rajoress

It ended up to be a busy baking weekend! "Ring ding" cake for my brother who asked for a "ding dong" cake - we never called them that as kids, we grew up with ring dings! And an end of summer peach cake from Cooks Illustrated- with roasted peaches inside and more macerated peaches on top. Thanks for looking! Ruth

Beautiful photos everyone! Here are a few of my latest. Fruit turnovers or mini pop tarts, mini cream horns, and a 65th birthday cake complete with numbered sparklers I found in a small chocolate shop on Cape Cod! Pink champagne cake (I had to make it non-alcoholic) with raspberry jam and raspberry mousse filling and white chocolate buttercream. Thanks for looking! Ruth

Wonderful looking desserts on this thread! Here are a couple of my latest bakes - a red velvet birthday cake and watermelon sugar cookies for a memorial day bbq. Thanks for looking! Ruth

@ChocoMom I have a ton of molds that I just don't use anymore if you're interested I'd be more than happy to give them away to someone who would use them. I have the cheap $2 molds and a bunch of polycarbonate molds - the majority of them are probably 3-10 years old. I don't do half what I used to and I'm running out of room. If you're interested let me know and I can figure out a way to mail them to you. I have a few lollipop molds but alot of flowers, seashells, bonbon types, some magnetic molds, Christmas and Easter, etc. Ruth

My annual Easter cakes! One of them also served as a birthday cake - that one is a double egg surrounded by edible grass! Strawberry and green apple flavors - it was determined that it tastes like those little penny candy space ships we used to eat as kids or communion wafers....! thanks for looking! Ruth Host's note: this topic grew too large for our servers to handle efficiently, so it has been split. Click here for the next segment.

Carrot cake seems to be one of those items that everyone likes something different! I have used Martha Stewart's recipe a couple of times with great success. I like the texture and crumb because it's made with butter where most are made with oil. Best of luck! Ruth

@shain - those babkas are beautiful! I've been on a cookies kick as I got Dorie Greenspan's cookie book for Hanukkah. Three of her sables - vanilla, chocolate, and jammers and funfetti cookies from smitten kitchen. Thanks for looking! Ruth

@RWood those sables looks beautiful! And perfectly round! Did you roll them into a log and slice? I've been making sables from Dorie Greenspan's new cookie book and the method in her book is great - you refrigerate/freeze the dough, cut out in rounds and drop into muffin tins and bake - no more lopsided cookies for me - they come out perfectly round (although you can't get sugar on the edge, she shows most of hers with decos on top).

There are some seriously gorgeous treats displayed here! Here was my contribution for Christmas morning (a good way to celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas - a chocolate babka wreath courtesy of the browneyedbaker blog whose directions made it very easy!) and chocolate cupcakes for after dinner! Happy new year all!

@Thanks for the Crepes That's a lovely story and I'm sure the birthday boy will love the wreath cake!! :-)

@Thanks for the CrepesThanks so much for your nice compliment! I have perfect chocolate molds for starfish and shells but we've been in the middle of a hot humid summer and drought so my chocolate making equipment hasn't seen the light of day since the spring. I found these at a craft store along with some real ones that I almost purchased by mistake! Of course these were in a bag of 6 so now I have extras if anyone needs them.... Thanks again! Ruth

Some beautiful baked items showcased here! Here is my latest - a beach themed birthday cake that had to drive 90 miles in the heat - luckily the humidity wasn't too bad! Design from iambaker.com. Ruth

Not sure if this would help but a long time ago I bought a heat sealer for about $60 and it was one of the best purchases I made - gave me piece of mind for certain packaged chocolates over the years! I could take any bags I had and seal them anywhere on the bag to make different sizes (I did have to cut off many an end!) You just have to make sure you don't melt the bags and I only use on cello not plastic that I buy from papermart. Good luck!

pastryani - those look amazing! Could you share with us how you made the semi-liquid filling? Was it firmer when you filled the chocolates and then it liquified? Also, I love the mold. So impressive!

pastrygirl - that is adorable!