hawaiian wedding cupcakes

We recently made cupcakes for one of my work friend's daughter's wedding reception. We attempted to make hibiscus flowers on top of bright tropical colored frosting. (They got married in Hawaii!)

We also made an almond cake for the bride and groom to cut into. The cake flavor got rave reviews.

nintendo power

Our friends Theresa and Andy got married last weekend, and Mark and I made Nintendo cupcakes to contribute to their cookie table. I made the red velvet cake with white whipped frosting, and Mark did the fondant designs. (I can't figure out how to flip some of these photos, so bear with me.)

the last few months

Here's what I've been doing/baking/making the last few months.

Mexican hot chocolate cookies (chocolate, cinnamon, and chili pepper)

Raspberry Lemon Cake (a wedding cake flavor test)

An AMAZING German chocolate cake for Mark's 31st birthday

Star Trek sugar cookies with the custom cookie cutters I had made for his birthday.

Cupcakes for my bridal shower - lemon with lemon cream cheese frosting and white cake with toasted coconut buttercream and chocolate filigree hearts

Sugar cookies for Amber's bachelorette party

Mark and I also did an entire practice run of our wedding cake, which was a two day ordeal that I'll recap at some point with photos of the actual cake.

But if you want to see some professional photos, from the wedding, you can click here. The great photos make us look more sophisticated than we actually are, but the smiles on our faces are totally real.

still here

I've obviously neglected this blog for awhile, which I promised myself I wouldn't do. I blame being generally busy with large life changes for my lack of updates. However, I've been busy with baking during that time period as well. So to start yet another phrase with "once the wedding is over," I promise to fill you in on the in between time when I can.

In the meantime, here's something to tide you over. We'll be baking our own wedding cake starting tomorrow morning. These photos were from the practice in July. Tomorrow it's on for real...and when I return to the blog, I will have made a three tiered wedding cake and married my love, the icing to my cake...









(These photos are by One Way Street Production. A great photographer couple that really humored our awkward non-photogenic selves.)

pumpkin desserts before it's officially winter

I've obviously got some catching up to do. I've got a list of things to cover, so bear with me as I catch up. I'm catching up on my blog reader too.

I'm probably not your typical pumpkin fan seeing that I hate nutmeg and cloves, and often both of those are used to spice pumpkin desserts. (I hate nutmeg because I am my mother's daughter and I hate cloves because I had my teeth packed with them in high school and it ruined cloves for me for life.) But I love pumpkin desserts. So thus far this season I've made two. I hope to make a third for Thanksgiving.

First up, my pumpkin ginger snap trifle. I sort of came up with this idea myself and used recipes I had on hand for the different parts. It was for a group dinner for the Pens home opener. (squee!) I layered pumpkin bars with cream cheese whipped cream and ginger snap cookies.

For the bars, we have all of the ingredients in the Magnolia pumpkin bar recipe except for nutmeg. And no Sir Sous Chef, being as this was at Mark's.

Dry ingredients. I love how soft flour is. I'm a nerd. I know.


Beat pumpkin, sugar, eggs, into gloop.


Add the dry stuff and some nuts. That's looking better now.


In a pan, and into the oven.


And while that's baking, the cream cheese whipped cream (which would be SO fantastic on cupcakes, btw. Thanks Cooks Illustrated.)


Cream cheese and confectioners sugar. Side note: when I was little I hated cream cheese, as I did most cheese. And sometime in college, I decided to be bold and try it on a bagel. We have had a torrid love affair ever since. ;-)

Whip that up with vanilla and sea salt and heavy cream. While it's going, put some ginger snaps in your trifle bowl.


Add in a layer of the cream that is now done and delicious.


Chunk up the now-cool pumpkin bars and toss them in.


Keep going til it looks like this.


Then stick your face in it. No, dish it out and eat it like a civilized human being. Then when everyone goes home, stick your face in it. :)

****Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies (for Dani's wedding)****

Ah, the return of Sir Sous Chef.


Eggs and sugar. And spatula.


Eggs and pumpkin. Bloop bloop.



Dry ingredients. Meet the pumpkin mixture.



Mix it up and add a lot of chocolate.


Get that dough on a sheet with some parchment.


Aaaaaand finish. Yummmmm. Netmeg free awesomeness.