Frost that shit...

It isn't a good cake without frosting. Don't even try to convince me. 

These are my favorite ways to make delicious sugary toppings for my cupcakes. 

Vanilla buttercream:

1/2 cup butter, softened (vegan margarine works as well)

3 cups icing sugar

1-2 tsp vanilla (use the real stuff, please)

1-2 tsp milk (yes, you can use fake milk) 

1. Mix 1 cup powdered sugar and butter in a bowl with an electric mixer. 

2. Add in vanilla. 

3. Add the rest of the icing sugar one cup at a time and add in 1 tsp of milk. 

4. Check consistency. Add more milk a tiny bit at a time. You can always add a bit more sugar if yiu add too much milk. 

Change the flavor by adding in strawberry purée instead of milk or 1/2 cup of cocoa powder and more milk. 

Cream cheese icing:

1 8 oz pkg of cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup of butter, softened

2-3 tsp milk

1 tsp vanilla

4 cups powder sugar

1. Beat together cream cheese, butter, milk and vanilla. 

2. Beat in icing sugar one cup at a time. 

Add cocoa powder or 2 oz baking chocolate melted and cooked in with the butter. Store iced cake in the fridge. 

Fudge frosting:

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup baking cocoa

1/4 cup milk

2 tbsp butter

1 tbsp corn syrup

Dash of salt

1/2 to 3/4 cup powdered sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla

1. Mix sugar and cocoa in a saucepan. Stir in milk, butter, corn syrup and salt. Heat to boiling, stirring frequently. Boil 3 min, stirring occasionally. Allow to cool 30 min. 

2. Beat in powdered sugar and vanilla until smooth. 

Drunken Chocolate Cake

This cake has been nicknamed "drunken chocolate cake" because the first 10 times I made it I was less than sober. It is that easy. If you screw it up - head to a bakery and never ever attempt to make a cake again. 

Chocolate Cake 

(recipe courtesy of Betty Crocker - with my own embellishments)

Prep: 20 min; Bake: 45 min (~18-20 for cupcakes); Cool: 1 hour and 10 min *12 servings or 24 cupcakes

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour or 2 1/2 cups cake flour

1 2/3 cups sugar

3/4 cup butter, softened 

2/3 cup baking cocoa

1 1/4 cups water

1 1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 tsp baking powder

2 large eggs

1. Heat oven to 350F. Grease bottoms and sides of a rectangle pan, 2 circles with shortening and lightly flour. My trick is to lightly grease then pop in a round of parchment paper (trace from bottom on the pan and cut). Or pop some cupcake liners in a cupcake pan. 

2. Beat all ingredients on a low speed for 30 seconds, scraping e bowl constantly. Do this is the sink! Then beat in high for 3 min until nice and smooth. Pour into pans. Or use a nice cream scoop to scoop into cupcake liners. 

3. Bake 40-45 min for rectangle, rounds 30-35 min and 18-20 min for cupcakes. Cool rectangle in pan. Cool rounds 10 min, then remove from pans and allow to cool completely for 1 hour. 

4. Frost heavily and enjoy. 

Cloth Diapering - Soap/ Detergent

During the time we were cloth diapering Juni, I constantly had to strip. Diapers... We had barnyard stink and ammonia. I followed the advice of blue dawn and extra rinses. I used only "safe" detergent. Hell, I even spouted off that advice myself. My diapers were crunchy, stinky and not absorbing well.

I joined a few Facebook groups. They all praised Tide. They all said the blue dawn thing only worked for grease. Everything I knew was wrong?

I thought I would give their advice a try. I refuse to use P&G products - so no Tide for me. I picked up a super cheap box of PC Ultra Free Laundry Detergent. I used the full amount. Then I prayed. Forrest's diapers came out fluffy. There was no stink! 

A couple weeks later, I decided to try Melaleuca since it is what I use on the rest of our laundry (it gets delivered to my door. I'll leave the Melaleuca praise for another day). Similar results. The diapers were the cleanest they have ever been. I'm a convert. No special detergents around here anymore. 

Side note: I've had very good results with Country Save detergent. It is super cheap, powdered and works well for diapers. 

Blueberry Banana muffins

Muffins are one of our favorite ways to use up fruit that is going bad. 

Tonight, Juni and I made banana blueberry muffins from the Betty Crocker cookbook with some adjustments. Here is our recipe:

Blueberry Banana Muffins

Prep: 10 min; Bake: 20-25 min for regular muffins, 15 min for mini

1/3 cup original Almond Breeze almond milk

1/4 cup melted unrefined coconut oil

1 large egg (can use powdered egg replacer)

2 cups whole wheat flour (also delicious with oat or brown rice flour)

1/4 cup molasses

1/4 cup maple syrup

2 tsps baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 mashed ripe bananas

1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

Heat oven to 400F. Grease bottoms only of muffin tins. 

Beat milk, oil, egg and mashed banana in a large bowl with a whisk. Stir in all ingredients except blueberries until flour is just moistened. Fold in blueberries. 

Divide into muffin cups. Bake 20-25min for large muffins. 15 minutes for mini muffins. Let cool in pan for 5 min. 

Creamy vegan curry soup

This soup has become a fast favorite in our house. Creamy and tasty. It goes really well with my curry chicken salad wraps. 

Ingredients:

-carrots

-celery

-onion

-lentils

-quinoa 

-coconut milk

-veggie stock or veggie bullion cube

-pepper

-cumin

-curry

How to make it:

Cook one rough diced onion, 3 rough diced carrots and 3 rough diced celery stalks in ~4 cups of stock overnight in a crockpot. In the morning, cool and purée this mixture. Return to the crockpot. Add 1/2 cup quinoa and 1/2 cup of lentils (rinse and sort). Add 1 can of coconut milk, about 2 cups of diced carrots. Add some pepper, 1 tsp cumin and 2 tsp curry powder (or as much as you want to taste). Cook in the crockpot until lentils, quinoa and carrots are fully cooked. 

You can garnish with cilantro, vegan sour cream, Greek yogurt... You can also add garlic into the soup, if your husband isn't allergic like mine.