This weekend I made peanut butter cupcakes with peanut butter cream frosting and added a dollop of strawberry jam! I got the recipe for the cupcakes and frosting from Martha Stewart's website. They were good cupcakes, but tasted more like a pb sandwich than a true cupcake! Good with a glass of milk though, and my BFF who is a peanut butter lover LOVED them!






Over Christmas I decided to make the oreo truffles everyone has been raving about, but didn't post pics because they didn't look that great! I made them again last week and tried to do a nicer job this time, dipping them in semi-sweet chocolate and then piping a detail with milk chocolate.








Thanks for looking!

I wanted to try making lemon curd tarts ever since I tried them at a local cafe. They turned out very well, and were so delicious and rich.





My boyfriend requested that I make him some banana muffins while I'm home for spring break, so I added photos of those too. I don't normally like them, but they were delicious just out of the oven with butter inside. Yum!

Today is my boyfriend's birthday and he didn't want me to bake anything - he wanted a DQ ice cream cake! I had the urge to bake and was disappointed when he wanted something bought for his birthday, so I made monkey bread.
For those of you who don't know what it is, it's a cinnamon pull apart loaf with pecans. I first heard about it in a Kanye West song and wondered what it was so I googled it...best decision ever! The recipe I found on Martha Stewart's site doesn't include a glaze, and I wanted it to taste like sticky buns, so I found a glaze recipe on the food network. It was worth it - the bread is delicious!

Here is a picture of it:


Close up of the topping:


We dug in pretty fast!


Here is the recipe for anyone who wants to try:

Monkey Bread -  makes one 10-inch Bundt cake
FOR THE BREAD
    * 2 tablespoons solid vegetable shortening, plus more for pan and bowl
    * 1/4 cup warm (110 degrees to 115 degrees) water
    * 1/4 cup granulated sugar, plus a pinch for yeast
    * 1 envelope dry active yeast (scant tablespoon)
    * 3/4 cup warm (110 degrees to 115 degrees) milk
    * 1 teaspoon salt
    * 1 large egg
    * 3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
FOR THE COATING
    * 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
    * 3/4 cup firmly packed light-brown sugar
    * 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
    * 1/2 cup pecans, coarsely chopped
Glaze
    * 3/4 cup dark brown sugar
    * 2 tbsp whipping (35%) cream
    * 1 tbsp maple syrup
    * 2 1/4 tbsp butter
   Put the warm water and a pinch of sugar in a small bowl; sprinkle yeast over top. Let the yeast soften and dissolve, about 5 minutes.
    Place shortening, milk, sugar, salt, and egg in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the dough hook. Add yeast mixture to shortening mixture, and beat to combine. Slowly add flour. Knead on medium-low, 1 minute. Transfer dough to the prepared bowl. Cover with plastic wrap, and let stand in a warm place, 20 minutes.
   Lightly coat a 10-inch Bundt pan and a medium bowl with shortening; set aside.
   Make coating: Place melted butter in a bowl. In a second bowl, combine brown sugar, cinnamon, and nuts.
   Then make the glaze. Put the dark brown sugar, cream, maple syrup and butter in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Bring to just a simmer until the sugar dissolves. Set aside to cool slightly.
     Pour a third of the glaze in the bottom of the bundt pan. Cut dough into 1/2-inch pieces. Roll into balls. Coat in butter, then roll in nut mixture, and place in prepared pan, alternatively with a third of glaze (pouring glaze on the bottom, middle, top of the loaf). Cover with plastic wrap, and let stand in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.
    Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake, 30 to 35 minutes. Let cool in pan for 15 minutes. Invert onto a serving plate, and let cool 20 minutes more.

Okay, so I finished them...they turned out well! I used a devil's food cake scratch recipe I found on the internet, and the filling recipe from this page. The frosting was Betty Crocker and Duncan Hines...I didn't think I could get buttercream to look that flawless.
My friends loved them!
Here is what they look like:

Here is a shot of the cupcakes:

I'm sure most of you are familiar with Hello, Cupcake! I got the book over Christmas and tried the sunflowers for a BBQ my boyfriend and I held at our house. Here are some pictures:



The green frosting is a little messy, because I became pressed for time and had to have someone else do that part!



Last night I decided to make some cupcakes from scratch. I used a recipe for a chocolate fudge cake from Toba Garrett's "The Well Decorated Cake", and I just poured the batter into muffin tins instead of cake pans. The recipe was amazing. Once it was all whipped up, it looked and tasted like chocolate mousse. The cupakes are delicious - rich and fudgey! Definitely better than the boxed stuff I've been using.
Here are the chocolate fudge cupcakes with brown sugar cream cheese icing!







Thanks for looking. Hope you like them!

I finally worked up the courage to try this...the fondant is sleeping, and I am going to apply it in a few hours. So excited! The fondant sure made a huge mess in my bf's kitchen 

Here it is!! I know the colors aren't that pretty, but I didn't have gloves to work in the color and I didn't want to stain my hands too badly. This one is a yellow cake with chocolate buttercream crumb coat with the fondant on top.




I had enough fondant leftover to make another cake, so I tried a different color. This cake is vanilla with vanilla buttercream crumb coat and fondant on top.



I had a better time with the second cake. Thanks so much for the tute, I will definitely try this again!!