Guinness Cupcakes aka Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes

Happy St. Patty's Day everyone!

Maybe I'll get around to posting every now and then, who knows. In the mean time, I thought I would jump in around where I left off and share these amazing cupcakes I made last year to celebrate March 17th and everything Irish and green. Whats better than a sweet treat with the alcohol included (most of it bakes off, yes, but that frosting is potent and delicious!)? Enjoy!

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes
*Note: This name is not meant to offend anyone, it is in reference to a drink. If you find it offensive, please call them Guinness Cupcakes.
Recipe from: Smitten Kitchen

Makes 20 to 24 cupcakes

For the Guinness Chocolate Cupcakes

1 cup stout (such as Guinness) *Hubby loves that this leaves at least a half can of Guinness for him!
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream

Ganache Filling
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate
2/3 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons butter, room temperature
1 to 2 teaspoons Irish whiskey (optional, I used more like a Tablespoon.. or a little more)

Baileys Frosting
3 to 4 cups confections sugar
1 stick (1/2 cup or 4 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
3 to 4 tablespoons Baileys (or milk, or heavy cream, or a combination thereof)
*I made a double batch of the frosting, and used 3 of the mini-bottles of Baileys.. I didn't measure, but I know I added more than is listed here

Make the cupcakes:
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 24 cupcake cups with liners. Bring 1 cup stout and 1 cup butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.

2. Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in large bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined.

3. Divide batter among cupcake liners, filling them 2/3 to 3/4 of the way. Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, rotating them once front to back if your oven bakes unevenly, about 17 minutes. Cool cupcakes on a rack completely. (Yes, I made mini-cupcakes because I thought the bite size-ness would work better for the party we were going to. No, I do not remember how long I bakes them, but it was less than 17 minutes.)

Make the filling:
4. Chop the chocolate and transfer it to a heatproof bowl. Heat the cream until simmering and pour it over the chocolate. Let it sit for one minute and then stir until smooth. (If this has not sufficiently melted the chocolate, you can return it to a double-boiler to gently melt what remains. 20 seconds in the microwave, watching carefully, will also work.) Add the butter and whiskey (if you’re using it) and stir until combined. If you add the whiskey to a very hot mixture, some of the alcohol will evaporate. Wait until it cools a little if you want a more potent filling.

Fill the cupcakes:
5. Let the ganache cool until thick but still soft enough to be piped (the fridge will speed this along but you must stir it every 10 minutes). Meanwhile, using a small knife or an apple corer, cut the centers out of the cooled cupcakes. You want to go most of the way down the cupcake but not cut through the bottom — aim for 2/3 of the way. A slim spoon or grapefruit knife will help you get the center out. Those are your “tasters”. Put the ganache into a piping bag with a wide tip and fill the holes in each cupcake to the top. I did not put the removed cake back on top of the filling, I just frosted right over it.

Make the frosting:
6. Whip the butter in the bowl of an electric mixer, or with a hand mixer, for several minutes. You want to get it very light and fluffy. Slowly add the powdered sugar, a few tablespoons at a time.

7. When the frosting looks thick enough to spread, drizzle in the Baileys (or milk) and whip it until combined. If this has made the frosting too thin, beat in another spoonful or two of powdered sugar to reach a piping consistency. (You may need to add a bit more powdered sugar if you use as much Baileys as I did!)

8. Ice and decorate the cupcakes. [I used a similar method as here, I painted stripes of orange and green gel food coloring up the insides of the piping bag, and then slowing swirled the cupcakes as I was frosting them.]

REVIEW: Awesome. These are so good! You can easily adjust the amount of whiskey and Baileys to suit the tastes of your crowd. I thought the cupcakes were really moist and I was extremely pleased with how they turned out. Plus, they were quite the topic of conversation!

UM vs. MSU: GO BLUE!!!! (aka fondant cupcakes)

Its rivalry weekend, time again for my University of Michigan Wolverines to take on the cross-state rival Michigan State Spartans!

We have an annual tailgate party at work, and I knew I wanted to make a UM/MSU themed dessert. I kind of settled on sugar cookies with royal icing, until I saw Annie's post about fondant earlier this week. It had been on my list of things to try, so that was it. I went for it!

Annie's tutorial is great, so I won't even go there. A few comments about the process:
-I made the fondant (1 batch of the below recipe for 24 cupcakes) a few days ahead and stored it in a Ziploc bag, which worked out great. I suggest making it the day before because it took me about an hour to color the fondant - I used 4 different colors, and it took quite a bit of kneading to evenly distribute the color.
-I do not suggest intricate shapes - I think I spent 3 hours cutting out the M's and S's from a card stock stencil. Next time I will either do easier shapes, or search for cookie cutters beforehand!
-Transport carefully! My fondant got a little sticky in my carrier, and the cupcakes bumped into each other leaving a little of the coloring on other cupcakes - hence why you see some blue on the edges of the white.
-I actually did like this fondant, but not as much as I enjoy buttercream! You pretty much need a stand mixer to make it, no guarantees how it would turn out otherwise!

Because I knew I would spend a lot of time decorating these, I just made a box mix of spice cake cupcakes, and a batch of this vanilla buttercream to go under the fondant. (I made 4/5 of the batch, but would easily have had enough if I only made 1/2 the batch.) I made 1 batch of the fondant recipe below.

Marshmallow Fondant
from Confections of a Foodie Bride

16 oz bag plain marshmallows (I used jumbo and they worked fine, but you need 16 oz)
2 Tbsp water
shortening, for greasing bowls
1-2 tsp flavoring (I used almond extract)
2 lb confectioner’s sugar, divided
pinch of salt

DIRECTIONS:
1. Grease a microwave safe bowl, a spoon, the dough hook, and the bowl of your stand mixer with shortening (grease it well).

2. Place the marshmallows and water in the greased microwave-safe bowl and microwave for 60 seconds. Stir with the greased spoon. If all the marshmallows have not melted, microwave for 30 seconds more. Stir in flavoring.

3. Place confectioner’s sugar and salt in the stand mixer bowl, reserving 1 cup, and make a well in the center. Pour in the marshmallow mix and turn the mixer on to the lowest setting. When it sounds strained, increase the mixer speed up one setting. Turn off the mixer once all sugar has been incorporated. If the fondant is sticky, add the reserved confectioner’s sugar 1/4 cup at a time. (My mixer was sounding a little strained, so once the sugar was just incorporated, I kneaded it by hand for a while - I covered my hands in Crisco first.)

4. Turn fondant out onto plastic wrap. Rub a bit of shortening on the outside of the ball. Wrap in plastic wrap, place in a Ziploc bag, and let rest for at least 2-3 hours. Keep unused portions covered when not using. If the fondant becomes stiff, place in microwave for 20 seconds at a time until pliable. (I used this microwave trick quite a bit - it doesn't hurt it at all.)

As for the game, well, I'm banking on my team to come out on top. Watch out Sparty!

GO BLUE!

Key Lime Cake

The first half of June is celebration-heavy in my family, with my sister's birthday, my mom's birthday, and Father's Day all within 2 weeks of each other. We headed to my parents for a BBQ to celebrate all of the above, and I volunteered to bring dessert: cake and cookies. The cookies were a back-up option because I wanted to try a non-traditional cake - Key Lime cake. I had seen key lime recipes popping up lately, and I wanted a twist on the traditional pie.

This cake was DENSE. I have no idea if it was supposed to be this way or not. The recipe does call for a box of pudding, so that could be the cause. The taste was also quite powerful - the cake and buttercream were very tart. It wasn't bad per se, but it also didn't quite satisfy a craving for birthday cake. If I were to make this again, I would play around with the recipe a bit (half the pudding mix?), and probably leave the key lime juice out of the frosting. Or, I would use this buttercream on a different cake - maybe raspberry?
Key Lime Cake with Key Lime Buttercream
recipe from cakecentral.com

Key Lime Cake:
1 (18.25oz.) lemon or yellow cake mix
1 3.5oz. box instant lemon pudding mix (dry)
4 large eggs
1/2 cup key lime juice (bottled or fresh squeezed)
1 cup vegetable oil (I subbed 1/2 with applesauce)
1/2 cup water

Key Lime Buttercream: (I cut this in half, and had plenty of frosting)
1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup Crisco
2 teaspoons real vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
8 cups powdered sugar
6 tablespoons key lime juice (more if desired for consistency and flavor)

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Combine above ingredients and beat with electric mixer for 2-3 minutes
3. Pour into prepared pans (2 8" or 9" rounds) and bake for 45 min. or until done (mine did not take this long - check at 35 min). Cool for 10 minutes and turn out from pans.

4. For the buttercream, beat butter and shortening together for about 5 minutes. Beat in vanilla and salt. Add powdered sugar 1 cup at a time alternating with the key lime juice. Decorate cake as desired.

REVIEW:
As I said before, this was ok. It was definitely more tart than sweet, and I can't help but think I messed something up given how dense the cake was. Oh well, it was a new recipe for me and I'll never learn if I don't try new things! It was also an excuse to practice some cake decorating - obviously I still need to work on my printing....

Apple Pie Cupcakes

I made these for father's day, but they would be a great addition to a 4th of July party! This is an easy way to serve the ever-American "apple pie."

Apple Pie Cupcakes
adapted liberally from Annie's Eats
Yield: 24 cupcakes

For the cupcakes:

3 cups sifted cake flour

1 Tbsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1 c. butter, softened

2 c. sugar

4 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 c. milk

For the apple filling:

2 tbsp. butter

2 tsp. cinnamon

2-3 tbsp. sugar

3 large Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and diced

For decorating - Vanilla Buttercream: (I made half of this recipe)

2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened

2 1/2 c. confectioners' sugar, sifted

1/8 tsp. salt

2 tsp. vanilla

2 tsp. heavy cream (I used milk)

DIRECTIONS:

1. To make the cupcakes, preheat the oven to 350°. Line two cupcake pans with paper liners.

2. In a medium bowl, sift together the cake flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well and scraping down the sides of the bowl after each addition. Add the vanilla extract and mix well to combine. Add in the dry ingredients alternately with the milk, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined.

3. Divide the batter evenly among the cupcake liners, filling them about 2/3-3/4 full. Bake until golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 18 to 22 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for 5 minutes in the pans. Transfer to wire racks to cool completely.

4. To make the apple filling, heat the butter a medium skillet over medium-high heat. Add the cinnamon and sugar and cook for a minute, until the mixture begins to bubble. Lower the heat to medium and stir in the apples. Mix well. Cook until the apples are somewhat tender, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

5. While the apple mixture is cooling, use the cone method to remove a chunk from the center of each cupcake, making sure to leave a rim around the top of the cupcake. (Annie describes the cone method in her post.) Fill the holes with the cooled apple mixture. To decorate, top each cupcake with a swirl of vanilla buttercream.

REVIEW:
These were very yummy! They were much easier to serve than a traditional pie, and the flavors were great.

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

I was looking for a light, fresh cupcake to take to a friend who is in the hospital. I found a bunch of lemon cupcake recipes online, but I liked how much lemon this one had in it. It is so easy for flavors to get lost sometimes. These were good, and trust me, they were not too lemony! We have some to eat around here because I completely over-baked the first batch (the original recipe called for 30 min. My other batch was done in about 22!). Oh well, more for Josh to eat!Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Buttercream
adapted from Tea Journal, makes ~24 cupcakes
frosting adapted from this post

1 cup of butter (2 sticks, room temperature)
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
3 Tbsp lemon zest (zest from 1 large lemon)
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup cake flour (I used 1 c. ap minus 2 Tbsp., + 2 Tbsp. cornstarch)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp. lemon juice
3/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp lemon extract

Lemon Drizzle/Syrup:
Juice from 1 1/2 lemons
1/2 cup sugar

Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting:
1/2 c. butter, softened
8 oz cream cheese, softened (I used 1/3 less fat)
2-3 c. confectioners sugar
1 tsp. lemon extract
zest from 1/2 a lemon
1/2 a lemon sliced into small sections for garnish, optional

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly spray muffin tins and dust with flour. Alternatively, you can line the tins with cupcake liners, however, there is a step that follows baking that can leave your cupcake liners somewhat sticky. If you don't mind sticky cupcake liners, then use the liners instead of spraying and flour dusting.

2. Cream butter and sugar together at medium speed for about 5 minutes. Do not skimp on this step, it greatly affects the texture of the cupcakes.

3. Add eggs, one at a time, to creamed mixture, blending well before adding another egg. Add lemon zest, and blend well, taking time to scrape down the sides of the bowl of your mixer and the mixer blade. The zest accumulated on the blade for me when I made these, so do make sure that you scrape the blade to make sure that the zest gets well incorporated.

4. Sift together flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder. In a different bowl, mix together the lemon juice, milk and vanilla and lemon extracts. Gradually add 1/3 of the flour mixture, blend, and then half of the lemon juice mixture, blend. Add another 1/3 of the flour mixture, blend, the last of the lemon juice mixture, blend, and finish up with the last of the flour mixture. Mix for about 20 seconds on medium speed, making sure that batter is well blended but do not over mix.

5. Scoop batter evenly into muffin tins, filling each cup about 2/3 full. (This makes about 24 cupcakes.) Bake at 350 degrees for about 20-25 minutes. Cupcakes are done when a wooden skewer inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

Now for the sticky part!

6. Juice 1 1/2 lemons, and pour into a small saucepan with 1/2 cup of sugar. Heat over medium heat until sugar is completely dissolved.

7. Using a wooden skewer, poke several holes into the crown of the cupcake. You should drive the skewer through to almost the bottom of the cupcake, as you want the syrup to be absorbed throughout the cake.

8. Now, spoon the lemon juice syrup over the cupcake. It is best to place the cupcakes on a cooking rack and place wax paper or newspaper underneath to catch the drippings. Allow the syrup to absorb into the cupcake. Allow the cupcakes to cool completely before frosting.

9. For frosting, mix butter and cream cheese until smooth. Mix in lemon extract and zest. Slowly add the powdered sugar until you get the desired sweetness.

10. I put my frosting in a bag and pipe in onto the cupcakes because I find it neater and easier this way (and faster too, actually). Top with a small slice of lemon for garnish if desired, or add some yellow sprinkles.

REVIEW:
Very yummy, the ones I didn't overbake were better. The cream cheese was a great pair with the light, lemon cakes. A tip: I don't think I made big enough "skewer holes." This was my first time using a simple syrup in a cupcake, and most of it ran off the top and dribbled down the sides. If the holes were a little bigger, more syrup would be absorbed by the cupcake. Make the holes near the center, and you will have no problems covering them up with frosting.

Wilton Buttercream Icing

There are a few versions of the Wilton recipe out there, but this is the one recommended in my class. I will probably stick with a pretty traditional Wilton recipe for "decorating," but there are plenty of other icing recipes that you could use as the base frosting on your cake. The Wilton recipes are meant to be stiff enough to hold the shape of your piping and decorations without "melting," which is why they don't use straight butter.

Class Buttercream Icing
stiff consistency, yield ~3 cups
source: Wilton Class I Student Guide

1 c. solid white vegetable shortening (For the batch I make as the base frosting on my cake, I use 1/2 c. vegetable shortening and 1/2 c. butter)
1 tsp. flavoring (clear vanilla abstract, or almond or butter abstract will work too)
2 Tbsp. milk or water
1 lb. confectioners' sugar (approx 4 c., sifted is best)
1 Tbsp. meringue powder
a pinch of salt

DIRECTIONS:
1. Cream shortening, flavor, and water.
2. Add dry ingredients and mix on medium speed until all incorporated. Blend an additional minute or so, until creamy.
*To alter to medium consistency, add 1 tsp. water to each cup of stiff consistency icing. To alter to thin consistency, add 2 tsp. water to each cup of stiff consistency icing.
** Chocolate variation: Add 3/4 c. cocoa or three 1 oz. unsweetened choc squares (melted), and an additional 1 to 2 Tbsp. water to recipe. Mix until well blended.

Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate Frosting

I found this courtesy of Annie when I was making Cookies and Cream cake. It really is the perfect chocolate frosting. Irresistible.Perfectly Chocolate Frosting
original recipe from Hershey's

½ c. unsalted butter (1 stick)

2/3 c. cocoa powder

3 c. confectioners’ sugar

1/3 c. milk (I used skim)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS:

1. Melt the butter in a medium bowl. Stir in the cocoa. Alternately add confectioners’ sugar and milk, beating to spreading consistency. Add small amount additional milk, if needed. Stir in vanilla.

2. Stop eating it out of the bowl!

REVIEW:

Ohmygoshthisissogood. Perfect chocolate frosting. Don't tell Hershey's that I used Nestle cocoa powder. But seriously - this is great for covering cakes, spreadable - a great consistency. I recommend all around.

Cream Cheese Frosting

This is an excellent cream cheese frosting. Not grainy, not too sweet. From Simply Recipes. I used it on Orange-Vanilla cupcakes and it was fabulous!Cream Cheese frosting
probably enough for ~24 cupcakes?

1/2 c. of butter (1 stick), room temperature
8 oz of Philly cream cheese (1 package), room temperature (I used 1/3 less fat)
2 - 3 c. of powdered sugar
1 tsp. of vanilla extract (I added 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract and 1/2 tsp. orange juice since I was frosting orange cupcakes)

DIRECTIONS:
1. With an electric mixer, mix the butter and cream cheese together, about 3 minutes on medium speed until very smooth. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl to ensure even mixing.
2. Add the vanilla extract and mix. Slowly add the powdered sugar. Keep adding until you get to desired sweetness.
3. Either spread on with a blunt knife or spatula, or spoon into a piping bag to decorate your cake or cupcake.

REVIEW:
Very smooth. Not too sweet. The perfect touch for cakes and cupcakes.