Lasagna Cupcakes

Cupcakes are taking off. I've seen so many things in cupcake forms lately. Like in Tokyo, theres a 'red velvet' cupcake. Sounds normal, right? WRONG! The red in the cupcakes is from beets. Ick! Cinnamon buns can now come in cupcake form. And now, lasagna. 

This was really good, but really hard work! Like... it took a lloooonnng time to finish. Was it worth it in the end? meh... not really. I'm all about pretty, delicious and pretty easy and less time consuming to cook. 

Pretty, right? They were pretty tasty. But honestly, I think I could use this same recipe and just make it the old fashion way. This recipe was adapted from The Girl Who Ate Everything

What you need: (Sorry, I don't have measurements)

Italian Sausage (I used Johnsonville Chicken Sausage, 3 cheese Italian Flavored)

Red pepper

Onion

Garlic

Lasagna noodles, cooked al dante

Ricotta Cheese

Parmesan Cheese

Mozzarella Cheese

(I added in some Fontina Cheese as well)

Italian spices (I.e. basil, oregano, etc)

Spaghetti sauce (I use Prego, my Favorite!)

What you need to do:

Start out by putting your sausage in a food processor.

Pulse until it looks like the above photo. The smaller, the better.

Next, pulse some pepper and onion. Garlic would be nice too, but I crushed mine with a knife so we have lots of big pieces! 

Saute it all together, fully cooking the sausage.

Spray your pans and warm your oven to 350 at this point, if you haven't already.

Take your lasagna noodle and put it on a hard surface, like a cutting board.

Grab a cup and cut little circles out.

Voila!

You may even have to pinch off a bit more if it doesn't fit right.

Place your lasagna circles in the tin.

Take a lasagna noodle and cut it in half, the long way. Wrap the noddle in the pan like so. It doesn't have to be perfect, the stuffing will hold it together later.

Mix your cheeses, making sure their creamy and well blended.

Add in your spices!

Now layer. Sauce first.

Meat/onion mix next.

Ricotta mix next.

More sauce.

Place shredded Mozzarella Cheese on top.

Bake for 15-20 minutes, allowing everything to get warm and melt. The edges should get a bit crispy, but don't leave it in more than that otherwise it will harden. 

Not so bad, just a lot of prep work. I hope you all enjoy!

Linky Parties:

FriDAYS Made Sweet

Lime Cupcakes with Strawberry Frosting

So, few things:
1. Strawberries are not in season and are $5 for a box that is squishy, So I used little Strawberry Shaped Marshmallows for the Topping, but you don't have to have anything on top at all.
2. My strawberry frosting would not stiffen because
             a. my electric mixer broke
             b. I had to do everything by hand, which took forever, and apparently was not enough force for it
so I kept adding more and more powdered sugar until I was out and then by the end, still was not stiff and was incredibly and overly sweet! So I just used my backup supply of store bought frosting. If you have an electric mixer, I'm sure you'll be much better off with this frosting!

So what you need:
2 3/4 cups All Purpose Flour
3 tsp Baking Powder
1/3 tsp Salt
1 cup Shortening
1 2/3 cup Granulated Sugar
5 Egg Whites
3 tbsp Lime Juice (Fresh)

For the Frosting:
1 pkg Philadelphia Cream Cheese, softened
1/2 cup Butter, softened
3 1/2 cups Powdered Sugar
1/2 cup minced Strawberries, well drained
Small Strawberries, for topping

What you need to do:
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Place cupcake liners into each cup of a 24 cup muffin pan.

For the Frosting:

Makes 48 cupcakes

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Red Velvet Chocolate Chunk and Drizzle Cupcakes

First off **Drool**

No seriously, these are super easy and super simple!!!

What you need:

Box of moist Red Velvet Cake Mix {I cheated, I know :(}

Whatever box calls for (i.e. eggs, oil, water)

Cocoa Powder

Either chocolate chips chunk from a bag or hand cut (I think hand cut is better, but that's just me) :)

My Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe ( added a little sweetened condensed milk this time)

Chocolate chips and shortening (or melting candy coating chocolate)

Start making your red velvet cupcakes as the box directs, but once you're all mixed up and insure there are nu clumps, add in your chunks of chocolate pieces. Also, add in just a tsp of cocoa powder to add more of a chocolate flavor. Then bake as directed.

Next:

Make the cream cheese frosting (try adding in the sweetened condensed milk, I know you don't want to open that whole can for just a few tsps, but its something different to try!) and once done pour into a Ziploc bag with one corner snipped off or a frosting gun.

Whist cooling your cupcakes, melt your chocolate on low heat on the stove top adding just a bit of milk to it so it doesn't burn or for 30 second increments in the microwave then stirring in between. Add in your shortening (about 1 spoonful) and stirring it in. If you're using candy coating chocolate then you don't need shortening. Once melted pour into a bottle with a small tip or just use a Ziploc bag with a small cut in the corner. 

Once cupcakes are cooled (make sure they are COMPLETELY cooled!!!) Start piping out your frosting. I just did simple swirl around the cupcake. Once applied, just do simple zig-zag motions over you frosting. It doesn't have to look perfect, in fact that's what makes it look nice, is just a bit of chaos. :)

That's it!!!

You're Done!!!

Go show these simple and easy cupcakes to your friends, neighbors, family and let them assume how much hard work you went through over these cupcakes! They'll never know!!

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Sweets for a Saturday

Peanut Butter and Jelly Cupcakes

Ok everyone, meet Tracey.

She is my buddy and a guest baker! How exciting!

She got to choose what we are making. 

She saw a recipe for Peanut Butter Cupcakes form Cupcakes, Cupcakes and more Cupcakes by Lilach German and so we had to make them, whilst making them our own of course!

Ok, so Peanut Butter and Jelly cupcakes. What you need:

4 2/3 flour

4 tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 sticks of butter

2 2/3 sugar

3/4 cup peanut butter

4 eggs

1 cup milk

4 tbsp jam (Which ever you like)

Frosting:

1 cup peanut butter 

4 tbsp honey

4 tbsp milk

4 oz cream cheese

and some more jam

What you need to do:

Preheat your oven to 325.

Mix your dry ingredients together in a bowl.

In a mixer cream butter, sugar, and peanut butter until fluffy.

and eggs one at a time, while mixing still.

Gradually add dry ingredients.

Add milk until smooth.

Add jam with a spoon, not thoroughly so chunks of jam remain.

 Bake for 23-25 minutes.

Cool for 10 min.

Preparing your frosting: 

Mix together all ingredients except jam.

Place a little helping or a dollop of frosting on top of the cupcake.

Place a spoonful of jam on top of the peanut butter frosting!!!

TA DAA! Super easy, Super fun, great classic with a sweet twist for anyone, young or old!

Linked to:
Sweets for a Saturday

Sweet Indulgences Sunday

 Monday, Mmmm... Dessert
2 Maids a Baking
Muffin and Cupcake Monday
Cajun Sugar Pie

Cookie Monster Cupcakes (Not the best)

So, I just saw a picture of these today and decided to do them... Only problem: I make my own frosting and today it would not come out thick enough. No matter how much powdered sugar I put in it! Usually, it's not a problem... I'll have to use store bought ones next time. Anyways, since I'm so disappointed in them I'm just going to show a picture, not a tutorial.

 They are supposed to be "fluffy" and the frosting just kept sliding off!

I'm sorry they look horrible, I'll have to re-post if and when I make them again!

Apple Cupcakes

Ok, I made these simple and awesome cupcakes a while back before I had a blog, but I wasn't able to take many pictures of how to do it! So here it is!

What you need:

Cupcakes, already  prepared

Small Powdered Donuts

Red Frosting

Red Crystal Sprinkles

Tootsie Rolls

Green Laffy Taffy's 

Whip up your red frosting.

Place a little bit of frosting on you cupcake, enough to make your donut stick.

Kitty decided to help, too!

Place your donut on your cupcake.

Frost your donut.

Make an indent on the top of your donut.

 

Should look somewhat like this.

Dip in red sugar. 

Out of you tootsie roll, make a stem and make a leaf out of you green laffy taffy.

Pretty easy, pretty quick, great for birthdays, barbecues, any occasion, really!

Linked to:
Sweet Indulgences Sunday
Savory Sundays

Sweets for a Saturday
Monday, mmmm.... Desserts
 Mangia Mondays
Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays
Tuesdays at the Table
Whisking Wednesdays 
Recipe Swap

Mango Cupcakes

I wanted to make a simple cupcake for my husbands co-workers, because they requested cupcakes, but I just got home from work, was tired, hungry, and just wanted to relax. Plus, I had two mangoes that were going to go bad soon.

 I made some lemon cake and used a Mango Frosting that I just whipped up, and came out pretty good!

On these I added half a dark chocolate Pirouette and on some I added coconut, but since a lot of people don't like coconut, I added red nonpareils on the rest.

On these I added Caramel wafers from Holland from the World Market.

Again, I added coconut to a few and red nonpareils to the rest.

Linked to:
Sweets for a Saturday
Monday, mmm.... Desserts
Mangia Mondays
Make a Food- e Friend Monday
A Marvelous Mess Monday
Made From Scratch Tuesday