Raw Chocolate & Spice Cupcakes

For everyone!

Cake: Bitter chocolate with chilli powder and cayenne pepper

Icing: Coffee fudge ganache with walnuts

This was another experiment. Either you love them or you hate them. Either way, they'll spice up your life like your having a good time.

Sam's Underwear Cake

For Sam Branman

Cake: Black cherry forest cake (get it?) made with cherry coke and fresh imported black cherries! With cherry vanilla icing.

Details: Pink Fondant, coconut (dyed black) & white piping icing.

Sam Branman is a longtime friend of mine and a fine gentleman at that... at least when he's outdoors. But as soon as he is indoors, off comes the pants! For years Sam's been frolicking around our apartments, no pants, no shame, no problem. This cake was for his 24th birthday and I may say, it's a pretty accurate replica of his entire pelvic area.

HOWEVER! It was also two other friends birthdays!!

So...

For Rachel Hauer we made her a chocolate brownie with strawberry icing:

A CUTE ASIAN THING!

And...

For Alex Profera we made him a insanely PLAIN chocolate cake with vanilla icing:

ALEX PROFERA CAKE!

Alex Profera.

Mia Cake

For Mia Tortora

Cake: Chocolate and Funfetti cake with vanilla icing as well as cappuccino cookies and cream icing.

Details: White & teal fondant. Black fondant spray. White & yellow piping icing. There's also a milk chocolate ganache on top.

This cake was made by Anastasia Tortora with my help! Mia was turning 21, so Anastasia designed this one-of-a-kind cake for her cousin after her love for playing the piano and all things beautiful.

Lavender & Honey Cupcakes

This was a recipe experiment that came out great! Everyday this week I was having Lavender tea with honey and it was so good that I wanted to work these flavors into a cake. The only thing was that the icing was not as fluffy as I'd like, but the flavor was perfect. Maybe next time I'll whip it more. Unfortunately, I did not have my electric mixer on hand.

I'll share the recipe below!

Cake:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter (You can use salted, just don't add the salt then)
1 cup sugar
2 cups self-rising flour (You can use all-purpose flour, just add 3 tsp baking powder then)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp salt
4 eggs
1/3 cup lavender water (seep the lavender in hot water for a few minutes)
1/2 cup actual dried lavender (as much as you want really)

BEAT THIS! BAKE AT 400 UNTIL GOLDEN BROWN! MAKES 18 CUPCAKES!

Frosting:
1 pack (7oz) Cream Cheese
1 1/2 c powdered sugar
2/3 c honey (as much as you want really)

WHIP THIS!

Directions: Put 'em on top one one another, ya done.

Wizards Of Waverly Place Cake

For Isabella Petruzzi

Cake: Carrot cake with raisins (special request: no walnuts!) with cream cheese frosting.

Details: Purple, marigold & aqua fondant. Lime & grape Runts. Neon green, purple & aqua piping icing.

My god-daughter, Bella, was turning 8 years old and her party was themed "Wizards of Waverly Place" -- a televison show where teen star, Selena Gomez, runs around with a wand and cast spells. Anyway, I wasn't sure what to make for this cake until I saw the paper goods for the party that my sister RoseLyn had bought. It had a lot of pretty colors and flowers and shapes, so I styled this cake according to the designs. It was my first 3-tier cake, pretty exciting! Hopefully, there will be more to come!

Crossword Puzzle Cake

For Eric Larson

Eric Larson's lovely son Arthur came to me with the idea for this cake. It was his father's 60th birthday and he loves crossword puzzles. It originally only said "Happy Sixtieth Birthday Eric" but it seemed like it was missing more answers. So Arthur texted me other words that Eric is associated with like, being sarcastic, the love of his dog and coffee, and the fact that he's a grandfather. So, even though this might seem like it says "Happy Sarcastic Birthday Dog" -- it's still super appropriate. Arthur also explained to me that his parents are not big fans of fondant, so this was all iced by hand and hand-piped, a little more work, but it was definitely worth it!

Cake: Chocolate chunk raspberry cake with buttercream frosting.

Details: Black piping icing, blue piping icing

Beatles Cake

For Matthew Sanders

My friend Erika came to me and asked if I can make a Beatles-themed cake for her friend Matt's birthday. He's a huge fan and he has a tattoo of this very image, a silhouette of the famous Abbey Road cover, on his arm. We snuck into Erika's empty apartment and waited for him to come for his surprise birthday party -- 'twas a fun night!

Cake: Chocolate cake & brownie, vanilla frosting.

Details: White & black butter-cream fondant, black piping icing.