Kenzie's cupcake baking 101

THIS TURNED 

INTO THIS↝  

From Vacuum pick up 

to cupcake baking with Kenzie

I asked my friend Adam if he would help me pickup a vacuum cleaner that I ordered.  It was at a hardware store about half way between where both of us live.  We talked about picking it up maybe after work and then just picking up dinner maybe but the vacuum cleaner finally came in on a friday so we made plans to pick it up saturday afternoon.  Saturday morning I get a text that his 3 year old wants to bake cupcakes because we talked about it the last time we baked and I guess she asked him about it.  She remembers everything.  We made plans to pick up the vacuum cleaner while she napped and then we went back to his place to bake up a batch of Vanilla Cupcakes.  He pulled a recipe out of Magnolia Bakery (NYC) cookbook and it seemed pretty easy to make.

 When I arrived at his house Kenzie was sitting on the couch with her Ipad coloring a cake.  So from screen to real life, time to get off the couch and bake for real Kenzie.

We propped her up on a bar chair in front of the mixer and we let her help dump and stir while her dad measured and got the ingredients ready and I took the photos and helped her put it all together and do the decorating afterward.

Here are the photos of her helping in the process.  

You are never too young to learn.  She is only 3 and this is the third time we have baked or decorated cookies together and she thinks it's like a fun party and takes it very seriously as you will see from the photos.  It's kind of funny since she is a very fussy eater and only ate half of the cupcake that she made but I think she likes the process of baking more than the actual eating which is probably good.

The benefits of baking with young kids as they learn how to take direction, to focus, to understand ingredients, to understand what goes in their food and most of all the develop food memories and baking and cooking skills that will serve them for their whole life.

Check it out.  I will post the recipe at the end.

 

Kenzie wanted rainbow icing and since that would take a lot of time and icing we settled on rainbow colored sprinkles.  This is the one I decorated and Kenzie is eating the one that she decorated.

 Magnolia Bakery Vanilla Cupcakes with Buttercream Icing. (Food Network)

Ingredients

Cupcakes:

• 1 1/2 cups self-rising flour
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 large eggs, at room temperature
• 1 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Icing:

• Vanilla Buttercream, recipe follows

Vanilla Buttercream:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 6 to 8 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions

Icing:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Line 2 (1/2 cup-12 capacity) muffin tins with cupcake papers.

In a small bowl, combine the flours. Set aside.

In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugar gradually and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the dry ingredients in 3 parts, alternating with the milk and vanilla. With each addition, beat until the ingredients are incorporated but do not over beat. Using a rubber spatula, scrape down the batter in the bowl to make sure the ingredients are well blended. Carefully spoon the batter into the cupcake liners, filling them about 3/4 full. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the center of the cupcake comes out clean.

Cool the cupcakes in tins for 15 minutes. Remove from the tins and cool completely on a wire rack before icing.

Vanilla Buttercream:

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl. Add 4 cups of the sugar and then the milk and vanilla. On the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat until smooth and creamy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Gradually add the remaining sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating well after each addition (about 2 minutes), until the icing is thick enough to be of good spreading consistency. You may not need to add all of the sugar. If desired, add a few drops of food coloring and mix thoroughly. (Use and store the icing at room temperature because icing will set if chilled.) Icing can be stored in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

P.S.  The vacuum cleaner works great and I had the cupcake above after cleaning my carpets with the new vacuum cleaner.  I deserved it. :)

Casting Call for Great Bakers in Canada

Are you a serious Bakeaholic?  

Do you dream about baked goods and spend all of your free time in the kitchen whipping up mouth watering treats to share with friends and family?

Are you obsessed with the Baking Competitions on TV?

Are you looking for a big break in your life and a challenge?

Well the good news is there is an opportunity for you in Canada.

The Great Canadian Baking Show which originated in the UK is now casting for Season 2 and you can apply now by clicking the link below.

Click Here to apply:  Great Canadian Baking Show Casting  

I wish I had the talent the time and the energy to apply but I hope that you do and if you do and you get on the show please let me know so that I can watch and cheer you on.

Good Luck and even if you don't apply I would recommend watching the show because it's a lot of fun and you learn a lot about different baking techniques that you can use in your kitchen to impress your friends and family.

GOOD LUCK and HAPPY BAKING!

Recipe: Dark Chocolate Egg Nog Scones with coffee glaze

GoGot Eggnog?

Make some Holiday scones with the little bit of eggnog left after the party.

Dark Chocolate Eggnog Scones with Coffee Glaze

I bought some eggnog just in case anyone stopped by and I wanted to serve them a glass of some but I didn't end up drinking it so i thought it would be a great substitute for buttermilk in scones so I thought about what I would like to pair it with and of course my favourite chocolate would do the trick and make a delicious flavour combo.

Here's what I came up with:

Ingredients:

Scones:

2 cups of sifted flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 tablespoon of baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup of sugar

1/2 cup of cold grated butter

1 egg

1 tbsp vanilla

1/2 cup of Eggnog

1/2 cup of chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chips

reserve a couple of tablespoons of eggnog for the top and flour for the board to roll out.

Coffee Glaze:

1 tsp instant coffee 

1 tbsp hot water

1/2 cup icing sugar approx.

Directions:

In a medium sized bowl sift the flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder and mix it up with a fork or a whisk and add the sugar and mix again.

Grate a half a cup of cold butter right into the dry ingredients and mix with a for or pastry cutter until it's combined into little pea shaped bits and then mix the wet ingredients.

In a measuring cup crack 1egg and whisk it up for a few minutes and then add a 1/2 cup of eggnog and a tablespoon of vanilla and mix well.

Chop 1/2 cup of chopped dark chocolate or measure a 1/2 cup of chocolate chips.

Add the wet egg mixture into the dry ingredients and stir with a fork or wooden spoon until combined and before all the flour is mixed in add the chopped dark chocolate and mix until combined.  It should slightly come together but don't mix it too much or it will become tough.

Dump the mixture out onto a floured board and knead it all together until it's all mixed and pat it down into a dinner plate sized flat shape.

You can cut it with round biscuit or cookie cutters or you can just cut it into pie slices by cutting in  half and then quarters and then cutting each quarter in half if you want them smaller.  

I didn't cut mine out that great but it didn't matter but it does matter that they are similar in size so they can bake the same.  

Place on a baking tray and you can line it with parchment if you like.  I didn't bother this time.

Brush the top with the reserved eggnog and place in the oven.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 15 -20 minutes depending on how hot your oven is.  Remove when they are brown on the bottom and golden brown on top.

To make the glaze in a small bowl mix the hot coffee with the instant coffee and mix well and then add icing sugar until you get a runny icing paste.

Drizzle with a fork on the Scones just out of the oven and they will dry once the scones are cooled.

Serve immediately.

Makes 12 large scones.

Goes great with eggnog or hot coffee and would make a great Christmas or Boxing Day breakfast.

December Food Revolution Toronto Challenge - Oaty Fruity Cookies

I am one of a group of many Food Revolution Ambassadors in Toronto and around the World a group of people that believe in Jamie Oliver's mission to educate people to eat better food and currently on a mission to fight childhood obesity.

Each month we get Challenges that are sent to us by the team in the U.K. that manage the Ambassadors around the world.  I try and participate in the ones I am able to do.  I wasn't able to do November's because it was a pasta dish although somewhat simple I had a bit of a fall and haven't been able to lift my right arm to make it on my own.  I even purchased the ingredients before I got hurt and hope to make the recipe at some point.

The Toronto Team have decided to select monthly recipes for us to make and to share with out social streams for a chance for people to win a cookbook each month.

December's recipe is Jools' Oaty Fruity Cookies but I wasn't sure if I would be able to make this recipe because of my injured shoulder,  but my friend came over to visit me and bring me a few things and I told him about the challenge and asked if he would help me do it and he provided the reaching, mixing and all the physical things that it took to complete this recipe.  He did most of the work but we did it in my very tiny kitchen as you can see there isn't much prep space.

The reason I wouldn't have been able to do it myself was because of the ingredients and tools were either stored very high and out of my reach or too heavy for me to access.  This recipe requires a lot of ingredients that you may or may not use everyday.  Luckily I got help and together we worked our way through this recipe.

The link to the recipe is below.  For my cookies I used Pumpkin seeds, flax and sesame seeds.  I used coconut sugar and white sugar and I used raisins, golden berries and some dried cherries.  That's what I had. You can adjust for what you might have.  For the spices I used cinnamon, ginger and cloves for that winter spice flavour.  It's not difficult once you have organized all of the ingredients.  They bake very quickly too.

If you would like to try this recipe and get a chance to Win a Jamie Oliver cookbook you can see the link and the details below this photo.

This recipe might be great to make with kids that can gather the ingredients and dump and stir and form the cookies because you just need an ice cream scoop to measure equal portions.  Give it a try and let me know what you added to yours.

Hey #Canada - we want to get you BAKING! Starting today, December 1st 2016 until December 31st 2016, bake up a batch of Jools Oliver's Easy Oaty Fruity Cookies for your chance to win one of four Jamie Oliver cookbooks thanks to HarperCollins Canada!

http://www.jamieoliver.com/…/fruit-recipes/jools-easy-oaty…/

How to enter:

Bake Jools' Easy Oaty Fruity Cookies with your family, snap a picture and share it on social media using the hashtag #CookwithFoodRevTOand tag us here on FB, or at @FoodRevToronto on Twitter or Instagram and you'll be entered to win a cookbook!

Eligibility and contest rules:

– Contest begins on December 1st 2016 at10am EST on and closes December 31st 2016 at 6pm EST.
– Prize consists of one (1) Jamie Oliver cookbook (various titles)
– There are four (4) prizes in total.
– Open to readers or the age of majority with a Canadian mailing address.
– No purchase of any product necessary for entry.
– Winners will be chosen randomly (using random.org) from all qualified entries on December 31st 2016 after 6pm EST.
– Winners will be notified via email January 1st 2017 and will have 48 hours to respond to the email.
– Winners will be required to answer a skill testing question.

Bake some easy Irish Soda Bread for St. Patrick's Day

HAPPY ST.PATRICK'S DAY

March 17, 2016

Seems like everyone is IRISH today but even though I have a lot of different cultures in me I am pretty sure there isn't any Irish but I can easily become Irish inspired by FOOD today.

I love making fresh bread and I don't do it often enough because it takes time but this Irish Soda Bread is as easy as making Beer Bread.  This was my first attempt at Irish Soda Bread but I think it turned out pretty well.

I followed a pretty basic recipe.  Traditional Soda bread has only a few ingredients.

INGREDIENTS:  

4 cups of flour
1t sp of Baking Soda
1 Tbsp of Salt
1/2 Tbsp of Sugar
2 cups of Buttermilk

Directions.
Mix all the dry ingredients and then pour the buttermilk in all at once and mix with a wooden spoon or even your hands.   Fold it out onto a floured board and just bring it together until you can form a ball.   Cut an X in the top of the bread with a knife and then place it on a sheet of parchment paper.
Preheat oven to 425 degrees and place a Dutch Oven (Le Creuset) is what I used into the oven to heat up.  Once the Dutch Oven is hot take it out of the oven and then lift the bread dough with the parchment paper and put it in the Dutch Oven and place the lid on it and put it back into the oven for 30 minutes.   Take it out of the oven and take the bread out and place it on a cookie sheet and place it back into the oven for another 15-20 minutes or until it's browned all around and has a crunchy exterior.   Let it cool for a few minutes before cutting it.   You can add currants to it for a sweeter bread but I skipped it.   Serve with butter and honey if you like or along with a good Irish Stew and a Guinness to wash it down.

I was going to make Colcannon but it's getting late.  I had to go out to the store to get the buttermilk for the bread so I didn't get to it until later than I planned to.  I wanted to get it done quickly so I could take a photo while there was still natural light outside.

So go and be IRISH for a DAY and make some Soda Bread.  It's pretty easy.

Mocha Coconut Ugly Sweater Brownie Cake

For the past few years I have been taking photos of different weekly challenges for Gastropost.  Gastropost is part of Postmedia who own the National Post.  Every week a few photos are chosen to appear in the Gastropost section of the Saturday edition of the National Post in Toronto and versions across Canada as well.

Recently the team at Gastropost chose 8 of us Gastropost Bloggers to complete a sponsor Challenge for the Holidays.

THE MISSION:  HOLIDAY TREATS

We were given a couple of different items from a couple of different sponsors.

I was given a Brownie Mix and Wine gums from Walmart Canada.


After scratching my head to come up with an idea of what to do with these items I decided to tie them into the Holiday Party Theme I am doing for a party with friends this weekend.

THE THEME:  UGLY SWEATER PARTY

What I did to transform and turn the products into a Holiday Treat?

I decided to make a Mocha Coconut Brownie Cake.
I knew I wanted to frost it with Coconut so it made sense to compliment the flavours of a chocolate brownie mix with Espresso flavour and coconut.

I tried to turn the wine gums into stained glass ornaments but that didn't work out as well as I would have hoped so I just used the Wine gums as decoration for the Brownie Cake.

I decided to make it round instead of the traditional square brownies to make it look more like a snowy cake and also so that I can cover it on a cake stand.  A practical reason for sure.

Directions for the Brownie:

I added about a tablespoon of Espresso powder to the mix because it enhances the chocolate flavour.
I also added about 3 tablespoons of shredded coconut to the mix.
I added the required water and 2 eggs but had to substitute the vegetable oil for Olive Oil but I wouldn't suggest this.  I didn't have any vegetable oil and didn't have time to run out to get some.  I probably would have substituted in Coconut oil if I had some and I know that would have further enhanced the flavour.

I mixed it up and then baked it.   There are directions on the box to tell you how long to cook it.   I tried to do the toothpick test to see if it comes out clean and cooked it longer but I think because I used Olive oil and added the coconut it was a bit too long and the edges burnt but these things happen sometimes.  I just cut off the brown edges when i frosted the brownie.  It takes a bit of time to bake and you have to cool it completely before you frost it.

For the Frosting:

I whipped up some white buttercream using just a couple of sticks of softened butter and a couple of cups of icing sugar and added coconut extract to it to boost the coconut flavour.

Because I only had the one box I couldn't make another one so I had to try and get it right the first time around.

I frosted the cooled brownie with the white buttercream and then added shredded coconut to make it look like snow.   I added red food coloring to the little bit of leftover buttercream and piped the outline of a sweater on the cake.

I added colored sprinkles to the inside of the sweater outline and then added a few whole and cut wine gums for the buttons on the sweater.   I also added wine gums to the border of the brownie around the edges to tie it all together.

And Voila,  and Ugly Christmas Brownie Cake.

I wanted to cut it and show a slice of it but then I would ruin the surprise for my friends  at my Holiday Party on the weekend.   So you will have to trust me that it looks good on the inside and is very chocolatey.

I will post a photo of a cut piece on my Instagram account @lindamatarasso once I cut it this sunday.

Thank you to Walmart Canada for the goodies and thank you to Gastropost for organizing a few of us crafty Bloggers.  You can follow along on Twitter and Instagram to see what the others have done by using the hashtag #GastropostHoliday.

I hope to have more photos with the Brownie cake after the weekend so look out for more soon.

Sweet Heart Chocolate Chip Scones

Chocolate Chip Heart Shaped Scones

Why not make a simple but thoughtful breakfast for yourself or for someone else this Valentine's Day.  Skip the expensive dinner and start your day with a sweet little touch of goodness.

I was thinking about making some chocolate chip scones and since tomorrow is Valentine's Day I was inspired to make some heart shaped Chocolate Chip scones.  I have to say that they turned out to be the best scones that I ever made.  Almost like a light cookie.  I didn't want to make them into rock scones so I was very careful not to over work them.

As usual I just cook a lot by feel so I will try and approximate the ingredients that I put into these scones.  I will give you all the ingredients but you may have to just work with it to get it to the right consistency to get it right.

Ingredients:

2 cups of all purpose flour
1/4 cup of sugar
1 cup of milk
1/2 lemon juiced
1tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup of cubed cold butter

Topping
1 egg beaten
2 tbsp Turbonado sugar

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 400F.

In a large bowl add the flour, sugar, salt, baking soda, baking powder and cinnamon.  Whisk until all the ingredients are distributed throughout.

In a measuring cup add the milk and add the juice of half a lemon.  Set aside.

Cut the cold butter into small cubes and add them to the flour mixture.  With your hands or a pastry cutter mix the butter and flour between your fingers until the mixture is a sandy texture.  You can add butter or flour until you get the right consistency.  When you squeeze some in your hand it should stick together like when you make sand castles.

Add the chocolate chips and mix throughout the flour mixture.

Add the vanilla to the milk mixture and stir.   Then pour the milk mixture into the dry ingredients a little at a time and mix until the mixture comes together and away from the bowl.   I left my dough fairly loose.  Make sure you don't over mix it.  You just want it to come together to be able to have them hold to roll out.

Dump the mixture onto a lightly floured board.  I didn't roll the dough I just patted it down to a 1/2 inch thickness.  You can roll it to get a smoother top finish.   For me the less tools I have to wash the better.  Use your hands.. that way you put some love into them.  Yes it makes a difference.

I used 2 different sized heart shaped cookie cutters mostly because I wanted to see which came out better and also so that I didn't have to re work the leftover scraps much.

Place the cut out scones on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet.
Brush the tops with the egg wash and then sprinkle turbonado sugar on top.  I suppose you could use colored sugar to be fancy too but consider the color of the chocolate chips.  It might not look that great.

Bake for about 20 minutes or until brown on the bottom and slightly golden on top.   Keep checking your oven because it may take more or less time.

Use this as a guideline but I basically just dumped and stirred and didn't measure anything exactly.  This is grandmother cooking.. even though my grandmother and my mother never made scones I still learned how to guestimate some baking from my mom.  I think she only measured a few recipes and then winged the rest.   Learn to wing it so that you can get creative with your recipes.   I added cinnamon and vanilla to boost the chocolate flavour.   Also cinnamon regulates blood sugar so it's a good thing when you bake.

My batch turned out great and I hope if you try them you will like them as much as I did.

Oh and I had them with Cherry Blossom Lemon Lilly Tea from Postal Teas.  The hint of cherry was a nice pairing with the chocolate chips.

Thanksgiving Dinner using your Oven only

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

It's Thanksgiving time and a whole lot of people will be sitting down to have Turkey and all the trimmings.  I have already had 2 Turkey Dinners at this point at friends houses.  While my family doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving because it was never our tradition,  but I do enjoy the whole Turkey dinner and the classic meals that go with it.

This year I thought about all the dishes you could make using your oven besides roasting the Big Bird.

This is the Turkey we made at my friends house in Peterborough.  Notice the bed of vegetables underneath.  This is pretty standard to add a vegetable bed underneath the Turkey.  The reason is not just to cook everything in one pot but it serves 2 purposes.  The vegetables lift the Turkey so that the heat can circulate around the Turkey for more even cooking and also the juices will run off the rendering of the Turkey fat and baste the vegetables underneath.  It also prevents the Turkey from sticking to the bottom of the pan.  But the best part is that the vegetables roast and caramelize and baste in the Turkey juices and they develop flavour.   That flavour seeps into the juices that are left in the pan.  What do those juices turn into?  Great Gravy.   

For this Turkey I added some chopped garlic to the inside cavity of the Turkey and we added an onion to the inside and then underneath more onion, carrots and potatoes.

Once the Turkey and vegetables were cooked we removed the Turkey to let it rest and put the vegetables in a separate dish.   I should mention that the Turkey was only seasoned with Salt, Pepper and Paprika but you can add other things if you like to season it.  

We poured the drippings into a small saucepan and I added cornstarch dissolved in chicken stock and then added a little more stock to the saucepan and seasoned it with more salt and pepper.  I added the onion from the turkey to the gravy and cooked it to release more onion flavour and cooked the gravy while whisking until it thickened up.  If it works you have your basic Gravy.  You can experiment with other flavours from there if you like.

So if you have a big oven and like to make everything ahead and just stick it all in the oven to cook then what else can you make?

Here are a few ideas:

Mac and Cheese - I used Smoked Cheddar to kick up the flavour of this Mac and Cheese.

Fresh Baked Bread - I baked this bread by following along with Chef Michael Smith's Instagram recipe.  You start it the night before and let it rise.

Brussel Sprouts - This has become the only way I cook Brussel Sprouts now.  The roasting brings out the flavour and skips the boiling smell and mushy texture.  They become sweet and delicious.  You can add other things like bacon and walnuts to it after to dress it up.

Butternut Squash - For this Butternut Squash recipe I cut up the Squash the day before and added olive oil, maple syrup, smoked paprika and salt and pepper to season it and put it in a ziploc bag and left it in the fridge the day before and all I had to do is toss it onto a roasting pan and roast for about 30 min. at about 350F.

Sweet potato wedges -  I made this before Thanksgiving but I thought it could be a good alternative to butternut squash.  It's a lot easier to cut too.  Just peel and cut into wedges and season with salt and pepper and I added Turmeric and Cayenne pepper for a sweet and spicy kick.

Kale chips - If you want a little healthy crunch added to your table or something for people to nibble on when they arrive for dinner if you aren't ready to eat dinner yet then Kale chips are a good substitute for a bag of chips and add some healthy greens to the dinner meal.
I added a tiny bit of olive oil and then sprinkled smoked paprika on these ones.  Bake at 425F for about 20 min or until they are crispy but not burnt.

Now Let's talk DESSERT

Mini Pies - I made these mini Cherry Pies using frozen cherries that I had cooked down to a syrup consistency in advance but you can use any kind of pie filling or even some really great preserves and skip the fruit prep part.

Apple Crisp - One of my favourite Fall/Winter desserts is Apple Crisp.  It's semi healthy... There is a lot of sugar but you also get the health benefits from apples, cinnamon and oatmeal and combined it makes a super warm and comforting dessert that makes great breakfast leftovers the next day even.  You can even use other fruits instead of apples.   I like to add cranberries to apple crisp for the sweet and tart combination.  Berries make great crisps.  Can even use frozen berries but try and remove the liquid so that the crisp doesn't get too mushy.

These are some of my favourite ideas but there are a whole lot of fruits and vegetables that benefit from being roasted in the oven.   So if you don't like to be stuck watching a pot boil or trying to juggle multiple pots on the stove then try this if you like.  Prep all your food and just figure out the timing of when to put what in the oven.   Some things like the Kale chips can be put in the oven before making the rest of the dishes and some like the apple crisp can be made in advance and just heated up and the mini apple pies can be made the day before even.

Be creative and put your own spin on your oven meals.  These are some of my picks so try them if you like and let me know if they worked for you too.

Happy Thanksgiving or Happy Holidays because these foods can be eaten at any occasion.

Happy Baking.

Canada's Baking and Sweets Show Sugar Rush

Canada's Baking and Sweets Show is back at the Toronto Congress Centre near the Airport.  If you love all sweet things this is the place for you.   Cakes, cupcakes, Wonuts, Cannoli's, butter tarts, Macarons, Tarte's, Croqeumbouche's etc.   It's all there.

Make sure you have a healthy meal before you go there so you don't bounce off the walls trying all the sweet things but if you don't you can always try one of the Food Trucks that are parked outside of the building.  There were a couple of sandwich vendors like Panera Bread and St. Phillip's Cafe in the building as well but it was pretty much all sugar everywhere.   Not the place for a Diabetic to hang out at... kind of like an Alcoholic going to a giant Bar.

The theme this year is Wizard of OZ and it was the perfect theme to set the mood for fun sweet treats.  Starting with a very cool entrance of a witches legs sticking out of balloons at the entrance of the event.

One of the first booths I checked out when I entered the show was the Original Cupcake Booth whose owners were the Cupcake Girls (Heather & Lori) on W Network.  A show about their growing cupcake business.  I picked up a couple of things from their booth and tried one of their delicious cupcakes.
It was moist and the icing was a delicious buttercream that wasn't overly sweet.   I am not a fan of pure sugar icing.

Speaking of Sugar, the title sponsor of the show is Redpath Sugar who also had a cooking demo booth where my Food Revolution Ambassador pal Mardi Michels is there doing demos all weekend with her demos of Tarte au Citron and Pavlova.

Check her out if you get a chance.  There are also demos of cookie decorating and I missed the Croquembouche demo unfortunately.   There are also sugar stretching art demos that will amaze you.

With the theme of the show being all things in the Land of OZ there was an abundance of Competition cakes in all kinds of Land of OZ designs and there were touches of Alice designs throughout the show as well.

Some of the other notable Sugar Celebrities that are at the show are Top Chef Fabio Viviani who I got a chance to say hi to before he did his hilarious and fun Panettone demo.  One of the cake Boss Buddy Velastro's bakers was also there doing a fondant demo.   Coming up this weekend are baking experts Anna Olson and Ron Ben-Israel.

My other Food Revolution Day Ambassador pal Denise Livotti who owns Petits Chefs Academy is also there all weekend with her chef to show kids how to decorate cupcakes with Cake Boss's sponsored fondant and decorating products.   Sign up your child for a fun 15 minute quick play dough like demo.  They will love it.

There are also booths if you have an addiction to all kinds of baking tools and you can pick up a lot of your tools and decorating supplies and even a small appliance to work your magic.

Bring the family and enjoy the demos and treats and have some sugar fun.