Black Forest Brownie Pizza C*O*W

Ok, so not technically a COW, but close enough. This is a Black Forest Brownie Pizza - a deliciously moist brownie topped with a sweetened cream cheese layer and topped with cherries! Then the whole pie was drizzled with dark chocolate. I also made a Chocolate Peanut Butter Brownie Pizza, but sent that off with Linda and Colin. I remembered after they left that I hadn't take a photo . . . but they said it was yummy, and rich! It was the same chocolate brownie, but this one was topped with peanut butter filling, then a layer of chopped Reese's Peanut Butter cups, peanut butter chips and chocolate chips, and finally drizzled with melted peanut butter chips and dark chocolate.

What my friends thought . . .

Deanne - It may be a flat cow, but it's a great one!

Willy - Never had anything like this before. It was so beautiful to look at and the taste was out of this world. If you were going into business I certainly would order one for special occasion. Thanks for sharing your awesome creativity talents with your friends.

I made molten chocolate lava cakes for desert after our BBQ on the 4th with homemade fresh raspberry sauce and sweetened vanilla creme, too . . .

And the winner is . . . .

Hot Cha Cha Cappuchino Chip cupcakes!

Thank you to everyone who voted in the poll. Look for the winning cupcake to make an encore performance soon!

Banana-Rama C*O*W

Happy 4th of July! Celebrating the short work week with a Banana-Rama cupcake sporting festive stars and stripes wrappers. Start with a banana cupcake, plump it full of banana cream, and top it off with a billowing cloud of pure white vanilla buttercream sprinkled with red, white and blue decorettes. I couldn't decide if I wanted to fill this cupcake with banana cream or with strawberry filling, but the banana cream won out.

What my friends thought . . .

Fred said: t-------rific! This one is now officially #2 in my alltime favorites list...

Rhonda: This is my new favorite!

Janet thought they were too sweet.

You Got Peanut Butter in My Chocolate! C*O*W

Yum! Sink your teeth into this one!
A super moist triple chocolate fudge cupcake, bursting with peanut butter filling, topped with a generous helping of home-made chocolate frosting, then drizzled with peanut butter (yep, made that from scratch, too) , and crowned with a mini peanut butter cup.

*WARNING*

If you don’t like peanut butter – stay far, far away from this one!

What my friends thought . . .

Well - this one is proving to be very popular! I think the tons of frosting and peanut butter filling went over well with this one.

Pineapple Upside-Down C*O*W

This was fun - at least the first batch! Cute pan, isn't it? And mine came out exactly like the ones on the advertisement photo. The pan makes 6 little cakes at a time. I needed 24. So - the fun wore off after the second round of washing the pan, regreasing, and repeating 4 times. After the obligatory 24 were baked, there was still batter left, so I really ended up doing 30. But after I was all done, they looked so cute, all those little pineapples on my counter! I now await comments . . .

What my friends said . . .

I can't believe how many people said pineapple upside-down cake is their favorite cake! Who knew?? The cute little pineapple shapes were a big hit too - made the price of the pan worthwhile afterall!

Cookies 'n Cream C*O*W

It's finally here! Tuesday, June 2, on my doorstep courtesy of Amazon.com's preorder opportunity, was my brand new, just released copy of Martha Stewart's Cupcakes book. YAY! So many cupcakes - so little baking time. We need more weekends. :-}
I had aleady decided that for this week I wanted to do a cookies 'n cream cupcake so I went with those, but I decided to try a new frosting. I have read about this in alot of different places, so I decided to make vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream. Yum! it tastes like ice cream. Really smooth. I added crushed Oreos to it, to match my flavor of cupcake. I can't wait to try other flavors, and more of the recipies from the book. And, what you can't se from the picture - they are wearing cute zebra print cupcake papers!

I did make something for me, this weekend (since I rarely keep any cupcakes home). Rhubarb! I just made a simple rhubarb sauce, since I didn't want to mess with a pie crust, or making cookie bars. This way I get straight rhubarb, anyway.
Did I mention I bought the ice cream freezer attachment for my KitchenAid mixer? I also bought a used copy of the Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream and Desserts cookbook online, and made a batch of New York Super Fudge Chunk ice cream for Scott. Tasted just like theirs! My next recipe will be a sorbet for me, I think. If I remember, I'll snap a photo next time he's eating.
Well, till next week . . . . .

What my friends thought . . .

. . . have you secretly taken out an insurance policy on our lives? these are really decadent!

. . . Fabulous, as always. I especially liked the cookie surprise at the end!

Rhonda hated the frosting. But, Julie and Carol both loved the frosting!

Seems overall consensus is the Hot Cha Cha Cappuchino Chip cupcakes are still the favorite.

Cappuchino Chip C*O*W

This week I snagged a cupcake from a friend (you'll know who you are!), but as it should be, they pale in comparison to hers - at least in the decoration department. I do love the cupcake wrappers, though. Unfortunately, I didn't have enough to tase one, myself. That is probably a bad idea, actually - I really should try them, shouldn't I?? Oh well.

I'm calling these Hot Cha Cha Cappuchino Chip with Mocha Buttercream, from the Cupcake Doctor book. I decorated them with little chocolate fondant flowers. The fondant tastes just like Tootsie Rolls - yummy!

What my friends thought . . .

. . . Up until today, the lemon was my favorite. I'm partial to coffee flavored things and this was fantastic!

. . . Delicious. You are a super baker and a super person!

Lemon Meringue C*O*W

This week’s COW is a lemon meringue cupcake, from the new Martha Stewart Cupcake book, coming out June 2nd.
The lemon curd is what makes this cupcake, in my opinion. I didn’t think the cake was very lemony tasting at all, and the 7 Minute Frosting is a little too airy for me. It holds up better than traditional meringue, which is good. I really don’t know when else I’d ever use it though. I certainly wouldn’t use it to frost an entire cake, although I see Martha recommends it over and over again. The recipe for everything is here.

I was afraid that the frosting might jiggle itself off the cupcake during the ride to work, but it stayed in place. I think traditional meringue would have slid off. This frosting didn’t collect the little drops of condensation on top, either.

It must be me – this is the second recipe for lemon curd I’ve made which seemed to remain  too runny – like a lemon sauce. Still good, but not firm enough to hold up as a pie filling. I did watch Martha demonstrate these cuppies on her show, and her lemon curd was much thicker. Wonder what I’m doing wrong? It made a lot, though – much more than I needed for this recipe. Same with the frosting! That’s a shame, because you need to use that immediately, otherwise it firms up and is like trying to spread marshmallow cream. I wasted it all.

What my friends thought . . .

One comment echoed my own - that cake wasn't very lemon-y, but it was very moist.

Everyone loved the lemon curd.

They all also thought they were bee-u-tee-ful!

All in all - rave reviews!

Chocolate Birthday C*O*W

This week is a chocolate birthday cake for someone I don't know - my husband requested one for work. It's a boxacana, but I did make the chocolate frosting from scratch. I just love Hershey's recipe! It is my go-to.

As mentioned a week or 2 ago, I also make a birthday cake for my friend Rhonda. She requested lemon cake with "wedding cake icing". You know - the surgary buttercream icing most people don't like - however, we both love it. I made fresh lemon filling, but I am afraid it is going to dissolve into the cake. Ir seemed a little runny to me, but boy did it taste good! I am ashamed of the way the cake looks - very amaturish, but, I'm an amature, so you get what you pay for, I guess. I am posting a lilttle size picture in hopes of saving myself a little embarrasment.

Cinnamon Ripple Angel Food C*O*W

No decorating on this one. It is just a simple angel food cake with a few ripples of cinnamon running through. It is topped off with a dollop of cinnamon whipped cream. Very light and tasty cake!