Cake #8 -Presleigh's Birthday Cake

I can't believe I forgot to post our cake last week...well actually I can.  It was Presleigh's birthday week - yes, week.  Her birthday was on the 1st - so we had presents in the morning, brought lunch at school, left early for an appointment (with AMC 30 to see Justin Bieber - who also was having a birthday on the 1st.  Cool, isn't it?!!), then dinner, cake #1 and more presents.   We planned a London themed birthday sleepover party for Friday with 7 sweet and silly 4th grade girls.  Cake #2 was actually ordered at one of the best bakeries here in the area.  But I digress...Here is our Cake #8...a Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting--It was an easy cake as we used a mix enhanced with the Cake Mix Doctor method.  As for the frosting, we cheated--it was store bought but oooh, so good!!  As always, the recipe will be on the page to the right.

Cake Mixes are great!  I am sure the women from the pre-mix era would have loved these!

My baby girl turned 10--time flies!  Savor every sweet moment!!!

Until next time,

Finding the Sweetness in Life,

Cake #7- Heavenly Chocolate Bar Cake

Well better late than never..Here is #7.  We thoroughly loved making this cake.  The batter is so good even before adding the melted Milky Ways.  Yes, you read it correctly...melted Milky Ways.  Do you see now where the name came from?  This recipe is from Southern Living Classic Southern Desserts.  Oh, I LOVE the South...  Here are some mouth watering pictures to show you just how Heavenly this cake really is. 

 Make sure to freeze your candy bars for the "Icing on the Cake"

 Some of my favorite cookbooks in the background

 along with my vintage silverware

 First big slice....For Presleigh!

 OOH, is your mouth watering yet?

You'll find the recipe over on the pages..soon.   Right now we are heading to dinner...I'll post the recipe tonight!!  Until next time,


Finding the Sweetness in Life.....

Cake #7.....get ready!!!

What a week we have had!!! 3 trips to the doctor, one daughter on crutches, one in a wrist brace and the injuries are unrelated; our pool being replastered for the 3rd time... What's the saying...Third times a charm, bought a beautiful paint horse, and headed to Abilene on Friday( where I am posting from my phone)and all of this happened while my husband was in London!!! Calgon take me away!!! So get ready for our cake double feature. I wanted to give you a heads up and tell you to head to the grocery store for your favorite chocolate bars (now is the time to stock up on Valentine's Day chocolate)for our first cake on Monday and then a red velvety cake at the end of the week. See you on Monday!!!

Finding the Sweetness in Life...

Cake #6 Chocolate Bliss Cheesecake

Here we are another week has gone by.  We started out the week with 74 degrees and sunny, by Wednesday dipped to 11 degrees with snow and ice and by tomorrow will be around 65...gotta love Texas.  So in our mixed up crazy weather we still found time to bake and make a wonderfully easy, wonderfully tasting cheesecake.  This recipe is from a little booklet for Baker's chocolate dated 2005.    Cake #6.....

We loved doing the powdered sugar stencil...details on the recipe page.

A smaller slice would have been enough...

but too much of a good thing is wonderful!!

This cake came together in no time--the longest part was the refrigeration (over night) and then we were able to do the dusting of cocoa powder and the heart stencil.  The crust is oreos and butter, the filling is made with a handful of ingredients and the pan is a springform pan.  SO simple and yet SO big on taste and SO pleasing to the eye and the heart.  Hope this cake finds it's way into your heart - it sure did in ours. You can find the recipe over on the right...Until next time,

Finding the Sweetness in Life....

Cake #5--Easy and Elegant Chocolate Cake

yes,   that is me next to Presleigh, I was worried 

about being able to get up...but obviously I did!

Let me first begin by saying...We have had  4 glorious snow days being homebound and having wonderful lazy and productive, creative, fun-filled, together time.   Having this time was a great thing for our Cake of the Week as we actually made 2.  It is good to try recipes and it is good to know when they really don't work.  Our first cake (which we will not share) was intriguing based on the ingredients.  It had the usual sugar, eggs, vanilla, cocoa but then there was a departure with self-rising flour and no liquid!  It baked rather quickly, made thin layers as there was not a lot of batter and of course, you guessed it-dry!  We went ahead and frosted it with a wonderful chocolate frosting, which we did use on our final cake for the week - It was that good!!  So the tips for recipes in general...there must be liquid whether it is milk, oil, buttermilk, even sour cream would have made it moist.  If it is a thin layer cake, bake it under time as it will become to crisp the more you bake.  Mark in your cookbook whether it worked or not, or how you might change it ...and for the  biggest tip... Be ready and willing to toss it out and start over!!  I share this with you to let you know you are not alone in your failures and we want to share in your successes as well as ours. SO as we tried again, we found success and it was so GOOD!! SO get ready....Our Cake of the Week is here...

Easy and Elegant Chocolate Cake with Fluffy Chocolate Frosting

Both the recipe and the frosting are from the Cake Doctor.  And we even tweaked it a bit to our liking, that's the beauty in baking and cooking..making it your own.  We like to do that, so feel free to do the same!!  You'll find the recipes over on the right under pages as well as in the two different cookbooks that these recipes come from....I think this will become a favorite at our house and hopefully yours also.

Finding the Sweetness in Life....

Gooey Butter Cake #4

Where has the time gone this week?  We had Birthday Celebrations, school/homework, projects, sickness and yes, we still found time to make the cake on Thursday.  So now it is time to share this week's cake.  It is our last in January - Can you believe it?  I think this creative endeavor may make my year pass even quicker!!!  We have focused on sheet pans and 9x13 pans this month.  These cakes are crowd pleasers and easy if you are not a lover of frosting cakes - We are all lovers of frosting!!  However, this recipe has no frosting.  This cake is like a combination of the old fashioned chess pie and a moist blonde brownie but it is definitely a cake.  The recipe is from one of our favorite chefs from the Food network...Paula Deen!!!  I remember loving her from the very first episode but a friend of mine said Paula used to much butter...my friend just didn't get it!!   This week I thought I would show you more pictures...Savannah is an awesome photographer as well as a baker.  Check out the recipe page for more pictures of the recipe in the making.  This cake will not last long at our house - better do some more time on the elliptical!!!

Gooey Butter Cake with Chocolate Chips 

Yes, she has cake mixes, cookie mixes, muffin mixes, spices- 

Yes we have them and more!

Look at Paula in the beginning...

We use my Havilland china for our desserts!  And our sweet 

vintage pastry forks, too!

This has been a great first month..We have made a great Texas Sheet Cake, an old recipe from days gone by in our 7 up cake, a Coca Cola Sheet Cake and now an Oh so good, gooey butter cake.  I hope you have enjoyed the first month of cakes...Get ready for February... 

It's all about love and chocolate!!

Finding the Sweetness in Life, 

A quick Critic on a new cupcake pan....

It's Valentine's Holiday Season (Who knew?)...and the stores have had Valentine's out since December 24th!!  I love Love, I love hearts, I love all the new cute stuff that is out right now....but I don't love this.....

This is the new Cupcake Pan from NorticWare.  It is at Walmart for a pretty hefty price tag ($18).  The pictures on the pan's brochure look great, look like cupcakes, look perfect. I love the idea of filling in the middle of the cupcake... So I bought this pan thinking "Oh, this will be great for parties, birthdays,..."  I was so hopeful and really wanted to like this pan so I made them for Savannah's birthday along with a Chocolate covered Strawberry Cake (the cake was all strawberries!!)  Much to my disappointment, the cupcakes once baked and assembled look like mushrooms and they do not stay together when you bite into them!  The taste of the cupcakes were great but I wish I would have used just a standard muffin tin or better yet cake pans!!!  So if you are tempted to purchase this, walk away!!!  Save the $18 and make the traditional cupcakes that everyone loves....

Our cake #4 will be up tomorrow....

Finding the Sweetness in Life,

I'ld like to teach the world to sing....Cake #3

This title is from a commercial back in the 70's (I think)... I loved it!!  I was a little girl when it first played and can still sing it today.  Can you?? If so, you probably know what our third cake is....the ever southern...              Coca Cola Cake.

As you probably have noticed in this first month, we decided to make our cakes with our sheet pans or 9 X 13 pans as so many of us have those readily in our cabinets.  We will be going in many directions with these cakes/recipes  over the next 11 months...Yes, January is almost gone.  While we were making this cake, we thought it might be very close to the Texas Sheet Cake.  After tasting both, they are very different cakes indeed.  While they are both incredibly moist and chocolatey, the consistency is different as one is in a sheet pan and one in the 9X 13.  The frostings are both melted and poured over the warm cakes but again the taste and consistency is different.  

A few tips

• Have all ingredients ready and measured as this makes the time go by fast.  
• Use Coke - it's the real thing!!
• We only greased the pan (the recipe called for grease/floured pan) and the cake came out with ease.
• It took 35 minutes to bake but check at 30 minutes.  Oven varies
• Spread the marshmallows out in the pan after the batter has been poured.  The marshmallows gravitate to the center of the cake.

• We omitted the pecans (allergies) but please try them- It should be wonderful and will cut the sweetness  a bit.
• Prepare frosting when you take the cake out of the oven. 
• Pour frosting over warm cake.  

All in All , the cake was a delight.  You might say  we had  a "Coke and a smile" while we were baking,  this brought "perfect harmony" to our evening and don't forget to use the "Real Thing."  

Until next time,

Finding the Sweetness in Life 

Cake 2 - a bit of sunshine to chase away the Winter blues....

7-UP Cake takes the stage this week.  This is a recipe from my childhood Church's first cookbook called Aromas.  It was first published in 1977.  This cookbook is a treasure to me as it contains memories just by reading the names of the cooks, bakers and hostesses that grace the pages.  It was when I was a little girl that I first learned of hospitality from my mom and many of these women whom I would see in our Church's kitchen on those many occasions we called Fellowship Dinners...a great time that has somehow missed this century- I would be allowed to be in the kitchen to help, I was a runner.  I would be the one who could take napkins, silverware, etc. to the tables.  I loved to see the ladies fixing platters or warming dishes, they would laugh and share their lives with each other.  Little did they know that I was watching and learning all the while as they were just doing what they all did so well..Serve and Share.  

This Cake is incredibly moist and was easy to prepare.  We liked what happened when we poured the 7-UP into the batter..... a little like Chemistry with a few bubbles here and there.  I must show a picture of the pan after the Cake came out...Savannah is one incredible greaser.  She says it's a hidden talent.  Hidden no more!! 

Our only hitch was the frosting.  Our frosting didn't thicken up as much as I thought it would.  Perhaps we didn't let it cool long enough, we were just ready for the tastin'...We hope you'll find a ray of sunshine in this cake as so many of us had snow this week.  Yes, I said had- our's is already gone:(  

Until next week--

Finding the Sweetness in Life!

Number 1!!!

TEXAS Sheet Cake....Could there be any better way to start than this?  A wonderful cake with differing stories on why it is called such.  Some say it is big like everything in Texas or perhaps it has big flavor like that of Texas cuisine.  For me it is a southern staple, a large cake for crowds and just an awesome cake with very little effort.  It is delicious served warm with a glass of milk or a cup of coffee!

Here is the first slab with a vintage silver pastry fork (a recent find in Canton).

Ready for the first bite!!!

 Morgan, his first word after taking that bite was WOW!! We had this for dinner tonight...Life is uncertain- eat dessert first!

Here are some tips for you...

*Have ingredients measured before you start as part is stirred in a bowl and part is on the stove.  

*Our jelly roll pan is from William Sonoma and we generously greased it...

The cake came out with ease!!  

For the frosting....

*Have ingredients measured about 10 minutes before the cake is done.  

*Then begin with about 5 minutes left on your cake.

*Frost this cake immediately after you take it out....

BUT here is the biggest tip of the day...

****Lightly put the frosting over the cake in different areas and then gently smooth on the cake.  Use a light touch and do not spread it too thin as it could remove the cake's top layer.  Continue to frost the entire cake!! ****

Then no matter the time of day, pour a glass of milk and enjoy a slab of this Texas sized, Texas flavor Cake!!

....Finding the Sweetness in Life.