The Quest for the Perfect Swirl

I'm sleepy. I was on a baking spree last night and I made some Mocha and Chocolate Cupcakes. Van and Ate Mayz ordered a bunch of those cupcakes. I started baking at around 8PM, and finished at past 3AM with a lot of welcome interruptions in between. I made 75 cupcakes, half of which frosted with Mousseline Vanilla Buttercream, and half frosted with Neoclassic French Buttercream.

The Mocha was a variation of Sarah Phillips' Orange Sponge Cake, and substituted the orange flavor with mocha and espresso. The cupcakes did not dome because the recipe is for a cake, and when baking a cake, it bakes nicely flat and very easy to frost. The cupcakes were still very cute though (although Van said, it's just a couple of bites to finish!). I frosted the Mocha cupcakes with the Neoclassic French Buttercream.

The chocolate cupcakes, which is my best seller, is of course Sarah's Ultimate Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Chips inside. The cupcakes domed nicely, and were very moist. I frosted it with Vanilla Mousseline Buttercream.

After baking all the cupcakes and before making the frostings, I ran out of sugar and it was already 1AM! I wondered where at this time could I buy some sugar. So I went out of the house and drove to 7-11 hoping that they were selling sugar. And they were selling sugar! I never thought I'd be buying sugar from 7-11, and then finding some in it.

I garnished the frosted cupcakes with a small piece of flower. I could only manage a single color at the ungodly hour. I was too sleepy to make it fancier. I also noticed that all of my frostings are just variations of white - from off-white, to beige, to slightly yellowish. For some reason, I always make the frostings when it is too late, so I never get to color it! Well I should next time, and if you request for it, I will color it to your liking. Price for the Mocha cupcakes is 460php for a box of 12 which is the minimum order.

And as for the quest for the perfect swirl? Well, the quest is still on. After 75 cupcakes last night, I still am nowhere close. I hope they loved the cupcakes though.

Red Velvet, Vanilla-Lemon and Carrot Cupcakes

These are some of the cupcakes that I made last week because I had orders of the Red Velvet Cupcakes and the Vanilla-Lemon Cupcakes. While at it, I made some Carrot Cupcakes to give as samples. All recipes are of course from baking911.

The Red Velvet cupcakes were frosted with Cream Cheese Frosting. I love Cream Cheese Frosting on anything, and with Red Velvet cupcakes, it's just perfect. I still can't get enough of the red coloring, it's just lovely.


These are some of the Carrot cupcakes that I made, also frosted with Cream Cheese Frosting. Cream Cheese is expensive here in the Philippines!

And lastly, these are the Vanilla-Lemon cupcakes that I made, frosted with Italian Buttercream in Vanilla.

I gave this sample box to Ice and Ly, and they loved it. Even Bry who does not eat carrots tried the Carrot cupcakes. The cupcakes were decorated with sugar gumpaste and dragees.

Current prices are 520php (box of 12) for Carrot, Red Velvet. 460 (box of 12) for Vanilla-Lemon, Chocolate. Minimum order is box of 12 per flavor.

Chunky Cookies

I was craving for cookies yesterday and I thought of baking some of Sarah Phillip's Thick-With-A-Chew cookies. They were really easy to make and my mom was amazed that I had it done in no time. I just kind of threw in the ingredients together, mixed it a little bit, baked and voila, I have freshly baked cookies to serve. I think these are the best cookies that I have made ever, is it me or is it the sparkling new oven? I think it's the oven. Hehe.

The cookies were chunky which I loved. When you bite it, it was crunchy on the outside, yet chewy on the inside. The mix of milk and dark chocolate chips were also a real treat.

Samples and Orders

The last time that I baked was about a month ago and I have not been really on a baking mood ever since I came back from Israel. In fact, I think I despised the idea of hearing my Kitchen Aid churning. I dreaded the day that I will open my boxed baking stuff. I was basically out of sorts. I also never wanted to bake half-heartedly, or else it won't taste good. To cut a really long story short, I was forced to bake.

For the first batch, I made my most reliable recipes, Ultimate Butter and Ultimate Chocolate Butter Cupcakes by Sarah Phillips. I was able to yield 24 Vanilla Butter cupcakes and 36 Chocolate Butter cupcakes. I was surprised that it went perfectly, and none of the cupcakes fell off the liners. These became samples that I gave to my officemates, to daddy A for his birthday and as a thank you for driving for me, to the Dacios and to some of my Mama and Uncle Obet's friends. The cupcakes looked very elegant in the boxes. The boxes were a little expensive though, so Ly please go to divi with me. :)

The samples got rave reactions and I immediately got a lot of orders. Below is a glimpse of the orders that I got. I was only initially offering the Vanilla and Chocolate because I still had to compute the prices. Minimum order is box of 12 for 460php.

When I brought the orders, I also brought samples of the Red Velvet cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting. I was finally able to make it red, oh I love food colors here in the Philippines! The Red Velvets also got rave reviews. I don't have prices for the Red Velvet yet. I know I should be computing it really soon, as I already have orders!

Here's a sample of how the cupcakes look like in the pretty boxes. This is just a box of six though, as these are gifts.