Culinary School Blog

The cupcakes were a hit with our wee dinner guests

We had a friend and her two little boys over for dinner the other night, they are 2 & 3.  We made the  boys Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, as well as chicken tenders, while the adults had Mostacholi, Ratatouille & salad .  I decided to make cupcakes for dessert, as I thought they would like this - the night before I made Strawberry & Cream filled Vol-au-Vents for other guests - which is not very kid friendly.  The boys each had two cupcakes, so I would say they were a success.  I think it was lost on the boys that the cupcakes were made with a French meringue or that the icing was made with an Italian meringue.

The recipe made 12 cupcakes in all, and seeing as Mark & I didn't want any extras left for us, I dropped a few off at another friend's house, who also has two boys.  She "sampled" one of them & described it as a fairy cake.

The self imposed baking strike is over......

We were back home about a month from NYC, before we headed to our house in the Keys for six weeks.  Mark was in dire need of a fishing fix & he also fished both the Hawley & Gold Cup tarpon tournaments in Islamorada. We're happy to say that he was 2nd runner up in the 12lb division of the Hawley.  We stayed at The Moorings Village for both weeks of his tournaments.  We ate well while in Florida - as always.  While in Islamorada we went back to dine at Pierre's , Kaiyo's, Uncle's, & Marker 88.  We found a new place that's quite casual & eclectic called Coco's Cabana near our house, as well as our two favorites:  Square Grouper & Mangrove Mama's.  We only ventured into Key West for dinner one night this trip & enjoyed Cafe Marquesa as always. 

We've been back in Texas since July 1st and just recently bought some land to build a house on.  We're enjoying being back home, even though dining out in our town is sometimes challenging.  A few new restaurants opened while we were gone, so we've tried those a few times.  And we even got a movie theatre in our town!

We ordered a new mixer a few weeks ago, the DeLonghi DSM7.  The maiden voyage for the mixer was a white cake, with strawberry filling & an Italian Buttercream Frosting.  It has a 7 quart bowl, so Mark will be able to make breads much easier with this mixer. 

DeLonghi Mixer

White Cake