I know it's not perfect but this is the biggest dang cake I've ever made, let alone decorated, and I wanted to share! I was asked to make this for the 15th anniversary of the LRP system I play in . It's 13x18 inches, made of 4 9x13 cakes (2 layers). Chocolate on the left, vanilla on the right, with cherry filling. The icing is white mountain flavoured with vanilla and a hint of almond extract. This was my first attempt at writing on a cake!

( Bonus: a tip for filling layer cakes )

xposted from bakebakebake, natch.

Tags: aberddu, bogganing, food, geekery, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: accomplished

This is a favourite of mine. It's more of a crustless quiche than a casserole, and if you make it with low fat cheddar and nonfat cottage cheese, it comes in at just 200 calories a serving (or 300 if you split it in 4 instead of 6) while being very tasty and filling.

( Recipe here! )

xposted from bakebakebake.

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: full

I'm having a little get-together tonight to celebrate. After the weekend's exploits I decided to keep it simple - my go-to Black Midnight Cake, frosted in the pan with White Mountain Frosting (subbed maple syrup for the corn syrup, natch). The leaves are marzipan. Hooray for the True North Strong and Free! :)

( More pictures this-a-way... )

xposted from bakebakebake.

Tags: bogganing, canada, food, holidays, photo, social crap
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: hungry
groovin' on: The Dust Brothers - Who Is Tyler Durden ?

What we had for dinner before the Baked Alaska last night:



This is a delicious vegetarian recipe that uses a TON of cheese. I couldn't find any Ricotta or Romano in Somerfield, and I was unwilling to walk to Morrisons in the pouring rain, so I ran some fat-free cottage cheese through the food processor and used that instead of the Ricotta, and just left the Romano out. It was as yummy as ever.

( Recipe here! )

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: sleepy
groovin' on: Gay Pimp - Soccer Practice

My entry for this month's theme at bakebakebake: strawberry baked Alaska! The pictures don't do it justice, I'm afraid... I had to work very quickly to get any, and it kinda shows... But trust me, it was awesome. Everything in this recipe is made from scratch, and I'm quite proud of it. The ice cream was so creamy, and the meringue was spongy and melt in your mouth delicious with just a hint of vanilla... The strawberry jam seeped into the cake a bit and tied the dish together in a most delightful way...

( Recipe(s)... )

( Pictures! )

(A crosspost, obviously. :p)

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth

Emii's birthday picnic was today, and since she mentioned cookies the other night, I decided to try out Alton Brown's The Chewy. It certainly lives up to the hype... wow! Oh, btw, I used an 1/8 cup measure as I had no idea what a '#20 disher' was, and it seemed about the right size judging by what other people had suggested (thanks bakex3faq!), and it worked out great, yielding almost exactly the predicted number of cookies.

(xposted from bakebakebake)

Tags: birthdays, bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: sleepy
groovin' on: The Legionnaire's Lament - The Decembrists

I tried Lannie's recipe today for Rose's birthday, and it turned out great! I used strawberries, blackberries, raspberries and blueberries. I also made it in a smaller, springform pan so I reduced the recipe a bit. It was devoured and raved over. Nyom!

( 2 more pics behind the cut )

xposted from bakebakebake

Tags: aberystwyth, birthdays, bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: full

Made a few cupcake cones this weekend to try out the rainbow thing... They didn't turn out as spectacularly as I'd hoped - I think because the cone is so narrow the layers got more mixed up when the cake rose. Or maybe I just suck! They are still cute and tasty though.

( A few more photos )

Cupcake cones are easy to make, in general. Just make your favourite cake recipe, place a flat-bottomed ice cream cone in each well of a muffin tin, and fill them about 2/3 of the way. Bake as normal cupcakes.

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: groggy
groovin' on: Bright Red Orb - Scary Valentine

I had a bunch of lemon buttercream left over from yesterday's adventures, so despite having like 1/3 a cake sitting on my table, the logical thing to do was make cupcakes! I cracked open my brand new copy of Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which I finally broke down and purchased after so many glowing recommendations from bakebakebake. I used actual (skim) milk instead of soy because that's what I had, though. I went with the basic vanilla cupcake recipe - it did not disappoint. So moist and tender and delicious. I am considering it as a new go-to white cake (although Starlight is sturdier and better suited to heavy icings like marzipan and such). I can't imagine it would be any less good with soy milk, either. I would recommend this book based on this recipe and the photos alone, even for omnis like myself!

( More pics! )

Tags: bogganing, books, food, photo, recommendations
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: satisfied
groovin' on: Steeleye Span - Saucy Sailor

Well, my Ian's birthday party is today, and he requested, months ago, a lemon flavoured cake with a Lovecraftian theme. So lemon=yellow=Hastur for those in the nerd-know like myself... :V I used the recipe for New Starlight Cake (same as in this post), using lemon extract instead of vanilla, and with about 1/8th cup lemon juice substituted for so much milk, and filled the 4 layers (2 rounds sliced in half) with alternating lemon curd and lemon neo-classic buttercream. The covering and decorations are all made from golden marzipan, which he adores, so I piled it on.

So, here we go... The stars are right!

( Hastur, Hastur, Hastur! )

Tags: birthdays, bogganing, food, geekery, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: accomplished
groovin' on: Steeleye Span - You will Burn

You have to say it in the Dad voice. Hee.



Just a quick pic of some cookies I made for purplefog last week! :)

( Recipe here. )

xposted from bakebakebake

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: giggly

Well, today I had my 1-day installation at the School of Art. I titled it 'absence and essence,' for want of a better idea. I guess I'm satisfied with how it turned out, although things can always be better... It is still a work in progress, after all.

I ended up using 25W bulbs, each housed in an MDF box, with the glass slides fitted in the front. The images were projected onto free-hanging paper screens. I showed 5 images, all of my mother and sister, in a rough semi-circle.

It seemed like there were quite a few comments in my little envelope when I checked in at lunchtime - obviously I haven't looked at any of them yet. I hope some of them will be nice! ;) Tomorrow I'll be seeing Chris, and I hope he will be nice as well!

If you are interested, video footage of the installation is available on my facebook and Youtube. There are 2 on FB, one long pass over the whole exhibit and a shorter one showing the motion of the screens; but I've only got the longer one up on Youtube at the moment. There are also some still images on facebook, which should be viewable to everyone. I welcome questions and would very much appreciate any comments/suggestions!

( mini-statement )

Tags: art, exhibition, mom, phd, photo, sister, video
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: artistic
groovin' on: Tom Waits - Poor Edward

wererogue scored us some tasty organic beef mince at the market, so I decided to make a classic I'd neglected for far too long: meatloaf! I didn't really measure stuff, but it went a little something like ( this... )

xposted from bakebakebake

Tags: bogganing, food, photo
Current Location: Aberystwyth
i feel: