Apple Pie

For the last 3 weeks, I've been helping my friend out from school to do a bake sale to help with fundraising for Japan with our Red Cross club. This is the last week, and it's "pie week". We made the crusts at my house and she made the filling with her other friend at another house since I'm too busy. But I needed to make an apple pie for my own family anyways so I did that.

I used both the filling and crust recipes from allrecipes.com. I used Ruth's Grandma's Pie Crust and Apple Pie by Grandma Ople. I get lots of compliments from this pie from both family and friends, especially from the crust. My own family is actually not very fond of pies, but the only pie they will eat are my apple pies. :)









Pie Crust:
Adapted from Ruth's Grandma's Pie Crust
Yields about 2 crusts

• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 3/4 cups shortening
• 3 tablespoons white sugar
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup water

1. In a large mixing bowl, combine all-purpose flour, shortening, sugar, and salt. Blend together with a pastry cutter until crumbly.
2. In a small bowl, mix egg with water. Blend into flour mixture. Chill in refrigerator until ready to use.

Tips:

• Chill for at least 1 hour in the fridge (makes it easier to roll out later).
• When rolling out the dough to make the crust, sprinkle flour on and around the dough.

Apple Pie:
Adapted from MOSHASMAMA

• 1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch double crust pie
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 8 Granny Smith apples - peeled, cored and sliced (you don't have to use smith apples, I simply use what I have on hand)

Additions:
Based off of the reviews on this pie, here are the adjustments I got to make this even better tasting. :)
ADD EXTRA:

• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tbp vanilla (take out 1 tbps of water)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Melt the butter in a saucepan. Stir in flour to form a paste. Add water, white sugar and brown sugar (and extra ingredients), and bring to a boil. Reduce temperature and let simmer. Mix sliced apples with syrup (save some to brush on top of crust).
2. Place the bottom crust in your pan and brush with egg white (to prevent sogginess). Fill with apples mixed in syrup, mounded slightly. Cover with a lattice work crust. Gently brush leftover syrup over the crust.
3. Bake for 45 to 60 minutes, until apples are soft.

Tips:

• Place flat pan with foil underneath pie for drips in oven later.
• Place shelf in the middle of the oven,
• The thicker your crust is, the longer it will have to be in the oven.

Doll Cakes

So I was paid to make 2 birthday cakes for these two girls from my church. They love girly stuff, so after lots of surfing the web, I decided on making doll cakes for them, and by using google and youtube, I learned how to make one. It looks complicated, but it's actually pretty simple and I believe beginners may even try it out if they wanted to. The only thing though is that this type of cake takes patience since there's lots of waiting time involved.

The two cakes I made into two different flavors: chocolate and vanilla. Vanilla for the youngest girl (I think is turning 8), chocolate for the older girl (I think is turning 10). The vanilla recipe I got from my friend when we baked a cake together for school, and the chocolate is a simple one I took off of the back of a Hershey cocoa powder container. :P
For the vanilla cake I also used vanilla frosting (cuz the girl wanted pink frosting) for topping and filling. For the chocolate cake I used chocolate frosting filling, but vanilla topping so I could add bright colours.


Chocolate Cake:

• 2 C sugar
• 1 3/4 C all-purpose flour
• 3/4 C HERSHEY'S Cocoa
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 eggs
• 1 C milk
• 1/2 C vegetable oil
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 C boiling water

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans.
2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour batter into prepared pans.
3. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely.

Vanilla Cake:
Adapted from SCOTTOSMAN

• 1 1/2 C all purpose flour
• 1/2 C butter or margarine (softened)
• 1 tbp vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 1 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 C and extra 1/8 C milk (as suggested from others)
• 1 C sugar
• food colouring (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease the pans with butter or oil and coat with flour
2. Sift together the flour and baking powder in a separate bowl and set aside.
3. Make sure your butter or margarine is room temperature or softened. Cream the butter than add the sugar and cream some more. In small bowl, whisk/beat each egg one at a time and add each egg into the cream and sugar mix separately. Then add in the vanilla extract.
4. Add the dry ingredients mixture into the wet ingredients until all the ingredients are wet, add milk and stir.
5. OPTIONAL: Next in separate bowls colour the batter with your colour of preference. Separate batter into different bowls, one bowl for every colour you choose (I made one layer pink).
6. Next pour the batter into a pan (if you chose to use more than one colour, bake in separate pans for each). Bake for about 20 min to 30 min, or when a toothpick comes out clean after being inserted into the cake. Let it cool.

Tips:

• If your butter is straight from the fridge and is hard, try microwaving it for at least 20 sec.
• You can mix ingredients together using an electric mixer, but I prefer using a hand whisk (using an electric mixer will make the batter more smooth if you're not used to whisking by hand).
• If you use colouring, the colour of the cake will come out of the oven slightly lighter than it looked before as a batter.

Chocolate Frosting:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine
• 2/3 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
• 3 cups powdered sugar
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Melt butter. Stir in cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating to spreading consistency. Add small amount additional milk, if needed. Stir in vanilla. About 2 cups frosting.

Vanilla Frosting:
Adapted from xoshadyxo

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened (I used margarine)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups confectioners' sugar, sifted
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 4 drops food coloring, or as needed (optional)

1. Cream room temperature butter with a hand mixer, the paddle attachment of a stand mixer, or a wooden spoon until smooth and fluffy. Gradually beat in confectioners' sugar until fully incorporated. Beat in vanilla extract.
2. Pour in milk and beat for an additional 3-4 minutes. Add food coloring, if using, and beat for thirty seconds until smooth or until desired color is reached.

Tips:

• If you prefer to use just frosting to cover the cake instead of whip cream, add more milk so the frosting is more smooth and easier to spread.
• If you make the frosting more firm (less milk), decorations will also be more firm after it's chilled and less prone to being ruined by touch.

ASSEMBLY:

1. Take the bottom layer and cut (using a knife with "teeth") the top until flat and smooth (make sure all layers are completely cooled or else frosting will melt). optional: take the top layer and cut around edges until smooth and looks round (if you want to make a more dress effect).
2. Stack the top and bottom layer, make sure they're aligned. Take a circular cookie cutter or a knife, and cut a hole in the middle of the cake larger enough for the doll to fit, but not too large.
3. Lay the bottom layer on whichever plate you want the cake to be on (try to find the flattest plate/bottom to put the cake on, it makes decoration easier). Take your frosting and put a generous helping onto the bottom layer and spread around the top.
4. Take the top layer and put it on top of the frosted bottom layer. Put more frosting on the top layer and spread. Spread frosting on the sides of the cake as well, but only a thin layer (this will be the base layer of frosting). Chill for at least 1 hour.
5. Take the frosted cake out of the fridge, make sure frosting is cooled and firm. Put a generous helping of frosting on top of the cake and spread all around (this is final layer so put on as much frosting as you want). Put the cake into the fridge to cool another hour until frosting is cooled.
6. If you choose to only use frosting, then you can skip this step and move onto step 7. If not, take your cake out of the fridge and add whip cream. If you want the dress to have a specific design using the cream, you can look up doll cakes on google. I just spread the whip cream all over the cake to create one whole dress piece. Put into the fridge to cool another hour until cooled.
7. Take out the cake from the fridge. Make sure it is firm and cooled before decorating. Prepare your icing bags if you have one. If you don't have one, there are many makeshift icing bags you can hand-make if you look it up on google. Using paper or a ziplock bag are some examples.
8. Take your doll. Make sure you wash it thoroughly with soap (take off all clothing). Tie the hair up if not done already so it doesn't get frosting on it. After drying, you can choose to put the clothes back on or leave it off. Wrap the doll tightly with plastic wrap from the chest and down (if you leave the clothes on, push the shirt down so the doll is "topless" for decoration). Do not wrap the arms.
9. Place the wrapped doll into the hole in the cake (its okay if frosting gets on the wrap, that's what it's there for). The cake should reach around the doll's hips/waist (you may need more layers if the cake is too short or a smaller doll). Fill the hole with leftover frosting or whip cream so it looks like the dress is attached to the doll.
10. Now start decorating! Using your prepared icing bag, decorate the dress any way you want it to. Make sure to ice the doll's top to match the dress. With the icing, you can use stars, dots, lines, etc.
11. Either put the cake back in the fridge until the cake is needed, or serve right away!

Tips:
-try to chill everything completely for at least 1-2 hours before decorating; it makes decorating a lot easier if the surface of the cake is firmer and colder.

Hello!

This is my first time doing a blog on baking, so bear with me here! I have been baking a lot recently and have decided to start a blog on my creations! I will be putting up recipe information along with photos and step-by-step instructions. Hope you enjoy!