25 before 26 « GOODKNITS // a knitting & crochet blog

coconut + pecans = bliss

By Lisa Gutierrez on 11/01/2010

This is probably the least-Halloweenish cupcake ever (minus the awesome Martha Stewart cupcake liners I got on sale the day before)! However, it’s the only part of the day my husband requested. And not even directly. That guy can’t make a food decision to save his life! But he did say it was one of his favorites and I really wanted to try it, so I made them.

I originally planned to turn them into cute owls or scary werewolves, with candy and piped frosting and blah blah blah. I’m pretty gnarly at planning and ended up making the frosting while cooking dinner, so needless to say, I ran out of time. They still looked pretty sweet–

cupcake of the month.7: German Chocolate

I got this recipe from my aunt. It’s the one she uses when she makes this enormous german chocolate bunny cake every Easter. It.is.scruuuuumptious!

Ingredients:
1 egg
5 1/3 oz can of evaporated milk
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter
dash of salt
1 1/3 cup flaked coconut
1/2 cup chopped pecans

Directions
In a saucepan, beat egg lightly. Stir in milk, sugar, butter, and salt. Cook and stir over medium heat for 12 minutes, or until thick and bubbly. Stir in coconut and pecans. Cool thoroughly, then spread on cake (or cupcakes!)

I would double for layer cakes. I was only able to frost about 12-13 cupcakes.

If you try the recipe, I hope you like it! October had 2 cupcakes because I accidentally skipped a month somewhere! I’m all caught up and brainstorming ideas for November’s cupcake recipe. Any suggestions??

p.s.! don’t forget to enter my giveaway, lovelies!

July Cupcake

By Lisa Gutierrez on 07/30/2010

cupcake of the month.4: peanut butter on chocolate

Here’s my cupcake of the month, just in the nick of time! I was really craving chocolate, last weekend, but never got around to making the cupcakes. I had some extra time, yesterday evening, and whipped these up. I used the chocolate cupcake recipe on joyofbaking.com and a peanut butter frosting recipe from allrecipes.com.

They came out pretty delicious. The cupcakes were moist and not overly sweet, which is a plus for me. The frosting tasted like the center of a Reese’s peanut butter cup, so that was pretty rad. My kids absolutely LOVED them. Especially Nathan, who usually isn’t into baked goods if they don’t involve a certain song and presents afterward. I’d call these a success.

!!PLUS!! Anytime I get to use all of my mixing bowls at once makes me smile inside. There’s something about these vintage Butterprint Pyrex bowls that gets my blood a-flowin’.

Taste the rainbow [cupcake]

By Lisa Gutierrez on 05/20/2010

Today has been all sorts of awesome. Andrew actually slept in and so I got to putter around in the morning. After breakfast, he noticed my [naked] cupcakes on the table and promptly requested one. I couldn’t deny the birthday boy a cupcake, so I split it with him. He loved it. A little bit later, I frosted them and sent two on their way with my mom, who was picking up Nate at school, to give to his teachers.

While we were waiting for Nate & Grandma to return, my sister and I took Andrew outside for some birthday photos with the cupcakes.

I told you they were pretty! I didn’t get a chance to get a photo of the insides, but believe me when I say they are awesome! It was a beautiful little surprise when you split it. Everyone who had one loved it. Especially this little guy.

Nathan requested a giant rainbow cake for his birthday (2 weeks away)! I can’t wait! I used this recipe as a general guideline to making them. My only tip would be to put only 1t of each color batter in the [baking] cups, instead of 2. You wouldn’t have enough batter to do 2 and they’d be huge with 10t of batter. One was sufficient!

—
#4 on my 25 before 26 list is to try a new cupcake recipe each month.

Fruits of my packing…

By Lisa Gutierrez on 05/12/2010

Yesterday, I made a big dent in sorting/packing/purging. The best part about it isn’t that I’m that much closer to being done. No. It’s that I’ve been able to unearth a few projects that just got lost in the shuffle. One of them was my English paper-piecing project. I originally intended this to be blanket-sized, but when I saw it yesterday, I thought it would look great on a canvas, as a wall decoration. When I picked it up this morning, though, I wanted a pillow. I wanted to be able to cuddle it. So, I got to work. I finished up the corner hexes and then I quilted it to a piece of cotton batting (with embroidery floss). I used some cloth napkins to make an envelope back and sewed it up, early this afternoon. It’s pretty.

Baby no more

By Lisa Gutierrez on 05/10/2010

I should probably stop calling him my baby. He’s the youngest, though, so he might be stuck with the “baby” nickname for all eternity. Or until I’m brave enough to get pregnant again (oh, the VOMIT!).

He’s growing up fast! Because I knew he’d hate the long drive and then the long ceremony, I timidly suggested he stay with grandma while I went out of town. Afterall, daddy was going to take Nathan to his first baseball game and I knew Andy wouldn’t really like that.

It took a bit, but we solidified our plans and I kissed his sleeping face goodbye, early Saturday morning. Later that afternoon, he got dropped off at grandma’s.

And we never heard from him again.

I KID! To my complete and utter surprise, he did wonderfully! Nary a fuss! In fact, when we went over early Sunday afternoon, he was happily riding a bike in the driveway. I asked if he wanted to go and he kinda pulled back. As if to say, “no way, Jose. I’m at Grandma’s!” Alas, we had plans to go to Grandpa’s, so we had to head out pronto. With promises of a prompt return, I buckled him up and off we went for a few hours.

I’ll have you note, it was now over 24 hours since he last nursed! Pretty amazing. We spent a few hours at Jason’s dad’s, where I smelled a magnolia for the first time.