Our Favorite Time of Year

It's November!  Halloween clearance candy is all over our house right now, and there is so much canned pumpkin for sale right now that it's hard to maneuver our shopping cart through the aisles.  Can you smell that wonderful autumn smell?  It's such a great time of year!

For the third year in a row, PSR is starting our holiday season a little earlier than you guys would probably like (sorry about that...if it makes you feel any better, we refuse to decorate at all for Christmas until after Thanksgiving), but it's for a good cause...we're starting our baking fundraiser, and we need to know who is interested in ordering some wonderful and delicious cupcakes.

In the past two years, we have sold dozens of boxes of these treats, and have had such a wonderful time spreading the holiday cheer through our one true love: baking.  To keep the orders manageable, we have again capped the number of orders we will accept, so if you're on the fence about ordering anything, don't wait too long!  Trust us, these are wonderful!

Some quick facts for you:

1. Each box contains 6 holiday cupcakes and are $12 each.
2. They make excellent gifts for those hard-to-buy-for friends and relatives.  Each box is hand packed and delivered, for a unique gift that all can enjoy.
3. All orders will be available for pick up/delivery on Sunday, December 21st, 2014.  Other arrangements can be made on a case-by-case basis depending on the situation (including UPS delivery)

Want to order?  Click the link here!  Fill out the information, and we'll send you a link confirming your order.  It's honestly that simple!  Not only do you get some yummy holiday treats, but you're also helping to support small businesses.

Thanks for making this event so successful everyone!  We couldn't do it without you!

Autumn is Here!

Hello fellow sweet treat lovers!

Can we just tell you how excited we are about autumn?  Don't get us wrong, we love the summer, and the beach, and the fireworks, and half-melted popsicles.  Mmmmm, popsicles.  But we love autumn.  The flannel shirts, apple picking and cider drinking (warm apple cider is amazing!), pumpkin carving, carol singing...wait, not that last one!  The weather is still nice, there's no snow on the ground, and the crunch of leaves underfoot reminds you just how beautiful everything looks outside.

Yes, autumn is our favorite.

And so far, we've had such a busy autumn schedule.  We had two orders last weekend for two separate weddings, another fantastic order for next week (look for pictures soon!), and we are talking to 3 brides about possibly baking for their big days.  Brides, you are so on top of things right now!  Way to go!! :)

On Tuesday we had a lot of fun helping the city break a World Record...a cookie-themed world record.  Reason #2,689 why we love this city!

Giant Eagle hosted the cookie dunking event (the first time in a long time we haven't hated the company), and it was so incredibly random it was wonderful.  Two cookies, a napkin, a cup of milk...and a world record shattered.  The previous record for number of people simultaneously dunking Oreos together stood at 1,700 (why this record already existed is still a complete mystery to us), but Pittsburgh managed to set the new record at 2,152.  Something new and fun to add to the resume, right under ninja.

We're also already gearing up for our annual Christmas Cupcake Sale in December too.  We hate thinking about Christmas too far ahead...but sometimes early prep is good.  We won't say too much more in this post, but it's something to keep in the back of your mind when you're stuck figuring out gifts for those barely-know co-workers.

Until then, enjoy the weather, Pittsburgh!  Make sure you stomp on a few extra-crinkly leaves!!

Chocolate Nutella Cheesecake

It's rare that I do this.  Really rare.  But for once, I'm going to share a recipe with my fellow blog readers (you lucky 3!!)

I made this recipe up off the top of my head today, and I like the way it turned out.  If you've never made a cheesecake before, it's not as hard as everyone makes it out to be (no really, it's not).  It just takes some time, and a lot of patience to let it cool between each step.  If you don't let it cool, well, you're going to end up with a cracked cheesecake, and no body wants that.

So for those of you who are serious about baking (and really, if you're reading this blog, you have to be at least slightly interested), here's our newly created Chocolate Nutella Cheesecake recipe.  Enjoy!

FOR CRUST

• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus room-temperature butter for pan
• 12 chocolate graham crackers (3-by-5 inch)
• 1/4 teaspoon coarse salt

FOR FILLING

• 2 pounds bar cream cheese, room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 cup chocolate hazelnut spread (or more if you're feeling creative)

FOR Topping

• 16 oz. heavy whipping cream
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon hazelnut extract
• Few drops of vanilla extract
• (optional) pinch of baking cocoa  

DIRECTIONS

1. STEP 1

   Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Make crust: Butter a 9-by-3-inch springform pan. Using a food processor, pulse graham crackers until fine crumbs form; add melted butter and salt, and pulse to combine. Press crumb mixture into bottom and about 1 inch up side of pan. Bake 12 to 15 minutes; let cool. Reduce oven to 325 degrees.

2. STEP 2

   Make filling: Using an electric mixer, beat cream cheese on medium until fluffy, scraping down side of bowl. Gradually add sugar, beating until fluffy. Beat in vanilla extract, and salt. Beat in eggs, one at a time, scraping down side of bowl after each addition. Beat in sour cream.

3. STEP 3

   Securely wrap bottom half of pan in foil (foil should be tight around the outside of the pan). Pour in filling; place in a roasting pan. Pour in water to come halfway up side of springform.  Add a tray of ice cubes to water for an even bake. Bake until just set in center, about 1 3/4 hours. Remove pan from water and let cool about 20 minutes. Run a paring knife around edge; let cool completely, about one hour. Cover; chill overnight before serving.

STEP 4

Make topping: Mix whipping cream, vanilla, and hazelnut extract together on high with an electric mixer, about 4-6 minutes.  Slowly add sugar (and optional cocoa powder) about 1-2 minutes into mixing.  Continue to mix on high until whipping cream thickens.  Spread onto top of cooled cheesecake, or decorate with piping bags.

Back to the Basics

Hello everyone!

Wow has it been a long time!!  Sorry to the 3 of you who read this blog semi-regularly I've interrupted your summer reading a bit.  To be fair, several people mentioned to us how they missed our blogging, so maybe if this baking thing fails we can just turn to blogging?  Maybe...??

Anyway, it has been a crazy and unexpected summer, both good and bad, but as we roll full steam into August Pittsburgh Sweet Relief is back and baking, finally!

The past six weeks or so we have taken almost a complete hiatus from baking as we handled some personal items that took us away from the kitchen.  We practically shut down our kitchen, only filling two orders, and focused more on friends and family that needed our help.  We turned down quite a few orders, and if you're one of those people we turned down, we hope you understand that while baking is our love, family and friends come before any cake or pie or cookie.

Today we fired up the ovens for the first time in awhile baking some wonderful cupcakes for an order this week.  It was so wonderful to load everything back up into the mixer and switch the power lever to "On" as if no time had ever passed.  Eggs, sugar, vanilla, into the bowl they went.  How did we leave our kitchen for six weeks?

That being said, we're still going to be taking things a little slow for the time being.  Besides the fact that we have to get used to regularly baking again (and the awful dishes that come with that), we still would like to enjoy this last month of summer as well.  August is definitely our favorite month of the year!

So stay tuned, we won't stay away so long this time, we promise! :-)

Baking Pro Tips

A lot of times when people try something we've baked we receive a very similar reaction to the product: "I make this all the time and it doesn't taste anything like what I'm eating now!"  It's not a bad thing...people are just awed that something they may be familiar with can have a different taste than what they're used to.

We usually don't share full recipes with people (it's taken us awhile to develop some of them), but we figured we'd take some time to let you in on a few tricks and tips we use in our kitchen to reach the desired results in our desserts.  Some you might have heard of, others you might be shocked to read, but we hope next time you're baking you remember a tip or two and try it out in your kitchen.

1. We use a lot of salt in our icing.  A lot.  Most recipes you see for call for a "pinch".  Depending on the amount of icing we're making we will use anywhere from a teaspoon to a tablespoon.  We feel like it really helps to balance the sweetness so it's not too overpowering.

2. When you want to make a chocolate icing from scratch, melt down good chocolate in a double boiler.  Yes, you will pay more, but you will definitely notice a difference.  And before you ask, no, Hershey's is not considered a "good" chocolate.

3. We mentioned this before in a past post, but you really need to start using buttermilk in recipes that call for buttermilk.  The taste is just the tiniest bit different, but it's definitely worth the extra effort.  Try it once, and you'll never go back to cheating with regular milk again.  We promise.

4. If you love vanilla cake (and really who doesn't), make yourself a batch of vanilla sugar.  Take a whole vanilla bean, split it open, and put it in a plastic container full of sugar (one that seals tight).  Put it on the shelf and forget about it for awhile.  Next time you go to bake a vanilla cake, use the sugar in the container.  Sugar takes on flavors of objects around it, so your sugar will be infused with vanilla, adding to the ridiculous amounts of vanilla you're about to add to the batter already.  This will send your cake into the vanilla stratosphere.  Trust us.

5. A lot of cheesecake recipes out there tell you not to "over mix" the egg/cream cheese mixture you're creating.  We couldn't disagree more.  We like our cheesecake to be a bit on the airy side, still thick and full of bad-for-you calories, but with just a hint of a whipped surprised.  If your cheesecake weighs the same as a small child, we feel it's a little too dense.  We over mix our cream cheese mixture, and love the results.  Sure, there are probably some cheesecake connoisseurs reading this who are cursing at the very idea of over mixing their batter, but if you're up for a fun challenge, try it next time.

6. If you ever make a Boston Cream Pie (and really, they're so easy, who wouldn't?) there are lots of ways to cheat on the recipe a little.  Use a boxed mix, microwave the chocolate topping, etc.  One are you do not want to cheat, though, is the cream center.  DO NOT use Jell-O mix, guys!  It takes just as long to make the pudding as it does to make some delicious from-scratch cream.  Just google a recipe.  It's worth it.

Hope this helps you guys next time you're in the kitchen!  Share all the yummy things you might cook up, we love fun stories!

Surprise Cake

So for the past few posts we have been hinting about a surprise cake we were creating soon but couldn't give you the details about.  Maybe that was kind of mean of us to do, dropping hints and offering no other details, but we have been so excited about this cake for so stinkin' long it was hard not to just tell everyone what was going on.  But we were patient, and the cake was finally delivered last night so we can tell you all about it.

This is our little sister, Allison.  She used to be that annoying little sister who follows you everywhere, but she has grown up to be a pretty awesome human being, and one of our best friends.  She runs her own wedding photography business (shameless plug here) so it's safe to assume she's pretty obsessed with photography.

A few months ago, we decided to do something nice for all of our siblings for their birthdays.  As much as we bake for customers, we don't ever really take the time to bake for close friends and family, mainly because we're so busy filling business orders.  But we decided to go with a themed cake for Ali's birthday, and what better theme than a camera?

The cake itself was actually a pretty straight forward design.  It's nothing ridiculously over-thought, and the cake inside is a classic vanilla bean (after red velvet, that's the cake Ali prefers).  What made this cake a bit of a challenge, though, was we did not make this in our own kitchen, where we have all of our supplies labeled and organized and ready to go.  We made this back at home, in our parent's house, where nothing seems familiar, and the only supplies we had were the ones we remembered to pack.  Imagine trying to paint a picture with only half of the paint brushes you normally have.

Even though we were limited in supplies and space, and the humidity tried to melt the fondant a good half dozen times, we're fairly happy with how the cake turned out.  Simple, whimsical, and pretty, exactly how the perfect cake for our baby sister should turn out!

Next up -- a pretty awesome cake for the baby brother.  But again, that idea will have to stay under wraps until we finally deliver it to him.

Happy Memorial Day weekend, guys!!  Enjoy the beautiful weather!!

Keeping Up Appearances

May!  Wonderful May!  What a great month it's been!  And we're not just talking about the warm weather that's finally arrived in the Burgh (although that's wonderful too)!

Business has been booming, guys, and we couldn't be happier!  Between baking for the restaurant (more on that later), online orders, and fun "surprises" for friends, we cannot believe that we're already more than halfway through May.  Where has this month gone?

Today we had the opportunity to do something we've never done before: go shopping at Restaurant Depot.  For those of you who have no idea what RD is, it's similar to a Sam's Club in terms of it offers bulk food at wholesale prices.  However, unlike Sam's Club, which is tailored for families, RD is tailored towards, well, restaurants.  You can buy a 50lb bag of flour in one aisle, and then head over to the next aisle for a swimming pool of Heinz ketchup (slight exaggeration).  For someone who regularly flies through flour, sugar, butter, and flavorings, it was pretty much like Disney World on a rainy Saturday morning.

We ended up buying a 25lb bag of powdered sugar, which sounds like a lot, but that will not last us long.  Maybe we should've picked up another one.  Oh well, we can also go back.  We also picked up a tub of peanut butter you could fit a small child into, and a wonderful find of almond extract.

This picture above, we've added for comparison.  The bottle on the left is one most of you are probably familiar with, all major grocery stores sell it.  If it's on sale, you can snag that baby for $3.99.

The bottle on the right.  We bought for $9.14.  We could drink that bottle of almond extract, and the value is ridiculously good.  As we mentioned, the Restaurant Depot may be the best place in the world (don't get too excited, it's a pretty exclusive club...you actually have to own a restaurant to shop there.  Sorry guys!)

We need all this almond extract because we have been baking so much for our new restaurant deal.  It's definitely been an adjustment, baking every night getting stuff ready for our weekly delivery, but we have loved it so far.  And the feed back has been great...cheesecakes, pies, cakes, everything seems to be a big hit.

If you want to head out for some PSR treats yourself (and we think you all should!) you should head out to Champs Sports Bar in Penn Hills.  That's where everything available for you to buy and consume.  The address, for those of you up for a road trip, is 540 Rodi Rd Pgh.  If you head down, go for a meal, the food is good, and decently priced.  Just make sure you save room for dessert!! :-)  For example, this week this apple pie is on the menu (and trust us, it's amazing!!)

We will be updating later this week, we have a cake we're pretty excited to tell you guys about (it's a surprise delivery, so we can't detail too much here.  Just in case someone other than our mom reads this blog).  But check back, we'll be posting some pretty awesome pictures!!

Even though it's raining, enjoy the weekend!  We have two cakes in the oven right now, our work is never done!!  Talk to you guys soon!

Big News

Hello and happy spring, readers!  Aren't you so excited that the trees are finally starting to bloom in the Steel City?  We look outside and it no longer looks like winter.

There has been so much going on with us recently, we're not sure there is enough time to tell you about EVERYTHING.  In fact, there are still some things in the works that we can't tell you about yet.  But there are some things we are finally able to announce, and we're so excited!

So, please, drumroll......(no seriously, do that childish thing where you beat your hands on your thighs.  No one's watching, and even if they are, who really cares.  Just tell them we said it was cool.)

We are so super duper holy cow excited to share our good news with everyone: we're going to be selling our desserts in a local restaurant.  No, you didn't read that wrong, what an awesome awesome step for us and our bakery!  Now you don't have to order from us for delivery only...you can go out for a meal, enjoy this beautiful weather, and top if off with an awesome treat from PSR!!

We're still working out all the details, so it's hard for us to say "Head there on [insert date here] and everything will be ready to go".  But we've been so excited this past week, we've been ready to explode.  EXPLODE!! (we're awful at keeping secrets, fyi.  Don't ever ask us to host a surprise party.  We will fail.  Completely fail...)

So in the next week or so check back here to get all the details...we'll tell you the restaurant, where it's located at, what we'll be serving up, and when you can head out to claim your own piece of PSR dessert.  For now, though, can we take a moment and just celebrate.  This is such a monumental moment for our small-but-growing bakery.

WE'RE IN A RESTAURANT!  HOW AWESOME IS THIS?!?!

Because I'm Happy??

What a week!  No seriously, it's been a crazy week of ups and downs.  Our computer has been on the fritz (computer gods, please help us out here), we messed up the side of our car in an awful no-win parking garage situation (thank you Pittsburgh Parking Authority) and today we sliced our thumb with a knife.  No seriously, this has been our week.  Can we get something happy?

To be fair, though, we've also had a lot of good things happen to us this week.  We met with a bride to go over some potential wedding cake ideas, managed to perfect our Ferraro Roche cupcakes (yes, you read that right), and we managed to make some delicious cheesecake.  So, does that mean our week was a wash?  A lot of good, a lot of bad, everything ends up just where it began?

We have so much coming up in these past few weeks, 60th birthday party cakes, a 2 year old's birthday, and let's not forget our Easter cupcakes that we're so excited to bake and ship out!  We also have 2 pretty awesome surprises in the works, but we can't leak any details quite yet.  We just know they're going to be some of the biggest cakes we've ever made!!  Sorry to tease you with such a sentence like that, we promise as soon as we can share more with you we will!

Until then, we'll be kicking back watching these Buccos, enjoying that spring is finally here.  Did you hear that?  SPRING IS FINALLY HERE!  Hope you're having a great weekend!!

Springing into April

It finally feels like spring outside!!  Well, minus the snow we had on our car this morning!  Is it too soon to say we've finally put this horrible winter behind us?

In our last post we posted about what dull February it was for our bakery, probably because everyone was too cold to order anything.  March started out with a trip we took to Texas (did you know Texas is warm, even in winter?  Because Texas is warm, and PSR may migrate south soon if next winter is awful too), and then we came back for a nice booming week of business.  Easter cupcake orders have come in, as well as two specialized cakes, and we have a separate cupcake order and wedding cake order currently in the works.  You'll be seeing this blog blow up in the next few weeks as we get underway with our spring time.

Speaking of Easter cupcakes, don't forget to place an order for yours, we only bought so many Cadbury Eggs for our cupcakes, and when we're out, we're out!  We already have half of the spots filled, so don't wait too long.

Check back here in the next few weeks, we'll be updating the blog more frequently with all of the wonderful creations we have in the works.  :-)  Can't wait to reveal them all!

Dull February

Man, it's been awhile since we updated!  Our apologies to the 5 of you who read this blog religiously!

It has been a slow February for us, and it's driving us slightly crazy.  We have a lot of "potential projects in the works" with people, but right now it's a lot of sitting around, doing inventory (the worst thing in the world!), and marathoning Parks and Recreation.

Sometimes when business is slow, it's hard to not freak out and rip your hair out and stress about the lack of business.  But we should be used to business being slow in February...it's February.  No one wants to get married in Pennsylvania in February, and the only major holiday, Valentine's Day, is a day dedicated to candy.  It's something we've become used to over the years.

For now, we will just keep working to create some more business opportunities for ourselves, and keep working on the 3 projects we currently have in the works for the upcoming weeks.

Stay warm, Pittsburgh!  We can't wait for March, and spring, and plenty of baking opportunities!

Big Dreaming

We're a few weeks late with this, but we wanted to talk to you today about our New Year's resolutions.  Not our personal ones, mind you, but our bakery resolutions.  It's good to look forward into 2014 to see what we should be aiming for, right?  Well here are 3 resolutions Pittsburgh Sweet Relief has for this coming year.

1. Build an Epic Cake
We've made some pretty awesome cakes in the past 18 months of business (hellllllloooo, who could forget that we made this awesome cake...twice!) but this year we're thinking bigger and better.  We're thinking lots of tiers, lots of colors, lots of whimsy and imagination.  Honestly, we're thinking we want to go a little crazy here!  Our goal by December 31, 2014 is to have successfully made a truly amazing cake for someone that beats everything we've previously done!

Oh, and if you're on the fence about whether you want a big crazy cake for your birthday party/wedding/graduation/retirement/shower/etc you should drop us a line.  We're gonna offer huge discounts to the first person who lets us try this out for their event.  Monumental discounts.  So contact us.

2. Increase Our Business
This is a no-brainer, but it had to be said: obviously we want our business to grow.  We want more of you guys to fall in love with everything we have to offer.  This requires more dedication on our end, though.  2013 was a crazy year: We changed jobs, made new friends, sort of reinvented ourselves.  Personally, it was great, but all the time we devoted to training for a 5k was less time we had to devote to building our business.  It still grew, thanks to the wonderful support of all of you, but this year, we want to focus back in on what we love: baking wonderful things for you, and telling everyone about it.  Easy peasy, right?? :-)

3. Perfect Something New
In the past year we've learned a lot of new tricks to the trade.  We've learned a pinch of salt can go a long way.  We've learned that macaroons will always continue to be difficult for us to perfect.  We've learned that making flowers out of gum paste is a really relaxing way to spend 6 hours.  We've learned 365 days later we still don't like doing the dishes.

This year, though, we want to take something, learn it, and perfect it.  You know our staples are cookies, cakes, and cupcakes, and we don't feel like there's anything wrong with that.  In the past year we've dabbled with cheesecakes, bread, pies, and pastries, and we've learned lots of secrets to all of them.  Now it's our turn to step it up.  We're going to perfect the art of something, and add it to our repertoire.  We're going to make the effort to continue to educate ourselves about the baking world, and not stop until we've become successful at something new.

Big goals for 2014, we realize that.  But if you don't aim high, you don't achieve big things, right?? :-)  Anyway, these are our goals.  If you see us, hold us accountable.  Maybe we'll give you a cookie if you help us hold up our end of the bargain.

Polar Vortex Round II starts this week.  Get those fuzzy socks back out, it's gonna be a cold one out there!!