Martha Challenge #35- Tiny cherry-almond tea cakes

So, it's been a while, because I lost the charger for my camera and therefore couldn't upload my photos! But I found it yesterday, so here we are again.
I was inspired last week and bought a huge bag of fresh cherries. They were delicious, but I couldn't possibly eat a whole pound of cherries myself, so I made cupcakes with them instead! These are Martha's almond tea cakes with cherries inside. She calls for leaving the pits and stems on, but I didn't want to do that, so I pitted all the cherries. I didn't have a fancy cherry pitter, so I consulted the internet on how to do this, with the cherries remaining somewhat intact. The best suggestion was to use the flat end of a chopstick and push on the pit until it pops out the other side. This worked, but was messy. Cherry juice everywhere! My kitchen and hands looked like a crime scene :).
So, The almond mini cupcakes were easy enough to make, using ground up almonds. Then I put a cherry in each one, and covered the top a little with more batter. The recipe made more than the 24 Martha predicted.
They came out nice and domed (no more problems with altitude), with the cherries peeking out. I like cupcakes that have a surprise inside, so when you bite into it there's a different texture. The cherries are sweet and the cupcakes are warm and almond-y. A good recipe, but maybe not one I'd include in my regular rotation, as it's seasonal.

Almond cupcakes with Green Tea frosting

So, another deviation from the Martha challenge. I needed to make an Asian-themed cupcake, and there aren't any in Martha's cupcake book! So, I looked elsewhere. This recipe is adapted from Baked, the book from the super awesome bakery in Brooklyn and Charleston. I have loved everything I've made from this book so far, and this is no exception.
However, this recipe was quite laborious. I had to buy some special ingredients, and it took forever!
The cupcakes are almond flavored, and very light and fluffy. There's almond extract and ground up almonds in them. I looove the smell of almond extract! After beating all the ingredients, I had to fold in beaten egg whites. I only have one mixer bowl and no hand mixer, so I had to beat these by hand. I doubt I beat them enough, but they turned out ok. Next time I'd beat the egg whites first and put them in a separate bowl while I mixed the rest. They baked up perfectly!

Next was the frosting. OMG. This was difficult and time consuming. I couldn't find the green tea matcha powder I needed, but at the Teavana store, the guy told me I could grind up green tea, so I did that. I don't think it was fine enough, but it wouldn't get any finer in the food processor.
This frosting was cooked. Never done that before. You add sugar, flour, matcha, milk and cream in a pot and whisk it while it boils until it's thick. It smelled like grass and looked like slime.
30 seconds after I took this picture I dropped the whole strainer in the bowl. So I had to re-strain the whole thing and clean out the bowl before I could continue. Then I beat it with butter in my mixer, added vanilla, and it was awesome! Tastes great, not too overpowering with the green tea flavor, and sweet enough.
The extra special topping is fortune cookies dipped in white chocolate. I added my own flair and used flower sprinkles too :) They look so pretty!


So, to finish, almond cupcake topped with green tea frosting and garnished with a chocolate-dipped fortune cookie. Yum! They look awesome, and it was totally worth all the work. I love taking on a new challenge and doing well.