Paper Party: Cats and Dogs Birthday

This year my little girl turned 5, and she wanted to play her favorite game pretending to be a cat or a dog with her friends. After a few weeks searching for the perfect party supplies and invitations, I gave up on the big stores and decided to make my own. With a little construction paper and a dash of creativity I am convinced that ANY birthday party theme can be done best when it is home-made. Getting to choose the exact set of colors and design style for the favors made for a super-customezed birthday party experience that matched my little Anna’s style to a tee!

Starting with construction paper for the favors and birthday pennant banners to decorate the house, I set the color theme for the party. The next step was making a quick design plan and choosing foods, napkins, plates and balloons that matched. I’ve found that a growing number of party supply stores will carry a good selection of the basics in a wide variety of colors.

For this party, I chose to have favor bags that looked like cats and dogs, a mask and tail station for kids to decorate and dress-up as their favorite animal, and snack foods labeled as “doggy treats” and “kitty food”.

These kitty and doggy tags  are made from the same paper that I used for the banners and all of the other party supplies. It made for a very coordinated presentation. Making your own birthday party supplies is a guaranteed strategy to have a perfectly coordinated birthday party, no matter what you choose to create with them!

Some of you might be wondering where the designs come from for these party goodies. I spend a few days getting inspired online. I searched Pinterest and did some general Google image searches for cat and dog clip art until I gathered a handful of samples that looked cute. With the inspiration in front of me, I grabbed my pencil and paper and started to draw out my ideas. The next step was cutting paper templates to trace. I have to admit that this step took the better part of an afternoon experimenting with shapes and designs that did’t quite look right. But, a little persistence saw it through. The rest of the process was really fun, tracing cutting and gluing everything together. My kids even got to help along the way, which added to their anticipation of the party.

The end result was worth the hands-on effort. Paper, glue, scissors and tape came together to make a birthday party experience that was really fun! The whole littler of cats and dogs celebrated in masks, tails, and collars while parents and kids alike enjoyed an afternoon of games and birthday treats among the balloons and banners of Anna’s birthday party.

These macrons, done in all shades of pink, were a bit of an experiment and a learning exercise for my very trusting girlfriend who let me make them for her French-themed baby shower.  Fortunately, what they lacked in uniform structure and beauty (thanks to my lack of experience and French baking finesse) they made up for in great flavor and texture. It also helps that my girlfriend is a very talented photographer, designer, and has an eye for making everything beautiful.  She took these photos and really made them look amazing. If you’r just getting back from the bakery with your macaron, you must also take a minute and visit her site, Grace & Ivy. Soak in the beauty of her stories and photography of French-inspired vintage collectibles.

I digress. Now, back to the macarons…
If you are new to making macarons, the batter is a combination of an egg white meringue with sugars and flours. It is very delicate and can easily be disturbed. This often translates to bad results in the oven such as cracked tops, flat cookies, over baking and browning, raw centers or a host of other things that might leave you wanting to throw out the whole batch and start over. That said, the results are so tasty they are worth the effort.  Here is a good basic recipe and a few tips I discovered along the way.

You can see the imperfections, but they are trying to be good macarons!

French Vanilla Macarons
60g egg whites, room temperature
150g sugar
50g water
1 tsp vanilla exract
150g finely ground almond meal
150g powdered sugar
60g additional egg whites, room temperature

TIP #1: Weigh your ingredients to prevent the mixed results you might get from differences in egg sizes,  humidity, and the way ingredients might be packed or scooped into a measuring cup.

TIP #2: Have all of your ingredients fully warmed to room temperature. The eggs will hold their structure much better once they are whipped.

Baking Instructions

Make the meringue: Whip 60g egg whites in a free standing mixer until soft peaks form.  Meanwhile, heat the sugar, water and vanilla extract in a small saucepan over medium heat. Using a candy thermometer, stir and heat until the mixture reaches 140 F. Remove it from the heat immediately. Begin to mix the egg whites again at medium speed and slowly pour the sugar mixture along the side of the mixing bowl until it is fully incorporated. Turn the mixer speed to high and whip until thick glossy peaks form.

TIP #3: Mixing long enough to get stiff, glossy peaks to form the meringue is critical to getting stable, fluffy cookies. Otherwise, the batter might be too gooey and sticky to rise or come off the baking sheet later on.

Make the flour: Combine the almond meal and powdered sugar in a food processor and blend until the mixture is smooth. ( You can sift the ingredients together instead, but the food processor is much faster. ) Once blended, add the remaining 60g of egg whites and stir until a smooth creamy batter has formed. DO NOT whip these egg whites. If you’d like to add color to the batter, add it here and combine until fully incorporated.

Finish the batter: Start by adding one scoop of the meringue to the almond/sugar mixture. Gently fold it in until just incorporated. Add the rest of the meringue and gently fold in until the batter just barely drizzles smoothly off the end of a spoon.

Make the cookies: Transfer the batter to a piping bag with a large round tip. Make quarter-sized dots on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a Silpat. Let the unbaked cookies set out for one hour until a dry skin forms. (This will prevent cracking and make a nice smooth surface as they bake). Bake the cookies at 275 degrees for 5-7 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet and bake for another 5-7 minutes and remove from the oven. Do not let them brown.  Once the cookies have cooled for a few minutes, they should come off the parchment paper if gently pulled by hand. Using a spatula might damage the delicate texture of the cookie.

TIP #4: Drying the cookies is a critical step that cannot be skipped. It will make all the difference in the shape and texture of the cookie.

Final Assembly: Sandwich the cookies with a buttercream frosting or pastry filling of your choosing. The cookies can be stored in the fridge overnight and served the next day. They also freeze beautifully for a couple of weeks.

TIP #5: Enjoy!

The design: It took a while to think of a design that took the cake beyond the single-layer bundt shape the cake is baked in. I wanted this to look like a birthday cake and not a dessert dish for a summer barbeque. To change the shape a bit, I stacked and layered two store-bought angel food cakes. I had to trim the sides to make the cake nice and straight.  Not wanting to fight the delicate flavors of the cake, I also didn’t want to weigh the cake down with traditional buttercream frosting or fondant. This cake is covered in a light whipping cream frosting. Wanting to add a delicate vintage touch to the cake, I made a few quick gum paste flowers by rumpling circular-shaped cut outs and bunching them around a small round ball-shaped center.

Building the cake: I was delighted to find the angel food cake rather sturdy and resistant to tipping or collapsing with all of the handling that goes with stacking and layering a cake. It held up beautifully. I was also concerned about the sturdiness of the whipping cream frosting. I attempted to thicken a few batches with gelatin and other methods I researched online, but in the end, plain old whipped cream cream sweetened with sugar did just fine. It almost solidified as it was spread on the cake. It also piped very well and showed no signs of drooping.

The core of the angel food cake was also an issue. I didn’t want a big gaping hole left in the middle! This cake is filled with plain fresh strawberries, rinsed and dried thoroughly. I was worried about the juices seeping in to the cake, but they kept to themselves nicely for a good 24 hours after the cake was assembled.  And they made for a beautiful surprise when the cake was cut and served.

Here is a close-up of the gum paste flowers. These little details made an otherwise crude and rustic cake look light and delicate. The perfect touch!

Some Recipes: Pressed for time, I resorted to store-bought angel food cake, which I now regret. The following weekend I baked one from scratch that was incomparably better in both taste and tenderness. If you’ve never tried to bake angel food cake before, it is a MUST for your to do list this year. It’s surprisingly easy. All you need is the right pan and a few tips for your recipe.

- Use an angel food cake pan with straight sides and a hollow core through the middle. It provides the batter lots of surface area to cling to and helps it to grow tall, light and fluffy as it bakes.

- Do NOT use cooking spray or butter to coat your cake pan. The batter needs to stick to the pan walls to climb tall and fluffy. You will easily be able to loosen the cake by scraping a knife along the cake pan walls when it is cooled.

- Make sure all cake batter ingredients are ROOM TEMPERATURE. I warmed my eggs too much on the first attempt, and they never formed stiff peaks that are critical in a good angel food cake batter. Let your eggs sit at room temperature for 30 minutes or longer and they will whip up beautifully!

Whipped Cream Frosting Recipe:
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup granulated sugar

Unlike the angel food cake batter, this recipe works best when all of the ingredients are very COLD. Refrigerate your mixing bowl and whisk for 15-30 minutes ahead of time to give the ingredients a cold surface to mix against. When chilled, simply combine all ingredients in your mixing bowl and whip until stiff peaks form.

These Valentine’s boxes were from the $1.00 section at the front of Target in just plain red and white. Most of the goodies and Valentines cards were found at a local dollar store, so the whole project for 2 weeks of daily surprises for two kids cost right around $30.  Not bad!

I added the names and hearts on the sides and front to customize the valentine boxes. I wanted these to become a special part of our holiday traditions

After considering regular acrylic craft paint, decals or puff paints, I decided that nail polish would have the nicest finish and last the longest through a couple seasons of kid use.  To make sure the lettering stayed straight and even, I used masking tape to to section off the area. Then I used a pencil to outline each letter before I attempted to apply the nail polish.  I also used masking tape to make the bottom point of the hearts nice and even and centered. The top round parts were done free hand.

If you are going to make these at home, plan to do 2-3 coats of nail polish for the red on a white valentines box, and a good 4-6 coats for white polish on the red box. Don’t be startled if the first coat comes out looking uneven and bumpy! Let each coat dry for 30 minutes and keep applying. With enough refining, the it will become more even and solid.

After experimenting with puff paints and sticker decals, I decided that nail polish

This awesome appetizer may look like sushi, but it’s the farthest thing from it. If you can believe it, or if you’ve seen the recipe on TV from Food Network Chef Guy Fieri,  these rolls are stuffed with an assortment of your favorite bar food fare. We made a big batch of these for a Super Bowl party and stuffed ourselves sick. They were such an amazing combination of tastes and textures of dishes that we’d never experienced together before.  The light chewiness of the rice roll and wrapper was combined with the tangy savory deliciousness of BBQ pork, hot fresh french fries, and fresh avocado.  Check out the original Gringo Sushi recipes on Guy’s website and be inspired to roll up your own combination of ingredients!

Besides the amazing taste, the real fun of serving this dish is all in the presentation. It’s fine dining meets pub food. These bite-sized treats have all of the visual appeal and finesse you get from a traditional sushi dish with all the comfort and down-home  tastes of a BBQ and burger joint.

THE RECIPE:
To make the rolls, prepare your filling ingredients ahead of time. Choose any combination of foods that sound good to you.

You will need:
Sushi rice
Rice wrappers
Bamboo sushi rolling mat
Sushi ingredients (such as fries, onion rings, meats, veggies, etc.)
Dipping sauces (such as chipotle mayo, wasabi, BBQ sauce, etc.)

For this version, we got our filling ready first.  The fries were cooked, the pork was sauced up and simmered for a few hours, and the avocado was thinly sliced.  The rest of the process was just like making traditional sushi. We cooked shushi rice according to package instructions, pulled out our bamboo rolling mat, and began to layer ingredients over a softened rice wrapper laid out flat.  After rolling things up, we sliced our Gringo Sushi into 1-2″ portions and set them  face-up on a platter for serving.  Chipotle mayonnaise and a bit of wasabe make great condiments.

Here are the recipes:

Raspberry Buttercream
1 cup unsalted butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon table salt
1/2 cup Raspberry jelly
1 teaspoon vanilla
2-4 oz. whipping cream

Whip the butter until pale yellow and fluffy. Add salt, vanilla, and raspberry jelly and combine for 1 minute until incorporated into the butter. On low speed, add the powdered sugar until mixed in thoroughly. Add the whipping cream, 1 oz. at a time,  and return to high speed when mixed in. Whip until light and fluffy.

Raspberry Jelly
2 cups fresh or frozen raspberries
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice
3 teaspoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon water

Heat and mash the raspberries and sugar over medium heat in a sauce pan. When bubbling, incorporate the lemon juice.  While it’s still hot, pour the mixture through a strainer into a second bowl separate out the seeds.  Pour the seedless raspberry mixture to the sauce pan and set heat to low. Combine the cornstarch and water and mix  into a smooth paste, then add it to the raspberry mixture. Cook over low heat until thickened and let it cool completely.

Toba Garret’s Devil’s Food Cake
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour (287 grams)
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar (285 grams)
3/4 cups dark brown sugar (170 grams)
1 cup dutch process cocoa (110 grams)
2 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 1/4 cups buttermilk
1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
2 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
6 oz. melted semisweet chocolate

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and line 2 9-inch baking dishes with parchment paper covering the bottoms. Measure and add all ingredients (except the melted chocolate chocolate) into a large mixing bowl. Blend 30 seconds at low speed. Blend in the melted chocolate slowly, scraping the bowl constantly. Beat for three minutes on high speed, scraping the bowl. Spoon into pans and level with a spatula. Bake layers for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean

Colors are the key to making a simple cake really pop. Here is a close-up of the green beaded buttercream border. You can see where I used a damp fingertip to flatten the points that were left from application with the piping tip. The white polka dots are finger-flattened buttercream as well. The flowers and cake board covering are all done out of fondant.  I always like to add a finishing splash of color and polish by wrapping the cake board in ribbon. The red mirrors the top of the cake and balances the colors out a bit.

To keep things simple for this birthday cake, I used a toy doll and embellished it with some fondant decoration. The stem shooting out the top is floral wire with fondant rolled around it. I left 3″ at the bottom to insert to the cake.

To accompany the cake and develop the Strawberry Shortcake theme, I also made a few cake pops out of Rice Krispy Treats and dipped them in red chocolate with some sprinkles. They  added a little of a wow factor to the party without taking up so many hours of preparation as an ornate cake design. The packaging and display of these goodies is really what makes them something special.

The cake had a rather intimidating start as a pile of wires. I happily left the electronic part of the project to my husband while I tended to the baking. It took both of us, however to fit the wiring up inside the tubes of licorice that would later run up the sides of the cake and hold the LED lights around the top edge of the cake. The licorice was a key to keeping the wiring elements separate from the edible portions of cake. It also kept it from becoming a fire hazard!

Aaah, here the cake comes together a little bit. Two layers of cake on a thin cardboard base stood on top of a nest of wires. You can see how the wiring was ran up one string of licorice, connected to an LED light, and ran back down the other side. This hid all of the ugly electronics work quite nicely. They only other challenge was concealing the battery pack which powered the whole thing. My solution was to tape it to the cake pedestal and cover it with curly ribbon.

After the wiring basics were in place, it was time to fill in the remaining surfaces with candy. This cake held almost 2 packs of Red Vines licorice, half a bag of Skittles sprinkled on top, 2 packs of Sour Patch ropes, and one large box of Nerds.

My son and his friends was in heaven with the candy overload, and they were blown away by the flashing LED lights. It caught a ton of attention and interest at the party venue that day. The effort was a bit extreme, but in the end it was totally worth it.

As a side note, we made a bunch of cupcakes sprinkled with Nerds and Skittles just in case the flashing lights made any of the guests skeptical about eating the cake. In the end, everything was devoured. It was a big hit!

It all started when my  niece told me about “the cutest” clothing line she ran into at Target with little monkeys.  I knew that she loved them for her babies, so why not use them as the theme for her shower? I took a quick trip to Target and snapped a few pictures of the clothes to get started.

I loaded the photos  onto my computer and traced them using Adobe Illustrator and made print-outs as my patterns. After that, it was a matter of cutting, tracing, more cutting and gluing. I’ll admit it, it was a couple of nights of work, but so much fun to make these little guys.

I also wanted to add a bunch of color without having to resort to crate paper streamers. By cutting large triangles out of 12″ square paper I bought at the craft store, I was able to string them together and make some really adorable pendant banners to hang all over the house.  Each sheet of paper made 6 triangles about 6″ tall and 4″ wide. I used regular old sewing thread and a needle to string them together. When the party was done, they folded into nice little bundles that I can save for use at another party.

There are a host of other ways that I applied the monkey design in preparing for the party. Once the design was set, it was really easy to copy and paste the images onto all sorts of things.

Here is a picture of all things monkey for the shower. I printed and assembled the invitations at home. I also printed my own monkey stickers and used them on the envelopes.  All of the prizes for games and favors were also labeled and tagged with matching monkey labels.

Here is a close-up of the favors. To celebrate her boy and girl twins, I carried a pink and blue theme through almost everything. The blue candies are Nutella-filled chocolate cups, and the pink ones are peanut butter filled chocolate cups. I could have left them out on a plate, but wrapping them up and putting a little tag on really made them feel like something special.

Balloons were an easy and very affordable way to get a lot of impact for little effort. I set a few bouquets around the house to really make the pink and blue effect pop.

Here’s where creativity in the kitchen set in. Wherever possible, the foods were colored to match the theme too.

I chose to make my own brunch muffins for use of the pink and blue liners, and, well…. it was just another good reason to make macarons too!

Here are the macarons how they were served at the party – all sorted by color. I made one big batch of batter and split into two before adding the food coloring.

All in all, it turned out to be a great shower. I feel a little spoiled because I got to have all the fun planning and putting things together.  Best of all, my niece was very happy with her special day and even asked to take some of the decorations home to use in her nursery. That made it worth every ounce of effort!

With a crunchy exterior and softy chewy interior, macaroons are notoriously difficult to bake. At first read the recipe seemed intimidating, but a second review gave me confidence. The original author piped her macaroons into  adorable heart shapes, but I played it safe and stuck to a simple drop-cookie shape.  I think I will try the hearts my next go around.

A Tribute to Macaroons
If you are new to macaroons, they can me made in any color and flavor combination the imagination can dream of. They are beautiful, each one having it’s own unique personality, but all sharing the same qualities of that amazing crunchy, fluffy, chewy texture. They are worth trying!

Back to the Valentines recipe
This recipe called for  an almond-flour dough combined with an Italian meringue mixture (hot sugar syrup and fluffy egg whites) to form the cookies. The filling is a cinnamon buttercream frosting that is delicious in its own right. As the author noted, the little amount of  cocoa added for a red velvet flavor in the cookies didn’t really come through. The end result tasted more of almonds and cinnamon – a very tasty combination! We served these chewy and creamy treats to our guests the day of baking and let them sit out overnight. The cookies got even more fluffy and tender the next day.

Here is the recipe from Delectable Delicousness. Enjoy!

Red Velvet Valentine Macarons
adapted from Kitchen Musings

for the TPT (tant pour tant)
300 grams almond flour
300 grams confectioner’s sugar
110 grams aged egg whites
1/2 teaspoon cocoa powder
red food coloring (I used a gel coloring)

Sift together the almond flour and confectioner’s sugar. Mix in the egg whites to create the “mass” (mixture will be very thick). Add in your desired amount of red food coloring and mix well. Note: I didn’t measure the amount I used, I just kept adding until I had a bright red color, keeping in mind that the color will be diffused a bit when the Italian meringue is added.

for the Italian meringue
300 grams granulated sugar
75 grams water
110 grams aged egg whites

Bring water and sugar to a boil until it reaches 239F on a candy thermometer. Start whipping your egg whites in a stand mixer to soft peaks once your sugar/water mixture reaches 239F. Continue boiling your sugar/water mixture while simultaneously whipping your egg whites.

Once the sugar/water mixture reaches 245F, remove from the stove and let bubbles settle. Turn your mixer to low-medium speed and slowly pour in your sugar syrup mixture while continuing to beat the whites. Beat until you get soft peaks that gently food over when you turn the whisk upside down.

Preheat your oven to 350F

Fold in 1/4 of your meringue mixture into the TPT “mass” to lighten the mixture. Gently fold in the remaining meringue until the mixture “flows like magma”. Transfer to two pastry bags with a plain tip. Pipe cookies onto parchment-lined baking sheets and bake at 350F for 12-20 minutes.

Cinnamon Buttercream
adapted from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking

3/4 cup sugar
1/8 cup flour
3/4 cup milk
1/8 cup heavy cream
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, soft but cool, cut into small pieces
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon

In a saucepan, whisk the sugar and flour together. Add the milk and cream and cook, whisking occasionally, until mixture comes to a boil and thickens. (recipe states “about 20 minutes” but my mixture thickened in under 10)

Transfer the mixture to the bowl of stand mixer and beat on high, using the paddle attachment, until cool. Reduce mixer speed to low and add the butter, piece by piece, beating until thoroughly incorporated. Add the vanilla and cinnamon. Increase speed to medium-high and beat until frosting is light and fluffy. If frosting is too soft, chill in the refrigerator and then beat again until proper consistency.