EASTER MINI CHICK CAKEBALL DECORATIONS

                                                                               Peep! 

So cute, eh?

I was contemplating making white chocolate chicks, but felt that my chocolate plastic tutorial posts that people have been visiting like crazy since I posted them a while back were done to death around the foodie world.

I needed inspiration.  I hate the taste of fondant and royal icing isn’t any better.  I love buttercream but making buttercream roses are so Safeway!   I’ve seen the craze peak with the famous Cakeballs and Cakepops that have been popularized by Bakerella.  The other day, on a stroll past a Starbucks, I saw Cakepops displayed along with Gargantuan Cupcakes in the glass display in front of the baristas.   You know food trends have peaked when they hit Starbucks and now that I’ve seen macarons at Costco,  you know they are so passé!

But I do wish I could start a trend.  hee hee!

Last night, while brainstorming ideas to bake before Easter weekend, I had an epiphany of sorts.  Of all the trends, I thought about  how yummy cakeballs really are.  They’re moist and they’re quite sturdy with the chocolate coating.  They are easy to decorate.  They’re cute!   How could I go wrong with that?  I was going to bake a batch of cupcakes and mash them with buttercream to produce a whole flock of chick cake balls like I did last Easter.   But I’ve done that already.   I was waffling between baking cupcakes and making cakeballs.

So I decided to sculpt tiny cakeballs into teeny chicks that would perch on the cupcakes.  The little balls of cake were so tiny I only had to break down 3 cupcakes to make enough to make these decorations.  Decorating the chick faces was not the easiest.  You need a steady hand and tweezers.  But I had so much fun making these tiny cakeball sculptures!

And there you are…my personal contribution to the food blogging world:  Mini Cakeball Sculptures--THE NEW WAVE for cake decorating!    They are deliciously edible, very sturdy and you can make them ahead of time.  You are only limited by your imagination, your patience and possibly,  fine motor skills!

Yes, cakeballs are not new and neither are chick cakeballs, but the fact that they are sculpted into incredibly tiny forms for cake decorating is!    What a concept! decorating a cake with more cake! yah!

Here’s a close-up of the mini chick cakeball sculptures before I dunked them in the candy coating.

I added yellow food colouring to white candy melts to get this shade for my chicks.  Notice how un-chicklike they are right now?  Not so pretty.

In fact, as they are drying on the parchment here, you can see how much of a mess I made with the dipping.  I must admit this is my least favourite part of the whole cakeball- making process.  The mini sculptures have definitely got bird-like features though. 

Precious!

Once dry, I used a Food Writing Pen to make eyes and I crushed a few orange flower sprinkles for the beaks.  

From the batch of 24 cupcakes, 3 were used to make the mini cakeball sculptures and the rest were decorated as usual with Swiss Meringue Buttercream swirls.  I perched the finished chicks on the cupcakes and voila!

The little chicks were so popular with my daughters and I imagine they would be at any Easter kiddie party.   Have a good Easter Holiday everyone!

PURPLE CUPCAKE BALLS

I have rediscovered the joys of cakeballs.

Since Daylight Saving time, it’s been such a drag what with such little sunshine during waking hours.  My little ones are constantly asking if it’s time for bed yet because it’s dark so early. 

I have little inclination to bake (as you can see from my lack of posts) because I’m so tired from just the daily grind of work and household management.  What I have found time for is cakeballs.  If you're not a baker, or you're too lazy to make a cake and frosting from scratch,  turn to my trusty pal, Betty Crocker (or Duncan Hines).  Horrors!  Yes, it's perfectly fine for cakeballs.  In fact, it's preferable because you'll be expending most of your energy on cakeball decorating--the fun part.

PUMPKIN CAKEPOPS

I found using the cakepop sticks easier and cleaner than trying to make the more environmentally conscious pumpkin cakeballs.  For some reason, the balls didn’t want to form smooth surfaces and I ended up with this drizzly mess all over the place as you can see below.  Even though the cakeballs were cold, bits of  chocolate cake crumbs started falling off into the bowl of orange candy melts.  It was not a pretty sight. 

Pumpkin cakepops for Thanksgiving.  Happy Thanksgiving, Canada! 

See that pumpkin shaped pop?  I made balls with my chocolate/frosting mixture.  Then I flattened both of the poles slightly.  I used a wooden skewer to make about 6 indentations longitudinally to the poles.  I put the formed balls into the freezer to set.

So I have a rather messy looking patch of pumpkin cakeballs, but they’re tasty nonetheless.  I know cakepops (on the stick) look better and they’re fun and cute, but there’s something simple and not-so-fussy about cakeballs.   I melted some green candy melts and piped little stems on the pumpkins.  I wasn’t going to attempt pumpkin leaves as I was already covered in orange and green candy melts.  The melts aren’t so easy to pipe.

CAKEBALLS FOR A BLEEDING NOSE

One thing I have been doing as a preventive measure:  Otrivin.  It constricts the blood vessels.  Just prior to something like gymnastics, where I know they'll get hot, I'll squirt it in each nostril.  Just once.  Not even afterwards.  I only do it once a week so they don't get addicted to it.  Doc says it's okay if I don't do it more than 3 days in a row.  But I never do that.  I use it selectively for when they have strenuous activities and will get hot from working out.     

These were for the lovely secretary at Bebe's elementary school.  
You see, I have a bleeder.  

Since she was 2, Bebe has had nosebleeds.  Regularly.  Sometimes twice a week.  Sometimes everyday; especially if it's extremely hot.  Sometimes both nostrils at the same time.  She's 7 now and still a bleeder.
When she was very young, we took her to Children's hospital once...with kleenex plugs in her nose--and the emergency doc looked at her and laughed.  He didn't do much for her.  He just told us to do what the first aid books tell you.  Well, the books also say that if the bleeding doesn't stop after 15 minutes, you're to go to the emergency!  The emergency doctors don't think so apparently.  We were sent home.

Some first aid courses and medical books say that you're supposed to pinch her nose and have her lean forward.  It doesn't work.  Her bleeding is below the place where you pinch.  And the blood backs up and goes down her throat.Yuck.  

The only thing that works is the kleenex plugs.  I pre-make hundreds of them and put them in a tupperware container and bring little baggies of them with me when we go out because you never know...

I think the plugs create a bit of pressure and help the bleeding stop.  I change the plugs until the bleeding slows down.

Twice a day since the age of 2, we've applied vaseline or some moisturizer (saline spray, gel spray) in both nostrils.  We've also tried premarin (I know...it's for menopausal women!)  I asked the specialist why a vaginal cream for the nostrils? and he replied it would help toughen up the tissue in her nose.  It didn't work.  We went through the whole tube--and nothing changed.  Meanwhile, I was worrying that she would sprout boobies at age 5 from the estrogen in her nostrils.
We went to Finlandia and the helpful lady told us to try Vitamin E oil.  She advocated Vitamin C and all the holistic stuff that I had already been giving Bebe.  She takes all that and omega 3 to boot.  So we tried the Vitamin E oil because you never know...and went through two bottles.  I eventually gave up because the difference from vaseline was negligible...and the bleeding still occurred.  

Some natural remedies we tried didn't work either.  We also employ an arsenal of things that help stop the bleeding once it starts:  we use ice packs on her, we have her drink cold water, we cool her down, we calm her down.  We place a cold towel on her forehead and/or on her neck.  You name it, we've done it.

I've even used acupressure on her and squeezed her middle finger at the first joint on the opposite hand of the nostril that is bleeding.  It might slow the bleeding, but it sure doesn't prevent it.
Apparently her skin is very thin in there and her blood vessels are close to the surface and rupture easily.  The specialist says she'll outgrow it eventually.  His preferred option is to put her under general anaesthetic before cauterizing both nostrils. I'm not too keen on that.  
 

You may think this is a bummer (and it is) because it's a bother to worry about a bleeding nose when you're at karate class, at gymnastics, or if you're just running around the playground.  She's often had to go to the office at lunch because it would start bleeding.  I usually equip her with kleenex in both pockets to ensure she can make it to the office without getting all her clothes bloodied.  She's a pro at bleeders and doesn't cry anymore.  She knows how to make her own little plugs.  You have to use them in her case otherwise you don't have a free hand to attend to her other nostril or hold the ice pack etc.

The poor secretary has called me at work to tell me it's been over 15 minutes…and I know I must sound like a callous mom on the phone when I tell her not to worry and I say it'll stop eventually.  I tell her to use a tiny kleenex plug and she says that's not the way they were trained in first aid.  I know.  I know.  But my family doc doesn't poo poo my method.  I've finally decided it's about time to get something done.  This is because Bib, who's now three and has had bleeders too since about 2 years old, is vying for attention by bleeding  just as much as her sis.  Between the both of them, I'm pretty busy plugging up nostrils.  Now you know why I need those darned plugs?  I don’t have enough hands to pinch noses, hold their heads forward and hold a kleenex under the nostrils to catch the blood.  It’s just so inefficient.  Especially when both of them are bleeding at the same time.  At least they usually have the decency to bleed at different times of the day.            
And yes, I do humidify my house when it's dry.  Besides, we practically live in a rainforest in Vancouver and it's always raining.  How often is it even dry around here?  That's obviously not the problem.

So no, I don’t stuff the cakeballs in their nostrils as my title may have had you wonder.  Nor do I feed them cakeballs to make their nose stop bleeding.  The cakeballs are a thank you to the kind secretary at school who frequently has to deal with a bleeder when she  a bunch of other work she could be doing. 

BTW, I am finally fed up and in a couple of weeks we’re going to cauterize.  My family doc is sending me to someone “old school” who cauterizes in his office under local anaesthetic and with a stick with some silver nitrate at the tip.    I have a feeling it’ll be a struggle to get them to allow a stick up their noses, but they’ve had enough things up their noses so they should be used to it!

For the recipe, you simply crumble a baked cake into a bowl (a mix or pre-bought is fine) add a dollop of frosting to it until it is moist enough to hold shape in your hands.  Mix well! then form balls.  Refrigerate.  Dip in Wilton candy melts.  Decorate before the melts dry.  Yum!

EASTER CHICK CAKE BALLS

Here’s a cute treat to make for kiddie Easter parties and will totally please adults too! 
These were so fun to make!  The googly eyes, beaks and feet are simply glued on with white candy melts.  I used Wilton candy sprinkles: the feet are orange maple leaves; the beaks are orange or yellow coloured sprinkles the shape of mini-chips and the eyes are white confetti sprinkles coloured with a black food writer pen.

 
I just happened to be at Safeway today and spied a sale on cake mixes and frostings.  I picked up 3 boxes for $5 and the cream cheese frosting in the can was only $1.29
I think the quickest way to bake off the mix is to make cupcakes.  That way my kids get to eat the leftovers too.  For every 8 large cupcakes, I used approximately 2-3 tablespoons of the prepared cream cheese frosting.

After baking the cupcakes, let them cool and then proceed to crumble the cakes in a large bowl.  I used a spoon to help it all along.  Then add the frosting a tablespoon at a time.  Don’t go overboard with the frosting as a little goes a long way.  If you put too much, you might have issues with the cake balls setting properly (especially if you want them on sticks).

This time, I chose not to employ sticks for my chicks.  Instead, I made truffle balls and refrigerated them on a sheet pan.