Christmas Cupcakes

I love Christmas, because it is a really big excuse for me to bake. We do an open house every year so I can bake all the recipes that call my name during the month of December. Unfortunately, this December our party was the 23rd, and my last day off was the 8th. This really meant that I didn't have to do any of the cleaning, P did. It did mean I had to do all my baking after I got home at 6:30pm every night. I made these cupcakes entirely on the evening of the 22nd, and they were still perfect the next day, which is always a good trait for a recipe to have.

The cupcakes are the Chocolate Graham Cracker Cupcakes with Toasted Marshmallow, from Trophy Cupcakes (via Martha Stewart). I got my inspiration though, from Room for Dessert's version.

What really got me was when I took some in to work on the 23rd, everyone kept saying 'You made cupcakes from SCRATCH?!'. For me, the scary part was the meringue icing. I had never made a meringue that worked, until that night. As you can see, I never did get stiff, glossy peaks with my mixture, but my mixer was starting to smell like burning so I decided to cut my losses and just go with soft peak-ish.

The Cupcake Courier came in hand for storing and serving them. I only brought 9 in to work, so those went in a cookie tin. Work got 9 because the batter (which was very liquid, is that normal for cupcakes?) made 9 more than called for. Of course, I hadn't planned that, so those 9 didn't have the graham cracker bottoms, but they were still tasty, and still got marshmallow meringue goodness on top.

Speaking of amounts of stuff: I only made half the icing recipe, and managed to ice 33 cupcakes just fine. Luckily, I had 4 egg whites hanging around, as I'd made a 4-yolk shortbread earlier. I also did not sprinkle graham cracker crumbs on the cupcakes, because all that mixture went into the crunchy bottoms. The chopped chocolate I used was a mixture of bittersweet and dark.

Makes 24 cupcakes

Ingredients:
For the cupcakes:
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons sugar
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon cocoa powder (not Dutch-processed)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 flat teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
80 gr unsalted butter, melted
2 Tablespoons orange juice
150 gr bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

For the frosting (which can easily be halved from these amounts):
8 egg-whites
2 cups granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F (180C) degrees. Line 2 standard muffin tins with cupcake liners; set aside.
2. Sift sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together into the bowl of an electric mixer. Add in the eggs. Using the paddle attachment, mix ingredients together on low speed, until the batter is uniform.
3. In a large bowl, mix together milk, oil, vanilla and boiling water. Add to flour mixture and beat on medium speed for 30 seconds. Scrape down sides of bowl and continue mixing on medium speed until the batter is uniform.
4. Place graham cracker crumbs, melted butter and orange juice in a large bowl; stir until well combined. Check the mixture - if you can take some of it between your fingers and unify it into a shape that doesn’t fall apart and all crumbly - that’s what where looking for. If still too crumbly, add some more juice, spoon by spoon, until you get it right.
5. Place 1 tablespoon graham cracker mixture into the bottom of each prepared muffin cup. Use a tablespoon or the bottom of a small glass to pack crumbs into the bottom of each cupcake liner. Place a teaspoon of the chopped chocolate above it. Reserve remaining graham cracker mixture and chocolate for topping.
6. Transfer muffin tins to oven and bake until the edges of the graham cracker mixture is golden, about 5 minutes.
7. Remove from oven and fill each muffin cup three-quarters full with cake batter. Sprinkle each with remaining chocolate and graham cracker mixture.
8. Return to oven and bake, rotating pans halfway through baking, until tops are firm and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 18 to 20 minutes.
9. Transfer muffin tins to a wire rack and let cupcakes cool in pan for 10 minutes. Remove cupcakes from pan and let cool completely.

10. Prepare the frosting: Place egg whites, sugar, and cream of tartar in the heatproof bowl of an electric mixer. Set over a saucepan with simmering water. Whisk constantly until sugar is dissolved and whites are warm to the touch, 3 to 4 minutes.
11. Transfer bowl to electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, and beat, starting on low speed, gradually increasing to high, until stiff, glossy peaks form, 5 to 7 minutes. Add vanilla, and mix until combined.
12. Pipe the frosting on top of each muffin. If you don’t feel like piping, place spoonfuls of the frosting on top of each cupcake and arrange it nicely.
13. Slightly burn the frosting using a burner, or put it back inside the oven (see tips).

Sweet and Salty Cake

A few weeks ago, we had a potluck at work. There was a sign-up sheet with various spaces to put down your name, with only two dessert spots. I immediately claimed one by putting 'chocolate something' on the list. Someone had already taken the first dessert spot with 'carrot cake', so I thought there should be some contrast.

As for what 'chocolate something' entailed, I wasn't certain until I remembered a cake I've seen making the rounds. Baked bakery's Sweet and Salty Chocolate Cake. The cookbook is on my Christmas list, but this recipe is on Martha Stewart's website.

I wanted a challenge, and boy was this a challenge! A fun one though. I'd been wanting to make a layer cake for a while. I want to be the cake-baker among my friends, the one people come to for a cake. I figured to become that person, I better start baking cakes. So I went out and bought some cake pans. I had one 8" pan, but this is a 3-layer cake after all!

I won't repeat the recipe here, but I will tell you what I found out.

That recipe makes a lot of icing. They said the caramel would do a couple cakes, and the ganache recipe would do one. This is NOT true. I actually made two of these cakes; one was a test that I took to our D&D night a couple days before the potluck. It was a completely different set of people, so no one got bored by cake. :) One recipe of ganache completely iced both cakes. Granted, I don't actually like icing on cakes, so I probably spread it thinner than the bakery does, but it would've been pretty overwhelming to have it all on one cake.

I needed two goes at the caramel, but that is more because my candy thermometer is a piece of junk. This I should know already, from my first adventure in cooking with Lester, on the fateful day we tried to make marshmallows. I have a feeling the caramel was supposed to be caramel-coloured rather than white, but I didn't want to risk burning it again.

I also ended up buying a Cupcake Courier (seen in the background of the top photo). If I do want to be cake lady, I need some snazzy transport. I'm also very excited by all the cupcake blogs out there, and want to try some of those for treats to bring in to work.

The cakes were well received at both events, and provided great snacks at work for the next few days. You only need tiny, sliver-like slices of this cake, even with my stingy icing job. The salted caramel is great, it cuts the sickly-sweetness of all the chocolate in the ganache (an entire POUND!). I used a hodge-podge of baking chocolate squares, which I think worked out to 6oz dark, 8oz unsweetened, and 2oz bittersweet.

Definitely put it in the fridge before transporting. The first cake needed to go in the car as soon as I finished icing, and I actually ended up using skewers to pin the layers together so it wouldn't slip apart. The second one had some time in the fridge (top photo) so it was good and sturdy. The Cupcake Courier worked well on my 15 minute walk to work. And I only got a few weird looks!