Year of the Rabbit

Tomorrow marks a new year - the year of the rabbit! Rabbit people are calm, conservative, detail-oriented, graceful...things that I am not. They also tend to get along extremely well with others. Again, something I do not do. Thank goodness I was born in the year of the horse. Horse people are impatient, rarely listen to advice, good with their hands, and have contradictions in their character. Yup, that pretty much describes me. As my husband and he will definitely agree.

To celebrate the Chinese New Year I decided to try a new medium - wafer paper. The paper is easy to use. Since I don't have a printer to print edible images I went ahead and purchased paper that already had the images printed on them. To use, just cut your paper to the desired size, brush a thin coat of corn syrup onto your frosted (either RI or fondant will work) cookie, and placed the paper onto the cookie. Turn the cookie image down for 30 minutes, then turn over and allow to dry completely for 12 hours. That's it! Once the cookie has dried you can embellish the cookie by adding decorations - maybe more icing, sugar pearls, really, whatever strikes you.

Why yes, that is a little cookie easel!

Once it's complete you have cookies that look like you slaved over them for hours!


Kung Hee Fat Choy! (That's happy new year.)

Kung Hee Fat Choy!

Happy New Year!

Yes, I am aware that it is February and no, I am not late on this. In addition to being Valentine's Day, February 14 is also Chinese New Year this year and brings with it the year of the Tiger. I myself am a Horse but you didn't ask my sign, so let's move on, shall we? Here in Honolulu the festivities have already begun. Yesterday the husband and I went to Chinatown to watch the parade and to feed the lions hong pao (minus the envelopes) for good luck. We also saw a spectacular dragon who was 150 ft long that I had never seen before. Sorry, no pics. I was too busy watching all of the lions.

What does this have to do with food? I had to attempt a cake for the occasion. If you know me then you know that my caking skills leave a lot to be desired but hey, I'm still trying! In my attempts to teach myself to cake, I purchased Confetti Cakes by Elisa Strauss. Elisa was the mastermind behind Charlotte's wedding cake on Sex in the City and in her first book, she features a Chinese Take Out Box cake. Seems simple enough in theory. How hard is it carve a take-out box and cover it? Answer: harder than you think. Here are my clumsy attempts:


You are supposed to see the seams of the box but I obviously didn't cut my pieces to the correct length. The overlay on the sides and top of the box are gum-paste over fondant and I hand painted the pagoda and the wording with gel color thinned with vodka. Definitely not my best work, but I do have high hope for Valentine's Day. Hmmm, maybe I should rename this blog "Clumsy Cakes?"

The inside was good though - yellow cake with a praline buttercream with a crumb coat of cream cheese frosting. Don't ask where I came up with that combo. I just went with what was around. Now back to the cookies drying on the counter. Hopefully they work out better than this cake!

BTW, never let it be said that I don't show you the screws up I make along that way! =o) Oh, and no one tell Elisa about this. I think she'd sent me a cease and desist letter post haste!