There's an Elephant in the Room...and It's a Sugar Cookie!

My sister's birthday was yesterday, August 2. Since she lives all the way down in Georgia and I'm all the way up in New York, I wanted to ship her a special treat to wish her a very Happy Birthday! Her favorite animal is the elephant, so I decided to send her some elephant sugar cookies. I worked with the icing in a different way than usual, so it didn't come out as smooth. What do you think???

I also made some cinnamon biscuit cookies. These are more of a Fall treat...something to have with your coffee. But who doesn't love a little cinnamon cookie in the morning?!

Summertime!

Nothing says summer time like palm trees and flamingos! I had some extra cookie dough left so I decided to make it into a summer treat. Let me know what you think...
I also had some extra cake batter left and cannoli cream filling, so I made cupcakes. They are yellow cake filled with cannoli cream and topped with royal icing.

I also am in the process of working on my first ever wedding cake! It's a big task, but it has been so much fun to experiment. Take a look at these sugar flowers that I made...

That's all for now, but be sure to check back soon because I will be baking up some other treats later this week!

Vegan and Low Carb? Why not?!

I've been trying to eat healthier and baking all of these delicious treats make me crave something sweet for myself. So, I came up with a sugar-free/low carb cold treat for myself and I also made Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe from Chocolate Covered Katie). They are both to die for! Oh, and check out the Penguin cake that I made...not low carb or vegan, but he deserves to be displayed! :)

 Frozen sugar-free pudding with sugar-free peanut butter centers (perfect chocolatey treat for a hot day)

 Vegan chocolate chip cookies (really delicious!)

Mr. Penguin before and after (yellow and red velvet cake)

It's been a while!

It's been a while since I've posted anything, but a lot has happened since my last post!
I moved into my own studio apartment in Staten Island, NY! The move brings me new found independence and a lot closer to work. With a shorter commute comes more time on my hands to bake and I've baked up quite a few creations since I last wrote. Here are some of the treats, let me know what you think:

 

Butterfly Sugar Cookie with Royal Icing and Sugar Pearls

Tulip Sugar Cookie with Royal Icing and Sugar Crystals

 Lemon and Basil Semifreddo (perfect for a hot summer night)

 

Oatmeal Cake

 

 Tuxedo Cake for Father's Day

Nothing says Happy 4th of July like some Star Sugar Cookies decked out in red, white and blue!

6 Dozen Lingerie Booties and Boobies for a Bachelorette Party

Close-up

The before and after

Baking The Weekend Away

I spent most of my weekend baking. There's something about creating delicious treats that relaxes me and helps me forget about the previous week and the week ahead.
My mother's birthday was on Sunday, so I made her favorite dessert...Strawberry Shortcake. Instead of having to deal with the messiness of cutting a shortcake, I decided to make individual cakes. Take a look...

Also, my office is throwing a mini baby shower for one of my coworkers. I offered to bake some sugar cookies, and here they are:

When Life Hands You Lemons...Make Lemon Cupcakes!

I was looking for a lemony treat to make for my aunt's birthday when I saw this great recipe for a lemon souffle from Martha Stewart. The recipe showed the souffle baked inside of the skin of a lemon. It looked amazing, but very time consuming. Seeing as how I had about an hour to prepare, bake and decorate, I thought it was a little out of reach so instead I took the concept and added a little twist.
First I started by making a meringue. I used a basic meringue recipe, piped it onto parchment paper and baked for about an hour. Then I moved on to the cake.
I took 8 lemons and removed all of the juice, pulp and rinds. Then I created a lemon cake batter and filled the lemons about 3/4 of the way full with the batter and put in the oven at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes. I had enough batter left over to make a round cake too, so I greased up a pan and put that into the oven also.
Once the cakes were done I made a lite glaze (just powdered sugar, milk and vanilla extract) to spoon over top of the completed cupcakes and cake. I cut the rounded tops off of the cupcakes so that they had a flat top surface and put just a small spoonful of glaze over top, then I put the cooled meringues on top of them. For the cake, I covered the complete cake with the glaze then added some gold flecks.
Everyone seemed to thoroughly enjoy the treats. Using the lemon skin really gave the cupcakes a terrific added lemon flavor that the cake did not have.
Here are the finished products:

What do you think??? I will definitely be making these again. They were light and fresh and, most importantly, they were a hit!

Welcome Home!

For the past two weeks I stayed at my coworker's apartment watching her dog while she was vacationing. I decided to surprise her with some welcome home goodies!

Do you have someone in your life that you want to surprise with a special treat? Send me a message and we can create something divine just for them!