a picture is a worth a thousand words.

momma surprised me this year with an early christmas present. ive been speechless since i've recieved this and am kind of nervous to open this heavenly piece of baking equipment.

sigh. SO MANY BAKED BY SAUCE THINGS SOON!

baked by sauce + seester

my sister finally came to visit me last weekend and we had such a good 24 hours together. even though she complains about our hometown, its still hard for that girl to ever come to see her sister in Boston. she also has a very big sweet tooth and unfortunately my cupboards were super bare the day she arrived. we figured out that i had enough ingredients to make sugar cookies with frosting so we did!

heres a nice shot of us icing:

omg! my first cupcake delivery!

everyone loves surprises right? i was always the kid who discouraged her younger sister to stop looking under my moms bed for the christmas presents. recently greg of geekhouse bikes got in contact with me via twitter about surprising one of his coworkers (and friend) for his birthday with some bakedbysauce cupcakes. of course i accepted the invitation! 

i only have a few recipes mastered right at this point, but have been really craving some inspiration to create something new. greg suggested something with apple or chocolate and sparkly like his new bike is. i found sublime recipes for both - but went with the chocolate because i realized......GASP.....ive never made a chocolate cupcake from scratch ever. 

this afternoon, i ventured out to the geekhouse labratories in lower allston, and wished brad a very happy birthday.he turned 27 on the 27th -- which my mom always told me was a lucky year ahead. 

though my visit wasn't long, i got a shop tour, which was really amazing. they are running an incredible operation right in my city and was happy to supply them with some treats to keep them going. thankfully, they have an ill camera as well. 

here are some shots from the beginning to the end of this fun surprise!

getting started with lovely baking cocoa!

i made these little toppers with vintage bikes and the geekhouse logo!

geekhouse bikes headquarters!

greg asked if i could make a cupcake to match his new bike! mission accomplished!
photo cred: greg

photo cred: greg

brad, me and marty of geekhouse bikes!
photo cred: greg

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRAD!
photo cred: greg

tye dye cupcakes

well, looking back through my blog - i realized that i never posted my tye dye cupcake photos! i made these back on labor day weekend - and probably was one of the most fun i've ever had baking and coloring at the same time!

make a vanilla cupcake recipe - divide into 5 bowls - and then chose your colors!

add a teaspoon of each color to each cupcake liner - no rules, layer how you like!

my taste-testers john and shannon

after the first bite, so happy at how bright they were!

 

(enlarged to show color) TA DA! definetly making these again!

buttermilk cupcakes and feeling like fall

as you can see in the previous post, i am really a fan of this buttermilk cupcake recipe! also, ive been waking up early enough these friday mornings to make a batch or two before work. it really puts me in a great mood for the rest of day (way better than exercise ever made me felt! ha!)

this morning, in the spirit of Boston finally feeling like fall, i decided to make two dozen vanilla buttermilk cupcakes, with homemade buttercream frosting and colored it a pale orange. i had some candy corn around too - so of course they found their way on top of these babies.

vanilla buttermilk with vanilla buttercream frosting

i ran out of candy corn, and had some "empty" frosted tops of a few more cupcakes. then, i remembered that my good friend Pat ordered edible fall leaves for her daughter weeding (which is already tomorrow!) and graciously gave me some. these edible leaves were from Sugar Robot etsy site and just melt in your mouth! they really made these early fall cupcakes authentic. Maybe the leaves will start changing colors in the city now!

yes, those are pirate skull wrappers!

busy -- but not forgotten.

i haven't posted nearly enough. need to step my game up with this if i want to get it anywhere, right? ive still been baking up a storm over here! promise more experimental recipes and photos soon. ive decided that thursday and sunday nights are my favorite nights to make cupcakes -- and boy am i in the mood to bake right now. i felt like i was neglecting my progress and stories here - so here i am with a little recipe i tried a week ago today.

something that i have always had a hard time dealing with, is wasting food. when baking, i feel that this happens unfortunately too often, since you are buying certain ingredients that are rarely used (especially with my adventurous style of baking) in supplies bigger that you need.

my girl risa and i decided that we wanted to make fall pumpkin spice cupcakes a few weeks ago and one of the ingredients was buttermilk. not only did i not find it in the grocery store after looking for 10 minutes in the milk isle - there were only 5 small cartons of it in the store. regardless, it made our cupcakes on point (and i unfortunately was too tipsy to get pictures of the wonderful teamwork process) but rest assured that they were delicious).

so i have this carton of buttermilk in my fridge thats good until october 15 and there is no way in these times that i was going to waste 4 cups of good ol buttermilk. my ever curious mind got on the interwebs and searched "buttermilk cupcakes". to my surprise, there were so many recipes to try! i went with the Vanilla Buttermilk cupcakes from Baking Bites for my first round. these baked perfectly and had a nice creamy color to them. I brought them into my job bright and early last Friday morning.

Here is the reaction I got:

 

yay!

for those who eat with no fear: maple bacon cupcakes!

my best friend kristie celebrated her 30th birthday this sunday - and if you are a good friend of mine, you know that will get BOMB cupcakes for your birthday! we went to seattle and portland together back in may of this year and one of our favorite parts of the trip was eating all of the west coast sweets - especially MAPLE BACON DONUTS! kristie is also a big fan of pigs (especially when it comes to eating them!) so when i came across this recipe from The Busty Baker - i knew that i had to whip these up for my special friend.

i was really nervous making these because 1. im not that great at making bacon and 2. it was my first time with the recipe. thankfully - they came out PERFECT. i was so impressed with these puppies, i cant wait to make them again.

 

AND KRISTIE LOVED THEM! happy birthday lovely lady!