Maple Pecan Pear Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Icing

I think every Friday should involve cake, don't you?
This Maple Pecan Pear Cake is loaded with chunks of juicy pears, crunchy pecans and the perfect amount of maple syrup. The only thing that could make this cake any better is the maple syrup cream cheese icing on top. Since it pairs so perfectly with a cup of coffee, I won't even judge if you have this for breakfast!

Maple Pecan Pear Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Icing

Maple Pecan Pear Cake
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup vanilla Greek yogurt
4 eggs
1 Tablespoon vanilla
¾ cup maple syrup
¾ cup lightly packed light brown sugar
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 Bartlett Pears, finely chopped
1 Bartlett Pear, shredded
1 cup chopped toasted pecans

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and spray a Bundt pan generously with non-stick baking spray.

In a large mixing bowl whisk together the oil, Greek yogurt, eggs, vanilla, maple syrup and brown sugar.

Add the baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and whisk until combined. With a spatula, gently fold in the flour, chopped and shredded pears and the pecans just enough for the mixture to come together but being very careful not to over-mix. 

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 1 hour, or until a toothpick in the center comes out clean. 

Let the cake cool in the pan for 20 minutes.

Remove the cake from the pan and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. 

While the cake is cooling, prepare the icing:

Maple Cream Cheese Icing
1 ½ cups powdered sugar
3 Tablespoons room temperature butter 
2 ounces room temperature cream cheese 
¼ cup maple syrup
1 Tablespoon vanilla coffee creamer

In a small mixing bowl beat the powdered sugar, butter, cream cheese, maple syrup and coffee creamer until smooth. Once the cake has fully cooled, drizzle the icing over the cake. Serve immediately. 


Serves 12-14

 #usapears #cookingwithpears @usapears 

Vegan Orange Cranberry Cake

Anyone out there freaking out over what to serve on Thanksgiving to your Vegan/dairy free/egg free friends for Thanksgiving? I think I have the perfect thing for you!

This is my second entry for the "Florida Crystal's Blogger Challenge". This Orange Cranberry Cake is so easy to throw together and can be made ahead of time, saving you stress and oven space Thanksgiving day. Orange zest and fresh cranberries are one of my favorite holiday flavor combos and since it's not overly sweet, you can totally have it for breakfast the next day if there's any left. I won't tell!

Vegan Orange Cranberry Cake

 1 ½ cups plus 3 Tablespoons all-purpose flour 

1 cup Florida Crystals Organic Raw Cane Sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

1 Tablespoon orange zest

1 teaspoon white vinegar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon orange extract

5 Tablespoon vegetable oil

1 cup water

1 cup frozen cranberries

3 Tablespoons Florida Crystals Organic Powdered Raw Cane Sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray an 8-inch square baking pan with non-stick cooking spray.

Place 3 Tablespoons of the flour in a small bowl and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl whisk together the remaining flour, sugar, baking soda, salt and orange zest.

Using a spoon, create 3 wells in the flour mixture (1 large and 2 small). Pour the vinegar into one of the wells, pour the vanilla and orange extracts into the second well and the vegetable oil into the last well. Add the water to the bowl and whisk until the mixture is well incorporated. 

Add the cranberries to the reserved flour and stir until well coated. Gently fold the mixture into the batter and pour into the prepared pan.

Place in the oven and bake for 40-45 minutes, or until a toothpick in the center comes out clean.

Set aside and allow to cool. Once the cake is completely cooled, place it on a serving plate. Dust the top with the powdered sugar and serve. 

Serves 9

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Boozy Berry Grilled Pound Cake with Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream

Mother's Day is Sunday and I think this should be the dessert of the day. Make it for your mom, make it for yourself, either way you'll thank me. It's so stupid simple to make, you only need 7 ingredients to get it done and I personally think it's a showstopper.
I took store bought pound cake and grilled it so it's warm and toasty - by all means, if you want to bake a home made pound cake go for it! But the store bought one worked perfectly fine and was the perfect thing to soak up all the juice from those marinated strawberries. You'll get bonus points if you put the extra Strawberry Elderflower syrup in some prosecco too!

Let's take a moment to talk about this vanilla bean whipped cream too. Can you see the flecks of vanilla in there?! Makes me want to dive in. 

I know fresh vanilla beans seem extravagant, but I promise you it's so very worth it! After you scrape the vanilla beans from the pod put the empty pod in your sugar canister - now you have vanilla sugar for baking or your coffee that will be divine!!

Boozy Berry Grilled Pound Cake with Vanilla Bean Whipped Cream

4 cups sliced strawberries

1 Tablespoon sugar

2 Tablespoons Elderflower liquor

2 cups heavy whipping cream

1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped

¼ cup powdered sugar

1 (10.75 oz) pound cake

In a small mixing bowl gently stir together the strawberries, sugar and liquor. Let sit in the fridge for 30 minutes.

While the berries are soaking, prepare the whipped cream. Place the whipping cream, vanilla bean seeds and powdered sugar in a stand mixer with the whisk attachment and whip on high speed until stiff peaks form.

Slice the pound cake into 8 equal slices. Heat a grill pan over medium high heat until very hot (about 3 minutes). Grill the pound cake slices for 1-2 minutes per side, or until lightly toasted and you can see the grill marks.

Top grilled cake slices with the soaked strawberries and a spoonful of whipped cream. 

Shark Attack Birthday Party

My son and his best friend both turned 12 in July an they had a joint Shark themed birthday swimming party to celebrate! Since the party was at his friend's house I was able to spend my time having fun creating the food and snacks for the boys! The big cake was pretty simple: chocolate cake with vanilla icing and a fondant shark cutout. The cupcakes were coconut cake, filled with berry jam and coconut cream cheese frosting. I used the extra fondant from the big shark and made mini shark fins for the cupcakes. For the favors I took rice krispie treats, dipped them in blue candy melts and decorated them with goldfish crackers and sprinkles.

For the snack table there was a drink dispenser with blue gatorade and mini Swedish fish frozen in ice cubes so they would float. Veggie Straws were pool noodles and Goldfish crackers and potato chips were called "Fish & Chips"

I had fun carving the watermelon and cucumber into sharks for the fruit and veggie platters and at the end of the day even the shark cucumber was eaten!

I think the best part of the whole party was the severed hands and feet floating in the pool! The kids got such a kick out of that and never stopped laughing at the "slow swimmers"

It was a great party and the kids had a ton of fun swimming!

This Turkey Takes the Cake

My kid's school threw their Fall Fair this past weekend, and I signed up to donate cakes and cupcakes for the cakewalk booth. I think they came out super cute and my kids were very excited to turn them in! 

 We made 2 dozen cupcakes and 2 turkey cakes 

For the turkey cakes I used this mix I was given on my trip to NYC. It's two separate mixes that were the perfect amount for my Wilton bowl pan! The cakes came out moist yet sturdy enough to work with so I had no problem with it falling apart as I tried to ice it. If you love red velvet cake, you'll love this fall inspired version!

I used mini marshmallows for the eyes and drew on them with a food safe marker. For the beak and waddle I raided the kid's Halloween candy and molded starbursts  after heating them in the microwave for a couple seconds.

For the feathered body, all you need to do is make rows of large dots of icing out of a piping bag and then press your spatula or spoon in the middle of the drop of icing and drag it down so it flattens it slightly. I'm sorry I didn't get a pic of that step, but I promise it's super easy! 

The weather was awful, but the kids had fun through the freezing cold drizzle! 

And, we were lucky enough to win two of the class raffle baskets!!

 One basket full of board games and the Yeti cooler, which Louis is over the moon excited about

All packed up and ready to go!

 



Star Wars 6th Birthday

 Every year I look forward to this moment. The "first glance at the cake" moment. 

The one second that makes all my pre-party stress totally worth it.

I am like almost every other mother I know; we put tremendous pressure on ourselves to make our children's parties "perfect"....whatever that means. 

And as I was decorating his cake this year I was realizing that I'm not going to be able to do my little tradition much longer. Every year I have completely hidden the cake from Marshall until right before his party, had him walk in when it's completely finished and gotten a picture of his face when he first sees it. It is something that I adore, seeing the excitement and joy in his face when getting the first glance at something that I have poured my heart into especially for him. 

 The older he gets the harder it is to pull this off. It takes hours to make his cakes and he needs to be gone or asleep for me to work on it. And keeping him away from the fridge where I am hiding it is a job itself. But I am so grateful for one more year of cake surprises and he was just as enthusiastic as I hoped he would be.

  Marshall is completely and utterly obsessed with Star Wars, so there was really no other choice for the theme of this party. For the cake I did a Millennium Falcon out of chocolate cake and vanilla icing.

 The party was at the Austin Children's Museum and I think everyone had a great time! I got the idea for the lightsaber utensil/napkins on pintrest and filled Yoda cups with bounce balls, candy, glow sticks, stickers and chalk for the favors

 The cake was chocolate and the cupcakes were vanilla

I got the idea for the chocolate covered lightsaber pretzel rods here

 I went a lot simpler this year with the food than I have in previous years. Han Solo Roll Ups for the adults (whole wheat wraps with ham, havarti cheese, spring mix greens and a spread I made out of sun dried tomatoes, mayo, garlic and a Pampered Chef Parmesan Garlic seasoning) and Jar Jar Links (crescent wrapped turkey little smokies) for the kids

 PB&J bombers that I cut out with these sandwich cutters and the cupcake decorating set from here. Luckily for me I live very close to a Williams-Sonoma outlet and was able to get all of these items on clearance!

 Droid Dip and Vader Veggies

Yoda Melon, Trooper Scoopers and Jawa Juice

 The birthday Jedi ready for some cake and Princess Brianna with her Leia buns

 Make a wish!!

 

 I love random pictures when you see all of your guests having fun!

 As we were cleaning up Brianna had to put herself at the head of the table and pretend it was her day, even if ti was only for 5 minutes

Once we got home Marshall got to open his gifts and I got to relax with a glass of wine. We were both happy!
I have always found it stressful to open gifts in front of people. You never know what potentially embarrassing things kids will say, like "I didn't want this" or "that's it?" or when you receive three of the same item.  Do you open gifts at parties or do you wait till you get home?


" Truly wonderful, the mind of a child is"
-Yoda

From boredom to Biscoff Buttercream

Do you still have any Girl Scout cookies lying around? 

Every year those little temptresses come around with their wagon of cookies and if you are anything like me you just can't say no. Especially to new cookies. This year the new flavor was "Shout Outs" and the description was a buttery caramel crisp cookie. Well, when I read that I instantly thought of Biscoff cookies and spread that I'm seeing pop up all over foodie blogs everywhere. And then I just had to get them. The problem was, after I ripped open the box and dug in, I was a bit dissapointed.

They were just meh.
Boring.

Not great, but not horrible either.
It felt like they needed something

So I dipped them in Nutella- that was good

Then I dipped them in Biscoff- that was even better

Then I made a deliciously dark chocolate cupcake, whipped up a Biscoff Buttercream icing and shoved one of those cookies in the top- that was heavenly

 

It's just what the cookie needed 

Absolutely perfect!

Biscoff Buttercream

5 Tablespoons room temperature butter

1 cup powdered sugar

1 cup Biscoff spread

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

4 Tablespoons heavy cream

Place all ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer. With the paddle attachment, combine the ingredients on low speed until just combined and then raise speed to medium and whip until fluffy and fully incorporated. Pipe onto cake layers, cupcakes or spoon in your mouth. No judgement here.

Under the Sea.....to Under the Weather

Before we left for our 10 day trip back home I packed everything I needed to decorate a beautiful mermaid themed birthday cake.

(at least the design in my head was beautiful) 

Sprinkles, homemade fondant, cutters, icing gel colors, streamers, pink plates and forks, a cake board and MUCH MUCH MORE. 

While packing all of my baking gear I came across a cupcake liner and topper set I bought a while ago and I threw it in the box. I really didn't know why but in the back of my mind I said "just in case"

well guess what?
I ended up needing that back up box and I was so glad for my over planning!
During our trip both the kids and Louis ended up with terrible colds and one ear infection which led to antibiotics, cough medicine, humidifiers and many nights of being up at all hours trying to console one of them.
The day before we had scheduled all of our family to come over and share a piece of that beautiful cake I had in my mind we had to cancel the party. My little mermaid princess was just too sick to invite people over. I was so sad for her but I still wanted to do something fun, so out came the fairy themed cupcake box.
Pink cake, purple icing and fairy toppers

She got to eat her girly cake in her footed pj's, princess crown and Ariel nightgown, Vick's vapo-rub and all!

(please excuse the hideous face I am making, apparently I eat cake like an animal)

Today is her birthday

She is 3 and very proud of it!

We are so blessed to have her and I couldn't imagine life without her

 so sweet

and so sassy

 

Thanks to Al Gawlik Photography for the amazing pictures! If you live in Austin you must check her out!

How Time Flies

Well the holidays just swept me away and I can't believe it's already January!

Today I was busy packing Christmas decorations to put away (among all of the other chores that go along with a 10 day trip back home) and the kids were a little upset with me.

They didn't really know why I had to put away all the decorations, why I was taking ornaments off of the Christmas tree and why Santa was no longer "comin' to town"

I tried to put it the best way I knew how:  "now we get to start all over again"

Trying to further make this transition a little more exciting than disappointing I reminded them both that after Christmas we also get to celebrate B's birthday

My baby girl is going to be 3 tomorrow

and I thought I'd share with you a cake I make recently for another princess that turned 2

This little beauty had a Dr Seuss themed birthday party so a bright, colorful two tiered cake was requested

I made a chocolate cake with vanilla buttercream and covered it with fondant and fondant accents

I hope she enjoyed her special day!