Divalicious Red Velvet Whoopie Pies

I have been reading a ton of blogs these days.  Checking out what is popular on the party scene, want to make sure we have a Divalicious menu to offer!!!  So, my latest attempt at a new and tasty treat was a batch of Red Velvet Whoopie Pies.  I myself had never tasted a Whoopie Pie but my friend Jeanette from Bella Diva Parties loves the ones from Starbucks so I thought that I would give it a try.  I searched the Internet for recipes and found 3 worth a try.  The first recipe called for apple cider vinegar and sour cream, yuck interesting!  I know that sour cream is wonderful in cakes and that apple cider vinegar is great as well  but for some reason I just wasn't sure about the two together.  Wrong!   The "cake" portion is very dense (which I love!!) and the cream cheese frosting is sandwiched in the middle so that each and every bite is as delicious as the first.  I'll can't be giving you folks anything less than absolute perfection!!!  Thinking that I need to make the next batch more on the "Bite Size" scale.  They are a bit rich!

See that batter, it's very thick!

Scoop the batter and smooth it over on the top to form a nice mound.

Let them cool and fill them with Yummy vanilla cream cheese frosting and chill.

A Divalicious Booth!!

This past Sunday we organized a Springtime Boutique with 25 vendors at the St. Joseph's Church Hall in Nipomo.  The boutique was a fundraiser for our MS Challenge Walk 2011 team, Wine Country Walkers.  It was very successful!  We will have to make a few changes for the next one to get a little more traffic, but all in all, I would have to say it was a great first time event!  This was also our first boutique as a vendor!!!!  That's right, Divalicious {Sweet Treats} made it's debut and the feedback was very positive!  Yay!  I made English Toffee (milk chocolate with almonds and dark chocolate with pecans), sugar cookies covered in fondant with a chocolate MS ribbon on them, peppermint patties to sell at the booth and German Chocolate Cake Truffles for samples.  If you like coconut, you will love these German Chocolate Cake Truffles!  Next time I am going to sprinkle coconut over the top instead of the little pearlized balls.  I had planned to this time but when I reached in for the coconut I realized that someone I forgot to buy it after I made all those wonderful coconut cupcakes. Argh!!   Christy made mini Mocha cupcakes and mini Tangerine cupcakes for samples as well that were Divalicious!!  I must say that I like mini cupcakes much better than the full size version.  The minis are bite size and you can try more than one without any guilt!!  Love that! 

So what's on the agenda for this week?

•  Devil's Food Cake Truffles for a little girl's First Communion (Special request on her part!!)
• Batman Sugar Cookies for a birthday party - Bam, Pow, and Bats comes to mind!
• Cake Truffles and Chocolate Covered Oreos for the Teachers of St. Mary's of the Assumption School
• Bar Pan Cookies for a FABULOUS friend who just had a beautiful little baby girl (I am taking her dinner as well but the cookies are her favorite so I am not sure she will even eat the dinner!!  :0)

Remember, life is short, eat dessert first!! 

Tulips and Ladybugs!

This weekend I made cookies for a Bumblebee and Ladybug party put on by Bella Deeva Parties.  This time I used a Deeeelicious Vanilla Almond Sugar Cookie recipe that I got from Bake at 350!  I gotta tell you, they are wonderful!!  I am not a lover of sugar cookies.  I mean, they are alright, just not on my top 10.  These are top 10 worthy!  Honest!  Anyway, I made tulips to go with the bumblebee and ladybug garden theme.  Christy came over to help decorate these little jems and we just knew they were gonna need a little "something" on them to POP!  So after we outlined and flooded them with color we sat there thinking about just how we were gonna do this little POP.  It finally came to me with a little help from my candy jar.  I always have M & M's around the house.  I love them in candy dishes and I LOVE the holiday ones with all the cute colors!!!  So as I stood there wondering how I was going to get this cute little ladybug on my fabulously frosted tulip, it came to me....  Use one of these fabulous little candies that "melt in your mouth, not in your hand"!  Christy had thought of using Skittles, but I didn't have enough.  So, after a few attempts, this is what we came up with......

And here is how they looked at this F A B U L O U S party!!!

Don't they look soooooo cute next to all of those wonderful colors?!!!  I would never have put those colors together, but they are GREAT!!!  I just love it!  Anyway, I gotta say our first official order of Divalicious Cookies went great!  Promise to start posting recipes to a seperate page sometime later this week.  Life is just too sweet not to share!
~  Shelly

Cupcakes, Cupcakes, Cupcakes

Yesterday I tried a Rasberry Lemonade Angel Food Cupcake recipe from the Did Someone Say Party? blog.  I gotta say that they are Delicious!!  I think these babies would be a wonderful summertime treat for any BBQ or picnic (or anytime)!  They just taste fresh and light, and let's admit it, we all like light!  Those were just because I subscribe to their blog and when they posted them, I could not resist!  Today was a different baking chore.  I made two batches of Coconut Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting (and Coconut sprinkled on top, of course!!) to drop off in the Dorothea Lange Elementary School Teacher's Lounge.  While my children don't attend school at this wonderful institution of knowledge, Christy works there and we thought this would be a great place to start spreading all the Divalicious sweets that we make!  We are going to start taking something from our menu (that has yet to be posted to this slog blog) once a month to the fabulous staff that Christy works with at Dorothea Lange.  These are one of my favorite cupcakes!  I love the crunchy top, I love the coconut all throughout the cupcake and I love the cream cheese frosting.  I don't love the guilt I feel when I eat one because I know I am going to eat another!!!  That said, Christy took 27 cupcakes with her tonight to deliver to the staff and left me here with about 20!!!!  I WILL be delivering these beauties to a few friends tomorrow, there is no doubt in my mind!!!  Will post pics tomorrow of our display and soon we will add a recipe page, soon! 

And here are the little lovies just waiting to be taken at school! 


~  Shelly

Fabulous takes time!

Today we have an order for two pounds of English Toffee and 2 dozen Homemade Marshmallows covered in Fudge to deliver to Jeanette over at Bella Deeva Parties.  I made the toffee yesterday so it would have all night to set up and be ready for delivery and last night I made the "mallows" so they would be all ready to get covered in the delicious fudge!  After I dropped the kids off at school I came home to make this wonderful fudge and  I must admit, I was a bit distracted.  I was on the phone, I was thinking of all the things I need to get done today and trying to split the recipe in half.  This did NOT work out very well for me!  I did not melt my fluff before I added the chocolate (was in a hurry, one should never hurry when trying to make fabulous treats!) and the entire batch ended up gritty.  After I cleaned up my mess I took a deep breath and started over.  Taking the time to think about what I was doing and enjoying a little alone time while doing something I love.  It paid off!  My treats are all done, look wonderful and taste Yummy all because I slowed down.  So today, remember to take the time to slow down and enjoy all sweetness that is around you! 

Birthdays

I love to celebrate birthdays!  In our house we celebrate with a "Birthday Week".  The kids get to pick the menu for the week (with a few guidelines, of course) and can choose one meal to eat out.  Each day they also get little surprises left in their chair at the table.  Nothing big, just some small trinket that they may have asked for over the past few months.  They really enjoy the extra little attention they get during the week.  This drives my husband nuts!  He just doesn't see the point in letting them celebrate for an entire week.  I think this must be a "man thing" because it makes perfect sense to me!!!  I mean, I would love to vacation celebrate for a week when my birthday arrives.  Oh the things I would put on my list of "trinkets"!!!  Anyway, back to reality.  My dear friend's birthday is tomorrow and I am trying to decide what Divalicious dessert I should make her to kick off her Week of Celebration....

• Chocolate cupcakes with Peanut Butter frosting
• English Toffee
• Homemade Marshmallows covered in Fudge
• Cake Balls (I love to make the Pops but let's face it, the balls are easier and less time consuming!)
• Devil's Food cupcakes with a Chocolate Glaze

The choices are endless since she LOVES chocolate!  I better get in the kitchen and get inspired by my cookbook!!!  I'll be back later with a few photos of the Divalicious Sweets that will be heading out for the Birthday Girl!!

Spring is a time for trying new things!

It's April and with that comes Spring Cleaning, Garden Planting, Easter Break (:0) and this year, starting a blog!  I gotta admit, I am not tech savy!  Not at all, not one bit!  So this starting a blog thing is really going to try my patience.  I realize it's not rocket science, but they do ask a lot of questions that are just not in my vocabulary!!!  Maybe I should ask my 9 year old, he seems to figure all this kinda stuff out without a drop of sweat.