Ok here is the problem and the deadline.  I want to do a spider cake for the wednesday before Halloween.  I have a caramel cake and I'm thinking that the chocolate hazenut flavor would work well with that and have the dark rich color I am looking for.  I am diabetic and would love to have a piece of the cake at the meeting so is there a way I can do this?  Anyone have a recipe?  Or am I totally nuts doing rich with rich.  Should I stick to something like a vanilla icing so I'm not fighting with the caramel flavor of the cake.  I would appreciate you input.  What would you do?

I do a lot of diabetic diet counseling, and I refer patients to the Splenda website for sweets.  Here's their recipe for something close to what you are looking for - Splenda Mocha Hazelnut Frosting.  Sounds like a nice blend with the caramel cake you are considering.

Truvia is a much better sweetener for cooking. Use the Splenda recipes but use Truvia instead. When the new Reb-A blends come out switch to them.

Thanks for the info Barb, I'll give Truvia a try.

Thank you that looks like it might work.  Of course the cream cheese is going to kill my low fat diet for that day.  I guess I can't have it all.

It doesn't apply so much in this case but Splenda does not hold up to heat at all, and it tastes fake. I made a Truvia cheesecake for a diabetic friend and you couldn't tell it wasn't sugar. Truvia is a bit more expensive though.

You can use half fat free or low fat cream cheese. Any more than that and it starts to fall apart.

I love cheesecake.  Thank you so much for the suggestions.  That will make my life easier or at least richer lol.

I'm going to get some of the truvia for baking and see how it goes.

I decided to cheat with the cake.  I bought chocolate frosting and I'm just adding the chocolate hazelnut spread to that.  I know totally lame but what do you expect from a woman who makes boxed cakes?  lol.  I'm not very good at baking deserts.

LOL, Tammy!!  I almost asked you if a Nutella glaze would work!!

I gave up on the idea of finding black paste food color so I could have a black spider but I still want a thick frosting.  A ganache would probably be best but, I'm just to lazy.  A glaze would be perfect for a spiderweb cake.  I'll put that one the list for next time.

For Thanksgiving I plan to do the double bundt cakes put bottom to bottom to look like a pumpkin.  I'm thinking I want an orange cake and a cream cheese frosting with black fondant for the eyes and mouth.  I like to fill the center with a chocolate fudge pudding and then do a cupcake for the stem of the pumpkin.

Walmart and Michael's both have gel food coloring, at Walmart it's in the craft section. They have an aisle with fancy baking stuff, mostly along the wedding cake line and specialty equipment. Cake splitters and icing turntables, that kind of thing. Anyway, they both should have plenty of colors not found in the baking aisle.

Nothing wrong with a cake mix, I used them for many years until I figured out scratch. Sometimes I still use them, I made the new key lime mix for cupcakes recently. It was really, really good. Made my own cream cheese frosting, tinted it green, and gave them candy eyes. They could see you! lol

Just make them very dark chocolate, then you won't have that black stain in your mouth after eating one.  Spiders come in brown too.

Key lime cake mix?  Where did you find it, which brand was it?  I'm looking for a really good key lime cake.

It's a new mini-line from Pillsbury, they have the key lime, pink lemonade and orange cremesicle. The key lime was excellent, very strong flavor. The cremesicle wasn't quite as dramatic but good. Haven't tried the pink lemonade yet though I did buy one. I got them at Wal-mart but you should find them in any grocery store.

*New-ish. I think I first saw them about 6 months ago. The flavors come in a boxed cookie mix too.

It certainly should be easy to spot in the store, the box is bright green - Pillsbury Key Lime Cake Mix

i'll be on the look out for it tomorrow when I go into town.

Thanks for the heads up.

The orangeslide looks like a possibility for the pumpkin double bundt pan cake.