Superheroes to the Rescue!

Superheroes!! Yes! There's not much to say about this cake, other than it was a blast to make. Who doesn't love superheros?  Most of us grew up with them--I know my brother was obsessed! If we hadn't thought about superheros lately, watching The Big Bang Theory has certainly brought them back to us, along with the Marvel superheros movie that comes out what seems like every month. We all love them, at any age! This cake was made for a young boy turning 11 who loved Spider-man and Batman.

First I made traditional cake pops with fondant pieces. Every single bat symbol is cut by hand with a pairing knife. Sometimes my patience astounds me!

My favorite was the batman cape! I wanted to add a lot of dimension to the cake that would seem "interactive" to the consumer.

Then came the Spiderman cake pops. I piped webs on them to make Spiderman's mask.   I also made spiders from molding chocolate-- nice and interactive!

The cake was a marble of vanilla and chocolate and frosted with butter cream, with a lot of fondant accents.   I wasn't sure how to take two superheros and represent them on a one layer cake. So I decided to give the sides of the cake to Batman with the city at night, lights on in the buildings and the bat symbol overhead, beckoning the Dark Knight.  The cake was placed on a cardboard I created with a Spiderman comic--modgepodged and covered in plastic so the youngster could unwrap it when the cake was gone and keep it!

The top was for Spiderman.  The vibrant red really played well with the dark colors, and made the web pop!

Finished cake!

But wait.. what about those cake pops???

There we are!  Pops added, and cake completed!

Such a fun way to celebrate a birthday! It was fun to do, because it really allowed me to be as creative as I wanted.  It was a good way to "warm up" for the holiday season!

-Elena

Unite, Love, Share, and Eat--Happy Thanksgiving

It is 7:53am on Thanksgiving morning and I feel light and energized. I ate turkey burgers and steamed asparagus all week and drank a ton of water and tea.. snuck only a few chocolate pieces! Worked out or went to yoga every day... I tried my best to save myself the calories and room for today--the best day of the year-- Thanksgiving.

My family has always been very traditional with Thanksgiving. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatos, rolls... and my Grandma Pauline's French meat pie. Oh I could eat an entire one in a sitting. Growing up she would bring three, two to serve and one for my freezer, all for me! I want to learn to make it her way soon. But I don't think it will be the same... she has to do it! I hope she makes it today and my mom brings me some! 

I am spending the day with Louis' family, who are very fun and very much into food--different foods, to me anyways. Cornbread and corn dishes, polish dishes, but mixed with the traditional turkey day fare. And I am excited for it!! 

I am contributing a dessert obviously! I made an apple crisp that is just delicious. It is my favorite recipie ever. I am very picky about my apple crisp. I like there to be a caramelized, thick topping, not a little dusting of brown sugar. So here it is! Very easy, basic ingredients but huge flavors!  My mom and I each made one last night, and here is what we did!

First, the dreaded task of peeling apples. I hate peeling apples, or anything for that matter. I have a very sharp, state of the art peeler from Cutco that Louis gave me, and it is still such a daunting task. But you have to do it! 

Next, use an apple corer and core the apples. Take each piece and cut into three so you are left with chunks.  Put these in a baking pan, then coat with cinnamon and sugar. I coat mine thick! 

Preheat the oven to 350.

Now it's time to make the topping. I like a lot of the topping so I increased everything by .5. So in a bowl, combine 1 1/2 sticks melted butter, 1.5 cups flour, 1.5 cups sugar and 1.5 egg, beaten. Add a pinch of salt and mix until it forms a wet dough. It will be sticky and buttery!

Don't pour it over the crisp! Take the dough in your hands and break into pieces over the apples. 

It should look like this before baking!

Now here is the key--Sugar in the Raw! Get some and use it in all your baking, it adds so much texture and flavor!  Sprinkle it over the dough, and it will caramelize during the baking process! Yum! 

Bake crisp for 50 minutes to an hour. It should be bubbling and starting to brown on top. Let cool then serve warm with ice cream, or (my favorite) cold!! You will not be disappointed! It is easy and amazing, so if you need a last minute recipe today, this is it!

I will post a picture of what it looks like once it's on the plate, ready to be devoured!

I can't wait to eat everything and talk all day long about my favorite subjects in the world--baking and cooking. I am thankful to have such a great guy to call mine and to be a part of his family! I will miss my own family today, especially my brother Nick who is in warm, sunny Florida and won't be making it back until Christmas! But I am thankful for all of the amazing people in my life who have taught me and guided me through this life so far. I am thankful for the ability to eat, and to be able to have such a passion and engage in it on a daily basis. 

I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with love and happiness, and of course delicious food! Take it one bite at a time, and savor the time spent with your loved ones today, because it isn't about shopping deals or football.. It is about uniting, sharing, loving and eating, of course. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

-Elena 

Sweet Puppy Love

There is something about the presence of a dog.  You never feel alone, and though its cliche, it's true that they offer the most unconditional love.  Baxter is 6 but still runs around like a maniac puppy dog. I love him. My whole family loves him. We do crazy stuff for him like hand feed him food, or heat up left over chicken breast just for him even when no one else is eating. We walk him, take him for "bu-bye" rides, and let him romp all over the beds. He's the King, no doubt about it. I mean, how can you resist this face!?

I think my favorite aspect of having a dog is you can come home after the longest day ever, and they will greet you with such joy and happiness. Then you can leave to run an errand for 10 minutes and return, and they still greet you with the same amount of happiness, like they haven't seen you in years even though it has been minutes. A pup always gives you something to look forward to.

I came across an article on Facebook about what is really in our dog's food and it got me thinking.  I grabbed Baxter's bag of bones and looked the the ingredients... wheat, sugar, salt, chicken flavor?...and a ton of ingredients I couldn't even pronounce.  I'm not saying it's all bad, but why all the extra stuff?? So I did some research and came across a few recipes and ingredients totally safe for dogs, so I gave it a go! These were SO EASY and cheap... you have all this stuff at your cabinets at all times anyways (minus pumpkin, but easy to pick up at the store).  So here goes:

3 cups flour, 1/2 cup oats and 2 tbsp cinnamon, mixed in a bowl

Then, combine a can of pumpkin (15oz), 3 tbsp of natural peanut butter and two eggs

Mix wet with dry to form the dough. It's so stick so I had to flour my counter top first before rolling them out with my marble rolling pin.

I wish I had dog bone cookie cutters but I don't so I used candy canes--half for the holiday season coming, and half because Baxter really likes long treats he can hold on to.

I baked them for 30 minutes at 350 degrees, and done! It made about 25-30 biscuits!! And the ingredients all together cost less than $10.  They were easy and they made the kitchen smell great! The best thing is, I know with confidence that I could take a bite of them and it's all natural food that's good for my pup! You could alter the recipe and add chicken pieces, apples, sweet potato, or other "dog safe" ingredients. I wanted to make a yogurt frosting but didn't have plain, fat free yogurt on hand... maybe next time!

I thinnnkkkk they were a hit!!

So to all the dog lovers out there, give these a try! You'll save some money and make your dog very happy!

In all it was a good weekend, and I am excited to continue my cake & cake pop order for a boy's 11th birthday, details soon!!

-Elena

A Polish Hash

Happy Monday! I am feeling rested and rejuvenated after a successful weekend of errands, cooking, and relaxing!  My boyfriend and I spent a lot of time this weekend in the grocery store and local ethnic markets picking out some foods for new recipes to enjoy while sipping wine and watching The Walking Dead, which we are totally addicted to!  I know I feature primarily sweets on my blog but I do cook often and wanted to share the meal I made this weekend.  

On Saturday afternoon we were perusing the shelves of Stop and Shop when I saw perogies and instantly got a craving.  Louis is Polish and absolutely loves Polish food – golumpkis, sauerkraut, kopusta... Up until I met him, I had never had polish food, not even a perogi.  It was all foreign to me, but I am not a big cabbage person, and that is a main ingredient in a lot of polish foods, but I did grow fond of Polish sausage and perogies!

So when I saw the perogies, my craving kicked in and Louis was totally on board.  However, we left S&S and he decided to take me to Belvedere’s, a local Polish market in East Windsor, CT.  I loved walking through the aisles and not being able to read anything—it reminded me of grocery shopping in Greece!!(which was the most INTERESTING experience of my life and warrants its own blog post someday!)  The juices and spices and soups..and the Polish sausage! It all looked so good, we couldn’t even choose. We ended up walking out with two packages of perogies (one 3-cheese and one with potato and bacon), half a stick of sausage, some sesame crackers, a loaf of fresh rye bread and a package of flavor filled chocolates that smelled so heavily of liquor after opening the bag, I had to put them away instantly.. although they were tasty! Just strong.. after biting into one, Louis laughed at me and said “it’s candy made by Polish people, obviously it has vodka in it!”… I should have known!

Anyways, I created a delicious dish with the perogies, sausage, onions, bacon and sweet potato. I don’t really have a recipe… I am all about cutting up ingredients and throwing them in together with spices… measuring just takes up too much time, and this dish wasn’t going to be healthy from the start so who cares! It was the perfect Saturday night meal we needed, filled with warmth and carbohydrate goodness!  Not every meal you eat needs to be healthy! You have to indulge! It’s all in moderation.

First I thawed the packages of perogies, and chopped the onions, bacon and sausage.  I cubed the a sweet potato and a Yukon potato and threw that into boiling water with some garlic salt for 15 minutes, until they were tender but not cooked all the way through just yet.  I drained and set aside. 

I got my skillet hot and added ¼ stick of salted butter and melted that down before throwing in the perogies.  I let them brown on each side for about 10 minutes, then removed from the skillet and put on a paper towel to rest and patted dry.  Of course, a healthier route would be to boil them, but traditional perogies are browned in a skillet with onions and bacon!   

I immediately added the bacon, onion and sausage to the skillet and let cook for about 15 minutes on medium heat, stirring frequently until onions and bacon was browned, and the sausage turned a darker pink. I added spices at this stage, such as cracked black pepper, garlic salt, a pinch of red pepper flake and some parsley.

I then added the potatoes, and let them brown while soaking up the flavors from the onions and sausage.  Once everything was browned and cooked to my liking, I threw the perogies back in the pan to heat them back up.  I topped it all with a thin layer of a three cheese blend, but any cheese works.  The salt of the cheese and sausage marries with the sweetness of the perogi dough and sweet potato, and the combination is amazing!

I served the dish with a side of rye bread, and mhmm it was yummy!

  It is definitely heavy on your stomach… You could lighten it up by adding veggies like sauerkraut or asparagus, or use less perogis, but it is rare to eat this food so I say if you’re going to make it, really go for it!  It will definitely hold my craving over for a while! 

We hope to travel to Poland in the next few years and really try an authentic Polish spread!

-Elena 

Baby Bliss

Recently, I’ve realized how much fun I have creating cakes for baby showers.  Sure it gets a little monotonous.. there’s only two possible outcomes and only so many colors (though usually it comes down to pink or blue!)… but I find each shower I do, I tweak my designs and change them up a little bit to really create something unique.

This shower was for a mom-to-be whom I met through my best friend’s family. I was so excited to hear the colors included purple!! Don’t get me wrong, I love pink, but it’s nice to throw other colors in there for contrast and purple is my favorite color!

One thing I decided to change up was my display.  The circular plates with the ribbon that I usually use are so perfect for baby showers – the ribbon ties in the theme and the presentation is always adorable but like I said, I am trying to tweak everything and switch it up! So I opted for the square, white enamel plates—and elegant design but no room for bows L I couldn’t deal with all that white showing, so I decided to cover the surface with fun, polka dotted paper that screamed “baby!!” to me! 

I wanted the cake-babies to be feminine and pretty, but fun—like the expectant mother!  So instead of the usual flowers, I decided to give the little girls bows, and I am so in love with the finished product.  The rosy cheeks added a perfect finish and I hear they were devoured in five minutes so nothing makes me happier than that!

And here is the finished product!

With the transition from babies and weddings to the holidays, I am excited to jump into different projects such as apple crisp, mini pies and peppermint bark! And of course, cake pops… It’s going to be an exciting few months, filled with the hustle and bustle of Christmas… just don’t forget to be present in your moments, especially the ones spent with family and friends! Don’t rush the holidays, take them minute by minute, or bite by bite, and savor them!  I am excited to see what this holiday season brings!

-Elena