Bug-cakes

I'm a little slow here, these were ordered (and made) last week, by a woman who wanted them for her grandsons birthday for his classmates.

Anyone who knows me knows that I would not make bugs (generally speaking) of my own volition, because I feel about bugs the same way I imagine a 4 year old feels about the bogeyman. My typical reaction to insects of any sort is a shameful mix of screaming, squealing and flailing - my mind doesn't register that I am approximately 1000 times larger and that this grotesque little creature can't, in fact, actually hurt me. In my mind it's the size of godzilla and it wants to bear hug me before devouring me. Seriously. I need help.

That said, because I did have to make bugs, I made them as cute and un-bug-like as I possibly could. There were 30 of these made, and I had some caterpillars, some spiders, some ladybugs and some ants.

I'd bought some "rocks" bulk, just because I was sure I'd use them at some point - they are candy covered chocolate and they actually look like pebbles. So I piped grass onto the cupcakes, put a bug on each, and scattered rocks around them. Everything was edible.

Last minute hook - one child was lactose intolerant. Rather than making one single lactose-free cupcake, I made them all that way.

Without further ado -

Lactose-free Cupcakes
Makes 30-32 cupcakes

-6 cups flour
-5 tsp baking powder
-1 tsp salt
-1 1/3 cups margarine or shortening (I used half and half)
-3 1/2 cups sugar
-4 eggs
-2 1/2 cup Lactaid milk
Soy or rice milk could be used, but I don't know what it'll end up like - I used Lactaid (Lactose-free milk).
-2 tsp vanilla
-2 tbsp lemon zest

Cream margarine and/or shortening with sugar, add in eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add vanilla, mix. Mix all dry ingredients, add alternating with milk, in 2 or 3 additions, mix well after each addition. Mix in lemon zest.

Spoon into prepared cupcake liners and bake at 350 degrees, 15-20 minutes.

I used butter-cream on these that I substituted again some margarine and shortening instead of butter.

The spiders and ants had legs piped on for simplicity.

And here they are:

Food-a-licious

Yesterday was my favourite Amanda's birthday, my sister-in-law. I promised to make her a cake, and she told me the kind she wanted, but would not tell me how to decorate it. I got a lot of "Oh, whatever you do is fine." Accomodating? Yes. Slightly infuriating? Also yes. Because I like things to be perfect (as perfect as I can do, anyway), and to be something that the person I'm giving to will love...

I racked my brain for a good week. I asked family members, all of whom were also stumped. I thought, and thought, and thought... and then, a lightbulb went off.

On her facebook she'd said that (being 5 months pregnant) all she wanted for her birthday was food. Chinese food, popcorn, etc. Foods she's been craving. And at the family BBQ over the weekend I did hear her talk about the cliche'd pickles and peanut butter sandwiches...

So I made her a cake with food on it. Cake food.

The cake is my apple cake, with caramel apple filling (that's getting to be popular), and then I also made a pound cake to use for decoration, since it's a sturdy sort of cake.

Recipe from epicurious.com:

• 1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 5 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 cups cake flour

1 Set rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 325 degrees.

2 Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a heavy-duty mixer and beat on medium speed with the paddle attachment until very light, about 5 minutes. Beat in the vanilla. One at a time, beat in 3 of the eggs, beating until smooth after each addition.

3 Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in one-third of the four, then another egg, beating until smooth after each addition. Stop the mixer occasionally to scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Beat in another third of the flour, then, after the flour has been absorbed, beat in the final egg. Scrape again and beat in the last of the four.

4 Use the rubber spatula to give a final mix to the batter, then scrape it into the prepared pan and smooth the top.

5 Bake for about 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours, or until the cake is well risen, cracked on top, and well-colored and a toothpick inserted into the center emerges dry.

6 Cool the cake in the pan for a few minutes, then unmold it onto a rack and turn right side up to finish cooling.

Pound cake. Done.

So, once that was finished, I cut a couple slices off, trimed them down to squares (no crusts) and made the same peanut butter filling I use for peanut-butter cups, except with chunky peanut butter. It's not exact, maybe 1/3 cup peanut butter, some icing sugar, some vanilla.

Made a sandwich with the pound cake slices. Made a couple fondant pickles.

Then I covered a peice of the poundcake in white fondant and made a chinese take-out box. I painted a chinese symbol on it (no I don't have any clue what it means) and a flower, with red gel, and put a wire that my husband so kindly contributed on top for the handle.

Then I made pink candy popcorn... which I can't, at the moment, find the recipe to... and put about half my batch into disposable piping bags, tied with ribbon. They wouldn't fit on top, so they're just kind of hanging out on the sidelines there.

In the end, this is what I got: