It’s official. I graduated on Friday with my certificate in public and nonprofit leadership from OSU. Kevin took the day off from work and traveled to attend my graduation on campus. We arrived on campus shortly before 9:00 a.m. and proceeded up the stairs of Page Hall into the policy forum section of the building. Kevin took a seat near the back. I joined my classmates at the reserved rows near the front. We all chit chatted for a bit before the ceremony started. Once the ceremony began, each of us took turns going up to retrieve our certificate. The ceremony lasted for about an hour. Right after the ceremony, we all snapped photos and enjoyed some light refreshments before parting ways. Kevin and I did stick around campus for just a bit to explore some of the sites on campus. Kevin was more excited to go to lunch at Hot Chicken Takeover at North Market, so we headed down to North Market after a short stay on campus. Hot chicken at Hot Chicken Takeover is a dish Kevin orders whenever he is in Columbus. North Market has a lot of great food options, but we usually head straight up the stairs to wait in line for hot chicken. I always go for the warm spice level, while Kevin pushes boundaries to test a hotter spice level each time. Shortly after lunch, we made our way back home. I had to stop by the supermarket to pick up some groceries, and then head home to prepare for the upcoming holiday activities. Court had her annual holiday cookie decorating on Friday night. I stopped by for a bit to help decorate and bake some of Grandma Wetzel’s sand tarts. The recipe for the sand tart cookies was a family tradition in Court’s home. She makes the cookies every year and always invites a bunch of us over to help with the rolling, brushing, sprinkling, baking, and decorating of the cookies. I was exhausted by 9:00 p.m. after all of the festivities on Friday, and headed back home shortly after. The next day, I had to run some errands in the morning and prepare the cake I signed up to bring along for our friendgiving/Christmas party in the evening. I had baked up a chocolate cake with strawberry frosting earlier in the week in my final lab class of my professional baking class. I chilled the cake in the refrigerator until I was ready to start decorating the cake. Usually, when I make buttercream, the only fat I use is unsalted butter. However, after making buttercream in my professional baking class, I learned adding in shortening can help stabilize the buttercream, which makes it easier for the decorations to hold on the cake. For the holiday cake I signed up to bring to friendsgiving/Christmas this year, I tried this new approach in making my buttercream. I used one stick of shortening (1 cup) and one stick of unsalted butter (½ cup) as the fats in my buttercream frosting. I also added in ¼ teaspoon of kosher salt, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, and tons of confectioners’ sugar. The buttercream was ready once I reached a creamy, spreadable consistency. I divided the buttercream in half and mixed in some red and green gel food coloring to give the buttercream a holiday touch. I then filled two piping bags (one with a circular piping tip and one with a star piping tip) and started decorating the cake. The final product (as you can see in the photos) was a festive holiday cake with a buttercream Christmas tree in the center. The Christmas tree was just several layers of buttercream piped in a circular motion. This was my way of using up the rest of the green colored buttercream and creating a centerpiece for the cake. Once I finished decorating the cake, I had about a half hour to rest before heading out for the holiday festivities in the evening.
For the decorating buttercream:
· 1 cup shortening
· ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
· ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
· 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
· 2-3 cups confectioners’ sugar
· gel food coloring (optional)
Directions:
1) In a large mixing bowl, combine the shortening, unsalted butter, kosher salt, and vanilla extract. Blend until fluffy. Gradually add in the confectioners’ sugar and mix until the buttercream achieves a creamy, spreadable consistency. You may not need all of the confectioners’ sugar.
2) If you are using gel food coloring, add a couple squeezes of the gel food coloring towards the end. Blend in the gel food coloring until the color is evenly distributed throughout the buttercream.
Takeaways: The cake I used in this recipe was a cake I made in my professional baking class. I had baked up two chocolate cakes and prepared a batch of strawberry frosting in class to use for my two-layer strawberry and chocolate cake. For other variations of cakes and frostings, check out my green tea vanilla cupcakes, lemon buttercream confetti cakes, lemon strawberry cupcakes, blueberry lemon cupcakes, chocolate cupcakes with raspberry frosting, or vegan lemon olive oil cupcakes.
