Cupcake Felicity's special birthday delivery, DC.

Photo courtesy of Buzz Maslov

Since I couldn't be there to celebrate with him, I thought I'd send NB some vegan cupcakes for his birthday! I researched DC vegan baked goods high and low and finally decided on Felicity's! I'm so glad I did, too, because she was a pleasure to work with and, although I didn't get to try one, I heard they were delicious!

The flavors I chose were Chai Tea and Chocolate Mousse with Raspberry. They both look fantastic! And her prices were so reasonable, too!

Thank you SO much, Felicity! And happy birthday, NB! :)

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Apple crumb cake.

Cinnamon cake batter with diced apples.

Cinnamon streusel.

Batter in pan, topped heavily with streusel mixture.

Baked! Mmmm! The cake wasn't as moist as I was hoping it would be, but had great flavors.

Cookies for my costume.

Chocolate, butterscotch, coconut flake cookies with cinnamon sugar.

I'm being a 50's housewife for Halloween and I thought I'd play the part by carrying around homemade cookies in some tupperware! SO excited! I have three parties to head to so I made a bunch of these--hopefully they last! :)

Carrot cake whoopie pies with orange cinnamon cream cheese filling.

Use your favorite cake recipe (I used carrot, but upped the cinnamon), but instead of the wet ingredients, use 1/2 cup water, 1/2 cup oil and 3 eggs.

Mini muffin pan, baby, I like using muffin pans for my whoopie pie haves because A). the batter is still pretty runny so I feel strange dropping it onto a cookie sheet and B). it makes even, perfectly circular rounds!

This was such a trip though because you use a minimal amount of batter. I used 1 teaspoon of batter for each cookie! Basically, whether you're using a mini or regular sized cupcake pan, you want to just cover the bottom of each cup. Needless to say, this makes an large amount of cookies/whoppie halves.

Whoopie cookie halves.

Basic cream cheese frosting recipe with added cinnamon sugar, coconut and orange extract.

Filled and put together! So cute. I hear it's actually good to refrigerate these, which isn't the case with cookies or cake.

Whoopie pies originated from the New English Amish! They are still relatively new to the West Coast, I guess, and I always find some people who know what they are and others who don't, but everyone seems to love them so I thought I'd make them from my friend's birthday party tonight. I have SO many of them though so I'll also be sharing them with friends and bringing some to the office on Monday! :)

Great cooking tips on NPR.

Flat Zucchini Break? Stuck Chicken? Get Advice.

I just heard this on All Things Considered. The lady gives a few simple, but must-know cooking tips.

Spinach and Feta pastry from Philz Coffee, Civic Center, SF.

Toasted, of course. This is the first food I've had out of the case at Philz, other than the Mission Minis cupcakes. The spinach and feta were perfect in this pastry--a little greasy, but soo yummy. And quite filling for $3!

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Jalapeno Cheese roll from Andersen Bakery, Japantown, SF.

This place is always packed, at every location. And I'd never been, so we decided to stop and grab a roll.

Pesto roll (left), Jalapeno Cheese roll (left). Ed, Jess and I split the Jalapeno Cheese roll. The bread was a lot harder than I thought it would be. And it was greasy because of the cheese. Not my favorite roll, but I bet some of the other pastries are better.

Thanks for the snack, Ed & Jess!

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Starbucks donut fail, SoMa, SF.

Okay, so Starbucks used to be really cool and served Seattle's Top Pot donuts in all of their West Coast shops. It was a neat, "local" thing they did and it was great because Top Pot donuts are fantastic! They always had the Top Pot old-fashioned and apple fritters, but now Starbucks makes their own old-fashioned donuts and apple fritters.

First, I think it's a bit tacky that they went with the same two flavors that they used from Top Pot, but that's beside the point. The point is--Starbucks does everything well except for food! Why is that?! This was the worst donut and, actually, the worst baked good I've ever had. I couldn't finish it! And I can finish most sweets! ;) I can't put my finger on what the off flavor was, but I think they used a strange sugar substitute or something that gave it an extremely bizarre aftertaste.

I seriously don't get it though!? I love Starbucks' drinks, but why can't they get food down!!? The sandwiches aren't good. The bagels are awful and their pastries are very hit and miss.. usually more of a miss. So many other coffee shops have better food so I don't know why they don't. Oh well--I supposed I'll just stick to my iced coffees!

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Jessica's Bachelorette Part 3: Cooking Sunday brunch.

Fresh blueberries added into some coffee cake batter. Wild are more flavorful, but these plump blueberries were on sale and are used later in the yogurt parfait!

Topped with streusel and into the oven! I prepared everything else while this was baking. :)

I mixed a little brown sugar into the plain yogurt. This looks like a lot, but it was for a tub and a half of yogurt.

Brown sugar yogurt parfait with granola, mixed berries and powdered sugar. Mmmmmm!

I made two scrambles. This one was bacon with cheddar. The other one was bacon with sun-dried tomato pesto and goat cheese. I really liked both.

Peanut butter banana sandwiches.

Blueberry coffee cake!

Everyone seemed to really the food, which always makes me happy! I hadn't made brunch in ages, too, so it felt good to do that again. It's one of my favorite meals to cook and eat! ;)

Lavender mint brownies.

I got the idea to do lavender mint brownies from the Paul Mitchell Tea Tree Lavender Mint Shampoo! I LOVE the Paul Mitchell Tea Tree shampoos. If you haven't tried them, you really must! I tried crushing the lavender on a plate with this rice spatula, but it wasn't working so I decided to just put the lavender in as is.

I just made normal brownie batter and then added the lavender and mint extract!!! Sooo pretty and amazingly fragrant!

Sprinkled with lavender buds on top.

Dusted with powdered sugar!

These are definitely my new favorite treat. I'm SOO excited about them!

I'm bringing these to the SF Station team outing I'm hosting this Sunday! I'm going to share them with the fabulous crew at the Three Papaya's Brunch at the Doc's Clock, the Levi's Workshops and of course, the SF Station crew!

My Indie Mart Bake Sale benefiting the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society at Thee Parkside, Potrero Hill, SF.

The little sign I made for my first self-run bake sale! :)

Our setup at Indie Mart! We got a nice shady spot in Thee Parkside's patio area right by the bar!

Left to right: Butterscotch coconut chocolate chip cookies, small lemon bars, chocolate chip cookies, large lemon bars. The cookies were 3 for $2, small lemon bars $1 and large lemon bars $2.

Strawberry cake balls with chocolate and coconut.

Lemon cake balls with white chocolate and nuts / lemon peel.

Chocolate mint cake balls with chocolate mint coating and mint flakes.

Birthday cake with white chocolate and sprinkles.

Chocolate cake with chocolate and sea salt.

My girl Emily was our 2nd customer! Yay! BIG THANKS to all of my friends who came out to support my bake sale and to support Indie Mart! You guys are amazing! Much love! :)

And this girl was super adorable and loved my cookies! :)

The rest of my photos from Indie Mart are here! Such an amazing event and a HUGE thanks to Kelly Malone for letting us set up and do the sale!

We were out there from 11:30am - 6pm and made a total of $350 for my friend Chris' Team in Training benefiting the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society! :) SO MUCH FUN!

Kingdom Cake mini cupcakes at Indie Mart, Thee Parkside, Potrero Hill, SF.

Peanut butter banana and blueberry basil! They were both delicious! I didn't really taste the basil, but they were both yums!

We got these while I was on break from my Bake Sale at Indie Mart! Thanks for the amazing treats, Franklin!

Here are the rest of my photos from Indie Mart!

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Bake Sale Baking Part 3: Lemon Bars.

I like to use these flat bottomed measuring cups to press out the dough--nice and even!

Perfect! :)

Lemmmmony yumminess!

Mmmm.. cooling and then ready to dust with powdered sugar!

This was two days of hard baking, but I'm SO excited for the bake sale!!

Bake Sale Baking Part 2: Cookies.

Classic chocolate chip cookies.

Chocolate chip cookies with butterscotch chips and coconut flakes.

Butterscotch coconut chocolate chip cookies--I love these!

We had toooons of cookies!

Bake Sale Baking Part 1: Cake Balls.

My friend Chris asked me to help him out by doing a bake sale to benefit his Team in Training for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Chris lost a friend to Leukemia last year so he's been training for this triathlon and we're all very proud of him! I, of course, was happy to help with the bake sale!

He requested knew my cake balls from when I served them at Maddy's birthday and requested those! Here's nothing... !

Birthday cake, also known as Funfetti! I just make white cake, but with sprinkles--super easy! You bake the cake and then crumble it up! Then you mix in frosting to create a new "dough". I used vanilla frosting for this batch. You then form the balls (I use a tablespoon) and then freeze!

We just had a Costco trip so our freezer was already overflowing--I had get pack savvy and move some stuff around to freeze these! These will later be coated with white chocolate and topped with sprinkles!

Lemon cake with lemon buttercream frosting. These will be coated with white chocolate and topped with nuts and lemon peel (in case anyone is allergic)!

Strawberry cake with strawberry buttercream frosting. These will be coated with chocolate and topped with coconut!

Chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. Half of these will be coated with chocolate and topped with sea salt! The other half will be coated with mint chocolate and topped with mint flakes.

Chocolate chips in my makeshift double-boiler (metal bowl over a pot of boiling water) with shortening.

Mint chocolate (left), chocolate with sea salt (middle), strawberry with chocolate and coconut (bottom right).

Close up of the mint drying.

Close up of the sea salt!

Mmmmm! I'm SUPER excited for these! Now sleep and then onto lemon bars and cookies in the morning!