Cakes

While I am trying to distract myself from anxiety attacks about my job(!) interview (!)because :::whispers::: I haven't had a job interview in 22 years holy crap....

I am mulling over birthday cakes.

Specifically this weekend we are having a party for my two kids and the grandparents, and a couple of Aunts and Uncles. So I will be making some sort of 2 mix rectangle cake for them.

I am torn between making ....

• a tv screen (kind of a lot of black though...) with the logo for CSI on it .... a show which my daughter got hooked on, after Taylor Swift was a special guest, and she (my daughter, not TS, but who knows really? maybe her too) has been watching marathons whenever possible all summer long.
  
• a laundry basket, full of rumpled dirty fondant clothing, overflowing actually, with a sign saying "remember me? I'm your chores" (that's kinda mean, huh?)
  
• a cake that depicts the endless rain we have had this summer, with something like "sorrrrrry" and about 100 fondant beeeeeees. We have lots of beeeeeeees. Technically a farmer told me they are wasps. But they are yellow and black and look mean and they are very persistent. It is a plague around here.
  
• some sort of map representing our road trip... and "thanks for being good sports while Mom dragged you 1500 miles so she wouldn't dwell on unemployment." Maybe that should have a faux pitcher of lemonade on it, don't you think? Or a starbucks cup, and portable dvd player, for sure, because that's how we all survived that trip
  
• the good old Yankees logo... a little easy but they are both fans... I could actually do stacked hexagon tiers to spruce it up a little.... this one might be fun and actually viable for me, since I don't have Duff's staff... (google Ace of Cakes if you don't know who Duff is....)
  
• an image of the Wii Fit screen, (with Mr. C's Mii as well as mine sleeping, my daughter's doing yoga, and D's doing some snowboarding or that annoying soccer game where the shoes keep whacking me in the head.... )

Suggestions? votes?

Apparently it IS

...too much to ask, for it to NOT RAIN for two days in a row here in upstate NY this summer.

But we planned that it would rain, and everyone fit in my house (thanks to last summer's addition) and we had this...



so who cares about rain? Suzy and I teamed up to decorate it Friday after dinner when we were both exhausted; I had baked the cake earlier in the day but hadn't frosted it. So I did the basketweave, which really made The Boyfriend confused until I showed him the way it's done. Suzy did the writing and the awesome diploma (rolled fondant) and we slapped on some gum paste daisies left over from the 50th anniversary party (saved for this cake, actually).



We looked at it and said "I'm fine with that. You fine with that? Let's go to sleep."

The party itself was awesome. One of the highlights was my mother showing up with four tiny goldfish for my mini fake-rock pond that I break out for family gatherings. Glug. I have THE most adorable picture of my almost-2 nephew looking at the pond and laughing at the fish.

The Boyfriend helped with fetching cold cut platters and making beans and just generally was my assistant caterer/dishwasher for the day. I need to bring him lots of beer next time that I go visit. His assistance allowed me to a) enjoy the party b) have time to TALK to my guests and c) drink lots of wine.

We ended the evening with a few favorite people on the porch wherein I had more wine. Speaking of the wine... I do not actually remember taking my contact lenses out. ::::blink:::: I'm pretty sure I did though. Hmmm.

The meaner streets of Pittsburgh

Food. Everywhere. Big hearty fries, and beer and wings, and pierogies, and.... well, this:

Let's break this picture* down so that you get the FULL story:

• Coldstone Creamery. http://www.coldstonecreamery.com/ Ice cream with candy and cookies and small baby feet and whatever else they can find in that irresistable vein, mixed in. And apparently they make cakes now... that fine print under the cake says, "Layers of moist devil's food cake & chocolate ice cream wrapped in a rich fudge ganache." That's pretty much evil. Your cheeks will plump up just reading that description, my friends.
  
• Curves! http://www.curves.com/ (Official voice: A Curves 30 minute fitness center is a woman’s gym that provides a total body workout. With both aerobic exercise for weight loss and strength training for toned muscles...etc) Curves is a gym that is targeted toward gym-a-phobic women who just want to get in better shape without Steroid Fabulous Guy sweating all over the equipment before they use it. So they have to walk by the Coldstone Creamery to get to the gym to try to get skinny. It's just mean.
  
• Hmm, maybe they can walk around the block the other way. Nope. Because on the far right there? That little sign, "Dozen" ? THAT'S A CUPCAKE STORE. No lie. http://www.dozencupcakes.com/ Game over.

Okay - be honest - how many of you were tempted to click on the ice cream link, or the cuppy-cakes, and not the gym? Don't lie, sitemeter will tell me EVERYTHING.

(By the way Suzy, we're going to Dozen next time I come down there. Seriously. Orange chocolate, carrot cake AND red velvet please!)

*Pardonnez-moi, the picture is crappy because I took it from the car window. While laughing.

Hello, Cupcake!

I bought Hello Cupcake the other day... I was in the megahuge bookstore that just opened in the mall near me, and I flipped through the book and loved it.

There is a page that has cupcakes arranged to look like a plate of pasta (see, at left? it's CAKE.... with frosting "pasta", strawberry jam and chocolate covered candies...)

This is a clever book with more cute ideas that I will probably never get to try, but given that I've been decorating cakes for almost 15 years, leafing through this book is entertaining for me, if I'm snowed in the house... and there is wine.

I will be making this particular project when I make lunch for my brother in law. He wants a ruben with steak fries. (This is from our Superbowl squares bet, winner at halftime got to pick anything at all for a lunch that the other family members to cook for him, and he went easy on me. The final score winner gets dinner - my nephew won that -- and so far I have him sold on fettucini alfredo with shrimp and broccoli. )

Two frosting covered thumbs up!! It's available on Amazon.

But I LIKE bread...

I really, really do.

My doctor sat down and looked me in the eye. "We have to talk about your bloodwork."

Hey, now that's a pickup line every girl wants to hear.

He started explaining Glycosylated hemoglobin and that mine has gone up .3 since the last time he measured it. He's been tracking based on my family history. (remind me to get that old scrapbook out and look through it and thank them one by one. )

By some of the things I've googled, I'm more like "Pre-diabetic", but the sheets his receptionist handed me emphatically state that with my level, I have type 2 diabetes.

It would explain quite a lot. And it's not cancer, or more heart trouble, I just have to actually eat right and start exercising much more.

But there's a 3 year old deep in my brain stamping her feet and saying "I like caaaaaaaaaake.... and FROSTING. " The funny thing is that I really don't bake much. I might make a cake for a birthday of an immediate family member, but that's about it. I am not really into cookies. Or candy - I don't even like chocolate.

No, my friends. It's the carbs in the pizza, and the Coke along with it. Evil, sweet, syrupy Cocca -Cola that combines with my genetic hiccups to totally fuck up my blood sugar levels. The wine, and the bonbons. The crusty bread I like to eat maybe 3 slices of with a meal of ...pasta. So I have to shuffle around all of my thinking. Learn how to trade off and only have one of those things at any given meal and not really very much of it either.

If anyone knows of good resources on the web for a very confused carb-counter, I'm all eyes.

Juniors

So while I was making the cheesecake I noticed that inside one of the Philly wrappers there was an ad to buy the Junior's Cheesecake recipe book.

As Carrie Bradshaw said to the Manolos: "hellooooo, lover".

It DOES have the carrotcake/cheesecake combo that I tried soooooo hard to eat all of. Now I can keep trying. So, yes, I have already ordered it.

More sugar

Another weekend, another cake. One I'm happy with! This was made in my 'two mix' pan, with some frosting slapped on, some blue gel for the water hazard, and some "sugar in the raw" for a sand trap. Easy. Ten bucks says I drop it on the way to the party. ;-)

Incidentally, I emailed one of my best friends my recent Ugly Kitty cake and she called me, laughing so hard she was unable to speak. When she could catch her breath, she said "You're never happy with your cakes, but they're usually pretty good. But this one.... (more laughter)"

Ok.