WE'VE MOVED

Hello!

Thank you for the amazing 8 years here at A Baked Creation, we can't thank you enough for the memories! But we've decided to move over to a new site - Sincerely, Syl. Please join us there for future posts on all the things you loved here!

Sincerely,
Syl

Saturday, February 28, 2009

Pink Princess Birthday Cupcakes

Do we remember Brian's little red car birthday cake? Today is his cousin's birthday! Ashley's favourite colour is pink and she likes princesses. Her favourite princess story is Cinderella, so we made a castle, some crowns, a magic wand, and the famous slipper from fondant.


We heart chocolate cupcakes!


Castle, magic wand, "glass" - fondant slipper, and flowers!


Crowns fit for a prince and princess! Check out the sprinkle "jewels" embedded into the crowns.


Plaques made from fondant.


Happy 6th Birthday Ashley!

As always, there are more photos posted on our facebook page and flickr account!

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Butterflies and Cross Christening Cupcakes



We made some cupcakes for a very cool mom this weekend. The christening was for her daughter and her son told us he wanted butterflies on the cupcakes! How cute is that request? So of course we're making cute butterflies fluttering around the crosses!



To make tiny fondant butterflies, we:
  1. Used food colour gel to tint the fondant to the desire shade.
  2. Rolled the fondant smoothly to a thickness of about 3-4mm.
  3. We don't have a butterfly cutter, so we used a tiny cookie cutter we had in the shape of a club:

  4. Of course we had to cut off the extra section of the club shape. We did this twice for one butterfly.
  5. Now, you know that extra section of that we sliced off? We used this for the body of the butterfly. Knead the fondant for the body and attach the two wings by pinching the underside.
  6. Let your butterflies dry on one side of the wings.
Pink butterflies on pink vanilla buttercream.


Vanilla and Chocolate

Pink butterflies and crosses on vanilla buttercream and chocolate cupcakes.

Monday, February 16, 2009

Iron Cupcake: Earth - Coffee

Happy Family Day everyone!
Tomorrow will be a work day and you might need... Cocoa Coffee Cupcakes!
As you may already know, last December we joined Iron Cupcake: Earth (similar to Iron Chef, but with cupcakes) and this month's ingredient challenge is Coffee! Interestingly enough, we don't drink coffee on a regular basis (or wine, which is why we didn't do January's challenge). Maybe one or two times a year at the most! So we were planning on just buying coffee at Tim Horton's, but my mother said she could make us coffee. Sure enough, she had these lovely coffee beans that smelled great. She then grounded them up and filtered them for us. "Thanks mom!"

We've actually noticed a number of chocolate cake recipes that include coffee. So... why not right? Even if we're not huge fans of coffee, we love chocolate!


Perfect fit: Coffee filter and measuring cup!

Chocolate Butter Cupcakes

Recipe from Little Cakes from the Whimsical Bakehouse
(Makes about 20 regular cupcakes)

1/2 cup of hot coffee
1/2 cup of cocoa powder
1/2 cup of cold water
1 1/2 cups of cake flour
1 teaspoons of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 1/4 cup of sugar
2 large eggs
3/4 teaspoon of pure vanilla extract
  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F) and have all ingredients at room temperature. Also have your cupcake liners and pans ready.
  2. In a bowl, mix the hot coffee and cocoa powder together - no lumps!
  3. Whisk in the cold water.
  4. In another bowl, sift the cake flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together.
  5. Using your electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
  6. Slowly add in the eggs and the pure vanilla extract.
  7. Alternate the two bowls (coffee mixture and flour mixture) into the batter.
  8. Mix until smooth. Then using an ice cream scoop, scoop the batter into your cupcake liners.
  9. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean.

We finally found a wholesale place that sold these cups in bulk! Needless to say, we picked up quite a few (the drive is semi-far). We think they look good, they stand for themselves, and they cater to different eaters. For example, at the pleats they can be easily pulled and eaten like regular cupcakes. Or you can take advantage of their sturdy cup form and eat the cupcake with a fork, spoon, or spork. Here, we show a step-by-step pulling of the pleated sides:





Chocolate Coffee Buttercream
(Makes enough to frost a dozen cupcakes and a few more.)

1 tablespoon of coffee
1/2 cup of chopped chocolate
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1 stick of butter
2 cups of confectioner's sugar
  1. Heat the cream over a double boiler until it bubbles. Mix in coffee.
  2. Remove from heat, pour heated coffee and cream over the chocolate.
  3. Let the mixture sit for about a minute and then whisk until smooth.
  4. Using an electric mixer, beat butter and confectioner's sugar until fluffy.
  5. Slowly add in chocolate coffee mixture.
  6. Mix until smooth and scoop into a piping bag.

This is what happens when we're low on frosting!


We haven't done a cross-section before, so here is our first photo of a cupcake half!


Yummy! I am bringing this to work!

You can vote for us HERE between March 1st to March 6th. The winner will receive these awesome prizes:
Iron Cupcake: Earth is sponsored by 1-800-Flowers.
You can also join in on the fun yourself! Click here to learn more about Iron Cupcake: Earth.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Electrolux and Kelly invite you to join their virtual bake sale!

This is a great cause that Kelly and Electrolux have teamed up for:
"Electrolux is proud to support The Ovarian Cancer Research Fund. Electrolux and Kelly Ripa have teamed up to raise more than $500,000 to support this important cause. Electrolux is also making a $1 donation to the OCRF (with a minimum of $25,000 and a maximum of $30,000) when you send a virtual cupcake to a friend."

"You choose the flavor, decorate it, and add a personal message. Then email it to anyone who deserves a little treat, or save it to your desktop to brighten your day."
So sweet and easy! Just go to the site, sign up, and send virtual cupcakes to your friends. You'll be helping a great cause, spreading cupcake love, and you even have a chance to win a new Red Hot Red Washer and Dryer from Electrolux.

On the website, Kelly provides cupcake tips and a recipe for the very best butter cream icing!

This is the first cupcake we sent:

Monday, February 2, 2009

Happy Groundhog Day!

Did the groundhog see a shadow today?
Will we get more snow or more sun?


Happy Birthday Howard, my dependable groundhog!

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Cheesecupcakes

Another birthday celebration! The birthday guys (yes this was a double birthday) love cheesecake, so we simply had to make cheesecupcakes! We always try to make decorations that are edible, but we're not sure that fondant would go well with cheesecake. Plus these men like really simple desserts.


Egg shells and graham crackers.


Cheesecake batter and graham cracker base.

Cheesecupcakes
Adapted from Kraft's What's Cooking
(Makes about 12 cupcakes)

2 packages (250 g each) of softened Cream Cheese
1/2 cup of sugar
2 eggs
1 cup of graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup of melted butter
  1. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F) and have cupcake liners ready in the tray.
  2. Combine the graham crumbs and butter. Divide the base evenly between the 12 cupcakes. Press firmly onto the bottom of cupcake liners.
  3. Beat the cream cheese and sugar on medium speed until well blended.
  4. Add eggs, one at a time, beating on low speed after each addition just until blended.
  5. Fill cupcake liners evenly with batter.
  6. Bake for 20 minutes or until centres are almost set.
  7. Cool and refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight.


Cheesecupcakes with chocolate ganache topping.

For decorations, we handmade these Boo and Toad toppers. Why Boo and Toad? Because when they play Mario Party, those are the characters they choose! On Google Images, we searched for "Boo from Mario" and "Toad from Mario" and found these two images. Printed them out on card stock (you can use any thick paper really) and attached them to toothpicks.


Boo and Toad, half of the cheesecupcakes had yummy chocolate ganache.


Boo!

Chocolate Ganache
(Makes about 1/2 cups)

1/4 cup of heavy cream
1/4 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips
  1. Heat the heavy cream over a double boiler until the edges begin to bubble.
  2. With the chocolates in a heat proof container, pour the heated cream in. Let it sit for a minute and then whisk the chocolate and heavy cream together. It should be smooth and shiny!
  3. Apply generously to dessert!