Your Daily Sweets (2005-2012)

[judiu]

First post here on eGullet....

Girlfriend and I made some homemade Cinnamon Buns. Couldn't get the powdered sugar to completely mix/dissolve in the frosting, which was frustrating.

Pre-frosting goodness

Post-frosting goodness

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They look delicious anyway! Did you sift the powdered sugar? That could be the problem, if you didn't. Otherwise, not a clue.

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Next time, mix just a little bit of the liquid into the sifted sugar and make a paste; that way you can knock the lumps out with your spoon or fork, then add more liquid to desired consistency. A little more stirring, but worth it in the end. HTH!

[eyensweets]

pomegranate cookies - not quite there but i am liking the direction i am heading in..

apricot seed cookies - i think i got this one down pretty good..

[Kim Shook]

Dessert last night was peanut butter pie:

Plain and good. I melted some PB and swirled it into the filling and topped with roasted, salted peanuts. I just love that shot of salty with something sweet. This was made especially for my dad, the dessert hater. He loved it – he likes precisely two desserts now – this pie and coconut cream pie.

Served for everyone but Daddy:

[CaliPoutine]

Dessert last night was peanut butter pie:

Plain and good.  I melted some PB and swirled it into the filling and topped with roasted, salted peanuts.  I just love that shot of salty with something sweet.  This was made especially for my dad, the dessert hater.  He loved it – he likes precisely two desserts now – this pie and coconut cream pie.

Served for everyone but Daddy:

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Robin has been begging me to make a PB pie all week. She loves them. I make the crust with nutterbutter cookies( that I bring back from MI because you can't buy them in Canada).

[Lior]

Eyensweets!!! Your pomegranate cookies look amazing!! Pomegranate is one of my favorite foods- anyway you look at them they are beautiful!! What a lovely idea!! How about putting some reduced pom juice into the dough? Would it be possible?

Edited October 26, 2008 by Lior (log)

[Kim Shook]

The wonderful coffee cake that Maggie describes in "Swans and Streudel":

I was reading about it this morning and 45 minutes later I was pulling this coffee cake out of the oven. So easy and really, really good!

[Lior]

That looks so good!!! I wish I could eat it! I can't though!!!

[gfron1]

The day of my tasting menu I was in such a hurry that all I had time to do for breakfast was some dough scraps rolled out filled with the usual cinnamon, dark muscovado, crushed pecans, baked, then topped with a huge squeeze of white chocolate ganache left over from one of my courses. Mmmmmm....

[gfron1]

And for that meal I made a 5-year cheddar cheesecake and served it with warm apple cider and lemon cotton candy

I also served a riesling marshmallow which was very good.

[Kim Shook]

Rob - those cinnamon rolls are just gorgeous. It's 8am here and that's exactly what I want. The tasting menu stuff is pretty cool, too . My daughter really wants us to try marshmallows in January and ones like yours are what I'd like to eventually master!

I put these together for our little friends for Halloween:

Just chocolate wafers, marshmallows, Reeses Cups and Kisses.

Close up:

I used canned frosting to 'glue' the stuff together and it's not terribly 'gluey'. Do you think that Royal frosting would work better to glue all the different things together? I ended up having to refrigerate them to firm up the frosting.

[Lior]

OMG!!! I wish we had halloween here!! And I wis my little one was one of your friends!! Boy are they ever lucky! You are wonderful to take such heart in everything!!

[gfron1]

Is that marshmallow winking at me?! What a flirt.

[Shelby]

Is that marshmallow winking at me?!  What a flirt.

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Rob!

Those are SO cute! Did you use chocolate chips for the eyes?

[Kim Shook]

Is that marshmallow winking at me?!  What a flirt.

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Rob!

Those are SO cute! Did you use chocolate chips for the eyes?

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Yep, the mini ones.

Thanks, everyone - I think they'd make a great kids project. But the frosting is a problem - anyone have an idea about using Royal icing instead??

[dystopiandreamgirl]

royal icing would work; it's awfully sweet, but that's not likely to bother any pint-sized trick or treaters.

"the republicans have never forgiven us for carrot cake" - al franken

i usually find it unforgivable as well, but was happy with the way this turned out,

with candied carrot ribbons and crystallized pansies:

[AnnaC]

Kim, those are adorable.

Have you thought about confectioners' coating? I know that a few makers (Wilton and I think Merckens) even make it in a sort of ghastly green Halloween color. It would look appropriately horrible as the hair dripping down and sets up pretty quickly once a cookie was set on top.

[Marmish]

I bake once a month for school (at least). For October birthdays, I am taking this eye cake.

Yellow cake with cream cheese coconut frosting

edited to fix pic

Edited October 31, 2008 by Marmish (log)

[Lior]

dystopiandreamgirl!! That is one beautiful cake! I just love the idea of the ribbons and the candied pansies! Heavens I would love to make something like that! IMHO it is a winner.

Marmish, I bet kids and adults alike get a major kick out of that eyeball cake! What an imagination! It is hysterical! How on earth do you make those eyes?

Just for the teacher who has eyes at the back of her/his head!! Eyes all over -every kid's nightmare!!

Edited October 31, 2008 by Lior (log)

[Kim Shook]

Thank you all for your compliments and ideas on better ‘glue’ to use. I’ll note that on my recipe for when I do these next year.

dystopiandreamgirl – that cake is an absolute dream . I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything that I’d rather be able to make.

Marmish – the eyeball cake is a hoot! I know that was popular!

Cake I made for a birthday at work today:

Side view:

It was, by request, the Crunchy Milk Choc–PB Layer Cake that I’ve made before. It was cute, and delicious, of course, but my lettering skills are seriously crappy! Plus my icing was too thin.

[gfron1]

Here is my submission to the Khymos.org Things That Taste Great Together challenge.

Banana cannoli filled with clove white chocolate ganache. The full description plus my second entry (banana martini with clove "olives" can be found HERE.

[Marmish]

...

Marmish, I bet kids and adults alike get a major kick out of that eyeball cake! What an imagination! It is hysterical! How on earth do you make those eyes?

Just for the teacher who has eyes at the back of her/his head!! Eyes all over -every kid's nightmare!!

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Ha! I didn't even think about the eyes in the back of the head! That's pretty funny. I found the gummy eyes at Target. They came packaged individually in little plastic eyeball shaped clamshells which were inside a kind of cardboard folder. But most of the folders had come unglued, so there were all these random eyeballs rolling around in the bin!

[isomer]

Today I made Sablés au Chocolat. The recipe is from this month's Cook's Illustrated. They used a cooked(!) egg yolk as leavener, and as promised in the article, the cookies have a wonderful sandy texture.

[gfron1]

Cooked egg?! That's an interesting idea. Those look super - I would have polished off the whole plate in one sitting.

[Sethro]

I thought most sable recipes called for hard boiled egg yolk?

Edited November 3, 2008 by Sethro (log)

[alanamoana]

not to be a total downer but CI often attempts to reinvent the wheel. yes, you add the hard boiled egg yolk to get some fat in there without adding moisture which would dissolve the sugar and thus take away the sandy texture. so, it isn't in there for leavening, but for shortening purposes.