Coconut Cupcakes

I am ALIIIVE!!!

Alright, my oven has been fixed. And just ion time for my housemate's birthday!

She wanted cupcakes and she told me to surprise her with anything but chocolate. All I knew was that she liked coconut, so coconut cupcakes it was! And I found an amazing recipe for these litte jems. They were moist, light and super delicious!

I also had some pictures, but the camera has been taken across the country by my mother, so I'll add them in when she returns.

EDIT: The camera has returned!

Here's the pictures from my coconut cupcakes...

And here's the recipe (from 125 Best Cupcake Recipes, by Julie Hasson):

Coconut Cupcakes
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sweetened shredded/flaked coconut
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt (only if using unsalted butter)
6 tablespoons butter, softened
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
3 egg whites
1 cup buttermilk ( if you don't have buttermilk, use 1 cup of regular milk and mix in 2 teaspoon of distilled white vinegar, let sit for a few minutes before using)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
2. spread coconut evenly over a cookie sheet and toast in oven for about 5 minutes or until they are slightly brouwn, watch them carefully or they will burn! set aside to cool.
3. In a small mixing bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt (if needed.)
4. In a seperate, larger bowl, beat the butter until smooth, add in sugar and beat until light and smooth. Add egg whites one at a time, beating them in completely after each addition.
5. Add cooled coconut to flour mixture and pour half into the butter mixture. Mix well.
6. Pour buttermilk into the nowl and mix until completely combined.
7. Add in the rest of the flour mixture and mix until smooth.
8. Scoop into lined cupcake pans and bake for 20-25 minutes.
9. When cupcake are finished (a toothpick poked into the center of a cupcak in the middle of the pan comes out clean) remove from oven and let cool.

Frosting: If you like lots of frosting, this recipe can easily be multiplied.
Ingredients

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature (for buttercream, you need to use unsalted butter for the right taste)
pinch of salt (a tiny pinch, mind you)
3 cups confectioner's/powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 cup sweetened shredded/flaked coconut

1. In a mixer, cream the butter (don't use the wisk! only the paddle attachment or a wooden spoon for those doing it by hand) until smooth and light. Add sugar and salt, beat until light and fluffy, add vanilla and beat until completely smooth. If the frosting is too thick, add 1/4 cup milk and beat until smooth.
2. In a shallow bowl or small plate, spread out the coconut.
3. Frost your cupcakes, then simply turn them puside down and dip into the coconut, making sure to completely coat the top. Repeat with all of the cupcakes, then unwrap one and eat it!

I really like this recipe and I might try to turn them into Pina Colada cupcakes. We'll see...

Tin Tin surprise

So this past Sunday was my mother's birthday. She's Belgian and a HUGE fan of TinTin.

For anyone who doesn't know who TinTin is, he's a comic book sleuth, and very famous throughout Europe. The comic series originated in Belgium around the 1930's.

Here's a quick peek of the characters:

TinTin and his trusty sidekick, Snowy (Milou in the original french version)

The characters I used for my mom's gift are the five in the middle. Starting on the left, the bearded man in the blue sweater is Captain Haddock, then TinTin, Snowy and the identical not-brothers Dupond and Dupont (in english, they're called Thompson and Thomson.)I made fondant silouettes of the character's profiles and put them on cupcakes.


My mom was pretty psyched about the whole thing, bringing them in to the office to show them off to all of her co-workers. Mission birthday present was a success!

I used mocha cupcakes with coffee buttercream. The cupcakes were a little lacking, but the buttercream was a definate keeper! On the sweet side, but you can always use less sugar than the recipe calls for.

Ingredients

1 cup unsalted butter, room temp
3 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon instant coffee granules
4 tablespoons hot water

Cream the butter until smooth. In a smaller bowl, dissolve coffee granules in the hot water. Slowly add sugar 1 cup at a time to butter, alternating with sugar, vanilla, sugar, coffee, and finally sugar. Mix until smooth and spread onto cooled cupcakes of your choice.

This frosting is pretty sweet, so make sure to ice your cupcakes in moderation.

I wish I had some coffee beans to decorate these with! Alas, but oh well.

That's all for now!

Red Velvet Awesome!

This past Saturday was a good friend's birthday, and his request was red velvet cupcakes.

Now, I've tried some red velvet recipes in the past, only to get less than pleasing results. But I was willing to try once again, and apparently the recipe gods heard my wish, because I found one heck of an amazing recipe! And even some pretty awesome icing to top them with.

The sprinkles are just tiny red circles that I got in a winter sprinkles collection, the were called red winterberries, I believe. Pretty snazzy, eh?

And yes, I will share this amazing recipe!

Red Velvet Cupcakes

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour (or all purpose flour)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt (only if using unsalted butter)
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1 oz. red food coloring
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature (if you don’t have any buttermilk, you can take 1
cup of milk, add 1 teaspoon of distilled white vinegar, mix and let sit for ten minutes.)
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon baking soda

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two 12-cup muffin tins or silicone pans with cupcake liners.

2. Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl and set aside. In a smaller bowl, sift cocoa powder and mix in food coloring to form a thin paste without lumps and set aside.

3. In a large bowl, using a wooden spoon or stand mixer, beat butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about three minutes. Beat in eggs, one at a time, then beat in vanilla and the red cocoa paste, scraping down the bowl with a spatula as you go. Add one third of the flour mixture to the butter mixture, beat well, then beat in half of the buttermilk. Beat in another third of flour mixture, then second half of buttermilk. End with the last third of the flour mixture, beat until well combined, making sure to scrape down the bowl with a spatula.

4. In a small bowl, mix vinegar and baking soda. Be careful as it will fizz so don't do it in a shallow bowl. Add vinegar mixture to the cake batter and stir well to combine. Fill cupcake cups with cake batter until they are a little under 3/4 full. I use my trusty ice cream scoop. Bake for about 20-22 minutes, rotating pans halfway through. The cupcake are done when you insert a toothpick into a cupcake in the center of the tin and if it comes out clean.

5. Cool the cupcakes in their tins on a wire rack for 10 minutes then remove and allow to cool completely before frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting

This recipe is enough for me to frost about 20 cupcakes, but I frost sparingly, If you like a lot of frosting on your cupcakes, you can double this recipe easily.

1 (8 oz) package of cream cheese, softened
¼ cup butter, softened
2 cups confectioner’s sugar, sifted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Cream together the cream cheese and butter until fluffy and smooth.

2. Mix in the confectioner’s sugar and vanilla extract until smooth.

3. Frost your cupcakes and enjoy!