Martha Challenge #31- A Variation: (Mexican) Chocolate Cupcakes

In honor of Cinco de Mayo, I wanted to make a themed cupcake. I've made margarita cupcakes many times, and Mexican Chocolate only once. So I decided to adapt one of Martha's recipes for Mexican Chocolate. These are regular chocolate cupcakes, but with the addition of cinnamon and chili.
Surprisingly, Martha does not have a lot of chocolate cupcake recipes in her book. I used her one-bowl chocolate cupcake recipe, which was amazing! Super easy, and the cupcakes turned out great. Big domed tops, nice and fluffy, and very chocolatey.


I added espresso powder to bring out the chocolate flavor, and cinnamon and a dash of chili powder to give it some spice. They smelled amazing baking!
Next, the frosting. Again, Martha does not have many chocolate frostings, and the only ones she did have made entirely too much frosting for the amount of cupcakes I had. So I relied on one of my own tried and true recipes, again adding cinnamon and chili powder.


I topped the cupcakes with red and green sanding sugar, to indicate the Mexican flag. I'll definitely be using this recipe again, it seems foolproof.

Cake Pops, Take Two

So once again, I tried making cake pops. The first ones were difficult, but I'm getting better. Practice, practice!
I had 6 leftover cupcakes from the jack and coke batch I made a few days ago. They were still super moist, and worked great as pops. There was the perfect amount of frosting with just what each cupcake was topped with.
I used actual chocolate bark this time, since I had stocked up when I last found it in the store. It was still a little thicker than I would have liked, but it worked ok.


So it turns out, 6 cupcakes make 24-25 pops. They got prettier and more even as I went along. Next time I'll make them perfect for sure! I put these in individual wrappers, but I didn't have anything to close them with. At least they're protected and won't stick to each other.


This is a great way to use leftover cake or cupcakes. If these cupcakes hadn't been so moist, I would have needed more frosting.

Birthday Cupcakes

So, for our friend Mike's birthday, he requested alcohol- related cupcakes. Since he likes whiskey, I made Jack and Coke cupcakes. I got the cola cupcakes recipe from the Coke website. It was different from most cupcakes, because you boil the butter and coke, and there are marshmallows in the batter. I assume the marshmallows are supposed to melt when you pour the hot liquid on top, but not all of mine did. I also added about 1 tbsp of whiskey to the batter.


The frosting was easy, just a typical vanilla buttercream, but with 2-3 tbsp of whiskey added. The smell was sooo strong!
And because it was a birthday, I had to write on the cupcakes. I used the easy way out, with writing tubes of icing.
These were a big hit at the party, although no one wanted to be first to dig in. Once the birthday boy had one, tho, it was fair game.
Might need to tweak the cake recipe in the future, but the frosting was a winner.

Martha Challenge #30- Strawberry Jam Tea Cakes

Back to the Martha Challenge! These are strawberry-jam filled tea cakes, which are just vanilla cupcakes with jam, topped with a citrus glaze.
A few weeks ago we went to Plant City Florida, which is the strawberry capital of the world. We came home with a jar of homemade strawberry jam, and it is fantastic! So fresh and not too sweet, like liquid strawberries. So, to use up the last bits, these cupcakes were perfect.


Instead of baking them plain and filling with jam after, like I usually do, these are baked with the jam layered inside. Mine were not as neat as Martha's, and next time I might swirl the jam for a pretty look. I can also use this technique in my peanut butter and jelly cupcakes :)


They baked up great, altho some jam seeped out and made the edges sticky. They were topped with a citrus glaze, of lemon and meyer lemon. I love the combo of strawberry and lemon, I discovered it with gelato and frozen ice when I was in Italy. I like the glaze a bit thicker, but I ran out at the end, so 2 lonely cupcakes are naked!
Good recipe, good result. Will definitely use this again.

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.

Chocolate-Bourbon-Pecan Cupcakes

So, taking a break from the Martha challenge, for our friend's birthday I made him Derby Pie, as requested. For those who don't know what Derby Pie is, it's a special pie named after the Kentucky Derby, with a pecan-bourbon-chocolate chip filling. In other words, to die for. Technically, you can't call it a Derby pie, because the name is trademarked, so for me it's a chocolate bourbon pecan pie.
So after making the pie, I wanted to see how I could translate it into cupcakes. I thought about making little pies, but decided on chocolate cupcakes with bourbon and pecan mixed in. And voila! delicious cupcakes. I also experimented with different bourbons, for the pie I used Wild Turkey, and for the cupcakes I used Jack Daniels. I think the Wild Turkey is more potent, the smell was overwhelming!

Now, the bottoms of these cupcakes were more well done than I would have liked, not sure if it's because of my oven, or maybe I had the rack too low. I sampled half of one so I could see the inside, and the pecans stayed pretty well in the middle of the cupcake. Very tasty!
I topped these with a bourbon whipped cream, which was amazing! Also a little pecan on the top to indicate what's inside. All in all, a good effort, might need some more tweaking, but these are a good addition to my recipe list.

Martha Cupcake Challenge #29- Meyer Lemon Cupcakes

For the next Martha challenge, I decided to try her Meyer Lemon cupcakes, in honor of Easter/Spring. You see, in her book, the lemon curd sits on top of the cupcakes, which makes it look like an egg yolk. Since Springtime is all about re-birth, eggs are a perfect symbol.

First step, make meyer lemon curd. I love lemon curd, but have never made it. It's like a custard, lots of egg yolks, sugar, and lemon juice. I was pleased to find Meyer Lemons at Whole Foods, which are a cross between an orange and a lemon, so they're not as tart as regular lemons. I followed the directions for the curd, but I don't think I let it cook long enough. It was thinner than I expected, and I figured it would firm up in the fridge, but it didn't get thick enough. The direction don't say how long to cook it for, just "until thick". That's kinda vague.

Anyhoo, the cupcakes turned out great, altho it's a big recipe. I got 36, but Martha says it makes 42. They were so buttery and lemony and rather dense. It's almost like a pound cake. Smells so good!
Now, for the final steps. The recipe says to sprinkle with powdered sugar and then fill the cupcakes with curd, letting it seep out the top to form a pool. I did this a bit different. Since I'd be serving them the next day, I made a traditional vanilla buttercream, and piped it in a circle around the edge of the cupcake. And since my curd was too thin, I couldn't pipe it at all, so I just dolloped about a tablespoon on top, inside the frosting. The white and yellow really made it look like a fried egg.
So, my husband was supposed to take these to work today, but he was sick, so now I have 36 cupcakes that I don't know what to do with. Anyone want some? Come and get them!