Di’s Almost Spring – Winter CITRUS Event

CITRUS!! When I hear that word I think of bright sunny days, big glasses of OJ, Fresh Lemonade!! So when Di mentioned a CITRUS event I knew I had to participate with something summery and fresh.

Simple Lemon Cake

I found this cake in MS’s Everyday Food (April 2011) and immediately knew this would be the cake for Di’s Event. It uses boiled lemons for a more intense lemon flavor.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup unsalted butter (1 stick), room temperature, plus more for pan
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled), plus more for pan
1/2 pound lemons (about 2), ends removed, cut crosswise into thin slices, and seeds removed
Coarse salt
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (from 1 lemon)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Raspberries and whipped cream (optional), for serving

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan (2 inches deep).
In a medium saucepan, cover lemon slices with 3 cups water. Add pinch of salt, cover, and bring to a boil over high. Boil lemons, partially covered, until very tender, 15 minutes. Drain in a colander and transfer to a food processor, along with lemon juice; process until smooth. Set aside.
In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon salt.
In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat butter on medium, 2 minutes. Gradually add granulated sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition.
With mixer on low, gradually add flour mixture in three additions, alternating with two additions buttermilk. Beat in vanilla, then fold in lemon mixture.
Transfer batter to pan and bake until deep golden brown and a toothpick inserted in center comes out with a few moist crumbs attached, 35 to 40 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire rack, 20 minutes.
Remove cake from pan and let cool completely on rack.
Dust with confectioners’ sugar and serve with raspberries and cream, if desired.

I initially served this with just powdered sugar (impromptu birthday party) but later added a simple lemon curd drizzle.

I cannot wait to make this one again. It was so lemony and sweet and tasty.

Then again I found a cake using mandarin orange, too. It will be hard to decide.

If you visit Di’s blog – Di’s Kitchen Notebook in a few days she will have a round-up of what I know will be a wonderful collection of Citrus-y goodness!!

 

{MSC} Black Forest Cupcakes

I haven’t made cup cakes for MSC for a couple of months. But when I saw the selection for January I knew I couldn’t skip them.

Black Forest Cupcakes

A deep chocolate cupcake filled with cherries and custard and topped with chocolate ganache. There was no way I was skipping these.

I only made 1/3 of the recipe which gave me 6 Texas sized cupcakes {baked for 30 minues}. Perfect size for this rich and delicious treat. I had some dark chocolate ganache on hand so that is what I used instead of Martha’s ganache.

It just added to the richness of this treat.

Janine of Janines Crazy World chose this month’s selection. Great Pick Janine. It got me back into MSC.

Please visit the other MSC bakers and see how they liked this cupcake. You can find the recipe on Janine’s site or on Martha’s site.

 

{MSC} Snickerdoodle Cupcakes

This month’s MSC pick was a take on the ever popular Snickerdoodle cookie. I made 1/4 recipe and ended up with 7 nice sized cuppies.
And they were very snickerdoodley (is that a word?). Instead of the 7 minute icing I used a simple buttercream. I just wasn’t feeling the love the the 7 minute this time. And to make a small amount it was an awful lot of work since you cannot store it well.

Anyway. It was just fine sprinkled with the cinnamon.

This is the first time a scratch cuppy has really worked out. It is because I finally figured out just how ‘off’ my oven was. Now I will have fewer fails – I hope!!

I kept the cinnamon at 1/2 the amount and I think that is what kept it snickerdoodley. But then I also like lots of cinnamon or other spices in my fallish cuppys.

Thanks to Katie of Katie’s Kitchen for this Fall pick. Tasty.

Visit the other members of this once monthly Cuppy group {MSC} and drool over their Snickerdoodle cuppys.

 

{MSC} Cookies and Cream Cheesecake (Cupcakes)

One of my favorite desserts is Cheesecake. I make them often. Probably more often than I should, but…

So when Nina of Nina’s Cupcakes chose these Cookies and Cream Cheesecake Cupcakes I didn’t hesitate. In fact I made them back in June when the monthly cupcakes were posted. That’s how excited I was to see this pick.

While these are cupcakes they are really mini cheesecakes made with Oreo cookies. The cookie serves as the base, pieces of cookie are mixed in with the cheesecake batter and they are all baked up in a muffin tin. Easy! Bitesize! Good!

I made 1/2 the recipe which gave me 12 cuppys (cause that is all the Oreos I had) and the rest of the batter made a small 4″ cheesecake.

I used only sweetener and no sugar because that is how I make all my cheesecakes now. It did not deter from the taste.

One hint, if you make these don’t use paper cupcake liners. Use the foil ones. These are really damp and the paper gets very soft.

See if the other members of liked these.

If they like cheesecake, they will love these.

There are a couple of places you can find this recipe. It’s not on Martha’s site but it is on 52 Cupcakes and Layla or Stellaland.

 

Triple Citrus Cuppys from Martha {MSC}

Summer and Citrus. A marriage made in heaven. The heat of the long summer days cooked off by lemonade, limeade, lemon in tea, orange smoothies. Citrus is good. AND good for you.

Now add cupcakes to the citrus and you have a delicious summer treat.

Triple Citrus Cup Cakes

means lots of lime, lemon, and orange zest.

A delighful mix of flavors. The zest of these three cooling fruits is added to the mix. But it just wasn’t enough to really add a distinctive citrus flavor to the cup cakes. If not for the citrusy glaze they would have been almost tasteless.

I made mine in my little mini bundt pan and used three different glazes with some zest on top.

The yellowy lemon glaze was the best (as far as looks) and I tried to mix/match the colors just for fun. Somehow the orange and lime glaze just don’t make the cut.

This was Marthe’s pick for August’s MSC. I like the citrus mix. Next time – more citrus in the cuppys themselves.

Visit the other members of

 

{MSC} Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes

Yes! It’s true! You can make cupcakes without flour. And it is easy. And they are tasty. You won’t even miss the flour.

These are under the category – Simple and Sweet – in Martha’s Cupcake Book. And they are.

Simple.
Sweet.
Delicious.

There are only 4 ingredients – butter, sugar, eggs, chocolate. What could be easier. I did, however, make one simple change. I used 1/2 sugar and 1/2 sweetener (and added a smidgeon of Stevia) since I am trying hard to cut down on the sugar consumption for the Fam. They were still quite sweet I made 1/2 of the recipe which gave me 18 mini cuppys.The recipe said the would sink and then crack, mine only sank.

But they were still good and just big enough to add a tiny dollop of whipped cream or a mini scoop of vanilla ice cream with a drizzle of ganache. Just a perfect bite of chocolaty gooness.

Now while I cannot post the recipe here (group rules) it is available on Martha’s Website

See how the other members of did with their Flourless Cupcakes.

Thanks for this month’s choice, Lauryn.

 

{MSC} Strawberry Cuppys.

Short and Sweet. Today is a day when Two blog posts are required. One for TWD (just below) and one for MSC (Martha Stewart Cupcake Club) This is going to be a short post for two reasons.

My frosting failed.
They were devoured before I had a chance to take some really good pictures of some really good cup cakes.

Strawberry Cup Cakes

These cuppys used plenty of fresh strawberries both in the cake and in the frosting. And since this is Strawberry Season in Louisiana, that was not hard to accomplish. The fresh strawberries kept the cuppys moist and flavorful. They were just as good ‘nekkid’ as they were frosted.

As for my frosting fail: it started out just fine. Everything went together quite well, except I think I put too much strawberry puree in the mix. It had wonderful flavor but it looked like curdled pink eggs on top. (Thus the single small picture.)

These excellent cuppys, which will be a repeat in this kitchen, were chosen by Sherry of Sherry Starts Cooking. Because of the MSC rules we don’t post the recipe but you can find it on Martha’s Site.

 

Move over Hostess Cupcakes. I can make my own!!! {MSC}

I grew up eating Hostess Cup Cakes. The Chocolate ones with the cream filling. I KNOW!! They are so bad for you. But then MOST tasty goodies are. (I also loved, and still do, Twinkies. I don’t care that they may outlast humanity with their preservatives.) But this month I learned (drum roll please) to make my own chocolate, cream filled cuppys. YAY!!! I was so excited when I saw this month’s cupcake.

Jumbo Cream Filled Chocolate Cup Cakes

.

Basically what we have is a chocolate cup cake. Then you fill it with a buttercream/marshmellow fluff. Martha suggested removing the bottom of the cuppy, scooping out some of the cake, filling the opeing with fluff, and putting the bottom back on. That seemed like A LOT of work. I figured there had to be an easier way. There was. I tried a couple of alternatives.

FIRST I put some batter in the cup, plopped in some fluff, and then some more batter. I Thought that would work. NAH!!!

As the cuppys baked the fluff baked OUT! So that didn’t work.

What DID work was baking the cupcake, filling a decorator tube with fluff and pumping it into the cuppy from the bottom. THAT worked GREAT!!!

Martha didn’t frost her cuppys. On top was merely a squiggle of the marshmallow filling. NOT ENUFF!! I made her chocolate ganache {AGAIN} and dipped the cuppys and THEN put on the squiggle. ENUFF!!! Loved them. But then – it’s chocolate, with ganache – and filling – what’s NOT to love. Thy them!! Now if I could just make homemade Twinkies!!!

Please amble on over to and see the other bakers’ take on these cuppys. You’ll be glad you did!! And thanks to Jess of Cook Book Habit for choosing this month’s Cupcake Pick. It was a good one.

BTW if you are a member and you are baking next month’s yummy cuppys (won’t say what they are) and you are tempted to use your silicone holders because of all the ‘liquid’ in them. DON’T!!! They are incredibly hard to remove BECAUSE of all the liquid. Just thought you should know.

 

Lemon Meringue Cupcakes {MSC}

I am not good at meringue on pies. No matter how hard I try the meringue seperates from the sides of the pie dish and gets all gushy on the sides. And that is a shame because it is my Hubs favorite pie. How to tame the beast – make Lemon Meringue Cupcakes instead. Crust Cupcake. Lemon. Meringue. Perfect!! And no pie plate to show off my shortcomings.

These are basically a lemony cupcake topped with lemon curd (I used Martha’s recipe, but you could use your favorite) and ‘frosted’ with lemon meringue which is carefully browned with a torch. Just like, sorta, kinda, lemon meringue PIE!!

DELICIOUS!!!

And then, to make it extra lemony, I scooped out part of the cup cake and filled the pocket with Lemon Curd.

VERY Delicious!!

‘Nuff said!!!

This weeks MSC pick was brought to you by – Megan of My Baking Adventures. And since we don’t publish the recipe (We WANT you to buy Martha’s Cupcake Book) you can find the recipe for these Cuppys -> HERE!!

Oh, and go over and visit the other members of and see their take on this little cuppy.

 

Memories of Scouts and Campfires {MSC}

Little girls in Green (or Brown) sitting around the campfire….

Telling ghost stories….
Licking chocolate off their fingers….
Sticky marshmallow everywhere….

Means only one thing….

S’mores

Martha’s S’mores cup cake was an attempt to bring that sticky, gooey, wonderful, campfire goody to the everyday kitchen.

Made with graham flour and topped with chocolate ganache and a Marshmallow frosting it was dense but tasty.
But it wasn’t what I was hoping for.

These tended to get stale very quickly, even though tightly stored. The marshmallow ‘frosting’ turned to rubber on the cuppy.
But I had fun because I got to use The New Torch my daughter gave me for Christmas. {They know what I like!}

My only problem was not being able to find graham flour. Not to be defeated I found a recipe to make my own.

Graham Flour
84 grams AP flour
15 grams wheat bran
2.5 grams wheat germ

This mix gave me enough (+ a little) to make 1/2 of the total recipe.

This was Mary Ann’s pick for February.
You can visit the other MSC Bakers and see how theirs turned out.