Photo TR: Brandy makes a cake.

[LcHg5265]

Do you think you could post the full recipe?

[Brandy524]

Do you think you could post the full recipe?

 

I can! I'll have to bring my recipe book to work with me to do it, so it won't be today. But I will post it.

[Brandy524]

It really looks nice, esp. with the turkey there in the center of the pie.

 

And I could swear the bird looks like a ceramic one! It really turned out nice for you - and the pie...

 

To me, in my hungry humble opinion, lol.

 

Thanks again for sharing another great (yum) "process" in baking.

 

 

 

(What??? Whipped cream "on the side"? How thoroughly decadent, lol!)

 

Thank you!! And yes, whipped cream on the side, so they could take it or leave it. I can't imagine not eating whipped cream on pie, but some people don't like it. Crazy, I know.

[Brandy524]

Sometimes I just get the urge to bake something. Danny used to argue with me, but he's learned now. Now he just rolls his eyes and tells me to clean the kitchen when I'm done. I'll drag out my cookbooks and rifle through the pantry to see what I can make. Most of the time it ends up being some type of cookie, because usually I only have the staples: flour, sugar, butter, eggs. It's not so much that I want to bake something so I can eat it, I just love the baking process. And usually I don't get to eat much of the finished product. With Danny and the girls (and mostly Danny) I'm lucky to get two or three cookies out of two dozen.

 

Anyway, my point is that I like to randomly bake without any special occasion. So I came across a cake recipe a while back that I've really been wanting to try but I had no reason to bake a cake, especially one that makes this much. Then I decided I didn't need a reason. If I can bake cookies at random, why can't I bake a cake? Do I need a holiday? Tuesday, December 1, 2009 was enough of an occasion for me!

 

I came across this recipe on Bakerella's blog (http://www.bakerella.com), but she originally got it from the Pioneer Woman (who is awesome; I could spend all day on her blog!). Here's the recipe for The Best Chocolate Sheet Cake. Ever. http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/06/the_best_chocol/

Yum! Seriously, make this cake. It really is the best cake. Ally ate two pieces last night. Danny ate five. That should say something, right?

The finished cakes! I think my frosting was a little too thin, and I didn't get the powdered sugar completely stirred up, but it still tasted awesome!

Then add more cocoa, and powdered sugar. The original recipe calls for chopped pecans, but I don't like pecans so I left those out.

Melt more butter on the stove. This time 1 3/4 sticks.

Into the oven they go! I only left mine in about 15 minutes because my oven cooks fast. Now for the frosting.

Pour the batter into the pans. It's actually supposed to be made in a commercial size cookie sheet, or a jelly roll pan, (i.e. something larger than what I have) but I only had regular-sized cookie sheets so I just made two!

Then add your buttermilk mixture to the rest of the stuff in the bowl and mix it well. Did I mention that you don't even have to get out the electric mixer for this cake? That makes it even more awesome.

Mix your buttermilk, eggs, vanilla and baking soda in a measuring cup.

Add the chocolate/butter mixture to the dry ingredients and stir.

Add water and cocoa to the melted butter. This part starts to smell soooo good!

And melt two sticks of butter on the stove.

We combine the dry ingredients first.

[Brandy524]

I remembered to bring my cookbook with me to work today so I could post my pumpkin pie recipe. So here it is. Hope you enjoy!

 

Traditional Pumpkin Pie

 

Crust:

1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/3 cup vegetable oil

1/2 tsp. salt

2 Tbsp. cold water

 

*But I have to admit that I didn't make my crust this time because I had too much other stuff to do!! But I've made it before, really I have!

 

Filling:

2 eggs

1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. ginger

1/8 tsp. ground clove

15 oz. canned pumpkin (not pie filling!)

12 oz. can evaporated milk

 

Whipped Cream:

3/4 cup heavy whipping cream

2 Tbsp. sugar

 

1) Pre-heat oven to 425. Mix flour, oil and salt in medium bowl with fork until flour is moistened. Sprinkle with cold water, 1 Tbsp. at a time, tossing with fork until all water is absorbed. Shape into a ball. Press into bottom and sides of pie plate, 9 x 1 1/4 inches.

 

2) Beat eggs slightly in large bowl with whisk. Beat in sugar, cinnamon, salt, ginger, clove, pumpkin and milk.

 

3) To prevent spilling, place pan on oven rack before filling. Pour filling into pan. Bake 15 minutes.

 

4) Reduce heat to 350. Bake 45 minutes or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in wire rack.

 

5) Beat cream and sugar in a chilled bowl until stiff peaks form. If not served in 4 hours, cover and refrigerate.

[moinab]

If I baked, I would seriously weigh 300 pounds!

 

I'm enjoying living vicariously, through your baking!

[Brandy524]

I told you all that I would be making another cake in mid-December for a friend's birthday. Well, we're having girls night this Friday to celebrate her birthday (even though her actual birthday is not until Dec. 31), so I got started on part of her cake last night.

 

She said she wanted something girly, and that she liked hot pink, white and black together. So here's what I'm doing: a one-tier cake, iced in hot pink buttercream, zebra print ribbon around the bottom, and a gumpaste shoe on top, painted zebra to match the ribbon. I'm planning on buying some feather boa-type frou-frou stuff to trim the cake board with. Not too complicated, but totally girly.

 

Anyway, I started on the shoe last night so it will have time to dry before Friday. I just assembled it last night, and I'll paint the zebra stripes on it tonight.

And the finished shoe. I forgot to take a picture while cutting out the top. And yes, I see that the heel has fallen a little. I ended up adding more to the bottom of the heel to build it back up.

The heel added. There was no pattern for the heel so I had to just make it somehow. I'm not exactly happy with it, but it looks ok.

The sole on the drying support.

About to cut out the sole of the shoe.

I found this pattern on Cake Central. I would have been completely lost without it!

[Brandy524]

I painted the zebra stripes on the shoe last night. I think it turned out great! Can't wait to finish the whole cake tonight. Final update will be tomorrow.

No, I did not put my name on it because I made it. My friend's name is Brandy, too. We've been friends since we were 3 yrs. old. Teachers had to add our last initials on our names to keep us straight.

Then I filled them in and colored the heel.

Then I used my food marker to outline the stripes.

First I sketched the stripes on with a pencil.

[STR8FXXXINEDGE]

The shoe looks awesome, and I LOVE the little turkey!

[Brandy524]

Thanks!! It was my first attempt at a shoe, so I was a little worried. I'm glad it turned out well.

[Nrthwnd]

Looks great, so far. Never can have too many shoes, hmm?

 

Looking forward to how the PINK of it all turns out, LOL!

[Brandy524]

Okay, finished it up last night. I think it turned out great. I know she'll love it.

 

She asked for a white cake. I had never made one, but I found a recipe easily enough. It turned out looking great. I just hope it tastes good!

 

I probably won't be making another decorated cake for a little while, unless someone asks me to do one. But I am going to be making cake pops on Saturday for a Christmas party, so if you're intrigued and want to see that, I'll post it on Monday.

One more picture! So that's it. I think it's very cute!

There they are. I found these jewel pick things in the wedding supplies at Hobby Lobby. I thought they were cute!

A little more dressed up. You can't see the little jewel things well in this picture.

You're supposed to use a paper towel with no pattern to smooth buttercream. My paper towels have little swirly dots on them, so the cake ended up with a swirly pattern, but I think it goes with the theme.

Frosted, but not smooth yet.

Starting to assemble the cake.

Color all mixed up.

Now to color the buttercream. Notice the big blob of food coloring.

Into the oven for 20 minutes.

You alternate adding the flour mixture and egg mixture to the butter mixture. This is what it looks like after all is finished.

In yet another bowl mix egg whites, milk and vanilla. The egg whites gave me fits. My egg separator sucks. I ended up just using the shells to separate the eggs by hand.

Mix the dry ingredients in a separate bowl. Flour, baking powder, and salt.

Beat the butter and sugar together until it's fluffy. Ally said it looked like popcorn.

Butter and sugar.

1 1/2 sticks of unsalted butter.

Pans...fascinating.

[Nrthwnd]

It looks fantastic! And definitely PINK!

 

And yummy I betcha, mmmmm.

 

(Maybe I can get you to do a fishing wader for a friend's birthday in the spring, 'cause he loves stream fishing in his spare time.)

 

Heh heh, great going with the entire creation.

[Brandy524]

^ Thanks!!

 

If you weren't so far away, I'd definitely do a cake for your friend!

[ebl]

For a first attempt at making a shoe, that was a darned good one. If you aren't already, it's time for you to get into business doing this.

 

Eric

[Brandy524]

^ Thanks! But nope, not in the business yet. I did get an order after someone saw that cake, though!

 

And I completely forgot to take pictures of the cake pops process on Saturday. I was so rushed to get them finished.

 

So this will probably be all I do cake-wise for a while. Hope everyone has a great holiday season!

[Brandy524]

I've kind of abandoned this thread because I've started making cakes with someone, hopefully it will turn into a business eventually. If you're friends with me on facebook, you may already know this. So now that someone else is working in the kitchen with me, I've stopped taking pictures of every little step. However, we've started working on a 30th birthday Broadway themed cake, with logos of the birthday girl's favorite musicals, and since I know there are lots of Wicked fans in here, I had to show y'all this:

I did this last night. Looked at the logo and freehanded it on fondant. I think it turned out awesome!

[Moose]

That looks great.

 

I have to admit, the first 10 or so times I saw the logo, I did not see Glinda/GAHlinda

[Brandy524]

Thank you!!

 

Just in case any of you are interested in following our new cake blog, here's the address: http://cakesbybrandyandkim.blogspot.com/

 

And if you're friends with me on facebook, please become a fan of our cake page.

[ebl]

To be honest, I like looking at pictures taken at each step along the way (maybe that's the tech writer in me). I like watching how something goes from a pile of materials (or in this case, ingredients) to the finished product.

 

I think over on Facebook I am a fan of your cake page.

 

Eric

[Brandy524]

I thought about still doing the step-by-step thing, but since we're both working on them now, it's hard to use our time wisely while trying to photograph everything. Not to mention some pieces (like the musical logos) are done separately; she did two of them at her home, so I can't photograph that either. Anything that I do on my own, though, I will definitely document!

[RCFreak]

Wow don't know how I missed it, but that cake is AMAZING! (I <3 all of those shows except Phantom, but the cake came out great.) I'll definitely bookmark that blog.

[Brandy524]

Thank you!! We were very proud of that one! And the birthday girl loved it, too.