Hugh & Sophie's Birthday and Palm Sunday Dessert

Happy Birthday Hugh and Sophie! Since their birthdays are very close together, we decided to just have the party on the same day. Their mother was more than happy when I offered to bake them the birthday cake. At first, she just wanted to have both their names on the same cake...but I thought, "Why not make each of them their very own cake??". So I baked two small cakes, one white chocolate strawberry and the other chocolate strawberry. Then it was time for decorating....

I melted some chocolate and made hearts, stars, musical notes, and spirals. I sprinkled pearl dragees on some of them. I cut up the fruits and the strawberries to make it look like they're singing.

They turned out really cute!

The addition of birthday candles a must for that authentic "Birthday Cake" look. Hugh and Sophie both loved the cake. Some people even had seconds, including Sophie herself.

Then for today, Palm Sunday, we again had the Bible study at our house, so I made lemon meringue tart. I made a 9" one for the adults, and for the kids....

Lemon Meringue Tigers! I made French Meringue, but added some cornstarch for stability. Baked in 400F oven for about 5 minutes for these little guys, 7 minutes for the big one. Unfortunately, the crust turned out a little tough. :( I was fumbling with the crust the other day, trying to figure out which pan to use to bake them, causing the butter to melt a bit. But the overall flavor was very good. Sophie (who has a humongous sweet tooth) ate it all, but Hugh didn't seem to like it as much--he thought the filling was too sour and the crust too hard. He said he likes cakes, pies not so much, like milk chocolate but not dark chocolate. He's definitely a lot more finicky than Sophie.