Contessa cupcakes via Moore Wilsons

A couple of days ago when at Moore Wilsons I picked up a few cupcakes to share with a friend and D. Moore Wilsons is like a wholesale/trade specialty store. They also have a fresh part where they sell fresh and gourmet foods, they also sell baked goods brought in from other bakeries. These cupcakes were baked by a bakery called "Contessa" I'm guessing they only do wholesale as I've never heard of them.

These cupcakes were OK - but far from awesome. I had to guess with the flavours as the assistant couldn't tell me what they were - I guess that is what happens when they aren't baked in store).

Chocolate/chocolate. I think this was the best but not amazing. The cake was quite moist and light but the icing was average and hard. It had definitely been frozen/chilled - as you can probably tell from the condensation on the icing.

Citrus/white chocolate. The cake was quite dense and the icing was rock hard - seemed as though it had been frozen/chilled. Too dense for my liking and a wee bit dry.

Vegan Carrot (this one had a sign). I didn't enjoy this at all - but D did. The icing was tasteless and the cake tasted kinda floury to me. I like carrot cake to be moist and rich - which this was not.

Vanilla/pink coconut icing. The cake wasn't as dense as the white chocolate one - but still far from light and fluffy. The coconut icing was OK (tasted a bit like coconut ice) but wasn't fresh tasting. Again - suspect the freezer!

All in all, I was quite disappointed. I like the idea of a Wellington bakery that sells amazing cupcakes. Though, as D pointed out, I wouldn't eat them - so am I really missing anything. They do look pretty. I'd rather bake my own thanks.

I've had a pretty relaxing weekend, and haven't done much at all. I got a couple of books from the library which I've already read. Its going to be full on week at work so I wish I'd been a wee bit more productive. Such is life.

Now its bedtime! Only a few hours before I wake up for work!

xxxM

spicy mocha cuppycakes

These cupcakes were so good, they get their own mosaic. Spicy chocolate & coffee cupcake with creamy coffee buttercream. Original inspiration came from wanting to make a spicy coffee cupcake. I then found Martha's Mocha Spice Cake which helped a bit. I wasn't sure on adding the chocolate - but I'm glad I did. These were an absolute hit. While trying to decide between chocolate and coffee frosting - I also came across How to Eat a Cupcake's verison of Martha's cake in cupcake form. Mine ended up a bit different - but hers looks yum too! Eventually decided on a really creamy coffee buttercream, which D declared the greatest frosting of all time.

I've decided that I need to start writing down these random cupcake recipes I concoct. I can't claim I create them from scratch, because I usually start with an idea about a flavours and then switch & add ingredients from a basic cupcake recipe. There are some amazing cupcake creators out there! All that said, I've decided all my colleagues who get get regular cupcakes for nothing - need to WORK for their cupcake. So I've introduced the feedback rule! In order to guarantee baking from me, they need to provide specific feedback.

Some of the Spicy Mocha Cupcakes Feedback:

“Om nom nom! Delicious. A leeetle bit strong (coffee) for my tastes, but that doesn’t mean I’d say no if offered them again.”

“Heaven in a cupcake - why do I drink coffee?”

“Overall, best cup cake I’ve had all year! Also the first. But I thoroughly enjoyed it. Here is my break down of the experience. The icing is by far the dominant feature of this cup cake, it tastes great and is a excellent coffee substitute. My concerns are that it is not firm enough, and perhaps would benefit from a little more (I don’t know what you use to make it firmer). It currently is more like a processed coffee cream than an icing. I would be concerned that if I dropped it, the cream would go everywhere, where as this wouldn’t happen if it was firmer. In regards to the cake. It wasn’t until my second to last bite that I noticed the great flavour of the actual cake. The cream is quite overpowering in this sense. Perhaps a little less cream would bring out the flavour of the cake a little more. The whole experience has left me with a wonderful after taste. And an alertness matched only by a slap in the face.”

“Yum yum. Very nice and well presented - looked very professional. Little gingerbread person good size in relation to cupcake. Nice texture of cake itself. All together a wonderful eating pleasure.”

“Bloody Brilliant – my favourite so far.”

So it seems they were a success! Enthusiastic(!) commenter #3 did get a cupcake with a sizeable amount of frosting and no gingerbread man! It was quite interesting watching who went for the cupcakes topped with gingerbread men.

xxxM

Phoenix city

What a game! Tonight the Phoenix played the Newcastle Jets and we absolutely smashed them 3 - 0. We took our friend's daughter K along (kids free night) and what a good luck charm she turned out to be!

Keeper Glen Moss was an absolute wonder in the first half (we're gonna miss him next season when he joins Melbourne) and we scored our three goals in the second half. Newcastle were, as usual, feisty and rude. Last time we played them - they were awarded two red cards! Read the full story about tonight's game here.


Sadly, I am back to work tomorrow. I've had a week and a half off work (though I've been on call for a bit of that) and I've really enjoyed doing nothing. I don't even feel guilty about the lack of stuff I got done, or the state of our spare room!

I discovered something nifty today - iGoogle! I noticed it on Scone's laptop.. so I came home and designed my own. (I even used the same header as Scone - it is light during the day and dark at night - how cool is that!?!) D tells me that its been around forever and that I am so slooow, but you know what? I don't care - I like nifty things. You can add all kinds of fun to it - I've got: calendar, calculator, WW points calculator, email, 1-day, grab a seat.... the list goes on!

What I also like is this amusing and poignant article by Michael Laws. I have to agree. There is so much doom & gloom around and for what? Wouldn't you rather be happy - we have a lot to be happy about!

I also read today that Wellington is "NZ's top spot for families". If only D and I could actually afford to have kids, I could agree! We're stuck in that space of wanting to have kids sometime in the next wee while (isn't that vague!) but also wanting to buy a house and knowing that our chances of getting both in the near future aren't high. I know that the traditional plan is that you buy a house and then have babies. But with house prices so much higher than they were thirty years ago, is this still the path to follow? I mean, my ovaries won't last forever!

It is two minutes to tomorrow, so I really have to get to bed...

xxxM

bath time

The other day I had a lovely bath with a pink Lush bathbomb and it made me remember how much I love baths. So relaxing and self indulgent. Sadly, I can't afford to have a Lush bath bomb that often so my dear friend Sconey and I decided to go homemade!

As I speak, our bathbombs are drying in Sconey's hot water cabinet. Hopefully they'll turn out good enough to give away as I can picture a wee pamper box being an awesome gift. We plan to try a few more homemade luxuries, maybe some bath melts or foot scrubs and balms. We did also make some body sugar scrub, but I'm not sure sure on how that turned out. It is made with lemon, green tea, and honey, using raw sugar. It doesn't look very pretty and is a bit wet. Might need to use this batch up quickly!

xxxM

oh - and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Some Lime&Cerise cupcakes I made for a friend's birthday on December 20. I am soo annoyed with myself for not taking better/more pictures of these cupcakes - they were gorgeous! Lime and vanilla flavoured cupcake with lime meringue filling (bright lime green, flowing out of the cupcake.. why oh why didn't I take a picture) and white chocolate flavoured frosting. My friend is christmas obsessed and every year she had a different colour theme - this year it was lime & cerise! Thus - the lime & cerise cupcakes. I figured lime tastes like lime and cerise tastes like pink white chocolate! I packaged them up in a white paper box with lime&cerise ribbon - they looked very pretty and I'm sure my friend was very glad to receive them. I think they would have been one of my best cupcake creations!

Have a very happy and safe New Year tonight wherever you are - its a quiet one for us!

xxxM

baking with a buddy

I had this week off work and I planned to do lots of baking but it didn't quite end up as planned. I ended up looking after a friend's daughter, so it wasn't the most conducive environment for the kind of baking I had planned, but still we managed to have some fun.

K and I decorated some gingerbread men and xmas trees, and baked a banana cake for my neighbour - with chocolate icing. K got a wee bit carried away with her decorating and some of the gingerbread had more icing than biscuit!

We made extra banana cake mixture so we could also make a small cake for D and some cupcakes for K to take home. The cake was extra moist and bananaery so we didn't even ice them.


The baking was Monday, we went to Wellington Zoo yesterday. Sadly my camera died just as we arrived at the zoo so I don't have photos of all the animals we saw (haha!) but we did have a great time. K got to feed (and get slobbered on by) a giraffe, we met Tahi - the 1-legged Brown kiwi, and generally enjoy the beautiful sunny day.

here is a pic from my last Zoo visit:

It was the first time at the zoo that I've actually made an attempt to go to all the guided talks. The talks were good - and I was pleasantly surprised that every Guide talked about only using FCS (Forest Stewardship Council) approved wood. Apparently, all construction at the zoo uses approved wood to ensure the wild habitats aren't being destroyed to provide the wood and paper products. To be honest, I think it went over most people's heads - they were too busy keeping an eye on their kids in the hot sun. I'd like to be more environmentally responsible in such things, I hate to think where some of our wood products come from!

D and I were planning to go camping tomorrow (after I work tonight ~ urgh!) but I've just realised I'm on call for work, so going too far out of Wellington probably isn't a very good idea. We're still going to look for a campsite very close to the city (with cell coverage) but its likely we'll be staying home! If our backyard was flat - we could camp at home! hehe.

I hope wherever you are, you are enjoying beautiful sunshine and a happy holiday season.

xxx M

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone had a fantastic, sunny, and safe Christmas. D and I didn't get up to much, we went to the in-laws' house for a BBQ Christmas lunch. It was a really nice day here in Wellywood, we both got burnt a little. We got a digital photoframe from D's brother (we all buy for 1 person), which was a pretty cool gift I thought. From the awesome Ree, I got my very own Aiko plush rat! I declare it the coolest thing ever. Photos to come!

D and I didn't really do presents this year, we just spent some money on camping stuff so we can go away in February. Speaking of camping, we are thinking we might do a "test" camp this weekend! At the moment we are thinking Lake Ferry. If it works out well, we might go there for our week long camping trip. Its only about one and a half hours from Welly so if I have to go into work I won't have to drive for hours! (More about WHY I would do that later).

Anywho, I'm off to bed. D is watching the football with relish - the outcome could easily affect the Phoenix' position in the league. I'm a little melancholy tonight after a dismal baking failure. I was *trying* to make a delicious treat that I've been wanting to make for aaages and this particular recipe had the added bonus of Sconey being able to eat it (being gluten/wheat/dairy free). I'll give it another go tomorrow I think. I plan to do LOTS of baking and cleaning this week. Trying to make a to-do list, 'cause otherwise the days will just disappear! I've got Monday and Tuesday off work (D is working). I'm working New Years Eve though - start at 2am on the 1/1/09! The joys of end of month processing!

Wait! Didn't I say I was going to bed....

xxM