Dessert Bucket List Spring Edition!

Beautiful Display by Just Wright Candy Buffets

Last week I had the pleasure of hosting my first Jem of the South event! I know I’m a blogger and this may sound cliche but words can’t express how pleased I was with how the event turned out!

As most of you know, I did a blog a few months ago listing the desserts I wanted to make this year and I titled the blog, my 2011 Dessert Bucket List.  I enlisted those who are fans of my blog to share their own bucket list. Some shared their goals while several others made it clear they just wanted to taste the things I made from my list.

Another blogger mentioned to me that this would be a neat blogging event, then I thought to myself, why not have a face to face event? I love all things social media, but there comes a time when I just want to see folks face to face and have some live social time together. Hence, my Dessert Bucket List Spring Edition was born!

Now the issue at hand was, what am I going to make for this event? I wanted to move quickly and not let the idea or the time slip away from me so I began planning, what I would make and where I would have the event. I was delighted when I met the lovely Rayann Larsen, owner of The Workspot, who was just as excited as I was about having an event at her location.  After Rayann and I finished our happy dance, the location was booked. Now on to figuring out what desserts to make. As you will recall from my bucket list here, lemon poundcake and lemon bars were two of the things I wanted to make this year. I started with these two desserts then decided that I would make the theme of my event lemon based. Talk about the ideal Spring time fruit and dessert combination!

I tested the lemon bars first and they were delicious, but they didn’t make the cut due to the fact that they were too gooey to transport and display properly.  Next up was the lemon bundt cake. The cake was a disaster! LOL! I was so disappointed, but I didn’t give up. I moved on to making what I thought would be a true winner, a white chocolate lemon brownie. Another dud.  I was starting to lose steam, but I had committed to making this event a success and I wasn’t going to let a few bad outcomes get me down.

While browsing in my local Target, I found the most adorable mini-bundt pan and said, this is it. I know this will work and it did! Yes, I finally had a winner. I was on a roll. From there the menu grew to include lemon whoopie pies, lemon marshmallows and lemon snowball cookies.

Look at these beauties! If you want the recipes, click on the name under each item. I did adapt some of the recipes slightly. For example, the marshmallow recipe, I substituted lemon extract for vanilla extract and added a few drops of yellow food coloring to get the pretty yellow hue. For the lemon whoopie pies, I used my own cream cheese recipe and added the lemon ingredients accordingly. I also used whole milk instead of buttermilk for the pies. For the lemon bundt cakes I followed the cake  recipe exactly, but used a powdered sugar lemon glaze. I made no changes to lemon snowball cookie recipe.

Lemon Snowball Cookies recipe from Sing for your Supper

Mini-Lemon Bundt Cakes recipe from King Arthur Flour

Lemon Whoopie Pies recipe from Joy the Baker

Lemon Marshmallows adapted from Barefoot Contessa’s recipe (minus the coconut)

I enlisted  help from my good friend Sheila D. Wright owner of True Southern Elegance and Just Wright Candy Buffets to assist me with the tablescape and she did a fabulous job as always.

I was also blessed to have door prize gifts donated from Candles Bayou and Uncommon Scent Creations as well as 2 special donations from a secret donor. The beautiful photography was done by No Contenders Creative Agency, LLC.

I want to thank everyone who came out to support my event and those who weren’t able to attend that encouraged me to forge ahead and take this challenge. I appreciate you all!

 

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