Some more S'mores!!!:D

Oh gosh! I have this fabulous cooking book "no time to cook" by Donna Hay. It's a wonderful book and I love it. It has got all these lovely but really easy recipes and from time to time I get around to make something I found in it.


So one day came across s'mores. I then found out that it's a traditional campfire treat common for the US and Canada. I have never heard of it before but who can resist chocolate, cookies and marshmallows?!


Their name seems to be perfect (s'more -> some more). But I have to admit after having had ONE I had to give up. I couldn't take anymore even though they were yummmmmmy!


They are really easy to make and taste great. Just a perfect little something for treating your guests or yourself :)

And this is how you make them:

Chocolate chip cookies with a piece of chocolate and half of a marshmellow on top it. Put it in the preheated oven for 3 minutes (160°C).

Take them out

Put another cookie on top of it. Eat!

Orange Cupcakes with Orange Buttercream Frosting

As I already said I'm trying to make all the yummy things of the book  "Meet me at the Cupcake Café". So there is this recipe for orange cupcakes with marmalade icing for a grumpy day :)

As it already says above it's with marmalade and I'm really not into orange marmalade. So I decided to look for a nice frosting with oranges. I came across the caked crusaders homepage. The caked crusader already worked together with Jenny Colgan (author of the book I'm talking about). So I thought I'd just use one of her recipes. She is wonderful! Discovering her blog was - well - bad for me and my surroundings as I'm baking even more now.

But onto the recipe and some photos.

Ingredients

120g butter, at room temperature
145g caster sugar
2 eggs
185g self raising flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
125ml fresh orange juice 

3 tablespoons grated orange zest

For the buttercream:

120g butter, at room temperature
180g icing sugar
2 tablespoons fresh orange juice (start with 2 and add more if the mix needs it)

Method

Preheat the oven to 180˚C

Line a 12 hole cupcake pan with paper cases.

Start by making the sponges: beat together the butter and sugar until pale, light and whippy. It will take quite a while (depending on the softness of the butter) but don’t skimp as this is the stage that makes the sponge light and airy. I will often beat for 10 minutes or more.

Beat in the eggs, one at a time.

Fold in the flour and vanilla extract.

Stir in the orange juice and, if using, the grated zest.

Spoon into the paper cases and bake for approximately 20 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the sponge comes out clean. Mine took 20 minutes. Don’t panic that they look pale – the sponge is pale and won’t turn golden on baking.

Place the tray on a wire rack and, as soon as you can safely do so, remove the cakes from the tin – leaving them to sit in the hot metal tin means that they carry on cooking and can become less fluffy.

Leave to cool completely on a wire rack.

Now make the buttercream: place all the ingredients in a bowl and whisk until well combined and light. Add more orange juice until you reach a soft but spreadable buttercream consistency.

Spread or pipe over the cupcakes.

http://thecakedcrusader.blogspot.com/2011/03/orange-cupcakes.html

The use of orange zest for the cupcakes is optional. The first time I made them without, the second time I added some zest and I prefer the ones with zest. It gives it some extra flavour and in my opinion makes them a bit more moist. But each to its own taste :)

The caked crusader also says that they don't brown - mine did. But they tasted delicious and so I don't really care if they brown or not :)

The orange cupcakes with orange buttercream frosting are a lovely, fruity and light option. They are not too heavy (you can have two if you want to) and they are sweet with a tiny bit of tangyness.. PERFECT !

onto the photos:

before the baking happened

and the finished product

Happy Halloween my lovely ones!!

Halloween has finally arrived and so had the day of my first order :D

I stuck to my original plan and made vanilla cupcakes, chocolate cupcakes and pumpkin cupcakes.

I'm soooo happy to have had the opportunity to make these and actually get some money out of it. But the smile they put on people's faces while eating them is still the best feeling ever!

I will post the recipes next week. For now some photos for your indulgence!

Top: Vanilla batter, Bottom: Chocolate batter

Pumpkin Cupcakes with vanilla/lemon Cream Cheese Frosting. Decoration : Orange food colouring and Black sugar bats.

Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Buttercream Frosting. Decoration: Black food colouring (which makes your teeth and tongue go black) and white sugar ghosts.

Vanilla Cupcakes with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting. Decoration : (Not enough) green food colouring and sugar pumpkins.

The black food colouring worked quite well. It's more like a paste and I had to add quite a lot of it even though the buttercream was already brown (coz of the choc(: ).At first it looked more silvery/grey but after a while it turned pretty dark. These Chocolate Cupcakes are actually the same recipe as the first cupcake I got for my birthday some years back (see The Story Behind The Blog).
The lady owning that shop wrote a book full of recipes :)

And I actually wanted the green of the vanilla frosting to be even more green. However, I didn't have any food colouring left. But they look quite cute :)

Final product all packed and ready to be picked up. The boxes are great even though depending on the size of the cupcakes it can be kinda hard to put them in/ take them out again.
But I already ordered some other ones which I will show as soon as they'll get here.
I also ordered some more decoration for christmas as I will make some christmassy ones for a christmas market at the end of november..

but I will keep you posted about any sugary sweet news :D

Halloween decoration arrived!!

On monday the ordered candy halloween decorations arrived!!! I am so excited!

I got them from the UK and they are gorgeous!

straight to the photos I would say! see what I got:

Cupcake cases in orange and brown. I wanted to get black but they were out of stock. But brown will work as well

"Pumpkins and bats" sprinkles!!

extra black food colouring for the frosting

Candy pumpkins and candy ghosts.

I just need to make the cupcakes now. I will post some pictures of the end result:D

Family reunion cupcakes...

The past weekend has been a busy one. Even though I only made 3 batches of cupcakes I had a few time management problems :)

I planned on doing cupcakes for our family reunion on sunday so I had to do them on saturday. Friday would have been a little too early. well so I worked on saturday and during my 3 hour break I made the cakes. On sunday morning I made the frostings and finished the cupcakes which took up more time than I expected.

I never realized how much time it takes to make the frostings and pipe them on  as I always made the whole cakes at once.

So we ended up being a little late:) but the cakes turned out well.

I made double choc cupcakes, orange cupcakes and coconut malibu cupcakes with mango.

The orange cupcakes were wonderful, so were the malibu coconut ones. I think I might have taken out the choc ones a minute too early. but they still tasted nice.

well, onto some photos!!

and action!

 Almost finished

Ready to go

left : orange cupcakes with orange frosting, right: Malibu coconut cupcakes with mango surprise

Halloween is coming up!!

As Halloween is coming up in two weeks I received my first order ever! I have made loads of cupcakes so far but just for friends and family.


However, today a new chapter of my cupcake life began. I get the opportunity to make some Halloween cupcakes for a friend's party. I can choose the flavours myself. I haven't decided yet what I will do but I think of doing double choc, vanilla and spiced pumpkin.
I also just ordered some decorations as I haven't really moved on to making my own decoration from scratch (which I really want to try as soon as I have enough time on my hands).


I also ordered some boxes to be able to provide safe transportation. I just really hope that it will all arrive in time. So as soon as I get all the things I will let you know and of course I will post some pictures of the halloween cupcakes :D


I will also be doing some cupcakes for our family reunion next weekend.


So next post should be up by the end of the week.


but for now: enjoy the rest of your week!!

Banana Cupcakes with Honey - Cinnamon Frosting

I had 2 bananas at home and thought I could make some cupcakes :) That's what turned out when combining me, bananas and my kitchen aid.




Banana Cupcakes

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, (spooned and leveled)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
• 1 1/2 cups mashed bananas (about 4 ripe bananas), plus 1 whole banana, for garnish (optional)
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 180°C. Line a standard 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
2. Make a well in center of flour mixture. In well, mix together butter, mashed bananas, eggs, and vanilla. Stir to incorporate flour mixture (do not overmix). Dividing evenly, spoon batter into muffin cups.
3. Bake until a toothpick inserted in center of a cupcake comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Remove cupcakes from pan; cool completely on a wire rack. 

• Honey - Cinnamon Frosting
• 1 1/4 cup confectioners' sugar
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Beat all ingredients for about 4 to 5 minutes.

Pipe the frosting onto cupcakes. If you want you could add a slice of banana on top of the icing. I didn't do that as I didn't have any bananas left :D But they tasted good anyway!


Onto some photos:

Cupcakes and Frosting: http://www.marthastewart.com/314063/banana-cupcakes-with-honey-cinnamon-fros

Double Chocolate Cupcakes

This is the first recipe out of Jenny Colgan's novel "Meet me at the Cupcake Café".

Maybe just a short input on the novel itself. The story told is about a woman losing her company job. She doesn't know what to do now and decides that she could turn her hobby into a profession. The recipes are embedded into the storyline. This recipe is the first one she does for her own shop.

Here you go quoting from the book:

Double Chocolate Cupcakes (commercial)
Makes one morning's worth.

2500ml double cream
4500g good-quality dark chocolate
50 eggs
1650g caster sugar
1500g plain flour
10 tbsp good-quality cocoa powder
5 tsp baking powder
sugar flowers to decorate

Chocolate Sauce

1000g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
800ml single cream

Stir double cream and chocolate in a pan over low heat until smooth. Cool slightly.
Place eggs and sugar in the bowl of your industrial mixer, and beat on high until pale and doubled in volume. Slowly beat in chocolate mixture.
Sift in flour, cocoa and baking powder and combine.
Divide the mixture between the cases. Bake for 15- 20 minutes at 180°C until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Cool slightly in pans, then remove cakes from cases.
Drink a pint of water.
Meanwhile, for the sauce, place ingredients in a heatproof bowl over a vat of simmering water (don't let bowl touch water). Stir until the chocolate has melted. Consider calling ex-boyfriend and old boss and crawling on hands and knees begging till he gives you back your old paperwork job.
Remove from heat and stir until smooth. Wonder how much weight you'll lose doing this. Taste delicious mixture. Decide, probably not that much.
Cool slightly. Serve cakes topped with sauce. Decorate with flowers if using. Collapse in heap, convinced this is never, ever going to work on a daily basis.

So this is what I started to work with. Or this was the original idea. Obviously I didn't want to make tons of double chocolate cupcakes. So I divided the amount of ingredients by 25.

I also didn't like the idea of just adding chocolate sauce instead of a proper frosting. So I googled for some frostings.

So here's what I did:

Double Chocolate Cupcakes (makes bout 12)

100ml double cream
180g milk chocolate
2 eggs
66g caster sugar
60g plain flour
1/2 tbsp cocoa
1/4 tsp baking powder

Sugar hearts to decorate

Directions for cupcakes see above.

Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

250g softened butter
2 cups icing sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1/4 cup milk

Whisk the butter for about 6-8 minutes. Add icing sugar, cocoa and milk and whisk for another 6 minutes.

Now pipe on cooled cupcakes and add sugar hearts or any other decoration you want/ have.

Onto some photos:

ENJOY!

Cupcakes: Jenny Colgan "Meet me at the Cupcake Café"
Frosting: http://bossacafez.blogspot.com/2010/04/donna-hays-double-chocolate-cupcakes.html