It was someone's birthday!

This past week has flown by! I cannot believe that tomorrow I already have the second part of my cake decorating class and that on Tuesday I start more! Crazy. So in order to practice this week I decided to make some yummy Champagne Cupcakes for a friend's birthday. You ask why Champagne Cupcakes, but it was a celebration. She was turning the big 3-0! So why not have some bubbly in the mix. I also made a champagne buttercream frosting. Now, even though I cannot have dairy I tried one. How could I not? They looked so good!

I made the frosting yellow and wish I hadn't. I need to find the right temp for my place when I am decorating as my hand gets too warm too fast and the house gets really warm with the oven on. For those of you who do not know this, but when the temp is high or above normal say, 72, the buttercream starts to melt and looks like poop! Therefore, they did not come out as nice as I would like, but oh well...I have class again tomorrow with a cake coming home from that. Cannot wait to decorate that cake!!!

YAY!

Champagne Cupcakes!

Mayo...lite or regular?

When do you use mayo? To make your tuna or when you put some on your bread? Right, those sound normal. What doesn't sound normal is to use it as a practice frosting type when pipping. Weird I know. However, this weekend I took my first class of a two class series at the BCAE and this is what our instructor, Susi, told us. She said to use mayo as it was very close to buttercream and way cheap. So...tomorrow I need to buy some practice mayo. I'll probably buy lite as that is what I normal buy. But...to class...

Because it is a two day class the first class was all practice! Practice, practice, practice! It was a good class. It was a little crowded, but it was good. We made a basic royal icing. For those that do not know what royal icing is, it is made up of sugar and egg whites. They are mixed together are form an icing that then hardens. If you you have ever had a hard flower on a cake or something like that it is most likely royal icing. It is pure white. It was fun to make it and also to use it as practice.

Next week we will be decorating a cake. I have to say that I was a bit disappointed that I was not able to bring home a cake on Saturday. I know I wouldn't be able to eat it but it would have been nice. I hope to make a cake tomorrow as LOST is not on so there will be nothing to distract me. Oh wait...I still have my 7 month old so we shall see if I get to. :)

Here are some pics from my practicing! I was told they were excellent. FYI - It is not mayo!

Tada....

I did it! I made my first dairy-free cake and I have to say it was so yummy. I found the recipe on about.com, so nothing too fancy but it was very good. The trick was that I was able to use a vegan butter sticks, rice and soy milk, and soy yogurt. It was soo good. Clearly, I am not able to keep my mouth shut and told the hubby that it was dairy-free before he had it but he did taste the frosting before and loved it! It was hard for me to decide how I was going to decorate the cake as I have the little babe here and time is not always on my side.

So, we went for the traditional nuts on the side and I would have like to do the carrots on the top but really was not in the mood to do it. Here we have it...I liked it very much but could not keep a whole cake in the house! It was nicely divided between my sister-in-laws! I hope they and their fams enjoyed. :)

Tonight's the night, I'm gonna make it...

So...I should probably not be doing this, but we are dead dead dead at work so here I am on my blog. Why?? Well, because right now it is 5am on April 12Th and most of you are sleeping. However, unless you are either teaching today and need to get up early to get to that lovely job of yours or you have a puppy that needs to pee or rather also a baby who is up or you are headed to the gym. There I think I covered it for those of you that might actually be reading this. I am at work thinking about what I will do tonight..

No...get your mind out of the gutter, however, that would be nice too! I am going to make my first dairy-free cake with dairy-free frosting. Last night the hubby and I were watching the Ultimate Recipe Challenge or what have you on the Food Network and one lady was making a carrot cake! So now the hubby wants to try it out. I will be making it dairy-free and will not be telling him. Hopefully I will be able to pull it off tonight! I shall add, while I was going to make this regardless for my dear husband to bring into work for all to share, I received a lovely message on Facebook from an old friend that gave me the idea to see about making a dairy-free cake. And, of course I need cake too! We shall see how it goes...

See ya dairy!

So, what a week...I know a few days past my normal Sunday arrivals, but it was Easter and it took me about an hour and half to get home on Sunday then I had to work 11p-7a! Yikes, it was a long day to say the least. What was interesting about it was that it was my first encounter with bake goods since my non-dairy diet. Non-dairy diet you ask, why? Why would anyone do this? How does this affect sweetbabycakes?

Here is the dealio! My little man has decided to have a reaction to dairy products. It has produced blood in his stool. For all of you moms out there, it is not fun to see that in there. Off to the GI doctor we went and he said no more dairy for me. The first thing I thought about was the buttercream frosting that I LOVE. I mean, I still have some in my fridge. It is way old, so I probably shouldn't eat it anyways but still...it's there.

I did cave and have a cookie on Sunday. It was yummy, but back to the dairy-free diet yesterday and today. I need to make something this week and practice. My first big gig is in less than 6 months so I need to practice.

However, I now know that this post is LAME-O. But I have a good reason, LOST is on soon and I found something that has no dairy in that I am enjoying...BUBBLY CAVA..YUMMY!