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Monday, January 31, 2011

Cookie cutters arrived!

I have impatiently patiently waited for the arrival of my new cookie cutters from Bake It Pretty! I wanted to order several more, but figure it would be a good idea to try these first and go from there. First in line will be the gnomes and mushrooms, in honor of the upcoming movie Gnomeo and Juliet.

Here they are, top left to bottom right: Frog, Snowflake, Cupcake, Folk Christmas tree, Ladybug, Bumblebee, Small strawberry, Gnome and Mushroom.

Friday, January 28, 2011

Swedish baking today

I just recently got this recipe from my Mom, who got it from her sister-in-law, Elsie. So they'll be called Elsie's what? Rolls? Breads? In Swedish, they're called Tekakor, whish translates to Tea cookies/cakes. But they are more like bread rolls. Anyway, they turned out delish! We eat them with jam and cheese. I see lots of these in the future, for 'fika' meetings. Fika is a Swedish term, un-translateable. It's a get-together with friends or family, and coffee is always involved. Often baked goods are too! Fika is definately part of the Swedish life style.

Here's the batch, fresh out of the oven (I got to use my new circle cookie cutters):



All dolled up, with cheese and apricot jam :



Here's the recipe, using metric measurements. Converted American recipe to follow at some point...

3dl milk
1.5 dl oats
50gr butter or margarine
1 tbs Swedish sirap (molasses)
2 tsp salt
2 dl cold milk (yes you use milk twice)
2 pkg yeast
8+3 dl wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder

Mix 3 dl milk and the oats in small pan and let it cook on low-medium heat until it's oatmeal-y in texture; I think it took 3-4 minutes at the most. Pull pan off stove and add margarine and mix until melted. Add sirap (molasses), salt and the rest of the milk.add the yeast and pour everything into your mixer. Add 8dl of flour.

In separate bowl, mix 3dl flour and baking powder. Add to other ingredients and mix until it doesn't stick to the edges of the bowl anymore.

Roll out dough and cut out circles (3-4" diameter) with cookie cutter. 

Place on parchement lined cookie sheets and let them rise for 40 mins.

Bake in 435F oven, for 10 minutes.



Sunday, January 23, 2011

Cake ball order

I just finished decorating the cake balls for my latest order. She wanted them with purple and green decorations and instead of using sprinkles, I used purple and green candy melts and drizzled that on top. I really need to get myself a nice camera so I can take snazzy pictures! I hope she likes them; delivery at 4.30 pm.
Trying for a close-up.

The entire tray of cake balls.

Just another view of the tray. I like this decorating technique!

Friday, January 21, 2011

Hooked already!

It was sooo much fun! I wish I had made a whole batch instead of ½ batch, because it sure was a lot of work with all the colors of icing etc. I think they turned out nice. Excuse the poor lighting, it was late at night and I wanted to snap a few pictures before the cookies got eaten! I used pretty stiff icing for the flooding at first, and it was hard to get it all the way to the edges. I thinned it out and it worked great. I'm a little shaky-handed, so the black lines aren't perfect, but not too shabby for a newbie, huh?

The prettiest ones made it back to the cookie sheet for a picture session

Freehanded cupcake.

Butterfly with 'marbled' details.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

First batch is in the oven!

I have made many cookies throughout the years, yet I have never braved decorated sugar cookies. I stumbled across Sweetopia a while back and just fell in love with her cookie decorating skills. Earlier today I received a suggestion on Facebook for a buddying cookie decorating business in Hawaii called Sugar HI Creations. So I thought I'd give it a whirl too. Bought cookie cutters and food color at Hobby Lobby, which has turned into a favorite shop stop for baking supplies. So now I made ½ batch of cookies. Didn't want to over-do it! They are cooling and I'm going to decorate them later. Updates to follow!