It's become a bit of a tradition at my office for me to bring in cupcakes on anyone's birthday. Brandon's is today, so when he approached me about cupcakes I was more than happy to oblige. We brain stormed and came up with this compass:

Things That Are Good:
chocolate
mint
caramel
vanilla

Things That Are Bad:
nuts
seafood
fruit

This led me to the really interesting idea of a seafood cupcake. I've actually got quite a few brilliant ideas for this, but it'll have to wait until later. It appears that Brandon and I have very similar tastes in baked goods, so I decided to make two batches of mini-cakes.

1) Mint mocha cupcakes

Rich Chocolate Cupcakes Filled with Chocolate-Mint Ganache with Topped with Mint Buttercream by Chockylit

I went by the book with this one for the most part. The only major changes were the use of Godiva's espresso dark chocolate and the addition of instant coffee into the cupcake batter to make chocolate-espresso cupcakes, and the use of cream cheese instead of butter in the frosting. Try as I might, I just hate homemade buttercream and working with it makes me want to gag.



These were very good. The only thing that was really wrong was that I used 1 bar of 100% cacoa chocolate and 1 bar of semi-sweet. The ganache was pretty bitter because of this. It was still delicious for people who like the taste of real chocolate, but a bit intense for some others (notably kids). It was all part of my secret plan not to have to share, anyway.


2) Chococarmel

Chocolate-espresso cupcakes with Heath Bar/dulce de leche filling and salted buttercream frosting

The cupcake is Chockylit's classic chocolate recipe, again with the addition of about 2 T instant coffee.



To add a filling to the cupcake after baking, use a serrated knife to cut all around the top of the cupcake with the intent to pull out a conical piece. Cut the tip off the top and then replace after you're done filling. The filling is a variant on the "Better Than Sex" cake concept. First, I roughly chopped Heath Bars and filled the centers.



I then heated condensed milk with some left over salted caramel (see below) and then poured the hot mixture over the Heath crumbles. You can also mix caramel ice cream topping with the condensed milk. I usually use a 1:1 ratio for this, but I didn't have very much leftover caramel.



The frosting is an adaptation of this Salted Caramel Frosting and Tartlette's too-die-for salted caramel recipe. I am obsessed with this caramel and had planned to use it as a filling when I hit Cupcake Bakeshop to get the cupcake recipe and 'lo and behold the latest recipe had caramel frosting! I wouldn't have been brave enough to try this on my own, but I was brave enough to make some alterations. I cut out one stick of butter and only used a box (16oz) of powdered sugar. It sets up hard in the fridge, and the lower sugar content allowed the caramel flavor to come through strongly.



The cupcakes were a hit at work. I'm usually very critical of my work and rarely eat more than a bite, but I can't get enough of the Chococarmel! I'm not sure what I'm going to have to try in order to beat these.

Labels: baking, caramel, carmel, chocolate, cupcakes, mint, yummy

For my champagne birthday (22) what else was I to do but make a champagne cake?

Filling:
chopped strawberries
sugar
mint
champagne
cointreau
Frosting:
very slightly sweetened whipped cream (homemade)
cream cheese
powdered sugar
champagne

The frosting was very runny because it was hot hot hot and HUMID while I made it. I just dumped it over as a glaze, but it was still delicious. Also, for the recipe, I recommend adding slightly more champagne than is suggested. I also used Martini & Rossi Asti instead of champagne; I very much like the flavor.

CUPCAKESCUPCAKECUPCAKECUPCAKECUPCAKESCUPCAKESCUPCAKECUPCAKES

I also made a cupcake version more recently.

Same recipe, though I added almond flavoring to it. Same filling, done with the cone method. I topped it with a straight cream cheese + powdered sugar + almond extract frosting, because I had to transport them.

The real innovation here was the topper. I bought pre-colored fondant and rolled it out and used various strange household objects to make the shapes that I wanted. Joe made a sailboat pattern for me out of primary shapes and after many painstaking hours of putting them together they turned out pretty darn cute.

The final product was very well received, with someone naming them "Champagne Supernova Cupcakes."

Labels: baking, cake, champagne, cupcake