Posts from the ‘Cupcakes’ Category

Nov 9

Iron Cupcake Earth: Cranberry

I’m going to admit first thing that I do not like the taste of cranberries, so I was a bit apprehensive about creating a cupcake for this particular Iron Cupcake: Earth challenge. It didn’t deter me, however, from my first entry into the cranberry challenge (I will submitting another entry this month); my green tea cupcakes, filled with cranberry cream cheese filling and frosted with cranberry buttercream with a drizzle of white chocolate.

I think the green tea and cranberry is a nice pairing. The overall taste of the cupcake is very sweet; the cranberry taste of the frosting is very subtle, while the strongest cranberry taste comes from the filling. I will also note that I used a small amount of red food coloring in the cranberry parts of the cupcake.

The Iron Cupcake: Earth prizes this month are from Etsy artists Lollipop Workshop, Cookie Sunshine, Lots of Sprinkles and Cakespy. Corporate prizes are from Fiesta Products, Hello, Cupcake, Jessie Steele, Cupcake Courier, and Taste of Home. For this month only we have an added bonus from Sweet Cuppin Cakes Bakery and Cupcakery Supply.

Iron Cupcake: Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers.

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Recipes:

Green Tea Cupcakes
based on Magnolia Bakery’s vanilla cupcake, and the same cupcake recipe I used for my my green tea cupcakes. What I did differently was divide the recipe by thirds; I ended up with eight cupcakes. For the green tea, add 1.5 teaspoons of green tea (matcha) powder to the flour mix.

Cranberry Cream Cheese Filling

Ingredients
* 1.5 ounces cream cheese
* 2 tablespoons cranberry sauce
* pinch of salt
* 6 ounces confectioners’ sugar

Method
Soften cream cheese and cranberry sauce together in medium sized bowl. Add salt. Gradually add sugar, beating with electric mixer until creamy. Add red food coloring, if desired, for a brighter color.

Cranberry Buttercream

Ingredients
* 1/2 cup cranberry juice
* 1/4 cup sweetened dried cranberries
* 1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature
* 1 3/4 cup confectioners’ sugar, more if desired for firmer texture
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method
In a small saucepan, combine the juice and cranberries. Simmer over medium heat for 5 minutes, or until softened. Let cool and either strain cranberry juice, pressing the berries until most of the juice is gone, or chop the cranberries finley.

In a large bowl, combine the butter, sugar and vanilla. Beat with an electric mixer until light and creamy. Beat in the cranberries. Add more confectioners’ sugar for a firmer texture, if desired. Add red food coloring, if desired, for a brighter color.

White Chocolate Drizzle

Ingredients
* 2-3 squares Ghirardelli White Chocolate

Method
Melt white chocolate in small microwave safe bowl, microwaving in short bursts of 15 seconds, stirring after each 15 seconds. Shouldn’t take more than 30 seconds total. Spoon into sturdy sandwich bag, or piping bag, cut off a small tip of one corner and squeeze white chocolate in a quick sweeping motion on top of frosted cupcakes. Top each cupcake with a fresh cranberry, if desired.

Oct 27

Chocolate Pumpkin Cupcakes

I’ve really been in the mood for pumpkin ever since my pumpkin cupcakes with cinnamon cream cheese frosting turned out so well. I bought a can of pumpkin at the store the last time I was there and I’ve been trying to think of what to do with it. I decided on chocolate pumpkin cupcakes with pumpkin buttercream frosting.

For the cupcakes, I used a recipe I found from Country Living magazine online and divided the recipe into fourths. The recipe said it would make 36 cupcakes, so I intended on getting 9 cupcakes; I actually ended up with 15! I added about 1/8 teaspoon of ginger to the recipe. The cupcakes rose to a very nice dome, I was very pleased. The cake itself is fluffy and moist.

For the frosting, I found a wonderful, no, awesome, pumpkin buttercream recipe from A Year In The Kitchen, originally created for pumpkin sandwich cookies. This frosting really added the flavor to the cupcakes; it’s a perfect pairing. I’m so glad I found this recipe!

I’ll also add that my daughter greatly approves of this recipe. She normally only eats the frosting off cupcakes, but with these cupcakes she ate the whole thing! She gives them two thumbs up!

Oct 26

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes, Revisited

My chocolate chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes are my favorite cupcakes that I’ve featured here at The Sweetest Kitchen. I didn’t really think that they could get any better. Well, I was wrong. They can get better. When I found out that Rebecca, over at Hello, Baker!, had made her version of the cookie dough cupcake, I noticed that she had used homemade cookie dough, rather than store-bought. She had used a chocolate chip cookie recipe called The Chewy by Alton Brown, which I had kept hearing rave reviews about and knew that one day I’d have to try for myself.

This past week I gathered up all my ingredients, baked a dozen of The Chewy chocolate chip cookies and loved them! and sent a few of them to my parents in the mail, who also loved them! I froze the rest of the cookie dough after rolling the dough in tablespoon-sized balls, not actually intending to bake cupcakes with them, but…

When the time came to bake cupcakes again, I suddenly remembered Rebecca’s post and had to do my chocolate chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes all over again with The Chewy. I used the same chocolate cupcake recipe as I had used previously, which is my favorite chocolate cupcake recipe.

I needed to use the rest of my mascarpone cheese that I had leftover from the Iron Cupcake Earth challenge; I had loved that frosting so much that I decided to make it all over again for these cupcakes.

Now, these cupcakes were spectacular. This particular homemade cookie dough turned out more gooey than the store-bought cookie dough, and those big chocolate chips (I used Ghiradelli semisweet chocolate chips) were just to die for.

Because of the mascarpone frosting, I had to refrigerate the remaining cupcakes, which made those chocolate chips hard. For the rest of the cupcakes, I put them for 8-10 seconds on the defrost setting in the microwave to get that gooeyness and those soft chocolate chips back. So yummy!

So in the future, I am not ever using store-bought cookie dough for these cupcakes again!

Oct 15

1 Comment

Iron Cupcake Earth: Cheese

I almost opted out of this month’s Iron Cupcake Earth challenge because of the bizarre ingredient. True, I could have just used cream cheese, but that wouldn’t have been quite so challenging. I wanted a cheese in both the cupcake and frosting, but I knew I didn’t want the average cream cheese… and well, I knew I didn’t want to make a savory cupcake. Hence, this was born…

A chocolate cupcake with a cherry ricotta center and frosted with mascarpone frosting. A dusting of cocoa powder sits on top, accompanied by a cherry. I can’t believe that it actually tastes quite nice! It’s the first time I’ve ever eaten a sweet ricotta, as well as the first time I’ve ever tasted mascarpone.

I’m quite proud of this cupcake, much more so than my entry last month for the basil challenge.

This month, the prizes for winning Iron Cupcake Earth are from Etsy artist Art On The Menu, Etsy artist Lots of Sprinkles, Bakelove Bakewear, Fiesta Products, Hello, Cupcake, Jessie Steele Aprons, Cupcake Courier and Taste of Home. Iron Cupcake:Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers.

Here are the recipes…

Martha Stewart’s One-Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes
-recipe cut into thirds

Cherry Ricotta Filling

Ingredients
1/2 cup ricotta cheese
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 heaping tablespoons cherry pie filling (without cherries)
2 heaping tablespoons cherry pie filling cherries, chopped

Preparation
Drain ricotta cheese if watery through a cheesecloth for 30-60 minutes. Mix ricotta, sugar, vanilla, cherry pie filling and cherries with a spoon until combined. Refrigerate about 30 minutes.
When cupcakes are completely cool, fill them with cherry ricotta filling using the cone method.

Mascarpone Frosting

Ingredients
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
4 ounces mascarpone cheese
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preparation
Cream butter, sugar, and vanilla until fluffy. Then mix in cold mascarpone cheese until smooth. Frost cooled cupcakes.

Oct 13

5 Comments

Pumpkin Cupcakes With Cream Cheese Frosting

I am a member of a neighborhood women’s group that meets every month. This month’s meeting has an Autumn theme and members can bring their favorite Autumn foods. Of course, I had to bake pumpkin cupcakes!

These pumpkin cupcakes are absolutely delicious, soft and moist. I am so pleased with the way they turned out. The original recipe called for fresh nutmeg, but I used ground nutmeg instead. Also, the recipe called for coarse salt, but I decided to use regular table salt instead – instead of the 1 tablespoon coarse salt, I used a little less than 1/2 teaspoon salt. The recipe is from Martha Stewart – and warning about that recipe, it says it makes 18 cupcakes, but the actual yield is closer to 30.

I decided to use a cinnamon cream cheese frosting on these cupcakes and this recipe can be found at Recipezaar. This is a really nice frosting as well. I used just a pinch more cinnamon than the recipe called for.

I used Brach’s mellowcreme pumpkins and a jar of Fox Run Halloween sprinkles to decorate the cupcakes.

Oct 2

6 Comments

Chocolate Cupcakes With Cream Cheese Filling

How To Eat A Cupcake often inspires me. In her recent post about making Martha Stewart’s one-bowl chocolate cupcakes, she raved about how “INSANELY good” they are; with this sort of review, I just couldn’t resist trying these one-bowl chocolate cupcakes for myself.

Now, remember that I had leftover cream cheese filling from those banana whoopie pies (How To Eat A Cupcake coincidentally posted a whoopie pie post just shortly after mine!) and I mentioned that I’d like to use it as filling in chocolate cupcakes. I planned to do this, and decided to mix mini chocolate chips in with the cream cheese filling and use chocolate buttercream for the frosting.

They were indeed very good! Great chocolate cupcakes, and so easy to make! I love how dark they are too.

My 3-year-old daughter and her dinosaurs helped make the frosting with me…

Veloca Raptor climbs out of the bowl, having finished up the last of the frosting!

Recipes:

Martha Stewart’s One-Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes

Hershey’s Perfectly Chocolate Frosting

Cream Cheese Filling

Ingredients
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
mini chocolate chips

Method
In a large mixing bowl, beat cream cheese until smooth. Add confectioners’ sugar and vanilla, mixing until smooth and creamy. Mix in enough mini chocolate chips to suit your taste. Fill cupcakes when they are completely cooled. This filling is best used with the cone method for filling the cupcakes.

Sep 25

Chocolate Mayonnaise Cupcakes

When I first heard of a chocolate cupcake made with mayonnaise, I was intrigued and had to try it out. Today was the perfect opportunity since I had no butter on hand, and there is no butter in these cupcakes. I got the recipe for the cupcakes from 52 Cupcakes.

I’m only posting a cross section of this cupcake because I was most interested in its texture, which was slightly dense, but very moist. The cupcake held its shape really well and was not crumbly.

It had okay chocolate taste, but in my opinion the taste was similar to a box mix.

The frosting is a Nutella and peanut butter buttercream swirl, which is basically this recipe (you’ll have to scroll down to find the pb frosting recipe), but the recipe was cut in half and Nutella was substituted for the peanut butter in one half.

While this won’t become my standard chocolate cupcake recipe, I can say that I may decide to make these again, especially if I have ran out of butter!

Sep 23

Iron Cupcake Earth: Basil

I wasn’t fully prepared for this month’s Iron Cupcake Earth challenge. I also couldn’t give it my total concentration because a variety of personal/family things have needed top priority this month.

I did try to make a white chocolate cupcake, filled with basil cream and frosted with strawberry meringue buttercream earlier this month, but that attempt failed – sunken cupcakes and non-fluffy meringue! Not to mention, I didn’t have enough basil to make basil syrup.

So my entry, with just a couple of days until the deadline, is, admittedly, a hurried and not full-hearted attempt at creating a basil cupcake.

A strawberry cupcake, filled with basil whipped cream, frosted with strawberry mousse that has chopped up basil in it. The taste? I’ll just say that basil cupcakes are not high on my list of favorite cupcake flavors.

Strawberry Cupcakes

Ingredients
2/3 cup whole fresh or frozen strawberries, thawed
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon coarse salt
1/4 cup whole milk, room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 large egg, room temperature
2 large egg whites, room temperature

Method
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with cupcake liners; set aside.

Place strawberries in a small food processor; process until pureed. You should have about 1/3 cup of puree, add a few more strawberries if necessary or save any extra puree for frosting; set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside. In a small bowl, mix together milk, vanilla, and strawberry puree; set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter on medium-high speed, until light and fluffy. Gradually add sugar and continue to beat until well combined and fluffy. Reduce the mixer speed to medium and slowly add egg and egg whites until just blended.

With the mixer on low, slowly add half the flour mixture; mix until just blended.

Add the milk mixture; mix until just blended. Slowly add remaining flour mixture, scraping down sides of the bowl with a spatula, as necessary, until just blended.

Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups. Transfer muffin tin to oven and bake until tops are just dry to the touch, 22 to 25 minutes. Transfer muffin tin to a wire rack and let cupcakes cool completely in tin before icing.

Basil Whipped Cream

Ingredients
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
5 ounces basil or mint
1 cup heavy whipping cream

Method
Bring sugar and water to a boil, stir until sugar dissolves. Chop basil or mint and add to the mixture. Boil for 3 minutes. Cool to room temperature.

Beat whipping cream on high until stiff peaks form add the five to six tablespoons of syrup to taste and beat until combined.

Strawberry Mousse Frosting

Ingredients
2 cups fresh strawberries, rinsed
1/3 cup sugar
1 tablespoon unflavored gelatin
2 cups heavy cream
3 tablespoons sugar

Method
Combine raspberries and sugar in a saucepan and cook over medium heat. Stir mixture until it is basically a liquid. Stir in gelatin, continue to cook until dissolved. Remove from heat and transfer to a medium sized bowl. Refrigerate overnight.

Beat heavy cream on high until stiff peaks form. Add the three tablespoons of sugar and beat until combined.

Mix about a third of the whipped cream into raspberry mixture until well combined. Fold in remaining whipped cream.

Prizes this month are Metal Sugar, Head Chefs by Fiesta Products, Hello Cupcake by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, Jesse Steele Aprons, Cupcake Courier and Taste of Home.

Sep 19

2 Comments

First Cupcakes Made With The Kitchenaid

Today I made my first cupcakes with the Kitchenaid mixer that I got earlier this week. I made a mistake with the first batch, the chocolate ones, by not mixing it enough. I realized this after they were done baking. I did better with the vanilla ones. I have to say that the Kitchenaid does a fantastic job with whipping cream and buttercream.

These are the chocolate ones. They’re not as pretty as I wanted them to be, but they are definitely tasty. They’re chocolate cupcakes, filled with whipped cream and frosted with a Lindt chocolate ganache.

See the inside of this cupcake here.

I really like how the vanilla cherry ones look. They’re vanilla cupcakes, filled with whipped cream, frosted with vanilla buttercream and topped with a maraschino cherry.

This is the first time I’ve ever baked with nut & party cups and I have to say that I liked it! I think that the cupcakes are generally bigger with the nut & party cups. I also cut a small slit at the top of the cup before I filled them up so that it could be easily unwrapped. See the inside of this cupcake here.

I used Wilton’s bismark tip for filling the cupcakes (which is a brand new toy), and found that this made it incredibly easy to fill them.

Now I know what you’re saying, I should be putting my efforts into this month’s Iron Cupcake Earth challenge, but I’m finding the challenge ingredient to be pretty difficult! I don’t have many days left now, so I’ve really got to get to work if I want to be a part of the competition this month.

Sep 14

1 Comment

Chocolate Cherry Diet Dr. Pepper Cupcakes

These cupcakes were a total spur of the moment decision. I had a bottle of Chocolate Cherry Diet Dr. Pepper and I remembered having seen this recipe recently. I’m not sure if Chocolate Cherry Diet Dr. Pepper or just plain Dr. Pepper is supposed to be used in this recipe, but I used the chocolate cherry one. I did know right away, however, that I would be using a different frosting (I originally wanted a white chocolate cherry ganache frosting, but couldn’t work out how to make that and couldn’t find a recipe for it!).

In reviewing this cupcake, I have to say right away that these are the moistest and softest cupcake I have ever eaten. The cake itself could have just melted in my mouth. It is absolutely delicious and does indeed taste like Chocolate Cherry Diet Dr. Pepper.

I had to make some changes to the recipe to suit my ingredients. First, I wanted to cut the recipe into fourths, since the original recipe is for 30 cupcakes and I am only one person! I wanted to make about 7 or 8 to share with the family though, so using this calculator I cut the recipe into fourths. Isn’t it strange though that I ended up with 15 cupcakes! The reason is, I believe, that I didn’t fill the cupcake liners up as much as I should have. I found out through trial and error that the liners should be over 3/4 full of batter in order for the cupcake to rise into a nice dome above the top rim of the liner.

My substitutions of ingredients were as follows, since I didn’t have all the ingredients called for in the recipe:

* I used all purpose flour instead of cake flour.

* I used a melted chocolate substitute for the unsweetened chocolate. 3 tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder mixed with 1 tablespoon of oil equals 1 ounce of an unsweetened chocolate bar. I used this substitution, but I added it to the batter right after I let the Dr. Pepper and butter mix set for 10 minutes, then whisked in the chocolate substitution.

* I used plain yogurt instead of sour cream.

* Note that this batter is very runny; I used a measuring cup to pour it into the liners.

* As for the frosting, I decided to use a different recipe because I’ve recently had an experience using an egg white-based frosting and I didn’t have much luck, so I used a basic vanilla buttercream recipe (recipe here). Instead of using 1 tablespoon of milk in the buttercream, I used 1 tablespoon of maraschino cherry syrup and I also added one drop of pink food coloring to give the frosting a nicer pink coloring. There was only a very very slight taste of cherry in the frosting.

I decided to use the pink and purple sugar sprinkles like the photo in the original recipe because for some reason those two colors remind me of soda, so I think it adds a nice touch. The cherry on top is a must, too; wouldn’t be complete without it.

Final word – these are SO good, and like I said, extremely moist! Such a nice treat on a rainy Sunday afternoon, like today!

Updated later: On the second day, these cupcakes taste even better and are still more moist than any cupcake I’ve eaten. I do notice that on the second day the cherry taste of the cake is stronger than it was right after I made them. These little cakes are so flavorful that I dare say they don’t even need frosting; a scoop of ice cream and a cherry would suit these cupcakes just fine, I’m sure!

Sep 8

14 Comments

Nutella-Coffee Frosting

If you’re a follower of The Sweetest Kitchen you’ll know that I have a slight obsession with Nutella. My latest Nutella creation is Nutella-coffee frosting. I was hoping this would turn out as nice as it sounded and I am pleased to say that it did!

I originally added two teaspoons of instant coffee, but after tasting the final result I would recommend that that amount be cut down to just one teaspoon. The coffee taste was stronger than the Nutella taste and I wanted to taste both flavors.

I put this frosting onto a simple butter cupcake recipe, but it would also taste nice with chocolate or mocha cupcakes, I think.

Nutella Coffee Frosting
Print this recipe via Tasty Kitchen

Ingredients
2 tablespoons butter, softened
2 tablespoons Nutella
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1-2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon instant coffee
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Method
In a small bowl, combine 1 tablespoon milk with 1 teaspoon instant coffee and stir until coffee is dissolved.

In a separate bowl, combine butter, Nutella, sugar, salt, vanilla, and the 1 tablespoon coffee-milk mixture. Mix well with electric mixer, adding more milk as needed to make a fluffy spreadable frosting.

Makes enough to frost 10-12 cupcakes if just spreading it on with a knife.