Sweet...

by Karolina, 31st March 2012

...and for the end of my book-party theme some sweets. Actually desserts galore :)

Yes, I told you it was quite a lot of sweetness there:
- black and white cheesecake
- quick chocolate mousse (more on it below)
- licorice cupcakes
- chocolate cake
- Earl Grey madeleines
- home-made Raffaelo
- chocolate clouds
- variation on Polish cake called "Karpatka"
- not visible on the picture but still there: kiwi pops and home-made Rocher

I hope your sugar levels are still in norm :)

OK, I do like sweets. If ,by now, you haven't noticed :P
I composed this dessert table to keep the book-theme of the party.
So, first of all it's all black & white - which is not that difficult to obtain in desserts while using loads of chocolate, coconut, whipped cream etc.
I added french madeleines - because they remind me of the book-theme (famous Proust's madeleines) but as well these contained Earl Grey tea which is my boyfriend's favourite.
Following his tastes I created licorice cupcakes (check Sweetalopita's ones) but because I didn't have anise flavour,I actually used star anise finely grounded in mortar. I got a few compliments on these- as they combined sweetness of vanilla cupcakes and whipped cream with strong flavour of licorice - give it a try (if you like licorice of course).
My favourite dessert thought was the simplest but the most attractive one (at least for me)....
Chocolate mousse shots.
I made it previously for my sister's bridal shower and it was a hit. Couldn't be simpler though...
Whipped cream + cocoa powder + sugar + alcohol (in this case whisky). Really!

Ok, I'll be more specific if you need:
1 cup of heavy cream (at least 30%)
2-3 spoons of cocoa (good dark chocolate one)
2-3 spoons of sugar
1-2 spoons of alcohol - I used whisky but you can try any liqueur or just omit is it's for children

Whisk the cream until well set - about 3-4minutes. Be careful not to make a butter out of it though.
Slowly add sugar and cocoa powder (make sure you don't make a mistake of adding all cocoa at ones and having it all on your face and apron, as I did ;)). Add alcohol (if using). Done :)

For party presentation:
- use piping bag to divide cream between little shot glasses
- for easy eating and nicer presentation I used ribbon to attach little spoon to each glass with mousse

How do you like this dessert table?

Mini birthday cake

By Karolina, 25th March 2012

As I mentioned in my previous post, it was my other half's birthday on Thursday.
The main party and celebrations were on Friday (all about it in the next couple of days), but I thought that it would be nice to make a mini cake for bday boy which he could enjoy on his Big Day :)

It wasn't easy to set my mind on one cake. At the end I went for something rather simple but still yummy: Krazy Cake from Kitchen Chronicles. It's really quick and simple chocolate cake (without eggs). But because it was supposed to be a mini-cake, I went with the idea from Oh Happy Day and baked the cake in the can. I think it's a brilliant idea and surely will do it again.

It worked pretty well. To decorate I used almonds and cute silver cake decorations.Between the layers to make it little less sweet I used black currant jam, but really any jam or marmalade would work.
I'm not the most patient person, so the end look is a little bit messy. But well, not everything has to be 100% perfect all the time, right? A little distort look is surely fashionable :)

The most important is that the most important person liked it :)

And how do You like it?
I'd love to hear from you...