Amaretto Truffle Icing and fondant flowers

I LOVE chocolate. Seriously, whoever said diamonds were a woman's best friend obviously was a man, because being a woman, I beg to differ--I think it is chocolate. I honestly don't know how I went 5 WHOLE YEARS without eating chocolate because of a bet with a good friend. Those definitely were years of sacrifice for me (and would you know I just received a letter from my friend indicating that she is on year 11 of no chocolate--can you say WILLPOWER?!)

Well, the past couple months have been hard--I am again off chocolate, this time because of my darling baby girl, who gets very fussy when I do eat it. Let's just say the holidays were very difficult--there was chocolate everywhere--but I resisted . . . until I got this book from my dad:

OK--that is a title I want put on vinyl lettering and plastered on my kitchen wall. There are soooo many amazing looking recipes in here that I just had to start trying them.

In this project I tried 2 of them. The cake was the Sinful Chocolate Cupcakes recipe and the icing was the Amaretto Truffle Icing recipe. Both looked delicious. I was slightly disappointed with the cupcake recipe, but then again all I had on hand was fat free sour cream, and it called for the fat-full stuff, so I'm guessing that may have had something to do with it. Still, not bad (but I am bound and determined to one day find the most perfect chocolate cake recipe, and will try recipe after recipe until I do).

On the other hand the Amaretto Truffle icing was delicious--and rich. Very rich. I love almond flavoring, so this hit the mark for me. It's kind of a mix between chocolate ganache and chocolate buttercream with a dash of almond. Definitely a keeper.

So I combined these two recipes into this birthday cake for a friend. Yes, I gave it away, and didn't eat it all (lucky for my baby I just tasted the cut off cake top with some icing for critique purposes :)

Then I whipped up a batch of marshmallow fondant to make my colorful flowers (recipe at end of post). I mixed in some gumtex with it to make it more of a gumpaste so my flowers would harden a little more).

These flowers were simple to make. I just used the medium flower cutter from my Wilton fondant rose cutters set (although another flower cutter would work just as well I presume). Just roll out your fondant/gumtex mixture, cut the flowers out (and use a knife to cut into them a little more so the petals will separate a bit more), and dry them in some tinfoil molded into a cup shape. I used my large lily nail to press my foil part way down to make the cup shape. Allow to dry (give a couple days at least--I only did one day and mine didn't harden as much as I wish they had--maybe I should have used more gumtex too). Rolled up balls of fondant can be glued in the center of the flowers with a little clear vanilla extract.

Just put the flowers where you like for a beautiful finished cake. Yum. Did I mention I love chocolate? Only 9 more months until I can really eat it again . . . but who's counting?

(I recommend checking out that book Chocolate Never Faileth. Unfortunately due to copywrite I can't reproduce the recipes here for you).

Marshmallow fondant
1 package (16 ounces) Kraft white mini marshmallows
2-5 Tbsp water
2 pounds (about 8 cups) sifted confectioners' sugar
1 tsp clear flavorings (vanilla, butter, almond) optional

Melt the marshmallows and 2T water in a greased microwavable bowl in 30 sec increments, stirring between until mixture is melted. At this point you can add in your flavoring if you want.

Place 1/2 of your powdered sugar in a pregreased Kitchenaid with greased dough hook attached. Pour marshmallow mixture over top (and scrap out all using a spatula). Knead fondant on medium speed. Continue adding powdered sugar in 1/2 cup increments until fondant is not sticky. By the end I usually have to knead a little bit more sugar in by hand on a well-greased surface. The amount of powdered sugar you need may vary depending on the humidity of where you live.

It should be done when it is pliable and non-sticky. I like to wrap mine in a couple of layers of saran wrap and let it rest for a couple of hours before using it. It can be stored for at least a month if coated with a thin layer of crisco, wrapped tight in plastic wrap, sealed in a ziploc bag, and stored in an airtight container.