6 posts tagged “cupcakes”

Making Devli's Food Cupcakes

My favorite cupcakes are chocolate cupcakes with vanilla icing. I love the deep chocolate flavor in the cake, balanced by creamy vanilla frosting. But despite it being my go-to cupcake at bakeries, I had never tried to make them myself.

This week I wanted to make Harry Potter themed treats to bring into work to celebrate Harry Potter day on Wednesday (the movie release of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince - which our COO took anyone who wanted to see it to the IMAX showing at 10am, amazing!). I knew I wanted to make and decorate cupcakes, and devil's food cake seemed perfect for the theme - dark and delicious, and a bit evil.

I wanted a deep chocolate flavor - more chocolate-y than sweet. They also had to be incredibly moist - dry cupcakes are the worst.

The America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book

I turned to my go-to source for good baking recipes - America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book. I can't recommend this book highly enough, all their recipes turn out fantastic.

I've adapted the baking instructions for cupcakes, instead of a layer cake.

Devil's Food Cupcakes

For an accurate measurement of boiling water, bring a full kettle of water to a boil and then measure out the desired amount.

1 & 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 & 1/4 cups boiling water
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1 teaspoon instant coffee
1/2 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder 
10 tablespoons (1 and 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 & 1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
3 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup sour cream, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line cupcake tins with cupcake papers.

2. Whisk the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together in a large bowl. In a medium bowl, whisk the boiling water, chocolate, cocoa powder, and instant coffee together until smooth.

3. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until combined, about 30 seconds. Beat in the sour cream and vanilla until incorporated.

4. Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in one-third of the flour mixture, followed by half of the chocolate mixture. Repeat with half of the remaining flour mixture and the remaining chocolate mixture. Beat in the remaining flour mixture until just incorporated. (Do not overmix.)

5. Give the batter a final stir with a rubber spatula to make sure it is thoroughly combined. Use an ice cream scooper to fill the cupcake papers about 2/3 full. Tap the pans lightly on the counter to settle the batter. Bake about 13-15 minutes, turning the pans in the oven carefully half-way through. A tester inserted into the center of a cupcake should come out with a few crumbs attached.

6. Let the cupcakes cool in the pan for 5 minutes, and then move to a wire cooling rack. Cool completely before frosting with your favorite frosting. 

Makes 30 cupcakes.

Devil's Food Cupcakes

 
 
I think I could have shortened the bake time on these a little bit (which I've noted in the recipe, next time I'll try 13 minutes instead of 15), and they would have been a little more moist, but they were still incredible. I will definitely be making this recipe often.

The key to this recipe's success is the instant coffee, which helps bring out the chocolate flavors (you won't be able to taste the coffee flavor) and the brown sugar and sour cream for moisture.

Decorating:

I wanted to decorate these to match the Hogwarts house colors, so that people could be Sorted to find out which cupcake they get. I used vanilla buttercream frosting, separated it into four bowls, and dyed each a base color of one of the houses. Then I used colored sprinkles for the accent colors. I got all my supplies at the NY Baking Supply Store, but you could probably find a lot of similar supplies online at the new (and charming) Layer Cake Shop.

Here are the colors I used:
 
Burgundy and Yellow: Gryffindor
Yellow and Purple: Hufflepuff
Blue and Silver: Ravenclaw
Green and Silver: Slytherin
 
I thought about doing one of the actual sorting hat quizzes online to sort people, but sorting over 20 co-workers that way (many of whom are Harry Potter fans, but definitely not all) would not be fun. So I printed slips of paper with each house shield on them, and people drew a slip to find out their house. This also worked better because it ensured that I had enough cupcakes to match all the sorting.

The cupcakes were delicious, and decorating them was very fun. I loved the movie, and it was a wonderful Harry Potter day! :)

Hogwarts House Cupcakes

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Cupcakes

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I found this recipe while looking through some older posts from How About Orange. They looked so good that I had to try them right away. I made them a few Sundays ago, and brought them into work the next day. They were a big hit. The cupcakes are delicious and don't take very long to make - I mixed the filling and the batter, filled the cupcake trays, and had the first batch in the oven in under 30 minutes. I do love frosting, but these taste so good you don't need frosting. So this is another recipe that's good for when you don't have a lot of time to bake, since you don't have to make frosting or spend time frosting the cooled cupcakes.

The filling is piping hot right out of the oven, so let them cool a little bit before eating. But they are amazing while they are still warm. To re-heat them later, about 20 to 30 seconds in the microwave heats them back up nicely.

You can view the original post on How About Orange right here.

Here's the recipe:

Filling:
1 package (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
1/3 c. sugar
1 egg
1/8 tsp. salt
1 c. chocolate chips
1 c. peanut butter chips (or just use more chocolate if you want)

Cupcakes:
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. sugar
1/4 c. baking cocoa
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 c. water
1/3 c. vegetable oil
1 Tbs. white vinegar
1 tsp. vanilla

In a bowl, beat cream cheese. Add sugar, egg, salt. Mix well. Fold in chips. Set aside. For cupcakes, combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, and salt. Add water, oil, vinegar, and vanilla. Mix well. Fill paper-lined muffin cups half full with batter. Top each with 2 Tbs. of cream cheese mixture. Bake at 350º for 25-30 minutes. Cool 10 minutes and remove from pan. Makes 18.

Cupcake Filling

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Cupcakes - ready for the oven

I’ve tried two different recipes for Cream Cheese Frosting on my Red Velvet Cupcakes, and I prefer the recipe from Magnolia’s. It’s a bit sweeter without being overly sweet. It has the added bonus of not having sour cream as an ingredient, so that’s one less thing to buy. We nearly always have sour cream in the fridge and it’s nearly always 2 weeks past the expiration date.

For both recipes, it’s important to not use low-fat or non-fat cream cheese or the frosting will turn out too soupy to work with.

AMERICA’S TEST KITCHEN CREAM CHEESE FROSTING INGREDIENTS:
2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened and cut into small pieces
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into chunks and softened
2 tablespoons sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups confectioner’s sugar

MAGNOLIA BAKERY CREAM CHEESE FROSTING INGREDIENTS:
2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened and cut into small pieces
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened and cut into small pieces
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
5 cups confectioner’s sugar

To make both recipes:

1. Combine all ingredients except the sugar into a large bowl and mix on medium speed until smooth, about 3 to 4 minutes.

2. Reduce the mixer speed to medium low and add the confectioner’s sugar one cup at a time. Scrape down the sides of the bowl often. Once all sugar is added, beat until fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes.

At this point, the American’s Test Kitchen frosting is ready to use. If it gets to soft to work with, you can refrigerate until firm. The ATK recipe can be stored in the fridge in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Soften before using.
The Manolia’s recipe should be refrigerated for 2 to 3 hours before using, but no longer.

For 24 cupcakes, I halved both of these recipes and still had more than enough frosting. Make the full batch for layer cakes, double batches of cupcakes, or if you like your frosting piled inches high on cupcakes.

The America’s Test Kitchen recipe is from their Family Baking Book, and the Magnolia’s Recipe is from More From Magnolia. Both are fantastic books, I have yet to make a bad recipe out of either of them.

More From Magnolia: Recipes from the World Famous Bakery and Allysa Torey's Home Kitchen

Allysa Torey

The America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book

Valentine's Cupcakes

I figured my next baking post should be about the best recipe I’ve made this year, so far: Red Velvet Cupcakes.

I’ve made this recipe three times so far - twice as cupcakes and once as two mini two-layer cakes. It’s been delicious every time. It’s most delicious as cupcakes though - the best cupcakes I’ve ever made. I foresee them becoming a staple for birthdays and whenever I have guests over. (So come with a sweet tooth in April, Emma!)

I usually bring any sweets I bake into work to share. Otherwise it’d be impossible to balance my goal of baking more with my New Year’s Resolution of eating better and getting in shape. These cupcakes are the most popular thing I’ve brought in so far. I brought them in for Ryan’s birthday and people absolutely love them. Many people said I should open a bakery and two people said it was the best cupcake they’ve ever had in their life. So these were very popular. :)

The recipe is from America’s Test Kitchen Family Baking Book. The recipe is for layer cakes, but I use it for cupcakes too and adjust the baking time.

This recipe uses buttermilk, which is a key reason why it’s so fantastic. It may seem annoying to buy a quart of buttermilk just for this recipe, but once you have buttermilk you can make all sorts of fantastic recipes like buttermilk biscuits and homemade buttermilk pancakes. I’ll post recipes for those soon too. (By the way, the only buttermilk I could find at Meijer or the A&P was lowfat buttermilk, which worked just fine.)

Here’s the ingredients, and the steps which I’ve somewhat reworded and added in my own tips.

INGREDIENTS

2 tablespoons natural cocoa powder*
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
Pinch salt
1 cup buttermilk (room temperature)
2 large eggs (room temperature)
1 tablespoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons (1 ounce) red food coloring (this is an entire bottle of McCormick brand     food coloring, which is the only brand I’ve seen at any chain supermarket)
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 12 pieces and softened
1 1/2 cups sugar

*For the cake to have the proper rise and color, you must use natural cocoa powder, do not substitute dutch processed cocoa. The two standard supermarket brands (Nestle and Hershey's) are natural cocoa powder and work fine.

STEPS

1. Adjust the oven rank to the middle position and preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prepare the cupcake pans with liners. (This recipe makes about 24 cupcakes.) If you’d like to make a layer cake instead, grease two 9-inch cake pans and dust with some cocoa powder. Then line the bottoms with parchment paper, cut to fit perfectly in the bottom of the pan.

2. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl. In another medium bowl whisk the buttermilk, eggs, vinegar, and vanilla together. In a small bowl mix the cocoa powder with the red food coloring to form a smooth paste. In all my experiences it took a lot of stirring to get the food coloring to combine with the cocoa powder. For a few minutes it looked like the food coloring would never absorb all the powder. But it does, so just stick with it and suddenly it will all combine very quickly.

3. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 to 6 minutes. Reduce the mixer speed to low and beat in one-third of the flour mixture, followed by half of the buttermilk mixture. Repeat with half of the remaining flour and the remaining buttermilk mixture. Beat in the remaining flour mixture until just combined. Beat in the cocoa mixture until the batter is uniform.

4. Give the batter a final stir with a rubber spatula to make sure it is thoroughly combined. Fill cupcake liners/pans to about 2/3 or 3/4 full. I like to use an ice cream scoop to make sure the cupcakes are all the same size, and so it’s easier to fill the liners.

5. Bake the cupcakes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with a few crumbs attached, about 15 minutes. (If you’re making the layer cakes, the baking time is about 25 minutes, and you should rotate the pans about half way through).

6. Let the cupcakes cool in the pans for about 10 minutes, and then carefully remove from the pans.

7. Frost the cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting. You could also use a vanilla frosting, or vanilla buttercream, but I definitely prefer Cream Cheese frosting, and it’s the traditional frosting for Red Velvet. :)

MY TWO MOST IMPORTANT TIPS
The two most important things you need to do to ensure moist, delicious cupcakes are:

1. Make sure you DO NOT over-mix the batter once the flour is added. Whisk away at the flour when combining the dry ingredients. Don’t worry about the liquid buttercream mixture - whisk as much as you want there too. But once you hit step 3 and start combining everything together it is very important not to overmix. When you’re alternating the dry and wet ingredients into the large bowl, don’t feel the need to mix everything so that it all looks uniform - alternate the ingredients and mix, but just a bit to get the new addition somewhat mixed in a little. Then add the next. Once you have all the ingredients in, mix until it’s mostly uniform, but keep in mind you’ll be doing more mixing to add the food coloring mixture, so that’s the first time when your batter should really all look like one, uniform thing. (Not over-mixing once the flour is added to the wet ingredients is a key tip for most recipes, and especially in this one.) I have a wonderful KitchenAid stand mixer (that will come in VERY handy for making the frosting) but for this recipe I use my small hand mixer to ensure that I don’t over-mix.

2. DO NOT over-bake. I found the baking time to be 15 minutes for my oven, but the first time you try this I recommend peeking at them at 12 or 13 minutes to see how they are. Once they don’t look liquid on the tops anymore and have peaked you can pull them out to test them. The toothpick or tester shouldn’t come out with batter on it, but it will have quite a few moist crumbs. This is good, and it’s probably done at this point. Over-baking will lead to drier cupcakes, and Red Velvets must be moist!

Valentine's Cupcakes

Valentine's Cupcakes

Well, there you have it! The best cupcakes I’ve ever made. :) If you try this recipe I’d love it if you’d comment and let me know how they turned out for you, and how you liked them.

As much as I love this recipe, I’m determined to try a few more Red Velvet recipes to compare. This was the first one I tried and I feel like it’s perfect. (America’s Test Kitchen’s recipes often are perfect.) So I will try a few other recipes, including the one in my Magnolia Bakery cook book, for testing. :) I’ll let you know how those turn out.

I wish I had a better photo of the insides of these cupcakes, but I only have one I took in low light on my iPhone while my little brother was eating one. It’s better than nothing though, so I’ll post it for now and next time I make this recipe I’ll take and post more photos.

Here's the iPhone photo, since it's better than nothing: 

Benny's Cupcake

Since I do most of my baking and reading on weekends, I thought it would also be fun to tell what book I was reading while making my recipes.

The first batch of cupcakes (the ones in the photos) were made over Valentine's Day Weekend while I was in Michigan visiting my family. I was reading Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. The second batch, and the layer cakes, were made before Ryan's birthday and I was reading The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough.

So now you know what books kept me occupied while each batch was in the oven. :)

It's been a whirlwind of a September, as usual. Here are some of the highlights of the last couple weeks, which were especially busy.

-While in Michigan, my family, Ryan, and I went to Binder Park Zoo. In addition to my favorite exhibit, the Giraffes, they had a baby Snow Leopard who was born in June and just about the cutest thing ever.

Here's Ryan with a new acquaintance:

Ryan and his new friend

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-Going to my good friend Johnny Gower's wedding, and catching up with fantastic high school friends.

-A lovely (pre) Birthday lunch with my family, Ryan, my Grandma, Jenn, and Emma Wad. Rarely have I been so stuffed at the end of a lunch.

-Surprise Crumb Cupcakes on my birthday, from a wonderful co-worker.

-Going out to dinner at Trattoria Trecolori with Ryan and then to the Gershwin to see Wicked!

Trattoria Trecolori

-Having my co-workers/friends over for a very fun premiere party for The Office.

-Finally giving 30 Rock a try and devouring all possible previous episodes. How had I not been watching until now?

It's been a wonderful month, and I hope fall slows down a little bit so I can enjoy it.

Baby Snow Leopard