But today’s inspiration comes from a cup of Liberté Méditerranée Coconut Yogurt, one of our favorite yogurts, with coconut on the bottom. It has lots more coconut flavor, but it isn’t easy to find.

Fortunately, it’s easy to make luscious coconut yogurt in your own kitchen: Just add flaked coconut from your pantry to your favorite yogurt flavor.

We add a heaping tablespoon of coconut to banana, chocolate, coffee, plain and vanilla yogurts. For a piña colada effect, add crushed pineapple to plain or vanilla yogurt, along with 1/4 teaspoon of rum extract. Yum!

It’s delicious for breakfast or lunch, and special enough to be served for dessert. Feel free to garnish with some chocolate chips.

Find more of our favorite yogurt brands and yogurt recipes.

Handmade to order, they let you “enjoy” cupcakes in a different way: on chalk boards, roll-up chalk mats, chalk board place mats or good old driveways and sidewalks.

Or, they can be used as objets d’art in kids’ rooms.

The set of six mini chalk cupcakes is available in your choice of blue, green, orange, pink, purple or yellow. They are 2 inches tall and 1.5 inches wide, just about the size as a real mini cupcake.

Each cupcake is hand piped and topped with glitter. Each set is packaged for gifting.

They’re great For party favors as well as stocking stuffers.

And there’s more of a choice than cupcakes: We love the chalk popsicles, as well as apples, tea cups and some 15 non-food designs from ballerinas, bees and butterflies to dinosaurs, lady bugs and owls.

The set of six cupcakes is $7.00 from The Chalk Shop, which sells via Etsy.com.

Beyond cupcakes, we love the popsicle chalk as well as the apples and tea cups. In the non-food arena, there are some 15 designs, from ballerinas, butterflies and flowers to circus animals, dinosaurs and owls.
  

It’s easy to follow a recipe and bake a delicious cake. Icing it beautifully is the challenge.

Pastry chefs practice long and hard until they perfect an absolutely smooth icing. And they learn some tricks along the way.

You can use the holiday season to practice, practice, practice. The people upon whom you bestow your homemade cakes will be thrilled, not critical.

A rotating cake stand and an angled spatula will be your two best friends.

Here’s a video demonstration on how to ice a cake from Clarice Lam of The Baking Bean, an online pastry business that delivers delicious desserts straight to your door.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ICING & FROSTING

The difference between frosting and icing is in the sugar:

Icing is made with confectioners’ sugar (also called icing sugar), frosting is made with granulated sugar (table sugar). The two words are often used interchangeably, but that doesn’t make it correct!

More on how to frost a cake.

Find our favorite cakes and cake recipes in our Gourmet Cakes Section.