Cupcake Frenzy

Rich Chocolate Cupcakes with White Chocolate and Strawberry

2006-11-06T14:31:00.000+11:00

Chocolate Cupcakes
makes 12 large cupcakes

1 1/3 cups plain flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup dutch-process cocoa
45g butter, softened
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C (350 F). Line muffin tins with cases.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition. Stir in the vanilla.
4. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and beat well.
5. Fill the muffin tins 3/4 full. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
Leave to cool in tins for at least 10 minutes, decorate when completely cool.

White Chocolate and Strawberry 'Frosting'

Ok so it's not really frosting. My vocabulary has deserted me so I can't think of what else to call it :)

180g good quality white chocolate
6 large strawberries

1. Boil a small saucepan of water. Remove from heat and place a bowl full of the chopped white chocolate over the saucepan, making sure the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water. Stir chocolate until smooth. Allow to cool for 5 minutes or so.
2. Cut each of the strawberries in half. Then, make 4-5 vertical slices in each half, being careful not to slice all the way through.
3. With a dessert spoon, spoon some of the melted chocolate onto each cupcake, using the back of the spoon to ensure even coverage. Leave at room temperature for about 5 minutes so chocolate is firmer but not set.
4. Place a sliced strawberry onto each cupcake, pushing down into the white chocolate a little. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Cupcakes, not Yellowcake!

2006-11-03T18:23:00.000+11:00

Hiroshima Day - the anniversary of the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki - was back in August. It's taken me 3 months to write this post. Oops! There's not that much to tell, we had a protest rally and I made nuclear cupcakes as a fundraiser. I thought they were pretty cute, and it's proof that baking can serve the revolution :)

Mini Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache

2006-10-28T14:49:00.000+10:00

We finally had a housewarming for Katherine and Trenna (who moved in in March and July respectively), and a going away party for Trenna who flies back to Canada in November. It was a funky little shindig, and to help feed the masses i baked these cute little chocolate bites. In the end i made about 50-60 and there were only about 12 left the next morning, so i guess they were ok!

Mini Chocolate Cupcakes
makes about 50 mini cupcakes

1 1/3 cups plain flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup dutch-process cocoa
45g butter, softened
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C (350 F). Line muffin tins with cases.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition. Stir in the vanilla.
4. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and beat well.
5. Fill the muffin tins 3/4 full. Bake for 10-15 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
Leave to cool in tins for at least 10 minutes, then pour over Chocolate Ganache when cupcakes are completely cool.

Chocolate Ganache

125ml cream
200g dark chocolate

1. Bring cream to boil in a medium saucepan.
2. Pour over chopped chocolate, stir until smooth and glossy
3. Leave at room temperature until of a good pouring consistency.

My 2nd finished knitting project ever

2006-08-08T16:26:00.000+10:00

I need a excuse to post this beautiful photo Katherine took of my scarf-in-progress recently. It's quite long and stripy (if you couldn't tell from the stripy scarf pictured). The yarn is 35% mohair, 40% wool and 25% acrylic blend. so it ain't exactly fancy pants but that isn't the point :). It's the second knitted item I have finished since learning to knit back in March. The first thing I completed was another scarf I made for Leigh a few months ago, and I feel kinda guilty because this latest which I made for myself is nicer than the one i made Leigh. Maybe I should knit him a life-size statue of George Lucas...

Also, if you look in the background of the photo, you'll see the skull-and-crossbones tea cosy I raved about in The Tea Cosy of Death. How much does it rock?!

Trenna's Space Cakes

2006-08-05T17:33:00.000+10:00

When Leigh and I got home last night, we found a note left by our housemate Trenna wishing us a good weekend and mentioning that she had made some cupcakes. She claimed that they were yuck, having been made from a packet mix. I believe she described them as 'blek'. However when we investigated, we found that the so-called 'blek' cupcakes were in fact tasty little vanilla joy parcels frosted with white icing and hundreds & thousands. Even though they were from a packet mix, they were great. So this post is basically a tribute to Trenna's Space Cakes :)

p.s.....

2006-08-01T17:04:00.000+10:00

A very Happy Birthday to all the horses out there. :)

Maple, Pecan and Apple Cupcakes with Maple Frosting

2006-08-01T16:43:00.000+10:00

I made these yesterday afternoon. Even though they turned out kinda deformed, they are still delicious and once I covered them with frosting they looked fine. They were good fuel for our household Monopoly marathon.

Maple, Pecan and Apple Cupcakes
makes about 30 mini cupcakes

60g butter, softened
1 cup self raising flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 cup maple-flavoured syrup
2 eggs
2/3 cup coarsely chopped pecans
1/2 cup coarsely grated apple

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (360 F).
2. Beat butter, flour, cinnamon, sugar, syrup and eggs with electric mixer on low speed until ingredients are combined. Increase speed to medium, beat until mixture changes to a paler colour.
3. Stir in pecans and apple. Fill cupcake cases 2/3 full with batter.
4. Bake for about 15-20 minutes, or until golden. Cool on wire racks, then spread with maple frosting.

Maple Frosting

90g butter, softened
1 cup icing sugar
2-3 teaspoons maple-flavoured syrup

1. Beat butter, sifted icing sugar and maple syrup until light and fluffy.

Vanilla Cupcakes with Rosewater Icing

2006-06-22T11:39:00.000+10:00

For weeks I have been searching for vanilla bean paste. While it's fine to use vanilla essence or extract, I like to use real vanilla for special occasions, and scraping vanilla pods is a pain. I finally found some yesterday - huzzah! Bloody expensive stuff - $14.99 for a little jar. Still, I think the difference it makes to the finished cupcake makes it worth the expense. Fingers crossed it will last me a long time too!

I made these cupcakes for Leigh's mum's birthday. She loved them and I have to say they were quite yummy :) Next time I think I will add more food colouring to the icing, to make the rose pink colour show through more.

Vanilla Cupcakes
makes about 24 regular size cupcakes

125g (4 1/2 oz) butter, softened
3/4 cup caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste (or one vanilla bean, split & scraped)
2 eggs
1 1/4 cups plain (all-purpose) flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup (4 fl oz) milk

1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C (320 F). Line cupcake tin with paper cases.
2. Beat the butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time and beat well.
4. Sift over the flour and baking powder and beat until combined.
5. Fold through the milk and spoon the mixture into the cupcake cases. Fill the cases 3/4 full.
6. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. Cool on wire racks, then frost with rosewater icing.

Rosewater Icing

1 cup caster sugar
1/4 cup (2 fl oz) water
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon rosewater
3 eggwhites
red or rose pink food colouring

1. Place the sugar, water, cream of tartar and rosewater into a saucepan over high heat and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Bring to the boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for 3 minutes.
2. Beat the eggwhites in the bowl of an electric mixer until soft peaks form. With the beaters still on, gradually add the sugar mixture and beat until thick and glossy.
3. With a flat-bladed knife, stir in the food colouring a drop at a time until you reach the colour desired.

Raspberry Chocolate Cupcakes with Raspberry Buttercream Frosting

2006-06-15T16:55:00.000+10:00

I wanted to make something that combined chocolate and raspberries, so I took a regular old chocolate cupcake recipe and added raspberries. Easy as! If you make these, they will last longer if kept in the fridge, although at the moment Canberra is so damn cold I really don't think it would make a difference if I left them out all night.

This recipe made 24 mini-cupcakes, 12 regular cupcakes and 1 muffin. As you can tell, I had so much batter I had to basically fill up whatever cupcake tins I had until it ran out.

I hope you like them!

Raspberry Chocolate Cupcakes
made 37 cupcakes of varying sizes

1 1/3 cups plain flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup cocoa powder
45g butter, softened
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk
frozen raspberries

1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C (350 F). Line muffin tins with cases.
2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well with each addition. Stir in the vanilla.
4. Add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and beat well.
5. Fill the muffin tins 3/4 full. In each individual cup, place a frozen raspberry and push down a little way into the batter. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.
Leave to cool in tins for at least 10 minutes, then frost when completely cool.

Raspberry Buttercream Frosting

The recipe for this is really imprecise. Basically you have to play with the quantities until you get the colour and consistency you want.

150g butter, softened
2-3 cups icing sugar
frozen raspberries, quantity depends on how much of a raspberry taste/colour you're after
1/3 cup milk

1. Cream the butter. Add the icing sugar and raspberries and beat well. If you find you need more liquid in the frosting, add milk gradually.
2. Frost away!

cupcake philosophising & chai spice mix recipe

2006-06-10T15:02:00.000+10:00

apologies for wanky post title!

I just wanted to add something to my previous post. One of the things Chockylit says in her post with the Chocolate Chai Spice Cupcakes recipe is that if you've got a great base recipe, you can add all kinds of stuff to it and come up with something original.

I have to agree. I highly recommend people try out the chocolate-chai combination. Use the original recipe (see link in previous post) or use your own favourite chocolate cupcake recipe and add in the spices with the rest of the sifted dry ingredients. Here's how to make the chai spice mix. Recipe courtesy of Chockylit.

Chai Spice Mix
2 teaspoons fennel, whole
2 teaspoons cloves, whole
1 tablespoon cardomom, ground
2 teaspoons cinnamon, ground
2 teaspoons ginger, ground

1. Grind up the fennel and cloves. I used a mortar and pestle, which took about 40 minutes. If you have a small food processor, press the button and away you go! Try to get the fennel and cloves as finely ground as you can. It would suck to bite into a cupcake and chomp on a clove instead.
2. Add the cardomom, cinnamon and ginger and mix to combine.

When I made the mix I made a regular amount first, and then did it again with twice the spice quantities listed here. I put the chai mix into an empty Moccona glass coffee jar where I can readily use it again.

cupcake debacle

2006-06-10T14:41:00.000+10:00

The unimaginable has happened. A recipe that I set out to make DIDN'T WORK! It's very distressing as this has never happened to me before. Sure I'll have cakes that stick to the pan, or cupcakes a bit undercooked, but in this case I honestly have no idea what went wrong.

*deep breath*

Ok, this is what happened.

I set out to make the yummy looking Chocolate Chai Spice Cupcakes posted on Chockylit's blog. I spent an hour and a half on Tuesday night grinding up whole cloves and fennel seeds to make the chai mix, I went to the chocolate store near the Resistance Centre and spent $7.50 on 250 grams of imported speciality chocolate. I had Katherine crack 8 eggs into the batter at precise 30 second intervals, I weighed my ingredients precisely, I followed each and every instruction to the letter.

So why is it then that ALL my cupcakes fell (even when I refrained from opening the oven door to check on my babies)? Why did they turn out so damned un-cupcake-like? It is so frustrating!

Still, Katherine and Leigh loved the taste of them, and we are steadily getting through the 50 or so I made. The chai spice buttercream was delicious. So i guess it wasn't a complete failure. Still, there's no way I'd take what i made to an event or a party.

It may seem odd that I'm having a rant about this. The thing is, I get a lot of pleasure out of baking. It's so cool to put all the various ingredients together and come up with something delicious that people will enjoy. It's usually really relaxing, and this experience was just stressful.

Vanilla Passionfruit Drops

2006-06-05T14:04:00.000+10:00

The first actual recipe I post here and it's for a biscuit not a cupcake. Blasphemy! Nevertheless, these are scrumptious little treats. The first time I made them was a couple of weeks ago, and they were all gone in a couple of days.
I think when I make them again I will up the level of passionfruit pulp and reduce the amount of vanilla extract. I find with the recipe as it is at the moment the vanilla icing overpowers the passionfruit flavour a little.

Enjoy!

Passionfruit Drops
makes about 50

150g (5oz) butter, cubed and softened
1/2 cup (125g/4oz) caster sugar
1 egg
1/3 cup (90g/3oz) fresh passionfruit pulp
1 3/4 cups (215g/7oz) self-raising flour
2 tablespoons plain (all purpose) flour

1. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees C. (350 F.) and line 2 trays with baking paper.
2. Beat the butter and sugar til creamy. Add egg, beat well. Add the passionfruit and beat to combine. Fold in the combined, sifted flours. Mix well.
3. Drop 2 teaspoons of the mixture for each biscuit onto the baking paper-lined trays. Be sure to leave enough room for spreading. Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden. Leave in the oven for at least 5 minutes, then cool.

Vanilla Icing
2 cups (250g/8oz) icing sugar
1-2 teaspoons vanilla essence
35g (1 1/4 oz) butter, softened

1. Sift the sugar into a bowl. Make a well in the centre, add the vanilla, butter and 2-3 tablespoons of hot water and stir until smooth. Spread on the biscuits and allow to set.

vicious kitties

2006-05-29T16:19:00.000+10:00

Have just had lunch with Leigh, mine a very scrumptious bagel filled with turkey, cranberry, avocado and cream cheese. Not too original, but yummy nonetheless. Afterwards went into the pet store on Bunda St to look at small furry, feathery and scaly animals, watched kittens for 10 minutes or so. Kittens are vicious little buggers when they play with each other, biting ears, tails etc. I was very satisfied to see the girl kitten overpower the boy kitten. I wanted to buy something for Katherine's cat, Mia, but i realised that our house is full enough of cat toys as it is. Plus, why play with a furry whatsit when you can have just as much fun knocking cups off the table. *sigh*

the tea-cosy of death

2006-05-24T16:07:00.000+10:00

Last night Katherine knitted a skull-and-crossbones motif tea cosy. It ranks high in my mental list of Best Things Ever. It says to me, "yes, you may be having a cup of tea, but it's a dangerous badass punk rock kinda cuppa. And there may or may not be poison inside. Do you take sugar?" As soon as I get my hands on a digital camera I'll stick a pic of it on here.