Recent Cakes

Since I have not blogged in so long, I am going to do a recap of the cakes and crumb orders I have gotten over the past few months.

I got a surprise order for someone for Mother's day. Since it was spring/early summer all the flowers were blooming in our garden giving me the chance to do some heavy decorating. My mom made the funky card from the client wishing her daughter a happy mother's day. This cake turned out really beautiful with the flower decorations and once it was boxed and wrapped with ribbon I attached a bundle of assorted flowers.
This cake was a simple moist vanilla cake with an amazing chocolate frosting!

This cake was not an order but a birthday gift to one of my favorite teachers. I decorated it with spirals in bright pastel colors.
This cake consists of a chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting, which by the way pipes really well!

Every year my school has a Maypole*/Grandparent's day which the grandparents of the community and of the school are invited to a celebratory meal. I was asked to make a cake for the event! That night before I boxed up the cake and got it ready for the trip to the school the next morning. The trip worked out fine without any problem and I got the cake to the Kitchen and was not late for class!
The cake is a lemon sheet cake with cream cheese frosting. (I like my cream cheese frosting!)

*Click on the link for a picture of what a Maypole looks like. Its a kind of dance you do while holding onto a string attached to a pole. And no that's not a picture of our school's Maypole.

The Essential Gluten Free Restaurant Guide

The Essential Gluten Free Restaurant Guide By Triumph Dining is a must for everyone Gluten Free!

The book is filled with thousands of restaurants that have dealt with gluten free customers, have menus, or are good at making accommodations to your gluten free needs. The book is organized by state, so finding a gluten free restaurant is easy. Each restaurant is given one to three $ signs, telling you the price of typical meals. The book is neatly symbol coded so if it says "100% GF" it means the restaurant is a 100% Gluten Free establishment, along with many others. Each restaurant in the book has a phone number and or website for you to visit if you have questions or concerns.

In the beginning of the book it gives you great advice on picking a restaurant, explaining your needs and ordering. It talks about how if you do not feel comfortable at a particular restaurant, leave.

This book will make you want to take a road trip around the US visiting all the great Gluten Free restaurants. Even if you are not traveling a lot, The Essential Gluten Free Restaurant Guide will help you build confidence in yourself, about living gluten free and explaining your needs to other people.

Triumph Dining has done an amazing job of putting together a book that will help millions of Gluten Free people! I would recommend this book to everyone!

Click Triumph Dining, then click 'Resturant Guide' to get your copy of The Essential Gluten Free Restaurant Guide or look at the many other Gluten Free tools Triumph Dining offers!

UPDATE [May 30, 2009]

Triumph Dining has released the fourth edition of The Essential Gluten Free Restaurant Guide and it is on sale now on their website. Click on the "Triumph Dining" link for more info and ordering options.

Lemon and Lime Citrus Cake

For months this idea of a citrus cake has been floating around in my head. I had ideas but never put it on paper till recently. For this cake I knew I did not want to use Pamela's Baking Mix. I wanted something different and new. So I made my own flour mixture for this cake using coconut flour, white rice flour and tapioca flour! The combination of these flours gives this cake a sweet, moist, dense texture to it but the sour fruit fights back making the cake taste light at the same time. And that's how I came up with this sweet and sour cake.

If you like sour foods you will love this cake!

Pre-heat your oven to: 350

You will need:

1/2 cup Coconut Flour

1/2 cup White Rice Flour

1/3 cup Tapioca Flour

1 cup Sugar

1 1/4 teaspoons Baking Powder

2 medium sized Lemons

2 medium sized Limes

2 Eggs

1/2 teaspoon Vanilla

1/2 cup Milk

Butter a 9 inch round spring pan (you can use an 8 inch round spring pan if that's all you have).

In a medium bowl mix the dry ingredients (Coconut Flour, Rice Flour, Tapioca Flour, Baking Powder and Sugar) together with a fork or whisk.

Mix the wet ingredients in another bowl together

Now take the lemons and limes and cut them into circles (you will get about 4 or 5 circles per lemon or lime). Try to get all the seeds out without killing the fruit. SAVE THE ENDS where there is not enough to get another circle from. You will need to squeeze the juice out of them later.

Cut the rind and white part off of the circles leaving as much of the flesh of the fruit as possible.

Cut each circle into 1/4 or smaller if the rounds are big.

If the center has a lot of white where the small individual pieces connect, cut it off.

Its is fine if the chunks are not even or one piece. They will be going inside the cake so you will not see them.

Take the ends of the lemons and limes and squeeze the juices out of them into a small bowl.

Now you get to mix the dry and wet ingredients together (EXCLUDING the lemon and lime juice). Its normal for the batter to be thick.

Once it is well combined, add the lemon and lime juice mixing well until there are no clumps. By now the batter should be a bit thinner.

Pour half of the batter into the prepared pan. Sprinkle the lemon and lime pieces on top of the batter.

Pour the rest of the batter on top of the fruit. You may need to use a spatula to move the batter so it covers at least the majority of the fruit.

Cook for 50 minutes until it starts to brown around the edges, is pulling away from the edges and is firm in the center.

Let cool till its at room temperature and enjoy!