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Posts tagged ‘vanilla’

Congrats, It's A Girl! Cupcakes

A friend of mine recently had a baby girl and a group of friends got together to bring the new mom meals and treats in these first few weeks. Of course I volunteered to bring cupcakes!

Congrats, It's A Girl! Cupcakes

I used Magnolia Bakery’s vanilla cupcake recipe and the following vanilla frosting recipe…

Vanilla Buttercream
makes enough to frost 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter, chilled
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk

Method
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine 1 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar, unsalted butter, salt, and vanilla, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as necessary. Add milk and continue mixing until well combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, as necessary. With the mixer running, slowly add remaining 1/2 cup confectioners sugar, mix until well combined.

I tinted half the frosting pink. To get the pink and white swirl, simply place pink frosting on one side inside of a pastry bag and white frosting on the other side so that the pink and white frostings are side by side. You’ll need to squeeze a bit of the frosting out at first to get to the swirled part. It’s a really nice effect!

The swirled stars on the white frosted cupcakes were made simply by squeezing out a small amount of frosting and twisting the pastry bag at the same time.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes

My inspiration for my chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes came from How To Eat A Cupcake. I love chocolate chip cookie dough and had never heard of this type of cupcake, so when I saw this recipe I just had to make it for myself! I didn’t follow the same recipe as How To Eat A Cupcake because I personally didn’t to use a boxed cake mix, and mainly because I didn’t want that many cupcakes.

So what I did was this… I bought a package of refrigerated Nestle chocolate chip cookie dough (the kind that is pre-cut) and immediately put it into the freezer when I got home from the store. This is the dough that will be baked into the cupcakes and it must be completely frozen when placed into the cupcake batter.

A few days later, when I was ready to make these cupcakes, I whipped up a batch of Magnolia Bakery’s vanilla cupcakes (I halved the recipe to get 12 cupcakes, though ended up with 14).

I filled my cupcake liners with batter, then cut seven little squares of frozen cookie dough in half so that I would get 14 and placed them each on top of the cupcake batter. I cut them in half because I personally didn’t want to end up with the majority of the cupcake being cookie dough, and the original recipe had also instructed to do this. I also didn’t want my cupcakes to overflow, so I slightly underfilled them to allow room for the cookie dough to bake.

In the meantime, I prepared the cookie dough that I would be mixing into the frosting. This is the same cookie dough recipe that How To Eat A Cupcake used in her chocolate chip cookie dough frosting (see recipe in her post), but I used a different frosting base (my recipe is at the end of this post). The cookie dough itself needs to sit in the freezer for about 30 minutes to become firm, then broken into chunks, and then placed in the refrigerator until it is ready to be used. Just mix the chunks into the frosting when it has been made, then spread onto the cupcake.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes

The look of the frosting reminds me of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream!

The inside of the cupcake…

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes

These cupcakes are very very good, but also very very sweet. And they definitely require a glass of milk after eating! I think that it would be just fine if you made your own cookie dough for this, and I also think that it could be baked into any flavor cupcake. In fact, I need to make these again sometime and think I will bake them into a chocolate cupcake.

Vanilla Buttercream
makes enough to frost 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
1 3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter, chilled
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk

Method
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine 1 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar, unsalted butter, salt, and vanilla, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula as necessary. Add milk and continue mixing until well combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, as necessary. With the mixer running, slowly add remaining 1/2 cup confectioners sugar, mix until well combined.

At this point you can mix in your cookie dough that you made while the cupcakes were baking. Mix in enough cookie dough to suit your taste, because I believe the recipe posted on How To Eat A Cupcake is for two dozen cupcakes, and if you’re only making 12 you’ll have some cookie dough leftover (unless you halve the cookie dough recipe). The best thing to do with the leftover cookie dough – eat it! There are no eggs in it so it is safe to eat. Yum!

Independence Day/Birthday Cupcakes

My son’s first birthday was on July 5, the day after Independence Day, so I made him some patriotic cupcakes.

Blake's First Birthday

The red and blue dots are supposed to represent fireworks. Just trying to keep it fun for him and his 3-year-old sister, who told me that the cupcakes were so pretty!

Birthday/Independence Day Cupcakes

I layered red, white (plain) and blue batter in the silver foil cupcake liners to get this effect.

Birthday/Independence Day Cupcakes

I used, yet again, Magnolia Bakery’s vanilla cupcake recipe and for the first time Magnolia Bakery’s vanilla frosting. This is the third time I’ve made these cupcakes and I’m getting the opinion that the cupcakes don’t taste very vanilla-y. I might try adding more vanilla the next I bake these. The texture of the cupcakes is nice, but I’d like it to be a little lighter; also the cupcake seem sticky – it sticks to my fingers more so than other cupcakes. The frosting is very, very sweet, but I like its texture, even on the second day.

Okay, this might be it on the cupcakes until my daughter’s birthday on July 19, for which I am making Bakerella’s cupcake pops, but a friend of mine had a new baby daughter on July 3, and I may bake baby girl-themed cupcakes to take to her sometime in the coming couple of weeks too.

Next on my own list, besides the cupcake pops are chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes and red velvet cupcakes.

Chocolate Cupcakes & Vanilla Frosting

My husband was teaching a class in his office a few weeks ago but fell ill in the middle of the week. A coworker covered for him for a couple of days, which was a big help to my husband. I baked a batch of my favorite cupcakes as a thank you present.

Thank You Cupcakes

This was my best batch yet; these cupcakes just get better and better each time I bake them. These cupcakes were shared throughout my husband’s office and everyone loved them.

St Patrick's Day Cupcakes

I baked these for a St Patrick’s Day party that my playgroup was having. They are vanilla, with a small dollop of green-tinted batter in the middle of each cupcake, the frosting is the same that I used here.

St Patrick's Day Cupcakes

I made a makeshift shamrock stencil for the white-frosted cupcakes, but it didn’t turn out as well I’d hoped. The kids didn’t mind at all, though.

The cupcake itself was quite a bit more dense than I like and I probably won’t be making this recipe again. Still on the search for my perfect vanilla cupcake recipe.

My Birthday Cupcakes

My birthday was quite uneventful; it was playgroup day for my daughter and her friends, so I invited them to our house and served these cupcakes – recipe here. I used one drop of each of fluorescent food coloring to color the icing.

Birthday Cupcakes

They were a hit and I had to give out the recipe! I wasn’t surprised, however, that the kids only ate the frosting and left the cake. I hated to see it go to waste!

Valentine's Day Cupcakes

I promised my daughter a Valentine’s Day party with cupcakes. I was after a batter that was safe to eat, so that we could lick the bowl and spoons. Luckily I found this eggless, butterless recipe on MarthaStewart.com and the frosting to match.

Valentine's Day Cupcake

They were absolutely delicious. The chocolate cupcake recipe has become my standard chocolate cupcake – I won’t make any other chocolate cupcake! It is also so simple, requiring no eggs or butter.

What I also like about these cupcakes are the perfectly domed tops – so cute!

A Perfectly Round Cupcake

I did use regular skim milk and regular unsalted butter in the frosting (the original recipe, linked above, called for dairy ingredients that were specifically for people who are allergic to diary) and it still turned out perfect. I added a single drop of pink food coloring to the frosting and topped it with pink sugar sprinkles.

Since making this recipe, I have not been able to find cake flour in my local grocery stores. I use plain old all-purpose flour for this recipe and it turns out so moist and delicate.

This cupcake recipe is thought to be dated back to World War II, created as a result of rationing when eggs and butter were scarce. It is traditionally called “wacky cake”.