I read Stefanie’s Cupcake Project post on how to infuse stronger tea flavor into baking and thought if it works for tea, it should work for dried herbs and spices. I followed the same method in her post and substituted lavender for tea in the heated butter mixture. The aroma was pronounced which gave me confidence that the lavender flavor would be stronger in the cake.

Infused Butter Method from Cupcake Project

* Slightly more butter than your recipe calls for. When you make the tea-infused butter, some of the butter will get stuck on the tea leaves and you’ll end up with less usable butter than you started with. How much more butter should you use? You’ll have to experiment. It will vary depending on the type of tea that you use and how good you are at pressing the butter out of the wet tea leaves. I found that I needed 1 cup of butter to end up with 3/4 cup of butter.

* 2 grams (or approximately 1 1/2 teaspoons) of whole-leaf tea per tablespoon of butter. As Robert says, “The key to flavor is freshness so be sure that you are using only tea that is highly aromatic and butter that has no off aromas or flavors.”

Instructions:

1. In a small saucepan, melt the butter until just liquid.

2. Add the tea leaves.

3. Continue heating the mixture for about 5 minutes on low heat.

4. Remove from the heat and allow to stand for another 5 minutes or until the butter is discernibly tinted by the tea leaves.

5. Pour the mixture through a fine sieve, pressing hard on the tea leaves and then discarding them. This is the part where you will undoubtedly end up with some butter that you can’t get off of the leaves. I encourage you to press as hard as you can, but not to obsess about lost butter – it’s for a good cause.

6. Let the butter come to room temperature and then use it as you would regular butter in your baked goods.

via Baking with Tea – How To Get the Flavor of Tea Into Your Baked Goods ~ Cupcake Project.

Frosting

* 2 8-ounce packages cream cheese, room temperature

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

* 1 cup powdered sugar

* 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

* 2 teaspoons grated lemon peel

* 3/4 cup lavender honey (purchased at Williams Sonoma)

via Pear Cake with Lemon-Honey Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe at Epicurious.com.

Lemon Cupcakes

Ingredients

Makes 24

* 3 cups all-purpose flour

* 1 tablespoon baking powder

* 1/2 teaspoon salt

* 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted lavender infused butter, room temperature

* 2 cups sugar

* 4 large eggs, room temperature

* Finely grated zest of 3 lemons (about 3 tablespoons), plus 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

* 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

* 1 cup buttermilk

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.

2. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, cream butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is until incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Beat in zest and vanilla. Add flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of buttermilk and lemon juice, and beating until just combined after each.

3. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until golden brown and a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 25 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

4. To finish, spread 1 tablespoon lemon curd onto middle of each cupcake. Fill a pastry bag fitted with a large open-star tip (Ateco #828 or Wilton #8B) with frosting. Pipe frosting onto each cupcake, swirling tip slightly and releasing as you pull up to form a peak. Hold a small kitchen torch 3 to 4 inches from surface of frosting, and wave it back and forth until frosting is lightly browned all over. Serve immediately.

From Martha Stewart Cupcakes, May 2009

via Lemon Meringue Cupcakes and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.

via PrissyCook » Blog Archive » Lemon Mergingue Cupcakes.

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Who dat think they goin to beat dem Saints?

Typically I watch enough football to weather pop football quizzes from my Dad. I love a good sports story and when they do those behind the scenes rags to riches over coming diversity stories, I well up with the best of them. But lets be serious, I bake cupcakes and knit and that doesn’t really fit into the football culture.

But on Super Bowl Sunday, I’ll watch the game and do all the fanfare and treat it just like Forth of July or Thanksgiving.

Suppose it’s obvious who I’ll be cheering on for this year’s game.

Don’t worry Cowboys. Next year for sure!

King Cake is a lemon, nutmeg flavored yeast bread cake typically filled with cream cheese. For these cupcakes, I took the lemon, nutmeg and cream cheese and incorporated them into a traditional white cake.

King Cake Cupcakes

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour

2 t baking powder

1/4 t salt

1 t nutmeg

3 large egg whites

3/4 cup milk at room temperature

1 stick butter

3/4 cup sugar

1 t lemon juice

Cream cheese cut into 1/2″ squares

Preheat oven to 350. Place paper liners in all wells of one 12 cup tin.

Whisk flour baking powder, nutmeg and salt together in a small bowl to aerate and combine, set aside.

Whisk egg whites and milk together in a small bowl to combine, set aside.

In a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium high speed, beat butter until creamy, about 2 minutes. Add sugar gradually, beating until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes, scraping down the bowl once or twice. Beat in lemon. Add the flour mixture in 4 additions, alternately with the egg white-milk mixture. Begin and end with the flour mixture, and beat briefly until smooth on low medium speed after each addition.

Divide batter evenly among cupcake wells. Insert cream cheese square into center. Bake for 20 minutes, or until edges turn golden brown.

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The past few batches of cupcakes in the “citrus series” from the Martha Stewart Cupcake book I had quite a few lid busters. Meaning most of them baked over the top of the rim of the cupcake pan. I still haven’t determined the root cause. Theories I’m working on include over filling the cups or I may need to refresh my baking powder. One friend suggested that Martha writes her recipes in such a way that they cannot be duplicated exactly as a way for Martha to make you, the home cook, feel inferior. That made me laugh just a little.

More than once in a frustrated baking moment I have muttered some not so nice things about our beloved Martha.

This recipe didn’t call for any active agents like baking soda or baking powder. Immediately I knew I wouldn’t have a baking over situation, but I then worried about not filling the cups with enough batter.

As you can see I under estimated just a bit. I took advantage of the bowl effect of the cupcake wrapper to be a bit lazy with my citrus glaze.

Here is a little behind the scenes footage. I’m typically up early and start prepping for my baking in my PJs.  Once my coffee it I realized I looked like Rainbow Bright’s long lost sister and it cracked me up.

Triple Citrus Cupcakes

Ingredients

Makes 36

* 3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

* 2 teaspoons coarse salt

* 1 pound (4 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

* 2 cups sugar

* 3 tablespoons finely grated lemon zest (from 3 lemons)

* 3 tablespoons finely grated orange zest (from 2 oranges)

* 3 tablespoons finely grated lime zest, plus more for garnish (from 3 limes)

* 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

* 9 large eggs, room temperature

* Citrus Glaze

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together flour and salt.

2. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, cream butter and sugar until pale and fluffy, scraping down sides of bowl every few minutes. Add citrus zests. Reduce speed to medium, and add vanilla. Add eggs, three at a time, beating until until incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in four batches, beating until completely incorporated after each.

3. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full; tap pans on countertop once to distribute batter. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool 10 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely. Cupcakes can be stored up to 2 days at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

4. To finish, dip tops of cupcakes in glaze, then turn over quickly and garnish with zest. Cupcakes are best eaten the day they are glazed; keep at room temperature until ready to serve.

From Martha Stewart Cupcakes, May 2009

via Triple-Citrus Cupcakes and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.

Citrus Glaze

Ingredients

Makes 1/3 cup

* 1 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted

* 1/4 teaspoon finely grated citrus zest, such as orange, lemon, or lime

* 3 tablespoons fresh citrus juice, such as orange, lemon, or lime

Directions

1. Whisk all ingredients until smooth and combined. Use immediately.

From Martha Stewart Cupcakes, May 2009

via Citrus Glaze and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.

Martha Stewart Cupcake Challenge 21/175

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The lemon curd:

Hands down homemade curds are richer and fuller in their flavor over the store purchased varieties. It’s simple to make and best of all you don’t dirty a lot of dishes making it. WIN!

Ingredients

Makes 1 1/2 cups

* 3 large egg yolks

* Zest of 1/2 lemon

* 1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice, (2 lemons)

* 6 tablespoons sugar

* 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold and cut into pieces

Directions

1. Combine yolks, lemon zest, lemon juice, and sugar in a small saucepan. Whisk to combine. Set over medium heat, and stir constantly with a wooden spoon, making sure to stir sides and bottom of pan. Cook until mixture is thick enough to coat back of wooden spoon, 5 to 7 minutes.

2. Remove saucepan from heat. Add the butter, one piece at a time, stirring with the wooden spoon until consistency is smooth.

3. Transfer mixture to a medium bowl. Lay a sheet of plastic wrap directly on the surface of the curd to avoid a skin from forming; wrap tightly. Let cool; refrigerate until firm and chilled, at least 1 hour. Store, refrigerated in an airtight container, up to 2 days.

via Lemon Curd and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.

The meringues:

Ingredients

* 4 extra – large egg whites, at room temperature

* 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

* Pinch kosher salt

* 1 cup granulated sugar, divided

* 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

* Roasted Berries, recipe follows

Directions

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Using a small glass and a pencil, draw 4 (3 1/2-inch) circles on each piece of paper. Turn the paper face down on the baking sheets.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites, cream of tartar, and salt on high speed until frothy. Add 2/3 cup of the sugar and continue beating on high speed until the egg whites form very stiff peaks. Whisk in the vanilla. Carefully fold the remaining 1/3 cup sugar into the meringue. With a large star – shaped pastry tip, pipe a disk of meringue inside each circle. Pipe another layer around the edge to form the sides of the shells.

Bake for 2 hours, or until the meringues are dry and crisp but not browned. Turn off the heat and allow the meringues to sit in the oven for 4 hours or overnight.

For serving, place each meringue on a separate plate and top the shell with berries.

via Meringues Chantilly with Roasted Berries Recipe : Ina Garten : Food Network.

All together:

Lemon Cupcakes

Ingredients

Makes 24

* 3 cups all-purpose flour

* 1 tablespoon baking powder

* 1/2 teaspoon salt

* 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

* 2 cups sugar

* 4 large eggs, room temperature

* Finely grated zest of 3 lemons (about 3 tablespoons), plus 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

* 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

* 1 cup buttermilk

* Lemon Curd

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.

2. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, cream butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is until incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Beat in zest and vanilla. Add flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of buttermilk and lemon juice, and beating until just combined after each.

3. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until golden brown and a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 25 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

4. To finish, spread 1 tablespoon lemon curd onto middle of each cupcake. Fill a pastry bag fitted with a large open-star tip (Ateco #828 or Wilton #8B) with frosting. Pipe frosting onto each cupcake, swirling tip slightly and releasing as you pull up to form a peak. Hold a small kitchen torch 3 to 4 inches from surface of frosting, and wave it back and forth until frosting is lightly browned all over. Serve immediately.

From Martha Stewart Cupcakes, May 2009

via Lemon Meringue Cupcakes and more delicious recipes, smart cooking tips, and video demonstrations on marthastewart.com.

Martha Stewart Cupcake Challenge 20/175

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I was watching this show on the History Channel, Hillbilly, have you seen it? It’s almost as good as my other favorite History Channel show, Hippies. There is this legendary moonshiner and he looks just like my Uncle Ricky. And I got nervous that what if he is my Uncle Ricky and subconsciously, in my attempt to make limoncello, I made moonshine because I was just programmed that way.

So, its in a jar in my pantry. I think I’ll keep it handy just in case one day I need some extra fuel for my car.

But I digress, I did in fact make a Limoncello and Berry Sangria, but I used good old Italian limoncello, that I did in fact buy in Italy.

I macerated the strawberries and raspberries in limoncello and I added a little sugar and orange zest.  Macerating is basicaly marinating, so the longer you marinate the fruit the more of the natural flavors of the fruit take on the flavor of the alcohol.

The base of this sangria blanco is sparkling wine, so it was light and crisp once I added the fruit.

Limoncello and Berry Sangria

6 oz sliced raspberries
6 oz sliced strawberries
2 oz limoncello
zest of 1/2 small orange
1 T sugar
4 cups pink lemonade
1 bottle sparkling white wine

Macerate fruit in limoncello, orange zest and sugar. Overnight if possible, minimum 1 hour.
Mix remaining ingredients when you’re ready to serve.

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I’ve said before that I know I’m not an artist, but I really wish I was. So, the way I satiate my desire to be creative with the fact that I’m not is that I craft. I do a lot of paint by the numbers projects and I’m happy as a clam doing so. Now every now and again, I go outside of the lines, you know, put my own spin on it, but typically, I chug right along following the directions.

Last Christmas I worked on handmade gifts that included knitted scarfs, hats, and jars of instant hot chocolate mix. I loved seeing my loved ones in items I MADE! And who knows one of these days, everyone will get a pair of knitted socks (don’t hold your breath).

For Mother’s Day this year, at the eleventh hour, I found inspiration for a Spa in a Box. I found tutorials on the Craft blog to make Lemon Sugar Scrub, scented drawer fresheners and I procured a batch of homemade lavender soap from a friend.

I loved the Lemon Sugar Scrub! It was so easy to put together and I already have plans to make more.

Lemon Sugar Scrub by Katie Goodman

Ingredients:

Sugar
Olive oil
Kosher salt
Lemon zest or other citrus zest
Lemon extract (optional)

One recipe makes 2 cups, enough for a 1-pint jar, or 2 half-pint jars.
Materials:

Microplane zester
Medium-sized bowl
Measuring cups and spoons
Mixing spoon
Container or jar for the finished product
Ribbon for decor

This project is great for reusing old jars that have been cleaned out (such as jam or sauce jars) or canning jars that you might have around.

Step 1: Combine 1 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup kosher salt, and 1 cup of olive oil in a medium-sized bowl. Stir until the oil is evenly distributed throughout the sugar and salt mixture.

Step 2: Using a microplane zester, grate the zest of 1 large lemon. Add zest to the bowl and stir to combine. If you would like a stronger scent, add 1/4 tsp lemon extract.

Step 3: Spoon the scrub mixture into a clean jar. Make sure to wipe up any spills on the outside of the jar. Tighten the lid on and decorate according to your tastes.

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You can’t help but wonder by the candy when you’re getting anything in the store. It’s amazing! The other day they had candied pineapples with lemon and chili. The flavor profile looked interesting and I tried one.

Yuck! Seriously, the candy was bad all the way around, weird chewy, gritty from the massive amounts of chili powder and not a hit of lemon flavor.  But I thought there was some reason they put those particular flavors together, so undetured, I started planning how I could that profile into a cupcake.

What I ended up with was the idea to make a Pineapple Chili Upside-Down Cupcake with Lemon Creme.

If you get really close to the monitor you can see the little chili flakes on the pineapple. These were some of my favorite cupcakes to date. I was able to bypass the whole “frosting” bit by adding whipping cream to the top.

I may make a batch of these again this weekend, especially since I know that my friend Wendy and her cupcake loving husband Jonathan are out of town this weekend!

Lemon Curd

1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons finely grated fresh lemon zest
1/2 cup sugar
3 large eggs
3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cut into bits

Whisk together juice, zest, sugar, and eggs in a 2-quart heavy saucepan. Stir in butter and cook over moderately low heat, whisking frequently, until curd is thick enough to hold marks of whisk and first bubble appears on surface, about 6 minutes.

Transfer lemon curd to a bowl and chill, its surface covered with plastic wrap, until cold, at least 1 hour.

Lemon Curd Creme

1 recipe lemon curd
1 cup heavy cream

Whip cream until it has firm peaks and fold in lemon curd. Chill for 15 minutes before serving.

Pineapple Upside Down Cupcakes

1 batch of your favorite yellow cake recipe
Fresh Pineapplie Chunks (about 1 1/2 cups)
6 T Brown Sugar
6 T Melted Butter
Chili Powder
Non-stick Cooking Spray

Prepare cupcake tins by spraying with cooking spray. Pour melted butter into bottom of cupcake tins, enough to cover the bottom with 1/8 inch of butter. Add brown sugar, about 3/4 T. Arrange pineapple chunks into a fan pattern on top of the brown sugar and sprinkle with Chili Powder. Give it a good sprinkle. If you don’t the taste will get lost in the other flavors.

Picture of prepared tins:

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My idea is that I’m going to use the marker board to write down cooking ideas I see through out the month and depending on the complexity of the dish, I’ll put it down or a week night or weekend “to do.”

I found a cute cupcake idea from Martha, headed right over to my handy marker board and slated Thursday night to try them out. That didn’t happen! But I did keep them on my list and by golly, I got them made this Sunday! Victory for follow through!

I also had another personal victory with these cupcakes. The recipe I used yeilded 12 cupcakes and look! I filled 12 cupcakes and I didn’t have any batter left over! Honestly in the three years I’ve been on this cupcake kick, I don’t remember EVER having a cupcake recipe yeild the exact number it said it would.

To bring the point up again, I’m really not that into frosting. So that typically influences my lack of cupcake decorating. I think if you spend any time trolling this blog you’ll see that the swirly frosting application is far and away my favorite. So, when I do try to venture into cupcake decorating land, I typically look for easy by the numbers kinda decorating.

Here’s a set that I tried to make look like green Easter baskets, ones made to look like ice cream cones, and these Halloween creepy crawly ones. Yup, everything else is your standard frosting swirl.

No news breaking recipe here. I followed the method from the Martha website. I made a basic yellow cupcake recipe from the book, Baker’s Field Guide to Cupcakes. I made a lemon symple syrup to drizzle on the top and then for the frosting I made a lemon butter cream.

Martha Stewart Cupcake Challenge 1/175

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This is the biggest lemon I’ve ever seen. I’ve actually not used it yet, because it’s so perfectly large. I’ve used every other lemon, but this morning I found a recipe for lemon shortbread cookies that I think are worthy of this perfect specimen.

This week I revisited a cupcake combination I’ve used before: Lemons and Raspberries. This lemon cake recipe is from Rachael Ray. It’s loaded with butter and lemon and when it bakes the butter and lemon caramelize and make a crunchy top.

I messed up on this batch of frosting. I hastily made a cream cheese frosting mainly because I had the ingredients on hand. I thought a heavier frosting could stand up to this cake recipe simply because there was so much butter already in the cake recipe. In retrospect, perhaps a fruit whipped cream would have been a better compliment.

And for the record, these lemons were a gift.

Other Citrus Cupcakes on This Blog:
Delux Lemon-Raspberry Cupcakes with Pomegranate
Sangria Cupcakes
Black and White Cupcakes

Other Citrus Cupcakes on the Web:
Jessica’s Lemon Lemon Cupcakes
Red, White and Blueberry Lemon Cupcakes

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An infomercial tactic is to use the IMPENDING DOOM close. That’s the one where time is running out, there is a limited supply, ACT NOW! Of all the sales techniques, that’s the one that gets me every time.  I really do get a bit anxious when I think that there may not  be something left. (it’s amazing I’m not a horder).

Insert Arizona citrus season and I get plain anxious. I know that all those trees aren’t going to be heavy with oranges, grapefruit, lemons and tangelos for long. I’ve found myself several times this year contempating pulling over on the side of the road when I see an easy citrus tree target. I’ve nearly broken my neck several times when I noticed an orange tree I haven’t noticed before.

This particular spot has been especially fruitful. It’s right off the canal by Chandler Airport and not a long bike ride from my house. Each time I’ve been, the house on the other side of the fence looks like nobody is home, ever.

You’ll find me this weekend on my cruiser, trolling Chandler, looking for unguarded fruit trees.

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