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Sriram's [first] birthday cake

  

My son Sriram's 3rd birthday was nearing, as usual i started planning well in advance for a simple party. I had a casual talk with my son what he wanted for his birthday & the chat continued to the cake design he immediately showed interest on baking a Thomas cake rather than buying one from shop. I quickly gasped his inner thoughts, while its a biggest ever challenge as i know my son would expect a perfectly shaped cake though bought fresh from the shop be made at home. Took a day or two to analyse whether i could handle such a big task for making a proper birthday cake, presenting before 20 guests while 7 months pregnant was an alarming job to complete. It did take my breath away but now i feel lot accomplished as it came out well to the satisfaction of my son.

First trial of Thomas: pondering on the websites for designing Thomas took a week almost. We both then decided on the color, flavor etc. Lot of home bakers around the world had published their professional birthday cake photos on their blog gave me an idea of not drawing or using Thomas train decor set but to build one. Accidentally i stumbled on all recipes.com which linked to Betty crocker where they had a video of making a train cake. Thanks a million to both the websites they just nearly saved my life. So Thomas train cake became a success only after the first trail. Bought a loaf cake from walmart to try thomas, collected all icing materials took a while to frame the icing recipe carefully went through the review all done on a thursday evening came out the train up to my expectation to win my husbands confidence. But can you imagine my son pointing out the littlest imperfections on trains face? he said my thomas usually is happy why did you make him sad? nose not perfect etc... Just got dumb folded by the comments dint give hope what happened next was a cake decorating class in progress. Never i had imagined of making (baking ) a cake and ending up with a class on cake decoration. All are positive motivations right? life sometimes seems extra challenging but mom's are willing to face it down right happily when its posed by their lovely little ones. So a million thanks to my son who is molding me in to a professional baker "mommy". 

   "Although the cake was not for a first birthday but one of my first cakes for a proud birthday party".

So now that had a look at how the famous thomas train turned out here is the recipe to my success story.

Cake : I made a 2 layer chocolate cake with a cream cheese chocolate filling, frosted with buttercream icing  toped with m&m's.

For the chocolate cake: Simple i bought the "betty crocker" chocolate butter mix.Baked the cake according to the instructions on the box. It came out well on 11x15 anchor glass pan even though the mix called for 9x13 pan. But needed 2 boxes to make 2 layers seperately.

For the filling: Duncanhines cream cheese frosting mixed with hersheys chocolate syrup for chocolate filling works well and tastes great.

For the frosting: Here is the recipe for buttercream frosting.
1 cup crisco{blue color} vegetable shortening
1 lb icing sugar
1 tbsp meringue powder
1 tsp clear vanilla
3 tbsp water
beat with a hand mixer on medium speed for few mins while the ingredients fully combined & forms a stiff peak. Serving size is approximately 2-3 cups. Now you can add desired colors to the frosting. For the above cake i added wilton orange gel color, green, royal blue, golden yellow & burgundy for lettering.

To build the train: You will get a wonderful idea by visiting the web links below.
http://www.bettycrocker.com/videos/videolibrary/birthday-cakes/how-to-make-a-train-cake

Even though the trial thomas train turned out well than the original party train it did not matter much for my son  he was contended with the train itself, as i promised. For me it was a hectic day to complete a cake in between all other dinner menu. Applause and appreciation where the back up for my enthusiasm to take such a leap,the cake rewarded well with a good taste & flavor for the hardwork.A finishing note, my son always ends up a story with a "The End" suits for a well accomplished task.

crumb coating with syrup

Whatever you do you cannot tame the crumbs on cake. So when there is few solutions available what best suits is important.

Piping gel : Even though a piping gel calls for crumb coating a cake your cake will always have the gel effect & taste a pasty glue.

Icing: almost all professional bakers go for crumb coating with a thin layer of icing or frosting. it works well for professional bakers but for the first time cake love mates? no matter what u do end up with a bits & pieces of cake.

Freezing: Freezing the cake before frosting & keep it frozen until frosting or decorating completed. It works for people who plan well ahead of time & be patient till its completed.

but simple syrup method works well for everybody.

Syrup:  you can make a simple syrup with sugar & water or with any syrup like pancake syrup to maple syrup or fruit syrup. but remember to thin the syrup before coating the cake as you donot want more flavor or change in taste etc. moreover select a syrup based on the cake flavor & recipe. any flavor would do good for a simple white, yellow cake. For all other cakes select ur syrup carefully.

Doing good for your cake is doing good to urself. At any cost we have to eat the cake not decorate & look at it. so be beneficial.

Nut mix

Nut mix is an excellent source of energy for mom & babies during pregnancy especially good for those who are under weight & deal with morning sickness. One great combination of nut mix is almonds, cashew nuts, pistachios, raisins, walnuts & peanuts. Except for the only concern of food allergy raised by all pregnant ladies & doctors nut mixes are very safe to eat while pregnant with an extraordinary nutrition benefits. If there are no allergy records in the family through generations then blindly you can enjoy the nutties everyday.

To check for nutrition database of each nuts mentioned here just visit USDA web page which is updated timely & accurate.
All the nuts are readily available in any grocery store in large varieties like raw nuts, whole, halved, fried, salted, glazed in sweet, slivered, pieces buy them matching your personal taste & preference or buy in bulk to try out this recipe of mine.

Recipe: buy your favourite nuts fry them in a pan or a toaster oven with or without oil. then lightly salt them and add chilli or black pepper powder to your taste. Alternatively the nuts can be fried or toasted with little ghee if you have an under weight problem.

How all the nuts are going to help you out? the reasons & facts that might amaze you and informations unknown while exploring about nuts can also wade off those misleading informations that where once confusing your mind.

Diet: Nuts are a wholesome everyday diet that can be easily added in any recipes. Add them as a snack on any time of the day or top it on your favourite desserts, sweets, savouries etc. Almost all the listed nuts here contains proximates, minerals, vitamins, amino acids, lipids and other considerables.

Now proximates are the water content of the nuts, energy they produce, protein, total fat, carbohydrate, fiber, sugar and starch. Lipids are fatty acids distinguishing saturated, unsaturated fatty acids dividing into monounsaturated & polyunsaturated, transfats, cholesterol, stigmasterol, campesterol, beta-sitosterol. Well amino acids are trytophan, lysine,glutamic acid, proline etc, Other considerables worth noting while  accounting for nutrition benefits are alohol, caffeine & theobromine.

Heart health: Naturally nuts are high in unsaturated fatty acids & low in saturated & transfat which promotes high density lipoprotein (good cholesterol) & reduce LDL. This helps the blood to reduce free radicals namely blood platelets not sticking together which creates the heart block leading to heart attack.

Pomegranate

Pomegranate is a healthy fruit in a pregnant moms diet. it helps regain good health for both baby & mother especially when under weight and gives extremely good color tone to baby in addition to the fruits nutrition.

macro nutrients :

water = 124.69g, calories = 105, protein = 1.46g,

pomegranate can be eaten as a raw fruit or as juice. Tropicana brand has got the best pomegranate juice with out any acidity and sourness. Its a healthy diet for mom-to-be as is a good source of antioxidants and keeps rejuvenated the whole day. It also helps in keeping tiredness, restlessness, irritation and any behavioural syndrome at bay. Try the time tested pomegranate juice for yourself and you will be amazed to see the results while recommending the fruit to everyone you might just know in life. Moreover pomegranate juice at empty stomach in the early morning during first trimester will help alleviate nausea, vomiting and control morning sickness.But one has to be extra careful because this fruit does not favour to every body condition, in some may cause allergy symptoms like cold, acidity etc.

http://www.juicing-for-health.com/pomegranate.html
There are several websites which states the benefits & information about this fruit while the USDA is one web page where you can get standard nutrition details.

In my family my mom and in-laws are extreme beneficiaries of pomegranate would gladly recommend to anybody who is pregnant.