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!

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.

New Recipe Review- Healthy Shrimp Newburg

As part of my 101 in 1001, I committed to trying a new recipe each week for the next 1001 days. While I don't promise to blog about all of my accomplishments in the 101 list (I highly doubt anyone is interested in the extra $10 I put into savings or if I called my mom that week), this is one that I'd really like to keep up with.

So last week, I decided to try Rachael Ray's healthy version of "Shrimp Newburg," recipe here. I saw it in the magazine and it looked delicious, so creamy and "shrimp-y" and flavorful, but it was a bit of a disappointment. It didn't really have any flavor at all. I ended up dumping a few teaspoons of garlic powder in, which made it better, but still nothing exciting. Granted, I used skim milk instead of the recommended 2% milk because that's what we had, but I have trouble believing that was the problem. Oh well. They can't all be winners.

It looked pretty anyway. I served it with orzo pasta and steamed broccoli.