Lazy Bunz

Long weekends call for a nice, not so healthy breakfast. I have no real reason for it, but I just think it does, and this morning I think I found my new favorite, go-to pancake recipe. I just have to share it with all of you. This is definitely a keeper.

That being said, people love pancakes. And people also love cinnamon buns. But if you eat one of each in one sitting, you may be under fire of a number of judging eyes. Not me because I'm 90% sure, I'll be right there with you. :) But friends, I have found the solution! CINNAMON BUN PANCAKES!! Yes. You read that right, cinnamon bun pancakes. This recipe is quite possibly the perfect hybrid of the two. Fluffy like a pancake should be, yet the perfect spice that a cinnamon bun would have. And the cherry on top is a rendition of the vanilla icing that you would find on a cinnamon bun - a maple-butter icing/glaze.

These were freaking delicious. I'm fairly certain the words "Oh my God" came out of my mouth when I tried a little piece of the first pancake that came off the griddle. I ate my fair share of these, as you can see below. Had Spencer not judged me, I may or may not have licked my plate clean.

The recipe was originally submitted on the Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen Blog by sapeylissy. I don't know her, but I love her. And I love the Pioneer Woman even more for adding the maple-butter icing. I made 1 or 2 tweaks here and there and they came through. I sifted the dry ingredients together and used buttermilk instead of regular whole milk.

Try out this recipe and I hope you love it as much as we do!!

Cinnamon Bun Pancakes

• 1-½ cup All-purpose Flour
• 3 Tablespoons White Sugar
• ½ teaspoons Salt
• 4 teaspoons Baking Powder
• 1 Tablespoon Cinnamon
• 2 whole Eggs Beaten
• 1 cup Milk
• 2 Tablespoons Corn Syrup
• ¼ cups Butter, Melted
• 1 Tablespoon Vanilla

1. In medium bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and cinnamon with a whisk. Whisk well to make sure everything is combined.
2. In separate large bowl, beat together eggs, milk, corn syurp, butter and vanilla. Stir in flour mixture.
3. Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium/low heat. Pour about 1/4 cup batter onto griddle. Brown on both sides.
4. Serve warm with maple-butter icing drizzled over the top. Makes 12 pancakes.

Maple-Butter IcingIf you remotely like syrup - double up on this recipe

• 1 cup powdered sugar
• ¼ cups melted butter
• Dash of salt
• 1 Tbl. maple syrup
• ¼ cup milk

Whisk all ingredients together until smooth, adding the milk slowly.  Add enough milk for desired consistency (I liked to keep mine on the thicker side - more of a syrup consistency). 

One Stick, Two Stick

I've been meaning to write up new posts since the beginning of the month. Obviously, time has gotten away from me. From trips, to family in town, to working non-stop, to saying unwanted good-byes to a good friend...where did the month of August go?? Who knows, but onward to September!

In the mean time, I'll fill you in on my newest undertaking, pie pops and cake pops! 

First we'll start with pie pops. How cute are these!!!

When I saw them on Bakerella, I just HAD to make them. There were no if's, ands, or buts about it. For my first attempt, I just used store bought pie crust and cherry pie filling. I did take note of what Bakerella had to say in her post about these - she wanted more filling. I decided to chop up the cherries in hopes I could get more filling in the pop. A valiant effort, I must say. Next time I make these cute buggers, I'll go up a size in my cookie cutter so I can get more filling inside and still chop up the cherries. I'll even try them with pecan pie filling. Mmmmm...I can taste them now. This may be a Sunday to-do if I'm bored. 

They're simple to make and quite self explanatory. Once I got into the groove of things, I got them together fairly quickly. As suggested, the best way to seal these pops was by using a piece of the lollipop stick. All you have to do is cut, stick, fill and seal! Bake for about 12 minutes and voila...pie pops!

Now, I've done cake balls before, so cake pops weren't totally new for me. I may even like making them better than cake balls because I think it's easier to get a smoother and more even coating. The flavor of the day was mocha! I made these for my good friend Kortney, who was moving out to California last week. She loves my mocha cupcakes, so mocha cake pops were an obvious choice! I have to send her off properly, right?

I had recently bought Bakerella's "Cake Pops" book, and appreciate all the tips she provided:

• Adding in some Crisco when melting the candy coating - this allows for a thinner consistency that's easier to work with
• When dipping, tap the wrist holding the cake pop in order to cleanly drip off any excess coating

For this batch, I used dark cocoa candy coating and white vanilla candy coating. Since Kortney's slightly obsessed with sprinkles, it was a given these were going to take a dive in those! I used small candy bags to cover them and tied them off with purple ribbon. In a linen covered box filled with purple paper grass, I laid the pops nicely, alternating directions so they weren't too piled on top of each other. I tied off the box with a good amount of purple tulle as a reminder of our tutu obsession, and called it a day!

I'm very happy with the outcome of these and can't wait to make more, in different types of shapes, of course! I will be sure to keep you all posted on my cake pops progress. :)

Happy baking!

Can't Stand the Heat

July has been a month of hot, hot, HOT. Consecutive days of triple digit heat? Oi vey. And the weather man just said if something with the air pressure doesn't happen, this heat will stick around well through August. The Texas summer may finally be getting the best of me. I don't hate the heat per se, but when baking, we're frenemies. The humidity just deflates my frostings!

But on a happy note, July has also been a month of many birthdays in my group of friends, so I figured this would be a perfect time to try out some new recipes. I like to bake, they like to eat, it's a win win for everyone!

The flavors I tried out were strawberry margarita, pancakes & bacon, Reese's and cookies n' creme.

Overall, I'd say it was a success, but I'll definitely be making some tweaks to the recipes I used. Which isn't too surprising...whenever I try something new the first time around I'll make it verbatim, see how it goes, make my changes from there and make the recipe my own.

Cookies n' creme - Specially made for my friend Kristin! I've made this before, but tried out a new batter recipe I found from Brown Eyed Baker. Pretty pleased with the outcome, I threw in some pieces of Oreos this time around and was glad I did. It just added to the cookies n' creme flavor.

Strawberry margarita - verrrry interesting. Hint of a margarita but definitely a cupcake! They turned out a little dry for me, but the boozy glaze that the recipe called for helped to moisten them up. These will be perfected.

Reese's - Spencer's new favorite cupcake. Enough said.

Pancakes with maple frosting and BACON! - My one FAIL of the night. I was so disheartened about these mainly because I was so excited to try them. The frosting just smelled so maple-y. Mmmm. But the cupcakes didn't turn out as fluffy as I'd liked. I need to work on my batter. One day it will come and I will show you the finished product! Many were skeptical about this, but come on...bacon! Reminds me of this video. Bacon is bad for you, they say? Nay, I say! Bacon is good for me!

I'm going to end on a high. Happy baking everyone!
Don't forget to like my Facebook page Cakes.by.Anna. :)

Don't Feed the Models...

Totally not related to cakes, but still an adventure. As many of you know, Spencer and I are engaged! Eight and a half years in the making, the big day is May 18, 2012. We're very excited about this next step in our lives.

We had been trying to take our engagement pictures since April, but things kept getting in the way...thunderstorms, sunburned faces from tailgating, facial hair trimming mishaps...I seriously thought Spencer was trying to sabotage our photo sessions whenever one of these came up.

Well, a couple weekends ago, we were able to have a successful session. It was a lot of fun and I couldn't be happier with the way they came out! Our lovely photographer is a co-worker and friend, Miss Audra Stroud. She's amazing and great to work with! Please check out her work at audrastroud.com. If you're in the DFW area and in need of a photographer - definitely consider her.

We started off bright and early at 6:30 AM over at White Rock Lake - which just so happened to be where Spencer proposed. After we headed over to Deep Ellum to take some pictures with the brightly colored walls and murals.

Here's a peek at the pictures Audra edited. Enjoy!

Can Somebody Say "Cabin Fever"??

Weather can make you do some crazy things...in my case, a week straight of being confined in my apartment due to illness and snow/ice days (in Texas of all places) has caused me to start this blog!

Aside from working from home all week, I spent many hours of the day reading over some of my favorite food blogs (The Pioneer Woman and Burnt Lumpia) and discovering new ones (Let Me Eat Cake and My Baking Addiction). All this time looking at food gave me an insane itch to get back in the kitchen and bake my life away. Side note, I had taken a bit of a hiatus from baking/cake decorating due to a new position at work and trips back home and abroad. Wanting to get back into it, I thought to myself, "Why not blog about the cakes I do?" to supplement my "Cakes.by.Anna" side biz I have going.

So here I am...

Since I don't have any cake orders in the near future, I'll leave you with some "memories" from Snowmaggedon 2011 in North Texas:

A view from our balcony, got about 6 inches overnight. It looks very pretty out - so serene. But it can go away now, I'm ready to join the world again.

This has nothing to do with cake, but who cares? It's still food. Today, I believe I made my best batch of Bolognese sauce. You should know this about me - aside from baking, I love to cook. I just love food in general, tasting new flavors and re-creating them at home. I'm getting distracted again, apologies. Back to the Bolognese!

I went off this recipe from Better Homes & Garden which is actually called "Spaghetti with Best-Bolognese Sauce Ever" - at least you know it holds truth! The depth of flavor is so great, the sauce is thick and hearty deliciousness.

I should add that this sauce caused quite the argument in our household today. I gave Spencer a taste and he gave it a big thumbs up. I make him up a plate when it's all done, he takes a bite, sets down his fork and walks over to me with a stern look on his face.

I knew what I was caught -- I tried to pull a fast one on him, giving him whole wheat pasta. Yep, this was the argument. Over pasta! It went so far where I had to vow to never buy whole wheat pasta EVER again. And I mean EVER. He may even have me add it to my wedding vows...whenever that day comes. ;)

So give it a try and let me know if you love it as much as me. Enjoy!

Ingredients

• 1-1/2 lbs. 85 percent lean ground beef chuck (I did a combination of ground chuck and ground pork)
• 1 large onion, chopped (1 cup)
• 2 medium carrots, chopped (1 cup)
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 cup half-and-half or milk
• 1 cup chicken broth (I did a mixture of chicken broth and red wine)
• 1 Tbsp. white wine vinegar (I chose to omit this)
• 1 28-oz. can crushed tomatoes
• 1 6-oz. can tomato paste
• 2 tsp. Italian seasoning, crushed (In addition I added some dried basil, parsley and oregano)
• 1 tsp. ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 14- to 16-oz. pkg. dried whole wheat, multigrain or regular spaghetti
• Grated Parmesan, Romano, or Asiago cheese (optional)
• Fresh oregano (optional)

• directions

  1. In 12-inch skillet brown ground beef, onion, carrot, and garlic until meat is no longer pink, stirring occasionally. Drain off fat.

  2. Add half-and-half. Bring to boiling. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, 5 minutes or until half-and-half is nearly evaporated. Stir in broth, then vinegar. Return to boiling. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, 15 minutes or until liquid is nearly evaporated. Stir in crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, seasoning, pepper, and salt. Bring to boiling. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, 5 minutes or until thickened.

  3. Meanwhile, cook spaghetti, with 1 tablespoon salt added to water, according to package directions Drain. Serve spaghetti with sauce. Sprinkle with cheese and oregano. Makes 8 servings.