Peanut butter cupcakes with white chocolate frosting and a sprinkling of white chocolate shavings!  I have to say that the peanut butter flavor really overpowers the white chocolate frosting, even though the frosting really does taste like white chocolate.  It still tastes pretty darn good though!

A note about the frosting – make it as soon as you’re ready to eat it.  It starts out nice and white, but after it sits for a few hours, it starts to turn yellowish.

And finally, keep a glass of cold milk nearby because just like straight peanut butter, these cupcakes stick to the roof of your mouth!

Peanut Butter Cupcakes
Adapted from I Heart Cuppycakes
Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 cup all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup smooth peanut butter, room temp
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk

Method
Preheat oven to 350F. Line muffin tin cupcs with paper cupcake liners

Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl and set aside

In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the butter, peanut butter and brown sugar until smoothly blended and lightened in color, about 1 minute. Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed during mixing. Mix in egg. Add vanilla and beat for 1 minute or until batter smooth.

On low speed, add the flour mixture in 3 additions and the milk in 2 additions, beginning and ending with the flour mixture and mixing until the flour is incorporated and the batter looks smooth.

Fill each liner with a generous 1/4 cup of batter, to about 1/3 inch below the top of the liner. Bake just until the tops feel firm and are lightly browned and a toothpic inserted in the center comes out clean, about 22 minutes. There will be cracks on the top. Cool cupcakes for 10 minutes in the pan on wire rack.

White Chocolate Buttercream
Adapted from BBC Good Food
Makes enough for 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
100g white chocolate
140g unsalted butter
140g icing sugar

Method
Melt the chocolate over a double boiler, stirring often. Leave to cool. Beat the butter and icing sugar in a large bowl until creamy. Beat in the chocolate. Use immediately.

We just had to keep looking on the bright side – our plane finally touching down in Sydney.

We’ve been back for about 7 months now and it feels like we never even spent those 3 long years in the US.  Even though we did spend all that time there, we didn’t make many friends and we didn’t know our neighbors very well; we didn’t even get out much (but there’s so much more to do here than where we were in Indiana).  Here, we are lucky to have some great neighbors – one of them even grows their own fruit and vegetables, organically, and are kind enough to share their bounty with us, such as butternut pumpkins, persimmons, plums, lemons and limes.  I’ve made pumpkin bread, persimmon bread, a lime tart, lemon melting moments and lemon butter with some of these fruits.  It’s great to bake with fresh food that I know is free from chemicals.

A few weeks ago, our neighbor gave us a bag full of lemons.  I had to run through a list of what I could make with lemons!  For this post I’m going to feature lemon meringue cupcakes.  I used the zest and juice of a couple of the lemons to make these cupcakes.  If you’re going to use and eat the zest of a citrus fruit, I highly recommend that you buy organic as the skin of citrus fruit absorbs a lot of those nasty chemicals that are sprayed onto them.

The recipe for these lemon meringue cupcakes comes from Martha Stewart, of course.  I don’t own her Cupcakes book, but this is one of the many recipes in that book that are already on her website.

The cupcakes are really nice, and my husband even exclaimed, in the middle of a mouthful of his cupcake, that they were really good.  I didn’t expect him to like a lemon meringue cupcake, but he certainly did!

The cake is soft and moist, and very lemony due to the addition of the lemon zest and juice.  The meringue frosting, although I made a mess with the sugar syrup, turned out really well and was super marshmallowy.  The lemon curd, well, I cheated and bought a jar of lemon curd from the store!

I don’t own a kitchen blow-torch, so I stuck these cupcakes under the broiler for a few minutes.  It didn’t brown like Martha’s did, of course, but at least by doing that, it gave the meringue a slightly crunchy skin.

Martha’s lemon meringue cupcakes are light, airy and fresh, and would be a perfect summery dessert.  Of course, it’s winter here in Australia, so I can only imagine what it would be like to eat these in summer!

To our neighbors, if you’re reading this, you know who you are, and thank you for sharing with us!

Recipe source: Martha Stewart

First of all, let me say that I’ve been planning these cupcakes for weeks.  It all started when I made the coconut pancakes with bananas, creme fraiche and caramel sauce last month, which was a recipe from Valli Little in delicious. magazine.  I loved those pancakes.  The combination of those flavors was like nothing else my tastebuds have ever experienced (probably mostly because I had never eaten creme fraiche!).  I started thinking that this flavor combination would taste great as a cupcake as well, and I haven’t made cupcakes in ages!

Over the past week I finally made up my mind as to how I would make these cupcakes.  I would use a banana cupcake recipe and stir sweetened shredded coconut into the batter.  The frosting would be something of my own creation, which turned out fabulous – creme fraiche whipped with confectioners’ sugar.  I made the same caramel sauce for these cupcakes as I made for the pancakes, except I replaced the thickened cream with coconut milk (I would have used coconut cream if I had had any).  This turned out fabulous as well, such a great flavor.

The assembly was easy.  The creme fraiche frosting was a perfect consistency and instead of using my piping bag I just used a Ziploc bag, snipped a corner off and piped a small mound on top of each cupcake.  I wanted the coconut caramel sauce to be concentrated in one spot, as opposed to just drizzling it over the frosting) so that it’d be able to be tasted and the only way I could think of to do this was to use a baby spoon to make an indentation on the very top of the frosting (see photo below this paragraph) and fill it with the coconut caramel sauce.  I then placed a slice of banana on top of the hole and gently pushed it down to cover the pocket of sauce (and threw on a bit of extra sauce just for the fun of it).

I’m very pleased with how these turned out.  They very closely match the flavor of those coconut pancakes, which is what I was aiming for.  The creme fraiche is slightly sweet with the addition of some confectioners’ sugar, yet still slightly tangy.  These cupcakes are best served on the day of baking due to the creme fraiche, as well as the use of fresh sliced bananas, which can turn brown quickly.  Be sure to place the sliced bananas on top of the cupcakes just before serving.

If you are interested in making these cupcakes yourself, I realize that the main problem you may have is in finding, or even affording, creme fraiche.  Creme fraiche is not available at every grocery store.  Luckily I can find it at my local store, but it comes at a price.  It is $6 for 250g.

Don’t despair though, you can make your own creme fraiche.  I haven’t done it myself, but it is so easy that I may just do this in the coming weeks.  You can find the instructions at joyofbaking.com.

I’d also like to point out that you can use whatever banana cake/cupcake recipe you prefer for these cupcakes.  I chose one of the first ones I came across that I had all the ingredients for!

And yes, you guessed right, I am watching too much MasterChef – look at those silly “artistic” blobs and smears of coconut caramel sauce on the plate!

On a sort of related note, I’d like to say how shocked I was to find the above chocolate-brown cupcake liners at my local grocery store!  This particular color of cupcake liner is very much sought after.  I bought a pack of 100 for $2.65 at Woolworth’s (in Sydney, Australia).  Awesome!

Anyway, here are the recipes, enjoy!

Banana Coconut Cupcakes
Adapted from Food Network
Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick butter (113g), softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 large eggs
2 large ripe bananas, peeled, and mashed
1/2 rounded cup sweetened, shredded coconut
1 fresh banana, sliced, for decoration

Method
Preheat the oven to 350F (180C). Line 1 (12-cup) muffin pan with paper cupcake liners.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl, add the butter and the sugar. Beat with a hand-held mixer until combined. Add the sour cream and the vanilla extract. Slowly beat in the eggs, 1 at a time. Incorporate the dry mixture and wet mixtures together until thoroughly combined. Add the bananas and shredded coconut, being careful not to over mix. Using an ice cream scoop, fill each cupcake liner 3/4 way full. Bake in the preheated oven until the tops turn golden-brown and when a toothpick, inserted in the middle of the cupcake, comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Remove the cupcakes from the oven to a wire rack and let cool before frosting.

Creme Fraiche Frosting
Adapted from myself
Makes enough to frost 12 cupcakes, plus some leftover

Ingredients
250g creme fraiche
1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar

Method
Combine creme fraiche and confectioners sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer. Using the whisk attachment, whisk until thick and creamy, being careful not to overmix or it may become grainy. Use immediately.

Coconut Caramel Sauce
Adapted from delicious. magazine, November 2009
Makes about 2 cups, you’ll have plenty leftover

Ingredients
50g unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/2 cup firmly packed (100g) brown sugar
3 tablespoons honey
150ml coconut milk or coconut cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method
Stir all ingredients in a pan over low heat to dissolve sugar, then simmer for 5 minutes, until thickened. Cool to room temperature before using on cupcakes, otherwise it will melt the frosting.

Use leftovers for pancakes, pies or ice cream.

Assembly
Pipe a small mound of creme fraiche frosting on top of each cupcake using a plain round tip, or a Ziploc bag. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Using a small spoon or butter knife, insert the tip into the very top of the frosting and turn in a circular motion while pushing down to make an indentation, or pocket, in the frosting (see photo above). Fill this pocket with cooled coconut caramel sauce. Place a piece of sliced banana firmly, but gently, on top of the pocket of sauce to completely cover it. Drizzle a little bit of the sauce on top of the banana. Serve immediately.

If not serving immediately, I suggest frosting the cupcakes, and making the indentation beforehand. Store in the refrigerator. When it is time to serve, fill the indentation with the sauce and place the banana on top. Once decorated, the cupcakes are best eaten immediately.

Ballet class lasts only 30 minutes.  Luckily, if I practically run, I can make it over to the nearby Westfield shopping center for a special treat for myself.  I visit T2 Tea and sample all four of the teas they have on display that day and have a chat with the friendly ladies who work there.  And then I do a fast-walk to get back to ballet to pick up my daughter.

As it turns out, my daughter also likes to sample the teas at T2 Tea, so before the holidays I started going to T2 before ballet class so she could try the teas too, and I sat in the lobby area of the ballet studio and read magazines while she was in her class.  They only have a handful of magazines and always the same ones, but I did find an Australian Women’s Weekly magazine (from March 2009!) that I hadn’t seen before and flipped through the recipe section.  I found some beautiful mocha cupcakes and read the recipe for them.  I was immediately intrigued by it because it used real melted chocolate, almond meal and buttermilk.

When I got home, I searched the Australian Women’s Weekly website and found the recipe.  Within the next week I had made them and said that they were the best mocha cupcakes I have ever eaten.

I’m not happy with my photos, yet again.  But here we have the best mocha cupcakes ever, frosted with coffee buttercream and decorated with a chocolate covered espresso bean.  Let me tell you that these absolutely require a chocolate covered espresso bean, they taste amazing when you eat them along with a bite of the cupcake.

I ended up using hazelnut meal instead of the almond meal.  And you can sort of taste this in the cake.  As with any mocha cake I’ve ever had though, you cannot taste the coffee.  Remember my tip from my white chocolate mocha cupcakes though – if you want the actual cake to taste like coffee, a good idea would be to fill it with coffee flavored ganache.

I used Lindt 70% chocolate for the melted chocolate, and I had just enough Green & Black’s cocoa powder left to use in these cupcakes.

For the first time in ages, I also used real buttermilk instead of the vinegar + milk substitute.

For the coffee in this, I didn’t use regular instant coffee granules.  I chose a special espresso-style instant coffee from Nescafe.  I don’t know if this made the difference, but the coffee flavor in that buttercream is intense.  It seriously tastes like you’re drinking a cup of coffee when you eat these cupcakes.

Try to let these sit overnight before eating them, if you can, because I think the flavor is even better on the next day.

My final word, if you’re after some fantastic mocha cupcakes, this recipe is definitely the one to use.

Mocha Cupcakes
Adapted from Australian Women’s Weekly magazine, March 2009
Makes 12 cupcakes

Cupcakes
1 tablespoon instant coffee granules
1/4 cup (60ml) hot water
125g butter, softened
3/4 cup (165g) caster sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1 cup (150g) self-raising flour
2/3 cup (80g) almond meal (I used hazelnut meal)
125g dark chocolate, melted
3/4 cup (180ml) buttermilk, room temperature
coffee beans, to decorate, optional

Coffee Buttercream
3 teaspoons instant coffee granules
1 1/2 tablespoons hot water
185g unsalted butter, softened
2 1/4 cups (360g) icing sugar, sifted

Method
Preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced). Line a 12-hole, 1/3-cup (80ml) capacity muffin pan with paper cases.

Combine coffee granules and hot water in a cup. Stir until dissolved.

Beat butter and sugar in a medium bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until just combined between additions.

Fold in half of the combined sifted cocoa and flour, all the almond meal and then the chocolate. Fold in the buttermilk, remaining flour mixture and the coffee mixture.

Divide mixture among paper cases. Bake for about 20 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer. Cool cakes on a wire rack.

Coffee buttercream
Combine coffee granules and hot water in a cup. Stir until dissolved. Beat butter in a medium bowl with an electric mixer until as pale as possible. Gradually beat in half the icing sugar, all the coffee mixture, then the remaining icing sugar.

Using a piping bag fitted with a small plain nozzle, decorate cakes with Coffee Buttercream. Top each cake with coffee beans, if desired.

I can’t get Rishi Tea in Australia though, so I needed a replacement. Luckily for me, there is an awesome tea shop at my local shopping center called T2 Tea, and right next door to the tea shop is the T2 Tea Teahouse which not only can make you a cup of any of their teas, but also sells a variety of delicious foods. You can get something savory made up for you, but hey, you know me, I’m more interested in the sweets and they have a tantalizing variety of those, including some beautiful cupcakes.

Well, unfortunately, on the day I went there, they didn’t have any of those cupcakes.  I decided on a chocolate chai cake instead.  Pictured above is said cake, a tall glass of iced chocolate tea, and a sample of gundpowder green tea.  All were very delicious.

I’ve been obsessing over T2 Tea for quite a while now and peruse their little tea catalog often.  A couple of my favorites that I have yet to try are Choc Chip Chai and Gorgeous Geisha teas.  Choc Chip Chai is obviously a chai tea but it has chocolate in it as well; I bet this is just decadent!  Gorgeous Geisha is a strawberry flavored green tea and a tea I’d so much like to try.  I have quite a few green tea recipes on this site, and even a strawberry green tea cupcake which is my second favorite cupcake that I’ve made (my first favorite are the pumpkin dulce de leche ones, of course).

The Choc Chip Chai tea got me thinking though a few weeks ago about a chocolate chip chai cupcake.  I was sure this would be a great combination of flavors and was looking forward to try it.

And wow, they are fantastic!  These cupcakes aren’t just flavored with ground chai spices, but actually infused with real chai tea from a T2 Tea Chai T-bag.  These cupcakes pack an immense chai flavor and the chocolate makes a brilliant match.  They tasted surprisingly similar to the chocolate chai cake I ate from T2 Tea’s Teahouse earlier this week.

Note that I would have used their Choc Chip Chai tea in these cupcakes, but I haven’t gotten any of it yet!  Long story on that actually.  If you care to hear it, I’ll try to sum it up.  I gave my mom a T2 Tea wishlist and she ordered from their online shop for my birthday.  I never got it in time for my birthday, so a week later I called T2 Tea (this was yesterday) and found out it actually had been delivered in time for my birthday – but to the wrong address!  This address was just 5 houses down from mine, so I went to ask them about it.  They had given it back to the post office since the package wasn’t in their name.  But I had already called the post office and they didn’t have my tea.  This is where I’m at in the matter right now, just waiting on the post office and T2 Tea to open to call them each again today.  I hope I am able to still get my birthday tea, which will probably include Choc Chip Chai or Gorgeous Geisha! Update – both the post office and T2 Tea tracked down my package (it is in transit back to T2 Tea) and T2 Tea is resending it, so I hope to have it within the next few days! Yay!

Back to the cupcakes now… In order to infuse the chai tea in these cupcakes, I brewed the chai T-bag with the amount of milk called for in the recipe, in this case 1/2 cup of whole milk.  This needs to come down to room temperature before using it in the recipe.  I also used a chai T-bag to infuse the ganache frosting by brewing the T-bag in the heavy cream; the ganache (which is made from Green & Black’s 70% chocolate) also has a healthy dose of cinnamon brewed into it.

Please know that you can use any brand of chai tea for these cupcakes, but T2 Tea is highly recommended!  :)

Chai Spice Mixture
Adapted from Dessert First

Ingredients
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cardamon

Method
Combine the spices together in a small bowl.

Vanilla Chai Cupcakes
Adapted from Dessert First
Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups cake flour
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons chai spice mixture
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2 egg whites
1/2 cup whole milk
1 chai tea bag
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Method
Place 1/2 cup whole milk in a small saucepan with 1 chai tea bag. Brew, stirring occasionally, until just before it starts to simmer. Remove from heat, let cool completely to room temperature, and remove tea bag before using in the recipe.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners.

Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together into a medium bowl. Stir in the chai spice mixture.

Cream the butter and sugar together in a stand mixer with paddle attachment on medium speed until soft and creamy.

Add in egg and egg whites, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition to combine before adding the next.

Add in the flour mixture and chai milk mixture in three alternating additions, starting and ending with the flour mixture. Beat just to combine each addition before adding the next. Gently fold in chocolate chips.

Using an ice cream scoop or a spoon, fill each cupcake liner about 3/4 full with batter. Bake in oven for 15 to 18 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through, until a toothpick inserted in the cupcakes comes out clean.

Let cupcakes cool in tin on a wire rack until cool before decorating.

Whipped Chocolate Cinnamon Ganache
Adapted from Dessert First
Makes just enough to frost 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
4 ounces dark chocolate, finely chopped
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 chai tea bag

Method
Place chocolate into a medium heatproof bowl.

Combine cream, cinnamon and chai tea bag in a medium saucepan and place over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Heat just until it comes to a simmer.

Remove tea bag and pour cream over chocolate. Let sit for a minute before stirring to combine. Stir until chocolate is fully melted and the mixture is smooth.

Pour into a container and chill in refrigerator for an hour or until it is firm.

Place ganache in a stand mixer and whip with whisk attachment until it is light and fluffy. Do not overwhip or it will become dry and crumbly, just like overwhipped cream.

The Sweetest Kitchen hasn’t always been The Sweetest Kitchen.  I started out blogging about cupcakes in late May of 2008 at Blogspot; my blog was then called The Cupcake Review.  As I started to expand and blog about more than cupcakes I knew that I needed to switch to my own domain.  After much thought, I finally decided on the name The Sweetest Kitchen in late February of 2009, and launched the new domain on March 3.  It’s now been one year and my blogging experience has been such fun.  The Sweetest Kitchen has became more popular than I ever expected it to – I’ve almost reached 500,000 page views!

My most famous post, with at least 30,000 page views so far, was the zombie Halloween cupcake I made for Iron Cupcake: Earth and Cupcake Hero in October 2009.  However, my personal favorite of anything I have ever baked since beginning this blog is the pumpkin dulce de leche cupcake.  Everyone who has made these has raved about them, and I’m so happy about that!

Today I’ve made some cupcakes in celebration of The Sweetest Kitchen’s 1-year anniversary.  They are actually very similar to the pumpkin dulce de leche cupcakes, but instead of the pumpkin cake, I used a chocolate cake and sprinkled the frosting with sea salt.

The great thing about this dulce de leche is that I didn’t have to make it myself.  I bought it at the store, where it was casually sitting next to cans of plain sweetened condensed milk and selling itself under the pseudonym of “Top ‘n’ Fill Caramel” from Nestle.  I found this at Coles but not Woolworth’s (in Australia), for anyone wanting specific details.  And I recommend giving the caramel a good stir with a wire whisk before using to smooth out the lumps.

If you can’t find dulce de leche, find directions for preparing it yourself in my pumpkin dulce de leche cupcake post.

Totally scrumptious!

Okay, now I’ve given you some cupcakes for my anniversary party, now what about that giveaway, you say?  Right, let’s get to it.

Bake It Pretty is one of, if not the, best places to buy your baking supplies from online.  I have made my share of purchases from this lovely store, and Amanda, the owner, is so sweet.  In fact, Bake It Pretty is where I got those zombie hands and spider toppers that made those particular cupcakes of mine so famous!

I knew I wanted to do a Bake It Pretty giveaway for my blog’s anniversary, so here it is – leave a comment on this post to receive a $50 gift certificate for Bake It Pretty!

Earn an extra entry by mentioning this giveaway and a link to this post on Twitter! Leave a comment on this post with the link to your Twitter status that mentions this giveaway.

Earn another extra entry by mentioning this giveaway and a link to this post on your blog! Leave a comment on this post with the link to your blog post that mentions this giveaway.

You have until Sunday, March 7 at 6:59PM to enter. In the meantime, click on over to Bake It Pretty to create your wishlist!  Note, the deadline is Sydney, Australia time, or Pacific Standard Time in the US on March 6, 11:59PM.

Thanks for stopping by over the past year and helping to make The Sweetest Kitchen the great little place that it is!  :)

The giveaway is now over and any comments left after 7PM on March 7, 2010 as recorded on the comment will not be counted.  The winner will be chosen tomorrow so check back then to see if you have won!

I have breastfed my babies exclusively for the first six months of their lives (and weaned at 18 months), and on their six-month birthdays I have given them their first tastes of solid foods. Yesterday, the 24th, was Miles’ six-month birthday and we had a great day.

Miles had mashed bananas as his first food.

Well, he at least tried it. Not much of it got in. But generally the entire experience was a blast for him.

We spent the morning making cupcakes for the occasion as well, of course. We went pretty simple with chocolate and vanilla, but we made them a little bit more fancy by adding dark chocolate pieces to the chocolate cake batter, and adding vanilla bean paste to the buttercream. The tiny blue sugar hearts were the finishing touch. You can find these at Little Betsy Baker.

These were so cute, and tasted great too. I used Green & Black’s organic cocoa powder to make these cupcakes, which is the first time I’ve used anything organic in my cupcakes. Honestly, I’m skeptical about higher quality cocoa making baked goods taste better. I couldn’t taste anything exceptional in these cupcakes when compared to a standard cocoa powder, such as Hershey’s.

The method of preparing this cupcake batter is similar to that of making a muffin, and for me, the resulting cupcake is more muffin-like rather than cupcake-like, if you know what I mean.

What do you think about high-quality versus average-quality cocoa powders? Does it make a difference in the taste?

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes
Adapted from Woolworth’s Fresh magazine
Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2/3 cup caster sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
125g unsalted butter
100g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
2 eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup milk, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
100g dark chocolate, chopped

Method
Preheat oven to 200C (400F) .  Line a 12-cup muffin tin with cupcake liners.

Melt butter and 100g coarsely chopped dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water.  Stir until melted and smooth.  Cool.

Sift flour, cocoa powder, sugar and salt into a large bowl.

In a small bowl, whisk together melted butter and chocolate mixture, eggs, milk and vanilla extract until thoroughly combined.  Pour into flour mixture along with 100g chopped dark chocolate.  Stir gently, just until combined.

Divide batter evenly into cupcake liners and bake 15-20 minutes or until the tops spring back when touched.

Vanilla Bean Buttercream
Adapted from Martha Stewart
Makes enough to generously frost 12-16 cupcakes

Ingredients
170g unsalted butter, room temperature
225g confectioners’ sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste

Method
Beat butter with a mixer on medium-high speed until pale and creamy, about 2 minutes.

Reduce speed to medium. Add sugar, 1/4 cup at a time, beating after each addition, about 5 minutes. (After every 2 additions, increase speed to high, and beat for 10 seconds, then reduce speed to medium-high). Add vanilla, and beat until buttercream is smooth. Use immediately, or cover and refrigerate for up to 3 days (bring to room temperature, and beat on low speed until smooth before using).

Happy half-birthday to my little boy, I look forward to many more!

My take?  I wouldn’t pass up a slice of cake made from a box, but when it comes to making a cake, I’d rather do it from scratch.  I also think that it doesn’t take much longer to make a cake from scratch than it does from a box, so if you’ve got the ingredients to make a cake from scratch, do it!

There’s something therapeutic and calming for me when making a cake from scratch (when my kids are not “helping” me, that is!) and I just can’t get that same feeling with a box cake mix.  That said though, I do love box brownie mixes!

Anyway, last week I stopped in a relatively new shop called Thomas Dux, which sells a lot of organic and gourmet products.  The main aisle I was interested in was the baking aisle, and there I found a range of Donna Hay box mixes – cupcakes, cookies and brownies.  What intrigued me about these mixes is that instead of the usual oil, eggs and water that you’d find in an average box mix, the Donna Hay box mixes required butter, eggs and milk.  I picked up the chocolate cupcake box!

Inside is a packet of cupcake mix, of icing mix and 12 stylish cupcake liners (I actually got 13).

The process of making the batter was a combination of doing it from scratch and from a box mix; first you cream the butter, then add all the dry mix, the eggs and milk and beat until smooth.

I found that I could fill the liners pretty full to get exactly 12 cupcakes.  They puffed up nicely in the oven, but when I took them out the tops flattened out, much to my dismay (I like domed tops).

The icing was very easy to make as well, just beat everything together until smooth and creamy.  However, my frosting ended up much lighter in color than what was pictured on the box.  The picture on the box looked like the icing was dark and fudgey, but mine was light and creamy.  This was disappointing, but it still tasted nice.

The moment of tasting – they are very good!  Definitely not a box mix taste to be had.  They are heavy, a little dense and so moist.  They were also very easy to crumble.  I preferred the taste of these straight out of the refrigerator as they tasted just like a mud cake this way!

The most peculiar thing about these cupcakes that I experienced is that the liners pulled away from the cupcakes soon after baking.  While I didn’t mind much since they were just for me and my family, this surely would not have impressed guests as it looked like we had unwrapped all the cupcakes!  I have no idea why they did this.

This box mix is considerably more expensive than your average Betty Crocker or Duncan Hines mixes at up to $15.95 for 12 cupcakes.  If you are after quality and taste however, I would definitely recommend Donna Hay’s cupcake kits.  I plan on trying all of her kits eventually.  I do believe these kits are only available in Australia, unfortunate for my international readers, but lucky for my fellow Aussies!

You can find Donna Hay’s cupcake, cookie and brownie mixes at Thomas Dux grocery stores (for $13.95),  Little Betsy Baker (for $14.95) and Donna Hay’s website (for $15.95).  If you try, or have tried, any of her mixes, please leave a comment and let me know!

Being a foodie, I also really love Australia’s native herbs and spices, such as wattleseed, lemon myrtle, mountain pepper and bush tomato, to name a few.  I’ve never cooked with any of these native spices before but now that I’m here for good I would really love to experience these herbs and spices that you can only find in Australia.

Luckily, my husband grows a variety of plants in the garden, including a lemon myrtle tree.  He picked some leaves from the tree earlier this week for my first experiment in baking with Australian native spices.

I thought I’d have to wait weeks for the leaves to dry, but I found a very helpful post from Simple Daily Recipes on how to dry basil in the microwave.  It looked so easy and quick that I decided to try this on the lemon myrtle leaves.

All you need to do is wash and dry the leaves, lay them in a single layer on a paper towel straight on the microwave’s glass plate, cover the leaves with another paper towel, then microwave on high for one minute.  Check the leaves for brittleness, then microwave at intervals of 20-30 seconds until they break with gentle pressure.  For more detailed instructions, visit Simple Daily Recipes.

Next you’ll need to ground the leaves into a very fine powder.  For this I recommend a mortar and pestle.  The smell of the lemon myrtle while doing this is wonderful and very lemony.  Not all of the leaves ground down very well, so I sifted the powder through a fine mesh colander to separate the bigger pieces that didn’t grind down.

After finishing up the lemon myrtle, I started on the cupcakes.  I chose the flavor of coconut to accompany the lemon myrtle.  The cake recipe is one I have used before from Ina Garten:

And they are the same ones that you see in the photo of me on the “About” page.  What I did differently was add 2 teaspoons of ground lemon myrtle to the flour mixture.

I must take this opportunity to state how much I miss my KitchenAid stand mixer.  I have a Breville stand mixer here, and it’s good, but it is NOT a KitchenAid.  Most of all, I miss my Beater Blade.  I have to constantly stop the mixer and scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl; how annoying!

Anyway, I made a lemon myrtle sugar syrup to drizzle on the top of each cupcake.  I poked holes in the tops of the cupcakes with a fork to make sure the syrup would drip down inside of the cupcake.  I decided to make the sugar syrup because I wasn’t totally sure about how strong (or not strong) the lemon flavor would be in the cake.

To frost the lemon myrtle cupcakes, I wanted a coconut cream cheese frosting that had coconut milk or cream.  I found just what I wanted at Good Eats ‘n Sweet Treats.  After frosting the cupcakes, I coated each one in sweetened, shredded coconut.

I couldn’t wait to taste these!  They are really nice and not too sweet.  It’s not a cupcake for kids; it’s the sort of cupcake you’d serve with tea or coffee for a morning or afternoon snack with a friend, if that makes any sense!  The lemon myrtle taste isn’t too strong; it’s more of a hint of lemon, while the coconut is actually the stronger flavor.

Overall, these are some lovely cupcakes and a great effort for my first baking experience with an Australian native spice!  I invited the neighbors over for morning tea to sample of these cupcakes and they really enjoyed them.  I even sent them home with the leftovers!

Lemon Myrtle Coconut Cupcakes
Adapted from Ina Garten
Makes approximately 14 cupcakes

Ingredients
170g unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
3 extra-large eggs, room temperature
3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon pure almond extract
1 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons ground lemon myrtle
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
100g sweetened, shredded coconut

Method
Preheat the oven to 325F (160C).

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. With the mixer on low speed, add the eggs, 1 at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition. Add the vanilla and almond extracts and mix well.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, lemon myrtle, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In 3 parts, alternately add the dry ingredients and the buttermilk to the batter, beginning and ending with the dry. Mix until just combined. Fold in coconut.

Line a muffin pan with paper liners. Fill each liner evenly with batter. Bake for 20-25, until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Remove to a baking rack and cool completely.

Lemon Myrtle Sugar Syrup
Adapted from Lemon Myrtle Australia
Makes approximately 2/3 cup

Ingredients
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/2-3/4 teaspoons ground lemon myrtle
juice from half of a lemon

Method
Bring all ingredients to the boil stirring until sugar is dissolved. Strain lemon myrtle from syrup. Poke holes into the cupcakes with a fork, then either dip cupcakes into syrup or spoon the syrup over the cupcakes. This is best done when the cupcakes and syrup are still warm.

Coconut Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from Good Eats ‘n Sweet Treats
Makes enough to frost 14-16 cupcakes

Ingredients
340g cream cheese, room temperature
3/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons coconut cream
1/4 teaspoon salt

Method
Using a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese and powdered sugar in a large bowl on medium-high speed about 1 minute. Add the whipping cream, coconut cream, and salt; beat until combined. Frost cupcakes when they are completely cool.

One night as I was putting her to bed she told me she wanted to make her own cupcake.  I asked her what kind of cupcake did she want to make.  She said she wanted a vanilla cake, pink raspberry frosting, a cherry on top and a piece of white chocolate.  I promised her I’d help her make them.

And later, we made her cupcake together.  They ended up being incredibly cute, don’t you think?  The recipe is made up of Billy’s vanilla cupcakes, a basic vanilla buttercream that has been tinted pink with red gel and flavored with LorAnn raspberry flavoring from Bake It Pretty, and topped with a maraschino cherry and a shard of Ghirardelli vanilla bean white chocolate.  The cupcake liner is also from Bake It Pretty.

In case you’re wondering why I didn’t use real raspberries to flavor the frosting it is because I have realized that raspberries actually turn frosting purple, and my daughter wanted pink frosting, so I had to artificially flavor and color it.

It was a fun experience for my daughter to see her cupcake brought to life, and for me it was a great moment to realize how creative she is!