Thirty One

I'm officially "in" my thirties. I like it.





Chocolate Cupcakes with Cream Filling from Food & Wine, November 2002

Self Frosting Nutella Cupcakes

For our beach potluck last weekend, I was stumped as to what I could make. I knew it had to be something that was both kid and adult friendly. I didn't want to spend a whole bunch of money trying a new recipe so I wanted to keep it limited to things I had on hand. I knew that there would be healthy stuff so I could get away with something sweet. Back before I even started food blogging, I saved many recipes and as I was going through my old recipe binder, I came across these cupcakes not once, but three times. Apparently I really wanted to make these back in the day. I already had the Nutella thanks to my recent investment at the grocery store and the rest of the ingredients were things I always keep on hand in case the mood to bake strikes which in my case happens to be often. This could not have been a more simple recipe.I think the most difficult thing was swirling the Nutella and even that was kind of fun. Make these immediately. The buttery cake is tender and the Nutella is the star as the frosting/topping. It's uncomplicated and completely delicious. I'm super shocked I restrained myself at just one.



Self Frosting Nutella Cupcakes
(Adapted from Baking Bites)



Makes 10-12 cupcakes

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Nutella (approximately 1/3 cup, about 1 teaspoon for each cupcake)

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners or alternately spray and flour each muffin tin and set aside.

In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder and set aside.

In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy, about two minutes. Add the eggs one at a time making sure that each egg is incorporated before adding the next. Stir in the vanilla.

With the mixer on low speed, stir in the flour mixture and beat until just combined. Fill each muffin tin with batter about 3/4 full. Top the batter in each tin with 1 teaspoon of Nutella. Swirl the Nutella into the batter with a toothpick taking care to spoon some of the batter over the Nutella.

Bake the cupcakes for 15-20 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center cupcake comes out clean. Transfer the cakes to a wire pan to cool completely.

Printable Recipe

Root Beer Cupcakes

I teased you with these the other day. Here's the recipe! I made these over the weekend for my birthday. I had actually been planning on making vanilla pistachio cupcakes, but the store on my corner had all these cute summer displays with root beer bottles and I couldn't resist. The bite I did manage to have was pretty good. Since I didn't use root beer extract or schnapps in the batter, you don't really get a lot of root beer flavor, but it does give the cake a nice richness and the cakes are moist. I had trouble really getting a good root beer flavor in the frosting too, so I kept adding more which made the frosting a bit soupy in the warm weather, but I did enjoy the flavor. The original recipe is intended to make a large bundt cake, but I cut the recipe in half and did cupcakes because big cakes made for me make me nervous (I don't know why).

I'm sorry it is still taking me a little while to reply to comments and visit your pages. Besides the crazy weekend last weekend, I am also moving this weekend and next. Hopefully I will return to a normal schedule in a couple of weeks!

Root Beer Cupcakes
(Adapted from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking)

Makes 12 cupcakes

For the cake:
1 cup root beer (not diet)
1/2 cup dark unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 cup unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 large egg

For the frosting:
1 ounce 60% cocoa, melted
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons - 1/4 cup root beer
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar

To make the cake:

Preheat even to 325 degrees F. Line a muffin pan with paper liners.

In a small saucepan, heat the root beer, cocoa powder and butter over medium heat until butter is melted. Add sugars and whisk until dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.

In a small bowl whisk the eggs until just beaten. Then whisk into the cocoa mixture until combined. Gently fold the flour mixture into the cocoa mixture. The batter will be slightly lumpy. Don’t over beat the batter or it could cause the cake to be tough. The batter is very loose.

Pour the batter into the pan, filling each cup about 3/4 of the way full and cook 20-25 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through baking until a sharp knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

To make the frosting:
In the bowl of a stand mixer, or using an electric hand mixer, beat softened butter and cocoa powder. Once combined add the melted chocolate, salt, powdered sugar and root beer. Beat together until smooth. Spread on top of cooled cupcakes.

Printable Recipe

Root Beer Cupcakes

Today is my birthday. I made root beer cupcakes (among other things). Recipe coming soon!!

Vanilla Pistachio Cupcakes with Chocolate Buttercream

I often get asked by my friends how I got in to food blogging. Of course, by my potluck posts you guys now I hang out with people who are seriously in to food, but what they want to know is what made me decide to take the plunge and write, photograph, and talk about it every day. Well a little over a year ago, Raul introduced me to TasteSpotting. I have to admit, I had not really heard of recipe blogs before then. Oh sure, I was vaguely aware of the Julie/Julia thing (especially after reading the script for the movie a long while ago), but besides that I had no clue that there was a whole world of people at home writing and photographing and thinking about recipes the same way as me. Once I discovered TasteSpotting, I got really into it. I would check several times a day amazed by the lovely pictures and words that people were coming up with. Like everyone, I was devastated when it was down for a bit last year, but it came back along with a ton of other great sites for sharing pictures. I longed to be a part of it and that's pretty much how this blog was born. I normally don't like to boast about things like this, but I was quite happy to get my 100th post on TasteSpotting yesterday. So happy in fact, that I made cupcakes to celebrate. I am such a nerd. I didn't really make the cupcakes to celebrate the occasion, I actually am quite the hoarder of cake and cupcake recipes because I have been wanting to decorate my own cake ever since I got my decorating tips a couple of months ago. I was originally going to do a chocolate cupcake, but then I came across these vanilla pistachio cakes and I just had to try them. The cakes are really moist and there is a nice crunch from the pistachios in the batter. I decided to frost them with a chocolate buttercream because I really like the combination of chocolate and pistachios and I had a bit of chocolate left over from my distarous Daring Bakers challenge.

Not to sound like a cheeseball, but I want to share these cupcakes with all of my fellow bloggers who are such an inspiration to me every single day.



Vanilla Pistachio Cupcakes
(From A Good Appetite)

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Seeds from 1/2 a vanilla bean
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup buttermilk
2 egg whites
2 tablespoons pistachios, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 350 F. Prepare 6 muffin tins.

Cream the butter and the sugar together until light & fluffy. Beat in the vanilla & vanilla seeds. Add the baking powder, baking soda and 1/4 cup flour, beat until just combined. Beat in half the buttermilk. Beat in 1/4 cup flour. Add the last of the buttermilk and finally the last of the flour.

In another bowl beat the egg whites until glossy, stiff peaks are formed. Fold 1/3 of the egg whites into the batter. Once combined fold in the remaining egg whites. Gently fold in the pistachios.

Fill each muffin tin with 1/4 cup batter. Bake for 20 - 22 minutes, a toothpick inserted into the center should come out clean.

Allow to cool completely on a rack.

Chocolate Buttercream
(Adapted from Ina Garten)

3 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 large egg yolk
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted

In a microwave-safe bowl, heat the chocolate at high power in 30-second intervals, stirring, until most of the chocolate is melted. Stir until completely melted, then set aside to cool to room temperature.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle, beat the butter at medium speed until pale and fluffy. Add the egg yolk and vanilla and beat for 1 minute, scraping down the side of the bowl. At low speed, slowly beat in the confectioners’ sugar, about 1 minute. Slowly beat the cooled chocolate into the butter mixture until just combined.

November Daring Bakers: Caramel Cake (or Cupcakes)

I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend with people you love and that you're eating too much!! It's also time for another Daring Bakers post. November's challenge was hosted by Dolores of Chronicles in Culinary Curiosity, Alex of Blondie and Brownie, and Jenny of Foray into Food. Natalie of Gluten-a-Go-Go helped with the gluten free edition. The challenge, which I accepted, was to bake Shuna Fish Lydon's famous caramel cake with the optional challenge of making Alice Medrich's golden vanilla bean caramels from her book Pure Dessert.

Let me tell you, I was super deluxe nervous about making this recipe. Last month, I mentioned that I suck at candy making and this recipe called for caramel in several ways. There was caramel syrup in the cake and frosting, and of course, being the overachiever in the kitchen that I have been known to be, of course I was going to try making the golden caramels. My first concern was when to make the cake and how to make the cake. The original recipe called for a tall baking pan which I do not have. The other concern was deciding whether to bake the cake for myself or my friends. Luckily, JenFinn decided to host a potluck (which was one of our biggest) at the beginning of the month so the when was not so much an issue. To make this recipe more potluck friendly, I changed it a little to make cupcakes (which many Daring Bakers ended up doing). A little bit of research (and very helpful advice from my fellow bakers), turned me on to this article by David Lebovitz. I realized that my main problem when making the dreadful pepita brittle was that I was using organic sugar. In his article, David explains that one of the secrets to making caramel is to use a white, refined sugar. Lesson learned.

The first part of the recipe that I tried was the caramel syrup that was needed for the cake and for the icing. I found this to be quite easy compared to some of the other Daring Bakers. I have an intense fear of burning things, so I didn't let this syrup get quite as amber in color as others, but I also didn't burn it. I made the syrup the night before the cakes kept it in a jar in the refrigerator until I made the cakes (I still have some left!). Later that same night, I attempted the caramels. The recipe for the caramels calls for something called golden syrup. I have never heard of or seen golden syrup, but my trusty Google led me to a site that said you can use half light corn syrup and half honey to get something that resembles golden syrup so that's what I did. I cooked my caramels to 260 and then poured them into a pan to let them cool. I made two mistakes that night. 1) I really wish I had cooked the caramels to 265 to make a firmer caramel, the ones I made were very soft blobs, 2) I kept tasting the caramels (and burning my fingers) as they cooled. I could not get enough of the flavor of these things. SO INCREDIBLY GOOD! I have never been a huge fan of caramels, but if you get a chance to make these sometime, I strongly suggest you do so. Again, I wish I had cooked mine to a firmer temperature. It was kind of a bitch getting these into wrappers and they kept turning into caramel blobs instead of the lovely squares I cut them into, but all was forgiven once I popped the sugary goodness in my mouth.

The last two parts of the challenge were the cake itself and the brown butter buttercream icing. I found the cake recipe to be very straightforward and the easiest part of the recipe. The only thing I really had to modify was the cooking time because I made cupcakes instead of a full cake. The frosting was...interesting. The measurements were vague and many people were complaining of the overwhelming sweetness in the final recipe. I absolutely hate when things are too sweet so instead of the pound of confectioners sugar called for in the recipe, I only used two cups. I added the beans from a one inch piece of vanilla to give the icing some more flavor and those lovely flecks of vanilla. I also used about a teaspoon of sea salt to counteract the sweetness of the recipe. I topped each cupcake with a caramel blob and I think the flavors all complimented each other nicely.

And there you have it. These seemed to be a big hit at the potluck, but it could have been my friends lying to me, paired with the copious amounts of wine and the thrill of our monster version of Mafia, the game (to this day I maintain my innocence as a townsperson). Again, I hope you are having a most fantastic Thanksgiving weekend. I am off to my highschool reunion. GAH!! Has it really been 10 years already?!?! Enjoy the long weekend. If you would like to see how the other Daring Bakers interpreted this cake, check out the blogroll. To get the full recipes, please visit the sites of any of our hosts.

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes

It's my birthday today. Also, my name means a girl born on Sunday - so happy birthday to me!! I had a lovely drinky evening at the Palihouse and I still managed to get up early and go to the farmer's market. I spent much of the day baking yesterday and here are some of the results. I wanted a cake that wasn't too sweet, but was still festive and fun. After much searching, I settled on Nigella's chocolate Guinness cake. It was a perfect mix of richness and chocolate with just a slight sweetness despite the two cups of sugar in the mix. I am really looking forward to all the next year has to offer and thanks to all who made my birthday so special!!

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes
(Adapted from Feast by Nigella Lawson)



Cake
1 c Guinness stout (not the whole can - drink the leftover yourself!)
1 stick unsalted butter
3/4 c unsweetened cocoa powder
2 c granulated sugar (superfine, if possible)
3/4 c sour cream
2 eggs
1 tbsp pure vanilla extract
2 c all-purpose flour
2 1/2 tsp baking soda

Icing
8 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
1 c confectioner's sugar
1/2 c heaving whipping cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin pan with baking cups.

Pour Guinness into a large saucepan, add butter and heat over low heat until melted. Whisk in cocoa powder and sugar. In a small bowl, beat sour cream with eggs and vanilla until smooth and whisk into the beer mixture. Finally, whisk in flour and baking soda.

Divide batter among muffin tins, filling each 3/4 full. Bake 20 - 25 minutes until risen. Cool and turn out on a wire rack.

To make the icing:
Place cream cheese and confectioner's sugar in a mixing bowl and whip with an electric beater until smooth. Gradually add cream and beat again until you have a spreadable consistency. Ice top of the cake starting in th middle and fanning out so that it resembles the frothy top of a pint of Guinness.