Farewell Hostess

Did you grow up with Hostess stuff in the house?  I definitely did!  As I've said before.....my mom has never been much of a baker....so growing up I remember a lot of Hostess fruit pies (yuck), Twinkies (yum), chocolate cupcakes (yummer), and Ding-Dongs (yummiest!).  Well, with all the talk of the Hostess bakery closing, I couldn't stop thinking about making something Hostess.  I probably would have just gone to the grocery store and bought something, but apparently people decided to make a run on the stores and start selling everything on Ebay (seriously....you can buy Twinkies on Ebay....crazy!)......so, I decided to just do it myself!

I decided that I would make these as my kiddo dessert for Thanksgiving.....I mean, who doesn't love a chocolate cupcake??  Luckily I had saved a recipe for "Faux-stess" cupcakes from Confessions of a Cookbook Queen, and believe me.....these did not disappoint!  Every single one of them was devoured!

The best part for me (because I didn't have too much time to do these)?  The recipe uses a boxed Devil's Food cake mix!  Now, I normally would much rather make cupcakes from scratch....and there are some recipes for Faux-stess cupcakes that are from scratch......but I just decided to go with it, since I was under a time crunch.  Then you fill the cupcakes up with a vanilla frosting that I thought tasted a lot like the original.  "Only better", according to the hubby.

And then there's the top of the cupcake.  A can of chocolate frosting!  Seriously!  Did you know that you can nuke a can of frosting, then dip a cupcake in it and voila!  Easy peasy chocolate ganache?  I realize it's not the real deal....but come on!  It tastes just like it!  And it was exactly the right topping for these cupcakes!  Such a great trick to know.......I'll be using that again!

Check out Confessions of a Cookbook Queen for the recipe.....and Enjoy!  Now I've got to give homemade Ding-Dongs and Twinkies a try!

Game Time!

We are a UCLA family!  The hubby and I met when we were both at UCLA....and my brother-in-law played football there.  So obviously we have a pretty strong opinion when the UCLA-USC game rolls around every year.  Unfortunately we've played second fiddle to USC for most of the last decade (actually we've only won once in the last 14 years)....but this year was going to be different.

The hubby and I decided to actually head to the game this year with a bunch of UCLA and USC people.  I decided my contribution to the tailgating party had to be some sugar cookies decorated using my edible printer.  Yay!  These are so much fun!

And the best part?  We won!  The worst part?  The pouring rain that we had to walk through when we left the stadium to get to our car.  Soaking wet!!  But it was totally worth it.  A great day with my sweetie :)

Thanksgiving Turkeys

It's almost Thanksgiving!  Are you ready?  Me, well......no.  But at least I don't make the whole dinner......I'm just responsible for dessert.  So every year I usually bring something that's yummy for adults.....and something fun for the kiddos.  Since I'm a little behind this year, I thought I'd show some of the turkeys I've done over the last few years.....in case you're looking for some cute inspiration :)

First off are some Oreo and candy turkeys that I had seen over at Our Best Bites.  We used these as placecards on our kids table that year.

Next up are turkey cakepops.  I haven't made many cakepops lately....I've been making Oreo pops more often since they tend to be quicker to make.  But people sure do love cakepops!  I usually make red velvet cakepops......but with these turkeys I decided that it might be creepy if you bit into a turkey and it was red inside.  I ended up doing a yellow cake instead.  For the step-by-step instructions on how to make these, check out Bakerella.

Lastly we've got a combination of the first two.....Oreo turkey pops.  I used a combination of mini and regular Oreos for these, and still found them to be quicker to make than the cakepops.

So that's it!  Have a safe and wonderful Thanksgiving!  

Carrot Cake Cupcakes

Carrot cake is something that falls into the "take it or leave it" category.  Not really my thing.  Chocolate.......caramel.......now THOSE are my things.  However, I do try really hard to make other people's favorite things as well as my own.

For my father-in-law's birthday I decided to try a new carrot cake recipe for him, since carrot cake is one of his favorites (as well as a favorite of most of the guys in our family).  When I think of carrot cake, I usually think of a really heavy overly-spiced cake with gobs of drab cream cheese frosting.  Hmmm......based on that description, I guess you can figure out why I'm not a huge fan of it.

I tried the Carrot Cake Cupcake recipe from the SoNo Baking Company Cookbook.  I've had the book for a while, and just hadn't gotten around to trying anything yet.  These were a huge hit!  The cupcakes are light and fluffy (it uses cake flour, instead of AP flour), with just enough spice.  And can we talk about the amazing cream cheese frosting on these bad boys??!??  It's got the addition of orange zest and fresh ginger!  It totally wakes up and brightens the frosting.  Delicious!

Give these cupcakes a try the next time you have a hankering for carrot cake.  You won't be disappointed!  Go to Project Foodie for the recipe.......and Enjoy!!