Rockharbor Church | My Sweet and Saucy

Posts Tagged ‘rockharbor church’

Mini Desserts & Sugar Cookies

Wednesday, September 17th, 2008

I am so excited to share photos with you from some of my last events. This last week was my busiest yet for my business and by the end I was physically aching, but it was all worth it. I also celebrated my 25th birthday this last Monday and am so excited that one of my birthday presents is going to be a trip to Florida to the Notter School of Pastry Arts where I will be lucky enough to take a three day cake decorating class from Colette Peters!!! Colette is simple AMAZING and I can’t wait to watch her in action and learn some tricks of the trade. So get ready for some fun posts in October as I document my class. I have also never been to Florida, so if any of you have any “must eats” let me know!

Well enough about that, lets get onto the desserts! So this last week I had an order for 1,000 mini desserts for my church’s leadership & launch party. The fun part about this menu is they left the choices up to me, so I got to try a couple new dessert ideas and play around with fun presentation ideas. Overall the party went really great, but as I said earlier…I was so happy when it was all over. Here are some photos of the goodies!

My Grandma’s famous caramelized party mix (not the savory kind). This stuff is beyond addicting…don’t doubt it’s deliciousness! I thought it would be fun to put them in paper cones, so I had my husband build me a custom paper cone holder that turned out just perfect!

Carrot Cake Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting!

Chocolate cups filled with Chocolate Mousse and topped with Valrhona Crunchy Chocolate Pearls.

A view of one of the tables. My brother-in-law made me this stand! It is perfect because each part comes off…there is a total of 6 tiers, so it is nice that I can customize it to any party size. Thanks Wes!

Mini Monster Cookies…peanut butter, oatmeal, chocolate chunks, M&M’s, and lots of sugar!

Mini Chocolate Peanut Butter Pies with Oreo Crust and Chocolate Ganache Swirl.

Mini Keylime Pies! Love the meringue tops!

Of course I couldn’t pass up a chance to use Bakerella’s adorable idea of cake pops. I did three different kinds…Red Velvet, Buttermilk Banana, and Chocolate. These are so tasty, so if you haven’t tried them out I recommend you do!

And finally a last view of one of the tables.

Besides that order I had another 500 cookie order, but this time it was for USC…of course it had to be due on the same day! Anyways, they were throwing a huge volunteer recognition party and needed some sweet treats for their guests. These cookies were again made with edible frosting sheets like my last order. You can click here to see the whole process of the last order.

Thanks for taking the time to check out my photos! I do love being able to share them with you!

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Posted in Baby Shower Ideas, Bridal Shower Ideas, Children's Birthday Ideas, Cookies, Cupcakes, Desserts, Wedding Ideas | 66 Comments »

New Cooking Classes

Friday, September 5th, 2008

Cooking classes are definitely a huge passion of mine. As some of you might know, before I went into the pastry field I was actually studying to be an elementary school teacher. All of my life this is the job I thought I was going to go into and was blessed to be able to work as an aide for many years. I absolutely loved teaching, but felt that God was leading me into a new passion and I jumped head first into it and have never turned back since. However, God knew He didn’t give me the love for teaching and sharing my passions with others for nothing and has helped me find ways in this new field to share and bless others. I feel so honored to be able to help and guide others that share my same passion for desserts and food and inspire those that never knew they had it within them. I have loved being able to teach classes at Prep Kitchen Essentials in Seal Beach and at my church Rockharbor in Costa Mesa and now I am excited to announce a new opportunity that I have been given. This month I am starting to teach cake decorating classes at MiraCosta College in Oceanside, CA. I am teaching three separate courses that consist of three classes each. Here are the three classes…

Module 1 – Basic Cake Decorating (9/08-10/08) $120

This relaxed and friendly course takes you through the basics of using a
variety of icings to decorate typical cakes required for birthdays,
graduations, etc. You will be shown techniques related to piping, use
of modeling paste for flowers and ornaments, and the covering of cakes
using a variety of icings tools and equipment. This will be taught as a
beginners level course. Perfect for either the recreational cake
designer or the individual who wishes to gain professional skills.

Module 2 – Wedding Cakes (10/08-11/08) $120
This course is suitable for creative cake-makers who may have completed
a beginners cake-decorating course. The course will primarily focus on
the techniques and styles needed to decorate beautiful wedding cakes.
Please do not sign up for this class if you are not familiar with the
basic principles of cake decorating.

Module 3 – Specialty Cakes (11/08-12/08) $120
This course caters for participants who wish to advance their basic
skills. Learn a variety of new, contemporary techniques using icing and
fondant, allowing you to create beautiful and unique cakes. On
completion of the course, students will have a greater understanding of
cake design and the satisfaction and confidence to further their
abilities.

The classes still have spots left in them and are priced quite low for how much information you will be learning in them. If you are interested in signing up just check out their website and they can give you all the information. Hope to see some of you there!

Well before leaving I wanted to share some photos with you from my cooking class at Rockharbor. This class was on appetizers and we had a great time! The menu was…

Sun-Dried Tomato Dip with Pita Chips

Caribbean Shrimp Salad with Lime Vinaigrette

Crostini with Fresh Mozzarella, Arugula, Prosciutto, & Olive Tapenade

Bruschetta

I wanted to pass on this recipe of Ina Garten’s from Barefoot Contessa. Her recipe for Sun-Dried Tomato Dip is fantastic and extremely easy…a double winner in my book! I highly recommend that you try it!

Tags: cake decorating classes ca, cake decorating classes oceanside ca, cooking classes california, great appetizer recipes, prep kitchen essentials cooking classes, rockharbor church, Sun dried tomato dip
Posted in Cakes, Cooking Classes, Desserts, Recipes, Wedding Ideas | 27 Comments »

Mona Vie Wine Bottle Cake

Tuesday, March 18th, 2008

This past weekend was definitely a crazy one for me! I had a cooking class for 16 people at my church Rockharbo r on Thursday night, an order for 135 Monogram wedding cake cookies on Saturday morning and a wine party for 20 people that I catered and did the cake for on Saturday night. Lets just say I got about 4 1/2 hours sleep Friday night… Anyways, everything turned out great for the most part, but unfortunately I didn’t get as many pictures of my food as I wanted to. The one thing I did get some pictures of was the Mona Vie Wine Bottle Cake I did for the dinner party. Mona Vie isn’t really wine, but rather a health/energy drink that the clients I did the party for sell. The juice comes in a wine bottle though, so I thought it would be fun to do an actual “Mona Vie” cake for them. The cake was a chocolate cake with chocolate mousse and raspberries and have a chocolate buttercream frosting. As you can see, I stacked the cake in rectangles pretty high and then carved a wine bottle shape into the first layer of cake. I then covered the cake in buttercream and covered the wine bottle with fondant. The sides of the cake were made with modeling chocolate, so that the cake looked like it was sitting in a wine crate. The packaging was made out of white chocolate shavings. Overall, I was pretty happy with my first wine bottle cake and am excited to get another chance to make one. Hope you enjoy the photos!