That's two parties. Two parties two
weeks apart. Somehow I thought this was a good idea a month ago.
We're two days for party #2, Naomi's first birthday. The week before the first party (for extended family) was all prep for that party. Last week was recovery. Let's set aside the fact that my itty bitty baby is going to be a year old, and focus on the party we had for extended family: Lemonade & Cupcakes.
Bryan has a big family, so I had a lot of work to do. But it was all fun and I loved how things turned out, even if they were not perfect. I fell back on the semi-homemade methods. I love making things from scratch, but when you're expecting a lot of people and don't have much time and energy, it's the way to go.
Featured here is the lemonade bar. To the left in the photo you'll note the drink dispenser. It was part-fake part-real lemonade. This dispenser, from Target, was a real pain in the neck. The lemonade did not come out easily. I think we have it fixed now, but I later resorted to putting the lemonade in a different pitcher.
The awesome part of the dispenser is that attached to the cap is a tube with holes in it. I think you're supposed to put ice in it, but I halved some nice lemons and put them in there.
The fun part of the lemonade bar is the frozen fruit ice cubes. There were strawberry, mango, apricot, pineapple, and orange ice cubes, as well as regular water-only ice cubes. I also made watermelon ice cubes but forgot about them. Oops. They are actual cubes, too, made in silicone Tovolo Perfect Ice Cube trays. I got mine at Ross a couple of years ago and I love them. The silicone makes them easy to pop out, and they are fun cube-ice-cubes.
I used clear bowls for the cubes, and wrote what each bowl held on the white wrapping paper table runner with a black marker.
I made three types of cupcakes.
First off was a red velvet cupcake (right). Pretty straight forward, Duncan Hines, with milk instead of water. Then I made a cream cheese frosting from scratch using half butter and half cream cheese. It was very yummy.
Then came the strawberry cream cupcakes. They reminded me of strawberry shortcakes. I made them with a white cake mix, also subbing milk in for the water. For this one, I had to pull off the cupcake liners and cut the tops off.
The fun part was making stabilized whipped cream with gelatin. That was a new technique to me, and a useful one. I tend to shy away from whipped cream as a topping since it melts so fast, but stabilizing it really worked wonders. Learn how to do it, like I did, from Baked Bree. Then I folded chopped strawberries into the whipped cream. I wish I had used more strawberries. Regardless, I topped them off with just a sprinkle of powdered sugar. No frosting required.
Last, but not least, I made the Key Lime Mango Coconut cupcakes. That's a mouthful. A mouthful of deliciousness. They started out as a yellow cake mix, but instead of oil I used pureed mango, and I added flaked dried coconut to the mix. I used rehydrated unsweetened coconut from Bob's Red Mill, but I am sure sweetened would work just fine. Because of the coconut (and maybe the mango) these didn't rise as much. Next to the lofty domes on the Strawberry Creams and the tall, swirling frosting on the Red Velvet, they looked tiny, but they packed a punch.
That was mostly due to the tangy key lime frosting I made. I started with homemade buttercream frosting, with some vanilla, and added key lime juice. That made it somewhat thinner, but because it was a strong flavor, I didn't want too much frosting piled on anyway. It was the least favorite of the crowd, but my personal favorite as I love lime (and lemon) flavors, and the texture that the coconut added.
I was really tempted to make a lemonade or pink lemonade cupcake as well. Or chocolate. Or carrot cake. I am really tempted to make all sorts of cupcakes all the time. I don't like the same thing all the time. I like variety. But you can only do so much baking when you're a mother of three with very little will-power against cupcakes! :)
We're two days for party #2, Naomi's first birthday. The week before the first party (for extended family) was all prep for that party. Last week was recovery. Let's set aside the fact that my itty bitty baby is going to be a year old, and focus on the party we had for extended family: Lemonade & Cupcakes.
Bryan has a big family, so I had a lot of work to do. But it was all fun and I loved how things turned out, even if they were not perfect. I fell back on the semi-homemade methods. I love making things from scratch, but when you're expecting a lot of people and don't have much time and energy, it's the way to go.
 |
| cell phone photos. oh well. |
The awesome part of the dispenser is that attached to the cap is a tube with holes in it. I think you're supposed to put ice in it, but I halved some nice lemons and put them in there.
The fun part of the lemonade bar is the frozen fruit ice cubes. There were strawberry, mango, apricot, pineapple, and orange ice cubes, as well as regular water-only ice cubes. I also made watermelon ice cubes but forgot about them. Oops. They are actual cubes, too, made in silicone Tovolo Perfect Ice Cube trays. I got mine at Ross a couple of years ago and I love them. The silicone makes them easy to pop out, and they are fun cube-ice-cubes.
I used clear bowls for the cubes, and wrote what each bowl held on the white wrapping paper table runner with a black marker.
I made three types of cupcakes.
Then came the strawberry cream cupcakes. They reminded me of strawberry shortcakes. I made them with a white cake mix, also subbing milk in for the water. For this one, I had to pull off the cupcake liners and cut the tops off.
The fun part was making stabilized whipped cream with gelatin. That was a new technique to me, and a useful one. I tend to shy away from whipped cream as a topping since it melts so fast, but stabilizing it really worked wonders. Learn how to do it, like I did, from Baked Bree. Then I folded chopped strawberries into the whipped cream. I wish I had used more strawberries. Regardless, I topped them off with just a sprinkle of powdered sugar. No frosting required.
Last, but not least, I made the Key Lime Mango Coconut cupcakes. That's a mouthful. A mouthful of deliciousness. They started out as a yellow cake mix, but instead of oil I used pureed mango, and I added flaked dried coconut to the mix. I used rehydrated unsweetened coconut from Bob's Red Mill, but I am sure sweetened would work just fine. Because of the coconut (and maybe the mango) these didn't rise as much. Next to the lofty domes on the Strawberry Creams and the tall, swirling frosting on the Red Velvet, they looked tiny, but they packed a punch.
That was mostly due to the tangy key lime frosting I made. I started with homemade buttercream frosting, with some vanilla, and added key lime juice. That made it somewhat thinner, but because it was a strong flavor, I didn't want too much frosting piled on anyway. It was the least favorite of the crowd, but my personal favorite as I love lime (and lemon) flavors, and the texture that the coconut added.
I was really tempted to make a lemonade or pink lemonade cupcake as well. Or chocolate. Or carrot cake. I am really tempted to make all sorts of cupcakes all the time. I don't like the same thing all the time. I like variety. But you can only do so much baking when you're a mother of three with very little will-power against cupcakes! :)
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