Blueberry!

My latest bake = a vanilla cheesecake cupcake with blueberry cream cheese frosting. It was a special occasion for myself, 1 year at my work so I thought I'd try something i haven't done yet and since blueberry was my next fruit on the list I went with it!

The cupcake batter involved the basics, as well as cream cheese. They came out so fluffy and light, they were amazing! And the frosting I added pureed fresh blueberries as well as a couple scoops of blueberry dessert filling.  I will get right to the pictures on this one!

Here they are undressed. The bright redish orange liners looked pretty neat with them.

Had to top it with a fresh blueberry!

Until next time, keep bakin ;)

Army boys love sweets too!

It was my boyfriends last day of active duty coming up and I loved making cupcakes for him to take to work because he would always come home with not one left :) That means everyone liked them right?! Well, I decided that for his last day I should go all out. What better than... DRUMROLL PLEASE....ddddddddd.dddddd.ddddddd

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes and

Raspberry cupcakes with marshmallow frosting!!

I am going to tell you that these were amazing, and I am not just saying that because I made them. Really, I swear. Lets get down to it shall we?

I want everyone who reads this to put it on their list as one of the next cupcakes to try if you have not already because this cupcake tasted so much like cookie dough that it was just incredible.

Here's what you will need:

For the cupcakes:

3 sticks unsalted butter, room temp

1 1/2 cups light brown sugar, packed

4 large eggs

2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup milk ( I use 2%)

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup semisweet chocolate chips (I had a mixture of big and mini chocolate chips because it was what was in the cupboard)

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350. Using the paddle attatchment, combine the butter and brown sugar. Cream together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Make sure you scrap down the sides of your bowl every so often! Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a bowl. Just like every other cupcake, alternate the dry ingredients with the milk, mixing on low speed. Beat just until incorporated. Blend in the vanilla. Fold in the chocolate chips then divide the batter evenly between 24 cupakes liners. ( I believe I got a few more than 24) Bake for 18 to 20 minutes and let cool in pan for 5 to 10 minutes for removing to cool completely.

Oh yeah, don't eat one just yet ;)

Now while those are cooling, you can make your cookie dough filling....

For the filling:

4 tbsp unsalted butter, room temp

6 tbsp light brown sugar, packed

1 cup + 2 tbsp all purpose flour

7 ounces sweetened condensed milk

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Instructions:

Cream the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. Add flour, sweetened condensed milk, and vanilla and beat until smooth.

I just loOoOoOoOVe sweetened condensed milk in any recipe!!!

Going on...Stir in chocolate chips. Cover with plastic wrap and refridgerate for about 1 hour.

After cupcakes have cooled, cut out the middle of the cupcake and put a spoonful of the cookie dough filling in each cupcake.

All cut out now ready to be stuffed... Like this!

Don't you just love the camo liners too :) I was so happy when I found these at Hobby Lobby!

 Now time to make the frosting!

For the frosting:

3 sticks unsalted butter, room temp

3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed

3 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

1 cup all purpose flour

3/4 tsp salt

3 tbsp milk

2 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions:

Beat butter and brown sugar with paddle attachment on high speed until creamy and fluffy. Mix in the confectioners sugar until smoooooooth. Beat in the flour and salt. Finally, mix in the milk and vanilla extract until smooth and combined.

Put this in a bag and get ready to pipe! Remember, take it easy on yourself and put the bag in a tall glass to help with getting it into that bag!

I just used a ziploc bag for this piping since I wanted some big swirls. Here's how they look!

And of course a close up!

How awesome are these!!??? Had to top them off with a mini Chips Ahoy, Voila' !

Now time for the raspberry marshmallow frosted cupcakes. For these I pretty much used a basic vanilla recipe but added in pureed frozen raspberries.

There was a raspberry glaze that went on top of the cupcakes and a recipe that I found used 'junket' which I couldn't find anywhere so I made up my own glaze to use. I just threw in some frozen raspberries that I kind of mashed up with a spoon and some sugar and simmered on the stove for about 5 minutes.

Look at how nice that looks!

Moving on, you will let that sit and in the meantime start making your frosting.

When mixing the frosting you wanted some stiff peaks, well let me tell you, I got stiff peaks..

Look at that shine! So pretty!

Lets glaze and frost!

And there we have it, raspberry cupcake with a raspberry glaze and topped with a marshmallow frosting. Ohh la la ;)

Now, I had to take some to work to share with my worker pals so I boxed some up in this cute little cupcake box I got from Target. I am almost ashamed that I did not pick up some more while I was there. Guess I learned my lesson.

The next day after I sent them all away, I was really craving one, hoping that there would be at least 1 left when he got home....yeah right, like that was going to happen ;)

I linked up to
http://www.somethingswanky.com/!
&
http://shabbynest.blogspot.com/!

A little bit of caramel never hurt anyone

Caramel, caramel, caramel..mmmmmm!

I got a craving for something, well with a caramel taste and I had a recipe printed out for caramel cupcakes, PERFECT!

This was a pretty easy recipe and they tasted very good!

1/2 cup butter, room temp
3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar (I added just a tad bit more because I LOVE brown sugar)
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350
In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar for 2-3 minutes, until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs and vanilla.
In a small bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt. Add a third of the dry ingredients to the butter mixture and beat on low just until incorporated. Add half of the milk and beat until blended. Add another third of the flour, then the rest of the milk, and then the rest of the flour mixture. Beat each of these additions on low just until combined.
Divide the batter between 12 muffin cups and bake for 20-25 minutes.

Be patient.....(thats the hard part)

For the frosting,

1/2 cup sugar
2 tbsp water
a few drops of lemon juice
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup butter, softened
3-4 cups powdered sugar

(and if you want to make it how I did, I added some caramel ice cream topping as well :) )

In a medium saucepan, heat the sugar, water and lemon juice over medium-high heat and stir until the sugar is completely dissolved. Cook, without stirring but swirling the pan occasionally, for 4-5 minutes, or until the mixture turns deep golden. Remove from the heat and whisk in cream. Some of the caramel will harden ( I ate these pieces) just keep stirring and it will go back to liquid form. Cool this completely. ( I stuck my whole saucepan in the freezer for awhile to cool faster)

Beat the butter until fluffy, then add half the powdered sugar and half the caramel mixture and beat until smooth. Add more sugar and caramel until you have the consistency you want. This is where I tested it and it just was not caramel..y enough so I added in the caramel ice cream topping...this made it just right!

So here you are, very plain, but very very good!

:)

Strawberry Orange Cupcakes

Since my last cupcakes, Lemon raspberry turned out so good, I decided well why not try strawberry orange!? I pretty much used the same recipe and instructions as the lemon raspberry except with these I used all purpose flour instead of cake flour. They turned out DELICIOUS!

Just remember to make sure in the first step when mixing your orange zest and sugar together, to get it all mixed nice and good so the sugar is nice and fragrant! I got a little action shot for you ;)

I added the zest of 2 oranges, and wanted to keep going but I thought I better not over-do it !

Here is an after-baked shot

You can see the specs of zest in there!

These turned out to be a good combination with the orange cupcake and the strawberry frosting.

I kind of just whipped up my own frosting. I put in a block of cream cheese, a stick of butter, a few frozen mashed up strawberries, some almond extract, and some powdered sugar, and WALL-AH! Amazing!

Of course, I had to put some in the middle...

I am just loving the fruit flavor combinations...what will be next???

Rapsberry Lemon Goodness!

My latest cupcake - Raspberry + Lemon = soooo good!

I loooooooooooove raspberries! I knew that I wanted to make a raspberry cupcake but when I really thought about it, I knew I wanted to mix some flavors, so I did. And here is how i did it.

Cupcake:

2 1/4 cups cake flour
1 tbs baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
4 large egg whites
1 1/2 cups sugar
lemon zest from 2 lemons
1 stick unsalted butter, at room temp.
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp pure lemon extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1. Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
2. Whisk together the milk and egg whites in a medium bowl.
3. Put the sugar and lemon zest in a mixer bowl and mix until sugar is moist from the zest.
4. Add the butter and beat at medium speed for 3 minutes. The batter and sugar should be very light.
5. Beat in the extracts then add one third of the flour mixture. Beat in half of the milk/egg mixture, then beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients until incorporated. Add the rest of the milk and eggs beating until it is all mixed together nicely.
6. Add the last of the dry ingredients and beat for another 2 minutes.
7. Bake for 18-22 minutes and cool on wire rack.

For the frosting I used 1 stick of butter, about 10 ounces of whipped cream cheese, vanilla extract and a can of solo raspberry filling. It was AMAZING!!

Here, take a looksy...

Looks good huh?

They were very cakey, and lemony, and just plain refreshing! I took them to work and everyone scarfed them down! A big hit!

When life hands you lemons, make these!

Sweet, Sweet July

How was everyone's 4th of July? I may say that mine was fantastic! Me and the pup went back home to family and friends and had a few cook outs, a few drinks, a few fireworks, and what else? A few cupcakes!

That's my little guy in the red and blue polo, and the taller guy there is Chip, my sisters dog. Don't they look cute in their red white and blue shirts?!

I love being festive!

And here are the cupcakes I made for my family party. They were red velvet with buttercream cream cheese frosting filling (kept that white) and buttercream cream cheese frosting that I tinted blue! The wrappers were red and whtie and had stars on the bottom and sides. Everyone loved them!

Tie-Dye take 2!

So I know I did the whole tie-dye thing already, but I was asked to make them for a birthday party and they turned out so cool that I had to share! I used blue, purple, pink, yellow, and neon green colors for the batter!

The frosting was blue pink neon green and yellow!

And the inside!

And up close! I just love the tie-dye look. Forgive me if I keep bringing these up :)