ok...i bought the Confetti cakes book by elisa strauss (spelling?) and decided to make cookies from scratch tonight using her recipe....its a vanilla sugar cookie recipe, it calls for 4 1/2 cups and 2 tablespoons of flour, 1ts of salt, 1ts of baking powder, 3/4 cup of unsalted butter, 1/2 and 2T of sugar, 1 egg and 1ts of vailla extract.
First it says to sift the flour, salt and baking powder together...(i did that)
Second, it says to combine butter and sugar in mixer and mix until light and fluffy, which I did and then it says to add the egg and vanilla, and beat until combined which I did.
Third, it says to add the flour now...it says add the flour mixture in 2 batches, scraping down bowl after each addition. Beat until the dough just comes together, being careful not to overmix.
(so this is what I did, well, maybe I just read it wrong but the last part meant to me that I poured in half the flour mixture and beat it all together with everything else and then once that was mixed, scrape the sides and add the rest of the flour and mix. well...thats what I did and it was very crumbly, not dough consistency at all, so I tried hard and put it in a ball like the recipe said to do and put it in the fridge for 1/2 hour and then roll it out, well, when I went to roll it out, it all crumbeled again, so clearly...it needs more liquids....i followed the recipe exactly how it said, did I misunderstand the whole 2 batches of flour mixture part?
please help!
April :0)
A piece of paper was put into the front cover of my Confetti Cakes book. It reads:
ERRATUM SLIP
The amount of flour given for the Vanilla Sugar Cookies recipe on page 53 is incorrect. The first ingredient should be 2 1/3 C plus 2Tb (11 oz.) all-purpose flour.
We regret the error.
I hope this helps!
Cathy
cathyfowler662 said:
A piece of paper was put into the front cover of my Confetti Cakes book. It reads:
ERRATUM SLIP
The amount of flour given for the Vanilla Sugar Cookies recipe on page 53 is incorrect. The first ingredient should be 2 1/3 C plus 2Tb (11 oz.) all-purpose flour.
We regret the error.
I have this in my book too!!
geez yeah, i thought that sounded like a heck of a lot of flour considering the amt. of butter. that kind of error stinks. that baker had to be chapped about that. i'm sure people expect something amazing from her! i'm sure there's no way to make sure EVERY book gets one of the "sorry here's the correct amt." papers. 
aprilcake, I left my copy of 'Confetti Cakes' at work, but I do recall there being a very, very small sheet of paper that was slipped into the book (near the middle) that indicated there was an error in one of the 'cookie' recipes. I will respond to your inquiry upon my return from work on Monday evening, unless you receive a response from someone else that has the book along with that sheet handy.
i bought the book...didnt have the slip. i bought sugar a few weeks back on a whim one day to do the cookies and icing - but never did. i 'm glad i didnt with that typo! when i first BEGAN reading your ingedients listed, my first thought was 'wow...cookies have less fat than a cake. and SO much flour, thats alot of cookies! better switch to cookies...hee hee....'
glad to find that it was an error, i will remember that when i finally make them, and now i learned my lesson, cookies arent really lower fat than cake. lol....
Thank you so much for helping me out with this...at least now I know it wasnt me....well...what I did was I ended up adding more vanilla, eggs and butter and had no clue how much I put in, I just threw it in figuring it couldnt be worse and my hubby actually loved the cookies...
so....is there any of typos in her book? also...i tried her royal icing recipe and I did not like it at all unless I did it wrong?
April :0)
so....is there any of typos in her book? also...i tried her royal icing recipe and I did not like it at all unless I did it wrong?
April :0)
i've not tried her recipe for royal icing, but one trick i learned here was to use lemon juice instead of water (hers may call for egg whites instead of meringue powder though...i havent made r.i. in a long time). it made a HUGE difference in the flavor. much easier to eat and enjoy. no odd bitter taste at all. this may be what it needs, i'd suggest you try it again with the lemon juice. just subsitute it out for any other liquid.
Thank you so much for helping me out with this...at least now I know it wasnt me....well...what I did was I ended up adding more vanilla, eggs and butter and had no clue how much I put in, I just threw it in figuring it couldnt be worse and my hubby actually loved the cookies...
so....is there any of typos in her book? also...i tried her royal icing recipe and I did not like it at all unless I did it wrong?
April :0)
YW, and that was the only error that the paper listed. Hopefully everything else is fine!
Cathy
Just an FYI -
This information is also posted on her website.
I saw no other corrections listed.
Theresa 
OMG! My girlfriend has made her smbc x2 and has come out with a very gritty bc. Tried to cook sugar to 180...and still gritty...taste good, but can't use because of the grit....we both have the book and never got any paper listing errors...any help with this would be great! 
I saw on the baking 911 site that they (sarah and squirrellycakes I think) had revised a chocolate cake recipe. I don't know if this was something they just went ahead and did to make it better or if there was something wrong with the recipe? I am not 100% sure it is the one from the book..?
cookiesup,
In every meringue buttercream recipe I've seen, the sugar syrup is cooked to 240° F. that would definitely help most of the problem with grittiness in the finished icing.
Only other thing I can think of to help that would be to make sure that any sugar splatters on the inside of the pan be washed down immediately with a damp pastry brush. This prevents recrystallization of the sugar.
HTH
~ Scott
Cookiesup --
Scott is right - the 240 degree temperature is use when making Italian Meringue Buttercream, which is sugar and water that is cooked to a syrup.
Swiss Meringue Buttercream should have the eggs and sugar started over a waterbath, and should only be taken to 160 degrees F, to pasteurize the egg whites and just dissolve the sugar. Any higher, and the egg whites will cook.
Can you post the formula and method your friend was using?
Theresa
Thank you all! O.k ...the recipe is the exact one from Confetti cakes..by Elisa Strauss. Now, the problem was not the eggs cooking, but the sugar crystals coming back after it was made into a syrup. At the syrup sort of stage it was smooth as can be, but as the mixture cooled, the gritty texture came into play...am I allowed to post her recipe on the site??? to show you ??? 
I have made her SMBC and not had a problem with grittyness. The only time I did have a few sugar crystals was from the upper part of the bowl when you are whisking the sugar and egg whites (the sugar that got stuck up there and didnt melt). Now I am more careful to scrape that part down. I just heat it until all of the sugar is dissolved. Once all of the sugar is dissolved it is at a high enough temp for the eggs.
I did look up the chocolate cake thing on baking911. They said they changed it a lot to make it bake right. The only thing I saw that they changed actually looked like a typo to me. Her recipe calls for 2 sticks butter (1 cup, 8 ounces) They revised it to say 2 sticks (1 cup, 16 ounces) Four sticks is 16 ounces right? So I dont really know why they said that they revised it? Plus it doesnt even look right the way they revised it??
hmmm...
So, the syrup was ok in it's most liquid form. Check.
I do have another question then regarding what you said about the crystallization "as the mixture cooled." Did you let the syrup cool before adding it to the meringue? If so, that would probably have been the culprit.
The MOMENT the syrup reaches the correct temperature, it is added in slow, steady stream to the meringue, so as not to curdle the egg products.
Also, it prevents the syrup having time to recrystallize before it blends with the other ingredients. Timing is KEY in meringue buttercreams, unfortunately.
From how I read what what you said, I think that may be the answer. If not, we'll all help find the solution.
HTH,
~ Scott
hmmm...
So, the syrup was ok in it's most liquid form. Check.
I do have another question then regarding what you said about the crystallization "as the mixture cooled." Did you let the syrup cool before adding it to the meringue? If so, that would probably have been the culprit.
The MOMENT the syrup reaches the correct temperature, it is added in slow, steady stream to the meringue, so as not to curdle the egg products.
Also, it prevents the syrup having time to recrystallize before it blends with the other ingredients. Timing is KEY in meringue buttercreams, unfortunately.
From how I read what what you said, I think that may be the answer. If not, we'll all help find the solution.
HTH,
~ Scott
listen to you , mr smarty pants~ what a perfect answer!!! good thinking.
i do agree with this logic. i also wanted to mention that out of several imbc and smbc recipes, hers is my absolute favorite, favorite, FAVORITE! havent had any problems at all.
Another question...do you think the amt. of sugar in that recipe (3 cups) has anything to do with how it stays gritty?? I haven't found another smbc that uses 3 c ????????
Also, I tried another recipe I found online..an adaptation of her original...uses corn syrup or granulated sugar...unfortunately, when I made it I only had 3/4 c karo syrup ..so I used that and 3/4 c granulated to make the total amount...Came out much better. here is the link to that recipe
www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=204&sid=1570607
Let me know your thoughts again...Thanks, Steph
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