A Minnie Mouse Birthday

My daughter requested a Minnie Mouse party for her 4th, complete with PINK cupcakes! Well, I'm a chocolate girl, myself, and I don't think any birthday is complete without chocolate cake. So I made her both--pink cupcakes, pink frosting, chocolate cupcakes, chocolate frosting--and mixed and matched.

 For the pink cake and pink frosting, I used a raspberry cake and raspberry buttercream recipe. Both were okay--again, I'm a chocolate girl.

 For the chocolate, I used my default, go-to, straight-from-mom recipe I've been making and eating for years. It is always amazing, even when you screw it up. I eat the batter by the spatula-full, and the frosting won't last long in a container on my counter. Usually I'm good and sick by the end of the process.

 The finished result was darling! I spent several days molding pink candy bows in a mold I bought on Etsy (using pink white-chocolate candies), and paired them with semi-sweet baking discs for Minnie Mouse ears.

And for the recipes:

Recipes:

Raspberry Cake
adapted from Sugar and Cloth

Ingredients:
1 cups Sugar
1 cup Butter
3 cups Cake Flour
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
3 eggs, room temperature
3 egg yolks, room temperature
1 1/2 cups whole milk
2 tsp. Vanilla
1/2 cup raspberry jam
Pink food coloring

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350. Sift together cake flour and baking soda and set aside. Combine milk and vanilla and set aside.
2. Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs one at a time, then add raspberry jam. Add dry ingredients and milk in alternating batches (at least 3), beginning and ending with the dry. Add food coloring and fold batter a few times to be sure everything is incorporated.
3. Pour into prepared pans (recipe makes 3 cakes) and bake 17-22 minutes.

Raspberry Butter Cream

Ingredients:
2 lbs. Powdered Sugar
1 lb. butter, room temperature
1/2 cup raspberry jam
1 tsp. vanilla
Pink food coloring

Directions:
1. Cream butter until fluffy, and then add sugar, two cups at a time.
2. Add vanilla and food coloring. Whip until good consistency and apply to cooled cake.

Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
4 oz. Unsweetened Chocolate
1/2 cup Butter, softened
2 1/4 cup Brown Sugar
3 Eggs
1 cup Sour Cream
2 tsp. Baking Soda
2 1/4 cups Flour
1 cup Boiling Water

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350. Melt chocolate.
2. Cream sugar and butter. Add eggs one at a time. Add melted chocolate.
3. Stir in sour cream and then add dry ingredients. Add boiling water; you must work quickly once water is added.
4. Pour into prepared cake pans and bake for 35 minutes. Cool before frosting.

Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients:
4.5 oz. Unsweetened chocolate, melted
1/2 cup Butter, melted
1/2 cup milk
1 lb. Powdered Sugar

Directions:
1. Melt butter and chocolate together. Meanwhile, combine milk and sugar in a food processor.
2. Add chocolate and mix until combined. Frosting will thicken as it cools.

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cake

A friend of mine gave me this recipe after I oogled over her picture on Facebook. And it's yummy! AND, it uses stuff I regularly keep around the house, so it was easy and fast to make! It looks pretty gooey and rich in the picture, but it has a great texture and taste--I recommend it!

Recipe:

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cake

Ingredients:
1 cup Quick Oats
1 3/4 cup Boiling Water
1 cup Granulated Sugar
1 cup Brown Sugar
1/2 cup Butter
2 Large Eggs
1 3/4 cups Flour
1 Tbsp. Cocoa Powder
1 tsp. Baking Soda
1 tsp. Cinnamon
2 cups Chocolate Chips
3/4 cups Chopped Walnuts

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350. Place oats in large bowl and pour boiling water over. Slice butter over the top and let stand 10 minutes. Prepare a 9x13" pan.
2. Add sugar and brown sugar, stirring until butter is melted. Stir in eggs, baking soda, cocoa, cinnamon, and flour. mix until combined.
3. Fold in half of the chocolate chips and pour into a pan. Sprinkle with remaining chocolate chips and nuts.
4. Bake for about 40 minutes, or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

The BEST Chocolate Chip Cookies

This is the best chocolate chip cookie recipe I have found. I used to use a different one, but moving to high altitude wreaked havoc on my cookies, and it took a while to find a new, BETTER recipe. The secret isn't so secret anymore... cornstarch! Perfect, fluffy cookies. With that said, the batch made on this post weren't the best I made (appearance-wise, they always taste great), and they still look pretty darn good!

Anyway, this recipe is like fool-proof. I will admit that I decreased the amount of chocolate chips, and that IS saying something (I'm always for more chocolate). It was just a little too much! They were rattling around in the bowl with nothing to stick to!

Recipe:

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:
3/4 cup Unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup Brown Sugar
1/4 cup Granulated Sugar
1 Large Egg
2 tsp. Vanilla
2 cups Flour
2 tsp. Cornstarch
1 tsp. Baking Soda
1/2 tsp. Salt
3/4 cup Chocolate Chips

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350. Line pan with parchment paper.
2. Cream butter with sugars and add vanilla. Once creamy, add egg and mix.
3. Add dry ingredients (flour last) and mix until combined.
4. Add chocolate chips and place in tablespoon-fulls on pan (makes about 24 cookies).
5. Bake for 8-10 minutes.