A Very Good Birthday Indeed

Another birthday down, I'm 23 now! This birthday was an especially nice one, for multiple reasons: I won the Royal Foodie Joust held at the Leftover Queen Forum (link is to the left in the foodie blogroll), I got accepted into the Daring Bakers (yay!) and my husband put a PINK KitchenAid on order for me (it hasn't arrived yet). I am one happy girl!

My boss' birthday is the day before mine, and I took the day off on my birthday, so I decided to bake him some cupcakes to have on his birthday. I was going to make this cake I saw in a cookbook I just bought, but decided to go with a real crowd-pleaser: the Cuba Libre Cupcake I found on Coconut & Lime's blog (http://craveperfection.blogspot.com/2007/07/tasty-little-treat.html). I love how dense and chocolatey the cake turns out, and the frosting is to-die-for. It reminds me almost of doughnut frosting, but not as gag-me sweet. Instead of using some Appleton White rum, I used Sailor Jerry's instead, since it's a darker rum. I think I liked that a lot better. They went over really well with my co-workers, and they loved joking about how they were "drinking" on the job. Look at how yummy these were!! I had to stop devouring my cupcake long enough to take a picture. Everyone wanted me to be included in the birthday hoopla, so I stuck a candle in my cupcake, too. You can kinda see the hole it left in the frosting.

And my good friend at work knows how much I LOVE cooking and baking, and she knew what my husband planned on getting me for my birthday, so she got me this lovely set of gifts:

From left to right: Three different kinds of pure vanilla (Madagascar, Tahiti and Mexico), a bag of super-fine Creme Brulee sugar (can't wait to make some now!), a bottle of Madagascar Pure Vanilla Sugar, and in the back (you can't really see it) is a cookbook stand with a glass reference table for it to sit on. She's the best!!

I just wanted to say a big Thank You to everyone who has made this birthday so special for me. I feel truly spoiled!!

~Mehgan~