Okay so last night my husbands' kids were visiting (11 and 7.5). I offered to make them cupcakes for today when they came back over. They of course were very happy to hear that. Vanilla cupcakes with chocolate frosting.

Well after they left last night for some reason my back started bothering. I told DH that I was sorry but had to go lie down. He offered to make the CC for me and take care of it all.

Well I wake up this morning and the CC are done and he asked for the recipe for the frosting. I circled the medium consistency in my book and added "add 3/4 cup cocoa and 1-2 tsp water once mixed".

I go off to work.......I come home, ask how the CC came out. He informed me that we didn't have any cocoa (well we did, he just didn't look hard enough LOL). So what does he do? He improvises.

He took a packet of hot coca mix, seperated the mini marshmellows out of it, and mixed that in.

I've got to say, it is FANTASTIC! hehe. DH is a regular baker now hehe. He however, needs to learn to put MORE frosting on! Hehehe. I also expected him just to do a big 1M swirl and be done with them. But no, he tops it yet again. He put sprinkles on them!!

How cute is he?!!? Just thought I'd share

Thanks for listening

That is sweet. So what exactly is the recipe...if you don't mind. I've never made choc. bc frosting.

It was very sweet of him. He likes the decorating/baking as much as I do. He's usually pretty good about making the cakes for me so I can just worry about decorating.

All I use is the Class Buttercream Icing from Wilton. Then just add the coca.

Medium Consistency
- used for stems, figure piping, borders and flowers with petals that lie flat
1 cup solid white vegetable shortening (like Crisco)
1 teaspoon Wilton Flavor (Vanilla, Almond and/or Butter)
3 tablespoons water
1 lb pure cane confectioners (powder) sugar (approximately 4 cups)
1 tablespoon Wilton Meringue Powder
A pinch of salt (optional) dissolved in your water

Then I just add the 3/4 cup of cocoa powder plus 1-2 tsp. of water.

But now I think I'll be using the hot chocolate mix from now on. All it was was "Swiss Miss instant hot chocolate"

Interesting....sounds good too!

TOO cute!! I shared the story with my hubby and he wasn't as enthusiastic as I was. Whatever...I'm very impressed with your DH's efforts and results!

I just read that too him and he said "yay" with a cheesy grin. It's funny, after we were done eating he asked me "so are you going to tell all your friends online about what I did" so I had no choice but to

Yea, he's a keeper!

Aww! So adorable! Sometimes the guys can be very cute. I am not married, but have a BF of a long time who supports my trials and errors of cake decorating. I recently made a cactus cake for my roommate out of Colette Peter's book "The Art of Cake Decorating", but put 3 needles in each rather than 5. Somehow my cake came out with smaller "points", but whatever, it was cute. My BF felt sorry for me that I was sitting at the table for a LONG time putting in all the tiny thorns, so he came over and offered to finish the rest of it, even though I was only about 1/3 finished. Gotta love them sometimes!

daisygurlvb ... your DH sounds wonderful and is definitely a keeper!!

Shaelyn ... why don't you post the picture of your cactus cake? I'd love to see it! I'm sure it looked great!! Your BF sounds pretty great, too!!!

Haha, I tried, I really did. But I'm lost at understanding this site. When I tried to get my Avatar, it took me 3 days to figure it out. Haha! I should know this stuff, but I dont. It said something about being too big, MB wise. If anyone could help me out, I'll try and figure it out enough to post it.

Go to this website: http://www.shrinkpictures.com

1. Upload your picture.
2. Type "1000" in the Custom box, and make sure you select the Custom box.
3. Leave this as is.
4. Choose "Best"
5. Click on Resize.

Then, follow the instructions and your picture should be good to go!

Thank you! That was very helpful! Let's see if it works...

Ok, the first time I tried it, I entered 1000 like you said, but when I submitted it, this site told me it had to be 800 pixels or less, so I clicked on the 760 pixels instead of typing in 1000 and it worked perfectly.

I had to laugh at this. My DH doesn't cook at all. But my teenage son loves to cook. It sounds so much like something he would try He is always trying something just to see how it will taste. He put hot choc. mix in something awhile back and I can't remember what. Oh ya he added it to coffee. He wanted a flavored coffee so he scronged and found some hot choc and tossed it in. He said it was good. I will take his word for it cause I am not a coffee drinker DH is. But he wasn't up to the choc. challenge. He said choc. in coffee yuck. He is a creative person like myself so there you go.

A ? though did the frosting have a brown look to it??? The reason I ask is I need a brown frosting and I am out of cocoa. How brown was it????
Was the frosting on the sweet side??

Shaelyn ... that cactus cake is fantastic!!! Great job!!! I would have never guessed that you used a different number of needles than the book said to use!!! I think the 1000 pixels would have worked if you had uploaded the picture to "My Photos". But you're right ... it has to be 800 pixels or less to be added to a post.

Oh, lol. Well atleast it got up for everyone to see! Thank you very much! This is only the 2nd cake I've ever decorated. It's FAR from perfect, but I think it came out alright considering.

kaychristensen,

It was brown but it was lighter brown than with the cocoa. I would suggest using it and then adding food color if you need a rich chocolate brown color. It was more like a dark tan.

It was a tad sweeter than normal BC but it wasn't disgustingly sweet.

Daisygurlvb - how sweet of your dh! Mine is that way, too. (Right down to the "not looking" for stuff! ) His mom had this happen once when one of her kids was asleep. She was making chocolate pie, but didn't have enough cocoa - she substituted Nestle's Quik. That is now her special recipe for chocolate pie - to die for!!!!!

Shaelyn - that cactus is incredible! It looks like the real thing! Great job!

bkdcakes- Thank you!!!