pinterest

this month i needed to share a "nice & new" at our leadership meeting at school.  basically every month someone on the board takes a few minutes at the beginning of the meeting to share something nice and new that they've discovered.  usually when it's my turn i try to incorporate food because who doesn't love food at a meeting?! i also wanted to share my addiction to pinterest (because i use it to find a lot of school resources) so i decided to choose a simple recipe from pinterest and get the best of both worlds!

here's my try at a sweet and salty treat.

ingredients:
- pretzel twists
- chocolate kisses
- m&ms

1.  lay out pretzel twists and top with a kiss.

2.  bake at 275 degrees F for 3 mins.

3.  squish an m&m on each treat

4.  refrigerate

5 enjoy!

this was a super easy recipe and super tasty...the hardest part was opening all of the kisses!

oh baby!

within the past week i've been to two baby showers.  they are so much fun, filled with the joy and anticipation of new life :)  one was for my cousin who is having a ??? and one was for one of my coworkers who is having a girl :)

here are my baby cakes:

red velvet w/ pink-vanilla frosting.  topped with
pearly white sprinkles and clear sugar + a single silver ball

butterscotch cakes w/ vanilla frosting & sea salt - my specialty!

some things i learned while preparing these cakes:
- making your own cupcake toppers with scrapbook paper, toothpicks, double stick tape, and a circle puncher is very cost effective (and it doesn't take too long.)

- i really love these wilton three tier cake stands

- it is okay to put more than one type of sprinkle on a cupcake :)

looking forward to meeting these two little ones :)

p.s. one week til the honolulu marathon!  

oreo stuffed

lately i've been addicted to pinterest.  it's basically a visual version of "bookmarking" stuff.  when you find cool things online, you can "pin" it and the link is saved along with a picture to your "board."  it's amazing, motivating, and inspirational all that the same time.  i've been getting ideas for crafting, photography, cooking, and baking.

one pin that came up was oreo stuffed chocolate chip cookies.  now chocolate chip cookies are amazing in itself, so stuffing it with oreos just takes it to the next level.  here's the link to the recipe and my version of it.

http://picky-palate.com/2011/10/17/itty-bitty-oreo-stuffed-chocolate-chip-cookies/

mix wet ingredients and dry ingredients in separate bowls.  then slowly mix them together.

scoop the dough using a mini scoop, top with an oreo (or mini oreo) and then another scoop of dough.  press together and make sure oreo is fully covered with dough

bake and enjoy

 here's some other baking projects i did this weekend.  pineapple cupcakes, cream cheese topping, and chocolate drizzle.

pineapple cupcakes with cream cheese topping.

other exciting news in my life:  i am officially registered for the honolulu marathon.  wish me luck!  i'm up to 16 miles and i've got one more month of training til the big day...goal for the race: to finish :)

hello, fall

fall is here!  which means pumpkin is in :)  last night i tasted a pumpkin pop-tart (yum!) and pumpkin beer (not-so-yum).

on to baking...a few weeks ago, i signed up to take refreshments to a class i had on saturday and to church today.  so i spent a chunk of this weekend baking.  but it's something i enjoy, so i was a happy camper...or i guess i should say, happy baker :)

for saturday's class i took my good ol' butterscotch w/ vanilla and sea salt.  i've decided this is one of the easiest, fastest, and favorite cupcakes to bake.  i'm designating it my "house-cupcake"  (like a restaurant's house dressing.)

for today i did mini's for church since it was for more people.  i wanted to do pumpkin so i went on an online hunt for an easy pumpkin recipe.  i found out that you can use yellow cake mix and substitute the water with pumpkin pie filling and come up with a fabulously moist pumpkin cupcake.  usually pumpkin is paired with cream cheese frosting, but i didn't have cream cheese and didn't really want to go back to the market so i decided on a toasted marshmallow topping.  I used egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar, and vanilla to whip up the marshmallow and then broiled it to toast.  the toasted tops of my pumpkin mini's added the warm homey feeling of fall!

pumpkin poppers

i also ended up with a little extra marshmallow topping so i used it for my left over butterscotch cupcakes that didn't get frosted because i ran out of vanilla buttercream.  and that's how my butterscotch with marshmallow was born. :)

butterscotch w/ marshmallow

sachi bento - a little bit of everything

i wanted to call this entry "mixed plate" but then i realized i already an entry with that title so here we go with the bento!

lately, i've been busy doing lots of different things (hence the title "bento.")  for those of you who don't know what a bento is, it's a japanese packed meal that has a little bit of a bunch of different foods in it...rice, veggies, meat, sides, etc.

so my (sachi) bento includes: school stuff, sweet stuff, and photography stuff :)

school stuff:
school has been crazy-busy lately.  the whole first quarter has flown by which means it's time for report cards and parent-teacher conferences.  though things are hectic, i'm enjoying what i'm doing.  i've got a fun bunch of kiddos and this year, i'm trying new things.  one thing i'm working on is a class blog.  here it is:
http://kidsteachingothers.blogspot.com

sweet stuff:
one of my coworker friends got married last weekend so our grade level threw her a mini-bridal shower luncheon.  she was on a no-carb diet so we decided on salad for lunch.  being me, i reeaally wanted to make dessert but a no-carb diet makes that quite challenging.  i couldn't make cupcakes or cake pops so i decided on layered-sugar-free jello in heart molds.  this prompted my first experience with gelatin, i know...pretty crazy.  so i used 3 packets to one box of jello.  in my opinion, i used a little too much, so maybe next time i'll try 2 packets :)

more sweet stuff:
this weekend i was craving cupcakes...quite the shocker ;)  so i decided to try the Sprinkles cupcake mix that my cousin got me for my birthday (you can get it from wiliams-sonomoa.)  it super easy to make, i just needed to add butter, eggs, and milk + frosting.  my favorite part was the signature Sprinkles-dots.  the cupcake ended up tasting good and was moist but it was quite dense (like all the other cupcakes i've made from scratch.)  any ideas for fixing this?

photography stuff:
in my last post i shared some photos i took of faces i came across in china town.  i've been practicing more and i've been loving every moment of it.  there's something about looking through the lens of a camera and capturing moments in time that is just so exciting to me.  i guess you can say it's my way of telling stories.  here are some pictures i took in seattle/portland.

the joy of baking +photography

yes, i know...my title sounds like the title of a recipe book, like "the joy of cooking."  but the phrase is simply true.  this past week i baked for "fellowship time" at my church.  basically, after church gets out, the congregation gathers outside and eats and talks story.  food has a way of bringing people together...my husband and i started going to our church in march but never really started talking to/meeting people until we started staying for fellowship.

i've come to find that baking for others gives you that "feel-good" feeling deep in your heart (and yes, i know this sounds corny too but it's oh so true.)  there's just something special about knowing you're bringing a little bit of sweetness into someones life.

here are my little bits of sweetness - red velvet minis

this past week was also one of my good friends' birthdays so i decided to bake for her as well...ironically enough, it was her family that taught me a lot of my foundation for pastry decorating when i worked at their bakery.  here are her birthday cupcakes.  i was going for the vintage-tiffany blue look.

i've also been working on my photography...getting tutored by a friend and trying some new things.  today i went out and actually shot people...people i didn't know...people who in one split second, told a story.  it was quite the experience, definitely stepped out of my comfort zone but in a good way :)  here are some of my favorite shots of the day.

whoopie! - it's back to school

my summer came and went and now i'm back in school...though i was not SUPER excited about going back to work, now that i'm back into the swing of things, i realize i have a pretty awesome job!  each day is a new day and at least one student is sure to make your day :).

so in the spirit of back to school, i baked some whoopie pies for my coworkers...cheers to a "SWEET" year!

i followed bakerella's recipe:
http://www.bakerella.com/whoopie-pies/

mix wet ingredients

mix dry ingredients

mix wet + dry ingredients

scoop onto parchment paper

bake (i think i should have flattened them before i baked them...they were thick)

frost - vanilla

frost - cherry

frost - chocolate

assemble

stack

wrap - thank you joohee for the cute tags! :)

i decided to try making cupcakes out of the batter too.

mint chocolate

in the end, i decided need more practice.  my whoopies were more like whoopie balls than whoopie pies and i need to work on the moistness of the cake.  it was a fun learning experience though!