winter yuki tokidoki unicorn birthday cake

For my daughter's 6th birthday this past December, I asked her what kind of cake she wanted. She told me that she wanted another unicorn cake, like the Tokidoki one that I made for her last year, except she wanted to pick a different unicorn this time. So we looked up Tokidoki unicorns, and as soon as she saw Yuki, a winter unicorn with snowflakes, she was smitten! (She's still really into Frozen, and she loved Yuki's snowflakes!)

Since we were going with the winter theme (winter bithday, winter unicorn), I decided she should have a minty chocolatey cake! So I made two 8-inch chocolate cakes (recipe in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!), filled with peppermint whipped cream. (I sliced each cake layer in half horizontally, giving me four cake layers and three layers of filling).

After filling and chilling the cake, I whipped up a batch of cream cheese buttercream (recipe also in my book!), and covered the top and sides of the cake with it. Then using a piping bag fitted with a medium star tip, I piped long vertical swirls of frosting along the sides of the cake (the same technique that I used here, here, and here, inspired by a Nikole Herriott cake).

Then I was ready to pipe the unicorn. I used a toothpick to draw my outline, and then used a small round piping tip with black icing to trace over the outline.

Then I used a small star tip to fill in my unicorn! (For the snowflakes, I used a smaller round tip to pipe them over the piped stars).

To finish decorating the cake, I piped a birthday message in blue, and then I was done!

Stay tuned to see the winter cookie favors that I made, and cupcakes for her class party as well!

Happy Birthday, my sweet Melodie! We love you so much!!!

easy brownie ice cream sandwiches

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to review these silicone baking cups by New York Baking Company, and I immediately knew what I wanted to make with them - ice cream sandwiches! That way I could use them both as a baking cup in the oven, as well as a mold for the ice cream in the freezer! I just love dual-purpose things!

I decided I wanted my ice cream to be sandwiched by chocolatey brownies, so I started by using this brownie recipe from Victoria Beckham I had been eyeing. The recipe sounded so easy and it was simple to divide the recipe in half, as I only wanted to make one dozen. (Although on a side note, these turned out not as chocolatey as I wanted. I think paired with the ice cream it was good, but on it's own I like the brownie recipe in my new book better - much more chocolatey and moist! Sorry, Victoria!)

Anyway,  I whipped a half batch up, lined my cupcake tin with the silicone baking cups (although they seem sturdy enough to be able to be used without a baking tin and just directly on a sheet pan), and divided the batter into my cups (I ended up filling them a litle less than 3/4 full). Then I baked them at 350F for about 20-22 minutes. Once cooled, I was able to pop the brownies right out of the silicone baking cups!

Then I cut each brownie in half horizontally, and popped the bottom layer back into the silicone baking cup.

Next I placed a scoop of softened homemade mint oreo ice cream in each cup (you could of course use store-bought ice cream as a shortcut, but I prefer to use homemade ice cream, mainly because I love making it!), and then used a small offset spatula to smooth out the ice cream.

Finally I placed the top of the brownie on top of the ice cream layer, and put it back in the freezer to set! So easy!

I would recommend serving these the day they are assembled, so that the brownie doesn't get too hard. But if you do leave it for longer than overnight, then before serving just leave them at room temperature for about 10-15 minutes to let the brownie layer soften a bit. Then just pop them out of the silicone cups (I found the easiest way was to turn the cups inside out!)



These turned out delicious and were super easy to make! Now if only New York Baking Company would make these in cute patterns or metallic colors! Fun!

no churn mint chip ice cream

When making the mint-chocolate Keroppi cake, from my new book "The Hello Kitty Baking Book", you may end up with leftover green minty whipped cream (depends on how thick you layer on the filling and frosting! Plus, I was recipe-testing so I had a bunch left over!). If you do have some left over, here's what you can do with it the leftover whipped cream ... turn it into no-churn mint chip ice cream!

All you need to do is add a few tablespoons of creme de menth liquor (or I suppose you could add any other minty liquor, or even a tasteless one like vodka), and toss in a few handfulls of mini chocolate chips. Then freeze it for a few hours, and you'll get no-churn ice cream!

I'll be the first to admit, the texture of this no-churn ice cream is not quite the same as regular churned ice cream. It's a little harder, and not as creamy, but hey I'm never one to waste leftovers and this is a great way to use them up :) Enjoy!

mint chocolate keroppi cake

This was the first new recipe not already on the blog that I created for my book, "The Hello Kitty Baking Book", and I while I have made many, many Hello Kitty cakes, this was my first Keroppi themed dessert. And I thought it came out adorable!

As described in the book, I baked two 8-inch chocolate cakes, sliced them in half horizontally, and then used a Keroppi template to cut out the shape of the cakes. (The Keroppi template is included in the book!)

Then I whipped up a batch of minty whipped cream to fill in between each layer of cake.

After frosting the entire cake, I piped on Keroppi's details (details in the book), and piped stars to cover the rest of the cake.

When cut, the striking layers of chocolate cake and green minty filling are revealed.

Moist, refreshingly minty, and delicious, this cake is a keeper! 

To get the recipe (including the template!) and see brand new photos, you can pre-order my book here!

chocolate mint layer cake for st. patrick's day

It's been almost a year since I made this St. Patrick's Day cake, and I'm only now getting around to blogging about it! Oh well, at least it's just in time for this year's St. Patrick's Day!

I didn't have much time to make the cake, as I had just given birth to my third baby a month earlier (and I was still nursing every 2 hours so I had to work in small half-hour chunks of time throughout the day), so I chose my favorite chocolate cake recipe which can be made in one bowl. I baked it up in two 8-inch pans, and while they were cooling I whipped up a quick batch of peppermint whipped cream (with a few drops of coloring to tint it green).

Then I sliced my cake layers in half horizontally (giving me four cake layers), and filled and frosted the layers with the peppermint whipped cream.

Decorating it had to be simple as I only had small spurts of time, so I piped a simple shell border, and a quick four-leaf clover in the center.

I thought it still looked rather plain, so I sprinkled some green and white confetti sprinkles over the shell borders.

With our corned beef and cabbage dinner that night, we had green beer and decorated with festive paper napkins...

... and ate yummy cake for dessert!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

mint thinmint ice cream

This year I bought around 12 boxes of Girl Scout cookies, from various family and friends.  Most of them were samoas and thinmints, as those are my favorites, and even though I was able to devour a few boxes by myself, there were still plenty left over.  That's when I decided I would make ice cream with them.

My friend Diana's husband and their daughter love mint chip ice cream, so when one weekend we decided to get together and play, I made them mint thinmint ice cream.  I turned to my copy of David Lebovitz's "The Perfect Scoop" for a mint ice cream recipe, although at the time, I didn't have any fresh mint on hand, so I used peppermint extract instead (plus a few drops of green coloring).

After churning the ice cream for about 25 minutes, I added a cup of chopped thinmint cookies.  Then I let it it churn for a few minutes after, to incorporate the cookie bits, and then poured the soft ice cream into a container and let it sit in the freezer overnight.

The next day we all met for lunch, and after a big meal of delicious burgers and fries, we had our ice cream!  Perfect and refreshing for a big burger meal!

A week later I made another batch of the same ice cream, this time using fresh mint from our garden (turns out we had mint after all!)  This time I heated milk and cream on the stove, and then soaked the fresh mint in it for about an hour (after the heat was turned off).

When I went back to check on it, the milk and cream mixture had turned a beautiful shade of green!  Then the rest of the steps were the same with the churning and the addition of chopped thinmint cookies at the end.

When I tasted the fresh mint version, it tasted really fresh and clean.  But it wasn't the same "mint" flavor as you'd expect from mint ice cream.  This was more of a "mojito" mint flavor, minus the lime.  But it was still good.  Next time I'll look for fresh peppermint leaves, and try it with that instead!

christmas wreath cupcakes - chocolate cupcakes with peppermint cream cheese frosting

I saw these wreath cupcakes in my Martha Stewart "Cupcakes" book last year, but never had a chance to make them last Christmas.  So this year I had to make them!  I started by baking chocolate cupcakes, and then whipped up a batch of peppermint cream cheese frosting to top it with (basically a standard cream cheese frosting with about 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoons of peppermint extract added to it).

Before adding any coloring, I first used the white frosting to cover the tops of the cupcakes.  Then I added green coloring to the rest of the frosting, and began piping a ring of leaves on the perimeter of the cupcakes using leaf tip.  Then inside the first row of leaves, I piped a second row, and a third row, to finish forming the Christmas wreath.

Martha's book suggested using red sugar pearls as the berries on the wreath, but since I didn't have any of those, I used these cute holly and berry sprinkles that I found at Target.

I loved the end result.  And it had just the right amount of minty-ness and chocolate!  Next year I plan on using the same leaf technique to make Christmas tree cupcakes!

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!