Pokémon Cupcakes

My friend had a birthday party yesterday, and rather than a gift, he asked for cupcakes (seeing as a. everyone knows I'll take any excuse to bake and b. he thinks "Kitchen" is a hilarious nickname for me). We'd been at another friend's house the night before, where the boys were playing Pokémon video games, which, you may be interested to know, I suck at. I thought it would be cute if the cupcakes I made for his birthday were Pokémon themed, so I baked a batch of devil's food cake cupcakes, iced them with cream cheese chocolate frosting, and set to work making teensy fondant Pokeballs for each one.

Quadruple Chocolate Cookies

Some boys are very, very spoiled.

I've been working at a food pantry/soup kitchen/men's shelter all this summer with a group of other teens. It's been one of the best experiences of my life, and I've had a wonderful time working in the kitchen, bagging produce, and getting to know everyone there. I'm definitely going back next summer (before leaving for college...*gulp*) because I feel like I've done some genuinely good work, and I've met a lot of great people, both from the shelter itself and from the volunteer program. Now, some of those fellow volunteers demanded cookies this year after figuring out that I'm a little bit nuts about baking. Because I'm a horrible pushover, I agreed to make them some. And because I'm an even more horrible pushover, I agreed to make what they requested: quadruple chocolate cookies.

Baroque Birthday Cake - I'm Seventeen!

It was my birthday recently, and besides going out to a wonderful restaurant with my family and a friend to celebrate (peach-mascarpone cannoli for dessert...I must attempt this at home), I made my own birthday cake. My mindset while planning and baking this was "It's my birthday. Now is the time to put everything that I love and shouldn't be eating in a cake." That's why this cake is now known in our family as the Baroque Cake - it's rich, complicated, over-the-top, and combines more flavors than are really necessary in a dessert. The only way a birthday cake should be done.

Double Whammy: Rainbow Cupcakes and Macarons

You read it right. The blogosphere's two favorite food trends in one shamelessly cutesy and (squee!) rainbow post. I made these for an art show a wonderful classmate of mine put on to showcase student talent in our city. I blogged about it when it was canceled in January due to snowstorms, but this time everything went according to plan. I made cupcakes and macarons in rainbow colors, as that was the show's theme, and because they're two baked goods that always seem to be a hit.

Chocolate Mousse

Hello all! I'm back from my ten-day trip to Madrid (with one day dedicated to Toledo). It was so much fun and we had a great time, but now it's back to business: the making and eating of delicious desserts. And blogging about them. This is actually something I made a little while ago, before going to Spain, that I never got around to sharing. That's a shame, though, because it's pretty fantastic. This chocolate mousse is smooth, fluffy, and has the perfect chocolaty flavor.

Cherry Apple and Nutella Macarons

Let me begin this post by saying:

¡HEMOS GANADO, HEMOS GANADO, EL EQUIPO COLORADO!

Marcona Almond and Nutella Macarons

First off, I owe some serious apologies. I haven't posted since...June 12th! My God. On a blog, that's like a year, isn't it? Well I'm going to ask your forgiveness, because it's been sort of impossible to get on here in the past month. With school ending, there have been graduation parties, a summer job to start, and lots of catching up to do with friends. We also had friends come in from Spain and stay with us for a few days, so that was hectic (though wonderful). On top of it all, my computer is broken, and anytime I have it on for more than a few minutes, it looks like the screen is throwing up. So it's been a little hectic around here. But! I come bearing gifts to make up for my laziness/business/computer brokenness, in the form of marcona almond and nutella macarons.