Papa Haydn, Third Time Charm?

Not much excitement for the third time around this year, but still yummy nonetheless! This time, we brought a friend, Maraia, to celebrate her belated birthday. After the waiter handed her a dessert menu, Maraia's eyes googled all over the menu as her mind filled with thoughts of wanting ALL these desserts. But her eyebrows were on the rise when we told it was $8 per piece. Ultimately, she chose the chocolate peanut butter cake. She devoured it so quickly that we didn't get a chance to take a picture! Amelia finally got what she wanted last time: champagne cake.

Clarissa didn't remember the chocolate mint mousse cake and ordered it again.

Looks familar, eh? Still just as delicious as last time, don't worry!

Return of the Papa Haydn

We returned to Papa Haydn's for Clarissa's birthday. Our goal is to taste all the desserts on their menu. Unfortunately, every time we go there, we never remember what we ordered on our last visit or recognize the items in the case. Apparently, they also change their dessert specials monthly. We will never catch up!

Last time we had five plates. This time we downsized to two plates (this was a struggle for us). This time, we chose the Passion (chocolate butter cake topped with passion fruit mousse with a center of raspberry mousse, wrapped in a band of white chocolate and finished with passion fruit curd)...

... and the Marjolaine (chocolate mousse and hazelnut-praline cream piped between layers of hazelnut meringue, topped with whipped creme fraiche and french vanilla chocolate).

At the end of the evening, Clarissa ordered two french macaroons (caramel and coffee flavors) to satisfy her cookie craving...and to cap a truly fabulous birthday!

Voodoo Doughnut

Four days before Christmas, we were craving for doughnuts from the original Voodoo Doughnut based in Old Town Portland (22 S.W. Third Ave.). We have lived in this city for two decades and since Voodoo Doughnut opened in 2003, we've lost count the number of times we were in this neighborhood and have never stepped inside its doors. Amelia went there on a previous Saturday and choose not to wait in a line, which stretched a block away in the typical Pacific Northwest weather (rain).



We munched on Marshmallow Matters (plain cake doughnut with vanilla frosting and mini M&M's), blueberry cake doughnut with a glaze, Raspberry Romeo's (doughnut filled with raspberry jelly topped with a glaze), and Texas Challenge (giant doughnut equals size regular glazed doughnuts). They sell more than 45 kinds of doughnut plus a few varieties of vegan doughnuts daily - too long of a list to include here, but we encourage you to check their menu.

Apparently the original shop attracts many locals and tourists as evidenced by the long line outside of their cramped storefront. They opened their second Voodoo shop (Voodoo Doughnut Too) in 2008, in Northeast Portland (1501 N.E. Davis St.). Their third Voodoo shop (Voodoo Doughnut Tres) is located in Eugene and opened in 2010 (20 E. Broadway).

One bonus for those who like late night munchies, all three shops open 24 hours 7 days a week. One downfall is that they accept cash only; however, ATMs are available inside the stores.

Cricut Lite Cupcake Wrappers Cartidge

"Turn plain cupcakes into special treats with this cartridge! Whether your cupcakes are for a birthday party, baby shower, holiday, or other special occasion, you are sure to love all the different wrappers. As a bonus, the cartridge also includes coordinating cupcake toppers to help the treats to stand out even more."

Isn't this product awesome?! We like to make our cupcakes cute by dressing them with wrappers. You can purchase a set of 12 cupcake wrappers at your local or online cake decoration supply store, but they charge you an average of $7. Our goal is to sell our cupcakes at affordable and reasonable prices and adding $7 to the bill when guests often discard the wrappers while devouring the cupcakes did not sound like a fantastic idea. If you do the math, you can actually buy a sheet of 12"x12" decorative cardstock at a craft store for $1 or less and cut three cupcake wrappers per sheet. You can create a dozen cupcake wrappers for less than $4! Also, you can customize the paper pattern and cut design. Fantastic, isn't it?


Cricut Lite Cupcake Wrappers cartridge gives you the choice of more than 50 laser cut wrapper patterns and 50 cupcake toppers that are sure to be compatible to your celebration. Now, you can make the perfect presentation for your cupcakes.

Buy it today at Cricut.com or Wal Mart.

Cricut Cake Mini Machine

courtesy of Cricut

After seeing the Cricut Cake a couple months ago, we decided we didn't need it because, first of all, we already owned a Cricut Expression that we battled over against hundreds of people last year on Black Friday, and second, it is expensive. However, recently we got a Black Friday advertisement from Jo-Ann's, and on page two, there was an image of Cricut Cake Mini. It costs only a penny shy of a cool hundred bucks. What a steal! (Amelia had to go to Jo-Ann, waited in the rain for 15 minutes before the store opened, raced against a hundred of people, asked a nice lady to show her where she could find the machine, and ten minutes later she was at a register and paid for this amazing machine... two hours later, Clarissa thought her older sister didn't get the machine and went to the Jo-Ann's near her work and bought one as well. We didn't keep both, though!)

Ever since we started our little "business," we have been hand cutting all the images, even the super tiny ones (around 1/8 of an inch). Cricut Cake Mini will benefit us tremendously because it cuts small shapes with accuracy and saves us a lot of time. We are excited to experiment with it on future orders!

27th Annual Holiday Cookie Bake

We're trying to make this our new holiday tradition! We got to attend the Annual Safeway Clackmas Bread Plant Holiday Cookie Bake 2010. This event is a fundraiser for Oregon Health & Science University's Doernbecher Children's Hospital Foundation.

If you want to bring joy to children, you can get involved in fundraising or give generous donations to the Doernbecher Children's Hospital here.