Gluten free chocolate cake

This cake is heaven on earth and it's actually gluten fee which is crazy. It's from Mel's kitchen cafe and if you haven't been to her site, she's an amazing cook.

Ingredients:
2 cups cooked and cooled quinoa
1/3 c milk
4 large eggs
1 teas vanilla
3/4 c butter cooled and melted
1 1/2 c sugar
1 c cocoa
1 1/2 teas baking powder
1/2 teas baking soda
1/2 teas salt

Frosting:
2 1/4 c heavy whipping cream
1 1/4 c semi sweet choc chips

Directions:
Preheat to 350 line 2 8 in rounds with parchment paper.
Combine milk, eggs, and vanilla
Add cooked quinoa and butter til smooth ( quinoa should be cooked and cooled and cooked in water not broth and needs to be two cups cooked)

In another bowl whisk sugar, baking Soda, salt, powder, and cocoa and combine with other ingredients until smooth.
Divide batter in the two rounds and cook on middle rack for 28 to 30 min on 350
Remove cake from oven cool for 10 min then put on cooling racks removing parchment paper

Frosting:
Put chocolate chips in a bowl
Heat whipping cream until it simmers and then pour on choc chips
Let sit for 5 min then whisk until it's glossy and smooth
Refrigerate frosting covered for 2-4 hours
Cover the cake and chill entire cake for 2 hours before serving

Note: my frosting did not turn out because I didn't whisk it so I had to use Melanie's picture since my frosting was horrible looking but this cake is very decadent and delicious. It's worth trying!

Chocolate Dipper Cake

Made this cake up in Rexburg with Grandma...delish

Chocolate Dipper Cake

Together Mix:

3 cups flour

1/2 cup cocoa

2 cups sugar

1 tsp salt

2 tsp soda

Make a well  in bowl then add:

2 eggs

1 cup vegetable oil

1 cup buttermilk

Mix well then add:

1 cup boiling water

1 tsp vanilla

Bake 25 minutes at 350

Makes big 9x13 pan or 3 rounds

You can frost it with THIS frosting (from texas sheet cake) or any chocolate frosting.

Grandma Lill's Carrot Cake

It was my birthday last week and I ended up making my own cake because I wouldn't settle for anything other than my Grandma Lill's carrot cake. It made my husband a bit nervous baking it from scratch, so I did it gladly just because I know how freakin good it is! :)

This cake is so moist and oh so delicious. My Mom use to make it all the time growing up. Love it!

Carrot Cake

Recipe from Grandma Lill

1 1/4 cup vegetable oil

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

2 cups flour

2 tsp cinnamon

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

3 cups grated carrots (raw and packed)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour 2 round cake pans (or one 9 by 13). Combine oil and sugar and mix well. Sift in half of the dry ingredients and half of the eggs mixing well each time. Repeat with the rest. Add carrots and vanilla and mix well. Pour into prepared cake pans. Bake at 325 for 60-70 minutes. Cool and frost.

Cream Cheese Frosting

Recipe from Grandma Lill

3 cups powdered sugar

1 cube butter (1/2 cup)

3 ounces cream cheese

2 Tbsp milk

1 tsp vanilla

Texas Sheet Cake

This cake truly is amazing and so addicting! It's much more moist and full of flavor than any cake out of the box for sure, and you have to feel somewhat better about eating it because you are using all natural ingredients instead of oil and preservatives. I made it last year for my birthday cake with my sisters, and they were all in heaven. Oh- and this cake is so much better the next day or even cold from being frozen. Yum!

Texas Sheet Cake

Cake
1 cup butter
1/4 cup cocoa
1 cup water
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sour cream
2 eggs, beaten

Combine butter, cocoa and water and bring to a boil. Remove and cool slightly. Combine flour, sugar, soda and salt in mixer (or a bowl). Add sour cream and eggs and mix. Add cocoa mixture and mix well. Pour into a greased and floured 15x10 pan, or 2 8x8 pans (do not use a 9x13). Bake at 350 for 25 minutes or until a toothpick through the center comes clean. Frost while still warm.

Frosting:
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp milk
1 pound powdered sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
1 tsp vanilla

Place butter and milk in a saucepan and bring to boil. Remove from heat and add sugar, cocoa and vanilla. Stir to mix well. Allow frosting to cool 5 minutes, stirring occasionally before frosting the cake.

*This cake freezes amazingly! I always make 2 8x8s, eat one (easily) and freeze one. To freeze, cool completely, cover with plastic wrap and tinfoil. Freeze. When you are ready to eat it just take it out of the freezer and let it thaw on your countertop.

Butterfly Birthday Cake

This cake is super easy and fun for any age

Butterfly Cake

Any flavor of cake baked into 2 round cake pans

12-15 oreos or other round cookies

any flavor/color frosting

2-3 cups fruity pebbles cereal

extra frosting for piping or message

Bake your cake as directed in 2 round cake pans (I used 8 inch). Cool in pan for 5-10 minutes, then take out and cool completely on wire rack.

To form the butterfly: Stack your 2 rounds on top of eachother and cut in half top to bottom. Switch places so that the cut sides are now on the outside. If you want 4 wings like I did, now you can cut each half into 2 pieces (one 1/3 piece and one 2/3 piece). Angle them out a bit so that you can see each wing.

You are going to make 3 stacks of oreos to go in the middle of the wings about 4 or 5 oreos high, so seperate the wings accordingly to fit your oreos. It's best if you can frost one set of wings completely, sprinkle with the fruity pebbles, line up the oreos next to the frosted side and then set the unfrosted wing set next to the oreos and frost that side- sprinkle with fruity pebbles. Press the fruity pebbles down slightly to adhere to the frosting. If you want to take some extra of the frosting and make designs on the top of the oreo stacks and make some antennas you can- whala!

Note: Use lots of frosting and make sure you add the fruity pebbles before the frosting hardens when it's nice and sticky.

Princess Cake

This is the cake I made for my daughter last year and it was so much fun! And super easy!

You will need to cake mixes to make sure it's tall enough for the barbie to fit in. Bake one mix in 2 round cake pans (8 or 9 inch) Bake the other mix in a big Pyrex bowl (this is where you get your skirt shape from, turned upside down, so pick out one you like *make sure it's oven safe). Once your cakes are baked and cooled and out of the pan you will stack the 2 rounds and then flip the Pyrex one over and set it on top, trimming the 2 rounds to fit. Stick the barbie in the top and you can use the trimmings to put around her waste if you need to. Frost the skirt however you want (with lots of princess sprinkles of course!)

*Note: It helps immensely if your barbie comes with an already painted on top like mine did. If not, just undress her and pipe on a cute top with some extra frosting.

Rapunzel Tangled Birthday Cake

My daughter LOVED this cake for her 3rd birthday!!

You will need:

4 small round cake pans greased
prepared cake batter to make four round layers and at least one cupcake two tubs of white, store bought frosting or a homemade frosting of your choice
ziploc bag
green food coloring 
 one sugar cone
one chopstick
candy rocks
Rapunzel doll/assessories
flower or snowflake shaped sprinkles
green icing with thin tip

This is the finished cake up close- as you can see I actually

used a large pizza pan to build my cake on. I then used the other

characters from Tangled to place around the cake to make it

more festive and then finished with Rapunzel at the top.

Note: the candy rocks that are circling the bottom of the tower can be found

at Michaels and so can the flower shaped sprinkles.

you have to put the Rapunzel doll in place, and I would put it

in the freezer, that seems to help keep it all together.

First, use 3 small cake pans ( I used cheesecake pans)

make sure they are greased and you can use any cake mix you

would like. With the extra cake batter, make a few cupcakes,

you will need these for the top of the tower.

You then start building the tower by making sure that each

round piece is perfectly flat so that your tower doesn't get crooked

when you place it on top of each other ( I learned that the hard way)

just take a butter knife once cooled and slice to make them perfectly flat.

Then frost inbetween each round piece to hold the cake together

Then use a large skewer or chopstick to put down the center

of the 4 cakes to keep them straight and together

once you have all 4 cake pieces on, then use a leftover

cupcake and place it on the center of the top piece letting the skewer go into

it, then the last step, the sugar cone upside down. Go ahead and frost the entire cake and

put it in the freezer over night. Then you can have fun decorating.

For grass, you can take green food coloring and put coconut inside a baggie.

Place the food coloring inside and mix well with the bag closed of course, then

pour it out around your cake and there's your grass!

Use the candy rocks to go around the bottom of the tower.

Flower shaped sprinkles to use with the vines/green thin tip icing to use as vines.

Place figurines around the tower and use a miniature Rapunzel doll to sit at the top.

Freeze for a few hours to set.

Adapted from: lifeasamom.com



Disney Cars Theme Cake

Since my 3 1/2 year old daughter is obsessed with cars and dinosaurs, I wasn't

surprised when she wanted to do a Cars theme birthday party for her dad,

so we made a Cars cake. It was super easy and fun!

Ingredients: 2 boxes of cake mix ( I used the confetti ones)

1 Can of white frosting

1 bag of coconut

green food coloring

1 box of Oreos

1 bag of black licorice

mini cars/ trees

1. make 2 boxes of Betty Crocker cake mixes of your choice

and bake in a large cookie sheet at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes or so.

2. Cool cake ( I let it stay in my freezer over night to harden it)

3. Take a bag of coconut and put it in a large baggie with green food coloring and mix it up to

make the grass.

4. Put several oreos in a baggie and smash oreos into tiny crumbs.

5. After cake is done cooling, spread white frosting on the entire cake.

6.After that, take your black licorice and cut it lengthwise in stips. Then make whatever number you want

to do or you could just make a race track too into block lettering or track out of the licorice lining them up like a road.

7. Carefully put the crushed oreos inside the block numbers or track completely covering the inside

8. Then take your green grass (coconut) and put it all around the outside of the numbers or the race track covering the rest of the cake.

9. Use Disney Cars to decorate the rest of the cake. You could also just use little mini cars and I took little trees from my daughter's dinosaur stuff and put those around too.

Enjoy