With Sprinkles on Top

I love bees. I love hearts. I love the color combination of light blue + red. And so these cookies were born! I used large heart sprinkles made by Wilton (check your local craft store for them). I bought the pressed sugar bees online. And I used a heart cookie cutter that is about 3.5 inches wide (though any size would work). The sugar cookies were made using my grandmother’s recipe (listed below) and the royal icing recipe is from Annie’s Eats (also listed below).  I outlined and flooded the cookies with light blue icing.  When the icing had dried enough, I piped the “Bee Mine” text and buzzy bee flight lines onto the cookies using black royal icing.  The bees and hearts were “glued” on using royal icing. Enjoy — and please let me know if you have questions!

Omi’s Sugar Cookies
Print Recipe

1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon nutmeg

Beat butter and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream, and nutmeg. Add dry ingredients gradually. Chill the batter overnight or for at least 4 hours. Roll out dough and cut with cookie cutters. Bake at 350F until golden (in true fashion, my grandma didn’t give a specific baking time. I baked the cookies for about 8 minutes).

I ended up with about 18 heart cookies out of this recipe.  The yield will depend on how large your cookie cutter is.  If you need to make a lot of cookies, I suggest doubling the recipe.

White Royal Icing
4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
2 Tablespoons meringue powder
5 Tablespoons water
Blue food coloring (I used Wilton gel – in sky blue); black food coloring (I used AmeriColor’s Super Black)

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on low speed until the sheen has disappeared and the icing has a matte appearance (about 7-10 minutes).  Transfer the contents of the mixing bowl to an air-tight container. This will be the stiffest consistency of the icing, and at this point it is still too stiff to use for decorating. Add water a very small amount at a time and stir by hand until fully incorporated. Continue until the icing has reached a consistency appropriate for piping.

You may need to make another batch or two of royal icing, depending on how many cookies you are making.  Dye most of your icing blue — and dye a small amount of icing black for the text and bee lines.

If you are new to decorating with royal icing, please visit this post by Annie’s Eats, which will teach you about outlining and flooding.

February is TOMORROW – and that means the next holiday to fret over is Valentine’s Day. I saw a cake like this floating around Pinterest and thought it was awesome. But can we just stop and discuss something? Why do all the hearts look like they were a) stepped on, b) printed by a toddler, or c) part of the reject bin? Go home, candy heart-making machine, you’re drunk.

I even bought a new bag thinking my first bag was surely full of defective hearts that somehow escaped quality control, but noooooo. So what we’re left with is a cute cake covered with some pretty imperfect hearts.

I hope you are all staying warm — as most of the country seems to be in a deep freeze! I won’t complain though, as round two of the “Polar Vortex” gave me a day off of classes earlier this week. Even Wisconsin shuts down if it gets cold enough. :)

Conversation Heart Cake
Inspired by Love from the Oven
Print Recipe

1 box cake mix (plus required eggs and oil)
1 tub of frosting (maybe two, depending on how big your cakes are and how much you like frosting)
6″ or 7″ cake pan(s)
A couple bags of conversation hearts

1. Make the cakes according to box direction.  You can use any flavor you’d like.  I used 6″ cake pans because I figured I’d go batty trying to cover a larger cake in candy hearts. Allow the cakes to cool on wire racks.
2. Assemble the cakes, spreading frosting between the layers and over the outsides of the cake. I used vanilla frosting because I thought the white color would work better than chocolate.
3. You might want to frost your cake in segments — because if the frosting dries at all, you’ll have a hard time getting the candy hearts to stick. I frosted the sides of the cake first — doing about a 1/3 of the cake at a time, covering with hearts, doing another 1/3, and so on.  The last step was to frost and decorate the top of the cake.

Let me know if you have any questions!

I’m reviewing Grace and Shelly’s cupcake shop – located in Whitefish Bay, WI!

• Grace and Shelly’s shops are primarily located in Florida. The Milwaukee area must be pretty special in order to get one! ;)
• I really like this bakery. I’ve visited a few times (so I could sample many varieties) and I’ve been happy every time.
• My favorite cupcake here is the Butterfinger Cupcake (shown above) – OH MY GOD. It was to-die-for. My other favorite? The maple bacon because, well, duh. Maple and bacon. On a cupcake.
• One of the great things about this shop is the variety of cupcakes. They print a menu – so you know what cupcakes will be made each day of the week.
• The shop also serves Chocolate Shoppe ice cream — a local company out of Madison that makes amazing ice cream.
• I also tried one of their variety packs of mini cupcakes — a wise decision if you can’t make up your mind. It was nice to be able to try teeny tiny versions of so many of their flavors.
• The inside of the shop is very inviting – decorated in pale blues and whites.
• So yes, if you find yourself in Milwaukee or Florida, please visit Grace & Shelly’s!

Note: I’m not being paid to promote this bakery. I just like to try new places and I’ll take any excuse I can get to eat a few cupcakes.

I feel as if I’ve neglected my blog lately. But life has been busy. Let me catch you up with a few bullet points.

• December marked a flurry of activity around here. A lot of Christmas treats were posted, but behind the scenes life was a little miserable. After months of being sick, the doctors told me that I had a faulty gallbladder and had to have surgery a few days after my final exams ended. Can you say awful and stressful?! The surgery was easy squeezy, the recovery was awful, but I’m back to being 100% now!
• Two days into 2014, I headed to Disney World with a friend of mine from law school. We wanted to mark our halfway point through law school by spending a week at the happiest place on earth. I’ll be sharing a lot of photos on this post – because who doesn’t love Disney? (If you don’t, don’t even speak of it – we can no longer be friends). And we ate a lot of treats, so I’ll share my thoughts on those!
• The spring semester has started and the mountain of work is piling up yet again. In case I haven’t complained about it recently (ha!), allow me this chance. You guys. Law school is nuts. The girls in my partnership tax class have already asked, “you’ll be bringing cookies every week, right?” Yes. Maybe every day. We will need them.
• That’s about it for me. I’ll try to post as many goodies as I can over the next couple months. Valentine’s Day is less than a month away (!), so it’s time make something cuuuuute!
• On with the Disney photos! If you have any questions or are planning a trip, shoot me an email or leave a comment. I love talking Disney. Also – early January is a great time to visit the parks (low crowds, cool weather, generally awesome experience — and the Christmas decorations will still be up!).
• And in case someone wants to know – the photos below were taken with either (a) my iPhone or (b) a Nikon D300 with a Tamron 17-50mm 2.8 lens.

Christmastime at the Magic Kingdom!My favorite ride – the Mad Hatter’s Tea PartyThese two photos were taken at the Confectionery on Main Street USA. Everything looked so delicious! I wanted one of those Goofy caramel apples – but not for $10!The new magnet collection is adorable. All the classic Disney treats!And here’s a real Mickey waffle! Waffles just taste better in Mickey form.A must-eat at the Magic Kingdom is pineapple Dole Whip. Do not be swayed by the orange Dole Whip. Go with pineapple. It is one of my all-time favorite treats.Gaston’s Tavern is part of the new Fantasyland. If you go, try LeFou’s Brew, which is frozen apple juice with a hint of marshmallow. It’s delicious!
Speaking of new Fantasyland, have any of you been to Be Our Guest? It was the best part of our trip. What a magical restaurant. Truly.Note the red napkin folded into a rose. Those Disney imagineers miss nothing!You can have “The Grey Stuff” for dessert – which is cookies ‘n’ cream mousse – but really does look like mystery grey fluff.A little more Magic Kingdom Christmas.Who doesn’t love fireworks?The Osborne Lights at Hollywood Studios – so amazing!We lunched at the 50s Primetime Cafe. The food was decent – all comfort food! Andrea tried a peanut butter and jelly shake – and it tasted like a blended and frozen Reese’s peanut butter cup. Mmm!
Is there anything happier than a Disney balloon?EPCOT is next!First stop, the bakery in France. I got macarons and Andrea got chocolate mousse.Next was the Karamell-Kuche in Germany. *Everything* was covered, dripped, drizzled, or dunked in caramel. My version of heaven. :)Norway brought us the Kringla Bakeri og Cafe. My friend (and Disney super fan and expert) Amber HIGHLY recommended that we try the schoolbread. You guys. Oh my god. And look, I *hate* coconut. But this magical pastry sent from the heavenly land of Norway? SO DELICIOUS. I dream about it. Others feel the same way!Loved the cookies ‘n’ cream cupcakes at the Boardwalk Bakery.A note about our hotel – we stayed at the Contemporary and booked a boring garden level room. Upon arrival, we were upgraded to a Club Level room with a view of the Magic Kingdom. H-o-l-y-s-h-i-t. You couldn’t have wiped the smiles off of our faces! In addition to the great view, there was free food in the common area from 7am to 10pm, every day. Breakfast! Snacks! Wine and cheese! Free beer! Dessert party! It was basically the best thing ever – and we’ll never be that lucky with an upgrade ever again.Free chocolates. The one with the photo of the Contemporary? It’s chocolate. I ate our hotel. Also, I love love loved the Contemporary. I didn’t know if I would because it was said to be so modern and cold – but I thought it was fantastic. The hotel was warm and clean and simple – and the biggest perks were the fact that you could walk to the Magic Kingdom and that the monorail went through the hotel (talk about convenient).And here’s the end of the photos (thank god, right?). I had a great time with Andrea and I will always love Disney with all my heart. And I will also always love those Mickey-shaped krispie treats. Daaaamn they’re good.

I’m off to Disney World with a girlfriend from law school! To mark the halfway point of law school, we’re reverting back to childhood and enjoying a week in the land of magic. As a result, I may be a little absent from my blog for the next week or so. Apologies in advance if I don’t approve comments or respond to emails as promptly as usual. :)