Mini Chocolate Cupcakes with Mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups

It took me longer to get this up then I wanted, but here it is. We had a potluck at work two Fridays ago, so what did I bring? Cupcakes, of coarse! I thought mini cupcakes would be perfect for a potluck since it’s a small bite (or two) and other people would also bring dessert. I also wanted to add a little something more then normal and I recently found this blog – bakeitinacake.com – and so I thought I’d try it. Recently I made mini chocolate cupcakes (I got the recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World) with peanut butter frosting for a friend and I thought it would be perfect with a mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cup inside! (My hubby got me the ones without a wrapper.)

I spooned in about 3/4 of the batter into the cups and then added the mini Reese's.

Then I covered the Reese's with a spoonful of batter. I am not sure this was really necessary because the candy just sinks to the bottom (see photo at the end). I saw this posted on someone's facebook page. It looks like the candy stills sinks towards the bottom, but maybe not as far as without it.

This frosting is the BEST. It tastes like a nutter butter. Soo good!

Peanut Butter Frosting (enough for 24 mini cupcakes)

1 stick unsalted butter; room temp
1/3 cup peanut butter; room temp
~1 tsp vanilla
1 - 2 cups sifted powdered sugar (I always like less sugar)
~ 2 tbsp heavy cream

Beat butter and peanut butter until creamed together. (I like using a stand mixer.)
Mix in vanilla. Sift powdered sugar into bowl and mix until well combined. Add heavy cream to desired consistency.

Chai Latte Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

So I have to start by saying that finding time to write this blog is a bit harder then I thought it would be. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t think it would be easy…but it takes me longer then I thought. I guess I focus too much on trying to make it perfect when I should really just be myself, but in writing. Harder said then done, that’s for sure. Anyways, here’s my next entry – chai latte cupcakes with cream cheese frosting.

I love chai tea. Hot or cold, it’s my favorite drink. The absolute best I’ve had is the vanilla chai tea from Bolthouse Farms. It has just the right amount of spice and is perfectly creamy. This is one of those things I think I could live on. These cupcakes capture the drink perfectly. And I added cream cheese frosting, which makes everything better!

The cupcake recipe is pretty straight forward and you can find it in the book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. (I haven’t found a recipe from here that I haven’t loved.) The batter may be a bit more time consuming then others because you have to make tea, but if you plan it right it really doesn’t take too much longer. I usually make the tea and let it steep and work on the rest of the batter.

Brought the soy milk to just barely boiling and put the tea bags in to let them steep.

Combined all the dry ingredients.

This is what the milk looks like after 10 minutes of steeping.

Whisked the wet and dry ingredients.

Fill the cups (these are mini ones) and bake for 10 - 11 minutes at 350F. (When I make full sized cupcakes I bake them for 20 minutes.)

I cut up the butter and cream cheese and put them in the mixing bowl when I started working on the cupcake batter so that they would soften up faster. (The recipe is below.)

I sifted the flour right into the bowl and mixed in.

Then I added the vanilla and neon blue food coloring. (These were for my coworker and her children so I like to make the frosting colorful and fun.)

Here I wanted Earl to take photos of me frosting the cupcakes, but as you can see it didn't work too well...better communication definitely needed.

I made two other cupcake recipes since I last posted...hopefully I will get the mini chocolate-peanut butter cup cupakes up tomorrow. :) Happy Cupcaking!

Cupcakes Cousin

So I know this is supposed to be a cupcake blog, but I didn't really have time this weekend to make cupcakes...so I made their cousin: muffins!

On Sunday we went to the farmer's market and got some strawberries. We still had some left in our fridge from the week before. I didn’t want to waste them so I needed a way to use. I remembered seeing a recipe for strawberry muffins on Two Peas and Their Pod blog (recipe here) and went back to find it. The recipe calls for Nutella, but we didn’t have any so I decided to leave that out.

I cut up all the strawberries and mixed the ingredients together and thought that the muffins needed a little something extra. Then I remembered my boss brought these amazingly delicious and moist strawberry-peach muffins. Luckily, I always have canned peaches in the pantry. They were the perfect addition!

I cut up 5 or 6 peach slices and threw them in the batter. I’m sure you could use fresh peaches, but these seemed like a better idea. I am not quite sure why…maybe it’s because they’ve been sitting in syrup and I thought they might make them a bit moister. Really it was just a gut feeling and it worked.

The batter was really thick – not quite as thick as cookie dough, but it made me think of it – so I thought I’d try adding a bit of the syrup from the canned peaches (maybe ~ 1 ½ to 2 Tbs). I wouldn’t add any more then this or it might get too liquidy.

The muffins came out great. They were the perfect combination of strawberry-peachy-muffiny goodness. Earl and I were going out to dinner basically right after these came out of the oven, but we couldn’t resist trying one. Best muffins ever!! I will definitely be making these again.

Recipe (adapted from Two Peas and Their Pod)

-makes ~ 10 muffins

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup canola oil
1 large egg
1/3 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

~ 1 – 2 tablespoons syrup from canned peaches
1 cup chopped fresh strawberries
5 – 6 slices canned peaches; chopped
Sugar, for sprinkling on top of muffins

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a muffin tin with paper/aluminum liners.

2. Sift together the dry ingredients.
3. Mix the wet ingredients until well combined. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix, being careful not to over-mix. Fold in the strawberries and peaches.
4. Fill the muffin cups ~ 2/3 full. Sprinkle with sugar (turbinado is probably best, but I didn’t have any so I just used bakers sugar).
5. Bake at 350°F for 17-20 minutes.
6. Let cool for ~ 5-10 minutes and remove from muffin pans.
7. While waiting for the muffins to cool to an edible temperature try to act like you have patience and self control and then devour.

Espresso Crème filled Cappuccino Cupcakes

When I make cupcakes I usually bring them to work so I decided to ask some of my coworkers what they wanted. Coffee flavor was requested, so coffee it is. I found the recipe for these cupcakes in the book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. My hubby (Earl) got this book for me quite a while ago and it sat around for at least six months before I tried any of the recipes. I finally tried one, then a second, and a third, and many cupcakes later I have to say this has become my favorite cupcake book. The cupcakes are always light, moist, and never too sugary. And everything in it is vegan! Though sometimes I modify the recipes to use what I have at home and so when I make them they aren’t always vegan.

This time I made Cappuccino cupcakes filled with Espresso Crème topped with a chocolate buttercream frosting. I got the cupcake and filling recipe from the book and then made chocolate butter cream from my own recipe.

I started by making the cupcakes (mine weren’t vegan because I used Brown Cow plain yogurt since I had that in my fridge). The recipe makes exactly 12 cupcakes and they smelled sooo good while they were baking. It was like a coffee house baking in my oven.

The recipe calls for an espresso crème filling and at first I couldn’t decide if I was going to make it. Well, I decided to and am very glad that I did! This was the best filling I have had…so good in fact, that what didn’t end up in the cupcakes ended up in my stomach. Can you say yummy? ‘Cause I can! Looking back this probably wasn’t the best idea, but it sure seemed like it at the time.

I used a knife to cut out the center of the cupcakes. Then I sort of smushed the cupcake to the edges to make the holes a little bigger and filled them with the crème. (I am disappointed that “smushed” is not a “real” word…)

I took the tops of the cupcake pieces I had removed and put them back onto the cupcakes to cover the filling. I don’t usually do this, but I thought I might try it today. It adds a little more cake back and it was nice because it makes it look like there is a lot of frosting without actually having to put too much on. (You’ll notice there are 3 cupcakes without their pieces replaced because Earl had to try them….one by itself, one with the frosting, and one with the filling. He like them all. Does that count as three thumbs up?)

Then I piped the frosting (recipe below) on with a 2D piping tip. I like the way they turned out and so did Earl.

I haven’t liked any of the chocolate buttercream frostings that I’ve found in recipe books. So I thought I would try just making something and seeing how it worked. I liked how this turned out. It’s not too sweet and you can definitely taste the chocolate. It also has a nice creamy consistency. I used semi-sweet chocolate, but I think you should be able to use milk or dark chocolate (though I haven’t tried using them).

Chocolate Buttercream Recipe

1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter; softened

3 oz semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled

2 cups powdered sugar; sifted

2 tbs soy milk

1 tsp vanilla

Cream the butter in the mixer. Then add the cooled chocolate and cream together. Sift the sugar into the bowl and mix until well combined. Add the soy milk and vanilla and mix again. This recipe is enough for 12 cupcakes.