Cookbook Review and GIVEAWAY!

That’s right! My first review and my first giveaway!! I am very excited about this!

Confetti Cakes for Kids is written by Elisa Strauss, founder of Confetti Cakes in New York City. She has created confections as elaborate as a platter of sushi, a wine bottle in a crate and a designer handbag. Now she focuses her talents on her younger fans with this enchanting collection of cakes, cookies and cupcakes for kids.

Since my cookbook arrived the other day, I thought I’d include a review of the book. First of all, this is a very beautiful book. It has a nice hardback and book cover that is colorful and fun. It is broken into a few key sections:
-Introduction
-Cake Basics
-Techniques
-Basic Recipes
-Cookies
-Cupcakes
-Mini cakes
-Cakes
I love how the hard cover book is actually different than the bookcover. Both are very cute.

After flipping through the book, I realized that it is geared towards decorating techniques, ideas, inspiration, and how-tos. There are some step-by-step photographs to accompany many of these techniques. There are also templates in the back that you can copy and use for your designs.

I personally love new recipes in cookbooks. Funky new flavor combos to inspire my creativity. I didn’t get a whole lot of that from this book (although I can’t wait to try the apple-cinnamon cake with brown sugar buttercream). The recipes are in fact all the basics. There are recipes for a few varieties of cookies, a brownie recipe and a few standard flavors of cake. There are also a few basic frosting recipes including a recipe for lemon curd and rolled fondant.

I decided that in order to complete this review properly, I should make something from the cookbook. I was initially leaning towards yellow cake with chocolate buttercream because I’ve never made a yellow cake. But then I realized I should make something that I know and love. Basically have a mini-throw-down right here in my own kitchen. As loyal readers know, I have a go-to chocolate-cupcake recipe that I got from Laurie (founder of Cupcake Hero, Tuesdays with Dorie, and Layers of Cake). I make this chocolate cupcake a LOT. Everyone loves it and it’s so easy.

So I decided to make the chocolate cake recipe from Confetti Cakes for Kids. Watch for the thrown-down results in a couple days… I’m not going to post the recipe here. Maybe you’ll win a copy of the book to try this and other recipes and techniques yourself.

So here are the rules. Post a comment here and you’ll be entered into the drawing. I will be giving away 5 copies of the book. Entries will be taken until Midnight (EST) on Wednesday, October 15. Be sure to leave an email address so I can contact you if you win. Feel free to use the DOT COM format to prevent spam.

Good luck!!

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5 Responses to “3rd Annual The Power of Pink Challenge”

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    Nancy Diane — October 1, 2010 at 4:41 am

    I’m confused by this bullet point:
    “Include the logo and link back to this post in your post”
    Does that mean our blog should link back to the post on your blog?

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    Jen — October 1, 2010 at 1:42 pm

    Nancy – when you post your entry in your blog, just include the logo with the pink ribbon and also include a link back to this post. This will help spread the word about the challenge. Let me know if you have other questions.

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    Rachel Cannon Humiston — October 1, 2010 at 2:09 pm

    This is a really nice idea! Love it!

  4. #
    4
    nutmegnanny — October 1, 2010 at 4:31 pm

    Fantastic! I’m hoping to participate this year 🙂

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    Miss Strawberry — October 20, 2010 at 1:59 am

    Hi Jen! Just in case you haven’t seen yet, I had baked some cookies for another cause but realized they’re pink too 🙂 I already entered your contest with the pink M&M cookies, but feel free to stop by and take a look at my pink rose sugar cookies 🙂

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