Apple pie
Oct 4, 2011 Cupcakes Bakery
Fall is definitely here in Vancouver. I love fall and all that comes with it. The colours, cooler weather, bundling up in warmer clothes and covers at night, Halloween and Thanksgiving, apple picking and of course the flavours! To celebrate the arrival of autumn and perhaps cheer up a few friends that are getting down because of the rain, I decided to make apple pie cupcakes this week. I started by baking some apples with brown sugar and cinnamon just like they would inside a pie. Layering them in the cupcake would continue baking them and blend the flavour with the cake. I topped it all off with vanilla icing to recall the simple scoop of vanilla icing that tops a warm apple pie slice. Here is the recipe for 18 cupcakes:
cake:
- 3 apples
- 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- 1/2 tsp of cinnamon
- pinch of salt
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 apple
- 1/2 cup of cream
- 1/2 cup of milk
method:
- preheat the oven to 350
- peel and cut the apples into quarters, place in a skillet or a pan that goes into the oven
- add a 1/4 cup of packed brown sugar and a 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and stir roughly all together
- start cooking the apples on the stove
- when the sugar starts to melt mix everything together a bit more evenly
- when the sugar is completely melted and starts to boil, stir one last time and put in the oven for 20 minutes
- when the apples are done take them out of the oven, stir one last time to cover the apples with the melted sugar and set aside.
- sift the flour, baking powder, 1/2 tsp of cinnamon and salt together and set aside
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the brown and granulated sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- puree the last apple and add it to the butter, sugar, egg mix
- add the flour and combine
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- put half the cupcake batter in the paper cups, then add the cooked apples and then add the rest of the cupcake batter on top covering the apples
- bake for 20 minutes
icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 1 vanilla bean
method:
- combine the egg whites and sugar in a double boiler
- whisk a little until all the sugar is melted away and the eggs reach body temperature
- take off the double boiler and beat on high until it forms a firm meringue
- add the butter one cube at a time while beating on a lower speed
- beat on high until you get a nice fluffy texture (it will turn to a cottage cheese kind of texture about half way through, just keep beating)
- add the vanilla bean
Enjoy 
Tags: 2 Eggs, 3 Apples, Apple 1, Apple Picking, Baking Powder, Brown Sugar, Cupcake, Egg Mix, Flavour, Flavours, Flour, Granulated Sugar, Last Time, Pie Slice, Pinch Of Salt, Scoop, Skillet, Tsp Cinnamon, Vanilla Icing, Warm Apple Pie
Bread, crumb bar and cookies
Jul 16, 2011 Cupcakes Bakery
I’ve had a busy baking week! I baked some banana-blackberry-chocolate chip bread last week. I used this recipe by Joy the Baker, replacing the cranberries with a cup of blackberries and added in 1/2 a cup of chocolate chips, because really, why not! The bread came out great. Everybody loved it and had a hard time stopping eating it!
This weekend, I had a beach bbq and brought dessert. I got a bit carried away and made two! In fact, I got so carried away that I didn’t notice the time fly by and showed up late! I baked some raspberry crumb bar from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking. It was really good as well. I should’ve let it cool longer before putting it in the tupperware though, by the time I got to the beach it had lost part of its bar shapped and turned partly into a crumble. People still loved it and asked for more though, so I’m still calling this one a success!
The other dessert I baked for the bbq was lemon cookies, once again, from Joy the Baker. I just love this blog! They were just the right crunchy/crumblyness to contrast the crumb bar turned crumble. The lemon flavour was light and perfect for a warm summer day in the sun.
Cheers
Tags: banana, Beach Bbq, Blackberries, Blackberry, Bread Crumb, Cheers, Chocolate Bread, Chocolate Chip Bread, Chocolate Chips, Cranberries, Day In The Sun, Dessert, Flavour, Fly, Hard Time, Lemon Cookies, New Frontiers, Raspberry, Time Fly, Tupperware
Tiramisu
May 12, 2011 Cupcakes Bakery
Last week it was a colleague’s birthday and for the third time, I was asked to bake cupcakes! These are the cupcakes of my third baking gig! I have now figured out my prices and will make a special page for orders later this week. Since the colleague in question is Italian, I was asked to make Italian themed cupcakes with possibly three coloured icing with the colours of the Italian flag. I researched traditional Italian desserts and came down to tiramisu as the easiest one to adapt in cupcake form. I made chocolate cake as the base, filled it with tiramisu cream and toped it with expresso icing. I used the tiramisu recipe from the Larousse des dessert by Pierre Herme, but you can use any recipe you like.
Having done 2 flavoured icing earlier the same week, I was ready to tackle a three coloured icing. The trick to getting more than one flavour or colour in one swirl is to put each icing in its own pastry bag and tape them together. Usually, you put the piping tip inside the bag before filing it with icing, but in the situation, you want to put it on the exterior of the bag and tape it. This way all the different icing goes through one piping tip together. As you pipe the icing on the cupcakes, it’s very important to apply even pressure on all the bags or you might end up with only one or uneven colours. I suggest to pipe a bit of icing on a separate plate first until you get all the colours even. This is how it looks.
Here is the recipe for 16 cupcakes.
cake:
- 50g dark chocolate
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 1 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup of cream
- 1/2 cup of milk
method:
- preheat the oven to 350
- melt the chocolate in a double boiler and set aside
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- bake for 20 minutes
icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 140g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 1 tsp of expresso powder
method:
- combine the egg whites and sugar in a double boiler
- whisk a little until all the sugar is melted away
- take off the double boiler and beat on high until cooled and turned into a firm meringue, touch the bottom of the bowl to make sure its at least body temperature
- add the butter one cube at a time while beating on a lower speed
- beat on high until you get a nice fluffy texture (it will turn to a cottage cheese kind of texture about half way through, just keep beating)
- add the expresso powder
Enjoy
Tags: 2 Eggs, Baking Powder, Chocolate Cake, Colleague, Coloured Icing, Cup Sugar, Dark Chocolate, Double Boiler, Flavour, Flour, Italian Flag, Larousse, Pastry Bag, Pierre Herme, pierre herme tiramisu, Pinch Of Salt, Piping, Third Time, Tiramisu Recipe, Traditional Italian Desserts, Tsp
