February 27, 2010

Maple Cupcakes, eh?

Have you been watching the Olympics?  The closing ceremonies are tomorrow, and then we'll be done with winter sports for a while.  It's been fun having the Games so close to home, although I will never understand why on earth we can't watch events without such a heinous tape delay.  Especially when they're happening just a half-day's drive from here.  Honestly, NBC, what gives?  Figure skating at midnight??  How am I supposed to get up and bake in the morning when I'm staying up late to watch the Soap Opera on Ice?



Bad TV scheduling aside, this has been a fun Olympics.  I don't remember pulling for Canada before, but I've been finding myself just as happy when a Canadian wins a medal as I am when an American does.  O, Canada has been going through my head for two weeks now, and I'm getting less annoyed at people with French accents......they might be Canadian, after all!  So in honor of the Vancouver Olympics, I give you these fabulous Semi-Canadian Maple Leaf Cupcakes!




February 21, 2010

Chocolate Spice Cupcakes

The weather here in Portland has been absolutely glorious this week.  I know other parts of the country are still in the thick of it, winter-wise, but it sure feels like spring around here.  The crocus are up, I've got a few tulips and daffodils blooming, and my favorite flowering plum tree is now covered in delicate pink blossoms.  With the blue skies and balmy temperatures, you'd think I'd be itching to bake something light and springy, right?  Carrot cake, maybe, or Hummingbird cake?  Wrong.  Despite the spring-like conditions, it IS still February, folks, and today it was all about deep, dark chocolate and warm, wintry spices.  Allow me to introduce you to my new friends, the Chocolate Spice Cupcakes.


February 17, 2010

Streusel and a few words about toppings

Part of the fun of making cupcakes is the ability to get creative with fillings, frostings, and especially the toppings.  Once you start looking around, you'll see potential toppings everywhere.   I've topped cupcakes with everything from peanut butter cups to fortune cookies to bacon.  If it has some relevance to the flavor of cupcake or if it's going to contribute to the all-over flavor, then go for it!  Be creative!  But also be careful.....there are some things that shouldn't make their way onto cupcakes.  Here, I'll give you some examples.


Strudel.  Strudel shouldn't be a cupcake topper.  We love sweets around here, and usually I'm a "more is more" kind of girl, but not in this case.  Strudel is another dessert all by itself, so cupcakes + strudel = overkill.  



Schnitzel.  The only meat that should touch your cupcakes is bacon, and that's because bacon is awesome and can be eaten on anything.   Schnitzel, on the other hand, is breaded veal.  Baby cow is not bacon, so no matter how tempted you might be to slap a chunk of schnitzel on your pretty li'l cupcakes, don't do it.



Schnoodles.  People, we just don't put puppies on cupcakes.  Yes, puppies are cute.  Yes, cupcakes are also cute, so I know it seems like a natural fit, but I'm here to tell you that it just ain't right.   Leave the puppies alone.

So what does that leave us with?  

February 14, 2010

Happy New Year!

Happy Chinese New Year, that is!  Welcome to the Year of the Tiger......let's have some cake, shall we?


There we go!  That handsome guy is one of 36 fondant Chinese zodiac animals that I rolled, cut, and colored for my oldest daughter's birthday this weekend.  She turned nine on the Saturday, and we had a Chinese-themed party for the neighborhood girls.  They had a blast dipping fortune cookies in chocolate (and SMOTHERING them in sprinkles), painting their Chinese names, and eating with chopsticks......but no matter what else happens at a birthday party, the star of the show is always the cake, right?  Right.  So let's get to it!



February 10, 2010

A Pink and Red (Velvet) Extravaganza!

I love it when I have a great plan for something and it falls totally flat.  I mean, the falling flat part isn't so great, but Plan B often seems to work out better than Plan A would have.  That's what happened this week with these Red Velvet Cupcakes.



Two of my girls are in a belly dancing class, and for their little Valentine's Day party a few days ago,  I decided to make the totally faboo brownies from my Baked cookbook.  They were going to be great;  I had big plans that involved heart-shaped cookie cutters, marshmallows, and pink sanding sugar.......but THAT was Plan A, and we've already established that it didn't go so well.  Let's just say that when baking, accidentally using chocolate candymelts instead of ACTUAL chocolate is not recommended.

Anyway, Plan B was implemented at the last minute, and what started out as normal red velvet cupcakes turned into a gigantic Red-and-Pink-a-thon.   They were super Valentine-y, and the girls loved them.....but when have you ever seen a room full of 9 year old girls NOT love anything that was pretty, sweet, and pink??  Exactly......I have a built-in fan base.  Know your audience, people.

February 7, 2010

Not to be trusted

These cupcakes are devious.  They're sweet and cute.  They draw you in with their nostalgic charm, and then BAM!  They turn on you.  You'll think you are strong, and you'll think you can resist, but forget it.  You'll be powerless against them.

These are the lovely, adorable Valentine's cupcakes from Martha's cupcake book.  They're made from her One-Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes and topped with a Shiny Chocolate Ganache Glaze.   Aren't they the best?


 The good news is that these were SUPER easy to recreate at home.  The bad news is that they are DELICIOUS.  And evil.  And not to be trusted.  Did I already mention that?  Here, I'll give you a glimpse of how things went down at my house this morning.....

February 4, 2010

Orange Vanilla Bean Cupcakes

So you have a bunch of extra citrus fruits languishing around your kitchen and aren't sure what to do with them?  Here, let me give you a suggestion.  Make candied citrus slices and then DON'T put them on these cupcakes.  Just eat them up all by themselves.  Yum!  They're a little syrupy, so be prepared for some sticky fingers.  I suppose you could drain them on a wire rack and then sprinkle with sugar, but seriously, forget the cupcakes.





I actually didn't set out to make these ones first, but I *did* happen to have a bunch of random citrus in my kitchen (a by-product of making this beautiful salad).  I had about four small blood oranges that were creeping my girls out (?), so I decided to use them instead of giant navel oranges, which, frankly, seemed like they'd be more a bedspread than a topping on a dainty little cupcake.

These cupcakes are fairly straightforward (cake, frosting, topping), but they actually ended up being really time-consuming, and I was pretty underwhelmed with the end result.  I hoped they'd be really orange-y and vanilla-y, but.....meh.  They LOOKED pretty, but they were definitely not worth all the effort.  First of all, the candied citrus slices.  I spent about an hour tending a simmering pot of oranges and sugar water a day before I made the cupcakes, which is a pretty big time investment already.  Anytime I have to spread a project over more than one day, my enthusiasm drops significantly.  The oranges can be put into a jar and covered with the syrup and kept for several days, which is good, because you can get this step out of the way before you bake.  But like I said before, I might just quit right there....

So the second issue I had here was the fact that the recipe only makes 12 to 14 cupcakes.  That's pretty much a half recipe, compared to most cupcake recipes out there.  Coupled with the fact that you have to make the damn orange slices......well, that's too much work for too few cupcakes.

The cake turned out nice, but another issue I have with it is that it called for the scraped seeds from TWO whole vanilla beans.  Now, I happen to have a ton of very nice vanilla beans right now, but two whole beans for a dozen cupcakes is kind of pushing the limits of ingredient sacrifice.  They ended up with a nice vanilla flavor, but it was still pretty subtle, and I think I probably could have made do with one bean.

All right.  Here's a picture of the ones I made.  Now remember, I used blood oranges, which turned REALLY bloody when I candied them.  Actually, once I got them on the cupcakes, I couldn't stop thinking that they looked like sliced tomatoes, and I even got kinda grossed out a time or two.  Maybe something nice like a Meyer lemon would have been a better, non-gory, non-vegetabley choice.


That's pretty, right?  A little tomato-y, but pretty.  Martha's version has much tinier dots of frosting, but I didn't have the right size decorating tip, so whatever.  Oh!  Speaking of frosting, let me also say this:  the recipe tells you to use Her swiss meringue buttercream, which uses a full pound of butter and yields 5 cups of frosting.  Do you remember I told you that this recipe only makes like a dozen cupcakes?  What does that work out to, almost a half cup of frosting per cupcake?  Ack!  You have my permission to cut the frosting recipe in half, people.  Half.   The frosting was lovely, though, smooth and silky like swiss meringue buttercream ought to be.  

Oh, and I can't believe I almost forgot this part.  Remember my speculation that when I bit into this cupcake the orange slice might come off in my face in one big piece?  I was right on the money.  That puppy came off in one big sweet and chewy chunk.  It's a good thing I wasn't trying to impress anyone.

Orange Vanilla Bean Cupcakes

Makes 12 to 14 
Preheat oven to 350ยบ

Whisk together in a bowl:
2 cups flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Combine in a small bowl or liquid measuring cup:
3/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup fresh orange juice
1 tbsp vanilla extract

In an electric mixer set on medium-high speed, cream together:
1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
seeds scraped from 2 vanilla beans
1 tbsp orange zest

Add, one at a time, beating between each one:
2 eggs

Reduce speed to low.  Add flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of the cream mixture, and beat just to combine.

Divide batter among lined cups.  Bake until cake tester comes out clean, 20 - 25 minutes.  Transfer pan to wire rack and let cool completely.

To finish, use a serrated knife to trip tops of cupcakes to make level.  Spread buttercream (don't forget to cut this recipe in half) over the tops in a smooth layer.  Place a candied orange slice on each cupcake.  Fill a pastry bag fitted with a small, plain tip and pipe dots around edge of each orange.

Cupcakes can be refrigerated up to 1 day in airtight containers.