Forgive me?

Ok so it turns out.. I'm not so great (actually quite horrible) at this whole updating my blog on a regular basis thing. I know it's been like... over a month since I last updated. I feel terrible and am on my knees BEGGING your forgiveness for my remissness in blogging (perhaps this is a wee bit of an exaggeration, but you get the idea).

Ahem.

Anyways, I think we're all adults here and can move past my lack of blogging-ness. That being said, I just want to clarify that I HAVE been making all sorts of desserts and stuff over the past month. The problem is that I've either A) not had my camera with me at the time (and who wants a blog post with no pictures, right??) or B) I've forgotten to take the pictures until after the item(s) have been consumed. SO I just want to summarize really quickly what I have actually made over the past few weeks but again, forgive the lack of pictures.

Late June/ Early July are heavy on the birthdays in this family. My dad's is June 25th, my sister Katie's is July 9th and then your's truly's is July 11th. As such, the call for many much cakes and like items is high and I managed to be the provider of such treats. For my dad's surprise party, I made a yellow cake with a rich fudge frosting and yellow cake cupcakes with a chocolate buttercream frosting and whipped cream (all from scratch, of course). This cake was an experiment because I made SO MUCH of it and did bigger bottom layers and smaller top layers so it looked like a two tiered wedding cake, almost. It was fun to make and I'm pretty sure some pictures were taken of it buuuuuut where those pictures are, I have no clue.

So for mine and my sister's birthday, I made a 3- layer devil's food cake with a vanilla buttercream frosting, chocolate ganache and whipped cream. I also made during the birthday weekend the BEST (no lie) homemade chocolate chip cookie recipe. This recipe, for those of you who are curious, is the New York Times recipe and produces, quite honestly, the best cookies I've ever put in my mouth. EVER. If you look up the recipe, you will see that it calls for the cookie dough to rest 24-48 hours in the refrigerator before you even bake them. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP. I skipped it once because the people I was baking for wanted their cookies immediately. The result was not horrible but it wasn't any OH MY GOSH WOW GEE GOLLY  WHIZ WOAH kinda thing. Ergo, if you decide to make this recipe, stick yo dough in da fridge. Are you picking up what I'm putting down?? Okay good. Moving on.

I'm pretty sure (again) that pictures of the cake I made for me and my sister are.. somewhere? But I have no access to them and therefore none to show you. Sorryyyyy. As for the rest of the month, I made some cake pops that essentially failed (word to the wise: don't EVER add food coloring to candy coating) and I also made these cream cheese cookies that were pretty good.

So, now for something that I DO have pictures of (can I get a cheer please? *cheer*). Today Katie had her writer's ring friends over for a lil party and Molly is turning 16 on Friday soooo she wanted to make a cake for her. Molly likes chocolate, lots of chocolate. Oh and more chocolate. So I made her this:

It's chocolate cake, from scratch, with a layer of whipped cream and chocolate ganache in the center and a chocolate buttercream frosting with chocolate ganache over the top. I wasn't able to take pictures during the process. Nor before the hungry ones managed to dive in.

Here's a close up of a piece so you can see the layers of whipped cream and ganache...

ummmm chocolatey much??

Yeah, that's my fork. Approximately 2.7 seconds before it helped me shovel all that deliciousness into my mouth. Also, sorry about the blurry picture. I tried unsuccessfully to get a nice, in-focus shot... buuuut it wasn't happening and that cake was staring me in the face and I grew impatient.

The recipe for this cake happens to be on the back of Hershey's Cocoa Powder. I had never tried the recipe before and it looked really simple. I used my own recipe for the chocolate buttercream, ganache and whipped cream which basically means... I kept mixing ingredients until they tasted right. :) I tend to make all my frostings this way. Since this post has had a lot to do with cake, I thought I'd post a simple buttercream frosting recipe that I like to use for pretty much any type of cake... it's also good for eating by itself (but we don't do that in my house, of course.... *cough*).

Easy Buttercream Frosting

2 sticks of unsalted butter, softened but still cool

3 cups of powdered sugar (more or less to taste)

2-3 tablespoons of whipping cream or milk

1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla extract


Whip butter with electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add powdered sugar and whipping cream/milk alternately, a little bit at a time. Stir in vanilla. If the mixture is too thick, add more cream/milk.

Well, seeing as this post has reached a very lengthy point, I think I'll call it quits. I will do my very bestest to post again soon... until then, much merriment to you in all you do!