Chocolate Cupcakes with Blue Icing

My sister-in-law asked me to make cupcakes for her little Andrew's first birthday. At first I had all these creative ideas of how I could make the cutest cupcakes but in the end... I went to my old go-to chocolate recipe and iced them with blue icing and blue sugar crystals. They turned out way cute though!

My go-to fast and delicious chocolate cupcake recipe:

1 (18.25 oz.) pkg. chocolate cake mix
1 (3.4 oz.) pkg. instant chocolate pudding
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup warm water
1/3 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups mini semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except chocolate chips. Mix 2 minutes on medium speed. Increase speed to medium-high; mix 3 minutes. Stir in chocolate chips. Spoon into cupcake pans lined with cupcake cups. Bake 20 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean and cool.
And look how cute little Andrew is.... :)

Homemade Marshmallow Fondant

After I made the red velvet cupcakes I thought I'd try my hand at fondant making. I found this recipe online from Allrecipes.com
Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter
1 (16 ounce) package miniature marshmallows
4 tablespoons water 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 pounds confectioners' sugar, divided
Directions:
Place the butter in a shallow bowl, and set aside. Place the marshmallows in a large microwave-safe bowl, and microwave on High for 30 seconds to 1 minute to start melting the marshmallows. Carefully stir the water and vanilla extract into the hot marshmallows, and stir until the mixture is smooth. Slowly beat in the confectioners' sugar, a cup at a time, until you have a sticky dough. Reserve 1 cup of powdered sugar for kneading. The dough will be very stiff.
Rub your hands thoroughly with butter, and begin kneading the sticky dough. As you knead, the dough will become workable and pliable. Turn the dough out onto a working surface dusted with confectioners' sugar and continue kneading until the fondant is smooth and no longer sticky to the touch, 5 to 10 minutes.
Form the fondant into a ball, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight. To use, allow the fondant to come to room temperature, and roll it out onto a flat surface dusted with confectioners' sugar.
It was super fun working with the fondant and it tasted really good too!

Red Velvet

Why is Red Velvet all the sudden so popular? I'm not going to lie. Red Velvet has never been my first choice. I feel like it tastes like a really dull chocolate. If you are going to encorporate chocolate then why not just make chocolate cupcakes?! Any way just my opinion... :)
So, when my sister mentioned that maybe it would be fun to do Red Velvet cupcakes for her wedding I was not uber excited. But... I decided to find a recipe that looked promising and give it a try. The recipe I found acutally didn't call for any chocolate so I was excited to see how they turned out. Here is the link for the recipe I used. http://thecreativityexchange.blogspot.com/2011/08/most-amazing-red-velvet-cake-recipe.html
Amazingly enough they actually tasted pretty good. The down side was that you use a whole big bottle of red food coloring per batch and it costs about $5 a bottle! We decided to not make these for the wedding but they were fun to make and pretty. :)

I LOVED how they came out of the oven. So perfect. I've never had cupcakes make such perfect little domes before. They reminded me of snow cones. :)

Blog Post Slacker...

Wow, So I tell you I'm going to perfect my cupcake making skill and then I totally fell off the face of the earth. :) No worries! I have been baking, just not posting. Bear with me while I try and get this blog caught up!

Week One - Zucchini-Spice Cupcakes

Does anyone else out there have zucchini coming out of their ears right about now? Well my parents do and everytime we go over there they are trying to bribe us to take more home with us. :) This is why my first recipe for my new project is for Zucchini-Spice Cupcakes. I was a little hesitant at first at putting a vegetable into my favorite treat and Canyon thought that the batter looked disgusting. But... they were actually pretty good. :) Here's the recipe.

Zucchini-Spice Cupcakes

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1 cup oil

2 large eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla

3/4 teaspoon grated lemon zest

2 cups packed brown sugar

3 cups packed grated zucchini

1 cup walnuts coarsely chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. In another bowl, whisk together oil, eggs, vanilla and zest until well blended; whisk in brown sugar until smooth. Stir in zucchini, then add flour mixture and stir unitl just combined. Stir in walnuts.

Divide batter evenly among lined muffin tin cups, filling each 3/4 full. Bake 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature

8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature

3 cups confectioners sugar

3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Milk if needed

Beat butter and cream cheese until fluffy, add sugar and vanilla and mix until smooth. Add milk if the consistency is too thick. Frost cooled cupcakes.

New Project...

Really? February 18, 2010? I have baked cupcakes since then... many times. I'm not going to lie. Life has been pretty crazy and I've neglected this blog. And my other blogs as well. BUT... Guess what? Something very exciting has happened in the Facer household. Drum roll please... I QUIT MY JOB! :) And now I have more time to be at home taking care of my little munchkins, taking care of business in my Etsy store and baking cupcakes! :) I've decided that since I am going to have more time on my hands it would be fun to work on one of my favorite cullinary hobbies. Baking Cupcakes!
My Mom bought be this lovely cookbook a couple birthdays ago and I decided it would be fun to bake my way through it. So in the forseeable future I will be taking on cupcakes a recipe a week and blogging my way along. :) I hope you enjoy!

Coconut Cupcakes

3/4 pound (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

2 cups sugar

5 extra-large eggs at room temperature

1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1 1/2 teaspoons pure almond extract

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup buttermilk

14 ounces sweetened, shredded coconut

For the frosting:

1 pound cream cheese at room temperature

3/4 pound (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract

1 1/2 pounds confectioners' sugar, sifted

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. With the mixer on low speed, add the eggs, 1 at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition. Add the vanilla and almond extracts and mix well.In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In 3 parts, alternately add the dry ingredients and the buttermilk to the batter, beginning and ending with the dry. Mix until just combined. Fold in 7 ounces of coconut.Line a muffin pan with paper liners. Fill each liner to the top with batter. Bake for 25 to 35 minutes, until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Remove to a baking rack and cool completely.Meanwhile, make the frosting. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, on low speed, cream together the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla and almond extracts. Add the confectioners' sugar and mix until smooth.Frost the cupcakes and sprinkle with the remaining coconut.