure to rotate the cake a couple times in your oven. Since the middle is deeper, the points will bake much faster. Rotating the cake will help prevent the points from burning before the middle is done. After the cake was completely cooled, I covered it with a fudge buttercream. I made a half recipe which was perfect with this size cake. I creamed one cup of butter in my mixer. While the butter beats I combined 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder with 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil. I used a tiny whisk to combine to a smooth paste. I added the chocolate mixture to the butter along with a teaspoon of vanilla and combined. Then I slowly added one pound of powdered sugar on a slow speed. You can add a table spoon here and there of milk until it is the desired consistency. I used a small offset spatula to spread the fudge over my football. Make sure it goes all the way down the sides to the board. It doesn’t need to be a perfect icing job. When you’re done, take a paper towel to wipe off the extra icing that piles up at the base of the cake on the board. Let the cake sit for about 15 to 20 minutes. While it sits the fudge develops a very thin crust. You can then take a paper towel and lay it over the cake. Gently rub your hand over the towel without moving the towel around. This will help smooth out lines and bumps to give you a smooth finish that almost looks like it was covered in fondant! To make the lines on the football, I used some fondant that was leftover from a previous cake. But you can pipe on the lines using some white frosting too! You can color the frosting or fondant so that it matches your team colors! You can also show team spirit by writing the team name on the cake!

If you don’t have the football pan, you can get them at the craft stores. Michael’s and JoAnn’s both have 40% off coupons in the Sunday paper or you can get them on their websites online and print them. You can also use the football pan as a Jello mold, you can bake bread in it to make a football shaped sub sandwich, all kinds of fun treats for your Super Bowl party!

Don’t want to buy the pan? You can carve your own football out of cake. I would suggest using two cake mixes in a 9×13 pan and bake. Once it’s cooled, cut the cake in half so that you have two 9×6.5 pieces. Spread some of the fudge on one of the pieces and then place the second on top. Freeze the cake for an hour or two. Carving cakes are much easier when the cake is cold. Using a serrated knife, carefully cut the corners off to make a sort of diamond shape. Slowly cut away at the cake until it starts to resemble a football. It’s better to take off not enough than too much! Once you have your desired shape, put back into the freezer for an hour. Next you will apply a thin layer of frosting called a crumb coat, or dirty icing. This thin layer of icing will lock in the crumbs so that they don’t show through in your final layer of icing. Once you’ve applied your thin layer of icing, you’ll want to pt it back in the fridge or freezer for about 1 minutes or so until the icing has stiffened. Then you’re set to finish icing your cake as I described above. 

It will be the highlight of your super bowl party!

Happy baking!

January in Chicago is cold. Actually, cold is an understatement. What’s colder than cold? Bitter? Frigid? Freezing? Numbing? All of the above? Definitely. In the time immediately following the holidays the last thing I want to do is to go into the kitchen and pull out the old Kitchen Aide. But by the time mid January rolls around, turning on the oven to warm up the house doesn’t sound like such a bad idea anymore. 

Yesterday my boyfriend asked me if I’d mind making 3 dozen cupcakes for him to take into the office for an employee’s birthday. When I ask him what kind he would like, he responds, an assortment. An assortment? An assortment of what? He says, yellow and chocolate. Well I’m sorry, in my opinion, two choices hardly counts as an assortment! He eventually gave me permission to make whatever flavors I want as long as it’s nothing too out of the ordinary. 

So this is what I did, I made him 6 cupcakes of 6 different flavors. Two of the flavors being traditional yellow cake with chocolate buttercream and chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream. You know, I need to have some safe flavors for those picky eaters, like my boyfriend. Then for my other flavors I made yellow cake filled with raspberry with a raspberry buttercream, yellow cake with a coconut buttercream, chocolate cake with a cappuccino buttercream, and last but not least the grasshopper cupcakes. If you’re not familiar with what grasshopper means, it means that it’s chocolate with mint. Other than the cute little insect, Grasshopper sometimes refers to the alcohol beverage made of Green Creme de Menthe, White Creme de Cacao, and light cream. But Grasshopper cake is chocolate cake with either mint icing or filling. Traditionally the mint part is dyed a lovely pastel shade of green.  

Now I chose to get creative with the frostings since I was making only 6 of each different flavor. It’s much easier to make two different flavors of cake and just mix up small batches of flavored buttercreams than it would be to mix up several batches of batter for just 6 cupcakes. But that’s alright, by just making small changes to the frosting it creates a whole different experience!

A great way of doing this is just adding small amounts of extract or flavoring. We have a pretty nice stock of extracts in our pantry which makes it easiest. The little McCormick bottles usually run about $4-5 each depending on the flavor and where you’re shopping. They’re not too cheap, but a little goes a long way. So they should last you a while. McCormick’s are a good quality for everyday home use and they can be found at most grocery stores. You can also find higher quality extracts and specialty kitchen stores. They make several flavors and it can be tempting to buy one of each. But unless you’re ready to spend $30 or more on extracts, I suggest sticking to the basics. Vanilla or Almond are must haves in my opinion. I buy the imitation Almond because my brother has an allergy. Second I like to go for a mint (it comes in mint or peppermint) extract and/or one of the many fruit extracts. Those are 4 types that we always have on hand. But depending on what your family likes, there is also butter flavoring, coconut, rum, anise, maple, and even root beer!

And time for the cupcake picture…. Drum roll please….

So here they are! My easy and yummy creations! The coconut, the raspberry, the cappuccino, and the grasshopper! I hope they’re a big hit at the office tomorrow. That is if they even make it there. All these flavors ended up being approved by my oh so very picky boyfriend, so who knows how many might get eaten while in the morning rush hour traffic!

Today is the day! The newspaper is out! And it’s lovely, if I do say so. Take a look!

Front page of the Carol Stream Press

Yeah, Thats right! I’m on the front page! The photographer took some beautiful photos, I’m really impressed! Nothing like a close up on my concentrating face… hehe. But thats just a picture, now where’s the article? Hmmm… maybe page 4?

Page 4 of the Carol Stream Press

Look at that! A whole page! Who knew that there was so much to say about cake? I did feel like a goof going into the convenient store down the street and buying a stack of these, but wouldn’t you?

So I go to the counter with 6 papers, one for me, my parents, the boyfriend, the best friend… yadda yadda yadda (apparently  no one can just go to the corner store themselves, hehe). The lady behind the counter looked at me, counted the papers and started ringing me up, $6 total (I never buy papers, I didn’t realize there’s no tax?) and she asked me if there was something special about them. I told her yeah! Me! Her eyes got big and she asked me where? I pointed to the big picture of the redhead on the front page and said there! She had to look at it really close, and it took her a second, before she realized that it was me. Now, I know I rolled out of bed and dragged my but to the store, and I wasn’t exactly looking my best, but the picture still looked like me!

Then she called over her coworker to show her that I was on the cover . They started oooh-ing and aaaah-ing over it. I was starting to feel a little awkward at this point. Her coworker looked at how many papers I had on the counter and asked if I had left any on the rack. *Embarrassed* Gosh, I didn’t take that many! I took 6 of the 10 they had there despite the fact I really wanted to take them all. And I would have bought them all,  except my mother taught me to share. Besides, I want some to be left for someone else to read! She laughed at me and said she didn’t care how many I took, as long as I left one there for them to read! *Sigh* Oh, OK!

Anyways, the ladies loved the article and asked for my website and I was off on my merry little way. You can read the whole article online at the Carol Stream Press website, or you can just click HERE!

Alright, here it is! Boofy Cakes is in the Carol Stream Press! You can click HERE to see it online. Or you can go to the local convenient store tomorrow and pick up a copy of the newspaper! Oh, and don’t forget to leave me a comment and let me know what you think! 

Thanks!

So Valentines day is coming! Do you have a valentine for your sweetie? If not, then  you should check out my Etsy shop Speak Sweetly! I have packs of 6 handmade valentines, all sure to please! Click HERE to take a look at my sweet stationary!

Just in case you didn’t know… Boofy Cakes is on Facebook! Become a fan today! Click HERE to visit the Boofy Cakes fan page!