National Cupcake Day for SPCAs & Humane Societies

Animals are precious.

I am a proud owner of a cat. My cat’s name is Mr. Cat and he’s a domestic short hair brown tabby. I adopted Mr. Cat when he was just seven weeks old - I remember he was so tiny he could fit in my coat pocket. It’s crazy to think that Mr. Cat will be 14 years old in two months, which will make him 73 years old in human years. Here’s my latest photo of my big kitty. As you can tell he is a very serious cat, hence the name “Mr. Cat”. This is his “Don’t-mess-with-me-I’m-a-tiger!” look:

To be honest, nobody calls him Mr. Cat unless he is at the vet. “Mr. Cat” is actually my cat’s legal name but we all call him “Fay Jai” in Cantonese at home, which means “Fat Boy” in English. It is a really fitting name because Fay Jai has always been a big cat. Currently, he weighs close to 20 lbs and I assure you that none of it is muscle. When Fay Jai walks his big, floppy belly swings from side to side. It’s adorable to watch. This is Fay Jai doing what he does best: doing nothing and being lazy.

Three years ago, Mr. Cat developed diabetes, a pretty common disease with older house cats. Ever since then Mr. Cat needs two insulin shots a day - once in the morning, once at night - along with a very strict, timed meal plan. There have been countless instances where my family and I had to change our plans to accommodate for Mr. Cat’s meals and medication. It is all worth it though because Mr. Cat is family, and we love him to bits.

As a pet owner, I fully support the Ontario Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (“Ontario SPCA”) and as a food lover, I’m very excited to tell you all about National Cupcake Day happening on Monday, February 29th. 

If you love animals, you can now show your support for your local SPCA by registering as a Cupcake Day Host and hosting your very own cupcake party on February 29th. Let your family, friends and colleagues know why you are baking and invite them to enjoy a cupcake at school, home or work, in exchange for a donation to your participating SPCA or Humane Society of choice. It’s an easy way to “bake a difference”, and it’s certainly the most delicious way to show your support for the SPCA. 

Could you use a Kitchen Aid Stand Mixer? Sign-up and raise $50 online before January 30th and be entered into a draw to win a KitchenAid Stand Mixer. It’s a great incentive to get started early!

For more information on National Cupcake Day, please visit www.nationalcupcakeday.ca/

*This is a sponsored post*

Touro Churrascaria: Brazilian Steakhouse & Wine Bar

Touro Brazilian Steakhouse & Wine Bar (Twitter: @tourosteakhouse, Facebook: Touro Steakhouse) off of Hwy 7 and 404 in Richmond Hill is currently York Region's only Brazilian Steakhouse. Touro offers the traditional Brazilian Steakhouse "Rodizio" service where guests get served an unlimited supply of beef, pork, poultry, lamb and seafood at table side. Each guest is given a medallion (shown on left); flipping it to the green side signals servers to come over to your table and carve you meat, and flipping it to red means you're currently experiencing "meat sweats" and want a break.

I have never been to a Brazilian steakhouse before my visit to Touro. I've certainly heard a lot about them through my guy friends whose eyes would literally light up once they start talking about all-you-can-eat meat. "It's a glorious thing," they would tell me. I believe them. 

Anyway, to give you a better idea of the vibe and atmosphere at Touro I've included a 90-second View the Vibe video of the Brazilian steakhouse. It's definitely worth a peek!

As mentioned in the View the Vibe video, Touro also serves an a la carte menu. Available at the bar and lounge areas, their a la carte menu offers barbecued meats as well as vegetarian options.

Touro boasts a self-serve Enomatic wine lounge - the first of its kind in Ontario.

Le Dolci's Bees, Mead & Cheese Class

I was invited to Le Dolci's (@LeDolci) first ever Bees, Mead & Cheese class with Rosewood Estates Winery & Meadery on Thursday, July 12. It was also my first time visiting Le Dolci's new studio location at 1006 Dundas St. W since my cupcake decorating class last year. What a beautiful space, Lisa! Congratulations on the move :)

Le Dolci, for those of you who don't know, offers classes on how to make and decorate delicious treats like Parisian macarons, cupcakes, cake pops, and mini fondant wedding cakes. They also host birthday, bachelorette and corporate events. 

I know this post should be about honey and mead but I need to show you these cute cupcakes first!

Sorry, I digress. Back to honey and mead :D

Owned by the Roman family, Rosewood Estates Winery & Meadery is an award winning boutique winery located on the Beamsville Bench. Lovers of wine and honey, Rosewood produces 100% VQA wines, honey and the first honey wines in Niagara. 

Below is Krystina Roman (@Rosewoodwine) talking about Rosewood's beekeeping and harvesting operation. Here are some interesting Rosewood's beekeeping facts:

-  Rosewood has 9 bee yards located all over Niagara with over 300 hives.

- Each hive is between 2 to 4 boxes high. Each box can have up to 25,000 bees. On average each hive can have over 75,000 bees

- Rosewood makes most of their hives by scratch

- Their honeybees source wildflower, clover, mint, goldenrod, Russian sage for their nectar. 

-Their bees need to visit over 1 million flowers for one pound of honey

- Their bees come from Hawaii, Italy & Russia

Cupcake Decorating at Le Dolci

Lisa Sanguedolci, owner of Le Dolci, invited me to one of her cupcake docorating classes a couple of weekends ago. To be honest I was a bit nervous going in; I mean, I can eat cupcakes no problem, but to decorate them?! I have zero creativity, I'm not kidding...I cannot draw or design anything to save my LIFE. And to think I gotta decorate cupcakes?  Seemed like a pretty daunting task to me...hmmm can I just eat the cupcakes instead? 


Not knowing what to expect, I dragged my friend Cindy with me (well I didn't really have to *drag* her as she jumped at my offer lol). Although I was a teeny bit worried at first, I managed to decorate a dozen cupcakes as shown on the left! Incredible! I must say I was quite proud of myself because as I said before, I thought I didn't one creative gene in me. So now, I think I do have one...just one.


Le Dolci is located in at King & Bathurst and is currently the only cupcake decorating studio in downtown Toronto. Le Dolci was first launched in the UK in 2009 and have since then moved from London, UK, where they ran some fabulous cupcake decorating classes to Toronto~

The 2-hour cupcake decorating classes are suitable for anyone at any age. Here's Lisa giving us a brief overview about what we would be doing. We were to decorate 6 cupcakes with fondant and 6 cupcakes with buttercream. Got it. Check. Let's DO this.

By the way, notice the Pride flags? This is because each month, Le Dolci has a different theme that usually relates to events happening in Toronto or around the world. Neat, huh?

Cupcake Cuties Launch Party

My good friend Steff, a.k.a Chef Steff, is a cupcake connoisseur. I mean, she is already an awesome chef as it is, but her true passion lies in cupcakes. Unlike many people who are merely "all talk", Steff was determined to follow her dreams - she launched Cupcake Cuties, an online business serving a total of 14 delicious and original flavored cupcakes. So, to celebrate her hard work and dedication, Steff invited her friends to Cupcake Cuties' launch party last Tuesday, January 28th, at Stonefire Bar & Grill. 


Ahhhh I can't go on without posting a professional pic of Steff first =)

Cupcake Cuties bake with the best ingredients and every cupcake is made to order to ensure ultimate freshness. On top of the variety offered, Cupcake Cuties also offer a special line of cupcakes just for diabetics. Pretty neat, huh? And of course, customized cupcakes are also available upon request.

Here are just some of the flavours available at Cupcake Cuties: Beani-Vanilli, Cocomonkey, The Way the Cupcake Crumbles..., Coconutty, Milky Sweet, Chocaholic, Black&White, Marvin the Martian, Cookies and Cream, Not Your Mama's Pecan Pie..., S'berry Good!, Darko Haze, Chocmond, S'Mores, etc...the list goes on~

Cupcake Madness at CupcakeCampTO

CupcakeCamp was originated in San Francisco. Its mission is to bring together cupcake lovers, bakers, and eaters from in and around the community to celebrate and embrace their love for cupcakes. It became so successful there that CupcakeCamp was brought over to Toronto for the first time last year at LabSpace Studios. This year, CupcakeCamp TO was held on May 2nd at Prime Gallery on 52 McCaul Street. What is also neat about all this is (yes theres more to it than just cupcakes) is that net proceeds from the ticket sales goes to the Daily Bread Food Bank. So, not only are the bakers having fun baking, and the eaters having fun eating (ME!), it is also for a good cause. Bonus!!! =) 


Here are some stats for this year's event:

• 38 bakers 
• >50 flavors
• >180 eaters
• 2,000 cupcakes

Crazy, huh? Bakers can also enter into a voluntary cupcake competition. Sugar overload for the judges! Can you imagine having to taste 50 cupcakes in a span of 3 hours?! I can't, and I love sweets!