Thank You.

This week, I got a flat tire.  It was pretty great.  It happens about once every two weeks or so.  Because my car hates me.  Seriously.  I woke up the other night, and it was standing over me with a pillow in it's hands.  I was like "Penny!  What's this all about?"  She dropped the pillow and zoomed back down to the driveway like nothing happened.  I keep a boot on her front tire at night now.  It was the rear one that went flat.

And one of my extended family members came to help me.  Because the lug nuts were stripped.

And so, I had this brilliant plan.  I was going to make cupcakes, using modelling chocolate, I was going to create a flat tire and one of those "x" shaped tie wrenches, and various other flat tire related chocolate pieces to top a cupcake.


But, the modeling chocolate was a failure.  I believe in documenting my failure.  The end product is a non-newtonian substance.  It's a total disaster.

So, I only had the candy molds on hand, all Halloween.  So I whipped up some ganache.  Which, by the way, turned out fantastic.

And I cored the cupcakes, and filled them, topped them with milk chocolate frosting and candy pumpkins.  Then I sprinkled with purple and orange sugar.

Aren't they lovely?  Here's another set:

Those are chocolate Pumpkins, bats and a chocolate/peanut butter guitar.

Overall, The failure of the modeling chocolate totally messed up my day and threw me off.   So, I never even completed the stuff I was going to complete.  Le Sigh.  Le Sigh.

But someone is eating well tomorrow!  And hopefully they will enjoy.

Curse you, internet!

So, I looked up how to make modeling chocolate online.  I found a place extolling the awesomeness of candymelts and corn syrup blended in.  So... I make this substance.  And instead of modeling chocolate, I ended up with a non-Newtonian substance.

I shoved it into the freezer after no good came from my efforts with it and will now focus my afternoons energies on Molding candy melts for the tops of my cupcakes and leave the molding chocolate for another day.

Meanwhile, check out my molded candies...

Works in progress:

Those little things are spider bodies and bats.

My return to the world of exhibition baking...

Well... Things were hectic for a while.  As in, the Blue Screen Of Death put me out of the online blogging world for a few months.  But, the computer is back, and the baking continues.  I'll post a little of what you missed while I was offline:

Most notably, I took a foray into fondant.  I'm not a fan of fondant.  I think it tastes like crappy stale marshmallows.  And I think it lacks a sort of artisan skill that spectacularly smooth butter cream demonstrates.  not that I'm at that level of awesome yet, but I''ve got goals.

Anyway, it was my sister's birthday.  And there are three things my sister adores.  The color Blue, cuddly bunny rabbits and fondant (of all weird things).  Well, there are more than three things she adores.  But I wasn't about to undertake a Stargate cake on limited resources.

So, I made her a choclate fudge cake with milk chocolate icing and Fondant dots.  And a fondant bnny rabbit.  Who almost instantly began to sink into the icing and drown.  So Megan (The sister) ate it first.

It was a good death.

Anyway, that's what I did.  And now, I'm about to undertake modeling chocolate.  Because I've had to rely on the generosity of some family the past two weeks and nothing says "Thank you" like homemade baked goodies.   Also, did you know it was Clergy appreciation week?  I might also be whipping up something for our ministry team.  Maybe.

Anyway, my mom warmed up the kitchen this morning with her famous (Seriously) pumpkin bread.  And I tested out my brand new 20 dollar digital camera capturing a shot of it:





Curse the grainy image and crappy quality.  How is my cellphone a better camera??