birthday 2007!

My lovely and completely kick-ass husband made me a cake for my birthday. It is two layers of chocolate cake, with a layer of Krispy Kreme doughnuts in between. Mmm. He’s not usually a cake baker, or really a baker of any kind. That would be me. Oh, and he found a Playmobil “me” at a teacher supply store, with a corresponding modern-ish bed and lamp. Fantastic! He also gave me amazing, thoughtful gifts, as did my friends and family. And we saw Spiderman 3.  I’ll save my opinions on that for later.  Thank you to everyone for making my birthday wonderful!  Tomorrow is Birthday: Part II. We’re going to Shedd Aquarium and then Sean’s taking me to Lula Cafe for dinner. Yeah, it’s pretty awesome. He’s really good at birthdays.

!!!

Update: We have now eaten the cake.  It is really, really delicious.  And the inside of it is pretty.  The layers are even and the cross-section is perfect.  Seriously.  I originally thought it would be one of those “I love it because you made it” kind of situations, but cake + doughnuts = something more people should eat.  That will keep America thin! 

I am the way, the truth, & the Muffin

Yes, it’s true. This Muffin is the son of God.  It is the holy Raspberry Cream Cheese Muffin made and created by your truly.  I mean God.  Whatever.  I get us confused.  It was immaculately conceived??  However it got here, it rules the world with truth and grace.

Up until recently, I managed a bakery in Chicago. Over the years I have picked up a wealth of “odds and ends” baking information and it’s helped in my home baking a lot. We used to make sour cream buns at the bakery a long time ago, so I looked over that recipe, reduced it from about 30 batches to one, then made some substitutions. They weren’t always perfect in the beginning, but now they rule. These are my favorite muffins of all time.

preheat oven to 350 degrees and gather round:

• 1 3/4 C. all-purpose flour
• 1 t. baking soda
• 1/2 t. baking powder
• 1/2 t. salt
• 1 8 oz. package cream cheese, softened
• 1 stick butter, also softened
• 1 C. sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 t. vanilla
• 1/4 C. milk
• 1/2 pint of fresh raspberries (may be substituted with blackberries, blueberries, or other fresh fruit)

Grease and flour or release spray a 12 cup muffin tin. 

In a medium bowl, mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.  Set aside.

In the bowl of a mixer, beat cream cheese, butter and sugar together until fluffy (2 minutes or so).  Add vanilla and eggs, one at a time.  Add the dry ingredients, alternating with the milk until well combined. 

Fill muffin cups halfway.  Add 3-4 raspberries to layer of batter.  Fill remainder of cups with batter.  Press 2-3 additional raspberries into the top layer of batter until covered.  Make sure fruit is covered by batter and not exposed to heat. 

Bake 20-25 minutes, until golden and top springs back when lightly tapped. 

When removed from the pan, cool upside down on a wire rack.  The inside of the muffin is malleable when warm, so invert only when cooled completely.

Enjoy! 

Update: These look great with sanding sugar sprinkled on top before baking.  It gives them a much more finished look. 

sweet potato casserole muffins

Okay! So these are good muffins. Good, not great. They are from the Cupcake Doctor book, so the base ingredient of the muffin is from a cinnamon swirl mix. This is one of the exceptions where the add-ins are disappointing for the time they require. That is my doing, though. The recipe calls for canned sweet potato, but I much prefer to boil and mash the sweet potato. I hate canned foods. I really do wish the add-ins had left more flavor. I’m not even leaving the recipe here because of it–just use the mix. The topping were cute–cinnamon and sugar, chopped pecans, and mini marshmallows. They added a lot for the presentation. Overall, these were good, cute muffins, but just go buy the mix and save yourself some time!

April Fools’ Cupcakes

Oh strawberry cupcakes, how I adore you!  I know you’re a fake flavor, like grape soda, but I love you for that very reason.  I am a self-professed food snob and still you–least classy cupcakes ever–are irresistable.  I especially love your Spiderman cupcake liners and leftover Valentines non-pareils.  You make me happy, even though you are mostly disgusting.  Almost a joke.

For cupcakes, use strawberry cake mix and bake accordingly.  I don’t usually make a mix without adding something to it, but thse are the exception.    

For chocolate whipped cream:

• 1 C. (1/2 pint) heavy whipping cream
• 2 1/2 T. granulated sugar
• 5 T. dutch-process cocoa, sifted
• 1/2 t. vanilla extract

Combine ingredients in mixing bowl and stir to dissolve sugar.  Cover and chill ingredients (still in mixing bowl) and whisk for one hour.

Whip on high speed until desired consistency is achieved.  After cupcakes are completely cooled, top with the whipped cream.  Decorate if needed. 

Eat five of them all at once!  Just kidding, more than two would make you sick from all the whipped cream.  Enjoy!

cookies and cream cupcakes

Yesterday was my mother-in-law’s birthday, so I needed to whip up something easy yet substantial.  I headed over to my friend Natalie’s baking blog, Bake and Destroy, to find the perfect recipe.  The cookies and cream cupcakeswere a perfect fit.  Crushed oreos folded into white cake batter, more oreos mixed into the icing, and an oreo half baked into the cupcake (placed in the bottom of the liner before baking).  The only change I made was using double stuf oreos and keeping all of the icing on one side for the cookies in the bottom.  So delicious…they were gone in two days.