Alpha Bakers: Coconut Cupcakes with Milk Chocolate Ganache

"I don't like cupcakes."

That is what my friend told me when I mentioned it was the last thing I baked.

"They are basically cakes, just in cupcake form," is what I told her. I know this because I used to make all kinds of cakes into cupcakes form when I was baking through Rose's Heavenly Cakes.

"Yeah, but I don't like them. They are individually sized, with frosting on top and stuff," is the response I get.

Well no matter. I didn't make these for her. My other friends whom I shared them with thought they were yummy.

On a side note, I don't know what's wrong with things being individually sized with frosting. Isn't it the same with having a 9 inch cake sliced? Each cake slice is individually sized with frosting? The only difference with cupcakes is you have to buy the wrapper - which means spending some money on said wrapper. And if you want to be really precise, as Rose is, and as I try to be, you have to spend some time to weigh each cupcake individually so they are all even (which is my least favorite part of making cupcakes by the way). But it's not a big complain since I find cupcakes very cute so their cuteness way surpass my feeling against weighing each one individually.

End rant.

HCB: Yellow Butter Cupcakes

This is the last cake I have to blog about. I made this back in April 2010 but somehow never blogged about it.

I vaguely remembered this being an easy cake to put together. It was pretty plain and was not a favorite. I prefer my butter cakes to have some sour cream in them. It makes them softer and the flavor is better with sour cream.

That being said, this cupcakes is anything but boring and it's because of the neoclassic buttercream. I made the orange flower water version but with the addition of orange oil. The combo brings buttercream to a new level.

HCB: Mud Turtle Cupcakes

This cake is my 77th cake from Rose's Heavenly Cakes.

It feels so good to say that.

I have been saying that I have 17 cakes remaining. That number seem so small in comparison to 77, and yet, if I bake one every week I have 3 months left.

I can't wait!!!

It's not because I don't like being part of HCB. But at this point in the game, where the end feels so near (what's 3 months!?!) but yet so far (still 3 months!!!), I am itching to finish. 

I can smell and see the finish line (okay, I am being a tad melodramatic).

But wouldn't you be?

I am not very excited to make this cupcakes. Like I said last week, a cupcake named "mud" does not make me think "yum."

Still, I woke up on Sunday morning feeling quite excited.

Not necessarily about "mud," but about photography. Cupcake photography, in this case.

HCB: White Velvet Butter Cupcakes

I've made the cake version of this cake (okay that sounds weird) last year, frosted with milk chocolate ganache. The cake was good but the ganache was too sweet for me, so I only used a thin layer and have leftover in the freezer.

This time we are frosting it with the yummy golden neoclassic buttercream. I had made a whole batch of neoclassic back in March to frost Mini Vanilla Bean Cupcakes and had 1/2 quantity leftover in the freezer. I'm excited to use it now (and also excited that I don't have to make it again, making this the fastest cupcake made in Knitty Baker's history :)).

HCB Free Choice: Devil Food's Cupcakes

For the free choice this week I made Devil Food's cupcakes.

Again, you said?

We just made it 6 weeks ago.

Yes. It's that good.

So instead of catching up on the remainder 23 cakes left, I made this again.

It also helps that I have leftover Midnight Ganache in the freezer, as I didn't use it all last time.

This time, I used the book's method of mixing. The result is a fluffy cupcake, not dense and fudgy like next time. It is really good. I like the texture this way.

Also this time, the brandied cherry tasted more boozy. I can feel myself swooning after finishing a cupcake. I better not drive.

Note: My apologies for such a short post. But since this is a repeat performance, I don't know what else to write, ^o^!

HCB Free Choice: Mini Vanilla Bean Pound (Cup)Cakes

I made this cupcake a couple of weeks ago. I was actually making the Pecan Pie from the Pie & Pastry Bible, and felt like making something from RHC as well. So I made the mini vanilla bean pound cake as cupcakes. I figured it's easy enough to do. I made 1/3 of recipe, which yield 4 cupcakes - about 45-50 grams each.

I am not going to go over the recipe in this post. It's pretty easy - like a regular butter cake. But also because I had forgotten what the recipe is like and I don't have my book with me. Haha. The downfall of baking ahead :).

In the recipe, the cake isn’t frosted, only syruped, but I felt like having some frosting. It’s been a long time since I made buttercream, and I have yet to try Lyle's Golden Syrup on neooclassic, so that’s what I made - flavored with orange flower water and orange oil. I figured since the pound cake does not have a strong flavor it would go well. And it did. So good was the buttercream that I ended up forgetting to syrup the cupcakes.

Frosting the cupcakes was fun. And I thought it needed something else so I took a bar of Green & Blacks white chocolate I had in the freezer and grated some over the cupcakes. The topped with little pink non pareils for more cute effect :).

Tasting impressions:
I didn't miss the syrup in the cake at all. The cake remained moist. It's definitely more dense than the yellow butter cake/cupcake but in a good way. The neoclassis buttercream is excellent. With Lyle the taste is phenomenal.

And I will leave you with a picture of the Pecan Pie. I made the chocolate version and decorated them with lattice top and whipped cream.

HCB Free Choice: Spice Cake with Peanut Buttercream and Whoopie Pie

Spice Cake with Peanut Buttercream

I had some free time this weekend, so I thought I'd play catch up on the cakes I've missed. Here is Spice (Cup)Cakes with Peanut Buttercream.

As usual, I made 1/2 recipes and felt like making cupcakes. By the way, I'm beginning to think that I am developing an addiction to cupcake shapes. A few months go by and I haven't made cupcake and I would miss it.

This cake is super easy to make. The hardest part about it is sifting all the dry ingredients. I'm not a big fan of sifting, but it's not a step that I'd dare skipping. As I was prepping the ingredients, I thought of Hanaa. Why? Because Hanaa is one HCB who loves to add spices to her cakes, and this cake has both cinnamon and cloves. A quick search on her blog, and I found that she's made this cake back in September, and added ground nutmeg, ginger, and all spice. Hanaa, I wish I have your courage of playing with spices in cakes.

The buttercream is also super easy. At first I was dreading it when I read this cake uses buttercream. I haven't made buttercream for a while, and the last couple times I made mousseline, they curdled. No chance of that happening with this one. Nothing could be easier than having to combine all the ingredients in a food processor.

Since the cake was so easy, I thought I had a bit of fun decorating it.

Tasting impression:
The cake is really good, soft, tender, and light. The buttercream I am not so sure of. I like the peanut flavor but combined with the cream cheese and butter, it taste too creamy. After I ate one, I feel like I would not be hungry for hours. I know it's my fault, 1/2 recipe of cupcakes to 1 recipe of buttercream. It is not an even distribution. But even if it's 1:1, I am not sure I like the taste combo very much.

Two Fat Cats Whoopie Pie

For this recipe, I made the buttercream first. Rose said in the book that once you're done, to congratulate yourself for making the perfect buttercream. Somehow that makes me think that this buttercream must be hard. True enough, somewhere she said it's similar to mousseline. Uh oh. So I made it first, thinking that if it didn't turn out, then I wouldn't even bother to make the whoopie cakes.

It all started out so well. I combined the sugar, water, and corn syrup over low heat until the sugar dissolved and the mixture started bubbling. Took it off the heat and proceeded to beat the egg whites with a hand mixer. Added cream of tartar and beat until stiff peaks. Put the sugar mixture back on the heat and boil until it reached 248 degrees. Then poured it onto the egg whites while mixing. Btw, is it just me or is it always fascinating to see egg whites change texture into the smooth, shiny, and silky meringue.

So far so good....

Once the meringue is cooled, Rose tells you to beat butter and powdered sugar until it's smooth, creamy, and white. Added the meringue and this is the part where I messed it up. Rose said to beat for 10 seconds until combined. I beat a bit too long, about 30 seconds, and the cream curdled a bit.

Arrghhh...

Ok, deep breath, let's taste it.

Taste fine so I made the pies.

I remembered from reading all the HCB who made this that the pie turned out so big. Keeping that in mind, I measured 20 grams (instead of the 40-something grams per instruction).

The result?

I think it's still too big. I'd prefer to make this somewhat bite size, as in, I can eat it in a couple of bites. So maybe next time I would try 15 grams.

Tasting impressions:
Yum!  It is so good. The marshmallow cream is super yummy and combined with the pies it is awesome. As I am typing this sentence I took the last bite of the one pictured about (with all the Xmas tree sugar around it). I am still not hungry from the Spice cupcakes 2 hours ago, but I gotta have a whoopie pie! (I think tonight's dinner will be a very small salad...)

HCB: Designer Chocolate Baby Grand

I was looking forward to making this cake. The name of this cake is just so cute and it looks so adorable, with its shiny glaze and flat top.

I was not, however, looking forward to it being the week after the chocolate banana cake. As much as I like chocolate, it is a little too much to have chocolate cake 2 weeks in a row.

The cake itself is really easy to do. Mix the cocoa powder with boiling water. Once it's cooled to room temperature, mix in the egg yolks and oil and mix until it resembled buttercream. Next, add all the dry ingredients in 2 batches. Finally, mix in the egg whites.

I tried to divide the batter equally between 14 cupcakes. First I distributed 25 grams to each cupcake liner, but then I still had leftover batter. In the end I think I ended up with 29 grams.

The cupcakes baked in 15 minutes. While it's baking, I made the milk chocolate ganache syrup. I heated up the heavy cream, then mix it with the milk chocolate. It is so easy to break the milk chocolate into little pieces. At first I used a knife, but then realized that the chocolate is soft enough that I could use my hands.

Once the cupcake baked, I poked holes all over with a wooden skewer, then applied the syrup. I don't know if any of the HCB bakers managed to use up all the syrup. I couldn't. Even after 3 application, I ended up with a puddle of ganache on top of the cupcakes. Somehow they were not being absorbed very well so I gave up. I had a little leftover ganache, which is now happily sitting in the freezer, accompanying the leftover ganache from the chocolate banana stud cake last week. I'm gonna have to figure out a way to use these 2 little leftovers, perhaps I can get creative with the chocolate featherbed cake, coming up in 3 weeks...

With all the ganache on top of the cupcakes, looking almost as shiny as a lacquer glaze, I made an executive decision right there and then to skip the lacquer glaze. Plus I have these chocolate pearls from Whole Foods that I wanted to use, and as Rose mentioned in the book, I should put them on while the ganache is still wet.



I got a little carried away with the decoration, not sure of what pattern to do, so I ended up with multiple ones. I really like the swirls so there are a few with those. And for fun, there's an "I love you" one. See if you can spot it, :).

Tasting impression:
YUM! It is so good. I was so glad I reduced the sugar in the cupcakes by 25 grams, the sweetness level is good. The chocolate pearls has a little crunch (it has crunchy cereal in the ingredients). I like the texture of the pearls with the cake.

HCB: Chocolate Butter Cupcakes

I made the Chocolate Butter Cupcakes last year and was not very impressed with it.

The taste is really good, very chocolatey. The texture I don't like. It was dry and fragile and fell apart as I bite into it.

So this time, I thought I'd improvise a little bit. I set aside 20% of the sugar in the cupcakes, all other variables are the same, the 20% sugar I made into sugar syrup (added a little of grand marnier) and used it to syrup the cupcakes while it's cooling down.

For the buttercream, I thought of making something new. The burnt orange silk meringue buttercream. I skipped this buttercream last year when I made the pumpkin cake and I've made all the other buttercreams so it's time to make this one.

You are probably looking at the above picture and thinking, hm... that does not look like the burnt orange smbc. Well, it's because it isn't. The whole thing failed, catasthropicly.

First I made the orange concentrate from orange juice. Feeling rebellious and not wanting to follow Rose's instructions, I use a sauce pan on medium-high heat to reduce the OJ. Well okay, it's more because I don't like the idea of heating up OJ in a pyrex cup in the microwave. It might explode and then I have all the mess to clean up. Call me crazy, but that's what went through my head. Minutes went by and the OJ is reduced. I transfer it to a bowl and proceeded with the recipe.

Next step is the creme anglaise. I scald the milk, heat up the sugary water until amber, then pour the milk in. It bubbled furiously. I put the pan back on the stove and stir to get all the caramel goodness. Somehow some of the caramel crystalize at the bottom, so I continue stirring and stirring until they all dissolve. This is where I figured I did something wrong as by the time all those crystals are reduced, there liquid is pretty well reduced (mistake #1). Then I mix it into the egg yolk mixture, and heat the whole thing on the stove while stirring continuously. Rose said to keep stirring on low heat until it's close to boiling point and you see steam. This takes forever by the way and by the time it's done the creme anglais is pretty thick. By thick I mean as thick as honey. I think this might the mistake #2, I heat it up too long and it became too thick. Of course at that time I didn't think anything is wrong. I strain it onto a bowl and set it aside.

I proceeded by making the italian meringue. Nothing exciting to report here, everything went on smoothly.

Now onto putting everything together. Mix the butter on the mixer. I went to grab the creme anglais and they seem to have turned into a toffee caramel consistency. I tried to incorporate it into butter, to no avail. It still remained in big globs. I continued adding the italian meringue in it. I didn't think any miracle will happen by adding the meringue, but why not, I already made the meringue anyway. The caramel globs are still there. Okay, so I thought this can be a buttercream with toffee in it. I tried a tsp of it, it does has the toffee consistency, as in it sticks to my teeth, but without the yummy toffee flavor.

What to do... what to do..

Devastatingly I thought of throwing the whole thing away. But then my cupcake will become naked and sad looking without any decorative element. Starting over is not an option as I'm already behind schedule, and still have to cook.

So I strained the d***m thing. I couldn't help chucking as I was doing this because it was kinda funny to push buttercream through a strainer. I doubt anyone on the bake-a-long has done this before.

Buttercream strained, I tried a little bit and it's missing flavor indeed. So I added a couple of drops of the Boyajian Orange Oil and voila, it taste so much better. Very fragrant and very orangey.

Too tired to do fancy decorating, I used my small offset spatula to do swirls of buttercream on the cupcake.

So there you have it. My humble chocolate butter cupcakes with almost burnt orange silk meringue buttercream :).

Tasting impression: I'm glad I added some sugar syrup, as the buttercream is more moist now. The buttercream, however, did not have enough taste. Where did all the orange oil flavor went?!? Or maybe I didn't have enough of it. Hm.. I think I'll add some orange zest on the rest when I get home...

HCB: Sybil's Pecan Cupcakes

I was going to skip this week's selection, as I don't have a 6x3 spring foam pan. Near the end of the week, I counted how many cakes I've made from HCB. I've made 15 cakes and I've missed 11 cakes. Determined not to miss anymore (well not this weekend at least :)), I decided to make Sybil's Pecan Torte as cupcakes ^_^.

This cake is pretty quick and easy. And it's even easier as I made 1/3 of the recipe. The hardest part is dividing the ingredients, and making sure I divided everything and not miss anything. Toast pecans, grind with some sugar and Starbuck's instant coffee, whip the egg yolks for 5 minutes, fold in the pecan mixture, whip the egg whites, fold these into the rest of the batter. Then onto the silicone cupcake pan it goes.

1/3 of the recipe makes perfectly 6 cupcakes. I fill them up to where the foil liner ends, and they came out tall, a little higher than the rim of the pan. Then they sunk a little in the middle, just as Rose said it would.

I left them cooling on the rack while I make the stabilized whipped cream. Making this was a breeze too. I divided the recipe into 1/4 - the math was easier this way. I also toast extra pecans and then coat them with caramelized sugar for decoration.

Tasting impressions: this is really yummy. It's moist and tender. The coffee flavor is not very strong, which is interesting as last week's Le Succes used the same amount of coffee and it taste much stronger. I suppose it's because in this recipe the coffee is in the batter and is baked in the oven, whereas in Le Succes the coffee is in the ganache. I love the toasted pecan taste on top, hm... should have put more on each cupcakes instead of one only :)).

A Baking Weekend - Part 1

This weekend, I was very inspired to bake so in addition to the scheduled cake for the HCB group, I also made several other items. First, I did the Chocolate Butter Cupcakes with Chocolate Egg-White Buttercream from Rose's Heavenly Cakes. I made half a recipe of the cupcakes and the full recipe of the buttercream. Why, you asked, would I make another cake? Well, because I just received the 6-cavity Lekue silicone muffin pan and I feel compelled to test it. Also, I want to play with buttercream and the idea of making practice buttercream using shortening sounds plain gross (if there are shortening lover out there reading this, please don't take this personally). Anyway, back to the cupcake. It's very easy to make. The only thing is that you sorta have to plan ahead a bit because you have to boil the water and then mix it really well with the cocoa powder, then let it cool down to room temperature. The recipe said you can refrigerate it. But even that takes about 10-15 minutes to cool down (and this is half the recipe btw so you see how you should sorta plan ahead.) The buttercream is a bit more challenging. It tells you to beat the butter first until smooth and creamy. Rose suggests that you use the hand mixer for this if you only have 1 stand mixer - as you would need the stand mixer for the egg whites. So I did that. Then you beat the egg whites until foamy, add cream of tartar, beat again, then gradually add the fine sugar, until stiff peak. After all that, continue beating while adding butter by the tablespoon. Halfway through this, the buttercream looks like a soupy mess. Rose said that if the whole thing curdled, which I'm guessing what the soupy mess is, you should increase the speed and continue beating until it came together. Well, I did that and what feels like forever later, the consistency didn't changed. So I put the whole thing in the fridge - thinking that the reason why it still curdled is because it's too warm. True enough, after five minutes of refrigeration, I rebeat on high speed and it smoothed out. After all the butter is added, add the melted chocolate that's already cooled to room temperature. And you're done. Next is piping fun! It is so fun to pipe buttercream - provided you're not a perfectionist and fussed over every little imperfection (which I am kinda like that but I've decided since this is for personal consumption it just have to be fun and does not have to be perfect). I used a round tip, rose tip, and star tip and here's the result.


Aren't they cute? At least I think so. I'm very happy with the result. The one with the star tip makes me think of odd-shaped mushrooms.