Browned Butter Cupcakes

I didn't lie; I told you this year's theme was browned butter.

I have made browned butter cupcakes a few times this year, but my favorite iteration has to be the one with the rosemary infused maple syrup and toasted pecans. It was inspired by a very delicious ice cream I had at a lovely restaurant in Oakland. Vanilla ice cream studded with salty pecans and topped with this rosemary maple syrup drizzle. Outstanding combination of salty and sweet, and very rich. I thought it would work very well with a browned butter base, so turned it into cupcakes.

Browned Butter Cupcakes
Makes about 2 dozen

1 1/2 sticks butter, browned (instructions below)
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
3/4 cup milk
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup chopped, toasted pecans (optional)

Directions
Preheat oven to 350˚.

First off, toast a handful of raw pecans. Spray them very lightly with some oil and sprinkle with some kosher salt, roasting from anywhere between 200˚-300˚ for about 10 minutes or until you smell the nutty aroma. Don't burn them, so keep an eye, and toss them around halfway through if needed. Set aside to cool.

Then make a quick infusion of rosemary into maple syrup. I don't think I did a good job of measuring out how much syrup or rosemary I used here. Let's say 1/4-1/3 cup and a 4" piece of rosemary. I do recommend trimming the rosemary into small clusters first (versus sticking the whole stock in the syrup) so that you have small pieces to top each cupcake with. In a small pan, bring the syrup with rosemary in it to a boil, then remove from heat and let it steep until it's cooled off on its own. Oh, just in case it's not a given, you should only be using real maple syrup for this - not the fake stuff. 

Next is the batter, starting with browning butter. In a medium size sauce pan, melt butter slowly over a low heat. Keep a close eye on it and stir frequently. The butter will probably try to boil or sizzle, so don't let it do that. Stir frequently, scraping up any bits from the bottom as you do. First it will foam up and be hard to see what's going on underneath the foaming. Then the foam will subside and you'll start to see little "bits" floating in the butter. That's the good stuff. Keep your eye on those bits and when they start getting to a caramel color and the aroma is nutty, remove from heat. This all takes between 5-10 minutes depending on how much butter you're browning, width of your pan, and how low your heat is.

Set that aside for a minute, and in a medium bowl whisk together your dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, and salt (and nuts if using in batter).

Mix brown sugar into the browned butter (in the sauce pan is fine), then quickly whisk in the eggs one at a time until combined. Add vanilla, then alternate adding the flour mixture with the milk (typically 1/3 flour, 1/2 milk, 1/3 flour, 1/2 milk, ending with remaining 1/3 of the flour). Try not to over mix.

Pour batter into prepared baking tins (1/4 per cupcake works great for me) and bake for 20 minutes.

While cupcakes bake, make frosting.

Rosemary Maple Buttercream
Side note: I have found that 1 stick of butter to ~2 cups of powdered sugar is just enough frosting for a dozen cupcakes. Consider it a good rule of thumb if you decide to start experimenting. Likewise, you can gauge how many cupcakes you'll get out of recipe (roughly) by following the formula that with every 1 cup or so of flour in a recipe you'll get about a dozen cupcakes. Give or take. Anyway...

2 sticks butter, softened (1 cup)
3-4 cups powdered sugar (depending on your sweet tooth and the consistency of the frosting you like - more sugar = stiffer and will form a kind of crust once it's set for a while - great for making shapes/flowers, less sugar = less stiff and creamier.)
2-3 tbs of infused maple syrup
dash of kosher salt
1-2 tsp milk as needed

Whip butter, adding powdered sugar until blended. Drizzle in syrup and dash of salt and beat until it gets fluffy. Add a little milk to smooth out the consistency. You're now ready to decorate.

Another side note: I didn't do it with this recipe, but if you're REALLY loving the browned butter flavor and want to make it really pop, you could make a little extra browned butter and scrape some of the nutty caramelized bits into the frosting at this point as well. I did make just browned butter cupcakes with browned butter frosting once and they were delicious, albeit extremely rich.

Pipe your frosting onto the cupcakes and top with a pecan or two and LIGHTLY drizzle with the remaining maple syrup. You don't want to put too much because it will just drip off the cupcake and make a sticky mess. Do try to include a little piece of rosemary that was infused in the syrup on the top of each cupcake though. And if your nuts didn't hold onto their salt while roasting, definitely make sure you sprinkle a little extra onto each cupcake. It makes all the difference.

Horchata Cupcakes, Gluten-free

Horchata, a delightful Mexican beverage made from sweetened rice milk and spiced with cinnamon, has been a favorite of mine since I first discovered it at 11 years of age. My friend Tracy and I had a mix that we would blend up and sip on for hours. Later, I discovered that mixes were nothing compared the goodness of a real home made horchata, and have never looked back since.

Horchata is typically made by soaking white rice in cinnamon stick spiced water for hours, then draining out just the "rice milk" and adding sugar and vanilla to it until just right. Seductively simple, just requires a little fore thought, with the soaking.

The other side of this is that I've been playing around a lot with recipes that bend to certain dietary restrictions. A long time ago, I had been playing around with mochi cupcakes, which was a fun fusion of a Japanese dessert I had come to love, and my already beloved cupcake. The recipe I was working from called for Mochiko rice flour. Rice flour, although sometimes falsely advertised as "glutinous rice flour" does not actually contain gluten. Starch, yes, but not gluten. As to how it hadn't occurred to me sooner that this was the perfect medium to build another rice based dessert from, we will never know.

I, however, short-sightedly mis-remembered one of the ingredients to this cupcake recipe, so ended up doing my usual on the spot, bake-time experimentation to ward off yet another trip to the store for just one silly can of evaporated milk. Therefore, my new recipe calls for a homemade version of this kitchen staple, with a ricey twist. Also, topped with a rice milk pudding frosting, which is probably more like a custard actually. Best not make these on a really hot day, as the frosting would probably weep right off.

Rice Milk Pudding Frosting

- 16 oz rice milk
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/3 cup cornstarch
- pinch of salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 yolk
- 2 tsp vanilla


In a small bowl, whisk together sugar, cornstarch, salt eggs and 1/4 cup of rice milk. In a medium sized sauce pan, heat remaining rice milk and cinnamon stick and let simmer for a few minutes. Don't let milk reduce by more than 1/2 cup. Remove cinnamon stick and slowly pour some of the warm milk over the egg mixture, whisking steadily until it begins to incorporate, then return pot to stove and pour the egg mixture into the milk. Bring to a boil, whisking constantly (pudding will thicken quickly and look chunky unless you whisk very heartily). Once pudding is thick and coats the back of a wooden spoon, remove from heat and pour into a clean bowl. This pudding will make a very thick skin, which normally is fine, but we're going to be turning it into a frosting, so best to cover tightly with saran wrap and refrigerate until needed. 


Cinnamon Mochi Cupcakes
Adapted from the Food Librarian

- 1 pound mochiko (1 box)
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 cup butter melted (yeah, gluten free doesn't mean this is healthy, btw)
- 2 cups sugar
- 12 oz evaporated rice milk, made from 16 oz of regular milk  
- 4 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 350˚. Prep muffin tins; will make 2 dozen.

First, in a small sauce pan, heat rice milk over medium heat until reduced to 12 ounces. Don't let it boil. It will take about 10 minutes or so.

In the meantime, in a large bowl whisk together mochiko, baking powder, and cinnamon, and set aside.

In a medium bowl, mix butter with sugar, then one by one, mix in the eggs, whisking until incorporated. Whisk in vanilla. Once the rice milk has reduced to 12 ounces, slowly whisk into butter mixture. Gradually pour butter mixture over mochiko, incorporating them together as you pour. 

Fill cupcake tins with batter and bake for 20 minutes or until edges begin to brown. Let cool.

Check out my new, sweet 24 slot cupcake tin. Fits in my oven and everything! And by new, I mean, someone got it for me at a yard sale, and it is so old and been through it all that it started smoking half way through baking from all the caked on grease it has been harboring. Didn't set off my smoke alarm though, of course. Why would pillars of smoke do that?

Once both parts are cooled complete, then fill a pastry bag with your pudding frosting (it will be thick, but runny, so be prepared to make a mess), and pipe a dollop of pudding onto each cupcake. Sprinkle with a dash of cinnamon sugar if you'd like.

I normally don't condone refrigeration for cupcakes since most of the time they're better off without it, but since these have the more volatile pudding frosting, I would recommend keeping them chilled. The pudding will form a skin if exposed, so if you have a tupperware, that is probably the better method for keeping these stored freshly (and does sort of taste more like its refreshing iced beverage counterpart anyway).

Best solution, of course, is just to eat them.

Strawberry Cheesecake Cupcakes

I never cease to be amused by transforming things into cupcake flavors. I am actually rather backlogged in showing off some of the things I baked lately, but long story short, I made a cupcake a couple weeks ago that was an homage to cheesecake, and it made me think that it could really go one step further.
Utilizing the always dependable Smitten Kitchen's epic recipe stash, I incorporated her black bottom cupcake cream cheese filling (with some adaptation) into a honey and graham flour cupcake base, and then topped with freshly sliced strawberries and a homemade strawberry glaze, with a decorative cream cheese frosting border (intended to add structural support in case the glaze decided to get slippery). I am happy to report that everything seemed to work out swimmingly, even for a first experimental try. Love it when that happens.

Honey and Graham Cupcake
- 6 tbs butter, room temp
- 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1 egg and 1 egg yolk
- 3/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1/4 cup graham flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/3 cup milk

Preheat over to 350˚. Line baking tins. This recipe should make just over a dozen regular sized cupcakes.
Whisk together flours, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl. Set aside.
With electric mixer on high, beat butter and brown sugar until fluffy. Add in honey until incorporated, followed by eggs. Beat until the point of being fluffy again, then turn mixer down low and in batches, mix in flour and then milk until incorporated. Do not over mix.
Dollop mix into cupcake tins to just about half full (aren't we so optimistic). Set aside while making cream cheese filling.

Baked-in Cream Cheese Filling
- 8 oz cream cheese
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 tbs cornstarch

Beat cream cheese and sugar together until smooth, then add in egg and beat until smooth, then add in vanilla and cornstarch until smooth. This is more filling than you will need (go ahead and double the cupcake recipe then!)

Dollop a spoonful of filling into the cake battered cupcake tins. Since the batter is actually kind of thick, I took a spoon and sort of hollowed out the inside of each cup before adding the cream cheese filling. I think it helped keep the filling mor or less in the middle versus resulting in being a top layer of the cupcake.

Bake for 20 minutes.

Cupcakes and filling will rise very nicely, but will fall a little when you take out of the oven. The filling may seem a little giggly while it's still warm, but once they get to room temperature, everything solidifies nicely. Sort of a typical cheese cake reaction, so don't freak out and over bake them.

Strawberry Glaze
So I happened to have about a half a cup of strawberry puree in my freezer from some previous strawberry project, so used that. If I had to guess, I'd say it was about the equivalent of a dozen large strawberries. Maybe 6-8oz. Give or take. To it, I added some undetermined amount of water... let's say 1/2 a cup, and 1/3 cup of sugar. I let that boil until it started foaming up, then strained out the chunks and seeds and put back over low heat and added a surrey of about 1 tablespoon water and 2 teaspoons of cornstarch. Once that started boiling again, I just whisked it all together to make sure it was incorporated and removed from the heat and let set for a couple minutes.  Should coat the back of a wooden spoon easily. And yes, another case of having too much glaze for the number of cupcakes I made. This made a lot of glaze... Enough for maybe 3-4 dozen cupcakes. I will find out how well it freezes and report back in a few months.

Cream Cheese Frosting
This (again) will make way more frosting than you need for this project, but I'm sure you can think of other things to do with leftover cream cheese frosting. You own a spoon, right?
- 8 oz cream cheese
- 8 oz butter, room temperature
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
Beat cream cheese and butter together until smooth. 1 cup at a time, add in powdered sugar until mix is fluffy. Add in vanilla and continue to beat (scraping down the sides as needed), until the whole thing is fluffy and elastic.

Once things have cooled down a bit, gently wash off as many strawberries as there are cupcakes (1 per cupcake for medium sized berries - if they are particularly large, 1 strawberry can top 2 cupcakes). When presenting berries, I typically don't drown them under running water, but instead dab them with a moist paper towel to clean them. Otherwise, I guess you could rinse them off earlier in the process so they're are dry again once you're ready to slice them - basically, you just don't need a bunch of excess water ruining your set up at this point.

You then top each cupcake with a splayed strawberry, then using a pastry brush, dollop and spread glaze over it.

With a small tip on a pastry bag, pipe frosting around edges. You can be as decorative as you please, my only goal was to encase the strawberries in an attempt to contain them. The glaze wasn't runny though, so in the end, the frosting ended up being purely decorative (oh, and tasty). 

Spekuloos Cupcakes

A dear friend and fellow blogger, Kristy, gave me a jar of Spekuloos cookie spread for Christmas. One spoonful was enough to know I was in trouble. Belgian cinnamon cookies ground into a spreadable paste? Impossibly delicious.

I had never actually had the cookie in its natural form before, so no comparison, but the consistency of the spread is akin to peanut butter, and it occurred to me moments after taking my first spoonful that it would work perfectly as a cupcake frosting flavor. So, I did just that.

I took a basic vanilla cupcake and added a dash of cinnamon and nutmeg, then topped them with a spekuloos infused buttercream. Simple. Delicious. I dare you to try it and not find yourself face first in a dozen of them before you figure out how to actually pronounce Spekuloos.

Slightly Spiced Cupcake 

- 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temp
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp nutmeg
- 3 large eggs (variation that's more like a yellow cake)
- 3/4 cup milk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract


Set rack at the middle level in the oven and preheat to 350 degrees.
Prep 20-24 cupcake tins.
In a large bowl, beat butter and sugar for about 5 minutes, until light and fluffy. Add in eggs one at a time (scraping the bowl in between) and then add vanilla. Whisk together flour, baking powder, spices and salt. Set aside. Add 1/3 of the flour mixture to the butter mixture then add half the milk. Continue to alternate beginning and ending with flour mixture. Scape the bowl and beater often.
Pour the batter into prepared tins (about 1/4 cup per cupcake liner). Bake 20 minutes, or until the top of the cupcake springs back slightly when touched.
Cool completely.

Spekuloos Buttercream Frosting
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1/4 cup Spekuloos spread, give or take
- 3-4 cups powdered sugar, give or take
- 2 tsp milk, give or take

Beat butter and Spekuloos together until combined. Add powdered sugar 1 cup at a time until mixture is light and fluffy (I tend to put less sugar, but you can adjust as you like it). Add milk to smooth out the texture.

Pipe frosting onto cooled cupcakes. I came up short of having a cute cupcake topper that worked well with the theme, but I suppose a nice Spekuloos cookie would work well, if you can find them. I have no doubt they will be gobbled up even if you don't find a cute decoration for them though.

Cake Pops

So I've seen these all over the place, but have actually only ever tried them 2 times (by trying, I mean tasting, not making). Most recently, while on a little vacation in New Orleans, one of the companions on our trip brought down some "cake bombs" from a place in Chicago called Bleeding Heart Bakery. Though I'm not sure how they made theirs, I was pretty sure it was similar to what I'd heard went into a cake pop (minus the popsicle stick), and I adored how they covered some of their flavors in cocoa nibs and hazelnuts, so that's what I opted to try when making my own.

So, I think you're supposed to mix cake with frosting until mushy enough to form into a ball. I didn't have any leftover frosting, but did have some leftover strawberry curd, so figured I'd give that a shot instead. Can't say for sure that the treats have a very strong strawberry flavor, but they are delightfully chocolatey. I made my basic chocolate cake but in true 9x13 inch cake form instead of cupcakes (and baked for 45 minutes, instead of 20). I crumbled some pieces into a bowl and mixed with the curd and formed them into balls. Sorry for the lack of precise measurements; true to form, I wasn't really keeping track. I put mini popsicle sticks into the balls and froze them for about 10-15 minutes, then coated them with melted dark chocolate. I didn't bother too much with tempering since I was going to cover them all over with topping anyway, but I would recommend adding a little vegetable oil to the chocolate so that it cuts down on the bloom (something I have a huge problem with, but hear tell that some people don't struggle with it nearly as much as I do). I let the chocolate drip off and then rolled them in nibs and chopped hazelnuts and laid them out to dry on parchment paper. They only took about 10 minutes to harden.

I will test them out at the office tomorrow, and say that they are a Valentine's day treat. I mean, it is chocolate, right?  Chocolate = Valentines Day.  If they go over well, I will probably keep it in mind if I ever have any leftover cake and frosting, that these would be a good way to use up leftover ingredients. 

National Nutella Day, 2012

It's that time of year again! Not wanting to miss out again like I did last year, I whipped together some tasty Nutella cupcakes this time. Albeit not the most creative, as I (and hordes of others) have done the same before, but sometimes you really just don't need to go reinventing the wheel.

Chocolate Cupcakes
(a recipe I've been using forever, and don't even remember where I first found it)

• 2 cups all-purpose unbleached flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 12 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for the pans
• 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons sugar
• 3/4 cup nonalkalized cocoa powder (not Dutch-processed)
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1/4 cup milk

Preheat to 350 degrees F. Prep Cupcake tins.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
In a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter at medium speed until smooth, about 2 minutes. Increase the speed to medium-high and slowly add the sugar. Continue beating until light and smooth, about 4 minutes. Turn the mixer off and scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula. Add the cocoa powder and vanilla and beat at medium speed for 1 minute more. (Stop the machine and scrape down the sides of the bowl again, if needed.) With the mixer running at medium-low speed, add the eggs, one at a time, beating for 1 minute between each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
Combine the water and milk in a saucepan and bring just to a boil. Remove from the heat. (Or microwave 2-3 minutes).
With the mixer at low speed, add the flour mixture, about a 1/4 cup at a time, carefully alternating with the hot liquid into, the batter. Divide the batter evenly between the cupcake tins. Lightly drop each pan onto the counter to settle the batter.
Set the pans on the middle rack in the oven. Bake 20 minutes, or until cupcake tops spring back when you gently touch them.

Nutella Frosting

(ripped off from inspired by Smitten Kitchen's Fudge Frosting)

6 ounces dark or semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled
4 cups confectioners’ sugar (no need to sift)
3 sticks (12 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/3 cup nutella
6 tablespoons milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Place all of the ingredients in a food processor and pulse to incorporate, then process until the frosting is smooth. (No really... that's all you have to do. It's kind of amazing. I recommend reading Deb's comments about it on her blog for more info and tips on making it).

Happy Nutella Day, everyone!

Thanks to the (webby) organizers of this stupendous holiday: Ms Adventures in Italy, Bleeding Espresso, and World Nutella Day.

Scharffen Berger Bakery Crawl

Last Friday, I had the fun privilege of being invited on a Scharffen Berger Bakery Crawl in San Francisco. A very fun event where 30+ unsuspecting members of the media (hey that's me!) hitched a ride on a trolly bus and drove to 4 lovely bake shops to sample wares that featured Scharffen Berger chocolates within them. The company is launching another, newer adaptation of their chocolate adventure contest; this year the idea is to elevate a classic recipe. 

Meeting point was at the Scharffen Berger Ferry Building shop where we were picked up by the trolly bus. It was a gorgeous October afternoon, and none other than the beginning of Fleet week, so the Blue Angels were doing a couple practice fly overs when we started. *awesome*

Our first stop was Anthony's Cookies where we sampled a double chocolate chunk cookie with walnuts. It was pretty much a perfect cookie: gooey inside and chewy/crispy outside. The nuts were a great add in with the chocolate and the flavors were well balanced. It was at this moment though that I had my first experience of being a member of the foodie paparazzi. I think everyone around me was more interested in taking a picture of the product than tasting it (not to say that they didn't get devoured in the end). Also of note: the cookie was still fabulous 2 days later when I got around to eating the rest of the "take home" sample. Delicious. 

After spending a little time chatting with Anthony himself and interrogating him about what his Twitter handle was, we packed back into the trolly and headed for Citizen Cake. 

I had been there myself a couple years back, but it has since moved, expanded, and transformed into what feels like an old fashioned ice cream parlor. Very cute interior, and the desserts in the cases looked impeccable. But we were there to try a sundae, hand made especially by Elizabeth Falkner, owner and celebrity chef/baker herself. Running with the idea of elevating a classic, she created an egg free chocolate gelato that she froze on the spot with liquid nitrogen (that she keeps a tank of right by the cash register!) and was an epic crowd pleaser to watch her make (more food paparazzi on that one). 

Apparently, liquid nitrogen was a Victorian era method for making ice cream, so while it sounds all spacey, scientific, and futuristic, she's actually harking back to ye old days when making this dessert. The final sundae was a dollop of gelato, a dollop of home made marshmallow cream (using xantham gum instead of gelatin - gotta remember that one), and fudge, nibs, and chocolate curls. It was very tasty. I enjoyed the marshmallow cream a lot, and while the chocolate gelato was good, I felt it could have been richer (it melted into a very low viscosity pool as I was eating my sample), which made me think it was unnecessarily low in fat. But the chocolate flavor was very good, and since this tour is all about chocolate, that is what I will take away from it.  

Jumping back in the trolly we swung over into Ghirardelli Square to sample a special Kara's cupcake flavor. She designed a "candy bar" cupcake featuring a chocolate cupcake, a dollop of caramel in the center, peanut butter ganache frosting and a sprinkling of sea salt. Yeah, it was pretty good. Very rich, as peanut butter often does for dessert. Sadly, I don't think I ended up getting a good sample of the caramel in the half a cupcake I tasted, which was disappointing, as I was looking forward to it.

By this time, we were running a bit late, so we headed back to the Ferry building for another quick stop at Miette to try a triple chocolate cream cake, but had to get it to go to make it to our final engagement, a baking demo by Yigit Pura. I did sample the Miette cake the next day when my stomach was mostly recovered from the sugar overload of Friday night, and it was quite delectable. Very moist, rich, creamy and chocolatey, with a lovely ganache topping. No complaints.

Moving on quickly to the baking demo though, our host Yigit was very charming and filled in his baking tips with funny anecdotes such as making chocolate and cream get along (2 unlikely couples: fat and water) by adding a little invert sugar, kind of like giving you and your in-laws a few gin martinis to get everyone relaxed. Silly and memorable. He also said not to whisk ganache, which I am definitely guilty of doing, so glad I took home a few good pieces of advice in addition to all the chocolate desserts.

He created a dessert using his go-to chocolate cake with chai tea spices added in, filled with a dulce de leche filling, and topped with ganache and a little pretty gold leafing. Initially I thought the cake was dry, but after further inspection (yeah, I ate the whole thing), I feel like it was just really dense, and I was already really parched from eating so much chocolate already. The spices were pretty good, but it's not my favorite combo for a chocolate dessert. It was well done though, so if that's up your alley, you would enjoy it. 

To culminate the evening, we did get more swag, like an apron (chocolate stains won't show on that!), a lovely (huge) whisk (you can never have too many whisks, right?), and of course, chocolate. This is on top of the take home samples, and tasting squares they fed us in between bakery stops, of course. 

I may have made myself a little sick on chocolate desserts for dinner, but the whole experience was completely worth it. It was also very fun to meet with other foodies, bloggers, journalists, and chocoholics.  

If their intention was to get me pumped about the contest, they definitely succeeded. I am looking forward to "elevating" a classic of my own, and left feeling inspired by what the other bakers had created. 

Spumoni Cupcakes

I love spumoni. I remember the first time I had it was when I was probably 7 and visiting family in Portland, Oregon. I mostly remember only odd tid-bits about that trip such as my cousin ordering a salad with honey mustard dressing which was also foreign and fascinating to this young girl who only knew about ranch. But I digress. It wasn't actually spumoni like the way it's supposed to be a slice from a terrine mold with the 3 flavors of ice cream and whip cream in between the layers - it was just a scoop with all 3 delectable flavors: chocolate, pistachio and cherry pineapple. It's like the ultimate reincarnation of Neapolitan.

But, it was years again before I ever saw Spumoni as an option, and it happened to be Dreyers (East Coast translation: Edy's) ice cream that brought it back to me years later. I'm sure that die-hard spumoni lovers out there would be remised to know that I actually adore the terribly fake, Americanized knock-off version of this Italian delight that Dreyers produces. I think they must somehow enhance or overly sweeten the pistachio flavor, because I've had some really REAL pistachio flavored gelatos in my day that were not as endearing to my palette. Knowing that I really love the flavor of the enhanced (chemically produced?) version of pistachio ice cream, I was a little worried about trying to make my own homemade variation of that flavor. I probably could have just bought pistachio extract, but that's just not readily available, and since I tend to bake on a whim, I didn't have time to wait around for an online order. The world we live in, I swear; such inconveniences.

So, I did some reading up on how to make pistachio flavor really stand out, and found Browneyedbaker to have a useful suggestion to steep the pistachios in hot milk, a trick she used to infuse her pistachio ice cream. I think it worked out pretty well, as the pistachio flavor in both my cupcake and frosting hit the spot.

Alas, I went through the process of making these cupcakes in my typical willy-nilly fashion of kind of making it up as I went, so in some cases only have approximate quantities. I'm sure it'll be fine...

Pistachio Cupackes
- 1 cup milk
- 1 cup pistachios (roasted, unsalted), divided
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 egg
- a few drops of green food coloring (optional)
Heat the milk up to almost boiling and soak 1/2 cup pistachios in it until the milk returns to room temperature. Strain out pistachios (reserve) and use only 3/4 cup for cupcakes. (Remaining 1/4 cup and nuts will be used for frosting). Add food coloring to milk if using (don't over do the green, just looks good with a little extra color).

Line cupcake tins (will make about 24-30 cupcakes).

Whisk together pistachios, flour, salt and baking powder and set aside.
Beat butter and sugar together until smooth. Add egg and scrape sides of the bowl, mixing until incorporated and fluffy. Alternating with the flour and milk mixture, slowly mix together, scraping bowl as needed, until incorporated. Batter will be pretty thick. (If desired, you can toss in a handful of the pre-soaked pistachios into the batter if you like the extra texture). Spoon a heaping table spoon of batter into the bottom of each cupcake liner. Make next batter:

Cherry Pineapple Cupcakes
These would probably be delicious all on their own (actually, so would the pistachio).
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/2 cup Maraschino cherries and crushed pineapple, well drained
- dash of red food coloring (optional)
Whisk together dry ingredients and set aside.
Beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add egg, and scraping down sides of the bowl as needed, mix until light and fluffy again. Alternating with flour mixture and milk, gradually add each until incorporated. Toss in the cherry/pineapple mix and stir until incorporated. The cherries will probably do a little bit of coloring to the batter on their own, but I helped it along a little with a dash of red food color. This batter will also be pretty thick. Spoon 1 heaping table spoon of it on top of each pistachio layer. Make chocolate:

Chocolate Cupcakes:
Preheat oven to 350˚
- 1 cup flour
- 1/3 cup cocoa powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup water
- 1/4 cup milk

Whisk together dry ingredients and set aside.
Beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add cocoa powder and whip until incorporated. Add vanilla and egg, and beat until fluffy and creamy looking. Heat water and milk together until almost boiling (I just head in the microwave for 45 - 60 seconds until it steams a bit).  Alternating with flour mixture, gradually add milk and flour until mix is incorporated. This batter will be a bit runnier, so if using a stand mixer and the liquid is getting out of control, whisk together by hand. Try not to over mix. Spoon batter over the tops of the other batters in the cupcake tins until 3/4 full.
Bake cupcakes for 20 minutes and then cool completely. For the record, the chocolate layer didn't rise as perfectly as it should have. I believe I had 2 tbs too much butter, but since this was exactly what I did, I felt it was best to give it to you as I made it. It was tasty, and you cover the top with plenty of frosting, so the less than perfect dome tops weren't a big bother to me. If you want perfection, I say try with just 6 tbs of butter instead of a whole stick and see if that does the trick.

Now it's time to make the frosting.

Pistachio Buttercream
- 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- reserved pistachio flavored milk and soaked nuts

Beat butter until smooth. Add powdered sugar and beat until incorporated with butter, and creamy, scraping bowl. With beaters running, slowly add milk until frosting gets light and fluffy. Probably only need a couple teaspoons to do the trick. Add in a few nuts and continue to beat until incorporated. Frost 1/3 of each cupcake with the pistachio frosting.

Cherry Pineapple Buttercream
Same idea here
- 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 1/4 cup maraschino cherry and pineapple, well drained (even patted dry with paper towel if you're up for it)
Beat butter until creamy, adding powdered sugar until fluffy, scraping sides of the bowl as needed. Add in the cherry pineapple mix and beat until well incorporated. Could toss in a bit of food coloring here too, but I think the cherries do a pretty good job of coloring on their own. Frost the middle 1/3 of each cupcake.

Chocolate Buttercream
- 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 2 tbs cocoa powder
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2-3 tsp milk

Beat butter until creamy, adding powdered sugar until fluffy, scraping sides of the bowl as needed. Add in the cocoa powder until incorporated. Add vanilla, and then milk and beat until light and fluffy. You can add more cocoa powder if you like a darker brown color.  Frost the last 1/3 of each cupcake. 

Whew! Quite an operation for just "one" cupcake, but totally worth it. I loved them.

Now do the dishes @_@

Watermelon Cupcakes

Summer is sort of coming to a close, so I'm a little tardy in posting this recipe. But if you really like watermelon, you might want to bookmark it for when watermelon is back at its peek in season. I personally am not head over heels for watermelon myself, but the idea of a watermelon cupcake seemed like a fun challenge. I used fresh fruit that I pureed and made into a pastry cream filling, and topped the cupcake with a light meringue frostings, one that wouldn't over power the flavor of the filling.

Watermelon Cream

Patience was the death of me on this recipe. You have to let the gelatin mixture set up for a couple hours, but can't leave it all night because you need to whip in the cream at the point where the mixture is just turning gelatinous. I thought I had screwed it up the first time, so made 2 batches of watermelon gel, one of which over set, making watermelon jello. I'm sure it was delicious, but as I mentioned before, I'm not THAT crazy about watermelon, so it didn't appeal to me so much. 

- 2 1/4 cups, divided, seeded, watermelon, pureed

- 1 envelope unflavored gelatin

- 1 cup sugar

- 1 tablespoon lemon juice

- 1/2 cup whipping cream, whipped

Combine gelatin and 1/4 cup watermelon puree; set aside. 

Bring remaining 2 cups puree to a boil in a small saucepan. Remove from heat; add gelatin mixture, and stir until gelatin dissolves. Stir in sugar and lemon juice, and chill mixture until consistency of unbeaten egg white (2 hours or so, check on it though).

Fold whipped cream into chilled watermelon mixture. Keep chilled until ready to use. 

White Cupcake

- 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

- 1 1/2 cups sugar

- 2 cups all purpose flour

- 2 teaspoons baking powder

- 1/4 teaspoon salt

- 3 large eggs

- 3/4 cup milk

Preheat to 350 degrees. Line cupcake tins (makes 18-24). 

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside. 

With mixer or in stand mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time until incorporated, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture alternating with the milk mixture until all mixed together. 

Pour the batter into prepared tins. Bake 20 minutes, then cool completely. Hollow out each cupcake making room for filling, and then pipe filling into each. 

Italian Meringue Frosting

- 3/4 cup sugar

- 1/4 cup light corn syrup

- 1/4 cup water

- 4 egg whites

- 1/8 teaspoon salt

- green food coloring

Beat egg whites at high speed with an electric mixer until foamy; add salt, and beat until stiff peaks form. Let sit while you cook syrup:

Cook first sugar, corn syrup and water in a heavy saucepan over medium heat, stirring constantly, until sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil, and boil until a candy thermometer registers 248° (about 5 minutes).

With mixer running, gradually whisk hot syrup into egg whites, whisking until stiff peaks form and frosting is of spreading consistency.

I added a couple drops of green food coloring to the whole batch and put half the frosting in a pastry bag, then added a few drops more to the remaining frosting and filled another bag with the remaining frosting. 

Once cupcakes are filled, pipe a stripe of the darker green frosting across the tops of the cupcakes, then go back with the lighter frosting to make the alternating stripes, similar to how a watermelon has stripes. I felt like the look of the cupcakes was only so-so, as the frosting was a little aerated, so had a really bubbly texture, versus a watermelon that is rather firm. But, everyone who tried them liked them! I usually don't refrigerate cupcakes, but since these had the gelatin filling, I didn't want to change them melting. Apparently the side effect was that the filling had a delightful chill, perfectly capturing the summer refreshment of watermelon. 

Orange 'n' Cream Cupcakes

With summer officially here, I am definitely feeling nostalgic for the summer flavors I enjoyed as a kid. I'm sure most American kids can recall the wonderous taste of an orange creamsicle pop or Orange Julius drink. There's something delightfully tart, creamy, and sweet about it that embodies the taste of lazy summers.

Making that flavor into a cupcakes was a no brainer. This flavor has been one of my top sellers since I started offering it back in 2009. I was surprised to find that I had never blogged about it before, so figured it was about time I did. And speaking of blogging, I was very delighted to receive an email last week regarding my blog. Apparently, people are reading, and someone decided I qualified for the "Top 50 Cutest Cupcake Blogs." Thanks! You can find the complete list here. While I am very honored to make anyone's "top" list, I will say, if there is a top 50 list... exactly how many cupcake blogs are out there? Yikes. In any case, I definitely enjoy making new and different flavors, and am glad you enjoy reading the recipes I've come up with, so thanks for checking it out.

PastrySchools.net

Orange 'n' Cream Cupcakes
I use a yogurt cake base for this cupcake as it is extremely moist and delicious and has served me well for this recipe. Easily replace orange with lemon, grapefruit, ugli fruit, or any other citrus you want. Sadly, I found the base for this recipe so long ago, I don't even remember its source. Blogger fail.

• 1-1/2 cups flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 1 cup plain yogurt
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2 teaspoons grated orange zest
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil

Preheat oven to 350˚.
Line cupcake tins. Makes approximately 18.

In small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, & salt.
In medium bowl, whisk together yogurt, sugar, eggs, zest, vanilla, and oil.
Gently blend the wet into the dry mix, until incorporated. Do not over mix.
Fill cupcake lines 3/4 way full and bake for 20 minutes. Cool.

Orange 'n' Cream Frosting

• 8 oz. cream cheese
• 1/4 butter, room temperature
• 1-1/2 c powdered sugar
• 1 tsp orange zest
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

In stand mixer, beat butter and cream cheese until incorporated. Gradually add in powdered sugar, scraping down sides of bowl to fully incorporate. Add zest and vanilla and beat until fluffy. Pipe half the frosting onto the cooled cupcakes. I make a swirled pattern on top, leaving space for another round of "orange" swirl. Add a little bit of food coloring to the remaining frosting, making it orange. Pipe the remaining frosting onto the cupcakes, completing the swirls.

Banana Caramel Cake in Phyllo Cups

In January this year, I was challenged to make a cupcake combining the 3 flavors of banana, caramel and phyllo dough. Certainly not a bad combo of flavors to be coerced into working with. The reason for the delay being the challenger of this flavor combo is not someone I see often, so am only now getting the opportunity to accept the request.

On another side note of importance, I have succumbed to the pressures of the many food bloggers out there, all with their pretty food pictures, and finally invested in a DSLR. And if the absolute joy in I felt in taking this evening's pictures is evidence, I think it may have been a good decision. If you're keeping tabs, it is a Canon Rebel T2i. I'd take a picture of it, but that would not only be tricky, requiring mirrors or something, but also a little "chicken or the egg" for me.

Anyway, back to cupcakes. Aside from them looking rather dashing, I wasn't wrong about the flavor combo being delectable. I tried a new banana cupcake batter this time (which, oh by the way has rum in it - yum), and whipped up some homemade caramel sauce for the occasion. Which if I haven't mentioned before, is pretty freaking easy and completely delicious, so why would you ever bother buying it?

Caramel Sauce
I've tried many variations of this before, and think I've landed on my favorite. Taken mostly from Simply Recipes (frankly, you might as well check out her instructions because she goes into way more detail and includes safety tips - I just leave you to your own devices!):

• 1 cup sugar
• 6 tbs butter, but into pieces
• 1/2 cream
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

First off, do have all your ingredients ready to go before you start. In a heavy 2-3 quart pot, melt sugar over low to medium heat, stirring frequently to prevent burning. Once sugar has melted, it will be begin to darken into an amber color. This is where you get to choose how rich you want your sauce. Be careful to not let it burn though. Once it reaches the optimal caramel color, removed from heat and add in butter. It will foam up a bit. Whisk until smoother, then add in cream. This will really bubble up, and seize. Just work through it and keep whisking until it comes together. Let cool for a bit, then transfer to a glass jar or container to continue cooling.

Phyllo Cups
Melt 1/2 cup of butter in a small dish. Unroll one log of phyllo dough, placing one sheet upon a work surface (cutting board or cookie sheet will do), and brushing it all over with some of the melted butter. Add another sheet on top, and repeat the process so that you have about 5-6 layers of phyllo. Cut dough into squares that are roughly 2-3 inches wider than the cavities of a muffin tin. Or bigger, or smaller, or wider, or longer - whatever you think will look good. mold each square patch of phyllo into the cavities of every other hole of the muffin tin. Mine was overlapping a bit, so I didn't want to have issues with the phyllo getting stuck in cake batter or something like that, so just kept the spacing between them to be safe. I did have to repeat with another batch of 6 sheets of phyllo, but didn't end up using the entire log of dough.

Once the tins are prepped (I made 3 tins based on the amount of batter and layout mentioned above), make cupcake batter.

Banana Cupcakes
Stolen almost completely from Baking Obsession
2 cups flour

¾ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
1 ½ cups banana puree (about 3 large bananas)
½ cup sour cream (I forgot to buy some, so used milk with a 1/2 tsp of white vinegar mixed in)
2 tbsp dark rum
1 ½ tsp pure vanilla extract
½ cup butter, room temperature
½ cup sugar
½ cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs

Preheat oven to 350˚

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, soda, powder and salt and set aside.

In a small bowl, whisk together sour cream (or milk), rum and vanilla and set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat butter until smooth. Add in both sugars and beat until creamy, scraping down sides of the bowl at least once. Add eggs one at a time until incorporated.

In batches, mix in 1/3 flour mixture, then 1/2 liquid, flour, then liquid then flour until incorporated. Fold in banana puree.

Using a 1/4 cup measure, fill phyllo cups with dough and bake for 20 minutes. Phyllo should get nice a crispy in that time. Rotate pans halfway through if one side is getting browner than the other.

Let cupcakes cool while you make the frosting.

Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
Can't have Banana cupcakes without some kind of cream cheese frosting.

• 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
• 8 oz. cream cheese
• 2-1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 2-3 tbs caramel sauce

Beat butter until creamy, then add in cream cheese and beat together, scraping down sides of the bowl at least once. Gradually add powdered sugar until mix gets thick and creamy, scraping down sides of the bowl still. Beat in caramel until smooth. Texture will probably be on the softer side, but isn't exactly runny. If you want a firmer frosting, reduce cream cheese quantity and bump up the butter a bit.

Top cupcakes with frosting, then swirl in caramel sauce on top. I attempted to fill a cupcake with caramel too, but it seemed like a bit too much. Maybe I was wrong and it would be insanely delicious. Give it a shot. Surely you could garnish these cupcakes with slices of ripe banana as well. I was too in love with the swirly pattern to let it be obstructed by anything.



I hope I win the challenge!

Arnold Palmer Cupcakes

While sipping on some ice tea this weekend, it occurred to me I hadn't ever tried making a tea cupcake before. I've thought extensively about making an Earl Grey flavor, cuz it's just the best tea ever ("Tea, Early Grey, Hot" of course), but still haven't gotten around to it.

But it is pretty much summer now, and that means iced tea is in order. While I enjoy my iced tea simply and unadorned, an Arnold Palmer is quite a refreshing twist, and a great excuse to use up some lemons I've been neglecting.

I didn't stray far from a traditional vanilla cupcake recipe, and probably could have used a higher concentration of tea to balance out the lemon (maybe seep 2 or 3 if you want the tea flavor to pop), but I think otherwise they came out quite tasty.

Black Tea Cupcake with Lemon Zest
1/3 c + 1 tsb milk
1 bag black tea
6 tbs butter, room temperature
1/2 c sugar
1/4 c brown sugar
2 eggs
1 c flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp lemon zest

Preheat oven to 350˚.

Line cupcake tin with 10-12 liners.

In small saucepan or microwave safe dish, heat milk to just boiling and seep tea bag until cooled.
Whisk together dry ingredients & zest in a small bowl.

With electric mixer, beat butter and sugars together until creamy. Scrape down sides of bowl and then add eggs, one at a time until incorporated.

Beginning and ending with flour mixture, alternate gradually incorporating milk and flour. Do not over mix.

Fill cupcake liners, then bake for 20 minutes. Cool completely.

Lemon Frosting
1 stick butter, room temperature
1-1/2 c powdered sugar
1 tbs lemon zest
1-2 tbs lemon juice

Beat butter until creamy. Gradually add in powdered sugar until crumbly. Add in zest and juice until frosting is light and fluffy.

Pipe frosting onto cooled cupcakes. I garnished a few with lemon slices, but candied lemon would probably stay better. Or none at all. I just thought they were pretty.

Rootbeer Float Cupcakes

I do adore anything that qualifies as "retro," from neon signage, to clothes, to cupcake flavors. When I saw BrownEyedBaker's Rootbeer Float Bundt cake, it reminded me that I still had to try my own cupcake version of this flavor combo. It has been on the (ridiculously long) list of things to try baking ever since I made Dr. Pepper cupcakes, but hadn't got around to it yet.

So, I really did follow the bundt cake recipe verbatim, but only made half the amount of batter. (Quick tip for approximating quantities: each 1 cup of flour per cupcake recipe will typically turn out approximately 12 cupcakes). (though in this case I managed 14).  (Hey, I said approximately!) Instead of making the fudgey rootbeer frosting, I made a malted vanilla buttercream, hoping to mimic the somewhat malty flavor that happens when you pour rootbeer onto vanilla ice cream, without the need for ice cream (sorry, nothing agains ice cream, but when it comes to cupcakes, I prefer to keep my options open by not requiring a fridge/freezer).

I brought these to a friend's Memorial Day get together, and am pretty sure they went over well considering the call for "who wants another cupcake?" was met with a chorus of takers (and none leftover). Overall, the flavor was rich and chocolatey, texture was spongy and moist, and the frosting was reviewed as having "something" about it that was delectable (yay malt powder!). I do have to say though, it wasn't very rootbeer-y, which I think I could counter with a nice rootbeer flavored filling of some kind. But for now, I still recommend it as an almost perfect chocolate cupcake worthy of baking again.

Bundt cake recipe here, cut in half to accommodate a dozen +/- cupcakes.

Malty rootbeer frosting:

• 3/4 c butter, room temperature
• 2-1/2 c powdered sugar
• 1/2 c malt powder (at first, I thought this was too much and panicked, but it turned out to be just fine)
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1-2 tbs rootbeer syrup, cooled (from the 1 bottle of Virgil's I had, after using 1 cup for the cupcakes, what was left I let boil down slightly until it was de-carbonated and a thicker viscosity)

Whip butter until creamy. Add in malt powder and powdered sugar until crumbly. Add in vanilla extract and continue to whip (scraping down sides of bowl as needed) and then add in rootbeer syrup until frosting has smoothed out.

I though it would be cute to dollop a "scoop" of frosting on top of each cupcake so it would look like ice cream. I think it worked out all right, but if you didn't know that was what I was going for, I think they kind of just looked sloppy. If I ever think to do a "scoop" of frosting again, I will chill it completely before scooping. I didn't have enough time before heading out the door to let it fully set, which is why I think it had some issues.

Enough of my rattling on about it - go bake some cupcakes already!

Happy Memorial Day!