This year, for my daughter's birthday, I decided to get a little creative. I've always loved the story, "The Princess and The Pea" and a tea party seemed the perfect thing so I combined the two into my theme.
The weather cooperated and we were able to have the party outside.
I found mis-matched tea cups and accessories at Goodwill; each child was able to pick their own tea cup to use and take home. The teapot ended up being wildly popular among the kids, they all took turns pouring a "tea" of raspberry lemonade.
Lunch included various cheeses & crackers, a caesar salad, assorted veggies with dip and three types of tea sandwiches (salmon, chicken salad and cucumber). I gave the moms the option of dropping off but there was plenty of food for everyone and champagne for the moms.
A friend gave me a delicious cupcake recipe (below).
Elissa Strauss' Vanilla Cake, Confetti Cakes, New York
2 c cake flour*
1 3/4 c plus 1 1/2 tsp all purpose flour
2 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 c (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3 c granulated sugar
3/4 tsp salt
1 T pure vanilla extract
1 c (8 oz; 7 about 7 eggs) egg whites or 100% pasturized liquid egg whites
1 1/2 c milk
Preheat oven to 350 F.
In a large bowl, sift together the cake flour, all-purpose flour, and baking powder. Set aside.
In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, combine the butter and sugar and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy.
Add the salt and vanilla.
Set the mixer to low speed and gradually add the egg whites, scraping often.
Alternately add the flour mixture and milk to the butter mixture in two batches, starting with the flour. Scrape down the bowl between each addition and beat until thoroughly combined. set the mixer to medium-high speed for about 20 seconds then stop and scrape sides of the bowl.
Divide the batter evenly between paper-lined muffin tins and bake 20 to 25 min.
Allow the cake to cool for 20min. once the cake is cool, release it from the pan by running a metal spatula or knife along the sides of the pan.
The recipe makes approximately 26-28 cupcakes.
*You can make your own cake flour using all-purpose flour & a bit of corn starch, if you don't want to purchase additional flour to store.
Once the cupcakes are cool, frost with Cream Cheese Frosting and top with a "pea" (in this case, I used green Holland Mints).
1/2 pound cream cheese, at room temperature
1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 + 1/8 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/8 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 3/4 - 2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
Double the above if you like heavily frosted cupcakes. The cupcake recipe above is fairly sweet and moist so you don't need a lot of frosting to make them good.
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, combine the cream cheese, butter, vanilla and almond extract on low speed. Add the confectioners' sugar and mix until just smooth.
In addition to a tea cup, each child took home a paper crown and bag of Holland mints with stickers.
Posts
