Cubicle kitchen: Whiskey Sour Cupcakes

I like to think of these as part of my rule-bending baked goods collection.  Because in my office, as I'm sure in most, you can't bring alcohol.  Unless it's a special morale-boosting event sponsored by department heads complete with beer and wine.

Now, I'm not a big drinker.  Some wine or a beer with dinner or a fancy drink with a cherry at happy hour.  Always assuming there are enough calories left in the day.  Otherwise, I've just personally never seen the point in being drunk.  Anyway, for happy hour, I've always been partial to Amaretto Sours.  Because sweet and sour are more appealing to me than the actual potency of the drink.  But amongst the random alcohol selection I was looking to use up (because we weren't drinking it), there was no amaretto.  So, whiskey it was.

No one turned down these corporate-policy-ambiguous Whiskey Sour Cupcakes.  Hopefully I didn't contribute to any poor afternoon decision-making in meetings after klatch, but you would need to put yourself into a sugar coma before you could make yourself drunk on these.  Having said that, though, they have a distinct smell and taste of alcohol.  Which is the point, being cocktail-inspired cupcakes after all.  The lemon in the cupcake is just a complement to the whiskey, but the frosting helps amp up the citrus and mellow out the alcohol.

Whiskey Sour Cupcakes
Adapted from bethcakes: Whiskey Sour Cupcakes

Ingredients
Cake:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup butter, room temperature
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3/4 cup whiskey
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 2 teaspoons lemon zest

Frosting:

• 3/4 cup butter, room temperature
• 1/2 Tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/2 Tablespoon grenadine
• 1 teaspoon lemon extract
• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350°.
2. Sift together flour and baking soda in a separate bowl and set aside.
3. In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar.  Add eggs, vanilla, and whiskey and mix until combined.
4. Incorporate the flour mixture.  Add the lemon juice and zest.
5. Fill liners 2/3 full.  Bake for 15-17 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Allow to cool before frosting.
6. Cream butter.  Add lemon juice, grenadine, and extract.
7. Incorporate powdered sugar until desired consistency.
8. Frost cakes.

Cubicle kitchen: Quinoa Chocolate Cupcakes

When it comes to recipes that are healthy or accommodate some kind of special dietary requirement, I prefer those with two qualities:

1. They don't require ingredients whose purpose is solely for that dietary requirement.
2. They taste good enough that people with no desire to be healthy crave them.

That means that I tend to stay away from gluten-free recipes that use fancy flours.  Yes, I would like to one day experiment with them just to see what they are like, but my baking pantry is bursting enough with just all-purpose, cake, self-rising, and whole wheat flours, I don't really have room for others.  Things like corn meal, oatmeal, and quinoa I already have on hand, so I tend to seek out recipes that utilize those.

And of course, describing a baked good as primarily 'good for you' is like describing a potential blind date as having a good personality.  It may very well be true, but it's not the first impression that's going to inspire a first bite or a first date.

These cupcakes meet both of my requirements perfectly.  First of all, it uses leftover cooked quinoa, so it's perfect for dessert after making some stuffed tomatoes.  And because you blend the quinoa, you end up with a gorgeously moist cake that reminds you of a decadent flour less chocolate cake, the ultimate example of something that is gluten-free practically as an afterthought.  

Plus, being quinoa, it's not just about the lack of gluten.  It's also about being a superfood with lots of protein and qualities that allow you to feel completely self-righteous as you lick frosting from your lips.

Quinoa Chocolate Cupcakes
Adapted from A Dusting of Sugar: Chocolate Quinoa Cake

Ingredients

• 2 cups cooked quinoa
• 1/3 cup almond milk
• 4 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3/4 cup butter, melted and cooled
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup plus 1 Tablespoon unsweetened cocoa
• 3/4 cup sweetened cocoa (hot cocoa mix)
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350°.
2. Combine milk, eggs, and vanilla in a large bowl.  Add quinoa and butter.  Using an immersion blender, blend until smooth.
3. In a separate bowl, mix sugar, cocoas, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
4. Add dry ingredients to wet mixture and stir until combined.
5. Divide evenly between cupcake liners, about half full.
6. Bake for 18-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
7. Allow to cool completely before frosting.

For frosting, make a double batch of cdkitchen: Easy Cocoa Frosting

Inspiration Saturday: That's the way the cupcake Crumbs-bles

I was surprised earlier this week to read in Cupcakes Take the Cake that the cupcake chain Crumbs had closed the doors of all of its locations permanently on Monday.  I wasn't keeping close tabs on the company, but I did know that they had gone from heady claims of opening locations all over the place, including as nearby as Dallas, to seemingly retreating back to the East Coast.  But I think everyone, including the employees, were shocked to hear that they were going to go from dozens of locations to none in a matter of hours.  And so, I offer you a eulogy* for Crumbs.

I can't tell you that Crumbs had the best cupcakes.  They didn't, and likely suffered from the increasing quality of smaller competitors as well as over-expansion.  But they were my first experience with gigantamous gourmet cupcakes.

It all began on my first trip to New York to visit Sarah Lawrence College as a prospective student.  We stayed in the city to be tourists apart from one day's expedition to the campus a few train stops away.  Along with a whirlwind whip around the city, taking the Staten Island Ferry past the Statue of Liberty and going up and down the Empire State Building twice, we stopped in what was then one of just a handful of locations around Manhattan.  I had a Red Velvet cupcake, taking a photo to show just how enormous it was in comparison to my face.  The combination of cream cheese frosting and college dreams made Crumbs part bakery, part symbol for me.

Sure, Sex and the City made Magnolia the go-to place for miniature frosted cakes, but I was several years behind the uptake on that show.  I didn't watch it until my first spring semester at SLC (yay for dreams achieved!) when my roommate arrived with the complete DVD set.  Then Sprinkles took over the West Coast, and the founder judges an entire competition show on the Food Network devoted to them.  Every other food trend report seems to declare the end of the cupcake trend, making it so frequent a topic of conversation that it seems impossible that it will ever really be true.  Every 'new' cupcake, whether it's doughnuts or pies or macarons, never reaches the same frenzied peak as the cupcake did, and never even really surpasses the cupcake's current numbers.  And so they continue to be the reigning treat in the bakery, constantly inspiring new and delicious creations.

But for me, Crumbs cupcakes were the treat that I indulged in when I went into the city on the weekends.  I was never a very wild, party-going person, so my adventures in the city generally involved Strand Bookstore and cupcakes.  Sometimes I would even buy two and haul one back to my dorm room for later.  And they were the amazing gift a Ravelry friend brought me from new York when we met up near Dallas, transporting them in her carry-on just for me.

So even though I've discovered some tastier cupcakes here in Austin at Sugar Mama's Bakeshop and Toot Sweet, and even though I bake my own cupcakes these days more often than I ever buy them from someone else, there's always going to be a place in my heart and stomach for Crumbs.

*Now, according to Cupcakes Take the Cake again, there's word that the CEO is going to infuse some cash into the company and get it reopened.  Since they're coming back from the dead, maybe they can capitalize on another trend and turn their brand into...zombie cupcakes!

For more (and probably healthier) inspiration, go to Woolen Diversions.

5KCBWDAY3: Wednesday means the week is only half-baked

Experimental Photography And Image Handling For Bloggers.  Refresh your skills at creating attention-grabbing pictures.

For more 'Experimental Photography' posts from day three of Knitting & Crochet Blog Week, search on the 5KCBWDAY3 tag.

Cubicle kitchen: Peas for the Pod Cupcakes

I told you about last week's cubicle move in my WIP Wednesday post.  One of the downsides of our new 'neighborhood' is that our team has lost a space we called 'The Pod', an isolated quad of combined cubicles with a projector that served as a great impromptu meeting space when all of the dedicated conference rooms were already booked.

Over the next few weeks it will be totally deconstructed to make way for not just new people but a whole new floor plan, so the usual coffee social became a wake for the area, complete with eulogy given by a former manager (wearing a kilt!), memorial light show, and, of course, baked goods.  This was the first time I'd really been 'commissioned' in a sense to bake something.  After offering my services, a co-worker requested cupcakes as a crowd pleaser.

So cupcakes it would be.  But not just cupcakes.  Oh no, I decided I needed pod cupcakes.  I did a little research in hopes that there would be some obvious food that pod people ate in 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers', but no such luck.  So instead, I decided that the play on words was going to have to be peas in the pod.  I figured it sounded just crazy enough to work.

First, I tried a James Beard recipe for pea cake made from scratch, and it turned out alright, like a nice dense, moist snack cake.  But they didn't rise much, and I ended up with 15 cupcakes that were only 1/2 to 2/3 full.  If I'd had the energy to make another batch, I could have done that, but it's really a recipe that should be done when you have an electric mixer on hand.  So I turned to a standby box of cake mix and applied a tried and true mantra: substitution.  You can use almost anything you like in place of the oil called for on the box, from the often suggested applesauce to, well, pea puree.

Because the mix flavor was just a yellow funfetti, the resulting cakes were a very pretty spring green.  In a chocolate cake, you probably wouldn't even know the veggies were there, the taste certainly doesn't give anything away.  A few people were skeptical about these, I even caught some people (who weren't part of the event, but were in a second meeting where leftovers were brought) wondering why anyone would put vegetables in a cupcake.  But those willing to try loved them.  And all the more for the fried green peas I found in the trail mix section of the produce area at HEB.

Peas for the Pod Cupcakes
Makes 2 dozen cupcakes

Ingredients:

• 1 box cake mix (I used Rainbow Chip)
• Water and eggs as called for in directions
• Pea puree, as much as the directions call for oil
• Cream cheese frosting (I used store bought)

Optional garnishes: Fried green peas, sprinkles

Directions:

1. To make pea puree: Take frozen peas out of freezer and allow to thaw.  For 1/2 cup of puree, you will need to start with at least 1 cup of peas.  In a blender or food processor, blend peas until they are a smooth puree.  Keep covered in fridge until ready to use.
2. Follow directions on the cake mix box for cupcakes, substituting pea puree for the oil called for.
3. When completely cooled, frost with cream cheese frosting and top with any desired garnishes.

Cubicle kitchen: Cranberry Lemon Cupcakes

To my mind, leftovers are just the start of a whole world of possibilities.  Yes, you can just reheat stuffing and eat it.  Or, you can reheat it and top it with a fried egg, using the herby, bready goodness to sop up the yolk.  Mmm...

Mom and I love cranberries so much we could have just eaten this leftover relish on its own, but I had to use some of it as a cupcake filling.  I call this a relish rather than a sauce because it was a chopped mix of cranberries, apples, and other fruits.  I wish I could be more specific, but this was someone else's contribution to our potluck Thanksgiving dinner, so all I can be sure of is that it was delicious.

People loved the tartness of the lemon, I think it pairs nicely with the cranberry, and has a good balance of sweetness.  This recipe would work with pretty much any cranberry sauce, though I think it's best with something with texture, chunks of actual cranberry rather than rings from where it was sitting in a can.

Cranberry Lemon Cupcakes
made a dozen regular-sized cupcakes and 45 minis

Ingredients:

Cake:

• 1 box lemon cake mix
• 1 can Sprite Zero
• a few drops lemon extract
• sprinkle of dried lemon zest
• leftover cranberry relish (or sauce)

Glaze:

• about 1 cup powdered sugar
• less than a tablespoon lemon juice
• dried cranberries for garnish

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix cake mix and can of soda together, adding additional extract and zest just to boost the lemon flavor.  Note: you can of course use your own preferred lemon cake recipe.
2. Fill lined mini-cupcake tins about half full of batter.  Add about a teaspoon of cranberry relish, pushing it into the batter until it's mostly covered.  For the full-sized cupcakes, scoop in batter about 2/3 full, add a little more relish, and then top with a little more batter rather than pushing in the relish.
3. Place in the oven and bake, about 10 minutes for minis, 15 for the full-size.  When fully baked, remove and allow to cool.
4. In a mug or small bowl, mix powdered sugar, lemon juice, and water until a glaze forms.  The consistency should be relatively thick to avoid the glaze running down the cupcake liner.
5. Using a spoon, apply a circle of glaze on each cupcake, and top with a dried cranberry.

Marissa Mayer, Yahoo's new CEO (Cupcake Enthusiast/Obsessive)

For over a year now, I've been a regular listener of NPR, beyond just Car Talk and Wait, Wait...Don't Tell Me.  I still love these programs of course, but they are like the dessert of public radio, and now I'm also enjoying my tasty veggies.  That might sound like a negative way to view the news, but let's not forget my enthusiasm for spaghetti squash.  So a comparison to vegetables is meant in the best possible sense.

That being said, even in the news, my mind is still on dessert.  More specifically, cupcakes.  Recently, Yahoo pulled of a kind of coup by hiring Marissa Mayer away from Google to be their new CEO.  I'm interested to see what she can do with the company, because she's the brains behind a lot of the Google features that I use everyday.  But what really caught my ear this morning as I was listening to the latest discussion of the move was the casually-included detail that Mayer has been noted for her love of cupcakes.

That's all I need to hear to go Googling.  Maybe after Mayer is done I'll be Yahoo-ing, but for now it's her former employer that I turned to to find this profile, published in 2008.  It's all about the qualities and quirks of a successful woman in Silicon Valley.  But this is all I need to know about Mayer:

Who else in Silicon Valley could report, with absolute seriousness, that she’d recently bought an array of cookbooks to study the cupcake recipes in each, created a spreadsheet for the ingredients, and then tested the recipes before writing her own? (She made another spreadsheet for frosting.)

Cupcakes and spreadsheets?  I love this woman.  Because the only thing that makes butter, sugar, and flour come together better is the excessive organization.  I've made spreadsheets for buying yarn and crafting for swaps, as well as for baking.  This makes me wonder why there's no 'Recipes' tab in Google when you search, like there is for 'News' and 'Images'.

And the application of logic to an ironically irrational level doesn't end there:

Mayer is an eager practitioner of the art herself. “I’ve always loved baking,” she says. “I think it’s because I’m very scientific. The best cooks are chemists.” In addition to creating her famous cupcake and frosting spreadsheets, she has analyzed all of the different paper linings available. “The problem with the silver ones,” she says in utter earnestness, “is that they seal the cupcake. You’ve got to go with the classic paper, which allows the cupcake to breathe.”

Because suffocating your baked goods is a crime, people!

I already knew that I wasn't the only quirky person out there.  The Sarah Lawrence campus was crawling with them, I'm always making friends with them on Ravelry, and heck, this is Austin.  But Mayer is the first example I've seen of this in the high ranks of the corporate world:

In many ways, Mayer is still that geeky, super-normal, enthusiastic girl. So it’s no surprise when we spend hours one day at—where else?—I Dream of Cake in North Beach. Mayer samples a piece of cake and says, “I’m a huge fan of frosting. Vanilla fudge is my favorite. It gives you brain euphoria.”

Granted, Silicon Valley is a little more open to 'brain euphoria' than Wall Street.  But it's still cool to see the kind of unapolagetic enthusiasm that nerdiness displays survive the real world rather than being something you have to grow out of.

Maybe Mayer is to cupcakes as Steve Jobs is to turtlenecks?  Except I don't think Steve really liked those turtlenecks all that much...

It's your civic crafting duty

If you haven't already, please go vote for The Knitting Nest in the Mission: Small Business program to qualify them for a $250,000 grant.  For more information, you can read my Examiner article.

And while you're there, you can also vote for some other Austin businesses, like Sugar Mama's Bakeshop, which has the honor of having baked the cupcake that is featured in my Facebook and Ravelry profile pic:

Doesn't that make you want to vote?  Fiber and frosting, people!  They must be funded!

A 5k cupcake

Yesterday, I ran in Maudie's Moonlight Margarita 5k, supporting the fabulous hike and bike trail along Lady Bird Lake.  I say this not to tout my athleticism, but to reveal how despite having recently become the kind of person who actually enjoys exercise, I am still very much someone who enjoys eating 'bad' things.  A twit for treats, if you will.

Recently, chocolate milk made headlines for being a good post-work out drink because of the mix of protein, sugars, and magical pain-reducing chocolate.  This was all the justification I needed to bring along a cupcake as my recovery/reward.  After all, if you can't enjoy a cupcake after an evening spent running through the still quite potent Texas summer heat, when can you?

A little background: I have a Groupon problem.  I see a deal, and, well, it's a deal, right?  If I think I can get to wherever the deal is being offered within the time frame, I feel like I should go for it.  Especially when it comes to baked goods.  I love them, and the opportunity to get a dozen cupcakes for half price is just one temptation too many to resist.

The trouble with this way of thinking is that I end up with a dozen cupcakes, and I want to eat each one.  But I count my calories, and twelve cupcakes are not going to get eaten any faster than within twelve days.  It's likely going to be longer than that.  And a fortnight later, those precious baked goods aren't so fresh.  And so I turn to that fabulous modern invention: the freezer.  One or two cupcakes are enjoyed straight from the store, while the rest are lovingly placed in Tupperware and saved for later.

So when I needed a post-5k cupcake, I went to the freezer and dipped into my cupcake stores.  I choose the Triple Stack Trio cupcake from Sweet Indulgence in Grapevine, TX.  I highly recommend this little shop.  Even after freezing, the cake was moist, and the frosting was delicious.  They've recently opened up a new storefront, so I'm clearly not the only one enjoying their work.  This is their signature flavor, I think it's a vanilla, chocolate, and red velvet cake with what I think is a cream cheese frosting.

And it was good.

It was very good.