Month 4 (2011) - Hamburger Helper

For April, my husband wanted me to try Hamburger Helper. He really wanted me to try the cheeseburger macaroni Hamburger Helper, and I wanted to try the crunchy taco Hamburger Helper. Since we couldn't agree, I said I would try both. Then I found a coupon for 75 cents off of any 3 hamburger helpers, so we had to pick a 3rd for me to try! We chose the four cheese lasagna.

The cheeseburger macaroni was just OK for me. I have never really liked meat mixed with noodles, so although the overall flavor was good, the texture kind of bothered me. I would eat this again, but not all the time.

Surprisingly, I really LOVED the crunchy taco one. The flavor was just like a taco, and I think I enjoyed it because it is made with rice instead of noodles. I will 100% be buying this again!

I haven't tried the lasagna one yet, but I suspect it will be similar to the cheeseburger one.

I give the cruncy taco meal a 10 out of 10 and other hamburger helper flavors a 7 out of 10.

April Cupcakes (Birthday & New Baby)

For my husbands birthday, we had a party at Dave and Busters. If I brought a cake, I was told there would be a $50 cake cutting fee! I guess this is because they would need to provide us with plates and forks. Since I didn't want to pay for that, I decided to make cupcakes instead! Greg wanted funfetti cupcakes, so that is what I made with blue buttercream frosting and sprinkles! Simple, but classic.

In addition to it being Greg's birthday in April, my sister-in-law had a baby girl! Her request was that I make chocolate cupcakes with cherry filling to celebrate the birth. I bought cherry pie filling, blended it up and inserted it into the cupcake using the Wilton cupcake filling tip. Since I had extra cherry filling, I decided to try mixing some with the buttercream frosting I made. The frosting tasted a bit fruity and had bits of cherry in it, perfectly complementing the cherry chocolate filling. For the baby girl, I made them pink with purple flowers!

Wilton Gumpaste and Fondant: Week Four

Week Four was spent entirely decorating our cake. We started by rolling out our fondant. This was the easy part, although I think I rolled mine out a little to thin. Once we got the fondant on our cake, we were supposed to lift and smooth it out until it set nicely around the cake. Since my cake was so tall (three layers of strawberry and white cake with fresh strawberry's in between) it was very hard to get the fondant to lay flat. I had a lot of folds in the fondant, and since it was so thin it started tearing.

My original plan was to put light purple and yellow stripes on the cake. As I started adding the stripes, I realized that if I also added dark purple stripes the same color as the fondant on the cake, it completely covered up the sides and the folds/tears. At this point I was very satisfied. I know it wasn't perfect, but it was pretty good for my first try!

I then added the carnations, daisy's and calla lilies that I prepared before class and then the leaves. Overall, I was very satisfied about the way it turned out! I can't wait to try using fondant again on my next cake and perfecting my skills.

Wilton Gumpaste and Fondant: Week Three

During week three of the gumpaste and fondant class, we learned how to make a mum and daisy. I purchased some shimmer powder to use when I make flowers, and I added some purple to the daisy. I don't like the way it turned out, but when used correctly I think it will add some nice sparkle to the flowers.


In addition, we covered a cake board with fondant, to be used in class 4 for our final cake. I went with yellow. I have decided that I wanted to make a purple and yellow cake with white flowers. Pictures to come!

Wilton Gumpaste and Fondant: Week Two

This week in class we finished the roses, calla lilies and carnations we started last week. They took a long time, but I think they turned out great and I will most likely use some of these flower types on top of my cake the last week of class!

I'm not sure what I will do when these classes are over. I really enjoy being creative every Wednesday for a few hours, it is a really good stress releaser! Until next time...

Wilton Gumpaste and Fondant: Week One

I was very excited to start my next Wilton class. I learned a few things in the decorating basics, but there were a lot of things I already knew. I have never worked with fondant, so I had a lot to learn!

The first week we spent time learning how to roll, cut and dye the fondant. We prepped some flower bases for next week and we were also tasked with making a bow! I chose teal for my bow color and I was very pleased with how it turned out.

I let the bow sit and harden, and Thursday night my husband said his coworkers had Thursday cake with drawl. I told him that if he baked the cake I would decorate it with some left over chocolate frosting and the bow I made.

He got out the yellow cake mix, and I was shocked when he started adding peanut butter and Heath bits. I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but it tasted delicious! I decorated it with frosting, lined the edges with Heath and set the bow on top! Oh, did I forget to mention that the middle is layered with banana? YUMMY! This is our chocolate, peanut butter, toffee, banana cake creation:

Month 3 (2011) - Meatloaf

My food to taste for the month, decided by my husband, was meatloaf. Myy biggest problem with meatloaf in the past has been that I don't like the shape. Meat shouldn't be shaped like bread. As I was thinking about this, I started wondering why it had to be in a loaf pan, I have been making a lot of cupcakes lately so why couldn't I make mini meatloafs in the cupcake pan?

It turns out that I wasn't the first one to think of this (duh...) so when I Goggled it I got all sorts of ideas! Some people even put mashed potatoes on top of the meatloaf to make it look like frosting. Once I saw this, I knew I had to do it!

I think they turned out really cute, and most of all they didn't taste all that bad. My husband liked them a lot and as I have said of the other two months of tasting food I thought I hated, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be!

I give this meal a 6 out of 10.