The Cupcake Addict's Cupcake Collection

Category: Mrs Shuck's Creations

• “I” is for Irish Car Bomb

  Posted at 7:27 pm by MLea

  Apr 25th

  So, if I don’t like beer will I like a beer cupcake?  I guess we’ll find out.

  You might ask, “What is an Irish Car Bomb?”  Wikipedia says “the name refers to the drink’s Irish ingredients – typically Guinness stout, Baileys Irish Cream, and Jameson Irish Whiskey – and the car bombings notoriously used by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) during the Troubles. The whiskey is floated on top of the Irish Cream in a shot glass, and the shot glass is then dropped into the stout. ”

  My goal is a stout cupcake filled with Baileys white chocolate ganache and topped with a whiskey butter cream.

  I started my cupcake by heating a mini bottle of Baileys (50ml) with 1/2 cup of cream then pouring the boiling mixture over 8 ounces of chopped Dilettante white chocolate.  After this was melted and smooth, I put it in the frig to cool off.

  For the cupcake, I used a recipe I found somewhere and copied and now I can’t find again.  Anyway, thanks to someone!  I didn’t want chocolate cupcakes, so I left out the cocoa and added more flour.

  Guinness Cupcakes
  1 cup Guinness Draught or Guinness Extra Stout
  1 stick, plus 2 tbsp unsalted butter
  ¾ unsweetened cocoa
  2 cups brown sugar
  ¾ cup sour cream
  2 eggs
  1 tsp vanilla extract
  2 cups flour 2 1/2 cups flour
  2½ tsp baking soda

  Preheat oven to 350°. Butter a muffin tin or line with muffin paper.
  Combine Guinness and butter, chopped into chunks, in a large saucepan.

  

  Melting butter in stout

  Cook over low heat, stirring frequently, until butter is melted. Remove from heat. Whisk in brown sugar.
  In a small bowl, whisk together sour cream, eggs and vanilla. Add this to the beer mixture and mix well.
  In another dry bowl, sift together flour and baking soda. Fold the flour mixture into the batter.
  Pour into lined muffin cups and bake 16-20 minutes (until an inserted toothpick comes out clean). Let stand 10 minutes and then remove cupcakes from tin and cool on a rack.  This made 48 mini cupcakes and I had some batter left over.  The batter turned out very lumpy and the lumps didn’t go away during cooking.

  

  Pouring in the batter: Click to enlarge

  I took the cupcakes out of the pans and set them on cooling racks, then turned to the frig to get a beverage while they cooled.  I guess I didn’t have the Bailey’s white chocolate mixture very stable on the shelf because it fell in the floor when I opened the door.  Did I mention I didn’t put a lid on the bowl?  Have you ever attempted to clean a huge pile of melted chocolate out of the floor?  The bowl didn’t land head first so I was able to salvage a little that was left in the bowl.  Maybe these cupcakes will be drizzled with white chocolate instead of being filled with it.

  I made a brown sugar Italian meringue butter cream using 1 1/4 cups brown sugar and 2/3 cup water to make the sugar syrup.  I added the 240 degree syrup to 5 egg whites which had been whipped to soft peaks.  To this I added 1 pound of softened butter and 2 tablespoonfuls of Jameson’s Irish Whiskey.

  I ended up having enough of the white chocolate ganache to dip most of the cupcakes.

  

  Dipped cupcakes: Click to enlarge

  I had enough icing to top all but one of the cupcakes.

  

  irish Car Bomb: Click to enlarge

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged baileys, Guinness, irish car bomb, stout, whiskey

• H= Half Baked

  Posted at 10:11 pm by MLea

  Mar 31st

  Inspired yesterday by Main Street Cupcakes and educated by the Cake Mix Doctor cookbook that I thumbed through at Costco, I decided that “H” was going to be for “Half Baked” instead of “Hostess”.  Converting a cupcake to another cupcake isn’t that imaginative, right?  Half Baked is a Ben and Jerry’s ice cream flavor that consists of a swirl of chocolate and vanilla ice cream laced with chunks of brownies and chocolate chip cookie dough.  In a word, it’s “YUM!”

  

  Ben and Jerry's Half Baked: Stolen from somewhere....

  For the chocolate and vanilla ice cream, I used Cooks Illustrated recipes for Dark Chocolate Cupcakes and Yellow Cupcakes.  For speed, I used 2 eggs instead of 1 egg and 2 egg yolks.  I didn’t think the yellow color was really necessary and figured there was enough going on in the cupcake that no one would notice the small bit of fat missing.  I scooped vanilla batter in half the cup and chocolate batter in the other half.

  

  Half and Half Batter: click to enlarge

  For the cookie dough filling, I cheated.  Maybe I should have made my own cookie dough, but I didn’t want a huge batch of cookie dough around the house in addition to a couple of pans of cupcakes, so I used frozen Nestle Toll House dough.  (Ok, so I still have half a pack of frozen dough in the freezer…but that’s beside the point.)

  

  Cheater Cookie Dough Filling

  I broke the frozen dough apart (as suggested by the Cake Doctor) and mushed it down into the batter.  It should be used completely frozen so it won’t cook all the way.  Otherwise, you’d end up with a cookie in a cupcake, not dough in a cupcake.

  

  Half and half batter with dough mushed in: Click to enlarge.

  I baked at 350 for 20 minutes and ended up with this:

  

  Hot cupcakes, fresh from the oven: click to enlarge

  After they cooled down a bit, the centers fell and I ended up with this:

  

  Half Baked after cooling: Click to enlarge

  While the cupcakes cooled completely, I made a Chocolate Italian Meringue Butter cream using Warren Brown’s recipe that I found here. My butter might have been closer to melted than room temperature, so I had to let the icing chill for a bit before I could scoop it out.

  Ben and Jerry’s also contains brownie bits.  I cheated again…since I didn’t need a whole pan of brownies… and used frozen brownie dough.

  

  Nestle Toll House Mini Brownie Bites

  I baked a few of the brownie bites, then cut them into little chunks to use as garnish.  If I make these again…and I will… I’ll try to make a brownie crust on the bottom. 

  

  Finished Half Baked Cupcake: Click to enlarge

  Mr Shuck and I both liked these a lot.  He liked the 2 different flavors of cake and thought the icing was silky and creamy and not too sweet.  I think the icing tastes like room temperature chocolate ice cream, if that could exist in a non-liquid form.  I would have liked to have gotten more brownie incorporated, but I think I’d need a baking assistant for that.   “H” is definitely an improvement over “G”.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged brownies, chocolate, cookie dough, half baked, vanilla

• G is for Guacamole

  Posted at 7:06 pm by MLea

  Mar 16th

  Mr Shuck is refusing to taste this one.

  It started with an avocado cornmeal cake that I found at Be Well at Stanford.  (Actually as I made that link, I realized that it is a MUFFIN.  This might explain why there’s only 1/4 cup of sugar….hmmm.)   Since I made minis, I baked for only 16 minutes.

  

  Avocado batter: click to enlarge

  So what to ice them with?…..

  Originally, I planned to make an Italian meringue using jalapeno jelly and lime.   As I melted the jalapeno jelly, I realized that it would eventually revert back to a JELLY from the melted syrup and I didn’t know how well that would do in the meringue.  I pictured lots of separation and running of egg whites when I woke up in the morning.  So…off to Thriftway at 8pm for some cream cheese.

  I mixed a box of cream cheese with half a jar of jalapeno jelly (and a drop or two of green food coloring) and whipped the heck out of it.  It tastes okay, but might be more suited to a Ritz cracker than a cupcake, even a savory one.   I toasted some small triangles of corn tortillas and used them as a garnish.   We’ll find out tomorrow how they taste since neither Mr Shuck nor I are willing to take the first bite.

  

  A leprechaun and cupcakes: click to enlarge

  

  Finished Guacamole cupcake: click to enlarge

  

  Guac Cupcakes: boxed up and ready to go

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged avocado, guacamole, jalapeno

• The polls are closed!

  Posted at 10:06 am by MLea

  Mar 16th

  G is going to be for Guacamole.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations

• F is for French Toast

  Posted at 5:49 am by MLea

  Mar 8th

  I am attempting an Italian Meringue Butter cream!  It’s a bit scary.  There is 240 degree sugar syrup AND whipped egg whites involved.  I’ve never successfully made a meringue before.  Probably doesn’t matter too much since I don’t like meringue, but I digress.

  Fortunately, I found a couple of websites willing to tutor the public on how to make an IMBC:  Allrecipes blog and JoePastry.

  I used the recipe on the Allrecipes blog and started with 1/4 cup water, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup white sugar & 1/2 cup maple syrup (which, incidentally, has had a cinnamon stick floating in it since Christmas).   I brought all this to a boil.

  

  Boiling syrup: Click to enlarge

  While the syrup came to temperature (240 degrees), I started beating the egg whites, a bit of cream of tartar, and a pinch of salt until they reached what I believe was medium stiff peaks.

  With the mixer on high, I drizzled in the just-off-the-stove syrup.  After the syrup was incorporated, I checked the temperature of the whites to make sure they were over 140 degrees, then turned the mixer on high and whipped until cooled.

  

  Pouring and whipping: click to enlarge

  

  Syrup + egg whites = meringue: click to enlarge

  So far, so good!  It tastes fluffy and maple-sweet.

  Then I attempted to add the butter…..  That’s the part I’ve never understood about a meringue butter cream.  You start with a nice fluffy meringue, then you add clods of coldish butter….Hmmmm…..how’s that supposed to work?  Well, it didn’t!  I ended up with this:

  

  Broken icing: click to enlarge.

  Thanks to some expert googling on my part, which led to some people out there who have been to pastry school, I learned that I could melt part of the icing and add it back to the mixer bowl and whip the hell out of it and it would come back together.  Guess what?  It did!   The butter cream turned out smooth and buttery with a light maple flavor.  Just what I was hoping for!  (Thanks to baking911.com.)

  For the actual cupcake, I wanted more of a French toast experience than just cinnamon, maple, and vanilla flavors.  What’s similar to French toast that goes into the oven?  Bread pudding.

  

  Cinnamon Swirl bread cubes: click to enlarge

  I cut up about 8 slices of Franz Cinnamon Swirl bread (roughly 7 cups), then soaked it for a bit in a mixture of 1 1/2 cups milk and 1/2 cup heavy cream.  In another bowl, I mixed 4 beaten eggs, 2 teaspoons of vanilla, 1/3 cup brown sugar and 1/3 cup white sugar and 6 tablespoons butter which had been melted and cooled.  In a third bowl, I mixed 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1/3 cup flour and a healthy sprinkle of cinnamon (and maybe some salt….did I add salt?).  I added the liquid mixture to the bread mixture and mixed, then added the flour mixture and mixed.  I scooped the mixture into buttered mini muffin tins and baked for 20 minutes at 350 degrees.  (If I had this to do over again, I probably would use mini cupcake liners as these were hard to get out of the pans in one piece.)

  

  Batter before baking: click to enlarge

  It would have been nice to have put a “pat” of icing on top of each cupcake, but my skills are not that advanced.  (See above near fiasco.)  Instead, I put a scoop of icing on top in the style of IHOP.

  

  IHOP pancakes: click to enlarge

  

  Buttered cakes: click to enlarge

  I sprinkled the cakes with powdered sugar, then made a caramel of maple syrup and heavy cream, let it cool and drizzled it over the top.

  

  French Toast Cupcakes: Click to enlarge

  Thanks to Mr Shuck for moral support, help with scooping icing, photography, tasting, and (most importantly) cleaning up the kitchen.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged French toast

• the rest of the alphabet…..

  Posted at 10:19 pm by MLea

  Mar 5th

  I’m open to suggestion for some of my letters for the rest of the year.  I’d like it to be another food or drink that I can convert to a cupcake rather than just a flavor.  I may settle for anything depending on the letter.   This is what I’ve got so far:

  F= French Toast….coming this weekend

  G= Guacamole, I think.  Obviously this would be a savory cupcake.  I’m open to better suggestions. Like Green Tea or Ginger Lemon (which I did awhile ago…an oldie but a goodie) Guiness something….since it’s close to St Patty’s
  

  H= Hostess cupcake. Half Baked

  I= Irish Coffee Irish Car Bomb

  J= no clue.  Options that I think are doable are: jalebi (an Indian pastry with cardamom and rosewater….I won’t know if I’ve got it right since I’ve never had one), Junior Mints, Jaffa Cake

  K= Kahlua, Key Lime, Kamikaze, KitKat

  L= Linzer Torte, Lamingtons, Lemon Chalet creams (Girl Scout Cookies),  Lemon Drop. Lollipop Lemon Meringue Pie

  M= Mudslide, Maple Brown Sugar Oatmeal, Mississippi Mud Pie, Moon Pie, Macaroon, Moosetracks (Vanilla with PNB cups and Fudge)

  N= Nainamo Bar, Nutter Butter, New York Super Fudge Chunk
  

  O= Oatmeal Creme Pie, Oreo Ovaltine

  P= Pesto (savory), Profiterole, Pretzel (chocolate covered), Phish Food (Chocolate Ben and Jerry’s with Marshmallow and Caramel swirl with Fudge Phish) Pumpkin Pie

  Q= Queen Anne Cherries, Queso (savory), Quaalude (the drink, not the drug)

  R= Rocky Road, Reeses, Rum and Coke, Raspberry Cheesecake

  S= Sticky Toffee Pudding, Sundae

  T= Thin Mints, Tomato Soup, Tomato in general, Twix, Tiramisu

  U= U-no bars, Ube, Union Square (cocktail)

  V= Valomint, Velvet (not necessarily red), Vanilla Health Bar Crunch (Ben and Jerry’s), Vanilla Latte,
  

  W= Whoopie Pie (if I don’t do Moon Pie), Whoppers, Waffles, White Russian, Waldorf Salad

  X= xiāng jiāo (banana), xocoatl (mayan word for chocolate), XuXuBana (cocktail)
  

  Y= Yam casserole, Yuzu

  Z= Zombie, Zero, Zucchini, Zagnut

  Green added on 3-6-2010, Pink added 3/14/10, Blue added on 3/17,  Purple added on 3/23
  

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations

• Elvis has entered the building

  Posted at 9:34 pm by MLea

  Feb 23rd

  So, there appears to be lots of debate on the internet about what constitutes an Elvis Sandwich.  In my mind, it’s a banana, peanut butter and bacon sandwich that’s been fried like a grilled cheese, so that’s what I based this cupcake on.  I know! I know!  Bacon on a cupcake?

  

  Mise en place: click to enlarge

  I originally got the banana baby food because there were no ripe bananas.  After Mr Shuck tasted the baby food, it was decided that we would use almost ripe bananas.  I didn’t want to just dump the bacon on top, so I made little rings of bacon and put them in the oven to cook while it was preheating.  Some of them turned out to look like little pork roses.

  

  Bacon curls: click to enlarge

  I used Martha Stewart’s Banana cupake recipe.  Found here. I liked the recipe because it was pretty plain…sometimes banana cake turns into spice cake.   I replaced 1 ounce of the butter with rendered bacon fat and baked the minis for about 16 minutes.

  

  Banana Cupcakes: click to enlarge

  I imagined that Elvis probably fried his sandwiches, so I browned the tops just a little bit.

  

  Frying cupcakes: click to enlarge

  I don’t know if it really added anything beyond another step and more photos, but you could see the little ring peeking out from below the frosting.

  

  Fried Banana Cupcakes: click to enlarge

  I used another Martha Stewart recipe for the peanut butter frosting.  The recipe specified to not use “natural” peanut butter, but that’s all I had on hand.  I imagine this is because it’s not very sweet.  I ended up adding a bit of corn syrup to sweeten the icing up a bit.

  

  Banana Peanut Butter cupcakes: click to enlarge

  The frosting was piped on and topped with a bacon rosette.

  

  Elvis Cupcakes: click to enlarge

  It think these cupcakes were a success.  I took around 40 mini cupcakes to work and came home with an empty container.  If I were to make them over again, I’d incorporate more bacon and use Skippy or Jif instead of Whole Foods’ peanut butter.

  Photo credits to Mr Shuck

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged bacon, banana, Elvis, peanut butter

• D is for Drumstick, continued

  Posted at 9:35 pm by MLea

  Feb 11th

  I had a lot of suggestions for “D”: Darjeeling Tea (actually received today, a bit late), Durian (gross), Doughnut, Dalai Lama (cocktail), Dulce de Leche, and others.  I ended up with Drumstick because it seemed creative.  This Drumstick is the Nestle ice cream product, not a chicken leg, just by the way.  It’s a vanilla ice cream cone with a fudge center topped with milk chocolate and dipped in peanuts.  Every time I’ve ever had one, it was individually wrapped and had to be unpeeled.  The chocolate almost always stuck to the wrapper a bit.

  I started my Drumstick journey a couple of days beforehand by making the fudge center.  I used a slightly modified Cooks’ Illustrated recipe for hot fudge sauce.  I figured if it wasn’t hot, it would be thick, right?

  Ingredients

  10 ounces semisweet chocolate , chopped (I used the rest of a bag of mini chocolate chips and some Callebaut 60% cacao)

  1/3 cup sifted cocoa powder , Dutch process  (I used natural cocoa as I was trying to use up the rest of a can of Ghiardelli cocoa)

  1/3 cup sugar

  3/4 cup light corn syrup (I only used 1/2 cup as I wanted it to be a bit thicker, probably would have been better to use the rest)

  1/3 cup heavy cream

  Pinch of salt

  1 tsp vanilla extract

  3 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided

  Instructions

  1. Melt chocolate in small heat-proof bowl set over pan of almost simmering water until smooth, stirring once or twice. Turn off heat and whisk in cocoa until dissolved; set aside.
  2. Warm sugar, corn syrup, cream, salt, and 1/3 cup water in medium, heavy-bottomed, nonreactive saucepan over low heat without stirring until sugar dissolves. Increase heat to medium-high; simmer mixture, stirring frequently, about 4 minutes.
  3. Turn off heat and whisk in vanilla and butter. Cool mixture slightly, about 2 minutes; whisk in melted chocolate.

  I kept this in the frig for a couple of days and brought it to room temperature while baking the cupcakes.

  

  Fudge filling: click to enlarge

  So the first step of the cupcakes was the wrapper.  I wanted to have the chocolate topping inside the wrapper, so I thought I would make liners out of parchment paper.  I probably needed to make them a bit taller as they ended up essentially being only slightly higher than regular cupcake liners.

  Next step:  The cone.  Drumsticks have a sugar cone, which are pointy, so I couldn’t make the cupcakes in the cones.  Instead I made a crust for the bottom of the cupcake by grinding up some sugar cones in the food processor and combining the crumbs with a little melted butter.  I put a small amount on each parchment paper and pressed it down with a utensil (a prescription vial in a ziplock….it was the perfect size to mush the paper down into the mini cupcake pan) then baked them for about 5 minutes at 350 degrees.

  3rd step:  Making the cupcakes.  I used the New Best Recipe Yellow Cupcake recipe, emailed to me by a coworker.

  Ingredients:

  1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

  1 cup sugar

  1/2 tsp baking powder

  1 stick unsalted butter, softened

  1/2 cup sour cream

  1 large eggs and 2 egg yolks, at room temperature

  1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

  Preheat oven to 350.

  Whisk together dry ingredients in bowl of stand mixer.  Dump in the rest of the ingredients.  (Odd, I know!)  Beat until smooth and satiny, then put into cupcake tins.

  

  Cupcakes before baking: click to enlarge.

  Bake for 20-24 minutes.

  I set the timer for 16 minutes since I was making minis.  When I checked them, they didn’t seem done, so I put them back for another 2-3 minutes.  Probably wasn’t a good idea as I think they got a little overcooked.

  So after the cupcakes cooled.  I moved on to step 3 (?? I lost count).

  I filled a decorating bag with what I thought was softened fudge.  After trying to squeeze a hard mass of chocolate out of a tiny tip, I realized it wasn’t soft enough.  I put the whole bag into a ziplock and soaked it in some warm water for a bit.  It softened up enough to fill the cupcakes, but not before exploding all over me.  Very attractive.  I tried to get Mr Shuck to take a photo, but he thought it was too disgusting.

  After filling, I melted some milk chocolate chips and crushed some dry roasted peanuts.  I dipped each cupcake in the chocolate, then into the peanuts.

  

  Almost finished! Click to enlarge.

  I broke some of the other sugar cones for a garnish.  I think they were a success, even though the cake was a bit dry.

  

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged drumstick

• C is for Caramel Popcorn

  Posted at 7:01 pm by MLea

  Jan 24th

  Today’s cupcake was a bit daunting.  When it came to C, I wanted to copy Dahlia Bakery’s Caramel Popcorn cupcake.   I thought it might be a bit ambitious for my limited skills.

  I decided to use Michael Chiarello’s Polenta Birthday Cupcakes that I found at Foodtv.com.  Original recipe is here.   I altered it slightly by using part brown and part white sugar and substituting medium grind cornmeal for part of the polenta, hoping to increase the caramel taste and texture.  It also called for gray salt, which I don’t keep on hand, so I used table salt.

  

  As usual, Mookie helped gather ingredients. Click to enlarge.

  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 3/4 cup polenta (I used Bob’s Red Mill Corn Grits aka Polenta)
  • 1/4 cup medium grind cornmeal
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 sticks butter, softened
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar, plus a pinch for whipping egg whites
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 6 eggs, separated
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

  Line 2 mini cupcake pans with 24 paper mini muffin cups each. Sift together the flour and baking powder and stir in the polenta and salt.

  In a mixer with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy. With the mixer running add the egg yolks, 1 at a time. Beat in the milk, vanilla, and lemon zest. With the mixer on low speed add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture until just incorporated.

  In a clean, dry bowl whip the egg whites until soft peaks form.

  

  Soft Peaks: Click to enlarge.

  Add a pinch of sugar while the whites are mixing. Add half of the whites to the mixture and beat with the paddle. Remove the bowl from the mixer and gently fold in the remaining egg whites with a spatula to incorporate air and lighten the batter.

  Spoon the batter into the lined muffin molds to fill the cups about 2/3 full.

  Bake 15-18 minutes, or until the tops are golden and a wooden skewer comes out clean when inserted into the center. Cool the entire pan on a wire rack for a few minutes before removing the individual cupcakes. Cool the cupcakes completely to room temperature before frosting.

  

  Cooling cornmeal cupcakes: click to enlarge.

  The recipe actually made 48 mini cupcakes and 6 regular sized ones.  I burnt the regular ones a bit, so I thought those would be good for tasting since they weren’t very presentable.  Both Mr Shuck and I thought they were very tasty.  The corn flavor was evident.  The top was a bit crunchy.  There was a little crunch in the cupcakes from the cornmeal.  Fabulous texture!

  So….I was originally going to try to make a Salted Caramel Buttercream.  This involved making caramel.  I was willing to try, so I combined 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup sugar in a pot and brought it to a boil.

  

  Boiling sugar syrup: Click to enlarge.

  I continued to boil the syrup until it was dark amber in color, then removed it from the heat.

  

  Amber colored syrup: Click to enlarge.

  Next, I added almost 3 tablespoons of heavy cream.  The mixture bubbled up like mad.  I wish I had been prepared with the camera.  After it settled down, it looked very caramely.  I think I’ve stated before that I don’t really like “real” caramel.  I haven’t changed my mind.

  

  Finished caramel: Click to enlarge.

  I let the caramel cool whilst I decided what I was going to do with it…..

  I still felt a bit intimidated by the meringue butter cream, so I went to my old standby: gravy frosting.

  I mixed 6 tablespoons AP flour with 1 cup of whole milk.  I added about 2 tablespoons of the caramel to the milk mixture and cooked over medium heat until it was thickened, then poured it into a bowl.  I covered the bowl with some wax paper and put it in the frig until it was cool.  Meanwhile, I set out to make pureed popcorn.  I put some Uncle Woody’s Caramel Popcorn in the food processor and ground it up thoroughly, then poured the ground popcorn through a sieve and collected the popcorn “dust” in a bowl.  I probably ended up using about 1/2 to 3/4 cup finely ground popcorn.

  To make the frosting, I creamed 2 sticks softened butter with 1 cup superfine sugar and beat on medium high for about 6 minutes until fluffy and smooth.  I add the cooled “gravy” and beat until fluffy and combined.  I added more caramel to taste and dumped in the popcorn dust and combined.  When smooth and fluffy, I stuffed it into a piping bag.

  I tested one of the mini cupcakes and it seemed a bit dry.  I had read about using sugar syrup to keep cakes moist, so I mixed a little of the caramel with a little water and brushed mixture over the tops of the cupcakes.  (I don’t know if they will be moist tomorrow, but they are definitely sticky!).  I piped on a swirl of frosting and Mr Shuck helped by topping each one with a kernel of Uncle Woody’s.

  

  Caramel Popcorn by Mrs Shuck: Click to enlarge

  Final photo credit to Mr Shuck.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged caramel popcorn

• B is for Black Bottom cupcakes

  Posted at 9:33 pm by MLea

  Jan 13th

  I was torn between Bananas Foster and Black Bottom for the 2nd letter of my year.  Black Bottom won out for 2 reasons: Mrs Cram wanted them and they seemed to be much easier than Bananas Foster.   I was correct about “easier”.  It’s amazing how time consuming icing is!  Since I have only 1 bowl for my KitchenAid, washing in between is involved AND there’s the extra step of actually getting the icing on the cupcake.  Lots of time saved by not icing and I reused the bowl without washing it between making the cream cheese part and the chocolate part.

  I used the Black Bottom cupcake recipe at CooksCountry.com.

  

  Mookie made sure all usually refrigerated items were brought to room temperature before mixing. (Click to enlarge)

  For cheesecake layer:

  Beat 16 ounces of cream cheese with 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 tsp salt until smooth.  Beat in 2 egg whites and 2 tablespoons sour cream until combined, about a minute.  Stir in 1/2 cup miniature chocolate chips and set aside.

  

  Cheesecake layer: Click to enlarge

  For chocolate layer:

  Combine 1 1/4 cups sugar, 1 1/2 cups AP flour, 1/2 cup Dutch-processed cocoa, 1 1/4 tsp baking soda in mixer bowl and whisk together.  Add 3/4 cups sour cream, 1 1/3 cups water, 1 stick unsalted butter (melted and cooled slightly), and 1 tsp vanilla extract and mix on low until just combined.

  

  Chocolate Layer: Click to enlarge

  To finish:

  Divide chocolate batter evenly among 24 lined cupcake cups.  Top each with 1 rounded tablespoonful of cream cheese mixture.  (apparently I forgot to photograph before baking).  Bake at 400 degrees for 23-25 minutes, until tops begin to crack.  Cool for 10 minutes in pan before transferring to wire racks. Store in the frig.

  

  Finished Black Bottom Cupcakes: Click to enlarge

  These cupcakes turned out to be quite delicious.  They were moist but still a bit airy.  The cream cheese and chocolate complemented each other nicely and the mini chocolate chips provided a bit of textural contrast.  Mr Shuck rated them 2.75 to 3 ❤’s.

  My complaints: The chocolate flavor could have been stronger.  I used cocoa from the bulk bins at the Central Market, led there by one of the bakers who happened to be wandering about the store.  I was going to buy Droste, but he told me the bulk cocoa was better.  I don’t know if he was correct about it being better than Droste or not, but I didn’t think the cupcakes ended up with a very rich flavor (LOVED the almost black color though).  I have ordered some Cacao Barry (French Callebaut) Extra Brut cocoa and may attempt these again.  CooksCountry also used just egg whites because they wanted to obtain a whiter cream cheese filling.  I think I’ll a whole egg instead next time so the cheesecake layer will set up a bit firmer.  It seemed a bit too loose.

  Posted in Mrs Shuck's Creations | Tagged black bottom

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