When it comes to topping off a cake or some cupcakes, there is frosting and then there is frosting. Buttercream is the classic cake topper. There are two ways to make it: a shortcut uncooked way and a slower cooked way. I usually opt for the quick-fix way to make it, creaming together butter and confectioners sugar with a bit of flavoring. That method is fast, reliable and dead easy. It also tends to make a very sweet frosting that doesn’t hold a candle to real buttercream and when I have some extra time on my hands, or really want to make a dessert a standout, I always go for the real thing.

This cooked buttercream frosting starts with sugar and egg whites. The sugar is cooked on the stovetop until it is boiling away at about 245F - also known as “firm ball stage.” Once the sugar reaches the appropriate temperature, it is streamed into beaten egg whites. The heat of the sugar syrup cooks the whites and gives them stability, preventing the resulting meringue from collapsing. Once the syrup has been added, the mixture is given some time to cool down before butter is beaten in to finish off the frosting. I flavor mine by scraping about 1/2 of a vanilla bean into it, but you can also substitute vanilla extract if you prefer.

The result is a frosting that is spectacularly light and creamy. It is stable at room temperature and very easy to work with, largely because of its soft and fluffy consistency. It isn’t too sweet, since it requires vastly less sugar than the “quick” buttercreams, and has a suitably rich butter flavor to it. I’m not always a big fan of frosting on my cupcakes (particularly when it is on the sweet side), but this is a really outstanding frosting that it is hard to say no to.

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Honey can be a great ingredient to bake with because it really adds a lot of moisture to things. It also helps to keep baked goods moist over time, so a cake or bread that has honey in it will often taste fresher than one without after it has been stored for a couple of days. Agave syrup, or agave nectar, has this moisturizing property, as well, and I took advantage of it by including it in this chocolate cake recipe.

The chocolate cake is a fairly basic one, the kind that I would have wanted to have a giant slice of after school when I was little. It is more substantial than some cakes, somewhere halfway between a very fluffy cake and a pound cake, but is very moist and tender. Agave syrup replaces some, but not all, of the sugar in the recipe. I found that the finished cake had a slightly better texture when some sugar was still used. The agave sweetener doesn’t have a strong flavor profile and is even more subtle than honey, so you can’t taste any unusual flavors in the cake to detract from the chocolate

For the frosting, I went with cream cheese. I generally prefer cream cheese frostings because they’re a bit more interesting to my tastes than a regular buttercream. I debated about using honey or agave syrup in the frosting, wondering whether I should opt for the more flavorful ingredient or stick with the same sweetener I used in the cake. Ultimately, I opted for honey. It matches well with the cream cheese and adds another interesting hint of flavor to the finished cake. Fee free to use agave syrup, if you like.

Be careful not to overbake this cake. As moisturizing as agave syrup can be, it also can help dry out a cake quite quickly if it is left in the oven too long. Use a toothpick to check the cake a bit early. It’s ok if a few moist - not wet - crumbs stick to the toothpick. You’ll want to pull it out of the oven before the cake really begins to pull away from the sides of the pan.
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 Dark chocolate, milk chocolate, semisweet chocolate, chocolate chip… is white chocolate the least commonly used chocolate in baking? Sometimes it seems that way, and while the sweeter chocolate isn’t everyone’s go-to chocolate, it does have a lot to offer in some dishes. As evidence, I offer up these white chocolate cupcakes. They have a delicious white chocolate flavor - milky and sweet, with vanilla highlights - and a perfectly moist and fluffy texture. They’re definitely something I’ll make again and again - which isn’t bad for the black sheep (white sheep?) of the chocolate family.

I used Ghiradelli white chocolate (conveniently sold in large blocks at Trader Joe’s) in this recipe and incorporated the melted chocolate into the cupcake batter. I cut back on the amount of sugar I might normally use in cupcakes to take into account the relatively high sweetness of the chocolate, but added eggs, butter and other standard cupcake batter add-ins.

I experimented a bit with the baking time for this recipe, too. When baked at 350F for 15 minutes or so, the cupcakes god a nice dome to them, but browned too quickly on the sides and bottom - a not uncommon result with a higher sugar/higher fat baked good, where the two substances caramelize and brown at higher temperatures more readily. In the end, I reduced the oven temperature and kept the cupcakes relatively small by dividing the batter into 18 muffin cups. These were more flat than domed, but they kept the moistness that I was looking for without overbrowning. Besides, flat tops are actually easier to decorate than large domed ones!

The frosting is a cream cheese and butter based one, with only a little white chocolate added for flavor. I didn’t want to have too much chocolate in the frosting because I felt it would be too sweet; cream cheese cut the sweetness of the chocolate perfectly and gave the frosting a very creamy texture. The hearts on top of the cakes are jumbo Necco Sweethearts. I sorted through an entire bag to find ones with legible messages and it was worth the effort when the tray of finished cupcakes looked stunning. If you don’t care for the Necco candies, however, you can use any kind of sprinkles or just keep the frosting plain.

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‘Tis the season for eggnog, that nutmeg-spiced, custardy, boozy beverage that is so popular around the holidays. It tastes delicious and is oh-so-rich. The richness, unfortunately, keeps me and most of my friends from drinking more than a very small serving at a time. To further enjoy that eggnog flavor, I decided to turn the drink into a batch of holiday cupcakes.

My first impulse was to do a regular cupcake recipe, substituting eggnog for milk and adding in nutmeg to punch up the flavor, but in the nick of time, I remembered the great success I had with the Margarita Cupcake recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the Worldearlier this year and decided to adapt it into eggnog cupcakes. The thing that further influenced my decison was that last year I did a taste testof soy eggnog (a.k.a. “snog”) vs regular eggnog and found that I quite liked the soy versions. The eggnog flavor covers up some the mild flavor commonly associated with soymilk and the drink still has a nice, creamy consistency. My two recommended brands would be Vitasoy Holly Nog and Silk Soy Nog.

The cupcakes turned out beautifully. They were incredbly moist and tender - and because of it, they did the drink justice very nicely. My preference is for rum in eggnog instead of bourbon, so I used quite a bit of rum in both the cakes and the frosting. The rum paired nicely with the nutmeg and the combination of cake, frosting, rum and eggnog was incredibly flavorful.

I want to note that I served these at a party and no one suspected that they might be vegan cupcakes; everyone simply raved about how tasty and eggnoggy they were. I used butter in my frosting (not vegan, obviously), but if you want a vegan version, use a vegan shortening or similar product in its place. If you don’t want to buy the soy nog, or can’t find it in a store near you, this recipe will work with “real” eggnog as well. I recommend opting for a low fat version because it will have a similar consistency to the soy nogs, and while the flavor of the finished cupcake might be slightly different (and not vegan, of course), it will still be delicious.

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When I made my big batch of cranberry applesauce last week, I wasn’t sure what do do with all of it. I’m not really into canning and, when I make something like applesauce or jam, I prefer just to work my way through it right away. Jam is more limited in its uses, but applesauce can have a variety of applications beyond being a simple side dish. In this case, I used up some of that applesauce to make cupcakes.

Applesauce is often used as a fat replacer in recipes and, as such, it kind of has a bad rap. There are too many baked goods that are mushy or dense because applesauce has been used overgenerously. These cupcakes, however, do not use applesauce as a fat replacer. Instead, the applesauce is one of the primary flavoring agents of the cake - rather like how carrots are used in carrot cake. As a result, these cupcakes have a very light texture and a tender crumb, which is exactly what you want to have in a cupcake. They are moist, but not overly wet or dense by a long shot.

The cupcakes are practically the epitome of fall. Every flavor in them reminds me of the season: the spices, the cranberries, the apples. Each element comes through in the finished baked good. If pecans are a big fall favorite, you can add some of them into the batter, as well, or use a large piece to garnish the top of each cake.

I really loved the glaze on top of these cupcakes, since I reminded me - especially in flavor - of tart tatin or other caramelized apple dishes. It’s not a really thick glaze, so it will probably run down the sides of the cupcakes; keep some napkins on hand when you’re serving. If you want a thicker layer, glaze the cupcakes, let the glaze set, then reglaze them. (more…)

Sick and tired of looking for vegetarian Thanksgiving options to feed your non-meat eating friends and family? I think that I may have the perfect solution.

Just kidding, unless you’re planning on serving dessert as the main course (not necessarily a course of action I would disagree with) at Thanksgiving dinner.

This turkey cake is just that: a vanilla buttermilk sheet cake sculpted into a three dimensional turkey shape and covered with a fudgy chocolate glaze. It is a real departure from more traditional pies and cakes, but you can’t get much more Thanksgiving-y than a cake shaped like a turkey.

For the cake, I opted to use a simple, thin sheet cake recipe. I typically use this recipe or a very similar variation of it for layer cakes because it is light, but fairly sturdy. This texture comes primarily from the number of eggs in the batter and it is a good choice for carving because it won’t crumble under the blade of your knife, nor will it shed an excessive number of crumbs when you try to frost it. The cake is fairly thin for a sheet cake, but I found that this made it very easy to maneuver the individual pieces of my turkey. It also produced an excellent cake-to-frosting ratio in the finished product. Besides, who has room for a massive slice of cake after a huge Thanksgiving meal anyway?

I sculpted the cake freehand, working with the idea that it would look just like this little sketch I made:

As you can see, I am quite the artiste when dealing with inedible materials - though in my defense, I only sketched this for fun while the cake was baking, and did not intend to use it as more than a decoration on my scratch paper. The actual shapes you want to cut out of the sheet are defined below:
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