Happy 14th Birthday!

So, for a Halloween/Day of the Dead themed party, I made the darkest chocolate cake I could find and Clay decorated it with a stencil and powdered sugar. Pretty awesome looking!

Among other things, guests got to make their own Ultimate Caramel Apples. Which really turned into a bit of a disastrous mess, as you can see in exhibit #2. The girls had a lot of fun, and the apples were quite tasty, with all the topping options and the homemade caramel and all, but the caramel was a little too runny and slowly slid off the apples while they were supposed to be cooling. They looked great when we left them, but when we came back, all the toppings had drooped to the bottom.

We had a bonfire and a taco bar and they watched "Wait Until Dark", which they deemed the scariest movie they'd ever seen in their lives (old-fashioned suspense!). Overall it was a success, but we worked so hard on the whole affair that I've sworn to just order a pizza next year and let them hang out.

So here are the recipes:

Caramel for Apples

Chocolate Beet Cake

The first time I made the caramel (test run), it seemed like it was going to have big crystalline chunks of sugar because of the way it melted while I was stirring, so the second time I added a bit of water to help it dissolve, which is, I think, the reason it all dripped off the apples at the party. The first batch didn't do that. So just follow the recipe and don't try to second guess it. I just used salted butter, though, because that's what I had on hand. Don't do this with the frosting for the cake without reducing the salt, though, because it will be too salty. My favorite apple topping is currently sea salt and toasted pecans. Mmmmmmmm.