The rest of the cupcakes

Here are the cat ones!
Both the cats and the dogs!
Here they are ready to be "adopted" and taken home by the kids at the party. We served icecream at the party, but the animals were the party favors! Each kid got to choose their's to take home.

Puppy dog cupcakes

I got a new cookbook for Christmas that I love -- "Hello Cupcake." When Catherine saw all the different types of dog and cat cupcakes in the book, she immediately requested them for her birthday. So in case you are wondering what I am doing tonight . . . Now you know.

Hopefully soon, I will have cats to post as well!

Thanksgiving 2008 Menu

We had a wonderful meal! It was a little tricky getting it ready since we all went to the parade in the morning and only returned home around 1:30. We ate at 5:30.

Turkey (a small 13 pound one so it would cook in 3 hours)
Dressing (not stuffed in, since that would slow down the cooking time of the bird)
Lion House Rolls (which I made ahead of time and froze right after shaping-- all I had to do was set them out to rise and bake!)
Green Bean Casserole (since my sister Carrie was here)
Mashed Potatoes and Gravy
Frog Eye Salad
Cranberry Sauce
Lingonberry Jam (from IKEA -- since Trent served a mission in Sweden, he loves the stuff)
Homemade strawberry jam and butter for the rolls

It wasn't the hugest of meals, but in a limited amount of time it was all we could do. On Sunday we had Thanksgiving round 2.

Ham
Rice Pilaf
Roasted asparagus
Sweet Potatoes
Rolls, jam and butter

It was kind of nice to spread some of the traditional foods out over 2 bigs meals rather than all at once.

The trouble with decorating . . . SOLVED

Most people I know love decorating cookies and cupcakes and love eating them that way. But no one likes making all the frosting, getting out all the piping bags and tips, and the mess involved. For several years now (as you can see in a previous post) I have only used freezer ziplock bags with the edge snipped to pipe icing. That way you can throw it all away, but it does limit your designs significantly. My aunt Kelli is a cupcake fanatic and hers always look so beautiful, but she uses a wilton 2D tip, which to me means, messing piping bags or specialty parchment paper ones that are not found at any of my local stores-- but yesterday I thought I would try using the 2D tip in a freezer ziplock and . . . it worked fabulously. I was a little worried it would leak due to the 90 degree angle of the bag and the 30 degree angle of the tip, but the freezer bag held up nicely. It was so easy and mess free. I just spooned one store bought tub of icing into the ziplock where the tip was waiting in the corner. I clipped the corner of the bag just enough to let the tip slide slightly into the hole. It worked like a charm. If ziplock really wanted my life to be easy they would make triangle shaped ziplock freezer bags.

Mini Meatloaf

This recipe is so easy and so quick and so tasty and so healthy.

• 1 lb ground beef
• 1 box chicken stuffing mix (I usually use the store brand because it is cheaper and in this recipe it doesn't matter how fluffy the mix gets)

Put your hands inside plastic sandwich baggies and knead until well combined. Shape into small balls that will fit into a muffin pan. (this makes 12).

Bake at 350 for 20 - 30 minutes. They are crispy on the outside and moist in the middle. We each eat about 2 of them (which is only 2.66 ounces of meat) so if you are looking for portion control, this is perfect and filling. If you splurge and eat 4 of them you are looking at only 5.32 ounces -- still smaller than many burgers and most steaks. I usually serve them with baked potatoes or rice pilaf and brocolli (and of course ketchup for the kiddos).

Fondant cake decorating class

I love the look of fondant, but I hate the taste. I took a class at church this week to learn how to do it. It was fun I don't think it is very hard -- It is just time consuming. That is probably why the class was so fun. Someone bought all the supplies, made all the cakes, fillings, frostings, and fondants -- colored them all, placed them in decorating bags with the right tips -- all we had to do was decorate.

This is the "inspiration" photo.

Here is my version. Now the biggest difference is obviously the cake size -- the inspiration looks to be like 3 layers of 6 in cake rounds and mine was 2 layers of 10 inch. Also we did not have the little white dots on the roses, but all in all I thought it was pretty close. . . too bad it still tastes like fondant.

Apple Pie

My sister was here a couple weekends ago and we got very ambitious one Sunday afternoon and baked the following

• 8 pie crusts
• 3 apple pies
• 20 english muffins
• 24 rolls
• a whole sunday dinner -- roast, mashed potatoes -- the works

Here is the pie stuff -- other recipes to follow!

Pate Brise (I have no idea why Martha Stewart call the pie crust this???)

2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2 sticks cold butter (cut into small cubes and keep in fridge until needed)
1/4 cup ice water (maybe a little more or less)

In a food processor combine the flour and salt. Add the butter and pulse until it resembles coarse crumbs.

With the machine running add in the water just until the dough holds together without being wet or sticky. Do not process more that 30 seconds.

Divide in half and place on a piece of plastic wrap. Shape into disks and refridgerate (at least 1 hr) (or you can freeze it for a month)

Apple Pie

1 recipe of the pate brise (1 disk for the crust, the other for the top)

Roll out the crust and place into a glass pie plate, Trim the overhang to about 1/2 inch.

In a large bowl toss together the filling
3 pounds peeled cored, sliced apples (1/4 in thick)
2 Tbs lemon juice
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp salt
3 Tbs flour

Arrange in the chilled pie shell -- take 1 1Tbs of butter, cut into small pieces and place dots throughout the top of the apple filling.

Roll out the second pie crust and place on top. Push together the edges. Cut 3 slits in the top for venting. Brush the top of the crust with

1 large egg yolk and 1 Tbs heavy cream mixed together

Dust with sanding sugar.

Place in freezer for at least 30 minutes (up to a year probably)

Bake at 400 for 20 minutes then at 350 for 40 more.

Enjoy!