As girlie as cupcakes get...

Courtesy of the Betty Crocker cupcake mini-magazine, meet the Pink Champagne cupcake. The thing I like about Betty, is that she keeps it simple. Her desserts almost always involve sprucing up a mix, not starting from scratch. The downer about Betty is that, although her stuff looks cute and is very creative, the taste isn't anything to blog about (yet here I am)! She certainly has some very cute designs.

The champagne cupcakes will not be a repeat experience. The cake part simply calls for adding a cup and a quarter of champagne and some food dye. The frosting is the same with less champagne and more sprinkle pizazz:

Cake:
1 box of Betty Crocker white cake mix
(I suggest using Duncan Heines - it has a richer flavor!)
1 1/4 cups of champagne
1/3 cup of veggie oil
3 egg whites
4-5 drops of food coloring

As for the food coloring, I highly recommend the Wilton 8 Icing color set - the colors are really rich and potent. One little dip of the fork prongs into the color gel and you have your self some HOT pink cupcakes. Just see to the right for proof! The coloring set also comes with a gorgeous shade of blue and green. So much fun!!

But back to the champagne cupcakes - so I separated the icing into the Betty recipe (calling for regular champagne) and my fun experiment (with strawberry champagne!). The strawberry champagne, though creative, in combination with the powdered sugar, practically brought cavities on contact with its sweetness! The normal champagne was an interesting flavor - maybe I'm just a sucker for a old fashioned vanilla frosting!

Cupcakin's First - German Chocolate Icing

I love making birthday desserts - and I've recently discovered my love of making cakes (thanks to my new non-stick, Williams-Sonoma 8" pan!) It has taken some practice, but now my cakes don't cave in, causing my med student fiance to re-engineer them using icing as gauze and butter knives as scalpels. What can I say, I'm a cupcake girl - cakes are new to me! This German chocolate cake was my first success.

Now, whether it is a faux pas in the baking world or not, I used the Duncan Heines cake mix for the cake part. People always remark how moist and rich my cakes are when I use their mix. I like it a lot better than Betty Crocker.

To make absolutely sure this cake wouldn't cave in, I cut the tops with a sharp knife to make them perfectly level (not rounded). What that revealed was tiny air-pockets that had formed in the cake's foundation. Upon some investigation, I learned that air pockets not only jeopardize the structural integrity (and thus the likelihood of a cave-in... or cake-in as we bakers might say!) but are also a sign of over-mixing. I always thought that you couldn't go wrong my mixing at a high speed, but apparently, medium speed is best over all - according to Duncan Heines, the alotted time for mixing on medium speed is 2 minutes. Eureka!

While I was letting my cake cool, I moved onto the icing, which was suprisingly complicated and not well-explained online. Here is the recipe I used from Allrecipes.com:

• 1 cup evaporated milk
• 1 cup white sugar
• 3 egg yolk, beaten with 1 teaspoon water
• 1/2 cup margarine (I used butter instead!)
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 1 cup flaked coconut

You are supposed to cook these ingredients in a saucepan over low heat (adding the pecans and coconut after the other ingredients are combined). What I could not seem to get a straight answer online about was how long you cook it or what the consistency should be when it's done. After all, it calls for raw eggs... I don't want to poison the birthday boy!

Here's what I did - I stirred in all ingredients and let it sit on very low heat, stirring it again every 5 minutes. I continued this for 20 minutes, careful to not let the bottom burn. I found the consistency of the above recipes to be a little watery, so I added extra coconut and sugar. This made it very sweet - but that's what you're going for with German Chocolate Cake!

Every stove/oven is different. Allrecipes put the cook time at 15 minutes. I probably cooked mine for 25 minutes total, adding more coconut as needed. Then, I let the entire mix cool completely (for about an hour). Applied it to the cake and refrigerated the cake. It did not melt or lose its structure and still tasted good even though it was refrigerated.

Not sure I would make this again, unless it was specifically requested... it was too sweet for my taste. Maybe if the cake were a straight dark chocolate flavor it would be a richer contrast to the super sweet icing....

Which Store Bought Vanilla Icing Is the Best?

I'm a fan of the vanilla icing - I love the way it tastes on chocolate brownies, smooshed in the middle of a cookie sandwich, and especially slathered thickly on a chocolate cupcake. I like it because it is quick and easy to make - requiring, at its core, four simple ingredients: confectioner's sugar, milk, butter, and vanilla. Not to mention you can dye it any color of the rainbow to dress up any holiday treat (like pink for every day of the year!).

What happens when you don't feel like standing on your feet for another 10 minutes to whip up the delicious topping? You reach for the back-up icing... oh, you know what I'm talking about - the icing that you keep at the back of your cabinet or fridge for a rainy day... the day when you have company but decide to pass off the easy alternative as your own!

Good thing you have me here to tell you that when it comes to store bought vanilla icing, you're better off sucking it up and making your own. I'm not talking about other flavored white icings like buttercream or cream cheese or funfetti - I'm talking about plain ol' vanilla.

Here to take up spoons in the name of science is my sister, Kristie, ever the scientist and scholar, who insisted that a blind taste test be conducted! Hardcore, I know. This is what we found:

Betty Crocker "Rich & Creamy" Vanilla:
Cupcakin' It Up's choice!
Appearance - yellow tinge to color, smooth, moist looking
Texture - powderiness that held fast in the after-taste
Taste - buttery, mild, powder-taste
Notes - Although Betty Crocker beat out the others for taste, the texture seemed off to me.

Duncan Hines "Home-style Classic" Vanilla:
Appearance - whitest, least shiny
Texture - stiffest, lack of creaminess
Taste - bitter after-taste, plasticy
Notes - Kristie thought this was the worst!

Pillsbury "Whipped Supreme" Vanilla:
Appearance - smooth, slimy-looking
Texture - syrupy, sugar crunched in your mouth, and the texture seemed to stick in my throat
Taste - sweet, syrupy
Notes - I thought this one was the worst! As a side note, I also thought the Pillsbury chocolate was the weakest in the last taste test - this time it was a blind taste in which I didn't know the results to the end, so it's not the brand I'm repulsed by, it's the quality.

Overall, I was very disappointed. It's hard to believe that you could mess up vanilla icing. But that's the difference between making it with a machine and sitting on a shelf and making it with love and sitting in your tummy right away. Do yourself and your guests a favor next time you feel tempted to purchase "the backup icing" - make your own! It doesn't take long, and you'll knock the lids off of any commercial icing competitor.

Which Store Bought Milk Chocolate Icing Is the Best?

There comes a time in every baker's life in which dessert must be (gasp!) thrown together quickly. In these times of panic, it is sometimes necessary to reach for the comfort and ease of store bought icing. But which one to choose? No fear, Cupcakin' It Up is here!

It is a dirty job, but someone must finally answer the age-old question - Which Store Bought Chocolate Icing Is the Best?

This is the first in a series of sweet analysis of store-bought icings, in which texture, appearance, and taste are evaluated - look for the baby detective to identify the blog posts about cupcake science! I believe in the scientific method in my dessert rationalization, and thus three brands and three people are involved in the testing process. Each time, one non-sugar addicted person (usually a boy!) will be involved to level the sugar playing field and give more well-rounded results. Here is what I discovered...

Betty Crocker: two thumbs up, one thumb down
Appearance - most homemade-looking, light in color, powdery, dry cracked surface
Texture - powder-base tasting, grainy, rougher than the others
Taste - mild flavor, most milk chocolate tasting
Notes - The one sugar-adverse taste-tester loved this one so much that he licked the whole knife! My other taste tester, Christyn from Bead Up! loved this one because it tasted the most "milk chocolaty" to her and she dislikes dark chocolate.

Duncan Hines: one thumb up, two thumbs down
*Cupcakin' It Up's choice!*
Appearance - smooth, medium color, thick to swirl
Texture - creamy, thick, easily spreadable
Taste - rich, sweet and creamy, great after taste that lingers on the palette
Notes - To me, the richness in flavor conjured the nostalgia for a simpler, yet vivid time - when my mom would make brownies with frosting during a thunder storm and we would watch old Disney movies... oh yes, I got all that from a knife lick. haha. To each their own!

Pillsbury (full sugar): one thumb up, one thumb down, one thumb in the middle
Appearance - syrupy looking, plastic-y
Texture - firm, choppy to swirl
Taste - cheap, very rich
Notes - Even though it was milk chocolate, it tasted rich - dark in chocolate but not in quality. It was like eating Hershey's over Cadbury or Ghirardelli. Although I am a fan of the white cake Pillsbury white cake and funfetti mixes and even their frozen biscuits, they just can't get the icing right or up to a high enough standard compared to competitors.

Pillsbury Reduced Sugar: three thumbs down! ick!
Appearance - plastic looking and terrible smelling
Texture - not as firm as its sugar counterpart but almost too fluffy airy, fake icing
Taste - tasted like rancid plastic, horrible after taste
Notes - Don't do this to your cake or your guests! I mean if you're eating cake/brownies/etc, go for the real thing!

What brand of chocolate are you a fan of? Stay tuned for the vanillas, buttercreams, and alternative flavors analysis in weeks to come!

Bubble, bubble, project and trouble!

When I woke up on Monday morning, I could feel a project brewing - with the summer season coming to a rapid close and fall just around the corner. So, naturally, I decided to skip my weekend chores and go to Michael's to ponder the possibilities. The moment I walked in the door, I saw a plastic pumpkin patch littered with tastefully placed fall leaves and smelled the crisp scent of pumpkin spice candles on sale for $4... sigh... sale... oh the sweet smell of sale!

Now, just to give you a frame of reference, I'm the kind of girl who puts up her Christmas decorations the day after Halloween and celebrates every holiday with a uniquely decorated muffin cup. So, I was not at all put off by the prospect of a Halloween project - though seeing the wall of holiday wreathes and the isle of sparkly winter bangles did make me do a double take! Wasn't it just last week that I was sweltering in my apartment and sitting by a pool, ready to celebrate the summer?!

I turned to the baking isle for guidance. There, I was greeted by assorted cookie cutters for Thanksgiving and Halloween - the creepy (skulls!) and the cute! - plus cooking pans that held endless options of accompanying Halloween muffin cups. I had a brief lapse of self-restraint as I threw a sparkly black icing tube into the cart, rationalizing that it could be used for more than just adorable spiderweb cupcakes. I still don't know how I feel about a haunted gingerbread house... I think it might be a fun use of candy...

But the question remains: what could I rationalize making that would be fun and potentially useful? Perhaps a Halloween wreath or trying my hand at pumpkin spice bread... the possibilities are endless. This week, I will explore some edible options! Let me know if you have any inspired ideas to welcome the Fall!

Pink is the new Vanilla!

Ever since I attended that Cupcakes, Cocktails, and Cosmetics Yelp Event where they had bubble-gum pink colored icing on the mini cupcakes, I've been thinking... ok, dreaming!... about pink icing. Why would you ever have white icing when your icing could be pink?! Thus, I have take a cue from Elle Woods (Legally Blond - the captain of the pink!), and have created the saying for us cupcaketeers: Pink is the new Vanilla! Yes, I think there might need to be a bumper sticker.

Here to prove my point, I give you a tribute to all that is cutely PINK! Be inspired. Don't be vanilla!


Courtesy of Cakerella


Courtesy of Katie's Kitchen


Courtesy of KnitXcor


Courtesy of Gingerbread Fun


Courtesy of For Cake Sake


Courtesy of Madi Moo Designs

Perfectly Pink!! There's no such thing as too much pink! Got any awesome pink creations? Email me at cupcakinitup@gmail.com

Icing, Icing Baby!

Ok, so I tried this Buttercream Icing recipe that I found randomly online over the July 4th weekend - most of the buttercream recipes I found were much like this one, calling for shortening and butter... so I tried it:








Buttercream Dream Icing
Ingredients
1 stick salted butter - room temperature
1 stick unsalted butter - room temperature
1 cup shortening
1 tablespoon Clear Vanilla extract
2 pounds confectioner's sugar (powdered sugar, 10x)
4-6 tablespoons very cold milk

Directions
Cream the butter and shortening in the bowl of an electric or stand mixer. Add the clear vanilla extract and combine well. Begin adding in the sugar and mixing thoroughly after each addition. After all of the sugar has been added and mixed thoroughly, begin adding the very cold milk... one tablespoon at a time, combining very well after each addition (mixer on medium-high to high speed) until you reach the desired consistency.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In comparison with my own icing recipe:
1 pound of confectioner's sugar
1/2 stick of butter
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
Whole milk to get to desired consistency

- Which I made at the same time, I personally found that adding shortening with butter made it kind of greasy in taste-tecture. The spreading consistency of the online buttercream recipe was much more even than my recipe, but it wasn't as sweet. Anyone else have good icing recipes?