Caramel Apple Cupcakes

Okay, time to get back into blogging.  So Fall has yet to really hit us in the Bay Area.  We're still wearing shorts and t-shirts during the days, and summer berries are still making a weekly appearance at our farmer's markets.  I grew up in British Columbia, where I took the change of seasons for granted, and I totally miss it.  Most of the food blogs I follow are in the full swing of Fall baking, and even though it's still summer here I can't resist making all these lovely treats.

I had the idea to make these cupcakes for our first Iron Cupcake Challenge here in the East Bay (more on that later!!).  I wanted to make an apple cupcake with a caramel center, topped with caramel frosting, and finished with a mini caramel apple on top.  I don't know why but I thought other than crab apples that there was such thing as mini apples, but alas I couldn't find any.  Then my Sunset magazine arrived with the most adorable mini caramel apples made using a melon baller.  Brilliant!

Well, making the caramel apples was a bit of a debacle.  The caramel recipe wouldn't really adhere to the apple since it was so damp.  So I gave up and found a similar recipe online using melted butterscotch chips.  Not quite the authentic effect I was going for but cute enough. 

One thing I have to mention is that the caramel sauce I usually make for cupcake fillings didn't quite work out this time.  I trusted my candy thermometer (which broke shortly thereafter) instead of my gut and I ended up with gritty caramel sauce.  I was really annoyed until it hardened up and my husband told me what I made was the center of our favorite See's candy, which is a fudgy textured caramel covered in milk chocolate.  Yay!  I'm going to try and recreate my mistake and hopefully you'll be seeing a caramel candy post soon. :)


Caramel Apple Cupcakes

Caramel Cupcakes
from Magnolia Bakery

3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups sugar
5 large eggs, at room temp
1 cup milk
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 1/2 cups coarsely chopped, peeled, crisp tart apples

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Line 24 muffin tins with liners (note: this makes more than 24 cupcakes, but most people I know don't have an oven large enough to fit more than two 12 muffin tins so you may need to do this in batches).
In a small bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt.  Set aside.  In a large bowl, on med speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth.  Add the sugar gradually and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. 
Add the dry ingredients in three parts, alternating with milk and vanilla.  With each addition, beat until ingredients are incorporated, but do not over beat.  Using a rubber spatula, scrape down sides making sure ingredients are well blended.  Stir in apples.
Divide the batter into tins, filling each about 3/4 full.  Using a large ice cream scoop makes this easy peasy.  Bake for 22 minutes, until a cake tester comes out clean.  After about 5 minutes remove to a wire rack to cool.

Caramel Sauce for Filling
from Martha Stewart

2 1/2 cups sugar
2/3 cup water
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon salt (if you like salted caramel increase this to at least 1 1/2 teaspoons)

Heat sugar with the water and corn syrup in a heavy saucepan over high, stirring occasionally, until syrup is clear; clip a candy thermometer to side of pan and stop stirring.

Cook until syrup comes to a boil, washing down sides of pan with a wet pastry brush as needed. Boil, gently swirling pan occasionally, until mixture is caramelized and just reaches 360°F. Remove from heat and slowly pour in cream; stir with a wooden spoon until smooth. Stir in sea salt.

Use immediately; if caramel begins to harden reheat gently until pourable.

Caramel Buttercream Frosting
from Bakers Royale  (this website is all kinds of awesome)

½ cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons butter
6 tablespoons of heavy cream
½ teaspoons of kosher salt
1 cup of unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
11/2 cup powdered sugar


To make the caramel portion: Add sugar and water into a saucepan over medium low heat. Stir until sugar has dissolved. Use a wet brush to remove any crystals that form on the side. Once sugar has dissolved increase heat to high. Now and then, using the handle give the pot a swirl to keep the mixture moving. Do not stir the mixture directly. The mixture will start to bubble after a minute. As the mixture darkens to a medium amber color, approximately 5-7 minutes add the 2 tablespoons of  butter and cream to saucepan. The mixture will bubble wildly. Whisk to combine (bubbles will subside upon cooling). Add salt and stir to combine. Set aside to cool completely before adding it to the next step.
Finishing the caramel buttercream frosting: Place butter and vanilla in a bowl and beat on high until butter is pale and fluffy, about 3-4 minutes. Turn mixer speed down to medium and add powdered sugar ½ cup at a time. Beat until combined. 3. Add in  caramel sauce and beat until combined.


Mini Caramel Apples
from Sunset Magazine 

3/4 cup light corn syrup
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter
About 1 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream, divided
1/2 cup chopped toasted pecans
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
1/2 cup decorative mini orange candies
2 large red apples

About 20 slender but sturdy food-safe twigs, such as magnolia twigs, or craft sticks
1. Heat corn syrup, sugar, butter, and 3/4 cup plus 2 tbsp. cream in a 3-qt. saucepan over medium-high heat until mixture reaches 275° on a candy thermometer*, about 15 minutes, stirring often with the thermometer or a wooden spoon once it starts to brown. While caramel boils, prepare the remaining ingredients (you'll need to have everything ready before beginning step 3).
2. Grease a baking sheet and set aside. Put nuts, chocolate chips, and candies on individual plates and set aside. Using a 1-in. melon baller, cut apples into balls (you should get 8 to 10 from each apple). Push thickest end of a twig into each apple ball through skin side to center. Set on paper towels to absorb moisture.
3. Remove caramel from heat when at 275° and pour in remaining 1/4 cup cream, stirring until very smooth (it will come together after about 1 minute) and being careful of any splattering caramel.
4. Dip apple balls into caramel, making sure caramel comes over edges of skin and letting excess drip off. Dip bottom of each ball into either nuts, chocolate chips, or candies, then set on the baking sheet to cool.
*You'll need an accurate candy thermometer. Check it by immersing in boiling water; it should read 212°. If it's a few degrees too high or low, cook the caramel to a corresponding few degrees more or less. If it's way off, get a new thermometer.
Make ahead: Chill until ready to serve, up to 3 hours ahead. Serve at room temperature.

Linked to:
Sweet Treats Thursday

Peach Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Frosting

Sorry for my lack of posts lately, I have a lot of stuff going on right now.  I still have loads of posts from the summer so here's an old one that I never got around to posting.  Peaches may not be in season for most of us anymore, but you could easily use canned peaches.

I made these luscious peach cupcakes for my birthday back at the end of August.  I used the pineapple cupcake recipe from Glorious Treats and subbed diced peaches in for the pineapple.  These were super moist and had a lovely fresh taste.  I had no idea what kind of frosting to use and my husband suggested brown sugar.  Brilliant!  The frosting was a little crunchy from the brown sugar and was a nice contrast to the ultra moist cupcakes.  A quick disclaimer:  I can't remember the exact measurements I used for the frosting so the recipe below might not be precise.  Frosting is one of the easiest things to make and fix so just adjust either the confectioner's sugar or heavy cream to get the consistency you're looking for.

I served these at my birthday potluck with a bunch of old friends, and they were a hit.  I actually got so many lovely compliments on them, I was truly flattered.  Maybe the idea of one day opening a bakery isn't so crazy after all. :)

Peach Cupcakes
adapted from Glorious Treats

2 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups diced peaches, the juicier the better

Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl and set aside.  In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the eggs and sugar until slightly thickened and a light cream color (about 2 minutes).

On low speed, mix in the oil and vanilla until blended.  Add in the peaches and sour cream and mix until fully incorporated.  Add the flour mixture and blend until just combined and smooth.

Line a 2 cupcake pans with paper liners and fill about 2/3 full. I find that using a large ice cream scoop is the ticket to perfectly portioned cupcakes

Bake cupcakes in a pre-heated 350*F oven for about 22 minutes.  Remove from pan and cool on wire rack.

Brown Sugar Frosting

1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
4 Tablespoons heavy whipping cream
2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar


Cream the butter and brown sugar until light and fluffy.  Add the confectioners' sugar 1/2 cup at a time, alternating with the cream.  Beat until light and fluffy.  If it isn't the consistency you want, add more cream to make it runnier, and more confectioner's sugar to firm it up.

Snake Birthday Cake

I made this cake for a little boy's 5th birthday party today.  It's the biggest cake I've made, a 12 X 18 sheet cake, two layers of chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, serving 60 people.  I was so pleased with the way the snakes came out, the big snake is made out of two mini bundt cakes and covered in fondant.  The little snakes and letters are all fondant.  Cute, no? :)

A Sweet Little Bird Baby Shower

My dear friend Jessica is expecting her second little boy any day now, and my friend Helen and I recently threw her an intimate baby shower in my backyard.  I LOVE throwing any kind of party, and Jessica kindly agreed to let me share the details with you.  :)

We made the invitations, nothing fancy, but cute:

Plenty of sweet treats of course:

Brioche Recipe

Recipe coming soon

I made the cupcake wrappers, they're super easy and it makes it easy to coordinate your party.  Find the instructions here.

The Wishing Tree: guests could leave wishes for the new baby

We invited guests to decorate a onsie for the new baby:

Me and the glowing mama-to-be:

Congrats Jessica!!!

Chocolate Banana Cupcakes with Strawberry Frosting

My darling husband bought me a huge Wilton cake decorating caddy for my birthday this year.  I have no idea what half of the tools are for, but I love to experiment.  I made these cupcakes for my friend's baby shower that I co-hosted a few weeks ago.  I usually use a large star tip to pipe frosting onto cupcakes but I wanted to try something a little different (these are made with the small petal tip).  I had seen this on another blog and thought they looked so pretty.  Not bad for a first attempt, right?

The cupcakes were delicious, I got the recipe from Joy of Baking, and they were moist and had lots of cocoa flavor.  There isn't a lot of banana in the recipe so it wasn't too overpowering.  The frosting was awesome, and even better the next day when each petal had gotten that crisp sugar texture.  I made the cupcake wrappers from a tutorial on Cupcake Project, it was super easy and I thought they looked quite pretty.  Thanks for visiting!

Chocolate Banana Cupcakes
from Joy of Baking.com 

1 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1 cup (130 grams) all-purpose flour

1/3 cup (35 grams) unsweetened cocoa powder (regular or Dutch-processed)

3/4 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 large egg

1/2 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 1 medium sized banana)

1/2 cup (120 ml) warm water

1/4 cup (60 ml) milk

1/4 cup (60 ml) canola, corn, or vegetable oil

3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C) and place rack in the center of the oven. Line 12 regular-sized muffin cups with paper liners or spray each cup with a non stick vegetable spray.

In a large bowl whisk together the sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In another large bowl, whisk together the egg, mashed banana, water, milk, oil, and vanilla extract. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir, or whisk, until combined. (The batter is quite thin.) Pour or scoop the batter into the muffin cups, about 3/4 full, and bake for about 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean.  

Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack.

Strawberry Frosting

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
2 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar
1- 2 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
3 tablespoons pureed strawberries (approximately ½ cup whole)


Combine butter and confectioner’s sugar in a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment.  Beat on low speed for about 1 minute, or until the butter and sugar come together (it will start off quite crumbly).  Add the whipping cream and beat on high speed until the frosting becomes light and fluffy, approximately 2 minutes.  Add the strawberries and beat until combined.

Mocha Cream Icebox Cake

You know you're behind on your blogging when you have pictures of desserts and you have no idea what they are.  Anyways...

I made this delicious and super easy icebox cake when I was in Canada this summer.  Icebox cakes look and taste impressive but are insanely easy to make.  I found this one of my favorite blogs, Sugar Bananas.  It's creamy, mochalicious, and just a little bit boozy.  Perfect for a hot summer's day.   I cheated and used store-bought chocolate wafers, but come on, I was on vacation. :)  I also used cream cheese instead of marscapone, which we couldn't seem to easily find.  The hardest part of this was waiting until company arrived to cut a slice!

Mocha Cream Icebox Cake
adapted very slightly from Sugar Bananas

2 cups cold heavy cream

8 oz cream cheese

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup coffee liqueur

2 tablespoons cocoa powder

1 teaspoon espresso powde

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

24 oz thin chocolate cookies 

Shaved semisweet chocolate, for garnish

Combine heavy cream, cream cheese, sugar, coffee liquer, cocoa powder, espresso powder, and vanilla in bowl of electric mixer fitted with whisk attachment.  Mix on low speed to combine and then raise the speed until firm peaks are formed.

Arrange cookies on bottom of an 8" springform pan to cover the bottom.  Spread a third of the mocha cream evenly over the cookies.  Layer more cookies on top, followed by another third of the cream.  Continue once more, ending with the cream.  Smooth the top, cover with plastic, and refrigerate for 8 hours.  

Run a small knife around the outside of the cake and remove the sides of the pan.  Sprinkle the top with the chocolate, cut in wedges, and serve cold.

Linked to:

Sweets for a Saturday

Sweet Indulgences Sunday

Caramel Filled Caramel Cupcakes with Chocolate Frosting

I had the pleasure of making cupcakes for our friends/neighbor's son's third birthday.  I love when people request cupcakes above and beyond vanilla and chocolate, they're so much fun to make and eat.  I'm all about tasty cupcake fillings, and what better filling for caramel cupcakes than more caramel.  Seriously, can you ever have too much caramel?

I had some trouble finding an actual recipe for caramel cake, most of the cakes just use brown sugar instead of white, or a mixture.  Finally I found this recipe from Shuna fish Lydon which uses a caramel syrup in the batter.  The cake didn't have the strongest caramel flavor and would have been completely overpowered by the chocolate frosting, so the filling definitely added to the caramel deliciousness.  I used a standard chocolate frosting recipe, and it came out nice and fluffy, perfect for piping.  Some colored sprinkles were a must for this sweet boy's birthday celebration!

Caramel Cake
from Shuna fish Lydon
(adapted to make cupcakes)
 
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/4 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup caramel syrup (recipe follows)
2  large eggs, room temperature
splash vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup milk, room temperature

Preheat oven to 350F.  Line 24 muffin tins with cupcake liners.  Sift together flour and baking powder.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream butter until smooth.
Add sugar and salt & cream until light and fluffy.  Slowly pour room temperature caramel syrup into bowl.  Scrape down bowl and increase speed. Add eggs/vanilla extract a little at a time, mixing well after each addition. Scrape down bowl again, beat mixture until light and uniform.

Turn mixer to lowest speed, and add one third of the dry ingredients. When incorporated, add half of the milk, a little at a time.  Add another third of the dry ingredients, then the other half of the milk and finish with the dries.

Take off mixer and by hand, use a spatula to do a few last folds. making sure batter is uniform.
Fill the cupcake liners about 3/4 of the way full.  I actually found the recipe made about 18 cupcakes per batch, but you could probably fill the tins a bit less full and get more.  Bake for approximately 22 minutes.  Let cool for about 5 minutes and then remove cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely.


Caramel Syrup

2 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
1 cup water for "stopping"

In a small stainless steel saucepan, with tall sides, mix water and sugar until mixture feels like wet sand.  Brush down any stray sugar crystals with wet pastry brush.  Turn heat on high.  Cook until smoking slightly: dark amber.

When color is achieved, very carefully pour in one cup of water. Caramel will jump and sputter, it is very dangerous, so have long sleeves on and prepared to step back.  Whisk over medium heat until it has reduced slightly (about 5 minutes).

Caramel Sauce for Filling
from Martha Stewart

2 1/2 cups sugar
2/3 cup water
1 tablespoon light corn syrup
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon salt (if you like salted caramel increase this to at least 1 1/2 teaspoons)

Heat sugar with the water and corn syrup in a heavy saucepan over high, stirring occasionally, until syrup is clear; clip a candy thermometer to side of pan and stop stirring.

Cook until syrup comes to a boil, washing down sides of pan with a wet pastry brush as needed. Boil, gently swirling pan occasionally, until mixture is caramelized and just reaches 360°F. Remove from heat and slowly pour in cream; stir with a wooden spoon until smooth. Stir in sea salt.

Use immediately; if caramel begins to harden reheat gently until pourable.

Chocolate Frosting

2 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
6 tablespoons butter, softened to room temp
5 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a medium bowl, sift together the confectioners' sugar and cocoa, and set aside.
In a large bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter until smooth, then gradually beat in sugar mixture alternately with whipping cream. Blend in vanilla. Beat until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. 

Assembly

To finish, use a paring knife to cut a cone-shaped piece (about 1/2 inch deep) from the center of each cupcake and throw away the pieces (or eat them). Spoon 1 to 2 teaspoons warm Salted Caramel Filling into each hollowed-out cupcake. You will notice the caramel will sink into the cupcake a little, just fill it up a bit more.  Make sure the caramel is completely cool before you pipe over your frosting or it will probably start to melt your frosting.

Use a pastry bag with a medium open-star tip and pipe chocolate frosting onto each cupcake, swirling tip and releasing as you pull up to form a peak. Garnish each cupcake with a pinch of sea salt. Cupcakes are best eaten the day they are filled and frosted. Store at room temperature in airtight containers - do NOT refrigerate.

Linked to:
Sweets for a Saturday
Sweet Indulgences Sunday