Lovin' From the Oven

bee’s knees & a giveaway.

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I was roaming around Albertson’s the other day, in search of something cheap to buy so that I could get cash back when using my debit card. Immediately, I went to the bakery section. After passing by various cakes, bite-sized brownies, and lofthouse cookies, my eyes stumbled across this pretty little thing. There were actually four different designs.. a butterfly, a bee, a flower, and something else that I can’t quite remember.

So why did I choose the bee? It was the cutest one! And plus, we need to save the honey bees! Did you know that honey bees alone are responsible for 1/3 of the crops that we eat? If honey bees were to become extinct, the human population could only survive for 4 years before becoming extinct as well (according to Albert Einstein). The weird thing is, no one really knows why they are dying out. We know that hives are experiencing Colony Collapse Disorder, where bees desert their hives for no apparent reason and die. Haagen-Daz has been really active on saving the honey bees and you can even find more information at their website, HERE.

To be honest the cookie wasn’t very good. It was a lemon sugar cookie with royal icing, but I was never really a fan of lemon baked goods. At such a steal for $1.99, it doesn’t hurt to buy the cookie just to look at. 🙂

I’m almost at 200 followers and just wanted to celebrate with a giveaway! I’m giving away a pastry dough scraper from Crate & Barrel. The rubber grasp makes it easy to grip and work with, while the ruler on the stainless steel comes in handy when trying to measure out the dough (one side is in inches and the other side is in centimeters.. perfect!).

For a chance to win, just leave a comment with your favorite sugar cookie shape by next Monday, August 3rd, 11:59 PM Pacific Time. Good luck!

Announcing the winner…

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Entry #18- “Eeeee now this blog is ever MORE awesome! I love cookie cutters :D”
Congratulations to Lori at clevercakestudio.com for winning the Crate & Barrel cookie cutters! I’ll be contacting you for your mailing address. Sorry for such a short post! I desperately need to finish my papers this week. 🙁

Chocolate Cupcakes & a Giveaway!

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When I’m in the mood for chocolate, I’m in the mood of chocolate.. lots and lots of it. A little piece from a candy bar won’t satisfy my craving. I need a mound of it, something that’s over the top chocolate-y. I was thinking of some of the most decadent chocolate treats to make for myself (chocolate mousse, pudding, flour-less chocolate cake, fudge, brownies, etc), when I just happened to turn my box of Hershey’s cocoa over. What did I find? Hershey’s “perfectly chocolate” chocolate cake with “perfectly chocolate” chocolate frosting. With a name like that, I knew I was sold. I mean, what other dessert has chocolate 4 times in the title?

I have nothing but great memories of Hershey’s. I was lucky enough to go to Hershey’s Chocolate World in Pennsylvania when I was younger with my family and see how chocolate was made. I still have a souvenir from there– a picture of my entire family on the ride that teaches you the entire chocolate making process. I remember being so appalled and in complete awe of the amount of chocolate in the factory, while wanting to take a bite out of everything. I’d definitely recommend a trip there, if you haven’t already, for all the chocolate fiends like me! :]

I followed the recipe exactly as stated, adding a bit more cocoa into both batters. The result? A perfectly chocolate chocolate cake. Moist, sweet, and chocolate-y, without a sense of empowerment from any of the flavors. Everything blended perfectly together. I dusted half the cupcakes with powdered sugar and left the other half as is. The cupcakes were so beautiful that I couldn’t help but post a million pictures of them. Enjoy!
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 3/4 cups AP flour
  • 3/4 cup HERSHEY’s cocoa
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 cup boiling water
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease & flour 2 9-inch round baking pans or line muffin cups with bake cups.
2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on med speed for 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour batter onto prepared pans.
3. Bake 30-35 minutes if doing 9-inch round pans, 22-25 minutes for cupcakes until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes; remove from pans/cups to wire racks and cool completely.
  • 1/2 cup or 1 stick butter
  • 2/3 cup HERSHEY’s cocoa
  • 3 cups powdered sugar
  • 1/3 cup milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
Melt butter, stir in cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating to spreading consistency. Add small amount additional milk, if needed. Stir in vanilla. Makes about 2 cups of frosting.
Hooray for my 100th post on Lovin’ From the Oven! Thank you so much everyone for following along. You guys are the very reason why I’m still blogging today! To show my appreciation, I’ll be doing my very first giveaway! I’ll be giving away A Year of Cookie Cutters from Crate & Barrel!
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If you recall, I own this set myself and LOVE it! I used the cutters in my previous post to make no fail sugar cookies. I love it so much that one lucky winner will be able to get your own, BRAND NEW set! It comes with 12 different cookie cutters, one for each month. The cookie cutters are adorably packaged in its own cookie container. It doesn’t get any better than that!
All you have to do to enter in my giveaway is leave a comment, saying anything you’d like… a random comment, a question, a thought… on this post with a way for me to contact you by Saturday, March 14th, 11:59PM Pacific time. I’ll choose the winner by using random.org. Good luck!
You can find more details about this gift (or if you just want to buy it for yourself) on Crate & Barrel’s site HERE

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