Kickass Cupcakes

...Are kickass indeed. Well, actually... the GF cake wasn't perfect. I think I could do better at home. But the icing, wow. Unbelievable. Especially the vanilla frosting. Makes me want to drive over there right now for another one :)


They have a fun selection of flavors, check out their website. They also deep fry cupcakes, turn cupcakes into parfaits, and make cupcake sundaes. Oh, and they use all natural ingredients. They even have a dairy bar next door that sells local milk and ice cream. Rock on!!

The cupcakes are pretty small, so Dan and I each got two. Dan ordered regular cupcakes, one vanilla and one red velvet. He seemed to like them both equally, although seemed into the cream cheese frosting on the red velvet.

I tried a GF chocolate cupcake with vanilla icing, and a vanilla cupcake with chocolate frosting. The best part was the vanilla icing, maybe next time I'll try vanilla on vanilla, if it's an option.



Cupcake box.... ohhh like a kid at Christmas

At first it may appear that you're getting gyped on frosting

But no, there is plenty :)

Best icing ever!!

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, a vacation from Gluten-Free living!

I was instructed to start eating gluten again in prep for a biopsy. I took full advantage! This is one awesome pineapple upside-down cake, courtesy of Cooks Illustrated. I love this recipe, it's an all-time favorite of mine.

After simmering the sugar and pineapples, collect the pineapple juice

Then cook the juice some more and then add a little butter to form the caramel topping

Pour the caramel in the prepared pan and set aside.















Get ready to put the pineapple in the pan!















Ta da! The pineapple topping is ready.















Cake batter... yum















Drop the cake batter onto the pineapple and carefully spread so that you don't disrupt the topping.















Ready to bake















Golden brown- done cooking!















Carefully, put a plate on top of the cake pan and invert. Remove the cake pan. I used a knife before inverting to loosen the sides of the cake.















Recipe, from Cooks Illustrated

Pineapple Topping
1 medium fresh pineapple (about 4 pounds), prepared according to illustrations below (about 4 cups prepared fruit)
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar (7 ounces)
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cake
1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (7 1/2 ounces)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick), softened but still cool
3/4 cup granulated sugar (5 1/4 ounces)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs at room temperature
1 egg white at room temperature
1/3 cup whole milk at room temperature

1. Lightly spray 9-inch round, 2-inch deep cake pan with nonstick cooking spray; set aside.

2. For the pineapple topping: Combine pineapple and brown sugar in 10-inch skillet; cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally during first 5 minutes, until pineapple is translucent and has light brown hue, 15 to 18 minutes. Empty fruit and juices into mesh strainer or colander set over medium bowl. Return juices to skillet, leaving pineapple in strainer (you should have about 2 cups cooked fruit). Simmer juices over medium heat until thickened, beginning to darken, and mixture forms large bubbles, 6 to 8 minutes, adding any more juices released by fruit to skillet after about 4 minutes. Off heat, whisk in butter and vanilla; pour caramel mixture into prepared cake pan. Set aside while preparing cake. (Pineapple will continue to release liquid as it sits; do not add this liquid to already-reduced juice mixture.)

3. For the cake: Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt in medium bowl; set aside.

4. In bowl of standing mixer fitted with flat beater, cream butter and sugar at medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Reduce speed to medium, add vanilla, and beat to combine; one at a time, add whole eggs then egg white, beating well and scraping down bowl after each addition. Reduce speed to low; add about one-third of flour mixture and beat until incorporated. Add half of milk and beat until incorporated; repeat, adding half of remaining flour mixture and remaining milk, and finish with remaining flour. Give final stir with rubber spatula, scraping bottom and sides of bowl to ensure that batter is combined. Batter will be thick.

5. To bake: Working quickly, distribute cooked pineapple in cake pan in even layer, gently pressing fruit into caramel. Using rubber spatula, drop mounds of batter over fruit, then spread batter over fruit and to sides of pan. Tap pan lightly against work surface to release any air bubbles. Bake until cake is golden brown and toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean, 45 to 50 minutes. Cool 10 minutes on wire rack, then place inverted serving platter over cake pan. Invert cake pan and platter together; lift off cake pan. Cool to room temperature, about 2 hours; then cut into pieces and serve.

To Prepare pineapple:
1. Slice 1 inch off top and bottom. Standing pineapple on one end, cut off strips of skin from top to bottom.
2. Quarter pineapple lengthwise. Place each quarter on its side and cut out light-colored piece of core.
3. Cut pineapple lengthwise into 3/4-inch strips. Turn 90 degrees and cut crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces, (or dice as recipe instructs).

SCD Peanut Butter Cake

Dan's birthday was a few days ago. I am committed to baking SCD style, so I searched for something that Dan would like. I found this recipe for peanut butter cake.

I actually mis-read the instructions and added 1/2 tsp of almond flour instead of almond flavor. It didn't seem to make any difference- in fact I only just noticed my mistake as I am writing this!

After a few bites Dan proclaimed that he likes the SCD desserts better than any other desserts I've made. This is huge, people! Dan is usually skeptical of the "healthy" food I like. So to hear that he likes this stuff so much is a good sign!!

Here we go...

All natural peanut butter. Just peanuts and salt!

Mmmmm... honey and PB in the blender

Throw in some banana
Add the other ingredients and blend. My blender did not cooperate. This batter was just too thick. Next time I think I'll put the egg in first or consider using a food processor instead. I was so stressed by my almost-smoking blender that I forgot to take any more photos until it came out of the oven.
It was moist, chewy, full of flavor. Delicious!!

Especially delicious with vanilla ice cream. No, the ice cream was not SCD approved. But it was a birthday celebration after all, gotta have ice cream :)

Thank you for having a birthday....

...so I had an excuse to make these Nutella cupcakes. This recipe comes from Carmen Cooks. They looked to die for. So when a co-workers birthday popped up (on Cinco de Mayo, fun!), I jumped at the chance to bring in a treat for the office. They ended up being so easy and so good. The cake was moist and delicious, and how can you go wrong adding Nutella?

It starts with a yellow cake batter (mmmm... cake batter)


Divide the batter into 12 cupcake things Add a dollop of Nutella to each
Swirl the cake batter and Nutella. Note to self (and others): it's not easy to swirl thick cupcake batter with even thicker Nutella in paper liners.
Try to resist shoving one in your mouth right when the pan comes out of the oven. It's hard, they smell so good!
The best part is the fact that they are already frosted. Super easy!
See? Swirling issues. The Nutella should have been swirled throughout the entire cupcake instead of blobbed in the center. Whatever, they were still awesome.
Nutella Frosted Cupcakes
From Carmen Cooks

1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup, 12 oz) butter, softened
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups sifted all purpose flour (sifted? I never sift flour)
1/4 tsp salt (I used salted butter, so I omitted the extra salt)
2 tsp baking powder
Nutella, approx. 1/3 cup

Preheat oven to 325F. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners (I highly recommend NOT using paper liners. Really, don't do it) or grease the cups with some butter. Alternatively, butter an 8-inch round cake pan.

Cream together butter and sugar until light, 2 minutes. Add in eggs one at a time, until fully incorporated. Don’t worry if the batter doesn’t look smooth (It won't. It looks pretty gross at this point. But don't you worry... it will be irresistible soon). Add vanilla. Stir in flour, salt and baking powder until batter is uniform and no flour remains.

Fill each muffin cup about 3/4 full (or pour all the batter into the cake pan). The batter will be thick. Top each cake with a dollop (I used about 2 tsp per cupcake and about 1/3 cup dolloped in tablespoon measures for the cake round) of Nutella. Swirl Nutella in with a toothpick, making sure to fold a bit of batter up over the Nutella (This is where you will regret using paper liners. That toothpick is no match for thick batter being held in flimsy paper).

Bake cupcakes for about 20 minutes and the round cake for 25-30.

Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
Makes 12 cupcakes or 1 8-inch round cake.

April Daring Baker's Challenge: Cheesecake

Yay! My first challenge!! Done! This was fun. The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge. We were encouraged to add a little flair to the basic recipe. I chose to do a chocolate turtle variety. Chocolate cheesecake, covered with caramel and pecans. Yum!! My younger sister offered to host Easter dinner at her apartment this year, so I brought this for dessert. I ran into a few speed bumps along the way though, and the cake didn't look too pretty. But dang, it tasted really good. I cooked this the night before Easter at my in-laws house in New Hampshire. I blame the new cooking environment for my accidents ;)

I think the main problem was that I skipped the water bath when I was cooking the cake. I was not able to find an aluminum pan that seemed the right size, so I stuck with a springform pan. I was so afraid of getting a soggy crust that I just skipped the water bath. I would have braved it, but I didn't want to mess up Easter dinner with a soggy cheesecake! When I took the cheesecake out of the oven, it was puffy and VERY cracked. And, well- it just didn't look like cheesecake. However, once I poured the caramel sauce and pecans over the top you couldn't tell. And, the deep cracks actually allowed for the caramel to seep deep into the cake! YUM!!

I think one other problem, that perhaps led to the puffiness, was that I mis-read the instructions and added the heavy cream in with the cream cheese and sugar at the beginning, so it took a little too much beating. The batter seemed a little too fluffy to me.

I also ran into some issues with the caramel sauce. This was due to the fact that I didn't pay very good attention to the stove. Too many distractions:) I over-boiled the sugar/water combo the first time (burned the sugar), accidentally let the heavy cream boil over the once, and burned the cream another time. But, I finally pulled it together and the caramel came out quite well. Unfortunately Dan and I then had to run to 6 stores to find more heavy cream to replace the extra carton of my mother-in-laws that I had to use. That is not an easy task at 8:30pm when you are in the middle of nowhere, NH, and it is the night before a big holiday.

One more note... I think I would add more chocolate next time. I had two 4oz bars of bittersweet chocolate, but I burned one of them while melting it in the microwave. So I just used one, and the chocolate flavor was not very strong. But all in all, this was a delicious recipe! I would absolutely make it again.

Ingredients ready to go, can you tell it's not my usual kitchen?


YUM, graham cracker crust!! Did you know that they sell graham cracker crumbs at the supermarket? I was dreading having to use a food processor (they are SUCH a pain to clean), so I was psyched to see that I wouldn't have to!


Before adding the chocolate
Chocolate and cinnamon are added, mmmm tasty! Definitely looks too fluffy. I think cheesecake batter should be denser.

Note to self, scrape mixing bowl a few times next time.

That doesn't really look like cheesecake to me.

Caramel topping and nuts are added, at least they cover the cracks! This went in the fridge overnight.

Easter Sunday, ready to be cut!

Ok, it doesn't totally look like a cheesecake, but it was so, so, so tasty.

Caramel-y goodness :)
The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes
Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake:

crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

cheesecake:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
1 tbsp liqueur, optional (I didm't use any)
**For the chocolate turtle variety, I added 4oz of bittersweet chocolate, melted and 1 tsp of cinnamon

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Set crust aside.

3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy. **This is when I added the melted chocolate and cinnamon.

4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.

5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you're looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

Topping: Classic Caramel Sauce from Cooks Illustrated
2 cups of sugar
2 Tbsp butter, unsalted
pinch of table salt
1 cup heavy whipping cream

1. Pour 1 cup water into 2-quart heavy-bottomed saucepan; add sugar to center of pot to keep granules from adhering to sides of pot. Bring to boil over high heat, covered. Uncover pot, insert candy thermometer, and continue to boil until syrup is thick and straw-colored, registering 300 degrees on candy thermometer, about 15 minutes. Reduce heat to medium; continue to cook until sugar is deep amber, begins to smoke, and registers 350 degrees on candy thermometer, about 5 minutes longer. Meanwhile, when temperature of syrup reaches 300 degrees, bring cream and salt to simmer in small, heavy-bottomed saucepan over high heat. (If cream reaches simmer before syrup reaches 350 degrees, remove cream from heat and set aside.)

2. Remove sugar syrup from heat. Pour about one quarter of hot cream into sugar syrup; let bubbling subside. Add remaining cream; let bubbling subside. Whisk gently until smooth; whisk in butter. Let cool until warm; serve. (Can be covered and refrigerated up to 1 month; reheat in microwave or small saucepan over low heat.)

Pour caramel over cooled cheesecake (before you put it in the fridge for the night). Sprinkle top with chopped pecans.

Not-so-perfect baby shower cake.

Pathetic. Frustrating. Wasteful. Those are the best words that can sum up my attempt to make a cute baby shower cake for Grace and Tony. I had planned something like this, with only 2 layers (minus the creepy baby faces, bottles, and booties):


I had done tons of research and planning on decorating cakes with fondant. I had a great book that I borrowed from my sister. I made the cakes a few days ahead of time (basic chocolate cake), and put them in the freezer.

On saturday morning I trimmed the cakes and primed them with vanilla buttercream frosting. I had everything lined up and ready to go.



But when the time rolled around to make the fondant, things started to fall apart. The recipe called for gelatin. I was supposed to sprinkle it over water and let it firm up. Well, there just didn't seem to be enough water. And, I couldn't get it to smooth out. It was all lumpy. I added corn syrup and glycerin as called for. Those ingredients never seemed to blend with the gelatine mixture. I ended up with a lumpy, gooey, separated mess. I tried adding it to the confectioners sugar anyway and crossed my fingers. I spent about a half hour trying to knead this mess into something useable. There was not enough moisture to soak up all the sugar. The sugar was poufing all over my kitchen, and it was sucking all of the moisture out of my hands (and arms... and elbows...). I eventually ended up with a crusty, lumpy, partially discolored mess (the gelatin lumps were yellowish).

Clearly, homemade fondant was not going to happen today. I ran out to the local craft store to get that store-bought fondant crap. And crap it was. Who knows how long it had been sitting on the shelf, but it was rock-hard and took forever to roll out. I really wanted the cake to be decorated in blue, but this stuff was way too hard to knead food coloring into. Once I finally was able to roll it into a big enough circle, I draped it over the cake. Things seemed to be okay, I trimmed it and pressed the fondant into the buttercreamed cake. Then, I decided to spray the cake with blue spray food coloring. Bad idea!! I ended up with a patchy, ugly, partially blue blob of a cake. And, I taste tested the fondant scraps. Disgusting! It didn't taste good... can't serve that.

Disappointed, I threw it in the trash. I realized that buttercream frosting was going to have to do for this cake. Luckily, I had a box of cake mix in the cupboard (marble), so I threw that together to replace the layer I had just thrown away. Meanwhile, I made pounds of buttercream frosting and got to work on the bottom layer. I did a simple pipe job all over the cake. I was running out of time with the second layer, so I had to slap that together while it was still partially warm. In my haste I wasn't as careful with the trimming (plus trimming a warmish cake is really tricky), so the whole cake ended up looking a little lopsided. I threw the second layer on and finished the piping (with a green basket weave on top)
Top layer removed for cutting/serving:I am really disappointed with how the whole thing turned out, but hey- at least it tasted good. I am determined to try again, however I will be using another recipe. I found marshmallow fondant recipe that looks interesting...

Here is the buttercream recipe, it is SO good. Another one from Cook's Illustrated.

If you prefer to skip the vanilla bean, increase the extract to 1 1/2 teaspoons. The buttercream can be made ahead and refrigerated; if refrigerated, however, they must stand at room temperature to soften before use. If using a hand-held mixer, increase mixing times significantly (at least 50 percent). This recipe can be doubled to make enough for a two-layer cake.

Ingredients
10 tablespoons unsalted butter , softened
1/2 vanilla bean , halved lengthwise
1 1/4 cups confectioners' sugar (5 ounces)
Pinch table salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1tablespoon heavy cream

Instructions
In standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat butter at medium-high speed until smooth, about 20 seconds. Using paring knife, scrape seeds from vanilla bean into butter and beat mixture at medium-high speed to combine, about 15 seconds. Add confectioners' sugar and salt; beat at medium-low speed until most of the sugar is moistened, about 45 seconds. Scrape down bowl and beat at medium speed until mixture is fully combined, about 15 seconds; scrape bowl, add vanilla and heavy cream, and beat at medium speed until incorporated, about 10 seconds, then increase speed to medium-high and beat until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down bowl once or twice.

My first, unofficial, challenge

As I mentioned before, I found this cake that I just had to make for my sister's birthday. This was an old Daring Baker's Challenge. Since I am hoping to join that group soon, I'll consider the baking of this cake as a warm-up! I didn't take many photos, unfortunately. Next time, I will be sure to have my camera handy.

I checked out many of the Daring Bakers' Filbert Gateau cakes, but I just loved Sydney's tall, fluffy cake yet intensely creamy frosting version. So, I modeled mine after hers. My process looked very similar to hers! Check her page for photos and for the recipes/instructions.

My notes:
-I doubled everything
-I made this cake for a Friday night dinner. I began cooking it on Wednesday night. It took a few hours on Wednesday, Thursday, AND Friday to cook, assemble, and clean up after! Man, I went through a lot of dishes for this!
-I used the substitute simple buttercream. I added more praline paste than called for, I think that the simple buttercream makes more frosting than the Swiss buttercream and so it needs more praline paste. I just kept adding the paste until I felt like the taste was strong enough. It got a bit crunchy, which I thought was weird (maybe I didn't process the brittle long enough?), but my family loved it.
-I used a combination of raspberry and strawberry preserves. This was an accident, but it worked just fine.
-I loved what Sydney did with her cake by piping praline buttercream all over the outside. I didn't have enough frosting left for that, so I just piped the buttercream all along the sides of the cake, and left the top alone. I kind of liked the effect!

I really enjoyed this cake. I had leftover ganache, so I heated that up and passed it with the cake. If you like hazlenuts, you will love this cake! I might experiment with a more chocolately version next time.