Tiramisu cupcakes and Jello Shots!

Unfortunately, working for a bank means rarely having a 2 day consecutive weekend and being married to a fellow banker means its pretty much unlikely that we can both get the same weekends off to plan a "weekend getaway". So when Mike and I get those rare opportunities to both have a 3 day holiday weekend off we make plans! That was the case this past weekend for Presidents Day. Mike and I drove out to Arizona to visit our friends, Chris and Michelle. Like me, Michelle loves cupcakes so it should be no surprise that on top of hanging out and having fun we BAKED SOME CUPCAKES!

That's right, we made cupcakes. But not just any old cupcakes, tiramisu cupcakes. If you haven't ever had tiramisu or don't know what it is then i suggest you RUN to your nearest store and buy some now! Hahaha. All jokes aside, I love tiramisu. Its an Italian cake dessert. Basically, it's made of ladyfingers soaked in coffee and liquor, layered with a whipped mixture of egg yolks and mascarpone and dusted with cocoa powder. Obviously we were going to have to tweak the design a little to make in a cupcake form but the end result was AMAZING. Keep in mind that I don't typically declare my own cupcakes to be "amazing" simply because I am always very critical of what I bake and am pretty sure I can always improve in some aspect. With that said, I still believe these cupcakes were AMAZING!!!

What You'll Need


Tiramisu Cupcakes
recipe adapted from The Cupcake Project's Tiramisu Cupcakes

6 egg yolks
3/4 cup sugar
2/3 cup milk
1 1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 lb mascarpone cheese
1 cup strong brewed coffee, room temperature
2 tbsp rum
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tbsp butter
dark chocolate (to make chocolate curls, optional)
ladyfingers baked in cupcake wrappers (see recipe below)

Homemade Ladyfingers
2 eggs, separated
1/3 cup + 1 tbsp sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/4 tsp baking powder


1. First things first, brew 1 cup of coffee and allow to come to room temperature.
2. In a saucepan, melt dark chocolate and butter over medium-low heat until smooth. Line a small, deep pan such as a bread pan with aluminum foil and pour melted chocolate on top of the aluminum. Place in refrigerator and allow to harden.
3. Next, In a medium saucepan, whisk the egg yolks and sugar together until combined. Slowly add milk and cook over medium heat . Stir occasionally until mixture comes to a boil. Allow mixture to boil for a minute then remove from heat. Cover tightly and chill in refrigerator for about an hour.

Next up, homemade ladyfingers! Preheat oven to 400F and line cupcake tin with cupcake liners.

4. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and baking powder.
5. In another bowl, beat egg whites on high until soft peaks form. Slowly add 1 tbsp of the sugar and keep beating until they are stiff and glossy.
6. In another bowl, beat the egg yolks and remaining sugar until they become very pale in color.
7. Fold half the egg whites into the egg yolk mixture. Fold in the flour, then the remaining egg whites.
8. Evenly spoon a small amount of the batter into the cupcake liners and bake for 8 minutes. This will be the ladyfinger base of the tiramisu cupcake so you want to make sure there will be enough room on top of the ladyfingers for the mascarpone and whipped cream.

9. Remove the egg yolk mixture from the refrigerator and whisk in mascarpone until smooth, set aside.
10. In a bowl, beat whipping cream and vanilla until stiff peaks form, set aside.
11. In a small bowl, combine coffee and rum. Slowly pour several spoonfuls of the coffee/rum mixture over each ladyfinger, allowing it time to soak into the cake until it stops absorbing.
12. Spread the mascarpone over each soaked ladyfinger.

13. Spoon a dollop of whipped cream on top of the mascarpone.
14. Sprinkle with cocoa powder.
15. Remove the chocolate from the freezer and make chocolate curls using a vegetable peeler. If the curls easily break allow chocolate to warm up slightly. I find this technique works best if the chocolate is at room temperature. Place several of the curls on top of each cupcake.
16. Cover and refrigerate for several hours, until set.

As i said above, these were amazingly good! So good in fact, I don't have a single complaint about them and will definitely be making these again! 

While in Arizona we also made some fun jello shots! A few weeks ago I found a cute recipe for birthday cake jello shots on a website that I follow called Sweet Tooth and posted it on Facebook. It seems that recently a whole bunch of fun flavored vodkas have come out such as birthday cake, whipped cream, and even toasted marshmallow. In the past it seemed like only obscure brands such as 3 Olives, Pinnacle, and Frost made these yummy flavors, but even Smirnoff has recently come out with them. As a surprise for me, Chris and Michelle got all the required ingredients so that we could make them...

What You'll Need

Birthday Cake Jello Shots

recipe adapted from Sweet Tooth's Birthday Cake Jello Shots

2/3 cup cream soda

2/3 cup cranberry juice

1 tbsp heavy cream

2 envelopes plain gelatin

2/3 cup cake flavored vodka

few drops of food coloring, if desired

whipped cream

sprinkles

mini cake silicone mold

1. Lightly spray mold with non-stick spray and wipe excess off so it doesn't affect the taste of the jello.

2. Pour the soda, juice, and cream into a saucepan. Sprinkle the gelatin on top and allow it to soak into the liquid for a couple minutes. Then turn the heat on low and stir until the gelatin is fully dissolved, approximately 5 minutes.

3. Remove from heat and add vodka and food coloring.

4. Pour into mold and chill in refrigerator for several hours until set.

5. Remove from mold. Top with whipped cream and sprinkles

These jello shots were delicious and we all had quite a few. In all honestly, they are going to get you drunk or even really buzzed but they are cute and very tasty. These will also be a repeat recipe...

Ultimate Vanilla Challenge

Most people who know me know that I would love to own my own bakery and it goes with out saying that I bake A LOT!! But one day my mom said to me "you should probably start figuring out some signature flavors". Well, she is totally right! I can't open my own bakery and not have a menu full of my own recipes. So I have decided to start with the most basic cupcake: vanilla. Yes, I have set out to find the very best vanilla cupcake and won't stop until it is perfect. I don't think that's too much to ask for, do you? For my first experiment i thought i'd try a recipe that claims to be "The Ultimate Vanilla Cupcake".

What You'll Need

The Ultimate Vanilla Cupcake
recipe adapted from The Cupcake Project's Ultimate Vanilla Cupcake

1 cup of sugar
1 vanilla bean
1 3/4 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup unsalted butter
2 large eggs
1/3 cup sour cream
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 tblsp vanilla
2/3 cup milk

First i made vanilla sugar by combining the sugar with the vanilla bean. Personally, I love vanilla sugar and generally have some around the house but happened to be out. In fact, when I use vanilla beans i put the left over bean pod in either my vanilla sugar of homemade vanilla extract. Those darn beans cost so much i'm determined to get the max use out of them!! Now, for those of you who have never worked with real vanilla beans before, have no fear, it is quite simple. Just lay the bean out on a flat surface and use a sharp knife to cut open the bean running along the entire length. Once open, scrape down the inside of the bean with the dull side of the knife. This will scrape out all the tiny little flecks of vanilla. Those tiny little flecks are what you want, not the pod. If you have it, you can substitute vanilla bean paste but you won't need as much because it is highly concentrated.

I then mixed together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Then I added the vanilla sugar. Then I added the butter and mixed it until it formed a crumb like texture. In a separate bowl, i whisked together the eggs, sour cream, oil and vanilla. I then mixed the egg and flour mixture together until they were just combined. Then I slowly added in the milk. This resulted in what looked like and extremely liquidy batter, but the recipe said that was how it should look so i trusted it.

I filled the the cupcake liners a little over half full and baked them at 350 for about 17-18 minutes. The original recipe said they would only need approximately 15 minutes but when i inserted a toothpick into them at 15 minutes they were still fairly wet. Once they were completely done, i flipped them out onto a cooling rack and started on the frosting. **I'd like to mention that I LOVE using real vanilla beans because i think all the little flecks look pretty in the cupcake!

For the frosting I decided to try a vanilla buttercream recipe that came from the same site as the cupcakes. I typically don't make buttercreams and prefer to make cream cheese frostings but that is what the author said as well. She even went as far as to say that this was one of her favorite frostings and tasted like melted vanilla ice cream. So i though, "This, I have to try!".

What You'll Need

Vanilla Bean Buttercream Frosting

recipe adapted from The Cupcake Project's Vanilla Bean Buttercream Frosting

1 1/2 cup powdered sugar (you can add more until the frosting reaches your preferred consistency)

1/2 cup unsalted butter

2 tsp vanilla bean paste

1 tblsp milk

Mix together the sugar and butter until they are creamy.Then add the vanilla bean paste and milk. You can add more sugar if the frosting isn't as thick as you'd like it.

After I make frostings I ALWAYS stick my finger in it and have a little sample before i frost my cupcakes. Let me just say that the woman from The Cupcake Project was correct, this is melted vanilla ice cream in my your mouth!! It is so sweet but yet so amazingly delicious! And just like the cupcakes, the little flecks of vanilla only added to my enchantment. 

Now for the fun part... frosting the cupcakes. Since the frosting was pretty sweet i decided that you wouldn't need a huge swirl of frosting on top (and I couldn't find my 1A tip anyways) so I opted to use a 1M (large closed star) tip and just put a dollop on top of each cupcake.

And because I am a perfectionist I decided to spruce them up a little bit and sprinkle some edible gold dust on top to add some pizazz! **Shout out to my sister, Alana, for buying me the "disco dust"!

First things first, these were good cupcakes! I must say they were tasty, light and fluffy, and moist. And the frosting was literally the icing on the cake. All my coworkers said they were delicious and couldn't believe they were eating gold dust! With that said, I'm not convinced this was "The Ultimate Vanilla Cupcake". I don't know what it is that i'm missing but it just didn't scream out Amazing Vanilla to me. Never the less, this is a good vanilla cake that i'd recommend anyone try.

Boozy Cupcakes

This year for Superbowl, Mike and I hosted a party at our place. Mike was pretty excited about it and decided he was going to make his own buffalo wings; he even busted out the deep fryer! Naturally, I had to bake something equally as awesome. After browsing through many ideas I decided to make a beer cupcake in honor of the beer filled event. But because I can't do anything simple i decided that I would make not one but TWO beer cupcakes!!

Let me rewind a little and talk about how I stumbled onto these fabulously boozy cupcake recipes... Ever since I started blogging about my baking experience I have started reading other baking blogs that I find interesting. My absolute favorite is a blog called The Cupcake Project (www.cupcakeproject.com). Trust me, if you love all things cupcakes you will adore this blog! Another blog I have recently began to follow is called Sweet Tooth (www.ericasweettooth.com). This girl not only has some good cupcake ideas but also makes some pretty awesome jello shots. As soon as I have a party to go to you better believe I am going to be making tons of jello shots!! Anyways, I found my recipes on this second blog.

Now back to the cupcakes! As I said, I made 2 different beer cupcakes: Blue Moon and Corona. As excited as I was about these cupcakes, I must say I was a little worried about the flavor. Don't get me wrong, I love adding alcohol to baked goods and think they generally taste delicious but I wasn't sure how beer would translate into baking. For the frostings I made an Orange Cream Cheese frosting for the Blue Moon cake and a Lime Cream Cheese Frosting for the Corona cake. I really only need 2 bottles of each beer though so Mike lucked out and got to drink all the rest!

On a side note, I want to introduce my new Sous Chef, Jen!! She came over and helped me bake (and drink, and clean my fridge out!!!). I'm thinking I may need to get her an apron of her own so that she doesn't have to wear my Christmas apron in February! :)

Blue Moon and Corona Cupcakes

For the beer cupcakes: 

3/4 cups butter, at room temperature

1-3/4 cup sugar

2-1/2 cup flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

3 eggs, at room temperature

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp orange or lime zest

1 cup Blue Moon or Corona beer, plus more for brushing on tops

1/4 cup milk

Orange/lime wedges and sanding sugar for garnish

- Preheat oven to 375 degrees and line 24 muffin tins with cupcake liners.

- In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.

- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes.

- Add eggs, beating after each addition then add the vanilla and zest.

- Combine milk and beer and alternatively add this mixture and the flour mixture to the butter/sugar mixture with the mixer on low speed, starting and ending with the flour.  

- Fill the cupcake liners 2/3 full and bake for 18 minutes, or until cake tester comes out clean.

- When cupcakes are done, poke holes in the tops of the cupcakes with toothpicks and brush some beer on each while still warm.  

For the citrus cream cheese frosting:

12 oz cream cheese, cold

6 tbsp butter, at room temperature

1 tbsp freshly squeezed orange/lime juice

1 tsp orange/lime zest

4 cups powdered sugar

- Cream together the cream cheese and butter in an electric mixer until smooth and creamy, about 2-3 minutes.  

- Add the citrus juice and zest and gradually add the powdered sugar until well-combined.  Beat until smooth for about 2 minutes.

- Load frosting in a piping bag and pipe cupcake tops once cooled.  

To stick with the theme I used yellow wrappers for the Corona cakes and blue wrappers for the Blue Moon cakes. For the frosting I used a large star tip and sprinkled the tops with green sprinkles and orange sprinkles, respectively. I then finished the cupcakes with a wedge of a lime and orange.

Overall I thought the cupcakes turned out really good. The beer wasn't too overpowering, it was just enough to give a hint of flavor and the citrus frostings balanced out the flavors perfectly! I personally preferred the Blue Moon cupcakes but that could just be my preference in beer. Everyone at the Superbowl party seemed to enjoy them as well so I'd say they were a success!