Texas, Our Texas

There is something about being Texan that very few others experience. I'm not saying we're better or worse (okay, some Texans are totally better or worse people) but it's a unique and distinguishing identity. Texans are a proud people. I was raised with the endless mantra of how beautiful and separate and special Texas was. We moved to Alaska when I was 10 and brought the pride all the way here. You can never take the Texas out of a Texan.

In search of cookie ideas, I stumbled on some University of Texas themed cooks and, being my alma mater, I fell in love. I started planning Longhorns and little states and the Hook 'Em hand sign. Just as I was about to order the special cutters online, my birthday rolled around and my mom got me a set of Texas-themed cutters. It included this huge 5 x 5 state and I knew I had to make it ASAP. The Horns would have to wait!

I found these beautiful designs from Deb's Crafty Cookies and the search was over. I can't thank her enough for sharing the lovely design with us all!

These are the little Texases I had from who knows where. I love finding cutters I forgot I had!

Then came the search for bluebonnets. Now, again, as a Texan, fields of wild bluebonnets are such a staple in the land we're raised on that every time I see them now, my heart just swells. It's hard to describe. It's like looking at your childhood home and it brings up every safe and happy memory you ever had. So looking through bluebonnet pictures might have been my favorite part of this exercise.

I'm happy with how they turned out.  I stuck to Sweet Sugar Belle's sugar cookie recipe and, my favorite because it's been so good to me, Lizy B Bakes' royal icing recipe.

Now on to the next theme... Here's a hint: he's got a movie coming out verrrry soooooon... (spins a web, any size, catches thieves just like flies...)

Cookies for Mom

My mom specifically told me not to buy her anything for Mother's Day. I mostly acquiesced; I'd already bought her a card. But I know she likes the cookies I bring over for Sunday brunches so I made a batch just for her.

I also usually get her flowers so I decided on cookie roses instead of real ones.  These'll last longer (in the freezer)!

Happy (Belated) Mother's Day, to all moms!

LOKI'D

There's a moment when you're decorating that you survey your work and just throw up your hands and call it a loss.  I pretty much did that with these cookies but I have a pretty legit source for my frustration. The god of mischief has struck, determined that I not render him in cookie form. I guess he's not keen on being devoured by mortals.

First, I found these adorable action figures and immediately decided I wanted to make them into cookies.  I quickly realized they'd be the most difficult design I'd ever attempted and grew wary... Almost dreading the decorating, to be honest.  But I'd committed myself (and already made the cookies) so I couldn't back out.  So I went into it with trepidation.

But to back up really quick, as I'm mixing the dough, adding the flour to make it come together, my poor Kitchenaid starts straining with some severity. I turn it off, only to see the pin holding the head to the base almost completely worked out. I try to maneuver it back in place - hell, I took a hammer to it (not Mjolnir, unfortunately) - and still nothing.  And suddenly I realized what happened.

UGH. FINE. See if I make your cookies again, prankster!! (JK; I love you!)

So he broke my mixer.  I borrow my mom's to make the icing and decide to try a new recipe that looks super simple from the popular blogger's video. I make the colors and sit down to decorate and it is absolutely WAY too thick. I don't understand; it looked fine in the bowls! I give up and wait a day, go back and thin all the colors and start over.  Slightly better but now it's almost too thin! UGH, THIS ICING IS TOO FICKLE. And then I realized...

By the end of this whole ordeal, I'd mostly given up. They didn't come out as I'd wished but I've learned some things: that freakin icing is not for me.  And if designs look difficult from the word go, they're going to be freakin hard.

My one amusement from this batch was this.  The multiples of Loki!  It makes me laugh.  So many Lokis!  Which one is real?  I'll never not fall for that, right, Thor?

See the icing consistency from the first try (on the lightning) and the second day, after thinned on Mjolnir? 

Mjolnir turned out to be my favorite.  I used an edible marker/pen to detail it so it's the only one with any definition.  I attempted to detail Thor and Loki's helmets as well and they came out junk so I nixed that quick.

April 22 - Earth Day

Happy Earth Day!  Not only do I super love Earth Day because of the awesome sentiment and the beautiful greenery that goes with it, it's also my birthday! In my quest to find ideas for designs, I came across some lovely cookies from a young lady who had a giveaway and declared Earth Day was someday in March and I went 'Nuh uh never!!'  It's always April 22nd!

April Showers!

So the cookie obsession continues and each time I'm trying new techniques (sugar coating, wet-on-wet flowers) and learning through trial and error.  I tried a new recipe (not these pictured) and they held their shape wonderfully but didn't taste great. They were kind of your typical bleh sugar cookie. I really like Sweet Sugar Belle's recipe however, as you can see (especially on the umbrella), they spread a bit.  Even in her notes, she acknowledges this issue and suggests adding a little more flour. I'll try that next time because I thought chilling the dough might help but it had no effect at all! Next time: more flour.

Cookies, Part Deux

Happy Easter!

In case you missed my Game of Thrones cookies post, I am kind of crazy into the cooks these days. Like, researching best techniques, buying all the tools, finding designs, etc.  This week was crazy baking-wise but I knew after the relative failure of the GoT cookies, I wanted to try, try again.  Easter was the perfect excuse!

I had better success on these but still not perfect. At this point, it's just about practicing. New techniques, seeing what works and what doesn't. My biggest issue was definitely the consistency: I was gun shy this time after the GoT royal icing was way too thin so for these I went a smidge too thick. I mean, they leveled off eventually (most of them) but I've watched dozens of tutorials and some decorators just squeeze it out of the bottle and it makes a lovely roundness and sets perfect and fast. That was the thing; I had to work it into place too much.  So.  Consistency still needs work!

(Bunnies love clover!)

Also, I used the same cookie recipe from Sweet Sugar Belle and they taste great but mine spread a little bit too much. Might be an oven that runs too hot.  Will experiment and report back!

As for the royal icing, I tried a new recipe from Lizy B Bakes and found it dried and worked wonderfully. I may just make this my go-to recipe!

Lizy B makes kind of amazing things so I was inspired by her design work, Sugar Belle's and many others.  I can wholeheartedly admit my own designs were the ones I liked least. HOWEVER, I will get better as I practice more and get more ideas from the brilliant bakers who blog and share their gorgeous work! (Thank you, thank you for sharing!)

A small note about the watermarks/blog name on the pics: I've never marked my pictures in the past because I thought no one would really take anything of mine. There's two reasons I'm doing it now. #1. It's kind of heartbreaking to see a picture you worked on setting up and making junk for being reused without credit. Like, my stomach falls out when I see one of my pics just randomly somewhere. So avoiding that feeling is a good thing.

And #2. I've noticed a few other blogs doing the same and realized, as I saved the picture to study later, it was a GREAT way to remember whose it was! I was cruising blogs, right-clicking away and when I went to study the pictures, there's the name of the creator right there! Now I can credit them easy! It takes the hassle off me to remember who made what and making my life easier is always a bonus! So that's that!

And everyone in my family got personalized egg cookies so, since my dad is in Houston, here you go, Dad! Love ya!

(The little chicky was my favorite!)

Birthday Season!

It's birthday season in my family! Well, I say that because of the immediate family, the coolest of us have April/May birthdays (that would be me, my mom and my fellow Taurus niece). WE'RE BOSS.

So my mom's birthday just passed and she requested an utterly boring vanilla cake mix with vanilla buttercream. yawn. But I made baby shower cupcakes for a coworker a few months ago with a new technique that I fell in love with.

Hey, look at this bouquet of roses I got for her birthday.

Game of Thrones: Winter is Coming!

Like most chefs I know, my cooking adventures too originate from seeing something and thinking, 'I wonder if I could do that...' I've seen hundreds of beautiful, intricate and amazing sugar cookies and I never thought twice about trying them. And one day it was just like, 'Hey... SUGAR cookies...'

Also, I'm crazy into Game of Thrones right now and I really wanted to geek out about it. Hence, decorated cookies. (The best part? At random intervals, such as coloring the red icing, I'd just suddenly think, "A Lannister always pays his debts." WEE!)

Fancied Up Chocolate Raspberry

I have a 14 year old nephew that's kind of a foodie. He wants to be a chef. But he also likes a lot of different foods so when I asked him what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday and he said the same chocolate/raspberry one I'd made for another friend before, I wasn't challenged. It was a smidge disappointing. So I went in search of at least prettying it up. I found a beautiful picture on flickr of a chocolate raspberry cake that I've, regrettably, lost the link to. I attempted to duplicate it and didn't quite succeed but my nephew liked it a lot so that was my main goal.

The thing I didn't prepare for was how time consuming every bit of this cake was. From the ganache to cutting the three layers to making the raspberry filling then chocolate buttercream then whipped cream THEN white chocolate marble decoration. so much work. But I'm glad it came out nice. And it was just as yummy as chocolate and raspberry always are. Win!

And it's six layers with three ganache fills and two raspberries. Mmmm!

More Halloween!

Every year, my office puts on a Halloween party and they usually ask for desserts to be contributed. This year they're doing a dessert contest but I was just excited to make something creepy. I saw this cake on I Am Baker and thought it was AWESOME so I went about trying to replicate.

She mentions she uses Americolor for the buttercream coloring but I couldn't get my hands on it before the due date so I cheated (again) and used the Wilton bottle of black icing. Now, the legs, on hers, are red and almost gel-looking so I was stumped. I bought the little red gel bottle and that was way too bright. I added black coloring to it and it plunged into darkness; too dark! So I ended up using the leftover red Wilton bottle icing from the little vampire cupcake fangs of last week! Added a little black to darken it and voila! Kind of reddish/black legs!

Thanks to this from I Am Baker to this awesomely creepy design!!