Saturday, April 7, 2012

Pretty Petit Fours

My sweet friend Jenn and her family just adopted the cutest baby girl, Miss Harper Rose. I made a few desserts today for Harper's sip and see, and these petit fours came out super cute. These are VERY time consuming, so get your big girl panties on and know you're in for some serious time in the kitchen. I was in it to win it, so really went all out with the fondant cutouts. I also made a few fondant roses, my inner Martha was out! Batter Up, Cowgirl!


Pretty Petit Fours

Cake
1 Box Pillsbury White Cake Mix
1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/3 cup water
1/8 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
4 egg whites
1 cup sour cream

Glaze
2 lbs confectioners' sugar
2/3 cup plus 2 tbsp water

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a jelly roll pan. Place all dry ingredients in a mixing bowl, and beat until combined. Combine water, vegetable oil, extracts and egg whites and whisk together. Add to dry ingredients and beat until well combined. Add sour cream and beat on medium speed for 2 minutes. Pour batter into greased jelly roll pan and bake for 30 minutes or until done (turn pan halfway through cooking time). Cool completely.

Cut cake into squares (I cut mine to 2 x 2, but you could definitely do smaller). Place cake squares on racks to ice. In a large bowl, combine glaze ingredients. Beat on low speed just until blended; beat on high until smooth. Apply glaze evenly over tops and sides of cake squares, allowing excess to drip off. Let dry. Repeat if necessary to thoroughly coat squares. Let dry completely. (I doubled the glaze recipe above because I iced my squares twice. You definitely don't have to do this, but they looked a lot better with a second coating of icing).

Now the fun part, decorate for your occasion!

Luscious Lemon Squares

Spring time always makes me think of fruity desserts- lemon squares, banana pudding, strawberry napoleons. I'm generally not a huge fan of lemon, but these lemon squares are really good. This recipe has a thicker crust, which I prefer. The filling is also just perfect, not too tart or too sweet. I'm not going to lie, squeezing all the lemons is a small beating, but definitely worth it. Don't ruin your gourmet squares by cheating and buying bottled lemon juice. Doing this would make even Jesus mad on Easter Sunday. Enjoy!





Luscious Lemon Squares

For the Crust
4 cups flour
1 cup powdered sugar
4 sticks of cold butter

Filling
6 large eggs
3 cups granulated sugar
2 tbsp grated lemon zest (4-6 lemons)
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 cup flour

Powdered sugar for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In the food processor, blend flour, powdered sugar, and butter until crumbly. Do not over mix. Press mixture into the bottom of greased jelly roll pan (I just sprayed lightly with PAM). Bake 15 minutes until lightly browned. Cool.

Whisk eggs and sugar until well beaten. Add lemon zest, lemon juice and flour. Whisk until well combined. Pour over cooled crust and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until set. Cool bars completely and cut into squares. Sprinkle with powdered sugar just before serving.