Red Velvet Cupcakes

I wanted to make the girliest cake for my manly little bro's birthday.  There was going to be a bunch of little girls from our friends so I thought even better!  

I decided on cupcakes, mini cupcakes.  

What's better than vibrant red cake and white frosting with more red decorations.  Can't be more girly than that.  

I also love fresh fruit in my desserts so I added fresh raspberries.  Red velvet cakes are such classic flavors that I've never added a fresh component, but I loved it and will do that for future version of this cake.

It turnout really cute!  Very girly!  

Nishino's

Last week, Samad and I went to eat at Nishino's for some sushi.  I forget how good this place is.  I usually come here for birthdays. It's my mom's favorite sushi place.  Just simple good quality food...no frills and trends.  Like Carrie said in SITC about George Cloony...like a timeless Chanel suit.  This is how I feel about Nishino's.  

We sat the sushi bar and Samad asked the chef to just make him something special and here are what he had.  I can't recall the names.

I, on the other hand stuck to the veggie items that I like...

Cucumber Roll.  Can't go wrong with this.

Veggie Tempera

For dessert, he let me choose and thought we should keep it light and had the Shiso Sorbet with Azuki Red Bean Compote.  Shiso is a Japanese mint like herb, leaf.  We eat this in Korean food too as a savory item, usually marinated in soy sauce, red peppers, and other spices.  We then wrap a little rice inside and eat it.  At first bite the dessert tasted a bit strange, like when you have a shot of wheat grass, but then when you ate it with the Azuki, it tasted better.  After finishing...it wasn't that bad.  It wasn't a dessert though.  More like a palate cleanser.

Having the sweet tooth that I do, I had to have something more decadent.  So, we also had some cupcakes at Cupcake Royale.

Happy New Year!

Happy 2011 my dear friends and thank you for paying attention to my little world of food!  It's such a passion of mine and I love very minute of it.  This holiday season has been so wonderful baking and spending time with all the people I care about. 


I expect 2011 to be another tremendous year of food for me.  I hope to grow in my food techniques, expand my creativity and design of food, and make it more serious then the hobby it has been.  Expect more goodies my friends.  I will be eating more healthy but it shouldn't stop my baking.  :)


New year's eve was a great start!  My friends Hamed and Pascale hosted a night of fabulous food, friends, and good times.  I made the desserts for the night of Red Velvet Cupcakes and Pecan Cranberry Bars.   Other folks brought some delicious food and of course Hamed cooked some mean meat and had the drinks flowing.


Red Velvet Cupcakes

Pecan Cranberry Bars

Veggie Crudites and Dip

Caesar Salad

Caprese Salad
I love the little cheese.  Always find the cheese is a bit much in this salad so the mini ones were perfect

Spanikopeta
I always buy these frozen so was good to try some home made ones.

Chicken Wings

Taziki Yogurt Sauce

Lamb
Sometimes I wish I could eat meat.

Veggies
Always thinking of of us veggies and vegans.

Steamed Rice

Oatmeal Cookies

Hamed the gracious host cooking away!

Salty Chocolate Cupcake

It was Marisella's 30th birthday celebration this weekend!  I made her mini cupcakes with chocolate espresso cake and chocolate butter cream frosting.  I bought 3 different salts:  Smoked, Hawaiian clay, and classic Fleur de Sel.  It was the latter that tasted the best...

2 Birthdays in 1 Day

This past Saturday, there was an afternoon 2 year old party and then a 30 something birthday dinner that I was going to bring cakes for.  I thought cupcakes would be good since they are portable and at restaurants we don't need to have them slice and plate.  (One time at Poppy restaurant,  we had 2 different birthday cakes and they charged us like $3 per person per cake so doubled the plate charge so moving on will only bring cupcakes for restaurant events.)

Here is same cake with 2 variations of frosting.

• Cake was basic simple chocolate made with sour cream
• Frosting 1 was milk chocolate buttercream with choc shavings
• Frosting 2 was espresso laced chocolate buttercream