More of the sweet, less of the fit

* This post was meant to be published on Sunday, but I had a computer glitch, please pardon the delay*

Happy Father's day to all the great dads out there. I'm so grateful everyday for the wonderful father I was blessed with. I worked on finishing the cake for most of the day, but still managed to get to church and sushi dinner and a movie with my daddy to celebrate.

I'm so excited, after wanting one forever I finally bought myself a new cake turntable. I had a sweet 50% off coupon at Michael's, so I couldn't help myself. Turntables make icing cakes so much easier, it's ridiculous.

The cake turned out pretty well. Linda, the woman who ordered the cake, didn't want a fondant cover for the cake, which is what I'm used to. Working with all buttercream was a challenge for me. It's so difficult to get it completely smooth all the way around. As you can see here

, So frustrating

I opted to airbrush some color on the cake and added in some fondant clouds ( I couldn't resist getting some fondant in somewhere) as well as the top of the cake. The airbrush color helped to hide some of the imperfections in the buttercream. I swirled blue and white fondant for the sky on the top of the cake and cut the airplane out of gumpaste. I wasn't totally happy with the finished product, but I did what I could with what she wanted. That said, Linda loved the cake so that's all that matters.

Between working on the cake and going out with my dad my day definitely consisted of more "sweet" activities than "fit ones" , I didn't have a chance to squeeze in a workout. I was due for a rest day anyway, so I'll try not to feel guilty and move forward.

It's a beautiful day

Today is one of those absolutely perfect Colorado summer days. It's 75 degrees out and beautiful. I had a riding lesson this morning and it was a nice change to not be riding in the heat.

Before heading out for my ride I had my standard summer berry breakfast.

I also had 2 unpictured pieces of Spelt toast with peanut butter, because I feel like I need a little extra nourishment for riding. Marco, the horse I ride was in a stubborn mood today, so he made me work really hard. I'm considering my hour long lesson my work out for the day. After all, I've got other things to tend to.

On Thursday I got my second official cake order, yay! One of my parent's friends called to order a birthday cake for her husband. It's a simple, round almond cake with raspberry filling and vanilla buttercream. Her husband was a pilot and still teaches flight lessons so she requested an aviation theme. We'll see how it turns out. Hopefully better than my last cake fiasco. So far so good :)

I put the cakes in the oven and whipped up a smoothie in a bowl before starting on the buttercream.

In my smoothie:

• Strawberries
  



• 2 T Organic cocoa powder
  



• 1 scoop Vega natural protein powder




• 1 Cup Silk unsweetend Almond milk
  



• 1 tsp. Xanthan gum




• tons of ice
  



• Mixed berries for topping
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Diving in head first

Vail, Colorado

Alright, here it is, my first post since coming back to Colorado from NYC. I have to say it's nice to be back. I love NYC and always will, but there's really no place like home and I'm glad to be staying with my dad for the summer.

My first week back was a busy one, starting with my cousin Kate's 3rd birthday. I went up to Vail for the weekend as a lot of my family was in town for this event. Kate's mom, my cousin Andrea (who also happens to be one of my very best friends) asked me if I would help her make the birthday cake. Kate is obsessed with The Little Mermaid, she's definitely a girl after my own heart. While Andrea said she wanted something pretty simple, I was still a little nervous about making the cake. I feel like people have very high expectations for me now that I've gone to culinary school. The thing they sometimes don't realize, however, is that a great deal of time and preparation goes into creating the gorgeous cakes you see in the bakery display cases. She wanted to make the cakes the afternoon before the party, which made me a little nervous, but it was her daughter's birthday so I went with it.

It. was. a. disaster.

I forgot about the perils of high altitude baking, and that, along with an oven door that didn't close properly, resulted in a giant cake flop. I don't have pictures for you, but let me paint you a picture. We dubbed it P.O.S. cake, otherwise known as 'pile o' sh*t" cake, because that is exactly what it looked like. Fortunately the addition of more flour, a slightly lower baking temp. and a locked oven door resulted in this :

Not my all time best work, but considering I started decoration at 10 o'clock that night and worked until 1 a.m., not so bad. Most important of all Kate loved her cake. So much so that I caught her hugging it. It was so adorable I really couldn't begrudge her smooshing the shell border I had meticulously piped the night before. Ahh, the things you do for family.

The birthday girl in all her glory:






Andrea, Kate (when she was just a peanut) and myself

I made cupcakes too, just in case someone wanted to take some cake home *ahem* that would be me

Blogging in my head

Wow, so far I kind of suck at this blogging thing. Let's see it's been over a year since my last post, I'd say that qualifies as a blogging fail, but I'm vowing to make up for it. The past year of my life has been a bit of a whirlwind, most of my time being spent in New York, either in culinary classes or at my internship at Colette's Cakes (more about this later). I had the best intentions to blog my daily activities, but somehow every day I came home so exhausted from my baking adventures I never actually got around to it. I blogged in my head everyday, it just never made it to my computer :)
After this year off I sort of felt a little silly, like it was an awkward time to start blogging again, but then I realized that it's sort of a "now or never" situation, if I don't start now, then when? There is no "best" time, so I've decided to dive in headfirst and re-enter the blog world. Even if no one ever reads my words, I will have a record of my life, and that in and of itself is valuable. After all, life is short :)

A Spring weekend in NYC

Saturday was one of the first nice, sunny Spring days I've had thus far in New York.

I had arranged to meet a couple girlfriends at the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. This time of year the cherry blossoms are in bloom, and it's gorgeous. The first thing I noticed upon entering the gardens was the smell. It smelled like Spring, the fragrance of cherry blossoms, lilac, and wysteria wafted through the air. It was such a peaceful, yet cheery place it really brightened my spirits. It's been a long time since I've slowed down for a day like this and literally "stopped to smell the roses". After the gardens we wandered around the Park Slope area of Brooklyn. It's a really adorable neighborhood, I loved it. We stopped for brunch at a place called Miriam's on 5th. It's a mediterranean cafe. Brunch was decent. I had an egg white omelet with a side salad. Later we stopped at Blue Marble ice cream and I had lemon honey sorbet since I can't do dairy. It was quite yummy. We parted ways after that and I went home for an exciting Saturday night of cleaning, lol. I didn't get a workout in, but with all the walking my bodybugg said I burned 3117 calories, so I called it good.

Sunday it rained and misted all day. It's hard to feel motivated to do anything on a day like that, but eventually I ventured out for church and a few errands. It stopped raining while I was out and the city was so beautiful. I'm from Colorado where the seasons tend to change directly from winter to summer. Here in New York there's a true spring. After the rain today the streets were slightly misty and the flowers and trees were adorned with raindrops. I know it sounds a little cheesy, but it really was like something straight out of a movie. Ahh New York, I'm really starting to fall for you.

Another week of culinary school is behind. Man this new schedule (night classes) is killing me. I feel like my energy is zapped. I love to work out in the morning, but it's like I'm still so tired from the night before (classes are 7 hours long and I'm on my feet the whole time) that I have no energy in the a.m. even after 8 hrs sleep. I will have to find a remedy for this and soon, I can't afford to miss anymore workouts. Especially with the things we're making in class. This week we made quiches, tarte flambee, creme puffs, eclairs and linzer torte.

I haven't eaten any of it (yet, I have some saved for my cheat day this weekend), but I worry about all those little tastes adding up. Instead tonight I came up with a healthy dessert recipe to tide me over before bed:

Protein brownie in a bowl:

1 scoop of your favorite chocolate protein powder

1 tsp. organic cocoa powder

1 packet stevia or sweetener of choice

1-2 egg whites

1 Tbsp pumpkin puree

water just to mix

stir all together in microwave safe bowl and microwave for 1 min.

(optional) top with whipped topping of choice ( I use sugar free cool whip or reddi-whip)

Enjoy!

Blogging Virgin

Please welcome me to the 21st Century, as I enter the world of blogging ;). I've been toying with the idea of starting a blog for a while, but it seemed too intimidating so I put it off. I just moved to New York City 3 months ago, and I've decided there's so much going on everyday that I need a way to record everything. I hope to use this blog to record my experiences in NYC as I live my life, bake my way through culinary school and continue on my journey to become my fittest self. If any of this sounds appealing, please stick around.