Red Velvet, take two

Martha Stewart knows how to create a damn good cupcake. I found this Red Velvet Cupcake recipe on her website, and they are soooo fluffy (I think because of the cake flour. Side question: should cake flour smell weird? I'd never used it before, and I googled it and found that it is chlorinated [sounds healthy, right?], so maybe that's why it smells weird? If it should smell neutral like good ol' all purpose flour, let me know so I can get rid of the stuff I have!)

Anyway, the cupcakes are moist and fluffy, but they are not red. But I don't think they're really supposed to be, because the ones pictured in the cookbook aren't either. From now on when I make red velvet anything, I'm leaving out the food dye. It never works anyway. Plus, I added a few drops of really strong Americolor dye to just a little bit of batter to see if I could actually get red cupcakes, and they tasted AWFUL. Very bitter (I always assumed food dye was flavorless. I was wrong). Here's a link to the recipe.

I didn't use her cream cheese frosting recipe though, because I don't like it with so much cream cheese. I used slightly different amounts than are typical to get a stiffer, sweeter frosting.

Less Cream-Cheesy Cream Cheese Frosting

4 oz. regular cream cheese
1 stick of unsalted butter, at room temperature and cut into about 6 pieces
1 t. vanilla (imitation or pure)
2 1/2 c. powdered sugar

1. Beat together cream cheese and butter until well-combined and fluffy
2. Mix in vanilla
3. Mix in powdered sugar in 2-3 batches (so as not to end up covered in powdered sugar by the end)

I just spread the frosting on, but it might have been thick enough to pipe, especially if I'd stuck it in the fridge for 5 or 10 minutes. I used more sugar and less cream cheese than other recipes, and I think the proportions work out better, though if you prefer it tangy add more cream cheese.

Here is my not-at-all-red batter

I used red liners, hoping they would give the illusion of red cake. Didn't really work, but still.



And here are the somewhat red and freakishly pointy experimental cupcakes from the end:

I really don't know why it looks like that. I'm so paranoid about food dye right now that I am blaming it. Apparently it served as a growth hormone for my cupcakes. Creepy.

Coconut is the best thing ever

And that is not hyperbole.

Okay so it's definitely hyperbole, but coconut is pretty damn good. My internship is about to end, and I want to go out with a bang and bring in some really amazing cupcakes. The goal: coconut cupcakes with coconut frosting.

I got the recipe for the cake part from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, but I changed it slightly because they were supposed to be coconut lime cupcakes and I only wanted coconut. And I didn't make them vegan. And I tried to make it slightly less fattening by using a bit less coconut oil and milk (not that anyone eats a cupcake expecting it not to be fattening). So here's my [doubled] version...

Coconut Cupcakes

1/2 c. coconut oil
1 1/2 c. granulated sugar
1 1/2 c. light coconut milk
2/3 c. skim milk
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 t. baking soda
1 t. baking powder
dash of salt
1 1/2 c. unsweetened coconut

1. preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. melt coconut oil in the microwave (10 sec., then stir, then 5-10 more) or in a saucepan over low heat
3. mix together coconut oil and sugar
4. add coconut milk and skim milk
5. add flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt; mix
6. stir in coconut
7. pour into lined cupcake pan and bake for 18-20 minutes (possibly longer for you since my oven is weird)

This recipe ended up making 23 cupcakes, and I definitely under-filled some of the liners, so it would make about 20 or 21 of the right size. As usual, I skipped the vanilla (I swear I'll buy some soon), and I also skipped the coconut extract that the original recipe called for (put in 2 t. of vanilla and coconut extract to stay true[r] to it).

On their own, these were merely okay. But as I have come to learn, the frosting is crucial in making an excellent cupcake. It is the icing on the cake. Literally.


Coconut Buttercream Frosting

1/2 c. unsalted butter (at room temperature)
2 T. coconut oil
3 1/2 c. powdered sugar
2 1/2 T. light coconut milk

1. mix together the butter and coconut oil
2. add powdered sugar and coconut milk; beat until fluffy (about 3 minutes)
3. After frosting the cupcakes, sprinkle some unsweetened coconut on top
   

Oh my god. This frosting tastes AMAZING. It's just a fluffy mouthful of coconut, and it really complements the cupcakes well because they aren't too sweet on their own. There was enough frosting to frost 22 cupcakes pretty thickly (though not as thick as piping it...then you'd need a lot more). I was trying to frost them in this cool swirl pattern, but I was only moderately successful. Whatever, I'm very very happy with how they look! They're probably my favorite thing I've baked so far, though I'm torn between these and the chocolate-raspberry mini cakes. I'll have to make them both again (and again, and again) to see which wins.

Orange-Creamsicle Cupcakes

I was so tempted to bake after my post yesterday that I immediately began on the orange-creamsicle cupcakes that I'd thought so much about.

Of course, as usual, things did not go exactly as planned. I started off with this recipe for white cupcakes from allrecipes. They were pretty bland on their own, which I'll admit was probably my fault because I left out the vanilla extract. You see, I don't have vanilla extract. And the reason I don't have it is that I don't like it. I never really understand the point -- it just makes stuff taste bad (like chocolate-chip cookie dough, which is very hard to ruin). And if I am going to use it, I like the imitation kind. But I think I have finally realized that it is necessary for some things, like white cupcakes. Next time I'll probably just use Pillsbury because they have mastered the art of artificial flavoring, and I simply cannot match it.

Anyway, the white cake was mediocre, but I figured the frosting and filling I had planned would redeem it. But then the filling did not work out as I'd imagined it. At all. I thought I'd use nice fresh, lightly-sweetened whipped cream inside. But my cream was unwilling to whip. It stayed kind of runny, and I knew it would just make the inside of the cupcake soggy overnight, so I abandoned the filling plan.

Alright, on to the frosting. I was actually reasonably successful with this (which is surprising because I just sort of combined things in random amounts until it tasted right).

Orange Cream Frosting

3 oz cream cheese
1/2 c. butter
3 1/2 c. powdered sugar
3 T. orange juice (no pulp!)
Some yellow and red food dye

Miraculously, the frosting tasted like a creamsicle! It completely redeemed my failing cupcakes, such that I was able to feed them to people without the utter shame I expected from the initial results.

If I make these again, I'm going to use a different kind of cake. Maybe one with buttermilk in it. Or maybe I just need to suck it up and buy some vanilla extract. I also think the orange cream frosting might be really good on chocolate cupcakes instead.

Chocolate-Raspberry Mini Cakes

Things did not start off well this morning with these cakes (though, in my humble opinion, they ended pretty well). I started with my great-grandmother's recipe for Wacky Cake (I have no idea what's "wacky" about it). It happens to be vegan, so you could easily make vegan frosting for it.

Wacky Cake
makes one 9" square cake

1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. white sugar
1/4 c. cocoa powder
1 t. baking soda
1/3 c. oil
1 t. vanilla
1 t. apple cider vinegar
1 c. water

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees; spray and dust pan with flour, or use baking cups for cupcakes
2. Mix all of the dry ingredients together
3. Mke a well in the middle and pour in the wet ingredients; stir
4. Bake for 35 minutes (if making a 9" square), or 16-18 minutes if making cupcakes
   

The batter is much thinner than most cake batters, but that's how it's supposed to be. Mine might have been a little too thin actually because I can't measure dry ingredients very precisely. You see, I don't have any dry measuring cups. That's right, I'm trying to become an expert baker with no dry measuring cups. Oh well, I just never seem to get around to buying them. Anyway...

Since I was making cupcakes (the mini cakes are just upside down cupcakes with no liners), I kind of just guessed how long to cook them. I filled each well in the cupcake pan about halfway because I wanted them to be pretty flat on the bottom when I turned them over, and then I cooked them for 16 minutes at somewhere between 325-350 degrees (you never know with my oven).

My first problem was that the cupcakes got sort of stuck in the pan even though I sprayed it, so I had to piece them back together a bit. No big deal since they were to be covered in ganache. Next problem: the cupcakes were so deliciously moist that they were too moist -- they were kind of tacky on the top, so as they settled onto the cooling rack, they got stuck to it (not to mention I dumped them out after they were out of the oven only 1 minute, which was probably not the right thing to do). I was feeling pretty discouraged by this point, but I wasn't about to waste them (waste=eat them all myself), so I kept going anyway.

I looked up various recipes for ganache and ended up with these amounts:

1 c. heavy cream
8 oz semi-sweet baking chocolate, chopped into small pieces
Boil the heavy cream (watch out, it will foam over quickly!), then pour it over the chocolate and mix with a whisk until it's smooth and glossy.

This made way more ganache than I needed for the dozen cupcakes and single layer 6" cake I made with the batter. I'd probably cut it in half next time for the amount of cake I had. To make it easy to pour, I put the ganache in a measuring cup, poured it on the cakes, and then spread it a little with a knife to get it to flow over the edge. It hid the crumbly mess underneath nicely.

Also, I had originally intended to add raspberry extract, but, wary from my experience with "Hazelnut Type Flavor," I decided to sniff it first. Good thing I did. It smelled awful and nothing like raspberries. The first ingredient was grain alcohol, and it smelled like it. So the raspberry part came in with the swirl of buttercream on the top. I used:

2 c. powdered sugar
approx. 5 T. butter
approx. 1/8 c. frozen raspberries, thawed and drained.

There's no need to add any liquid because the raspberries are wet enough. I also didn't need to add any food dye to get it that pretty pink color because the raspberries did it themselves. The frosting is nice and sweet and complements the dark chocolate-y taste of the cakes and ganache.

Things weren't looking good for a while, and I was pleasantly surprised that they turned out so well. Next time I'll try adding a bit more flour or less water or something to see it they get less sticky. Or maybe I need to cook them a little longer. Or maybe I need dry measuring cups. Ugh. I guess this will take a lot of trial and error (and will probably be heavy on the error).