Cheesecake Icing

If you've ever tried one of my cheesecake cupcakes, you'll know how great this stuff tastes. If you haven't, you don't know what you're missing! This icing tastes exactly like cheesecake...thick, creamy, and delicious! No more beating around the bush; lets get straight to the point! I know...it's cruel posting the picture of the entire cupcake but it's the only picture I have of the icing. BUT...stayed tune next Saturday (02/11/12) for the recipe for this delicious Blueberry Cheesecake cupcake. Though I bet you could piece together a recipe yourself.

Ingredients

• 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, cream together the cream cheese and butter until creamy. Mix in the vanilla, then gradually stir in the confectioners' sugar. Store in the refrigerator after use.

*This is a recipe from allrecipes.com

Chocolate Buttercream

Whenever I have a cupcake or cake topped with chocolate icing, this is my go to recipe. I absolutely love it and so far, so does everybody else. My sister has said it taste almost like fudge. I'm sharing this because I will be posting my Chocolate Passion cupcake recipe this weekend and this chocolate buttercream recipe is a must have.

Cash Budget Envelope System

I'm sure most of you have heard of using the cash budget system. It's been made popular by Dave Ramsey but honestly, it's little more than common sense. When we have cash on hand, we're more reluctant to get rid of it...or at least I am. And that's the main idea behind the cash budget system. You don't use debit cards, credit cards or checks. You use strictly cash.
This method is great for a multitude of reasons: you're less willing to hand over a $20 bill for some $5 frivolous item than you are to slide a debit or credit card; you can visually see where your money is going and realize more quickly when you're about to go over-budget...in fact, you can't really go over-budget with this method; you keep better track of where you use your cash than you do where you use your debit card; and if you're anything like me, I detest using $1 bills (such a pain!) so they just pile up which can add up to big 'savings'.

Cakes of the week!

The winter is usually a little slow for me but now that spring is just around the corner, I'm starting to get in quite a few cake orders. Now that I'll have new cakes to do, I'd like to take the opportunity to share them with you. At the end of each week, I'll post that weeks cakes. This week it will only be one cake.

Sweet Saturdays ~ Samoa cupcakes

Yes, I realize that today is Sunday but yesterday was pretty busy for us and for some reason, I was unusually tired. I think I took a nap at about 5:30pm and woke up at 8am. Now THAT is tired. Luckily, I have an awesome husband that let me do it!
I recently got a nice order for cupcakes for next week. It's only a total of 2 dozen cupcakes but the customer ordered 6 different flavors. Yes, its more work for me but I've really been wanting to start posting some of my recipes plus take some better pictures. Unfortunately, the order isn't until next week and I am not a baker who bakes that far in advance. Then I remembered, I have a few nice photos of some of my cupcakes.

Sweet Gifts: Towel Cakes

We've all seen or heard of diaper cakes, right? Well, have you ever heard of a towel cake? They aren't really that uncommon but definitely not as popular as diaper cakes. I've made my fair share of towel cakes; probably more than I've made diaper cakes. But that's just because I think they're a great, unusual gift to give. What occasion would you gift a towel cake? Really for anything but one of my most favorites is for bridal showers. The concept is the same as with a diaper cake: you make the basic cake frame and then load it up with goodies.

Caramel Apple Pork Chops

Let me just say...these are DELICIOUS! I'm not really a big pork fan but I'll eat it when I have to. Unfortunately, I married a pork fan so that is usually more often than I'd like. Growing up, I can't remember my parents making too many pork products. The only pork dish that I remember is pork roast and apple sauce. And that was always one of my favorites. It must be the apples.

Cinnamon Rolls

Despite what you may think, I don't do much baking for my family most of the year. I just don't like to heat up my house that much. It's different if I'm getting paid to do it. But once the cold weather hits, my ovens are on non-stop. This week alone we've made 4 batches of cinnamon rolls.

Houston...we have a problem...

Do you have something you do that you always do a certain way? I know certain people who drink their orange juice before they eat their cereal, or reading the sports section of the paper first. I'm sure you all can think of something. For me: I double my recipes.

DIY Coffee Liqueur

Recently, I was searching around on Pinterest for anything that I might like. I've found so many great ideas on there; you just never know what you'll find. Such as homemade vanilla extract. I have some steeping right now so once it's done, I'll be sure to write a post about it.

In the meantime, I found a great recipe for homemade coffee liqueur.

A slow start to a new year.

The very first year that I started baking (for profit) we had very distinct business periods. I was the most busy in the summer; when people are gathering together for graduations, birthdays, weddings, etc. About mid-fall, things began to die down and eventually, during in winter I didn't do much, if any business. Then in the spring, things started to pick up again.