VERY easy peanut butter and chocolate fudge recipe!




*1 12 oz bag of semi sweet chocolate chips (or milk chocolate depending on what flavor you like)
*1 can of sweetened condensed milk

*Mix together on low heat until all chocolate is melted. Pour onto wax paper (make
sure the wax paper lines the sides of the pan too) in a 9x9 pan. Put in the fridge while you continue.

*1 10 oz bag of Reese's peanut butter chips
*1 can of sweetened condensed milk.
*Repeat the above steps and pour over the slightly chilled chocolate layer.

Add any candy or marshmallows at this time then chill for a few hours!

Cotton Candy Donuts




Makes 6

3/4 cup cake flour
2 tbsp cotton candy sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 large egg, beaten
1/3 cup milk
2 tbsp butter, melted


*Beat egg. Sift and mix dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients and mix together.
*Spray a donut pan with baking spray and bake for about
8-12 minutes at 350F or until tops of donuts spring back when touched. Be careful not to overbake.


Cotton Candy buttercream

2 cups of confectioners sugar
1 stick of butter
1 tbs milk
1 tsp of cotton candy flavoring or 1 tsp of vanilla extract if you do not have this or don't want too much cotton candy flavor!

Mix all together and frost your donuts!

Pumpkin Mini Cheesecakes

To make this the easy way, you will need a cheesecake mini pan like this which can be found on amazon.com:

If not, you can spread the cheesecake in a brownie pan (after you have made a crust bottom with graham crackers) and cut into circles with a circle bun cutter.

If you have the pan, just use Oreos!

Place vanilla Oreos (a single cookie; not the full cookie with the filling) in each cup. The pan is non-stick so you don't necessarily need anything, but if you want to be completely safe, you can add a bit of butter to each cheesecake cavity before filling.


For the cheesecake filling:

*one block of full fat cream cheese (room temp)
*1/2 cup of pumpkin from the baking aisle(I use Libby's pumpkin filling)
*1/2 cup of sugar
*1 tsp of vanilla
*1 egg
*pinch of salt
*pinch of nutmeg (I don't like a lot so I didn't want to use too much)
*1/2 tsp of cinnamon

1. Mix the cream cheese and sugar on medium speed for about 2 minutes until well blended and fluffy. Then add the remainder of the ingredients.
2. Fill a pastry bag to easily fill in the cheesecake cavities (you can fill just about to the top)
3. Bake for 20 minutes on 350F
4. Cool for about 20 minutes and then place in the fridge covering loosely with saran wrap. They will be ready in about 4 hours.
5. Top with ganache, buttercream, whipped cream, etc!

Coffee No-Bake Cheesecake with Chantilly Cream

Finally posting this recipe! Sorry that it took so long; I've been neglecting the blog.

For the Crust:
*1 cup of vanilla Oreos (about 20 cookies) OR just buy graham cracker crumbs and you can skip the whole process of crushing Oreos :)
*2 tbs of unsalted melted butter

To make the crust:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease a 6-inch springform pan
2. Crush Oreos in a food processor and mix with melted butter.
3. Press the mixture into the pan and bake for about 10 minutes.
4. Refrigerate or freeze to cool while you make the filling.


The recipe for the cheesecake itself can be found on the back of Knox Gelatin, but I doubled it as follows:

*2 envelopes of gelatin
*1 cup sugar
*2 cups of boiling water
*4 packages of 8 oz full fat cream cheese (softened)
*1 tsp vanilla

For coffee flavor add:
*1 tsp black coffee



1. Mix gelatin and sugar in a small bowl and add about 2 cups of boiling water. Stir for about 5 minutes or until the gelatin is dissolved.
2. Beat cream cheese, vanilla, and coffee in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed. Add the gelatin mixture slowly and beat until well combined.
3. Pour the mixture onto the prepared crust.

It should be completely done in about 6-8 hours (to be completely safe though, I usually let set overnight). Thereafter, you can remove from the springform pan and top with whatever you would like! I put buttercream, Reese's Cups, and chocolate sauce on this one

For the Chantilly cream on the outside of the cheesecake itself:

*Place mixing bowl in the freezer for 5 minutes.
Take out and add two cups of heavy whipping cream to the bowl. Then add two TBS of pure granulated sugar and 1 tsp of vanilla.
Mix on medium and then up to high speed until soft peaks form

No-Bake Pastel Rainbow Cheesecake

I love no-bake cheesecake for the summer! Plus, it's so easy to make for a quick cheesecake craving :)





For the Crust:
*1 cup of vanilla Oreos (about 20 cookies) OR just buy graham cracker crumbs and you can skip the whole process of crushing Oreos :)
*2 tbs of unsalted melted butter

To make the crust:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease a 6-inch springform pan
2. Crush Oreos in a food processor and mix with melted butter.
3. Press the mixture into the pan and bake for about 10 minutes.
4. Refrigerate or freeze to cool while you make the filling.


The recipe for the cheesecake itself can be found on the back of Knox Gelatin, but I doubled it as follows:

*2 envelopes of gelatin
*1 cup sugar
*2 cups of boiling water
*4 packages of 8 oz full fat cream cheese (softened)
*2 tsp vanilla


1. Mix gelatin and sugar in a small bowl and add about 2 cups of boiling water. Stir for about 5 minutes or until the gelatin is dissolved.
2. Beat cream cheese and vanilla in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed. Add the gelatin mixture slowly and beat until well combined.
3. Get three bowls and add the cheesecake mixture to each bowl as evenly distributed as you can. You can then add food coloring to each; whatever color you desire. I added blue (bottom), yellow (middle layer), pink (top layer)
4. Pour the first color on top of the crust and freeze immediately. Also at this time, you will want to refrigerate the other two bowls of cheesecake filling. The reason for freezing the first layer is because you want it to set before you add the second color on top and you want it to be fairly quick so your other two bowls of cheesecake don't start to set! If you add all layers on top of each other right away, it will blend through and be more like a rainbow swirl rather than distinct layers (which would be a great look too)! After freezing for about 30 minutes, you can add the second layer. Freeze again for 30 minutes, and then add the last and third layer on top. You can then place normally in the fridge at that point.

It should be completely done in about 6-8 hours (to be completely safe though, I usually let set overnight). Thereafter, you can remove from the springform pan and top with sprinkles, whipped topping, or whatever you like!

Hi all!

I wanted to walk you through my latest cake because it was experimental, and I also have some tips to share from other great cake artists!



Goal #1. In need of a fluffy vanilla cake/cupcake recipe

I've been searching and experimenting to get the best fluffy cake recipe; like the "box" brand. Yes, I love the fluffiness of that cake and even though I make homemade cakes, I do still love that fluffy mix for myself from time to time. Then I found on Sweetapolita's blog that she mentioned the same thing about fluffy cake and her yearning for the box brand too! :p Anyway, she has a fantastic recipe that I tried out for this cake and I LOVE it. Here is the link to her recipe and here is a photo of what mine looked like.

http://sweetapolita.com/2011/07/fluffy-vanilla-cake-with-whipped-vanilla-bean-frosting/






Goal #2. Sequins on a cake. I've been wanting to try this as well and found out through The Cake Blog that Jenna Rae Cakes has a great step by step tutorial on this. It's way easier than I envisioned! I did run into a problem because instead of using pastel candy confetti, I used regular color and thus needed SO much silver luster dust to cover up that deeper color. I ran out of luster dust so if you can see in my photo below, the sequins aren't as silver as they should be and you can see some color peeping out. Otherwise, it was a success.

http://thecakeblog.com/2014/06/diy-gold-sequin-cake.html




3. Fantasy gumpaste flower and/or sugar peony

I don't have the materials needed to create one with wires and this seems like the best way to do so. I hardly ever make flowers with wires and usually only do roses. I didn't want to buy materials I probably wouldn't use much so I used the wilton peony cutters and I think it worked great. It was really easy to do; you just use a ball tool to roll out the edges much like with sugar roses and put in an egg carton to dry. You can see my Youtube tutorial on roses in other blog post if you want a reference point of what I mean here.





And for those who have asked me to do tutorials on icing a cake cleanly with buttercream as my bottom tier is here (although there are some imperfections)... Instead of me doing a tutorial, I would highly recommend you check out Tessa of SweetBakeShop's tutorial because she does a fantastic job explaining it and I use the same method as her. Below are some of the tools I use and the link to her page.

http://sweetbakeshop.com/video-tutorial-how-to-stack-and-frost-a-cake-with-perfectly-smooth-sides/

Chocolate Cheesecake/Brownie Base - Easy and delicious!




I love cheesecake but not so much a fan of the graham cracker or cookie base. Also, I've never tried a no bake cheesecake using gelatin so I thought I'd give it a go.


For this cheesecake, I just used a brownie mix to create the brownie base (I put it in an 8inch springform pan).


After baking, I put it in the freezer to cool while I made the cheesecake filling. I found the recipe for chocolate no-bake cheesecake here and just made the filling portion of it.

https://www.verybestbaking.com/recipes/28806/easy-elegant-no-bake-cheesecake/detail.aspx



For the coffee buttercream topping, mix all these together in a mixer with the paddle attachment:

*1 stick of butter
*1 tsp of coffee flavoring (extract or coffee itself)
*2 cups of confectioners sugar
*1 tbs milk