HCB: Chocolate Streusel Coffee Cake (Free Choice)

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I think this is the first cake that I make using my “Free Choice” pass with the Heavenly Cake baker group.  

While most of my fellow bakers are at the 70+ cake mark, I believe, I have only done about thirty-seven of them (hard to keep track), so as you can see I need to SERIOUSLY play catch up.

And our organizer, Marie has giving us a free choice each month to do just that.  While some of my fellow bakers have taking this and baked not, one, but two cakes during their free choice, I have totally and completely taken the high road to slothfulness and even sat there to deliberate which cake to do, and eventually gave up on myself and just not do a thing. *hanging head in shame*.

But this weekend, I was NOT GOING TO let my LAZY side win.  I was going to do a cake, come hell or high water.

I just needed to choose an easy one.

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The battle of the pastry bag - somewhat conquered

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So, you all know how I and the pastry bag in my kitchen are at a standoff. 

I hate the pastry bag, along with her tiny piping tip friends, it sits there and throws kisses my way, just to keep me in a state of panic every time I have to actually use it.

That is why I keep it hidden in the darkest corner of my kitchen drawer – you know, eh, too like keep it from misbehaving.

But, as I grow more and more into my baking repertoire, simple decorating is not going to cut it anymore, I need to really stretch my decorating skills and the only way to do this was to come clean with myself and realized that the pastry bag and I needed to make nice

It was time to conquer the pastry bag.

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HCB: Financier Style Vanilla Pound Cake

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If you asked me what my preference for cake is, I would right off the bat tell you that it will be those that are rich, dense and full of fat goodness, meaning they pack a gazillion calories, because they tend to be rich in butter, eggs, sugar and flour.

It’s no wonder that when it really comes down to it, I usually prefer the simple cakes.  I admired the fancy cakes with all the cool ingredients and decorations and fillings.  But, deep inside, I tend to run for those simple, easy cakes.

For the last couple of weeks, I been craving a pound cake. So when I read that this week’s choice for the Heavenly Bakers was the Vanilla Bean Pound Cake, I was ecstatic.

This lasted until Sunday, when I actually took a look and really READ the full recipe and realized that it was NOT going to be a pound cake. 

Tsk, Tsk, Rose, you had me fooled.

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