Frank the Bunny Cookies

      Happy Easter!

     I made these creepy bunny cookies to celebrate the beginning of spring with something terrifying. They're basic sugar cookies, cut into bunny shapes and decorated with a simple glaze, with white chocolate for the teeth and eyes. I brushed them with silver lustre dust to give them that eerie shimmer.

Photo credits: Kelly Garsha

     While it's not strictly speaking a horror movie, Donnie Darko (2001) was one of my favourite films during my teen years. You'd be more likely to put it in the category of sci-fi, fantasy or drama, but it's still a creepy film that defies genre. The story is confusing and admittedly flawed, but the dark, stylish direction more than makes up for it. It's set in 1988, and Donnie is your average moody teenager played by a very cute Jake Gyllenhaal. However, Donnie has quite a spectacular problem. He is led out of his house one night by a terrifying, 6-foot-tall bunny who tells him that the world will end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 12 seconds. He has until then to find a way to stop it, all while getting the girl, taking down an annoying motivational speaker and figuring out why his new best friend is wearing that stupid bunny suit.

Now excuse me, I need to go back to grad school.

Check out another holiday sugar cookie I made: Gremlin Cookies.

Leprechaun Cupcakes

 Happy St. Patrick's Day!

     I used the holiday as an excuse to try out these Guinness and Baileys cupcakes I'd been hearing so much about. These are probably the best chocolate cupcakes I've ever had. The batter contains a generous amount of Guinness, which made them nice and moist without tasting of stout. They're filled with a Baileys-chocolate ganache and topped with Baileys buttercream icing and they taste like Irish heaven. 

I live in Canada, so all I could find were chocolate loonies... Deal with it.

Photo credits: Kelly Garsha

     You may or may not have heard of the movie Leprechaun (1993). It's mostly known for featuring a pre-Rachel Jennifer Aniston and for being awful. A leprechaun is trapped inside a wooden crate in a South Dakota basement for 10 years, until the four-leaf clover holding him captive is brushed aside. Now, he's on the loose, and he's after his gold. He can teleport and he's got a nasty set of chompers, but you can easily distract him by throwing dirty shoes in his direction, as he is compelled to polish them. I've definitely seen worse films, but this one is pretty bad. It consists mainly of Aniston screaming "Leave us alone!" and the Leprechaun replying "I want me gold!" However, there are some amusing sight gags and even a scene where a man is killed by a pogo stick. 

Try as they will, and try as they might, who steals me gold won't live through the night."

The rainbow cupcake featured in the second photo is from my Serpent and the Rainbow cupcakes.

The Serpent and the Rainbow

     I thought it was time to add some Caribbean flair to my blog to combat the late-winter blahs. These cupcakes and coffin-cake are banana rum. The rainbow icing is, well, rainbow and the coffin is covered in salted caramel icing. The "snake" was made from half-and-half and then painted, as were the almond "petals".

Photo credits: Kelly Garsha

     This sweet scene was inspired by Wes Craven's The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988). Loosely based on the non-fiction book of the same name, it tells the story of an ethnobotanist/anthropologist who travels to Haiti to investigate a poison used by vodou practitioners to make their victims appear dead. Later, they rise from the grave as zombies. It soon becomes clear that the more our curious scientist keeps "digging", the more likely he is to get voodooed himself. 

"Don't bury me... I'm not dead."

Do you like your cake with a side of cupcakes? Then take a look at these Shining Cakes.