Cupcake and Cookie Boxes

So I was thinking what am I going to transport my cupcakes and cookies in, I don't want to go to Michael's stores every time I have a customer and get boxes from there, I want to have them on hand.

I found a box place that the prices are wonderful, and they have great reviews, I want to share it with you.

Bake a Box - www.bakeabox.com they have all different kinds of boxes, cake, pie, cookie, cupcake, and the cupcake inserts so your cupcakes wont slide all around.

I couldn't believe the prices, I thought it was a misprint but it wasn't.  So this will be the place that I will getting my boxes from.

I love that they have half sheet boxes and you can put 2 cupcake inserts in to carry 24 cupcakes, instead of just having a small box to carry only 12 cupcakes in, that makes life easier.

Go and check them out.

This week I will be making Key Lime Pie Cupcakes, stay tuned!

Menu Plan / Donation

Today was a wonderful Saturday, I donated some healthy treats to Hospice in my town, they just loved the treats.  I made Standard and Mini Lemon Cupcakes and Chocolate-Orange Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Here are some pictures:

Cookie Boxes with my sticker on them

Standard Lemon Cupcakes

Mini Lemon Cupcakes

Menu for this week:

Saturday: Spaghetti with sausage

Sunday: Grilled Cheese Sandwiches (It's just me and the kids night)

Monday: Grilled chicken sandwich with homemade honey mustard sauce / yellow rice

Tuesday: Taco Soup

Wednesday: Italian Chicken/side dish/veggie

Thursday: Sausage and Peppers w/ white rice

Friday: Pizza

Have a great weekend!

Food Waste Friday / Sad looking orange

I am joining Kristen from The Frugal Girl, to talk about the food that I wasted this week.  I think I am pretty good at not wasting much, so I checked the fridge and I had two things that I wasted this week.

Heavy Cream it was half full, I had it on the door of the fridge, that's why it started curdling so fast, if it was summer I might could have salvaged it and made some ice cream.

The poor orange that I zested last week when I made Whole Wheat Vanilla Sugar Cookies, I put it in a storage bag on the door of the fridge in the back of some other things so I forgot all about it, it got all wrinkled and brown looking, don't think I can salvage that.

Whole Wheat Mini Lemon Cupcakes

Yesterday I made Mini Lemon Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting, I used my new mini cupcake pans by Wilton (those are the best cupcake pans). 

 I have to say mini cupcakes are so tiny, and you only need a little bit of batter because they will go over the top. So let's get started:

Here are my ingredients:

2 1/2 cups 100% whole wheat flour
1 cup of light brown sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt

1 cup buttermilk (recipe in post)
2 fresh eggs
1 tsp white vinegar
1 cup of canola oil or unsweetened applesauce
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp lemon zest
Fresh squeezed juice from the lemon

Sift all dry ingredients together (the first 4).
Put all wet ingredients in mixer and mix until everything is together.
Add dry ingredients into your wet mixture and mix until batter is nice and smooth, start adding your lemon zest and fresh lemon juice.

Fill your baking cups 1/2 full and bake for 10-12 minutes on 350, let cool on cooling rack and then frost.

Here is my FRESH, HOMEMADE buttermilk, 1 tbsp white vinegar, fill with milk to make it 1 cup, let it sit for about 5 minutes and there you have it.

Make sure you crack your eggs in a bowl and then put into your blender, you don't want any eggshells in your batter.

I have all my recipes on my laptop (a present from my hubby and kids for taking them to all there football games in 2011, they treat me so special) so you don't have papers all over your counter.

Here is my beautiful Red blender, my favorite color is red (another present from my hubby and kids for taking them to all there football games in 2010, I tell you they really treat me so good).

Mix your wet ingredients together until well blended:

Sift your dry ingredients together and then mix them into your wet ingredients:

While the batter is mixing, whatever cupcake batter you are making, this is the step to put that in.  So I zested an entire lemon and then cut it in half and squeeze the fresh juice into my batter (watch the seeds).  Start your mixer back up so the lemon zest and fresh juice can incorporate in the batter, taste to make sure there is enough flavor.

Then start filling your cupcake pans, 1/2 full don't overfill especially the mini cupcakes because then they will start leaning.

Bake for 10-12 minutes on 350, let rest on stove top for about 5 minutes, and then take the cupcakes out and put on your wire stand, cool completely.

Then frost

1 cup of unsalted
butter (softened)
1 cup of cream cheese (softened)
1 tbsp of vanilla extract
3 cups of powdered sugar
Lemon zest / fresh squeezed lemon juice
mix together in blender and put in your piping bag and make swirls on your mini cupcakes

There you have it WHOLE WHEAT MINI LEMON CUPCAKES

What does healthy mean?

People might ask what does healthy mean? Can cupcakes and cookies be healthy?

Yes, they can be.  If you substitute certain ingredients you can make anything healthy for you and your family.

All Purpose flour - 100% whole wheat flour

Granulated sugar - Light brown sugar

Store bought buttermilk - Homemade buttermilk

Eggs - Egg whites / or Egg replacer

Vegetable Oil - Canola Oil / Unsweetened apple sauce

Butter - Unsalted butter

There are many other ingredients that can be substituted, but I just wanted to give you a small portion, so you know that you can make  cupcakes and cookies healthy.

Use natural/fresh ingredients - fresh fruit juice, and fresh fruit zest.  There is nothing like the freshness of ingredients that will make your treats taste HEAVENLY.

I am in the process of making a cookbook for Pamela's Heavenly Treats, so my kiddies will be able to have a piece of what I love to do, I will add to it as I come up with new recipes for treats. So by the time I give it to them it will be a nice size cookbook.

My kiddies like flavor, so the cupcakes and cookies that I make have a lot of flavor and don't taste healthy, I have people tell me if you didn't tell me that this cookie was healthy I wouldn't have known, because of the taste.  So don't think that healthy is not good, it is very good, especially for your health.

That's why I am exercising and eating right, so that I can stand behind, Pamela's Heavenly Treats motto:

Why eat a unhealthy CAKE to gain weight when you can eat a healthy CUPCAKE and still lose weight.

Remember tomorrow will be a tutorial and pictures of mini cupcakes and cookies, stay tuned.

Have a blessed Wednesday!

Update for the Week

I am always tweaking every recipe that I do to make it better, so I made 

Oatmeal Raisin Chocolate Chunk Cookie

They were so chewy and good.  They were ate up so fast, so I must have mastered that cookie, YAY! I can check that one off my list.

Wednesday will be my baking day, here is what I will be baking:

-Healthy mini cupcakes (they are so cute) lemon, red velvet

-New cookie - Chocolate Orange Chocolate Chip Cookie (that sounds YUMMY)

-Tweak the old fashioned Chocolate Chip Cookie

I will have pictures of these in my Thursday blog.

Have a blessed Tuesday, stay warm, and dry.

Morning Glory Monday - Whole Wheat Vanilla Sugar Cookies

Last week I made a new cookie, I call it Vanilla Sugar, but it tastes more like cinnamon spice, with a hint of orange cookie, it is good and healthy.

Whole Wheat Vanilla Sugar Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 tbsp. fat free milk
1 tbsp. grated orange peel
1 tsp. pure vanilla
1 egg

1 cup light brown sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
2 cups 100% whole wheat flour

These 2 ingredients are for rolling the cookies in:

2 tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon  

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In large bowl combine the first 6 ingredients until blended well. In another bowl combine the next 5 ingredients (sift). Then add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, until blended completely.

In a small bowl combine sugar and cinnamon.

Shape dough into 1-inch balls; roll in cinnamon-sugar mixture.

Place parchment paper on cookie sheets and place cookie

balls 2 inches apart; flatten slightly. Bake 8 - 10 minutes until

light golden brown. (Cookies will be soft in center.)

Yield 2-3 dozen

ENJOY!

Sunday Blessings

This is the day that the Lord has made. 

As for me and my house we will serve the Lord. 

Have a blessed day in the Lord!

Meal Plan Day

Saturday is my meal plan day for the upcoming week.  

This is Jeremiah's month to cook he is 14, and he is doing a great job with my help. 

Friday, Saturday, Sunday (Just me and the boys, hubbie is at work, so it is down time on dinner)

Saturday - Tostito rolls and applesauce

Sunday-  Italian Sausage and noodles

Monday - Baked chicken, noodles, veggie

Tuesday - Meatloaf, potatoes, veggie

Wednesday - Barbecue Pork Loin sandwiches (Crock pot)

Thursday- Stuffed Turkey breast, stuffing, veggie

Friday - Nuggets, fries

This seems like a good menu for the week.  I will also make some cookies and cupcakes for the week, for dessert.

Happy Friday

This is where I would like to be right now!

Wow its Friday already, this week flew by.  Fridays are a free day for me, I have a 4 day homeschool week, so Thursday is the end of my week.  I try not to make appointments, or have a big project to do on Fridays, I try and relax until my husband leaves around 5:00pm because he is gone until Monday morning.  It's funny his schedule has been like this for years and Fridays are still hard to deal with.

This weekend I am going to be making some new cookies, tweaking them a little to make them healthy and good, so wish me luck, and if it works I will have 4 new cookies to put on my list.

I was thinking the other day, do I enjoy making cupcakes or cookies, and it's really funny but I enjoy making cupcakes, it's alot more work but all the different fresh ingredients that you can put in your batter, tweaking my recipes to make it healthy and then taste testing them to see if it tastes like peach cobbler, mango, cinnamon roll, orange etc.  My husband is the taste tester of the cupcakes, he acts like the judges on Cupcake Wars that comes on the Food Network.  He is so funny.  I rather he be honest with me instead of a customer having something negative to say.  But I need that because I don't want to make a dessert and then give it to someone and its not good, that wouldn't be right.

Well I am going to sit back and enjoy my new hazelnut coffee, and meditate on the good things that happened this week, and get ready for the weekend.

Happy Friday Everyone!

Thankful Thursday

This is how I feel today:

Today I am so thankful for all the people that have been emailing me and calling me about my business.  The kind words that you have said to me are wonderful, talking about how inviting my website and blog are, I am so grateful to my awesome husband for taking his time out of his week to put my website together, he did such a terrific job. 

I never thought in a million years that I would start a business, let alone a Cupcake and Cookie business, but God has a plan for me and I am going to walk right though it, with bold faith and determination.  When I was weighing the pros and cons I thought to myself I am a wife, mother of 6, homeschool teacher, taxi driver, doctor, referee, comforter for the kids and the list goes on.  But the Lord has a plan for me, he gave me that many, many years ago, and its so funny that right here at the age of 36 and being married for  almost 15 years, 6 kiddies later that this is the plan he was talking about. 

This week has been like a dream, people are calling, asking me about and ordering my treats, I am donating my treats to Hospice in Centreville, MD once a month, by me doing something out of the kindness of my heart, they are going to put my information in there newsletter, and put my name down for there events, plus they have 250 volunteers that will hopefully love my treats, and the nice lady in charge asked if I would be on there incentive program to give them a discount whenever they order.  I tell you God is so good, that in 1 week my business has flourished.  I know I have some praying folks out there praying over my business and I thank you for that.

My business shirts and stickers for my boxes came in yesterday, they are so nice.  When they came I got really excited, like this is real.

Sometimes you have to humble yourself to enjoy God's blessings, and this is one time that I am doing just that. 

_________________________________________________________________________________

I am the coupon queen so here is a coupon that I want to share with you

Here is a coupon from General Mills *Whole Grain Cereal*

The Dietary Guidelines recommend choosing products with a whole grain listed as the first ingredient. Now every cereal with the white check has more whole grain than any other single ingredient, with the same great taste. You will see whole grain as the first ingredient on the ingredient list, indicating that whole grain is the first and most prevalent ingredient.

Make a commitment to incorporate more whole grain into your family´s diets by starting their day with a bowl of cereal with the white check, including Cheerios®, Lucky Charms®, Cinnamon Toast Crunch®, Honey Nut Cheerios® and Total®. For more information on the importance of whole grain and a chance to enter the "Fast Lane for Whole Grain" sweepstakes visit www.WholeGrainNation.com.

In addition, you and your readers can visit http://www.myblogspark.com/uc/main/d537/ to download a printable coupon for $1.75 off the purchase of any (2) cereals with the white check today!

*I received this coupon from Myblogspark*

Have a blessed day!

Frosting Cupcakes

When I first started making cupcakes which was many years ago, I would just use the small spatula that I had to frost them or the back of a spoon. 

But now since I have researched and want my cupcakes to look pleasing to the eye, I went out and purchased a piping set and I love it.  Its fairly easy to do, I watched a video on line and in no time I was piping my cupcakes.

 

All cupcakes that I make do not have frosting piped on the top, I do a creamy frosting which cant be piped so you have to glaze that on, and it looks really nice.

You can also use a small ice cream scoop to give your cupcakes a

fun effect, my kids like how these look.

All my frosting is homemade and I am amazed at how many different types of frosting you can make, a lot of my frosting recipes are something I just put together to see if it would taste good with that cupcake. To my amazement 98% of the frosting that I made they paired nice together.

Frosting that I make:

Cream Cheese

Butter Cream

Maple Syrup Cream Cheese (goes great w/my french toast cupcake)

Orange Cream Cheese (which takes like orange sherbert)

Granola Butter Cream Cheese

Peach Cream Cheese

and the list keeps going and going

I  use only fresh, natural ingredients when I am adding to my frosting.  No food color, things like that, you can make white turn red by adding fruit to your frosting, it is time consuming but it's worth it, because the frosting has a fresh taste, and its HEALTHY.

Yoplait Coupon - Yoplait® Frozen Smoothies

You can visit http://www.myblogspark.com/uc/main/707b/ to download a printable *coupon for $1.00 off one package of Yoplait® Frozen Smoothies.

*This coupon offer is not valid in the following states: including California, Idaho, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota and Tennessee

I received this information and the coupon offer from Yoplait through MyBlogSpark.

Tasty Tuesday

Winter is here and the air is cool and crisp, well yesterday and today its down right frigid. So what better way to keep warm is to have yourself a warm tasty cookie right out of the oven.

My signature cookie is my CHOCOLATE CHUNK COOKIE that's just a fancy name for Chocolate Chip, but it's oozing with chocolate chunks and walnuts (you may omit those is you like).

I call this cookie my HUSBAND SNATCHER COOKIE that's my name for Oatmeal Raisin. The reason why I call it that, is because every time I make a batch of these, I better make two or three batches, because my husband will snatch them while they are still hot and I go to look and there gone. It's cute to watch because he is not a fan of desserts, but he loves these magical cookies.

My kids have been asking when is it going to snow? Especially my 8 year old and 5 year old, my older three boys are not that excited about the snow because they have to shovel it :-) But my little boys are ready to put there boots on and make a snow man. So I made these SNOWFLAKE CUPCAKES, it's almost close to the real thing and they loved these better than the actual snow that falls from the sky. My 5 year old says "These are DELICIOUS" he loves to eat and test out my healthy treats.

I will reveal one secret to making GREAT taking treats sifting the dry ingredients all together 3 times, it might sound time consuming but once you mix your dry sifted flour mixture into the wet ingredients you will notice a difference in the batter and the taste.

Flour is a very important ingredient, I have learned this since I have been baking my healthy treats. You can't buy cheap or something on sale, I had a little problem in this area, because I am known as the coupon queen and queen of sales. But I will pay full price for this product, but I did call the manufacture and they are sending me some coupons YAY! There are many wheat flour brands and textures out there, I use two but the same brand. 100% whole wheat flour is a bolder texture and taste, the batter looks brown. I also use whole wheat white flour which still has the same protein % as 100%whole wheat, but the texture is better and the batter looks almost like your all purpose flour.


Cupcake sizes 
Mini
Standard
X-Large
Grandaddy

(named after my grandfather)

Homemade Buttermilk

One day I didn't have buttermilk in the fridge and was making a batch of cupcakes ingredients were mixing so I couldn't run to the store. so I though to myself what makes buttermilk, of course milk and then it had to be something with a little acidic, so I thought vinegar and/or lemon juice. I was correct here is the easy recipe

1 tablespoon of white vinegar
1 cup of milk

let it sit for 5 minutes and there you have it HOMEMADE BUTTERMILK, there is nothing better that having freshly made something instead of dealing with all the unhealthy ingredients and it also saves you money because you always have milk in the fridge and vinegar in the pantry.

Try it!

Ingredients in your pantry

You want to bake today and you go to the pantry and your out of FLOUR, well here is a post that will tell you what you need to have on hand so you don't have to worry about it.

Flour (All Purpose or Whole Wheat)

Baking Powder

Baking Soda

Salt

Granulated Sugar

Brown Sugar

Vanilla Extract

Eggs

Vegetable Oil / Canola Oil

Unsalted Butter

Cream Cheese

Powered Sugar

Just to name a few :-) Cookies or Cupcakes if you have these ingredients or even a handful of these you can make a great baked treat!!

What are somethings in your pantry that you cant live without?