Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

Some people feel red velvet cupcakes are a perfect Valentine's Day treat. I don't disagree, but I certainly wouldn't limit them to that holiday. I think they're perfect for many other occasions. Like Mondays. Or for the Fourth of July. I mean, they're red! What could be more perfect? With the white cream cheese frosting and some blue sugar sprinkles, they are perfectly patriotic little treats.

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting
makes 24 (and maybe a bit more) cupcakes

For the cupcakes:
5 Tablespoons of butter, softened
1 3/4 cups of sugar
2 eggs

1/4 cup of red food coloring (the liquid kind)
1/4 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder

2 cups of cake flour
1 3/4 cups of all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of baking soda

2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
1 cup of buttermilk

1 cup of sour cream
1 Tablespoon of white vinegar

For the frosting:
8 ounces of cream cheese, at room temperature
5 Tablespoons of butter, softened
2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups of powdered sugar

Directions: Preheat oven to 350. Line standard-size cupcake tins for 24 cupcakes.

In a large mixing bowl, beat butter and sugar with medium speed until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one by one, beating after each one. Turn mixer off.

Whisk red food coloring and cocoa powder together in a bowl until combined. Add to mixing bowl, beating until incorporated.

Mix the 4 dry ingredients- cake flour, all-purpose flour, salt, and baking soda together in a separate bowl. Combine the vanilla and buttermilk. Turn the mixer back to medium, and add the dry ingredients to the mixing bowl in three batches, alternating with two batches of the wet ingredients. Beat until just combined.

Add vinegar to the sour cream, stir to combine, and add to the mixing bowl. Beat on low until just combined.

Fill cupcake tins 3/4 full. (You may end up with slightly over 24. I think mine made 27.) Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool in pans for five minutes, and then move to racks to cool completely.

For the frosting: Beat butter, cream cheese, and vanilla together in a bowl with medium high speed until smooth and creamy. Slowly add powdered sugar, while continuing to beat mixture until it reaches the desired consistency. (If you're looking for a stiffer frosting, you may need to add more powdered sugar.) Frost cupcakes, and enjoy!


Adapted from Confections of a Foodie Bride, original recipe here.

Lemon Cupcakes with Raspberry Filling and Lemon Buttercream

Happy Easter! Hope you are having as lovely of a spring day as we are here!

We had a nice relaxing morning, and then attempted to dye some eggs, which didn't turn out as gorgeous as we hoped. We are headed out to H's parents' house for dinner soon for a nice, small get-together.

MIL said it would be great if I could bring a dessert, and we all know what the answer to that was! I found a number of desserts incorporating Cadbury Creme eggs (swoon), but I doubted they'd be as much of a crowd-pleaser as I would hope (although I may have to try some of them soon!). I love the combination of lemon and raspberry, and decided on something using those light, spring-y flavors: lemon cupcakes filled with raspberry jam and topped with a lemon buttercream.

Lemon Cupcakes with Raspberry Filling and Lemon Buttercream
(makes 24)

For the cupcakes:

3 cups of all-purpose flour
1 Tablespoon of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt

2 cups of sugar
2 sticks of butter, at room temperature

4 large eggs
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
zest and juice of 3 lemons
1 cup of buttermilk

For the filling:
1 1/2 cups of seedless raspberry jam

For the frosting:
1 1/2 sticks of butter
2 cups of powdered sugar
3/4 teaspoon of lemon extract

Cupcakes: Preheat oven to 325. Line 24 standard cupcake tins.

Whisk together flour, salt, and baking powder in a bowl.

Cream butter and sugar with a mixer on medium until pale and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, and mixing after each. Mix in the lemon zest (should be about 3 Tablespoons) and the vanilla. Add the flour mixture, alternating with 2 Tablespoons of lemon juice and the buttermilk, and mix until just combined.

Fill tins about 3/4 full of batter, and place in oven for 12 minutes. Rotate, and place back in oven for another 10-13 minutes, or until they are starting to turn golden brown.

Let cool completely on a wire rack.

Filling: Fill a pastry bag with the raspberry jam (I found it easier to use half the jam at a time and refill when needed) and attach a medium-sized round tip (I used Wilton #10). Use a small, sharp knife at a very shallow angle to cut a circle out of the top of the cupcake. Then knock a bit of cake off of the bottom of the piece you remove and set it aside. Use a very small spoon (I use a 1/4 teaspoon measuring spoon) to hollow out the cupcake a bit more, careful to not hit the bottom. Fill with the jam, and place the top back on, pressing down and wiping away any extra jam as needed.

Frosting: Cream butter on medium high until light and fluffy (about 1-2 minutes). Lower the mixer to medium and add the powdered sugar in 1/2 cup increments, scraping down the sides as necessary. Add in the lemon extract after the sugar. Place mixer on high for 10 seconds to aerate the frosting. Frost cupcakes as desired. (I split up the frosting in 4 bowls, added a different gel paste color to each, frosted with a butter knife, and topped with sprinkles). Enjoy!

Cupcakes and frosting adapted from Martha Stewart, original recipes here and here.

Happy New Year! (and Chocolate Raspberry-Filled Cupcakes)

Happy new year, everyone! I hope you all had an enjoyable New Years Eve, and that your 2011 is full of health, wealth, and happiness.

For New Years Eve, H and I, and two of our friends, had dinner at the Smith in NYC, which I would definitely recommend if you're ever in the area! Our friend chose the spot mainly because it wasn't crazy expensive, included a three-course meal, and a table that was ours for the night (funny how things have changed since the days when an open-bar and great DJ so we could dance the night away were top priorities). We were expecting the food to be decent, but it totally blew our expectations out of the water! The food was really, really, good. It was traditional American with a slight modern spin. We were very impressed! And the champagne sangria was delicious :)

The only downfall of the night was that there was no official countdown and the big ball wasn't on a TV there. This led to about 10 different drunken, randomly started countdowns between 11:58 and 12:02. Oh well! But on to the new year...

I'm not too big on resolutions, since I can never keep them, yet I still try. My goal for this year is for healthy eating and exercising to be more of a lifestyle for me, and less of a quick fix. I need to learn some darn moderation! I have the will-power to to diet and lose weight when I force myself to, but I'm too strict with myself, which causes me to burn out. And then I stop exercising completely and don't watch what I eat at all. And that bingeing is exactly what's happened in the past couple months. It's really not pretty when your loose, flowy tops are starting to become too snug. Yikes!

So I'm going to try to steer towards a bit more healthier recipes in the coming months- I'm excited to eat a bit cleaner, greener, and healthier. But I just have to sneak this cupcake recipe in first! It is the last of the recipes I made for the soup kitchen dinner last month, so it doesn't count, right??

Chocolate Raspberry Cupcakes with Raspberry Buttercream


for the cupcakes:

9 Tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1 teaspoon of baking soda

1/4 teaspoon of baking powder

8 Tablespoons of unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 1/2 cups sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature

1/2 cup strong coffee (or water)

1/2 cup of low-fat milk

for the filling:

1 cup of seedless raspberry jam

for the frosting:
16 Tablespoons of unsalted butter, at room temperature
6 cups of powdered sugar

1/2 cup seedless raspberry jam

Pink icing color

Directions: 
Preheat the oven to 350 and line two cupcake pans with paper liners.  In a small bowl whisk together the cocoa powder, flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar on medium-high until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Mix in the eggs one at a time.

In a measuring cup, combine the coffee and milk. Add half of the dry ingredients to the mixer bowl and mix on low speed until just combine. Stir in the coffee-milk mixture. Add in the remaining dry ingredients, again mixing until just combined. 

Divide the batter evenly between the cupcake liners, filling the cups about 3/4 full. Bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Once the cupcakes have cooled completely, use a small spoon or knife in the top of the cupcake to create a small hole in the center for the filling. Spoon in about 2 teaspoons of raspberry jam in each cupcake. (It may help to heat it up a very tiny bit to make it easier to work with. Be careful not to heat it to the point of being liquid, as it will just absorb into the cupcake.)

Finally, for the frosting, place the butter and jam in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Cream on medium-high speed until well combined, for about 2 minutes. Sift in the powdered sugar and mix until smooth. Tint with the pink icing color as desired. Ice cupcakes, top with chocolate jimmies, and enjoy!

Adapted from Annie's Eats, original recipe here.

Margarita Cupcakes

I have to say, H and I had a pretty awesome last weekend. We went to the Tom Petty concert on Sunday, and wow- what an amazing show!! It was awesome- one of the highest energy and just plain fun concerts I've ever been to. And while that was all fun and good, of course my mind was on the tailgating beforehand with some friends. The food! The drinks! Oh my! What should I bring?? I had been reading quite a bit about margarita cupcakes recently in the cooking blog world, and I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try some.

Margarita Cupcakes



Ingredients: 


For the cupcakes:
3 cups all-purpose flour

1 tbsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

2 cups sugar

4 large eggs, at room temperature

3 limes, zested and juiced

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 cup buttermilk

To make the cupcakes, preheat the oven to 325˚ F. Line two cupcake pans with paper liners. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt; stir with a fork to blend. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 3-5 minutes. Blend in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the lime zest, lime juice and vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, mix in the dry ingredients in three additions alternating with the buttermilk, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Beat each addition just until incorporated.

Divide the batter between the prepared cupcake liners, filling each about 3/4 full. Bake 20-22 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan 5-10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

For the frosting:

2 Tbsp. tequila, room temperature
3 Tbsp. margarita mix, room temperature
4 Tbsp. (1/2 stick) butter, room temperature
2 cups powdered sugar (approximately)

Mix the tequila and margarita mix together and set aside. In stand mixer bowl with whip attachment, combine the butter and 2/3 cup of powdered sugar on medium. Pour in 2 Tbsp. of tequila and margarita mix, blend well until mix. Continue to alternate powdered sugar and liquid until finished, frosting should be smooth, not too fluffy and not too liquid-y. Frost cupcakes with butter knife, leaving a bit unfrosted at the very edges. Let set for about 15 minutes, then roll edges in sugar to mimic a margarita. Enjoy!

Cake recipe from Annie's Eats, original recipe here. Frosting recipe adapted from Apple a Day and Martha Stewart, original recipes here and here.

The Great Doughnut Cupcake Experiment

A couple weeks ago, before we left on our trip, it was H's birthday. I meant to blog about this before but things got so hectic, it had to wait.

But anyway... H likes doughnuts. Really, really likes doughnuts. And for his birthday, I decided I would bake him something he would really appreciate- doughnut-inspired cupcakes! So... I found these two recipes in my Martha Stewart Cupcake book, and decided they would be perfect. The first one is Boston Creme pie cupcakes and the second was called Strawberry Jam Teacakes (which isn't online) and I was going to do that one with a cinnamon-sugar topping, inspired by a jelly-filled doughnut.

Well, let me say the Boston Creme ones turned out fantastic! I did have to bake them a little less than 15 minutes (13 should be plenty), since they were starting to get a bit too dark. But the custard and the ganache, and everything together- YUM!

The teacakes on the other hand... didn't exactly turn out. I followed the recipe exactly- which said to fill each tin with 2 T. of batter, 1 T. of jam, and then the rest of the batter on top- but the bottoms completely collapsed out when I tried to get them out of the pans.

  (the batter and jam, ready to be topped off)

 

(hm... not exactly what I was expecting)

 

(oh well!)

Don't worry, they didn't go to waste! I topped them with powdered sugar and we ate them like that. Still delicious!

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes- Part 2

Remember these?

I certainly do. That's because I may or may not have been drooling over them and dreaming about them since I originally found the recipe.

And although I wanted to make them sooner, I needed the perfect occasion. And by "the perfect occasion," I mean an occasion that involves being able to share them. Otherwise, H and I would eat all 24 within a few days and that is definitely not what our waistlines need.
So when we planned a pub crawl with some friends from college that involved hanging out at their apartment with snacks and board games afterward, I knew what I would be bringing.

Recipe here.

It's looking like a good night already, eh?

Creamy chocolate batter

Fresh out of the oven- a little sunken in. Good thing I'm cutting out the middles and filling them with ganache.

Butter and whisky waiting it's turn.

Simmering cream and chocolate pieces.

One creamy chocolate-y filling.

The filled cupcakes.

The final product.

Yum.

New Recipe Review- Oh, Martha!

For my new recipe last week, I decided to try Martha Stewart's Peanut Butter Cupcakes from the cupcake cookbook my sister got me for Christmas. I had leftover chocolate frosting from the cake I made for my mother-in-law's birthday and needed something to do with it. H suggested peanut butter and I was totally on board.

Well, let me say the batter was fantastic! I was so excited, it was perfectly peanut buttery, just sweet enough, and oh-so-fluffy. It took all I had not to shove heaping spoonfuls of it into my mouth before baking them.

Well... it turns out I should have just ate it all without baking them. I had raised my eyebrow when the recipe told me to preheat the oven to 375 and bake them for 22 minutes, when I usually bake cupcakes at 350 for 16-18 minutes. But Martha Stewart knows what she's doing, right?? Wrong, apparently. At around 18 minutes, the sweet smell of delicious baking goodies was replaced with a slight burning smell. I ran to the oven, opened the door, and lo and behold, it was my cupcakes. They all had completely burned- hard as a rock bottoms and all the top edges were burnt to a crisp as well. Poop on a stick :(

I broke the burnt part off the edges and iced them anyway. We were able to eat the top parts off of the hockey puck bottoms, but they still had that slightly burnt taste throughout. Big fat fail. I'll have to try these again and use my normal bake time; they definitely had potential!

Online recipe here. Strangely enough, the online version of the recipe gives you a shorter bake time at a lower temperature, and says it makes 18 (and therefore bigger) cupcakes and not 22 like the book said! Where is the quality control, Martha??

Here is a picture of my sad, burnt cupcakes. The iced versions were too messy to even take a picture of.

Cupcakes!

After a long day of cleaning, freelance projects, and snow, I decided it was time for some baking! I cracked open the "Martha Stewart's Cupcakes" cookbook my sister got me for Christmas (awesome!) and asked H to choose one for me to bake. He's a big fan of tastykake cakes, so it's no surprise he picked the "Cream-Filled Chocolate Cupcakes."

They were delicious and not too difficult.

Here is the cupcake cemetery. I should have listened when they told me to use jumbo muffin tins. I only had one, so I used that one and one regular cupcake tin. Since the cupcake tin was too small, most of the ones in there puffed up and over the sides, so it was impossible to get them out without the tops falling off. Oh well, I'll think of something to do with them.

Here are the successful ones in all their marshmallow-ed glory.

Yum!

I'll consider it a success! Recipe can be found here- I didn't make any changes. I did use fat-free sour cream (you know, cause I'm healthy) and it worked fine. Definitely use the jumbo muffin tins though and not regular cupcake ones!

Irish Car Bomb CUPCAKES??

I'm not an Irish car bomb type of girl. Really. Not even in college. Something about chugging a glass of curdling concoction... just doesn't do it for me. The ingredients however? Now that's a different story!

So when I saw these cupcakes on EastVillageKitchen, I was excited to say the least. Those beauties are Guinness chocolate cupcakes with a Jameson chocolate ganache filling, and a Bailey's buttercream frosting. WOW. My first thought was "what a great St. Patrick's Day treat!" but I don't think I can wait until then...

(images from EastVillageKitchen, recipe here.)

I told you this post would be a bit more exciting ;) I think I'll be baking these this week...