Ghirardelli Chocolate Festival!

In less than a year, San Francisco will be my new home! Actually Pleasant Hill will be, but I'll only be a bridge away in the East Bay! :) This past weekend, I made another well deserved trip up North to visit my sister! And the visited concluded with the Ghirardelli Chocolate Festival! I'm posting some of my pictures below:

Some Chocolate Tarts with Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream!

Some Chocolate pieces infused with different kinds of tea.

Kara's Cupcakes! Vanilla, Chocolate Ganache, And Peanut Butter :)

My Ciao Bella Blood Orange Sorbet!

My sister taking a shot of fruity tasting liqueur. 

So the price is $20 for 15 samples. My sister and I split it and it was more than enough. The only con: The super long line for Paul Frank. As it turns out, they were handing out free tote bags. Made to order! That was crazy. And of course we snagged some free drink holders too. :) It was such an amazing day, the weather was absolutely gorgeous!

Our amazing view! Although we totally wished we ate our lunch @ Fisherman's Wharf instead of that dirty pier. Too bad! 

 This month has been surprisingly full of ups and downs. I need more weekends like this! Cheers to another successful road trip to SF. I hope to see you soon. 

 Have a great week everyone! I already can't wait for October!

SoNo Brownies and other updates!

For those of you that don't know, its one month til my 23rd birthday! I'm strangely excited because frankly, I can't wait for Fall!
My absolute favorite season of the year, hands down! I'm thinking of all the warm, sweet and savory pies, tarts, and pastries (oh and fresh baked bread!) that I can make and eat :) Whoo hoo!

You know I've been spending so much time at the library lately (I know total nerd status right?) and I found some pretty amazing pastry, baking, cooking books which inspire me oh so much! I wish I could make everything in those books or try out all the different techniques. I'm just itching to be back in the Kitchen with my handy mixer. But I can't because my funds of $ are slowing diminishing. Disgusting, I know. So all I can do is dream for now...

Finding a job, any job sucks right now. All I know is to keep applying and interviewing, and repeat the process until necessary. That's all I can say. Not inspiring, but if you keep going you will always have hope of reaching your goal. So take out your inspiring pictures, quotes, and music and go for it!

So back to these SoNo Brownies! Super Delicious, ate half of the batch myself (Give me some amazing brownies and cookies and I will be fat but happy!)

I'm going to post the recipe below, but you should also check out the delicious cooking book as well. It should be at your local library (except at my library, because i have it for now :)

SoNo Brownies: Makes 16 Brownies give or take.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup of all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup of unsalted room temp. butter
1 cup of white granulated sugar
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
2 large eggs, room temp.
1 tablespoon of vanilla
1 cup of semisweet chocolate chips (I used a mixture of chocolate chunks and chips from Ghiradelli)

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 350 Degrees F. Coat an 8 inch square baking dish with cooking spray/butter. Mix the flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking powder in a small bowl. Set Aside. With a saucepan, melt butter completely over low heat. Then off the heat add your white sugar and corn syrup. Whisk to combine. Then add one egg at a time, whisking well after each addition. Add the vanilla. Combine this mixture with your dry ingredients. Add your chocolate chips and chunks (or nuts if you wish). Pour batter into your pan and bake for 30 minutes. Let it cool completely and eat it straight out of the pan if you desire! :)

This recipe was taken from The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook. By John Barricelli. I do not own this recipe. No copyright intended.

Sorry no pictures! I absolutely suck at taking pictures! haha

Now I must pack my bags and head to...Las Vegas with the fam. Cheers!

Have a great weekend everyone!

I need taste testers! Anyone?

This has been one of the longest weeks I've had in a while!

First off, being unemployed is extremely frustrating! Frankly I don't know how much longer I can stand it! To be honest this past week I just wanted to quit, quit it all. And you know start collecting cans on the street. And that my friends is what rejection after rejection does to me.

But that was a momentary lapse of judgement. I'm back and ready to hit the ground running!

Tonight, I took a break from job searching/applying and did something super fun, premature but fun! I decided to go on craigslist and browse the bedrooms for rent in SF. It is SO exciting looking at "my future home" (or for at least the next 2-3 years). I can really just imagine being there and learning even more amazing things about the culinary world and myself for starters. And if that makes ANY sense is what helps me to keep going on this endless job hunt (which is Part I of my so-called master plan).

This week I also did another video with my awesome cousin, and my grandma who stopped by to watch and in turn ended up being in the video! :) I'm saving this video forever, FOREVER.
If you haven't watched it please do! I'm posting it below:



Also, follow me on twitter: TdashCakes (t-cakes)

So this past week, was my dear friend Wing's birthday! She's been in Minnesota, and came back to SoCal for a few weeks (then she's off to St. Louis!). Well she absolutely loves, loves, loves Nutella--- really who doesn't? So I did a spin on a Nutella cupcake. I combined a few recipes from a couple of really cool blogs I found:

http://confessionsofacookbookqueen.com/2011/05/guest-post-nutella-cupcakes

http://pieceofcakeblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/living-spoon-to-jar-to-mouth.html

So the final cupcake product turned out to be a Nutella Cupcake, with buttercream, drizzled over chocolate ganache and almonds! :) Check out the blogs above if you have the chance!

Also, I've been looking for taste testers! Really, because after video shoots or my experiments in the kitchen I am left with a TON of leftovers. So if you are ever in the TC area let me know!

Thanks! Happy Sunday everyone!

I'm on You Tube! Holla!

Thanks for watching!

NEW UPDATE: My twitter name has changed to: TdashCakes! Follow Me :)

Have a great week everyone!

Thank you my readers!

Hi my dear family, friends, and fellow readers!

I just want to say THANKS for all of the support you have given me! It means a lot when you give me advice, tips, and just encouragement to reach for the stars. I'm not as confident as I should be, but your support does SO much :)

Alas, my campus job ends tomorrow. I wave goodbye to my home for the past 5 years and look ahead to the path of uncertainty. It's going to be interesting that's for sure.

For everyone who has a twitter (yes, I joined!) you can reach me at: CakeNThings. I will tweet about cool baking things, tips and such for starters. So follow me! I also have a youtube channel coming soon, I'll give you more information on that later. Special shout out to: my cousin Chrissy who came up with an awesome name. YAY!

This week I made: Kahlua Brownies, Red Velvet Goodbye Cupcakes, and Cupcake Pies. What a way to end June right? Here comes the pictures!

Small goodbye flags, in the only languages I know: English, French, German, and some Spanish! :)

 My toppings! Sprinkles and some Hi-Chew. Quite Yummy!

 I actually didn't want to use fondant because its way too expensive and tastes icky (if you ask me). So I was super smart and thought of that chewy candy, rolled it and cut it into hearts and spades. Quite cool right?

 You can see the candy cut out of the spade! 

 Crazy story! These cupcake pies didn't turn out the way I wanted it to. Long story short, my frosting solidified while I napped. So it turned out into a big mess. Note: If you are ever trying to do this project make sure you use a stabilizer in your frosting like meringue powder! Otherwise on a hot, sticky day it will droop like crazy.

 Those are skittles!

I think I'm going to be baking on a budget starting tomorrow. Flargh. This will be interesting but fun no?

Happy early July 4th everyone! SF here I come! HOLLA!

The results are in...

I am surprisingly chipper, but perhaps that's the Coke talking. haha :)

Recently one of my mom's really good friends, decided to help me out and take some pictures of my cupcakes. How thoughtful! So I'm posting my favorites right here:

SO the results are in! As a part of my last week at CSULA, I will be doing a farewell cupcake. It'll be super chocolately goodness. Maybe I will make goodbye flags...who knows? Oh and some Kahlua Brownies! Yum. Well there is more to come next week! So stay tuned! Holla!

Congrats Class of 2011!

Here we go!

I actually want to dedicate this post and these cupcakes to all my amazing friends/co-workers who graduated this June! 2011, whoo hoo! :) Congrats and I wish you nothing but SUCCESS in the future and I know you'll do all great things.

SF, here I come again! Have another great weekend everyone :)