Red Velvet Cupcakes

And I am back! 

After  travelling to New York & Montreal and suffering from terrible jetlag, my zest to bake hadn't subsided. I know now what the joy of creating something has and that gives a enough high (yes to even keep you awake!).

In New York, my darling sister and I made up our own cupcake crawl, which was not planned much in advance, but it was great fun to be with her and to sample the sugar filled delights - in fact they were so sweet, we couldn't eat more than 3 (and we shared those three too!!)

I made a batch of the famous Red Velvet cupcakes as one of my colleagues was hosting a dinner in which the theme was RED! What better way to end a dinner than with a light, fluffy cupcakes loaded with cream cheese frosting. 

I followed the recipe posted online for the Magnolia Bakery cupcakes. This recipe makes 36 cupcakes, and here it goes:

GET

• 3 ⅓ cups cake flour
• ¾ cup (1 ½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 ¼ cups sugar
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 6 tablespoons red food coloring
• 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
• 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 ½ teaspoons salt
• 1 ½ cups buttermilk
• 1 ½ teaspoons cider vinegar
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:

As technically cream doesn't exist in France, I make do with St. Moret or the simple Fromage à Tartiner.

• 250 grams cream cheese, softened and cut into small pieces
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened and cut into small pieces
• 3/4 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 21/2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

SET

1.      Preheat oven to 175°C. line the muffin tins with cupcake liners.

2.      Cream the butter and sugar until very light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

3.      Whisk together the red food coloring, cocoa, and vanilla in a small bowl and add to the batter and beat well.

4.       In a measuring cup, stir the salt into the buttermilk. Add to the batter in three parts, alternating with the flour. With each addition, beat until the ingredients are incorporated, but do not overheat.

5.      In another bowl, stir together the cider vinegar and baking soda. Add to the batter and mix well. Using a rubber spatula, scrape down the batter in the bowl, making sure the ingredients are well blended and the batter is smooth.

6.      Pour the mixture into the individual muffin moulds. Fill in 3/4th, make sure the mixture doesn’t fill up the moulds.

7.      Bake the cupcakes for 20-25 minutes or untill well done.Remove from the oven and cool completely before de-moulding. 

8.      For the Frosting: Beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth, about 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and beat well.

9.      Gradually add the sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating continuously until smooth and creamy. 
Cover and refrigerate icing for 2 to 3 hours, but no longer, to thicken before using.

GO

When the cupcakes have cooled, spread the frosting liberally and decorate with silly nothings !

Summer Love Preserve

No, no, this is not the song by the famous Johnny Hallyday who is the famous French rockstar.. errr. whatever ..
I stumbled upon this funny, very helpful and informative blog: Papilles et Pupilles where I noticed that there was a mention of a contest to make Preserves and what was more exciting were the prizes they are offering, one of them being the Kitchen Aid, which has been on my wish-list radar since months. I had proposed a recipe along the themes set by the author - to make a conserve/preserve based on what one would like to eat in winter, it should be ecological and economical as well. The contest sponsored by the jar making company - Le Parfait, required to send a recipe and if your recipe was selected, they would send you a jar to make your recipe and to submit it on your blog. I would like to thank Le Parfait for sending me not one, but 6 jars, which means I can make 6 different preserves!!! Okay, I need to calm down now!!

Summer Love Preserve

Winter, does it bring the desire to et something crunchy, fresh, something that will give you that extra pep in your step!
Try making this delicious preserve full of goodness, pure tastes and natural flavours. Watermelon - crunchy, succulent, sweet coupled with contrasting tastes like mingling mint, earthy ginger and rose petals -the essence of love. This preserve is sure to get back those fond memories of a bright yet tender summer.

GET

4 cups of watermelon juice (fresh)                                                                                    



 2 cups watermoelon pieces (75% white part, 25% pink part)             
3 tbsps apple cider vinegar                                                                      
1 cup sugar

2 tbps ginger sliced
1/2 tsp cardamom
3 tbsps lemon juice
2 tbsps lemon zest
1 tcup mint leaves
1/2 cup rose petals

SET

• Boil the watermelon juice, cook it till has reduced to half. Clean the jar thouroughly, wash in a hot soapy bath. Dry in room temperature.
  
• Add all the ingredients except for the rose petals and pink watermelon part. Cook till the liquid then reduces till more than half. 5 minutes before you take off the pot, add the remaining watermelon.
• Strain the liquid and take out only the watermelon pieces, put them in the jar and then add the liquid. 
• The jar should be filled till the brim, but fill a good 2-3 cms below the brim. close the jar immediately.
  
• Now the jar has to be treated in a water bath to be able to preserve for a longer duration.
  
• Take a large pot, fill it with cold water. Place the jar in this bath, and make sure that the water level is 3 cms above the lid of the jar.Make sure that the jar is tightly closed, we don't want the liquid to seep out now do we?
  
• Place this bath on high heat till the water boils, and then reduce the heat and cook for 30 minutes. 
• Take the jar out and cool. 

GO
Enjoy this yummy preserve with raisin bread or use it to top your ice creams.

Lavender & Red Wine Macarons

GET

Almond Meal / Powdered Almonds - 65 gms
Icing Sugar - 80 gms
Lavender 5 gms
Sugar - 40 gms

Egg White - 50 gms


For the Ganache:
1 3/4 cups red wine
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
55 grams dry pectin
2 1/4 cups sugar

SET

• Heat the oven to 160°C. Line the baking tray with parchment paper.
• Blend the almond meal, lavender and icing sugar in a processesor, making sure the mixture is well blended and fine. Then pass this mixture through a fine sieve, making sure that there are no lumps left. 
• For the egg whites: make sure the bowl you use is extremely clean. The egg whites should be at room temperature, before you start beating, add a few drops of lemon juice or a pinch of salt. Beat on a medium speed, and slowly add the sugar spoon by spoon. Increase the speed after a minute, beating on high speed for 4 minutes or untill strong peaks have formed. Make sure that the eggs hold firm peaks, like a bird's beak!
  
• Sprinkly the dry mixture spoon by spoon over the egg whies. Blend this mixture very slowly with a spatula, just bend and not beat, else the whites will flop over. 
• While mixing you should be gentle making sure not to overmix, as you'd rather have an undermixed batter than a cakey overmixed batter. Normally, I turn the spatula in 30-40 circular motions depending on the quantity. 
• The best way to know whether the batter is ready, is to look for these signs:
• When you started off, the batter was firm and was holding its shape. After mixing for subsquent minutes, when you lift the batter it should fall in ribbons, should be shiny and satiny. 
• You should not be able to see any of the egg white.
  
• Fill in this mixture in a piping bag and use a 8-10 mm round tip. Pipe blobs of batter on the circled baking sheet, make sure you are holding the piping back perpendicular to the sheet. Pipe in just about enough to cover the circles you made, or if you were lazy, pipe the size of macaron you would want remember that the batter usually spreads about 1 cm.
  
• Leave the piped batter in a dry warm place for minimum 20 minutes so as to develop a thin cover. 
• In the oven, place the tray in the middle, keep another tray below the with the macaron tray. 

• Within 5 minutes the feet will start forming, and at the 7th or 8th minute if the macarons start to brown unevenly, rotate the baking tray. Bake for another 3-4 minutes, however, another trick to check if they are done, is to softly push the macaron, if the feet move a bit. The total time should be 10-11 minutes at 150-160°C
  
• Remove the tray from the oven, take off the baking sheet and place on a wet surface for a couple of seconds so as to stop the baking process. You can do so by placing the baking sheet on a wet piece of cloth flattened out. 
• After a couple of minutes, peel the macaron off the sheet and place them upside down on a wire rack. If they do not peel or come off easily, pop them back into the oven for a couple of minutes.

For the Red Wine Jam (Compote)


Combine the wine, pectin and lemon juice in a large pan. Bring to boil, stir frequently, add sugar and stir untill dissolved. Boil for for 2-3 minutes on high flame stirring constantly. Take off the flame, cool the pan. Cool untill ready to use.

GO
To finish the assembly of the macaron:

• Smear small portions of the jam on the underside of each macaron and stick two undersides together. 
• Cool the prepared macarons for 24 hours at least, as they taste better..

Macaron-athon

As I will be travelling on and off for the 2 following weeks, I wanted to work on my lately acquired macaronia..
And so I made:
1. Lavender and Red Wine

2. Green lime and Melon
3. Passion Fruit and Mango
4. Coffee Caramel
5. Chocolate Blueberry and Sichuan Pepper
6. Vanilla Figue and Goat cheese

Martha Stewart's Raspberry Marble Cheese(CUP)cakes

My favourite cheesecakes are the ones you get in Starbucks - White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake, althought I think its moreso beacuse in Paris, cheesecakes do not exist! Quel sacrilège!
So anywhos, it had been ages, almost a year back when I made cheesecakes, and so thought could try out testing a recipe from Our Lady of cooking/home living/entertaining/styling/and the list goes on , ladies and gentlemen --- Martha Stewart......(applause applause!!)
 In her book Martha Stewart's CUPCAKES, there is a pretty recipe about making the cheesecake.

The recipe follows: makes 16 cups

GET
Ingredients
3/4 cup finely ground sweet crackers (or non-salty ones) - I used Petit Lu Caramel
1 1/2 tablespoons butter (unsalted and melted)
3/4 cups sugar + 2 1/2 sugar
125 grams fresh raspberries
450 grams cream cheese
pinch of salt

2 eggs at room temperature
2 tablespoon tequila

SET
Preheat oven to 180°C. Line the cupcake tins with liners.

• Mix the crakers with the butter and 1 1/2 sugar. Press 1 tablespoon of the mixture firmly into the bottom of each cup. Pop into the oven for 5 minutes, and then cool on a wire rack.
• Purée the raspberries in a mixer untill smooth. Pass this mixture through a wire mesh colander/sieve. Remove as much liquid as possible without retaining too many seeds. Mix in 1 teaspoon of sugar.
• Beat the cream cheeese on high speed for 5-8 minutes untill fluffy. Be sure to scrap down the sides of the bowl to ensure even beating.
  
• Add remaining cups of sugar in a slow and steady stream. Add the salt and tequila untill well combined.
• Add the eggs one by one, beating for 1-2 minutes between each addition.
• Spoon 3 tablesspoons of the mixture over each cupcake tin. Add 1 teaspoon of prepared raspberry purée in a few dots. With a wooden skewer or toothpick, swirl the sauce around in the cup to achieve the textured finish. 
• Create a small bain-marie by taking a roasting pan or a large lasagne dish. Put the cupcake tins in this pan and pour hot water in the large pan, the water should reach 3/4 of the cupcake tins. 
• Bake for 22-25 minutes, rotate the pan halfway through and 10 minutes to ensure even cooking. 
• Once done, cool and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. 
• Remove from the tins just before serving. These small bites of heaven taste great with fresh fruits.
  

Back to cupcakes!

And it was time to get back to the original passion, CUPCAKES!

I had a little farewell party for a friend's mum, and thought of making simple cupcakes. As pineapple upside downs are my friend's favourite, I thought of making those for him. I read a lot of recipes (as always) to make sure I have the right one, and did find a good one in the book I have: 500 Cupcakes by Fergal Connolly.

I will soon update the recipe, but for now, the pictures are all I can give ;)

Pineapple upside down cupcakes with Vanilla cream cheese frosting
Recipe makes 12 cupcakes

GET
Ingredients
For the Cupcakes - 
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup flour
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla / pineapple essence

For the Topping:
1/2 can pineapple pieces
1/4 cp butter
1/3 cup brown sugar

For the frosting:
1/4 cup butter
 125 grams cream cheese at room temperature
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

SET

• Preheat oven to 175°C. Grease the cupcake tins with butter and flour. 
• At the bottom of each cup, sprinkle 1 tablespoon brown sugar, 1 tablespoon butter and line some pieces of pineapple. I like to use pineapple rounds, so that they fit perfectly into the cup.
• Mix up all the cupake ingredients in a large bowl, beat with an electric mixer or a hand beater or roughly 3-4 minutes or untill silky and pale. 
• Spoon out the batter on top of the pineapple mixture and bake for 25 -30 minutes depending on your oven. 
• Remove from the oven and cool for 15 minutes.

For the Frosting:

• Beat the butter and cream cheese on low speed untill creamy and fluffy. Add in the sugar spoon by spoon making sure it is well incorporated into the batter. 
• Add the vanilla essence and beat for 5-7 minutes untill well blended. 

GO

• You can either use a piping bag or just spoon out the cream cheese frosting onto the cupcakes. Make sure the cupcakes aren't hot or even slightly warm. 

Dark Chilli Love

As they say, pratice makes you perfect! Although I have a long way to get to perfection, but one can dream..
And so the Macaronia continues...

After my successful attempt at the macarons, I wanted to try out some different, and maybe daring flavours, as making regular macarons, well, its boring and anyone can do that! So I started thinking about making chocolate macarons, especially because I had just bought the 'great' Van Houten dark chocolate powder. Then began the quest for finding the best chocolate macaron recipe, which I found through my bible blog/site of Syrup and Tang which by the way is the best guide to making macarons. Although I must say I had posed a few important questions to the owner Duncan Markham who never replied :(
On his site, he mentioned a French Chocolate Macaron recipe cited by David Lebovitz. Amazing and fool proof was the recipe and the guidelines were perfect and meticulous.

Of course, I always have the urge of trying something new and different, and thought of giving this recipe a little twist shall we say. I added some spice and made a different ganache instead of the routine chocolate ganache (which I am sure is great as well). the ganache I made was a raspberry Thai chilli ganache, very easy to make and leaves that tangy spicy taste lingering for minutes!

And so here it goes:

GET
100 gms powdered sugar/confectioners sugar)
50 gms almond meal (finely powdered almonds)
25 gms Van Houten or any other unsweetened cocoa powder
2 egg whites (at room temperature)
Lemon Juice - few drops
65 gms sugar

For the Ganache
3 tbsps raspberry preserve (I used a Bio type, but anything goes)
1 tbsp Thai chilli sauce (the hot n sweet types)

SET

• Preheat oven to 180°C. Line the baking trays with parchment paper, draw the little circles for the macarons if you like.
• Grind together confectioners sugar, almond meal and the cocoa powder for 30 seconds. Pass this mixture through a fine sieve.
  
• In a very clean bowl, add the egg whites, squeeze in a little juice of lemon or a pinch of salt. Whip the egg whites in a standing mixture (as I don't have one of these yet, you can use a standard hand held beater as well). Beat the egg whites while adding bit by bit the 65 gms of sugar. Beat the egg whites till the strong peaks are formed, normally I beat for 3-4 minutes.
• Carefully fold in the dry mixture in batches, make sure not to break the egg whites, but rather just swirl the mixture around, with a very light hand. 
• When you don't see any traces of egg whites, and when the mixture turns glossy and falls easy, stop mixing. Take a piping bag with a 2 cm plain nozzle, and fill in the mixture. 
• Pipe the batter on the parchment paper, make sure to hold the piping bag 90° to the parchment paper. Pipe in on the pre-made circles or make 1 inch circles while keeping 1 inch apart each piped macaron.
• After you have finished piping all the batter, tap the underside of the baking tray to get rid of the air bubbles. If you aren't too comfortable with this, then tap the baking tray slightly on your working counter. Let the mixture rest for 20 minutes at least. 
• Bake for 15-17 minutes. At the end of the 5 minute mark, the so called feet should have been formed, as mine!!! As each oven has its own temprament, I suggest nudging the so-called feet of the macaron, and if they move reluctantly, they are done.

 

• Take out the tray once the baking is done, and take off the parchment paper and place on a pre-cooled surface. After a couple of minutes of cooling off, remove the macaron from the baking sheet. If they do not come off easily, try scraping them off with the back of a knife. Leave the macaron to cool further on a wire rack.

For the Ganache:

• Simply take 3 tbsps of the Raspberry preserve and add in 1 tbsp of the Thai chilli sauce

GO

• Take the reverse sides of two macaron and layer them with the above made ganache. And Voilà, there are ready. For better tasting macarons, try to wait for 12-24 hours before munching on them