Babies, baking and buttons!

I had two of my babies, Zachy and Mini Mousey Amelia, come over today for some baking fun and buttons! We made cupcakes (surprise, surprise) and by the end of the day, we not only had two dozen cupcakes but buttons all over the living room! The babies found my button collection and thought it would be fun to play with the buttons while the cupcakes were baking in the oven! Although, it was fun to play with the buttons, it was not so fun cleaning them up.

Mini Mousey has taken quite a liking to baking and has come over to bake on a number of occasions. I am still trying to learn to let go and let her do things herself. But being the control freak that I am, I always feel the need to guide her through each step. By guide I mean do everything and have her hold my hand. Today, I actually let go and let her do things herself. And Mini did a great job! Although, she is still learning to pipe icing perfectly, she is most certainly getting there. She won’t be needing her Aunty Tina soon enough. After all, she is only 3! I guess there is still plenty of baking years of training a head.

We made raspberry cupcakes and they were YUM! All cupcakes were topped with a fondant topper and sprinkles. The babies decorated the cupcakes all by themselves.

Can you feel the love tonight?

I am currently sitting on the couch watching the Lion King (my favourite Walt Disney movie of all time). It is an all time classic. I cry at least twice every time I watch it - when Mufasa dies and when Simba and Nala reunite. I am welling up at the mere thought of it. You are probably thinking that I made Lion King themed cupcakes or something along those lines, but sadly I did not. But I did make cupcakes this weekend though!

This weekend, for the first time, I made Red Velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. I must admit, I do have my reservations about Red Velvet cupcakes, mostly regarding the amount of red colouring that is required to get that deep red shade. When putting the cupcake mixture together, it looked as though Elmo jumped in my food processor and went for a swing (a violent swing that is)!

All in all, it was an okay batch of cupcakes. I am not an avid fan of the Red Velvet cupcakes, they were 'nice', but I would much prefer a traditional vanilla or chocolate cupcake instead. Call me boring, but I guess I just like to kick it old school.

One aspect I particularly like about the Red Velvet cupcakes is that the cupcakes have such a romantic look and feel. I guess the deep red colouring gives the allure of love and romance. For instance, have a look at the cupcake I made below.

I actually made the Red Velvet cupcakes for my long time friend, Syb's, surprise birthday party. I am not entirely sure why I made heart, flower and owl toppers. But I did! I saw these cupcake toppers, designed by Blue Cupcake, way back and really liked them. And for some reason, I woke up on Saturday morning and decided to make them! And here we are.

Keeping it real

As you are aware, I follow a number of different baking blogs. Wanting to improve my blog, I decided to carry out some research into popular blogs and what makes them so darn popular. After trawling through numerous blogs, I realised that the blogs that were the most popular displayed professional looking cupcake photos, not to mention incredibly tasty looking photos too! After making this discovery, I conducted further research into how to improve my blog photography. I was soon faced with the harsh reality that I need to buy a professional camera, take photography lessons and then enhance my photos using Photoshop! So, what’s an aspiring bland Asian cupcake baker to do?!

As much as I would love to do all those things and more, I really can’t afford to! Like many people, not only am I money poor, I am time poor. So I am going to use what my mama gave me (my thinking cap that is) and make the internet my new best friend. I have spent most of tonight (and yesterday and possibly the day before) looking up photography tips and reacquainting myself with my good old friend Photoshop.

Early this year, after enduring one of my favourite baking adventures, I was really disappointed and left somewhat empty inside that I didn’t get a good photo of my achievement – the Super Mario cupcakes. In particular, the close up of the Mario and Luigi cupcakes was out of focus and the colour looked some what distorted. After about half an hour on Photoshop this evening, I manage to get a fairly drab looking photo and turn it into a semi-decent one. Check out the before and after shots:

Above image: Before editing

Above image: After editing

Given that half the taste of cupcakes is in the way it looks, it is so important that you capture the cupcake in the right way to do your little works of art justice. Ok, it is getting late (and well past my bed time), what is the moral of the story? If you want ample cupcake praise (and let's be honest, who doesn't!), you not only have to make a pretty mean looking cupcake, you got to photograph it well too. And in the event that you don’t, there is always Photoshop to help you keep it real. Hells yes! Fo’ show!

Georgetown cupcakes - I want to go to there!

I was recently introduced to the wonderful show that is DC Cupcakes from my hockey playing sister-in-law, Ash, who was introduced to the show from our  sister-in-law, Tenielle. The show is about two sisters who leave their corporate jobs in pursuit of their dreams to open a cupcake bakery. Each episode follows the sisters as they execute baking projects for various customers, ranging from wedding cupcakes to slot machines dispensing cupcakes! Some of their cupcake work, sorry I stand corrected, ALL of their work is amazing. 

Not only is show good value, the sisters' cupcake bakery Georgetown Cupcake is absolutely beautiful. Very slick and simple, yet extremely elegant. The way they display their cupcakes is simply breathtaking. When I saw the photo below, I just sighed in disbelief at the cupcake beauty that was before me.

I usually don't like to disclose to people what I will be baking, in the event that my baking adventure becomes a baking disaster. But after watching an episode of DC Cupcakes where the audience is shown how to do the Georgetown Cupcake 'signature swirl', I just have to give it ago! I will report back to you and let you know how I go over the weekend. If you are interested in viewing the 'signature swirl' in action, please watch the below video:

Oh my goodness, Georgetown cupcakes - I want to go to there! I guess in the interim, I have DC Cupcakes to keep me occupied. 

Cupcakes really do take the cake!

I follow a number of cupcake blogs for cupcaking inspiration. One of my favourite blogs is ‘cupcakes take the cake’. Although I turn to this blog for cupcaking inspirations, sometimes I walk away overwhelmed as some of the cupcakes that feature on this blog are breathtakingly amazing.

Last week, I decided to join the cupcakes take the cake flickr group to get more exposure and to basically get my cupcakes out there in a public forum. To my surprise, the next day I was featured on cupcakes takes the cupcake blog!

Check it out: http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/2011/07/audrey-hepburn-pirate-and-hello-kitty.html

This was a true honour as I am a huge fan of the blog and to be featured on it was very exciting. To honour this momentous occasion, I made a cupcakes takes the cupcake fondant toppers!

Sadly, the middle topper didn't photograph too well. I might have to do a reshoot.

All things Rockabilly!

Many months ago, I offered to make my friend, Michelle’s, 21^st birthday cake or cupcakes as her birthday present and she accepted my offer. Although there was no consideration, it was an informal contract nevertheless. Well that’s actually not true, as contract between friends and family are presumed to be made without the intention to be legally bound. Anyway, I have digressed, less about law more and more about cupcakes.

Being the main stream person that I am, when I got Michelle’s birthday invitation, I was a little confused. She was having a rockabilly themed party! What the heck is rockabilly? After extensive research, I discovered that rockabilly is not a decade but instead a way of life. Think Dany Zuko (a greaser), the T-Birds and The Pink Ladies (if you have no idea what I am talking about, I am talking about the movie and musical ‘Grease’). Rockabilly is very much still alive and kicking!

I was little nervous about making a rockabilly cake or cupcakes as I had such little knowledge about rockabilly itself. Thankfully the birthday was very kind and sent me a few links of rockabilly symbols. Given that there were a large number of icons associated to rockabilly, I decided to go with cupcakes. Also, as Michelle pointed out it would probably be easier to dish out oppose to a big cake.

So after a fun day of creating rockabilly fondant toppers, making the marble cupcakes, putting all the cupcakes together, I had to dress both myself and my husband to theme. Although, it was a long and somewhat stressful day, It was loads of fun. And here is the proof:

The more silicon the better!

I know people say less is more, but when it's comes to silicon, more is better! The more silicon bouncing around, the better I say.

I was first introduced to the wonders of silicon by my sister in law and follow blogger, Adelyn (Baroque Moments). She and Zachary gave me some star silicon bake moulds for my 22nd birthday. Although, they are very cool, I haven't used them too often due to the fact that you can't put a cupcake patty in them. However, I did put them to good use last year to bake little star cupcakes for the Starlight Charity Bake Off I mentioned a few blog post ago.

My next silicon purchase was silicon cupcake/muffin moulds and tray. The pretty coloured individual ones are really handy for mini quiches and custard tarts (Yes, believe it or not, I do bake things beyond cupcakes. I don't like to admit it. But I do!). The silicon cupcake tray is amazing. The way cupcake patties sit within the tray is just perfect. The cupcakes come out all tall and perfectly round - simply perfection. I would definitely recommend everyone to purchase a silicon cupcake tray or two! I have four and considering to purchase an additional two. What can I say, I love silicon!

Last year, I went to visit two very dear friends of mine who both lived in Canberra at the time, Koko butter and Ms wee! Koko and I share the same passion for cupcakes and decided to go out in search for cupcakes one afternoon. Little did we know, it end up being a small little road trip to Cherry Seed. By the time we got there, there was only top deck cupcakes left (chocolate base with white chocolate icing and topped off with a top deck chocolate of course). From memory, the cupcake was moist and quite tasty. Given we ate the cupcake at the end of the day, the cupcake had loss a bit of its bounce, i.e. fluffiness, but still nevertheless quite delicious.

The best thing about the little road trip was the stores within the complex that the cupcake store was located. There was this little gift store that had just the most adorable things, including baking utensils, such as silicon chocolate moulds. I ended up buying a baby and dinosaur chocolate moulds to make cupcake toppers.

NOTE: You will read about the rose moulds shortly.

And I will tell you what, they make pretty darn cute toppers. I used the dinosaur moulds for a batch of Zachary's kindy class' fundraising last year. It was devastating, the teachers ended up selling my cupcakes for one dollar each! I swear the ingredients cost me more to make then the money raised from them. I should I have donated the twenty five bucks and kept my three hours of additional sleep! Ah well, hindsight is a beautiful thing.

To top it all off, last year for my birthday my friend and fellow baker, Jodie, gave me rose silicon chocolate mould. And in return, on her birthday I made her a set of white chocolate mud cupcakes using the rose moulds. They turned out pretty cute.

Well this turned out to be quite a long post. I am nacked (nacked, not naked), peace out.

Topper envy

I pride myself on making unique handmade cupcake toppers. Whether out of fondant or chocolate, cupcake toppers are my thing! Hence, the name ‘top the cupcake’. However, a few weeks ago when I visited my favorite baking supply store, Cake Tinz and Thingz, I noticed some cupcake toppers that they sell weren't made out of fondant or chocolate. What was this mysterious product?! I purchased a few pony toppers to take home to research and, of course, to make pony cupcakes for my Mini Mousey!

After extensive research, I realised that it was made from royal icing! I have never made or worked with royal icing before! Just when I thought I was on top of my cupcake baking game, I realised that I’m really not. There is still so much to learn and explore in the wonderful world that is cupcakes! I just wish I had more time.  

To make myself feel better over the weekend I decided to make fondant cupcake toppers. I wanted to try and mimic the cupcake toppers I purchased from Cake Tinz and Thingz. But it was too hard. So I found myself a play doh lid with a pony imprint and made the below pony cupcake topper instead. I was pretty happy with how they turned out.

This morning, I got into work super-duper early. To ease myself into the working day, I decided to flick through a number of cupcake flickr groups that I recently joined. After 15 minutes, I was in tears (seriously tears were streaming down my face)! My goodness, there are so many beautiful cupcake designers out there (‘out there’ being globally). I just felt so overwhelmingly JEALOUS of their work! Seriously, if you have time, visit ‘cupcakes take the cake’ flickr group (www.flickr.com/groups/cupcakestakethecake/) or blog (www.cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.com/) and you will soon see what I mean.  

Ahoy there me hearties!

I always seem to make really cute girlie cupcakes. Not sure whether it is because of the nature of cupcakes itself being cute or because I like cute things? Ah well, food for thought (or more specifically, cupcake for thought).

Poor Zachy! Every time I make cupcakes for a family gathering, he is always stuck with a girlie looking cupcake. I have tried to make cupcakes more boy friendly in the past by putting little dinosaur sprinkles on the cupcake, but it still somehow looks a little girlie.

This past weekend, I was determined to make Zach a good old fashion masculine cupcake (if there is such a thing). I decided to put to use the pirate cupcake wrappers my mother-in-law brought me a couple months ago. The wrappers were black with orange and white skulls on it. Not pretty or cute at all! Very serious stuff.

While my vanilla cupcakes were baking away nicely in the oven, I decided to make a pirate cupcake topper for my all time masculine boyish cupcake for Zach. Early this year, Zach’s pre-primary class learnt about the sea and pirates. They even had a dress up day at school were all the boys dressed up in pirate outfits. Of course, my sister-in-law went above and beyond her call of duty and made an amazing pirate costume for Zach. To see a photo of it, please go visit her blog: http://baroquemoments.blogspot.com/2011/05/how-to-make-pirate-costume-and.html. She is truly amazing!

Anyway, more importantly back to ME, whoops, I mean cupcakes! An hour later, the cupcakes were cooked, cooled and ready for icing. I used my flavour of the month, 2D Wilton nozzle, and piped the vanilla butter cream icing onto the cupcakes into little swirl peaks. Then topped the cupcake off with the pirate topper! As you can see from the photo below, the topper was still a little wet as I had not given it enough time to dry before snapping the camera.

Later that evening, I had to bake another batch of cupcakes for my staff members as I was holding a briefing the next day. Half way through spooning the mixture into the cupcake patties, I realised that I had to make some semi-masculine cupcakes for my male staff members. I wasn’t sure whether they would be comfortable eating dainty, cute bunny cupcakes! So I had to think on my feet and improvise. I still had some pirate cupcake wrappers left, so I decided to use them.

While the cupcakes were baking away, I wasn’t sure how I was going to decorate the male orientated cupcakes as all I had was bunnies! Then it hit me. BAM! Out of no where. I could make masculine bunny pirate cupcakes! So, I took out my edible ink pen and drew eye patches on some of the bunnies.

There you have it! Masculine bunny pirate cupcakes. Aren’t they cute? Oh deary me, I mean aren’t they totally bad ass?!  

My name is Tina and I am a closet ...

Hello Kitty lover! This pains me greatly to admit this. Although I am a bland Asian girl, I like to rebel and challenge the Asian stereotype. But as the years go past and I get older (but never wiser), I have come to realise how truly Asian I am. I drive a maroon car, I am a bad driver, I love eating Yum Cha for breakfast, I love rice and now I have to add I like Hello Kitty to my ever growing Asian characteristics list!

There you have it! You have found out my dirty, dirty secret! I like Hello Kitty, although not enough to carry a Hello Kitty hand bag, enough to make a cupcake in her honour.

This phase to me is like a piping nozzle to an icing bag!

I go through phases with all aspects of my life. Some phases are fairly tamed and boring, where as others are more extreme. To provide you with an example, from 2001 to 2005 my favourite colour was pink. Everything I owned, wore, ate and drank had to be pink. I use to wear a whole ensemble of pink clothing while eating a pink iced donut and drinking a carton of pink strawberry milk. I kid you not (although, I do wish I was kidding)! But yes, the purpose of this hideously embarrassing story is to demonstrate the fact that I go through phases.

So, is my passion and devotion to cupcakes a phase? My goodness I hope not. I adore cupcakes way too much. I can’t imagine waking up one morning and not liking cupcakes as much as I do. Having said that, I use to think that I would always love pink and now when I look at my fluoro pink cord pants, all I do is cringe. 

Anyway, some of you may have notice that I tend to pipe icing onto my cupcakes using simular techniques. I tend to use the fairly stock standard swirl icing motion and pipe the icing into little swirl towers of yum – cupcake phase one. However, I have recently discovered a new nozzle, Wilton 2D. This nozzle is a-a-a-mazing – cupcake phase two.

I believe that the Wilton 2D nozzle enhances the icing’s texture and to a degree taste. As you can see from the image below, the tip of the nozzle is somewhat large in comparison to the ends of the nozzle. The icing that is pushed through the thinner portion of the nozzle is thinner and subsequently creates a more fluffy texture.

Not only does it in my opinion enhance the taste of the icing, this nozzle also pipes icing into a beautiful pattern. For instance, you could pipe roses on the top of your cupcakes using this nozzle. I am in process of perfecting the art of piping icing into the shape of a rose. I am experiencing trouble with how to end off the rose. If you know of a good youtube video teaching this, please send it my way! Please find below my chocolate and vanilla rose cupcakes I made over the weekend.  

So, will I stick to the Wilton 2D indefinitely? Unlikely, it is probably just a phase. So does that mean that cupcakes are just a phase? Absolutely not! I really do love cupcakes. If I am not baking cupcakes, I am blogging about cupcakes, and if I am not blogging about cupcakes, I am talking about my blog which is about cupcakes. My goodness, I live a somewhat sad cupcake existence.

If my obsession for cupcakes is just a phase it is going to stick for a very long time, definitely for the foreseeable future and far, far beyond.

The thicker the cream, the better!

I have recently discovered thicken cream and what it does if used in one's icing. It makes it amazing that's what! In the wise words of Black Eyed Peas, I think about it every night and day, I am addicted and I just can't get enough (vocals in the background: I just can't get enough). There is always a tub of thicken cream in my fridge for the times when I a have an emergency need to bake.

Using thicken cream instead of milk or water makes the icing richer and in my opinion more tastier. Also, I find that using cream reduces the sweetness of the icing sugar and gives the icing more of a creamy dairy flavour.

For instance, I use thicken cream in my ice coffee icing oppose to milk. It does mean that the icing doesn't set as nicely, i.e. harden, and can be at times a little runny. But the trade off is worth it!

Now that I have found thicken cream, I will never go back. The more cream the better, I say!

Miss Malaysia, thank goodness you are pretty ...

... because sadly your cupcakes were fairly average. What is the point of being pretty, if your cupcakes aren’t pretty?! Honestly, what a sad state of affairs.

A former Miss Universe contender from Malaysia opened up a cupcake store in Malaysia, called Cupcake Chic. While holidaying in Malaysia, I visited the store located in the Pavilion shopping mall. There was quite a large selection of cupcake flavours available, but sadly no raspberry flavour cupcake! I was quite devo. In my state of devastation, I decided to go with something simple, so I chose a vanilla cupcake. Unsurprisingly, Brendyn chose a choc-mint flavoured cupcake. I didn’t eat the cupcake right then and there, as Brendyn and I had just had a big lunch. I took on an American chilli dog and at that stage ... let’s just say the chilli dog was barking, howling in fact. I wanted to give the cupcakes the attention it deserved, so I brought my cupcakes and waited until I returned back to the hotel before I made my assessment.

I tend to find that Asian baked goods are not overly sweet. They tend to caution on the side of bland than sweet. Given that Cupcake Chic is made for the Malaysian market, I found that it followed the Asian bake good style - not very sweet and a little bit bland. The vanilla and choc-mint cupcake (I may have eaten Brendyn’s cupcake also, but who remembers these things?!) bases itself was quite enjoyable, although a little dense. As you know, I like my cupcake bases to be ultra fluffy to the max! Unfortunately, the icing was nothing to rave about. It lacked flavour and had no punch. Which is disappointing because in my opinion the icing is the hero of the cupcake and without good icing, it’s just a sad cupcake.

When it comes to cupcakes, I am very superficial. I am all about the looks baby! Half the taste of the cupcake comes from the way it looks. Being a former Miss Universe contender, I would have thought that Cupcake Chic would have agreed with me. Sadly, the look of the cupcakes did not tickle my fancy. But hey, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I’ll let you be the judge. Here is a photo of a box of personalise cupcakes on display. 

One aspect that I quite liked about Cupcake Chic was their marketing techniques.  The cupcakes were given quirky names. For instance, vanilla cupcakes were called ‘Back to basics’ and the choc-mint cupcakes were called ‘After dinner mints’. I thought this was a nice touch and quite cute. Also, I really liked the little carry box that the cupcakes came in.

Oh my goodness! I just realised that I am like an Asian bake good – not very sweet and little bit bland.  

Baking melt downs

As I am sure you have already guessed, I am very passionate about baking. I get extremely upset when things don't go well in the kitchen. I have been known to cry a few times and spit the dummy many times. To make it worse, when I bake I generally think in Vietnamese and speak to myself (yes, out loud) in Vietnamese. So, when things don't go according to plan in the kitchen, I tend to yell at myself in Vietnamese! If you haven't heard Vietnamese spoken before, it can be quite confronting. It tends to be quite loud and sharp, and extremely fast paced. Brendyn always thinks I am having an argument with my mum when we talk - most of the time we are just talking about our day... the rest of the time we are fighting! I joke, I love my mummy dearly.

Anyway, this post isn't about my Vietnamese heritage. It actually isn't about cupcakes either. It is about the extent of my passion for making baked goods, and my obsessive compulsive, perfectionist nature!

Last year, a few weeks before Brendyn and I got married, I volunteered to make our two good uni friend's birthday cake (for their joint birthday party). We decided to make a Babar cake. Anyway, Brendyn hates being late for events and I hate things not being 110% perfect. As always, I didn't give myself enough time to bake and so we were running terribly late to the party. Once I had cut the slab of cake and put the fondant icing on top, Brendyn wanted to leave. I asked him (perhaps I might have yelled, kicking and screaming ... perhaps...who remember these things honestly?!) to clean the board that the cake was on because it was smudged. He found it too difficult and said "darling, it's fine. No one will notice the smudge any way"! OMG! FML! Not LOL! I went bonkers, bridezilla crazy! Was it entirely rational? Probably not. But you see, I just love baking so much, and want every baking creation to be perfect, and if things don't go according to plan, I lose my marbles and have a melt down. Poor Brendyn - he has to deal with it every time. Every baking adventure of mine is an adventure for him, in which his challenge is to avoid the objects I've just thrown at him.

Ah, he chose to marry me and all my wonderful characteristics and multiple personalities. 

Putting the POP in cupcake pops

I am a very lucky girl, I work with a bunch of fabulous ladies who share my passion for baking. It is lovely to be able to work with such likeminded people. Definitely makes the working day go by faster.

A few weeks ago my fellow baking colleague, Angela, introduced me to the phenomenon of cake pops – cake on a lolly pop stick! She even made some for a morning tea we had at work. They were so incredibly cute and delicious (which is always a bonus).

I decided to try and give cake pops a go this morning. In all honesty, I didn’t think it would be too hard. Oh, how wrong I was. They were extremely tricky to make. The cake kept falling off the darn stick every time I dunked the cake into melted chocolate. The whole exercise soon became very frustrating. Eventually I gave up after making 12 cake pops.

Of the 12 cake pops, I made a cupcake, flower, rocket and lolly pop style cake pops.

I lost countless hours of my life this morning to make 12 cake pops. I take my hat off to you Ange!

Thank you to my sister-in-law for taking the above photos and my nieces and nephew for modelling the cake pops.

Was the cupcake from Delicious delicious?

Sadly no, the cupcake was very average. The first issue with the cupcake was it came out warm. Yes, warm. Don’t get me wrong, I am not adverse to the idea of a warm cake, but a warm cupcake is a little odd in my opinion. Serving the cupcake warm made the base of the cupcake quite moist and overall quite tasty.  However, this meant that the icing was extremely runny. This made me quite sad as one of my favourite aspects of a cupcake is that you can pull apart the cupcake wrapper and eat the cupcake straight out of your own hands. At delicious you could not, I had to use a spoon.

The second issue with the Delicious cupcake (i.e. the cupcake from Delicious, not that the cupcake was delicious) was that it was too big. It was about 50% bigger than the average cupcake. It was a bit too much. After eating the entire cupcake I did feel a little sicky, tummy ouchies to be more specific! This aspect of the cupcake was particularly not cool! I know you are probably thinking that I should have stopped eating the darn cupcake if I was full and felt sick, but my inner stingy Asian told me to keep going. Who am I to fight my heritage?!

Anyway, the decor of the cafe made up for the lack of tasty cupcakes.

Delicious, your cupcakes were not delicious! Not only is this false advertising but it left me sad and empty inside. Please rectify this situation ASAP.

You claim to be delicious, but will you live up to your name?

Apologies for my lack of blogging. Brendyn and I have been holidaying in the wonderful land of glorious food and shopping, Malaysia. We are flying back to Perth later this evening but had to check out at 12PM. We are now sitting in an adoreable cafe called Delicious to kill some time. The cafe is very cute. It has a white tree in the middle of the cafe with white bird cages hanging from the tree. Each bird cage has a candle inside lighting it up. Quite beautiful really.

To my surprise, there was cupcakes on the menu. I just placed my order and now I am eagerly awaiting for my vanilla cupcake and latte (sadly, they didn't have soy chai lattes on the menu - strike one). Hopefully, the vanilla cupcake makes up for it!

Photos and cupcake review to come shortly! Stay tune...