Raspberry Jam filled Yellow Cupcakes with Chocolate Buttercream

Wow what a long title! I made these cupcakes in order to celebrate the end of midterms and to thank my friend George for cooking me lunch. The dining hall food can be pretty good, but you just have to know where to go and what to order. However it’s always nice to have a home cooked meal especially when I get the chance to eat meat because all the food I cook is mostly vegetarian. Originally these were just yellow cupcakes with chocolate buttercream but I decided to add the raspberry jam for an unexpecting touch. I didn’t have cake flour so I made some using all purpose flour and cornstarch. Although my kitchen is tiny and clean up is such a pain, I look forwards to my days where I canbake. Cake recipe taken from Martha Stewart Baking Handbook and frosting recipe from Baked Bree.

Creamed butter, sugar, and eggs.

Flour mixture.

Cupcake batter.

Ready to bake!

Cooling.

Chocolate frosting.

Assembling:

Hollow out the cupcake using a sharp knife.

Fill with jam.

Ingredients:
For the cake (I halved these and got 12 cupcakes):
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for greasing pans
1½ cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting pans
1½ cups cake flour
1 tbsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
1¾ cups sugar
4 large eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1¼ cups milk

Frosting:
Chocolate Buttercream
2 sticks of room temperature butter
2 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1 teaspoon vanilla
2-3 tablespoons heavy cream

Directions:
For the cupcakes:
Preheat the oven to 350˚ F. Line the bottoms of two 9-inch round cake pans with parchment paper. Butter and flour the edges of the pans, tapping out the excess; set aside. In a medium bowl, combine the all-purpose flour, cake flour, baking powder, and salt; whisk together to blend well and set aside.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the butter and sugar. Beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down the bowl as needed. Mix in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Blend in the vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, add in the dry ingredients in three additions, alternating with the milk. Beat each addition just until incorporated.
Divide the batter between the prepared baking pans. Bake, rotating the pans halfway through baking, until the cakes are golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, 30-35 minutes.

For the frosting:
1. Cream together the butter and sugar. Gradually add the cocoa powder.
2.Add just enough cream to get the consistency for spreading. Add the vanilla.

Grade: A
George and his apartment mates loved it! I think each boy ate two cupcakes and they were gone quickly. I think the jam added a nice contrast to the chocolate frosting.

Some cupcake loveliness

These pictures are from my dear friend Alice. I think they’re so adorable and she is amazing at photoshop and graphic design.

Yellow Cupcakes with Chocolate Frosting

I made these for a get together that happened this past Saturday with my mom’s side of the family. We went and ate one of my favorite Vietnamese foods, pho. I got to see my cousin Ryan, Sean, and his new wife Shannon. Sitting and talking with them was very enjoyable since Shannon is very sweet and funny. My mom told me to make cupcakes and since my favorite cake combination is yellow cake with chocolate frosting, I wanted to give this recipe a shot. Recipe is from Joy of Baking.

Batter.

Ready to bake!

Cooling. These cupcakes turned out ginormous and almost mushroom shaped since I put too much batter in the pan.

Chocolate Frosting! I used the recipe on the back of my Hershey’s cocoa box. Recipe can be found here.

Ingredients

6 large egg yolks
1 cup (240 ml) milk
2 teaspoons (8 grams) pure vanilla extract
3 cups (300 grams) sifted cake flour
1 1/2 cups (300 grams) granulated white sugar
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon (20 grams) baking powder
3/4 teaspoon (5 grams) salt
12 tablespoons (170 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature and cut into pieces

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C). Spray two 9-inch x 1 1/2 inch (23 x 4 cm) cake pans with Bakers Joy, line bottoms with parchment paper, then spray again with Bakers Joy. Set aside.

In a medium bowl lightly combine the egg yolks, 1/4 cup (60 ml) milk, and vanilla extract.

In the bowl of your electric mixer combine the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder and salt) and mix on low speed for about 30 seconds or until blended. Add the butter and remaining 3/4 cup (180 ml) milk. Mix on low speed until the dry ingredients are moistened. Increase the mixer speed to medium and beat for about 2 minutes to aerate and develop the cake’s structure. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. Gradually add the egg mixture, in 3 additions, beating about 30 seconds after each addition to incorporate the egg.

Divide the batter and pour into the prepared pans, smoothing the surface with an offset spatula. (Pans will be about half full.) Bake 25 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean and the cake springs back when pressed lightly in center.

Grade: B+
Knowing me, I can never turn down a cupcake. These were pretty good however they were a little bit too crumbly for me. Also they didn’t quite have that yellow cupcake taste, but rather more of a white cake taste. It didn’t help that someone from home to the restaurant which is 15 minutes away the cupcakes got mushed. The family loved them which was all that mattered but the search for the perfect yellow cake recipe continues!

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

I even added some red sprinkles!

Some delicious red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting that I made the Thursday before college move in day.

Yellow Cupcakes with Chocolate Frosting

Today my friends and I celebrated a very delicious dinner at Chef Chu’s in honor of Safa Taha Lele’s birthday. I always love get togethers especially with the Persian crew because they’re all very nice and funny. Everything was there, the delicious food, the laughing, the wonderful rain in the middle of summer, Nima’s singing in the car, and taking forever to decide what to order. However there was only a small detail missing from this celebration, the birthday boy who canceled on us last minute because his family had planned him something for his birthday. However, no worries, to be honest, all of us were not surprised that he canceled because its just so typical of Safa. Safa’s a pretty cool fellow,whose obsessed with Obama and Rihanna, I know a nice combination right? We had Biology AP together junior year and I’m pretty sure our friendship was the reason I did not pay attention 99% of the time in class but instead I drew cells in his notebook and grabbed his arm everyday. We were even in the same group for the PDP project!

So for my mini baking challenge I decided to make cupcakes and put patriotic sprinkles on them cuz Safa’s obsessed with Obama. For his grad present Roya and I got him an Obama dvd and poster. I used the vanilla cupcake recipe from Martha Stewart and as usual the chocolate frosting from Hersheys.

Beating butter and sugar.

After stirring in dry ingredients and milk mixture.

Ready to bake.

Done and cooling.

Chocolate frosting.

All decorated and ready to eat!

Yellow Cupcake Recipe

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.line the cups of a standard (12-cup) muffin tin with paper or foil liners. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside. In a liquid-measuring cup, mix milk and vanilla; set aside.
2.In a large bowl, with an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. With mixer on low speed, add half of dry ingredients, followed by milk-vanilla mixture, then remaining dry ingredients. Do not overmix.
3. Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups (a 2-ounce or 1/4-cup ice-cream scoop is good for this).

Banana Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Swiss Meringue Buttercream

As usual we always have ripe bananas lying around the house and I’m the only one in the family besides my brother who can eat bananas. So instead of the usual banana bread I decided to make banana cupcakes topped with swiss meringue buttercream since I had some leftover eggwhites in the fridge. This was my first time ever making swiss meringue buttercream but Cassie of How to Eat a Cupcake loves it so I decided to give it a try. However, I didn’t have an thermometer or a Kitchen Aid mixer but I tried to do the best I could with my hand beater. Overall it was worth trying but I probably won’t make any SMB in the future since it was so sweet and I had to add powder sugar to balance the taste.

Beating butter and sugar.

Cupcake batter.

Ready to bake.

Cooling off.

Frosting

Whisking brown sugar and egg white mixture over the stove.

Beating the buttercream.

This is was suppose to be the final result but I decided I didn’t like the texture and it was too sweet so I added about 1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar.

After adding the powdered sugar I like the consistancy of the frosting better. A much better frosting. 🙂

All done!

Banana Cupcakes from Bakerella

1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 large ripe banana (or almost 1 cup)
1/2 cup whole milk, room temperature

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line cupcake tray with 12 baking cups. Sift together flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl with a wire whisk. Cream butter and sugar in a mixer for about four minutes. Add banana and mix until combined. Add eggs and vanilla and mix until combined. Add half the flour in three additions alternating with milk in two additions. Scrape down the sides with each addition. Bake for about 12-15 minutes or until done

Brown Sugar Swiss Meringue Buttercream from How to Eat a Cupcake

1 cup light brown sugar
4 egg whites
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

Put sugar, egg whites and salt into the top of a double boiler over a pan of simmering water. Whisking constantly, cook until sugar has dissolved and mixture is warm (about 160 degrees). Pour heated egg whites into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Beat egg white mixture on high speed until it forms stiff (but not dry) peaks. Continue beating until fluffy and cooled, about 7 minutes total. Switch to the paddle attachment. With mixer on medium-low, add butter two tablespoons at a time, beating well after each addition. Increase speed to medium-high; continue beating until frosting appears thick, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low and continue beating 1 minute to reduce air bubbles.

Grade: B
The frosting was extremely sweet and I think in general banana and cake just don’t work together. However my friend Roya and dad’s coworker enjoyed them.

Sprinkles Cupcakes

Many of you have probably heard of the famous cupcake store, Sprinkles founded by Candace Nelson which has claimed to start the whole cupcake craze. The first store opened in Beverly Hills, and as of now there are only 6 stores opened throughout the US. I am lucky enough that the closest one to me is only about a 30 minute drive from my house. They have a Twitter that sometimes has tweets that tells you a secret word to whisper which allows you to get a free cupcake. I have to admit I went on a crazy Sprinkles run, in which I had four cupcakes for four days straight. My friend Erin got very very mad at me but I have to admit I am be a little crazy sometimes. On Sunday, I got a dark chocolate cupcake. Monday was cinnamon sugar, Tuesday peanut butter chocolate, and Wednesday red velvet. I would have to say the cupcakes were pretty good, very sweet and moist but not as extraordinary as people claim. I probably could make cupcakes just as tasty but a $3.25 cupcake for free? I would have to say this is a pretty sweet deal.

My dark chocolate cupcake.

Peanut butter chocolate.

Some of the cupcakes.

Fourth of July Cupcakes

Happy Belated Fourth of July everyone! Having taken the vigorous class of APUSH my junior year, I now know the significance behind this important holiday. I would have to say I had an excellent fourth surrounded by some of my closest friends and cupcakes. I had a fun filled packed fourth and was glad I got to spend time with one of my closest buds, Erin. Here’s how our day went.

Morning:
Erin and I had planned to go to Sur La Table in Santana Row because her mom received an email that they were having cupcake demonstrations. We decided to get there early to avoid that non existent traffic to discover that this Sur La Table no longer did demonstrations. Since we had 36 minutes we decided we could still make it and instead go to the store in downtown Los Gatos. However, Erin and I don’t really drive to Los Gatos very often so we got a bit lost, going backwards on the high way and then finally getting to 17. Once we got to 17, we hit all the traffic of the cars who wanted to go to beach. Also 17 is tiny, there’s three lanes that always seem to be merging into two. Erin was in a bad mood and I tried my best to cheer her up. On the bright side, she had excellent mommy mini van driving skills. We reached downtown Los Gatos and were able to find the store. To our disappointment, it wasn’t really a demonstration but instead just talking about how to make the cupcakes. On the bright side, we received samples of mini cupcakes and recipes. We then decided to go to the Icing on the Cake bakery but unfortunately it was closed. After that, we drove back to Santana Rowe to Kara’s Cupcakes. The two of us split a strawberry cupcake which in my opinion, I could have made.

Lunch:
Went to the opening of Blackberry Farm since we heard there was free food. Stood in line for about 20 minutes to discover that it was pulled pork which Erin doesn’t eat. Luckily, there were Whole Food coupons which she took advantage of. Went to Target to buy ingredients for our mini cupcakes. Made these delicious mini cupcakes and decorated them in colored sugar.

Dinner:
Went over to Devina’s house, 2nd day in a row. Meet up with some of my favorite people including Maanya, Varada, Derek who is on crunches, Vivek, Roya etc etc. Drove to Hyde Park to watch the fireworks. I would have to say they were pretty cool. Highlight of the night: Erin gets stuck climbing over a fence and I’m the only one trying to help her while Matt and Vivek stand there laughing. Afterwards we went to Devina’s moms house and proceeded to play Big Booty and loser had to take a dare.

I guess this is what summer is all about. Staying out late, hanging out with friends. Just doing things like talking, laughing. Sometimes I wish it would never end. But like the Nelly Furtado song goes, “All good things come to an end.”

Lemon Angel Food Cupcakes

You know how some days you wake up thinking that it’s gonna be a bad day and instead you’re completely surprised as the day goes along because it turns to be a great day? Well this happened to me last Saturday. Feeling like a failure since I have to take a UC Writing placement exam that day (geez I got an 11 on my essay, shouldn’t that be worth something) and this was the day right after the IDC dance. So anyways the test was at Fremont High School which was about a 15 minute drive from my house and unlike the SAT I/II’s it was at 9. So far one positive thing, this test was an hour later than the normal SAT stuff I was use to. I was pretty nervous since Ithis test was used for placement and if I didn’t pass, then I would be placed in a lower literature class in college. So as soon I parked in the parking lot and started walking towards the classrooms looking for my building, I ran into one of my best friends Jo. What good timing I though to myself. Turns out there were a lot of other MV people that I knew that had to take the test. I personally thought that the placement test went well and finished pretty quickly since I am a faster reader. After that I went to lunch at one of my favorite ghetto places, Dairy Belle and had a delicious soft serve vanilla frozen yogurt dipped in chocolate. My day so far was going great, I had aced (knock on wood) the test, hung out with one of my best pals, and ate a delicious lunch. It got better, I had nothing to do since I am a second semester senior. Then later one of my pals called to say that her appeal to Irvine had got through! You have no idea how exited and happy I was! I was screaming running around the house and even crying tears of joy….which leads to this post.

We had a miny improptu celebration at Roya’s house and I made this after googling recipe with egg whites since I had 4 left over from the fruit tart. This recipe popped up and since I had some lemons in my house I thought they would be perfect! Recipe from Baking Bites.

Ingredients
3/4 cup superfine sugar, divided
1/2 cup sifted cake flour
5 large egg whites, room temperature
1/2 tsp cream of tartar
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
zest of one lemon

Directions
Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners.
In a small bowl, sift together cake flour and 1/4 cup superfine sugar.
In a large bowl, beat room-temperature egg whites until foamy, then add in cream of tartar and salt. Gradually add in the remaining 1/2 cup of superfine sugar while the mixer is on high speed, beating the egg whites to soft peaks. Mix in vanilla and lemon zest. Fold flour mixture into beaten egg whites, adding it in two or three additions.
Divide evenly into prepared muffin tins. The tins should be quite full.
Bake for 16-18 minutes, until golden brown. The tops will spring back when lightly touched.
Cool on a wire rack. Cupcakes may sink slightly, but there is not a great difference between cooling them upside down and not with these small cakes.

Makes 12 cupcakes.

Beating egg whites.

Become stiff and glossy.

Dry ingredients.

Folding in flour mixture.

Ready to bake.

Done and cooling.

Ready to go!

Grade: A
These definitely had the angel food cake taste and texture to them, very soft, fluffy and almost like cotton candy. I couldn’t really taste the lemon but the texture was very light which is nice after the pizza that we ate.

Carrot Cupcakes

Summer is almost here which means that weather has been getting a lot nicer. This means that when I wake up at 6:30 in the morning it’s not pitch black outside and I can wear my flip flops to school without my feet freezing. Yesterday we celebrated Josephine’s birthday. Boy can her family cook delicious food. I had corn on the cob, ribs, coleslaw, delicious potato salad, yellow watermelon, and cornbread. Since the weather was so beautiful outside we sat in front of her driveway and had a mini picnic. Senior year should be more about relaxing and hanging out with friends than worrying about grades and studying for boring old AP test. Josephine told me that she liked carrot cupcakes so I found this recipe on Baking Bites. What caught my eye was how it was a one bowl recipe which I absolutely adore because this means less clean up for me. The cream cheese frosting I got from All Recipes.

Beating together sugar and eggs.

Adding the rest of the ingredients. Note: I used shredded carrots that I bought from the store because I was too lazy to shred them myself but they were a little too big. I had to cut them with scissors.

Ready to bake!

Cooling off.

Cream cheese frosting.

All packaged and ready to go.

Inside.

One-Bowl Carrot Cake (This made 12 cupcakes)

1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/4 cup butter, melted and cooled
1/4 cup orange juice
1 tbsp orange zest (I omitted)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp allspice (I omitted and added pumpkin pie spice instead)
1/4 tsp nutmeg (freshly grated, if possible) (I omitted)
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cups shredded carrot (from 2-3 large carrots), drained

Preheat the oven to 350F. Lightly grease an 8×8-inch square baking pan.
In a large bowl, beat together sugar and eggs until smooth. Beat in melted butter, orange juice, orange zest, vanilla, spices and salt. When combined, sift in the flour and baking soda (sifting helps evenly distribute the baking soda) and gently stir it into the batter until no streaks remain. Stir in shredded carrot, then scrape into prepared pan.
Bake for 36-42 minutes (My cupcakes baked for about 22 minutes), until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Cool on a wire rack before frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting (This made enough to frost 12 cupcakes)

1-3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1/2 (8 ounce) package cream cheese room temperature
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a medium bowl, combine confectioners’ sugar, cream cheese, butter or margarine and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Spread on cooled cake.

Grade: A+
Wow these were so yummy! I do have to admit that cream cheese frosting is pretty easy to make and very hard to screw up. It always ends up tasting good! And the carrot cake was delicious. I felt somewhat healthy since there were carrots in my desserts. This recipe is definitely a keeper.