Part IV: Sweetening Life s Special Occasions in .NET

Generate Code 128 Code Set B in .NET Part IV: Sweetening Life s Special Occasions

For the decorations: 1 pound black licorice 4 2-x-4-inch squares of chocolate (from a 75ounce chocolate bar) Black food coloring gel Red red food coloring gel 36 red and purple square-shaped sour hard candies, broken into jagged pieces with a meat tenderizer 144-ounce box chocolate graham crackers, finely ground in a food processor 4 skeleton pops 2 ghost cupcake picks 2 pumpkin cupcake picks 1 plastic glow-in-the-dark skull-andcrossbones ring 1 witch cupcake pick

chopped semisweet chocolate in 2 3 cup boiling water Stir the mixture until smooth and slightly cool Mix the chocolate into the cake batter after the eggs but before the flour

in the pans for 10 minutes, and then run a knife around the edges of each cake Invert the cakes onto cooling racks, and then invert them again so that they re right side up

aside, and cut the other half into quarters, keeping one quarter, and discarding the others (The remaining quarter piece is one eighth-loaf)

coat (thin layer) of chocolate decorator frosting to each cake, and refrigerate them for 1 hour Frost the cakes again, and refrigerate them while you prepare the decorations

1 Prepare a cake board that s approximately 18-x-24 inches in size Use plywood or fiberboard that s wrapped with cake foil or Halloween wrapping paper covered with clear heavy cellophane wrap

on top of the other to form the bottom floor of the house Center the loaf cake on top of the bottom floor; set the half-loaf on top of that floor; and set the one-eighth piece on top of the half-loaf to form a witch s perch

square windows on the second story of the house, three square windows on the third story, and an oval-shaped window on the witch s perch Also pipe a doorknob and an awning on the door

a coupler, a #4 tip, and red frosting Along the top edge of the first three floors (not the witch s perch), pipe a string of pointed red drips to look like seeping blood

8 With an icing spatula, spread 2 cups of untinted chocolate frosting in front of the house 9 Outfit the black frosting bag with a #10 tip, and, over the chocolate frosting yard, outline a crooked walkway leading to the front door Fill in the walkway with crushed hard candies

black frosting bag, pipe frosting onto the candy tops of the skeleton pops Scatter the skeleton pops to resemble trees in the mansion s yard, sticking them into the frosting in the front yard, and mound chocolate crumbs at the base of each pop Refit the black frosting bag with a #67 tip, and pipe drooping black leaves on the skeletons hands

11 Stick the ghost picks and pumpkin picks on the second and third floors of the mansion,

and push the skull-and-crossbones ring into the oval-shaped window on the witch s perch Insert the witch pick into the very top of the house

Here s a jack-o -lantern that doesn t have to be scooped out! A fluted Bundt pan creates a realistic look, and the Brown Sugar Cake fits the tenor of October but is delicious year-round This cake is shown on the second-to-last page of the color section Tools: Two 10-fluted Bundt pans, #11 icing tip Preparation time: 20 minutes Baking time: 50 minutes plus 30 minutes for cooling Decoration time: 35 minutes plus 1 hour for refrigeration Yield: 24 servings

For the cake: 2 batches Brown Sugar Cake batter (recipe follows) For the frosting: 2 batches Buttercream Frosting (see 8) For the decorations: Black food coloring gel Leaf green food coloring gel Sunset orange food coloring gel Banana, unpeeled