Dear Internet; how have you been? Me? Oh I’m just peachy keen, thanks for asking. Where have I been? I’ve been in lame-not-posting town, that’s where! And then I went on a little jaunt, oh yes! But I am back now, and I have lots of bakes to share with you. Are you ready?
Now, I did some baking while I was away, and a couple of bake lessons for my kitchen-shy pal Pam, and particularly considering the oven we were using (which doesn’t believe in cooking anything. EVER) we did exceptionally well! I intend to fully write up those bakes soon, but in the interim, Dear Darling Simon asked that I posted a recipe for him, so he could make cupcakes for this weekend. So, consciously curbing my hyperbole, and, alas, omitting images, here are my White Chocolate Chip Cupcakes with Vanilla Butter Cream!
White Chocolate Chip Cupcakes
Makes approx 16 regular sizes cupcakes
225g golden caster sugar
225g unsalted butter (room temperature)
1tsp vanilla extract
4 Free Range Eggs (room temperature)
225g Self raising flour
White chocolate chips.
Preheat oven to 180c (160c fan assisted).
Cream the butter and sugar together. Once combined, mix in the vanilla.
Beat in the eggs. The mix will look curdled and disgusting, but fear not! From ugliness, comes deliciousness. Beat this mix fairly vigorously to encourage air into the blend.
Mix in the flour and chocolate chips until the mixture is pale in colour and even in consistency.
2/3 fill your muffin cases, and bake for 13-15 minutes, checking at 13.
Vanilla Butter Cream
113g Unsalted butter
1tsp Vanilla extract
250g Icing sugar
1tbsp milk/single cream
Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl.
Add the butter and vanilla and cream together until the mixture is dry and almost even in consistency.
Add the dash of a milk or cream and mix thoroughly.
If the mixture gets too wet, add more sugar, and more milk/cream if it still to dry.
Decorate as you please!
And because I think this would be great, an alternative topping for you!
White Chocolate Ganache
227g White chocolate (good quality (Menier/Green and Blacks etc))
180ml Double cream
28g Butter
Break up the chocolate into small pieces and set aside in a mixing bowl.
Heat the cream and butter in a saucepan over a medium heat, stirring as you go.
Bring the mixture to the boil and immediately pour over the chocolate. Let this mixture stand for a few minutes to make the chocolate melt, then beat vigorously with a whisk. This will make the mixture thicken.
Refridgerate for about an hour, and then the mixture can be piped. If you wish to spread the mixture onto the cupcakes, let it come back to near room temperature before you try.
Hope that helps, Simon dear!
Showing posts with label buttercream. Show all posts
Showing posts with label buttercream. Show all posts
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
Tuesday, 20 July 2010
Celebrating Summer: Strawberry Cupcakes
A couple of weeks ago, I went to meet up with my friend Looby after her job interview. She was sitting in the temple that is Starbucks (I am so clichéd, ugh), drinking a hot chocolate and eating a strawberry cupcake. She said ‘the cake is ok, but try the icing’. She was right. The cake itself tasted like shop cake; just a basic and sadly bland vanilla. The butter cream icing however was made with real strawberries, and was really something. It had the little strawberry pips dotted through it, giving it this adorable, rustic look, whilst being pristinely piped.
I wanted to make my own!
So I scoured the internet, and found a recipe that suited on cooksunited.co.uk. The whole first batch I made with this recipe I threw out for the birds (see this post), which was a real shame, as that’s a hideous waste of materials. However, second time around, I ended up with some pastel pink, aromatic and incredibly light cupcakes. And the frosting… stuff you Starbucks, I can do better at home!
I had to mess the recipe about a bit, mainly with the cooking times and temps, and it is one I want to mess around with more, but this is what I did for the firstrun. Apologies now, and always, for my hideous food photography.
Strawberry Cupcakes
Makes 12-16, depending on how big you make your cuppies.
For the cakes:
100g fresh local strawberries, hulled and halved
1sp baking powder
180g flour
60ml milk
120g butter (salted or unsalted, depending on your preference)
200g golden granulated or caster sugar
1 large free range egg
2 large free range egg whites
1sp vanilla extract (not essence; you’ll thank me)
Preheat your oven to 170/150 fan assisted. Line your muffin pan with paper cases, or, if you are like me, line a baking tray with silicone cupcake cases.
In a blender, puree the strawberries. Try not to glug the delicious fruity goop down on its own. Be strong. Set it aside.
Combine flour and baking powder in a mixing bowl. Set aside.
With an electric mixer (hand or processor) cream the butter until fluffy and pale, then gradually add the sugar and continue to mix.
Add one egg and mix thoroughly.
Separate off your egg whites. Add them to the mix with the vanilla and blend/beat well until the mixture is well aerated and uniform.
Combine the strawberry puree with the milk. Marvel at your milkshake of awesomeness, but do try not to drink it. Add the ’milkshake’ into the wet mixture, mixing well.
Combine the wet mixture into the dry flour mixture about half and a time. Be careful not to beat too hard; you want to preserve the air in the mix from the egg beating. Continue until mixture is even in colour (pale, pretty pink) and texture.
Spoon out your mixture into your prepared cupcake baking receptacle(s). I made mine quite small, so it worked out to be enough batter for 16. The recipe is meant for 12 good sized cupcakes.
Bake for 15-18 minutes. Mine were a little more well done than I would have liked (I baked for 18), despite taking 7 minutes off the original baking time. If you are baking 12 large cupcakes rather than my 16, 18-20 minutes should be plenty. When done, the outsides will be prettily golden (darker if like me you use unrefined sugars), the insides fluffy and pink.
Allow to cool in pan/on tray for about 5 minutes, before removing to a cooling rack. Mine fell out of their silicone cases with ease at this stage.
For the butter cream and decoration:
Strawberry Buttercream
50g fresh local strawberries, hulled and halved
250g butter
400g icing sugar
50g golden caster sugar (can replaced with icing sugar)
1 sp vanilla extract
Optional: decorations like sugar pearls, dragees, confectioner’s glitter, glitter sugar etc etc
While the cakes are cooling, make your butter cream. Puree 50g of fresh hulled and halved strawberries in a blender. Alternatively, blend them when you do the 100g for the cakes, and remove a third and set to one side.
In an electric mixer, or by hand if you are tough and awesome, cream 250g butter until fluffy.
Add the sugar(s) and blend well.
When the butter cream is beginning to come together, add the vanilla and strawberry puree, and watch the buttery mix turn into pure pink paradise.
When the cakes are cool, ice as you like with the butter cream (I *attempted* to pipe mine) and decorate as you will. I made mine as blousy and ridiculous as possible, and I think they looked soooo cute.
Due to the fresh fruit content, these will keep for longer and keep better in the fridge. They taste best within 1-2 days of baking.
This little cutie, decorated with white chocolate stars, is probably one of my two favourites out of the batch. If you can remember this recipe by any of the images here today, make it this one. Or perhaps the one of Looby in her darling hat. Though you may end up baking a darling hat. If so, send it to me, I want one.
When it came to decorating, my main issue is a) the butter cream was too cold because we’d had to refrigerate it when the first batch of cake failed. When I do this again (possibly later this week!) I will make the butter cream only when I am ready to use it. Also, I have a nasty neck injury from a car accident earlier in the year. I have numbness and muscle weakness in my arms, particularly the left, and I found it very difficult to pipe the not warm icing, and really quite painful. I‘d lost most of the sensation in the arm by the time I was done! I look forward to trying again with fresh, malleable icing. Also, I hate to blame my tools, but my piping bags are certainly not a grade, and I really do lack experience. This is probably my first time piping buttercream. Ah well, I can’t get worse!
I wanted to make my own!
So I scoured the internet, and found a recipe that suited on cooksunited.co.uk. The whole first batch I made with this recipe I threw out for the birds (see this post), which was a real shame, as that’s a hideous waste of materials. However, second time around, I ended up with some pastel pink, aromatic and incredibly light cupcakes. And the frosting… stuff you Starbucks, I can do better at home!
I had to mess the recipe about a bit, mainly with the cooking times and temps, and it is one I want to mess around with more, but this is what I did for the firstrun. Apologies now, and always, for my hideous food photography.
Strawberry Cupcakes
Makes 12-16, depending on how big you make your cuppies.
For the cakes:
100g fresh local strawberries, hulled and halved
1sp baking powder
180g flour
60ml milk
120g butter (salted or unsalted, depending on your preference)
200g golden granulated or caster sugar
1 large free range egg
2 large free range egg whites
1sp vanilla extract (not essence; you’ll thank me)
Preheat your oven to 170/150 fan assisted. Line your muffin pan with paper cases, or, if you are like me, line a baking tray with silicone cupcake cases.
In a blender, puree the strawberries. Try not to glug the delicious fruity goop down on its own. Be strong. Set it aside.
Combine flour and baking powder in a mixing bowl. Set aside.
With an electric mixer (hand or processor) cream the butter until fluffy and pale, then gradually add the sugar and continue to mix.
Add one egg and mix thoroughly.
Separate off your egg whites. Add them to the mix with the vanilla and blend/beat well until the mixture is well aerated and uniform.
Combine the strawberry puree with the milk. Marvel at your milkshake of awesomeness, but do try not to drink it. Add the ’milkshake’ into the wet mixture, mixing well.
Combine the wet mixture into the dry flour mixture about half and a time. Be careful not to beat too hard; you want to preserve the air in the mix from the egg beating. Continue until mixture is even in colour (pale, pretty pink) and texture.
Spoon out your mixture into your prepared cupcake baking receptacle(s). I made mine quite small, so it worked out to be enough batter for 16. The recipe is meant for 12 good sized cupcakes.
Bake for 15-18 minutes. Mine were a little more well done than I would have liked (I baked for 18), despite taking 7 minutes off the original baking time. If you are baking 12 large cupcakes rather than my 16, 18-20 minutes should be plenty. When done, the outsides will be prettily golden (darker if like me you use unrefined sugars), the insides fluffy and pink.
Allow to cool in pan/on tray for about 5 minutes, before removing to a cooling rack. Mine fell out of their silicone cases with ease at this stage.
For the butter cream and decoration:
Strawberry Buttercream
50g fresh local strawberries, hulled and halved
250g butter
400g icing sugar
50g golden caster sugar (can replaced with icing sugar)
1 sp vanilla extract
Optional: decorations like sugar pearls, dragees, confectioner’s glitter, glitter sugar etc etc
While the cakes are cooling, make your butter cream. Puree 50g of fresh hulled and halved strawberries in a blender. Alternatively, blend them when you do the 100g for the cakes, and remove a third and set to one side.
In an electric mixer, or by hand if you are tough and awesome, cream 250g butter until fluffy.
Add the sugar(s) and blend well.
When the butter cream is beginning to come together, add the vanilla and strawberry puree, and watch the buttery mix turn into pure pink paradise.
When the cakes are cool, ice as you like with the butter cream (I *attempted* to pipe mine) and decorate as you will. I made mine as blousy and ridiculous as possible, and I think they looked soooo cute.
Due to the fresh fruit content, these will keep for longer and keep better in the fridge. They taste best within 1-2 days of baking.
This little cutie, decorated with white chocolate stars, is probably one of my two favourites out of the batch. If you can remember this recipe by any of the images here today, make it this one. Or perhaps the one of Looby in her darling hat. Though you may end up baking a darling hat. If so, send it to me, I want one.When it came to decorating, my main issue is a) the butter cream was too cold because we’d had to refrigerate it when the first batch of cake failed. When I do this again (possibly later this week!) I will make the butter cream only when I am ready to use it. Also, I have a nasty neck injury from a car accident earlier in the year. I have numbness and muscle weakness in my arms, particularly the left, and I found it very difficult to pipe the not warm icing, and really quite painful. I‘d lost most of the sensation in the arm by the time I was done! I look forward to trying again with fresh, malleable icing. Also, I hate to blame my tools, but my piping bags are certainly not a grade, and I really do lack experience. This is probably my first time piping buttercream. Ah well, I can’t get worse!