Christmas bake sale goodies

I'm having a bake sale tomorrow in the mall. I just finished packing up all the goodies, tagging and pricing them. I thought I'd share some photos of my bake sale goodies. So this year I'm offering a Christmas cookie box, it has 25 cookies, which include gingersnaps, decorated sugar cookies, snickerdoodles, gingerbread men or gingerbread snowflakes and of course chocolate chip.

Christmas cookie box! A variety of flavours including my delicious sugar cookies! 

I'm also selling cake pops. I'm offering two different types, cake pops on a stick, which include Frosty the Snowman from my previous post and Rudolph the red- nosed reindeer. They're are both so adorable, I hope they're a hit.

I made up some cake pop baskets too!!

And then I tried something new. Shaped cake pops! I saw a chocolate mold in the shape of a gumdrop and so I pressed some cake pop mixture into each mold, let them set, dipped them in chocolate and viola.....

I decorated them with extra melted chocolate, sprinkles and peppermint candy. Chocolate peppermint cake pops...oh my!!!  I guess you have to like peppermint to appreciate them but still worth a try and it's easy enough to just change the topping to your personal favorite.

I will definitely be making these again, they fit so nicely into a little box and make the perfect gift for any chocolate lover. 

 Of course I will be offering the sweet dough pastries from my latest entry too! To tell you the truth I wouldn't be disappointed if these didn't sell out though. I can just imagine myself sitting by the Christmas tree with an apricot pirozok in one hand and a steaming cup of chai in the other. Throw in family and I'd say it's the perfect way to celebrate Christmas eve. I do have one more special item that I will be selling at the bake sale and it's these....

Snowflakes!!!

Don't they look delicious?  

These are a light, flaky, pastry dough that's deep fried and sprinkle with icing sugar while warm. They melt in your mouth and it's impossible to stop at one. Trust me I've tried. So the only problem was that I needed to come up with a creative name for them. These are an old recipe from my mom and she has a Russian name for them, which I have no idea how to translate so I had to come up with something and quickly. Then my dad  said, "Snowflakes, you should call them snowflakes." What a perfect name for them they look like a snowflake; are light, flaky and melt in your mouth just like a snowflake. 

And so that's all my Christmas goodies that I'm selling. I think I have a good variety of sweets and now to get some much needed sleep so I can actually stay awake during the bake sale. 

Here's a few more pictures of my bake sale goodies,

 I found these adorable container at the dollar store and filled them with small Christmas cookies!! I always find the cutest container at the dollar store, I'm so glad I spotted these.   

Well I've finished my work here and it's time to sell. Hopefully all my hard work pays off! I will let you all know how it turned out, but for now let me take the time to say, Merry Christmas to all and May your New Year be filled with love, laughter, and good health. 

With SweetBakedLove 

Apricot Piroshki and Kolachki

Only 3 days till Christmas and I had the best day, first I recieved a parcel in the mail full of presents which is always special.Secondly I made delicious sweet dough pastries with my mom today. The whole house was filled with the aroma of apricots, cinnamon, and sugar. We made  Apricot Piroshki, which is sweet dough wrapped around an apricot filling, baked to golden brown, Kolachy, and cinnamon walnut rolls which are basically the same as cinnamon buns.

Apricot Piroshki

Cinnamon walnut buns

Kolachki

Only thing needed is chai...

Are you hungry yet?

I had to take picture because they looks so good, hot and golden brown from the oven. Thought I'd share the photos with you.  As you can see I had a pretty good teacher! Enjoy!   


                         ~ With SweetBakedLove ~

Frosty the Snowman.....

Okay so cake pops are all the rage now so I decide to jump on the band wagon. I saw these adorable Snowman cake pops on Bakerella website and I just had to try making them. I had to improvise on some of the ingredients but none the less that turned out great!! I'm a bit obsessed when it comes to snowmen just wait and see.....


Making the cake pops is really quite simple. You'll need:

~ Cake Pop Recipe ~

1 box cake mix

1 can frosting

Make the cake mix according to the package. Bake in a 9x13 cake pan.

Invert the baked cake on a wire rack and let it cool.

Once it's cool, break off pieces of cake into smaller pieces and crumble the cake into a large mixing bowl.

Crumbly the whole cake up. Take your time and make sure you don't leave any large pieces of cake. Add half the container of icing. (You will not need the whole can, if you add too much icing the cake pops will be to moist and hard to work with) Mix frosting into the crumbled cake. You can use a fork to thoroughly combine the mixture, I use my hands. Make sure you wash and dry your hands beforehand!  

The mixture should be just moist enough to come together into a ball and still keep it's shape.

Place the cake rolls onto a cookie sheet and refrigerate for about an hour or in the freezer for 10-15 mins. The cake balls should be firm, *do not freeze them they will crack the chocolate coating if they are frozen or crumble and break in the chocolate.* I learned this the hard way and it was a disaster!

Once the cake pops are thoroughly chilled they are ready to be dipped in chocolate coating.  I use the double boiler method. I place a deep glass bowl, that fits snugly without falling in, into the pot with water. Keep the heat on low if the water is boiling to hard than you run the risk of water bubbling out the sides. Water will cause the chocolate to seize up!!

Dip the cake pops in smaller batches, keep the rest refrigerated. First attach the stick to the cake pop by dipping the end of the stick then gently insert into cake pops about halfway. I use floral foam, you can buy them at dollar store, to hold the cake pops upright. I attach all the cake balls to the sticks and put the floral foam and pops back into fridge for 1-2 minutes to make sure the chocolate is set and pops are firmly attached. 

Once the chocolate is set you're ready to dip the cake pops!! 

These are the ingredients I used: 

Chocolate candy melts

Mini reese's peeses cups

White confetti sprinkle

Maynard fuzzy peaches

Noodles

Mini Gobstoppers (red)

Flower sprinkles

Wilton Edible Markers

Okay so the problem with the first batch was the black edible marker wouldn't work.  First I used them to make the pupil on the white sprinkles for his eyes and it ran out of ink. So I had to wait between applications and when I went to draw on the mouth, after the chocolate had set, then it stopped working altogether. All was not lost because for the second batch I used black royal icing, I had just finished icing some sugar cookies....of course they were snowmen too....  

and had some left over so I tried it and it worked out great!! Easy, simple and just as sweet I thought!! You be the judge!!

Batch #1

Hard to tell from the photo but the mouth's were smudges and I only managed to make 8 before my edible pen died!!! 

Batch #2

Hmmmm......Okay so maybe they're both cute but the second attempt went smoothly and was so easy to do!!

Either way I had fun making them and that's all that counts!! When it comes to being creative the sky's the limit!! Use your imagination, dig in your candy stash and see what you come up. One thing for sure is give it a try. Cake pops are fun and easy to make. And eating them is just one bite away!! 

Oh and about the snowmen obsession, here's some pictures of the snowmen sugar cookies I was decorating.

They're so cute I'm having a hard time parting with them but as the song goes....but he waved goodbye, sayin' "Don't you cry , I'II be back again some day." I'm sure I will be re-visiting snowmen many more times <3

With SweetBakedLove <3

   

Sweet BAKED LOVE