Jilly's

Cupcake Wars. Do you watch it? I did for a while, and then I stopped. In fact, about two weeks ago I deleted all the recorded episodes on my DVR and took off the scheduled recording. The bakers were just too annoying. Then, seriously, like three days later I heard that the head pastry chef from Jilly's was going to be on an episode! So, I scheduled the DVR to record that one show. Great call on my part.

The show was fun to watch (the theme was space,) and I enjoyed it again after taking a break. The formal is very strict, so it does get old after a while. The first round is always a challenge to use crazy ingredients that have to do with the theme, the second round is 50/50 taste and decoration, and the third round is always making 1000 cupcakes and a show piece. Formulaic.

Well, the chef form Jilly's was fun and after she show, I was dying to try the cupcakes they had made. So when my friend Andrea came in early from Chicago we decided to do lunch. She is also an amazing baker, so she was eager to try the sweets.



The place was packed! But, Chef Casey was there! (Chef Dana was cooking in the back, and let me tell you, his French Onion soup is to DIE for!) I geeked out and took a picture with him.



(I'm wearing the Hawaiian shirt for the last day of school.)

I took a dozen cupcakes to go to Andrea's BBQ tomorrow. They should be amazing.



From left to right:

Raspberry Fizzion
CAKE: Chocolate-Raspberry
STUFFING: Raspberry Jam
TOPPING: Chocolate-Raspberry Ganache, Raspbery Buttercream, & Raspberry Fizzy Candy

Space Monkey
CAKE: Banana-Toffee
STUFFING: Toffee Dulce de Leche
TOPPING: Caramel Cream Cheese Swirl & Chocolate Astronaut Ice Cream

Meringue-a-Tang
CAKE: Almond-Orange
STUFFING: Tang Gel
TOPPING: Tang Meringue, Tang Gel & Silver Cookie Rocket



Top Row:

The Reese's

CAKE: Vanilla cake baked with Reese's Pieces
STUFFING: Peanut butter and ganache
TOPPING: Chocolate & peanut butter buttercream swirl with Reese's pieces

Bee Sting
CAKE: Vanilla
STUFFING: Honey lemon curd
TOPPING: Lemon cream cheese, toasted almonds and a lemon candy dust

Island in the Sun
CAKE: Pineapple
STUFFING: Oven-Roasted Pineapple Compote
TOPPING: Freeze-Dried Mango Pieces & White Chocolate Sunray

Bottom Row:

24 Karat(Carrot Cake)
CAKE: Carrot
STUFFING: Whipped cream
TOPPING: Vanilla cream cheese, toasted coconut & white chocolate shavings

Twisted Pink Velvet
CAKE: Pink velvet
STUFFING: Caramel
TOPPING: Cream cheese, caramel buttercream and pecan praline

Then another Island in the Sun.

Reviews to come.