Think Spring!

It's mid-April - I'm hearing birds chirp more, buds are starting to appear and I'm thinking spring. In excitement for the coming season that lasts a mere 2-3 weeks up here in Maine, I created a new cupcake called "Think Spring." It's a vegan lemon cupcake with berry filling, topped with vanilla icing, a blackberry and some lemon zest - and it is yummers!

These cupcakes were my first experimentation with a "filled" cupcake, which seems to be all the rage right now. I used a cupcake corer from Williams Sonoma, and I must say, if you want to fill your cupcakes, get a cupcake core; it makes the job so much easier and much less messier! They're only $5 and are nice and compact and easy to clean. 

Filled Think Spring cupcakes, pre frosting

So I baked up the Think Springs last Saturday with an upcoming cupcake job I'm doing for a friend's graduation party in mind. I've had a bunch of taste-testers and have heard that they're awesome and that they don't taste vegan. It's interesting that people always need to qualify food as "tasting vegan" or not "tasting vegan." Vegan just means there are no animal products in whatever the product is - it doesn't mean that the cupcake contains ingredients the majority of us aren't familiar with. I'm sure most of us have had margarine in some form, flax seed, flour, sugar, fruit juices, applesauce...all normal things, I promise :o) But when someone says, "This doesn't even taste vegan!" I take it as a compliment. I think that vegan baking got a bad wrap at some point because a lot of vegan bakers didn't understand the world of substitutions and the chemistry going on in our ovens, and so a lot of vegan baked goods came out tasting grainy, seedy, bland, or dry. This certainly does not describe what I've been baking up! 

You may have noticed from my other blog or the From Scratch and Sniff Facebook group that I recently got engaged. We got engaged a few weeks ago before the ring was actually ready. On Tuesday we got the call that the ring was ready, and after returning home, I was surprised with a second proposal. My fiance had been doing a photo-shoot with the Think Spring cupcakes and asked to borrow the ring so he could get a shot. He came up behind me in the kitchen with the ring sticking up out of the top of the cupcake, and proposed again. And of course, I said yes again! Then we shared the cupcake, after he put the ring back on my finger. It was perfection. 

New Name!

I've been working with a little focus group on renaming/rebranding my baking service to more clearly reflect my style. We're down to two options:

The Baker's Apron

OR

xo bakery

What do you think?? What do you imagine when you hear either one? Which would you rather visit? Be part of the fun and help us re-define my vegan baking service!

In it for the long haul....

I had a discouraging realization this week. I've started developing a "business plan" for myself which had a few beginning steps:

1. Develop a strong menu of 10-15 items that are fully vegan.
2. Rename business, develop a new look/logo, and packaging.
3. Go through the steps to get my apartment kitchen licensed & products FDA approved.
4. Obtain business insurance.
5. Begin visiting local businesses to get product sold in various places around the city.
6. Eventually, rent out a commercial kitchen and start doing local and shipping orders.
7. Dream - open a store front.

My good friend Kelly found me an article posted on the Maine Organic Farmers & Gardeners (MOFG) website by Cheryl Wixson who does workshops on how to get your kitchen licensed. The article is called Licensing the Home Food Processor Kitchen and goes through a lot of the requirements needed to get your kitchen licensed. Unfortunately, after reading this, I realized I would need to literally re-model our kitchen....which is in a rented property. I don't have a 2-bay sink, no dishwasher, no screen door, no granite or steel counter tops, and the floor is probably less than desirable. Huge let down. I sat on the couch close to tears as I realized my plan was now wrinkled quite a bit. My incredibly supportive and generous fiance asked if we should move. He said we could try to remodel this kitchen ourselves. And then he told me we would do whatever it took to have my dream fulfilled. What an amazing guy - I am so lucky!

I don't think we should move yet; between the two of us, we've moved 6 times in the last 2 years and it's getting really old. We also love our apartment despite the kitchen's "flaws" and the fact that the bathroom is wicked narrow/tiny and only has a stall shower. We love the location, that we have a driveway, that it's fairly quiet, and that we have an incredibly sweet landlord who lives in the building.

So plan b: find a commercial kitchen now or just sit tight, be patient and wait. I found a local commercial kitchen which rents for $10/hour, but I'm not going to jump into it right now. I think I'm just going to work at perfecting my products and will call on friends and family to promote my business, name, and quality products to everyone they know. Word of mouth is a powerful thing and I think it can get me far. I have some incredibly supportive friends who will call me rather than buying a cake somewhere, who will taste-test and give me real feedback, and who help me brainstorm through problems like these! I'm also going to look into going to some MOFG conferences focused on kitchen licensing and businesses planning. It'll be a great way to gain some new ideas/skills and to meet some locals with similar goals.

In the kitchen, I've been fervently baking each week and perfecting many of my recipes. Yesterday I baked up some vegan Nom Nom Carrot Cake Cupcakes with faux maple cream cheese icing. I took a few with me to a bar to meet friends and they were certainly a hit!

Vegan Nom Nom Cupcakes, photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

A friend has also asked me to do an event for her in May, so I'm really looking forward to working with her to develop some new flavors. I will probably experiment with a vegan lemon cupcake with berry compote filling, topped with vanilla bean frosting with candied lemon rind. Reminding myself that although there was a set back, it's minor in the grand scheme of things and I will still see this thing through!

Change, Change, Change

It's official - From Scratch & Sniff is going to be a 100% bona fide vegan bakery. As of the 1st of January, my fiance and I changed to a vegan diet and have decided this is the life for us. Not only are we cooking compassionately and promoting conservation, we're losing weight and feeling incredibly more healthy. It's fantastic!

This change in our diets left me with a problem though. How could I change my ideals and habits around eating, but still use eggs and cream and butter in my baking? I was nervous as I began to dive into the world of vegan baking. I'd tried vegan baked goods before, always with the same thought, "This is dry, dense, and tastes more like health food than a dessert." Although I'm all for health food, I believe that when we want dessert, dessert we shall eat! If I want a healthy snack at night, I don't grab a cookie, I reach for an apple, and so I began to worry that my baking would lose it's desserty qualities.

Not so! Around my birthday, good friends of ours gave me The Joy of Vegan Baking by Colleen Patrick-Goudreau. What I love about this book is the in-depth exploration into the chemistry behind baking. I have learned the methods and madness behind substitutions and have tried out several of her recipes to get a feel for how each substitution works.

Vegan Blueberry-Orange Bundt Cake from The Joy of Vegan Baking

Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

After practicing a bit, I started a new baking notebook, rolled up my sleeves and got to work! So far I have veganized 6 of my standard recipes:

-Kelly's Oreo Truffles
-Italian Polenta Cake with Orange Marmalade Glaze
-Ginger Cookies
-Awesome Crunch
-Irish Cream Cupcakes
-Treasure Chest Cookies
-Cranberry Almond Biscotti

Vegan Treasure Chest Cookies

Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

Vegan Kelly's Oreo Truffles (Chocolate, White Chocolate, & Peanut Butter)

Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

Italian Polenta Cake with Orange Marmalade Glaze

Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

And so far - I've received very positive feedback and have even been told that some of the vegan versions are BETTER than the non-vegan ones! Horrah! The goal is to make them taste the same or better, and thus far I'm succeeding.

The next step - we've realized that maybe it's time for a name/branding change. Although From Scratch & Sniff has served me well for almost a year now, it doesn't quite convey the type of baking I'm trying to offer, and on top of that, there are already two bakeries in town related to kitties/animals. So I'm going through the difficulty of trying to decide what sort of image I want to convey.

Some people are telling me not to include "vegan" in the name - to try to "trick" people into ordering/coming in. Some are telling me I should not only offer vegan treats, but should supplement my stock with some "regular" baked goods. I know want to stand proud and not shy away from the fact that I'm vegan and this is what I have to offer. I don't want to return to cooking with animal products and I think there's a real market for it in Portland; there aren't any fully vegan bakeries up here yet. I want my name to reflect the goodness and simplicity of my product. At least I know these things for sure - now I just need a name and logo, ideas are welcome and much appreciated!

Vegan Baking Explorations

This past weekend was the weekend of baking blunders and victories. My friend Amanda's Lady Gaga themed birthday part was on Saturday and I wanted to bake her a vegan cake that was splendiferiously Gaga inspired.

My plan was to bake a 6 layered cake, each layer a color of the rainbow, layer orange cream between the layers, cover the cake with fondant and create either a Gaga crown or a roller derby skate from gum paste for the top (Amanda's a Maine Roller Derby Girl with the Port Authorities- go check them out!). That was my plan.

However, plans can go awry. Although I've changed to a vegan diet for the new year (check out my other blog, The Vegan Explorer), I haven't quite gotten a full handle on vegan baking yet. I started baking at 9:30am on Saturday - first mistake, waiting until the day the cake is due. The first cake was a total disaster. It didn't rise well, it formed a strange hard sugary crust, and tasted awful! EW! I fed it to the trashcan after attempting to fix it twice.

Push the clock forward to noon. I start debating, do I stick to my vision and try again or do I make my no-fail Vegan Italian Polenta Cake instead? It was a toughie. I decided to go for it again, I'm no quitter! So I reformulated my recipe and started over. The layers were thin and a little bit sticky, but tasted great so I kept going. Fast forward to 4:30 pm. All of the layers are completed and cooled, time to start stacking and create my vegan orange butter cream. Ut oh, here comes trouble. How do you make "butter" cream without butter?? Well, the first attempt was a disaster. Somehow it started separating and just looked gross. The second version was a little better but not perfect...though I used it because I was running out of time.

Rather than take the time to roll out fondant for a cake that was already sort of uneven and time was running short (it was already 6:30), I made a vegan vanilla icing (thanks to the help of one of my boyfriend's cookbooks) and my boyfriend helped with icing the outside of the cake. He did a beautiful job of evening out the cake.

Still, I was totally deflated. I didn't think this cake would taste good and I just wasn't happy with the quality - it was not my usual highly polished work. My boyfriend convinced me not to pitch it into the trash and we left for the party. I'm really grateful that he got me to bring it because it seemed to be a big hit! Amanda and her friends appeared to love it and dubbed the cake "Gayke" - love it.

The Gayke!
Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography

The Gayke's rainbowy layers!

Photo by Justin Lewis, filmaperture Photography 

On Sunday, my boyfriend and I had our second annual Hot Chocolatey Crafty Night and I thought I'd bake my Polenta Cake. I made the cake, which turned out beautifully, but when I went to make the glaze (a recipe I made without really writing down what I did...a no no for me!) it came out horribly. I went through three versions until I got something I was mildly happy with but for some reason it did not come out the same way it had the first time (and I ended up scalding myself with boiling hot marmalade in the process and am now donning two blisters on my face and one on my finger - boyfriend medic to the rescue!). I still need to figure out what happened  - yes it was still good, but it was not the same glaze I'd made a few weeks before. Gah! Frustrations!

And through all this frustration, my boyfriend stuck by my side. He was incredibly supportive, encouraging, made me laugh, pitched in to help, played doctor to my wounds, and helped me realize that it really is okay to mess up sometimes. I don't have to be perfect and I can learn through making mistakes. He certainly is a good guy :)

MIA

Hello All- Sorry I've been a bit MIA lately! I've been baking up a storm---made tons of cookies for friends and family, shipped cookie packages all over the country and world, and had several orders due. This past week, I developed two new flavors based on requests made on the From Scratch & Sniff Facebook page: Mexican Hot Chocolate Cupcakes with Cinnamon Buttercream Frosting and Bailey's Irish Cream Cupcakes with Chocolate Bailey's Buttercream Frosting- YUM! I'll have photos up as soon as my boyfriend, photographer Justin Lewis, edits them and I promise to give you a "real" post after the new year.

Happy holidays, everyone!

KitchenAid, how did I ever manage without you?

That's right, folks! I have finally upgraded my kitchen with a beautiful, shiny, sparkling, heavy, white new KitchenAid mixer. I am smitten.

If you've ever been tempted to buy a KitchenAid, I will tell you that it is worth it. Yes, they cost a considerable hunk of change, but they are SO worth it! And I'll give you a tip- I purchased mine on Amazon and got a refurbished model. You just have to be willing to forgo the product warranty, but buying a refurbished model saved me a lot of cash and I've used it at least 10-15 times since I bought it and haven't found any problems as of yet.

If you do purchase one- a word to the wise: it is MUCH more powerful that the average mixer. So if you're following the instructions in a recipe, cut down the amount of time you spend mixing and I even suggest turning it down a notch. If you over mix, you'll end up with a denser dough, resulting in a denser baked good instead of the light and fluffy outcome you were seeking. So be careful!

It's also nice if you can set it up somewhere and leave it there- i.e. you need an outlet nearby. Unfortunately, I live in a house that has a very strange outlet situation and it's impossible to keep the mixer close to an outlet. It can be a workout moving this mixer back and forth- believe me, it is quite weighty. I actually lost a batch of cookies to the floor trying to move the mixer to the counter by the outlet! My wonderful boyfriend is going to rig an extension cord from the weird outlet halfway up the wall by our back door, through the drop ceiling tiles and down the wall to the mixer so that I don't have to keep hefting it to the other counter top each use. Hurrah!

If you have any questions about buying one, leave a comment! I'm happy to help out!