THE SWEET SPOT

Photo from Google Images Another food-related post! You can tell what's been on my mind during the holidays! A Hispanic friend of mine told me a couple of years ago that she likes to have tamales on New Year's Eve. I know tamales are traditional during the holiday season, so last year, when we hosted our very first ever New Year's Eve party, we served tamales, pork and chicken. They were a hit of course. For New Year's Eve 2008, I'm serving something new that I've been curious about all year--Sweet Tamales made with coconut, raisin and pecans. I found out about them last year when I bought the savory tamales at my favorite place , but they had already sold out of the sweet tamales, which are only made during the holiday season. I can't wait to taste them!

I think I mentioned before that because I'm always making cakes for other people's birthdays, when our own birthdays come around at our house, we like to celebrate with something besides a cake! We usually go for an ice cream cake or cookie cake, but this year I decided to surprise my husband with something different: Do you like donuts? How about Krispy Kreme donuts? That's right, it's a Krispy Kreme donut cake! It's actually a tower of donuts, but it doesn't really show well in the photo. I found an actual recipe online too, which I followed almost exactly (I ended up with a few extra donuts). I used 2 dozen KK holiday-themed donuts, drizzled with white and dark chocolate and accented with fresh strawberries and blackberries. Easy peasy. Here is the recipe if you're in need of an unusual and quick cake for your next party: The following instructions are based on using 2 dozen Original Glazed™ doughnuts and will result in formation of a ‘pyramid’ cons...

On the whole, I dislike Cupcake Cakes. You know, the "cakes" that are made up of individual cupcakes that are iced as a whole cake. I just think they look odd. Sometimes they just look really bad . However, they have been "in", especially for kids' parties, for a few years now, so last Christmas I made my first Cupcake Cake, a Santa Claus one: Santa Cupcake Cake , based on some other designs seen online I actually ended up making two of these, because they are quite handy when you're serving a bunch of kids who just cannot wait for an actual cake to be cut! I made one for our Girl Scout holiday party and one for my daughter's class at school. No one thought it was particularly amazing, myself included. (I tend to get oohs and ahhs when my work is really creative, but this wasn't one of those times). But it was cute enough. My cupcake cake curiosity was satisfied, however, and I haven't made another one in an entire year. I know the larg...

Happy Holidays! How do you like the fancy holiday blog decorations? Just needed a little holiday spirit around here! Free blog background from The Cutest Blog on the Block . "Business" is usually slow in December as everyone seems to enjoy baking for themselves! That's ok though; have been busy baking for our own holiday parties, including a large batch of cookies for my younger daughter's classroom Hannukah party tomorrow and some chocolate/chocolate chip cupcakes for a Winter Wonderland celebration at my older daughter's school on Friday. Lots of flour, butter and eggs in my kitchen lately. My watermarking project has been delayed due to having watermarked about a hundred images incorrectly (my own fault). Grrrrrr! Stay tuned!