Bonjour, Petit Gateaux!

This is a bit of a back posting, but perhaps worth sharing....especially since I wasn't blogging in December!


My daughter's 9th birthday had a French twist!  After falling in love with the book Tales of Desperaux, she'd decided long before December that she wanted a French theme for her party.  Ok....how to do that?  We combined the ideas of the season, her favorite sport (ice skating) and this location to come up with "Winter in Paris".  Decorations - easy...winter stuff!  Thanks to my crafty niece, Daphne, for whipping up some cute Parisian touches.  (Check out her Etsy shop!)

Every kid's party seems to require an activity, craft, or some crazy arcade venture.  Our activity?  The kids became painters in their own French gallery.  A make-it, take-it project!   Viola...instant party favors - a finished painted 8 x 10 canvas!  Actually, supplies for this activity were cheaper than stuff I might have bought for a favor bag!  Thanks to a handy Granny, each young painter also received a pretty nifty beret!

Bon appetit!

But wait...there's more.  As part of the make-it, eat-it activity (after all...it is France), we opted for a create-your-own crepe bar!  The kids were able to make their own choices as to crepe toppings or fillings - fruit, chocolate chips, Nutella (of course), whipped cream.

For snacks, semi-traditional birthday fare.  The French twist here was adding labels with the French translation for the snack.  After all, wouldn't you rather have a petit gateaux than a cupcake?  Speaking of sweets, the cupcakes were lemon with buttercream frosting.  Also, I had made some pretty yummy strawberry cookies with cream cheese frosting...these were super easy and made from a cake mix!

All in all, a fun afternoon trip to the City of Lights.  A super fun way to celebrate a birthday and adding a little cultural flair at the same time!

Easy Strawberry Snowball Cookies

Strawberry Snowball Cookies
(adapted from an Allrecipes.com post)

Ingredients
2 eggs
1 package strawberry cake mix
1/2 cup vegetable oil

Directions
1. Mix together cake batter ingredients in large bowl or KitchenAid
2. Roll into 1" balls and set on ungreased or parchment covered cookie sheet
3. Bake at 350 degrees for 5-10 (Watch carefully during this stage.  I always wait for a crinkly-looking crust to appear.)
4.  Frost with homemade or store bought cream cheese icing.  Decorate as desired.

Cool Trick - Dipped Cupcakes

One of the coolest tricks I've learned (both by reading & by doing) is soooo easy!  Yes, infomercial easy!  I found that many of the cupcakes that Tack & Richardson create require a dipping technique.  Ok, that was (admit-tingly) one of the many daunting things that caused me to look at the pretty pictures, then set the books back on my shelf. But, once I really stumbled upon the previously mentioned blog (With Sprinkles on Top) and found a couple of YouTube videos, I realized it really was crazy easy.

Here's the technique - seriously, it's easy.  Take store-bought icing.  That's right.  Get it on sale.  Use double coupons.  If you need color, divide it out into some microwave safe bowls.  I use gel coloring - it's more concentrated and has great consistency.  A little goes a long way!  For the cupcakes in this picture, I evenly divided one container into 2 Corning Ware bowls (cereal size - microwave safe).   Put one bowl in the microwave (make sure you've mixed the colors well). I microwaved for 12 seconds.  Tack & Richardson suggest 8, but I think that's too short.  Stir well, then immediately dip a cupcake.  Let it drip dry (sort of) and set it back on the tray, wax paper or wherever.   Repeat. Then, do the same with the next bowl of color!

Ta-da!  Cool trick....plus, looks like fondant!  Who knew?
I see lots of uses for this nifty trick.  Apparently it's how petit fours are made, so I tried it with mini cupcakes and they were really cute!