Day 47: Baked Goods for the coffee shop

I'm NOT a baker!  Never have been.  In fact when my youngest daughter was about 12 she started baking (from a box) and I thought even that was strange, where did she get that desire?  I'm not even a desserts person, I eat a dessert a few times a year...I don't like chocolate, and the idea of paying what they ask for a 'designer' cupcake, well thats just silly (although I admit, cupcakes are pretty amazing!) 

However, the tiny pastry's, breads, cookies, etc that I see in miniature scenes are the cutest things EVER!  and last year at the Good Sam show I fell in love with the cupcakes, I even went so far as to buy the 'frosting' and syringes to do it, but I didn't buy the mold, because I'll be honest, I was super broke at the time and the gal was asking $32 and well....that was 1/3 of what I spent at the whole show (I told you I was broke at that show :) Anyway, I had been reading about making miniature cupcakes and figured I could do them without the mold.  Well, in 6+ months, I never did get around to even trying (in my defense I've been a little busy), so one of my things on my list for Chicago was some molds, I ended up getting 4 (from 2 different vendors, 2 from true2scale and the other 2 I can't recall) anyway, last week I spent most of the week landscaping the book/coffee shop, however I ran into a few frustrations so I took a break from that (I've decided not to post any progress pics on the outside thought until it's done...I want the wow factor :) so now the remaining projects are espresso machine, counter top, a few misc displays, under counter/coffee bar supplies and baked goods..O and the darn menu has to get done....does it ever end?  I swear this is more work than opening a real book store and coffee shop.

Where was I and what did I start to write about? O' yes, baked goods. Just in case your curious on how the molds work, and if my flour-less thumb was successful....

Here are the molds I used.  I found there wasn't much "trial and error" in using them, they seem to work great no matter what.  I originally put some baby powder in the mold, thinking the clay would stick, it worked great, the powder wore off, and the clay still didn't stick, the clay got warm from constant re-rolling and still worked great, it was just a wonderful, easy and fun experience.  

Here are the chocolates I made, I experimented a little with different colors, I think way more can be done, but this was last thing I did yesterday and I was getting tired, so I made 3 'batches' (this is just a sampling) now I need to design boxes!

Here are some of the cupcakes, which I decorated this morning

The breads

The croissants, I really thought getting that flaky texture was going to be difficult, but it wasn't as bad as I thought, and didn't require as much patience as I though...thank goodness!

These should be breads, however I think I'm going to be using them in a cookie display

I think these are also going in a cookie display

What I found that worked the best for me was to make many cupcake bases in 3 different 'flavors' and then make many frosting tops in many colors.  This way I can put together what I need for this project and then if I need cupcakes for another the clay is all baked, I just need to glue together, decorate and wa-la!

Hope your enjoyed reading about my baking experience, I'd love to hear any tips you have to offer, my skills are soo limited, but my desire to learn is overwhelming!