I opened up the email and was shocked to see a half naked lady on my blog!!! OMG!!! Censor your children’s eyes!! How could I possible have half naked ladies on my cupcake blog? I mean really… do cupcakes and bikini’s go together? Last time I checked, they didn’t.

Here’s the ad. Send your children out of the room!

Come to find out, that the ad really had nothing to do with cupcakes and every thing to do with what my sister had been searching for or looking at on her computer recently.  If you notice, the ad is for Tommy Bahama… her husband’s favorite brand of clothing.

So I apologize in advance if Google puts a half naked lady in the ad on my blog when you’re searching.  But know, if they do… it’s your fault hehe

So last night, I put together a trial run of a new flavor and recipe of cupcakes.  White chocolate strawberry. I figured the cupcake recipe itself would be just fine… it was a variation of a cupcake I had made before.  But, this time I tried baking a strawberry in the middle.  Not a good idea.  It affected the structre of the cupcake and they sunk in the middle.  Next time, I core the middle and fill after baking.

So the cupcakes were a little sunk in the middle, but HOLY COW they tasted DELICIOUS.  I whip up some extra strawberry filling and decide I’ll plug those holes with this strawberry goodness.  Yum.

On to the frosting.  White chocolate whipped cream.  Double yum.  I steep the milk with a vanilla bean, get it nice and warm then melt in the chocolate.  Just like the recipe said.  Ok… on to cooling.  Pop it in the freezer to speed up the process, it was late and I wasn’t in the mood for patience.  I think it’s sufficiently cold and start to whip it in my mixer with the whisk attachment.

2 minutes later… epic failure.  It looked as though the chocolate was separating from the cream.  I’m no expert, so I have no ideawhat was going wrong.  Maybe it really wasn’t cold enough.  Who knows.  Maybe I should have added the melted chocolate after I started whipping the cream?   I don’t know.  Ugh.

I put the filled, unfrosted cupcakes in my Martha Stewart cupcake case, lock closed the lid, clean up the kitchen a little bit and go to bed feeling defeated.

A few hours into sleep, I hear a crash out in the living room.  I figured the cats had knocked

something over but was too tired to care to get up and look.  This morning when I wake up, my husband informs me as I take my first steps into the living room that I’m not going to be happy because the cats knocked my case of cuppies on the floor, smushing them.

*sigh*

I knew it was my cupcakes last night when I heard that horrific crash.  I just knew it.   I was angry but really… what could I do?  They were cats, not people.  I could yell and scream all I wanted but I’m sure they’d do it again… in a heartbeat.

So now, my cupcakes sit in their case damaged beyond any repair I could possibly imagine.  Seriously, if I could, I’d probably still eat every last one of them though.  The white chocolate cake with the strawberry is OUT OF THIS WORLD.

I’ll try these again soon… I want them perfected by Valentine’s Day, just not today… or tomorrow… or the next day.

Lessons Learned:

• Don’t bake with the cats in the house.  Lock them up in the back room until I’m done… and when I say done I mean every last cupcake is gone and the kitchen is back to being spotless.
• Don’t try to skip steps when making filled cupcakes.  Baking a whole strawberry in the middle of a cupcake equals sunken cupcakes due to loss of structure.  Bake cupcakes, core centers and then fill.
• When a recipe says to cool something before mixing it.  Don’t try to cut corners.  Allow yourself enough time to actually cool it before moving on to the next step.

This time… well, it was half disaster and half success.  You see… I have never used candy coating before nor have I ever coated anything I’ve ever made (other than dipping cupcakes in ganache… but that’s different).  So this cake ball thing is VERY new to me and you could say that I’m a “Cake Ball Virgin” haha.

To begin with… I used some left over cake and store bought jar frosting to make the balls.  Rolled them and froze them.  That was the easy part.  And to be honest, they turned out pretty darn good up to this point!

What I learned making these balls…

• Blenders do not work to break up cake into little pieces
• But… whisks do!

And then comes the candy coating.  I melted the candies in a deep bowl like Bakerella suggested and then started coating my balls.  (Hahahah, sorry… I can’t help but laugh right now because of what I just typed.  Coating my balls.  Go ahead, laugh.  You know you want to. )  The candy coating seemed thick, but because I’m not good yet at these cake ball things, I wasn’t quite sure if it was something I was doing or the candy melts or what.  Here are a few of the disasters…

I noticed too that the edible ink pen I bought wasn’t working either…. I think I’ll need to invest in the brand that Bakerella uses and not just whatever JoAnn’s has in stock.  So… no Jack-O-Lanterns for these pumpkins!

After these disasters, I took matters into my own hands and went to Twitter.  I asked my followers what the heck my issue was!  I got a lot of the same answer… it’s too thick, add oil or shortening!  I thought, well… I’ve got nothing to lose, might as well try!  I heated up another package of candy melts, this time adding 1tbsp of vegetable shortening (I had Crisco on hand).  I also added another 30 seconds of heating time in the microwave and got it really good and warm to make sure that everything was melted!

SHAZAAM!! It was thinner!  Halleluia!!  And… the balls were coating so much smoother now!! After about 5 or 6 I had them down!

Another little trick I figured out was to use a toothpic when getting the ball off my spoon and onto the wax paper… this made it a smooth transition and any bumbs I’d made from touching it would be on the underside.  Too bad I figured that out when I only had 5 balls left to coat!

Oh well… ya live and learn.

Here are the best of the best of the cake balls!! Oh… and one pop!

I individually wrapped the cake pops in little bags with ties and put them in a cute basket so my daughter can take them to her class tomorrow!!  So cute!  They make the perfect bite size treats for her classmates!

The last time I made mini’s was Spring 2009… almost a year… and I totally forgot the golden rule of mini’s DO NOT OVERFILL!  What did I do?  I filled them up as much as I’d fill up a regular cupcake cup 2/3 full.  WRONG WRONG WRONG! 1/3-1/2 and NO MORE!! I should have known.

They mini’s stuck to the pan and NONE of them were salvageable.   I got so mad, I took my spatula and stabbed a few.  GRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

Luckily, I didn’t use all the batter and will have enough for a second pan.  Guess I’ll only be bringing 24 mini’s instead of 48 to the event tomorrow.  (Thank goodness I volunteered to bring them and they weren’t for a client!)

So I’m a little bummed how the Orange Creamsicle cupcakes turned out tonight. I followed the recipe as instructed, but I think some things need a little tweeking. Next time, I’ll only fill the cups 1/2 way and really watch them the last 2 minutes.

Some of them came out a little toasty around the edges. And although the marshmallow makes it the creamsicle part, I’m not sure if I like how it looks piped onto the cupcake. I think next time, I’ll stick with straight orange buttercream frosting (which is DELICIOUS, by the way) and just call them Orange Delight cupcakes.

I’ll try these again someday…. make them perfect!!